RFK Must Be Turning Over in His Grave

Many of us remember precisely where we were and what we were doing in the early morning hours of June 5, 1968: we were glued to the television and shedding tears. For it was shortly after midnight, that New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy, the man many of us were supporting for POTUS, was gunned down by the 24-year old Sirhan Sirhan in the kitchen of the old Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, who was then gang tackled by journalist George Plimpton, former Olympic decathlete Rafer Johnson and former NFL great Roosevelt “Rosie” Grier. I well remember sitting in paralytic astonishment, my mother next to me on the couch in the family room. The next several hours would turn out to be the first (and only) time I ever got drunk with her . . .

Senator Kennedy was such a good man. Perfect? No, of course not, but he was pretty damn close for my taste. I well remember his brother, Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy’s eulogy, delivered at his memorial service held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral:

My brother need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life; to be remembered simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it. Those of us who loved him and who take him to his rest today, pray that what he was to us and what he wished for others will some day come to pass for all the world. As he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him: "Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not."

RFK and his widow Ethel Skakel Kennedy (who turns 94 this coming April) had 11 children over 18 years. The third of them (after Kathleen and Joseph), born in 1954, was Robert Francis Kennedy, Jr. Like his late father and a majority of the Kennedy family, Robert Jr. is a graduate of Harvard and earned a juris doctor at the University of Virginia. For most of his professional career, this Kennedy has specialized in environmental law, advocating and litigating for the protection of waterways, indigenous rights and renewable energy. He created a bottled-water company which, before being sold to Nestlé in exchange for a significant donation to local waterkeepers, turned over all its profits to Waterkeepers Alliance. Additionally, for nearly 30 years, he held the post of supervising attorney and co-director of Pace Law School's Environmental Litigation Clinic, which he founded in 1987. Through other projects and investments, RFK., Jr. has engaged in a lot of good works . . . typical of most Kennedys past, present and, we can only pray, future.

But then too, there is a disturbing side to Bobby Kennedy’s namesake . . . one which began evincing itself as far back as 2005. RFK, Jr. was a founding board member of the Food Allergy Initiative. His son suffers from anaphylactic peanut allergies. Kennedy wrote the foreword to The Peanut Allergy Epidemic, in which he and the authors falsely linked increasing food allergies in children to certain vaccines that were approved beginning in 1989. Kennedy is the chairman of Children's Health Defense (formerly the World Mercury Project), an advocacy group he founded in 2016. The group alleges that a large proportion of American children are suffering from conditions as diverse as autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), cancer, and various autoimmune diseases due to exposure to certain chemicals and radiation. The Children's Health Defense has blamed and campaigned against vaccines, fluoridation of drinking water, paracetamol (acetaminophen), aluminum, wireless communications, and others “dangers.” Kennedy's group has been identified as one of two major buyers of anti-vaccine Facebook advertising.

All this is merely the tip of a potentially lethal iceberg. It should perhaps come as no surprise then that RFK, Jr. has been a longtime anti-vaxxer, anti-masker whose lies and anti-science rhetoric have fueled the anti-vaccine movement. According to a study by The Center for Countering Digital Hate (PDF) there are just a dozen people who are responsible for 65% of the COVID-19 disinformation being spread on social media platforms; unbelievably, Kennedy and his organization, Children's Health Defense, were the second biggest offenders.

Goodness knows, many of us have become sadly enured to the anti-vaxx, anti-mask conspiratorial rantings of everyone from Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Senator Rand Paul and Representatives Paul Gosar, Matt Gaetz and Madison Cawthorn, to loonies like radio talk-show conspiratorialist Alex Jones and soon-to-be confirmed Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo. Whether they really, truly believe the shund (that’s a dismissive Yiddish term meaning, roughly, “dramatic theatrical trash”) or not is beside the point. Some are vaccinated liars who are merely doing what they do and saying what they say in order to gratify and thus solidify their political base. But Robert Francis Kennedy, Jr.? What in the hell is wrong with him? I mean, he’s neither running for office nor attempting to fill his already overflowing bank account.

And, to make matters even worse - if that’s possible - RFK, Jr., like the worst of the anti-vaxxers, has, on many occasions likened the directives of science and medicine to the Nazi’s “final solution.” This past January 25, appearing at an anti-vaccine, anti-mandate rally in Washington, D.C., Kennedy Jr. told the crowd that today’s COVID-19 mandates, along with technological advances in surveillance, had rendered anti-maskers and anti-vaxxers more persecuted than Anne Frank. (Pardon me while I brekh’n - that’s Yiddish for “upchuck.”)

His exact quote was: “Even in Hitler’s Germany, you could cross the Alps into Switzerland, you could hide in an attic like Anne Frank did. I visited in 1962 East Germany with my father, and met people who had climbed the wall and escaped. So it was possible. Many died [inaudible], but it was possible.”

Anne Frank? Doesn’t Jr. care or realize that Anne Frank is one of the world’s best-known symbols of the profound tragedies of the Holocaust; that she is a reminder of what was lost when humanity failed to stop the rise of Nazi fascism? Bobby Jr.’s comment - and this is certainly not the first time he’s made it - brought about a torrent of negative comments. So much so that he did issue an apology on his Twitter feed: “I apologize for my reference to Anne Frank, especially to families that suffered the Holocaust horrors. My intention was to use examples of past barbarism to show the perils from new technologies of control. To the extent my remarks caused hurt, I am truly and deeply sorry.” But this was far from enough. Both his sister Kerry and wife, the actress Cheryl Hynes (of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” fame) issued stunning condemnations. Kerry Kennedy wrote: “Bobby’s lies and fear-mongering yesterday were both sickening and destructive. I strongly condemn him for his hateful rhetoric. He does not represent the views of @RFKHumanRights or our family.

His wife, who has a recent history of throwing house parties that expect visitors to have proof of vaccination and other sensible COVID-19 public health precautions—tweeted out: “My husband’s reference to Anne Frank at a mandate rally in D.C. was reprehensible and insensitive. The atrocities that millions endured during the Holocaust should never be compared to anyone or anything. His opinions are not a reflection of my own.”

I for one simply cannot fathom how anyone with an ounce of sense or an education can buy into the anti-vaxx, anti-mask, anti-Dr. Fauci, anti-Bill Gates world of conspiracies. I have a feeling that the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy would not have been able to either.

His son and namesake must be giving him many sleepless nights in the world beyond . . .