Posted on 08/26/2009 9:11:03 AM PDT by BradtotheBone
Ailing Senator Robert Byrd, one of only two to have served longer than Kennedy, suggests in an emotional statement renaming the pending health care legislation for the late Massachusetts Senator:
In his honor and as a tribute to his commitment to his ideals, let us stop the shouting and name calling and have a civilized debate on health care reform which I hope, when legislation has been signed into law, will bear his name for his commitment to insuring the health of every American.
Washington, DC Senator Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., issued the following statement upon learning of the passing of his dear friend Senator Ted Kennedy:
I had hoped and prayed that this day would never come. My heart and soul weeps at the lost of my best friend in the Senate, my beloved friend, Ted Kennedy.
Senator Kennedy and I both witnessed too many wars in our lives, and believed too strongly in the Constitution of the United States to allow us to go blindly into war. That is why we stood side by side in the Senate against the war in Iraq.
Neither years of age nor years of political combat, nor his illness, diminished the idealism and energy of this talented, imaginative, and intelligent man. And that is the kind of Senator Ted Kennedy was. Throughout his career, Senator Kennedy believed in a simple premise: that our society's greatness lies in its ability and willingness to provide for its less fortunate members. Whether striving to increase the minimum wage, ensuring that all children have medical insurance, or securing better access to higher education, Senator Kennedy always showed that he cares deeply for those whose needs exceed their political clout. Unbowed by personal setbacks or by the terrible sorrows that have fallen upon his family, his spirit continued to soar, and he continued to work as hard as ever to make his dreams a reality.
In his honor and as a tribute to his commitment to his ideals, let us stop the shouting and name calling and have a civilized debate on health care reform which I hope, when legislation has been signed into law, will bear his name for his commitment to insuring the health of every American.
God bless his wife Vicki, his family, and the institution that he served so ably, which will never be the same without his voice of eloquence and reason. And God bless you Ted. I love you and will miss you terribly.
In my autobiography I wrote that during a visit to West Virginia in 1968 to help dedicate the Robert F. Kennedy Youth Center in Morgantown, Senator Kennedys voice quivered with emotion as he talked of his late brothers and their love for West Virginia. These hills, these people, and this state have had a very special meaning for my family. Our lives have been tightly intertwined with yours.
I am sure the people of the great state of West Virginia join me in expressing our heartfelt condolences to the Kennedy family at this moment of deep sorrow.
Yet another “See, I told you so” for El Rushbo.
This gets my nomination for Post of the Day.
Oh now you want civility..?
F you, Byrd, and F you Democrats. You killed political decency a LONG time ago.
I didn’t think it would occur that soon but here was my post of yesterday on the thread “FOX News Caught Flat-Footed on Ted K’s Death”:
“Rahm E and Axelrod will advise 0 and Congress to re-name their HealthCare Bill after Ted Kennedy. Any bets?”
The priests said it was rare that family members prayerd together. Good grief!!!
Health Insurance Control (...hic....)
This man, Robert Byrd, who carries his pocket Constitution, and vows his great love for it, must not have read the Founders' own explanation of its limitations on the power of people like him and the man he eulogizes. A pocket edition of THE FEDERALIST might be an appropriate gift for him right now.
Perhaps he should be reminded, as he advocates the biggest expansion of government power in the history of the Republic, that the "People's" Constitution was designed, in the words of Jefferson, to "bind them (the people's representatives) down by the chains" of that Constitution.
"The house of representatives... can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as the great mass of society. This has always been deemed one of the strongest bonds by which human policy can connect the rulers and the people together. It creates between them that communion of interest, and sympathy of sentiments, of which few governments have furnished examples; but without which every government degenerates into tyranny." - Federalist Papers, No. 57, February 19, 1788
"The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, first to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust." - Federalist Papers, No. 57, February 19, 1788
"Such will be the relation between the House of Representatives and their constituents. Duty gratitude, interest, ambition itself, are the cords by which they will be bound to fidelity and sympathy with the great mass of the people." - Federalist Papers, No. 57, February 19, 1788
"If it be asked what is to restrain the House of Representatives from making legal discriminations in favor of themselves and a particular class of the society? I answer, the genius of the whole system, the nature of just and constitutional laws, and above all the vigilant and manly spirit which actuates the people of America, a spirit which nourishes freedom, and in return is nourished by it." - Federalist Papers, No. 57, February 19, 1788
"An elective despotism was not the government we fought for; but one in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among the several bodies of magistracy as that no one could transcend their legal limits without being effectually checked and restrained by the others." - Federalist Papers, No. 58, 1788
"This power over the purse may, in fact, be regarded as the most complete and effectual weapon with which any constitution can arm the immediate representatives of the people, for obtaining a redress of every grievance, and for carrying into effect every just and salutary measure." - Federalist Papers, No. 58, 1788
"The propensity of all single and numerous assemblies (is) to yield to the impulse of sudden and violent passions, and to be seduced by factious leaders into intemperate and pernicious resolutions." - Federalist Papers, No. 62, February 27, 1788
"Every new regulation concerning commerce or revenue; or in any manner affecting the value of the different species of property, presents a new harvest to those who watch the change and can trace its consequences; a harvest reared not by themselves but by the toils and cares of the great body of their fellow citizens. This is a state of things in which it may be said with some truth that laws are made for the few not for the many." - Federalist Papers, No. 62, February 27, 1788
"It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man who knows what the law is today can guess what it will be tomorrow." - Federalist Papers, No. 62, February 27, 1788
Note particularly the following words of wisdom from Federalist No. 63, and take heart. You are doing what you were meant to do when you speak out on intrusions on your liberty. According to Madison:
"As the cool and deliberate sense of the community ought, in all governments, and actually will, in all free governments, ultimately prevail over the views of its rulers; so there are particular moments in public affairs when the people, stimulated by some irregular passion, or some illicit advantage, or misled by the artful misrepresentations of interested men, may call for measures which they themselves will afterwards be the most ready to lament and condemn. In these critical moments, how salutary will be the interference of some temperate and respectable body of citizens, in order to check the misguided career, and to suspend the blow meditated by the people against themselves, until reason, justice, and truth can regain their authority over the public mind?" - Federalist Papers, No. 63, 1788
remame it Mary Jo Kopechne Bill
Go ahead and name it after the SOB. It will go down in FLAMES like teddy
Make no mistake about it, the dems will suck this for everything they can get out of it, and the dumb masses in America will soak it up. They will remake Ted just like they did Michael Jackson and the dems will be lifted up.
The media will condemn anyone who dares say anything bad from today to the end of time.
"The Centers for Disease Control shall forthwith and hereafter commence and make cause to research the carcinogenic linkages of prostate and brain cancer to the 'Waitress Sandwich'."
The Cap & Tax bill to be renamed the ‘Give America the Byrd bill’.
Might as well. Then both will be dead.
Dead Bill= Dead Senator?
American citizens to Byrd: Shut the F*^(% UP you idiot old bassturd
Huh!!! Burning in Hell Health care Bill?
Sure we can rename it The Kennedy Healthcare Act or whatever and when it goes down in flames it can have his name attached to it. Then justice would be served.
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