The great adventures which our opponents offer is a voyage into the past. Progress is our heritage, not theirs. What is right for us as Democrats is also the right way for Democrats to win.
The commitment I seek is not to outworn views but to old values that will never wear out. Programs may sometimes become obsolete, but the ideal of fairness always endures. Circumstances may change, but the work of compassion must continue. It is surely correct that we cannot solve problems by throwing money at them, but it is also correct that we dare not throw out our national problems onto a scrap heap of inattention and indifference. The poor may be out of political fashion, but they are not without human needs. The middle class may be angry, but they have not lost the dream that all Americans can advance together.
The demand of our people in 1980 is not for smaller government or bigger government but for better government. Some say that government is always bad and that spending for basic social programs is the root of our economic evils. But we reply: The present inflation and recession cost our economy $200 billion a year. We reply: Inflation and unemployment are the biggest spenders of all.
Except some of you no doubt caught the numbers 1980 in the quote above. What Ted Kennedy said 29 years ago would have been just as true as if it had been uttered as his last words. This night the last echo of the great American age of liberalism that created the middle class in which you probably reside has gone silent. We won't see its return in our lifetime. Ours is destined to be a generation playing defense. The best we can muster being the audacity of health insurance co-ops. And that's when we're not getting our teeth kicked in.
I miss him. I can't even remember his best years, but I already miss his presence.
3 comments:
I thought of you when I heard the news. If interested I wrote some thoughts on his passing. The Kennedys were an incredibly complicated clan.
Who caries that torch now? I feel like people who think like that are becoming extinct.
Thus marches history. The sun setting on a dynasty.
I liked Kennedy...for the most part.
He was a key figure in trying to get compounding banned in 2007. His logic was that compounding a single Rx is the same as manufacturing, and, therefore, should be regulated as so. Obviously, he did not come up with this idea - he was "listening" to the drug company lobbyists. The main reason for this reform: commercially available hormones vs. compounded hormones. Without compounding, patients would have no choice but to buy commercially available hormones.
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