RFK:Part One

Who was Bob Kennedy? Rebel? Patrician? Liberal? Joe McCarthy apologist, Jack Kennedy's attack dog, or a misunderstood man who quoted Aeschylus and Shakespeare? As Winston Churchill said of the Soviet Union, RFK was a riddle wrapped in an enigma. Many who thought they understood him knew but one side of him. He could be ruthless, yet kind. He championed the underprivileged, yet criticized the welfare state. He attacked Lyndon Johnson's relentless prosecution of the Vietnam War, though when asked to oppose the administration in 1968 primaries, he initially declined-fearing to become the first Kennedy to lose an election. "Bobby" Kennedy dogged his adversaries, including Jimmy Hoffa and anyone running against Jack Kennedy. Nonetheless, this youthful aristocrat pushed himself to the limits of endurance with fifty-mile hikes, whitewater kayaking in rock-ridden rivers, and, in his first effort at mountain climbing, scaling the enormous peak named for his late brother. Perhaps the "bad" Bobby died on the same day President Kennedy did-or so RFK's admirers might aver. And maybe, had RFK become president, he may have sought to alleviate the plight of the poor, Indians, and blacks. But a bullet prevented any chance of a second Kennedy presidency.