Ted Kennedy's Circle Upset By Caroline's Awkward Exit [View All]

[Beacool]

By Karen Tumulty / Washington Thursday, Jan. 22, 2009



Of all the many ways in which Caroline Kennedy's brief and unofficial candidacy for the U.S. Senate was mishandled, one final ungraceful note is striking particularly close to home. Sources close to Senator Edward M. Kennedy tell TIME that his circle — including his immediate family — is furious that his brain cancer is being cited by some in her camp as the reason for her decision to withdraw her name from consideration for the Senate seat being vacated by Hillary Clinton in New York.

"It looks horrible," says one former aide to Ted Kennedy. "It makes him look like he is at death's door." In fact, those close to Kennedy, 76, say that while the Senator is suffering occasional seizures, like the one that sent him to a hospital on Tuesday during the celebratory Capitol lunch for the newly inaugurated President, he is generally doing well. And they add that Kennedy is fully engaged in the effort to pass universal health-care legislation — a cause for which he has fought for decades, and one in which he will play a crucial role as chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

"He is crazy about her. He encouraged her" in her bid for the Senate seat, one close associate says of Ted Kennedy's relationship with his niece. "But using him as an excuse, as though things were on the downward spiral, is not going to be O.K. with him ... This will get in the way of health reform" — by suggesting that a key legislator involved in putting the bill together may be incapacitated.

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1873328,00.html