A fitting Kennedy tribute: Clean up Arlington mess

[babylonsister]

A fitting Kennedy tribute: Clean up Arlington mess

A grateful family remembers Kennedy's work to help them get a more timely funeral for their son killed in Iraq

By Mark Benjamin


Funeral planners on Friday look over the site at Arlington Cemetery where U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy will be buried.


Aug. 29, 2009 | Thousands of people lined up in a seemingly endless line to pay their last respects to Sen. Ted Kennedy at the J.F.K. library in Boston on Friday, one day before his burial at Arlington National Cemetery. During that procession, a select list of guests had been asked to stand vigil at the senator's side as the visitors filed by. Among them were Kennedy's nephew Bobby Shriver, former staffer Patti Sarris, now a federal judge in Massachusetts, and Tim Hagen, the senator's old college buddy.

A couple from Bedford, Mass., Brian and Alma Hart, had also been asked to stand vigil at Kennedy's side for an hour Friday night. "Basically we were sitting in a chair next to the casket," said Brian Hart, who remembered watching the seemingly endless line of well-wishers stream by, estimated to be in the tens of thousands. "It was something to see."

The Harts are not former staffers or part of the Kennedy family. They became linked to Kennedy, interestingly, through Arlington National Cemetery, where Kennedy would be laid to rest the next day.

The beauty and dignity of a funeral at Arlington, including Kennedy's, is obvious. Because of the Harts, however, Kennedy learned about just a few of the serious problems at Arlington that lurk behind the pristine veneer of the historic cemetery where his brother, John and Robert, are also buried.

The Harts' son John died in Iraq in 2003. At the time, Arlington National Cemetery told his parents they would have to wait weeks before the cemetery would bury John there. "If we waived the chapel service we could get it to six weeks," Hart says the cemetery told him. The family appealed to Kennedy, who intervened on the Harts' behalf. The cemetery cut the wait in half.

Kennedy then attended John's funeral. Working with the Harts, Kennedy also worked tirelessly in the Senate for more armored vehicles, body armor and other equipment that could have saved John's life.

Six years later, however, the delays for funerals for soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan persist at Arlington. That wait time also reflects a pattern of serious, though little known, problems at the storied cemetery. Earlier this month, the New York Post reported that Jill Stephenson, mother of Army Ranger Cpl. Benjamin Kopp, would have to wait until October for her son's funeral, in part because she wanted the full honors for which he was eligible, including a horse-drawn caisson. Kopp died July 18 from wounds suffered a week earlier in Afghanistan.

more...

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/08/29/arlington_kennedy/

[iamjoy]

1. If All These Soldiers Have to Wait

IF there is a wait of several weeks or months for so many of the men and women of our armed forces to be buried at Arlington, why is Senator Kennedy's funeral today?

:shrug:

[babylonsister]

2. He takes priority, I'd guess. In a way,

it's a good thing. We're going to need to move on, as hurtful as that will be.

But I do feel for the families of the fallen, too.