May Contain Peanuts

A damn shame.

Yesterday was the day Massachusetts held the election to find a replacement for the recently deceased Senator, Edward Kennedy. Sen. Ted Kennedy had served his country for 46 years, after taking the seat of his brother John had resigned the seat to become the President of the United States. He was the second most senior member of the Senate at the time of his death and was the fourth-longest serving Senator in U.S history. He campaigned constantly for universal health care and helped pass many laws to try to reach that goal.

What is inopportune about yesterday's election is the sheer timing of it. Senator Kennedy got to see a Democrat take office in the White House with the same goal of universal health care. . He did not make it to see it to law, but there is still hope it will come to fruition. Everyone knows that universal health care is a controversial topic among the population, but this is the closest it has ever come to being made law. Democrats control the Senate and can make things move along. It is so unfortunate that the man whose goal was universal health care passed on at its most critical stage. With his seat empty, Massachusetts (a Democratic state if there ever was one) had to fill it. Continuing this misfortune is the American's incapacity for patience and foresight. Instead of putting another Democrat into the seat, something it has been doing since 1979, the reactionaries of Massachusetts decided a Republican would be a better fit. Despite the fact that this Republican has claimed to be an 'independent thinker', I feel the message sent has less to do with him or even Massachusetts, but rather those that have strong feelings about the current administration and its policies.

This, of course, is our political system as usual. Bipartisanship is all but a fairy tale. If a compromise is made one way, then the next election will make up for it the other way. This is expected. What sucks about the whole thing in this case is the underlying legacy that is being swept aside in what I see as a purely reactionary measure. Who cares if this Democratic Senator served the majority of his life helping Americans and the causes he believed in. Who cares that the people of Massachusetts elected him over and over to keep striving for those goals. It is all intensified by the fact that his one seat is crucial in the party stakes in the Senate.

To be honest, I am not surprised at how things played out; I just am saddened by the continuous tragedy that surrounds the Kennedys. They are taken before their time, leaving things undone. I am not really one for tradition or 'that's the way it was' type of stuff, but this Massachusetts election seemed to be more of a political exercise than a mission for what is right. That has me worried more than health care or abortion or what have you, that people will are more preoccupied with the politics and affiliations than the real causes.