Senator Kennedy

PALM BEACH, Fla. -- A police captain identified yesterday the suspect in the alleged rape of a young woman at the Kennedy family compound as William Kennedy Smith, 30, a nephew of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass.The identification came as Capt. Brian Roche, chief of detectives of the Palm Beach Police Department, gave testimony in a lawsuit brought by two local newspapers and a television station seeking release of police records in the case.Captain Roche was complaining that media coverage of the case had hindered the department's efforts to reach a positive identification of the suspect, when he unexpectedly remarked, "His picture is in the newspaper today.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy wrote a letter to the pope. The urgency of the message was evident in the preeminence of the messenger: President Barack Obama himself had handed the letter to Pope Benedict XVI at the end of the historic first meeting between the two leaders in the Vatican last month. The papal spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, was peppered with questions by reporters from around the world. What did the letter say? Had the pope read the letter yet? Had President Obama asked the pope to pray for Senator Kennedy?

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- The chief prosecutor in the William Kennedy Smith rape case charged in a court hearing yesterday that Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and his son, Rhode Island legislator Patrick Kennedy, had doctored their own depositions to favor the defense.The prosecutor, Moira Lasch, said second versions of the two depositions contained "subtle" but "substantive" changes in the men's recollections of what happened the night Mr. Smith is alleged to have raped a 29-year-old Florida woman.

An unlikely, flawed heir to America's political royal family who experienced tragedy, disgrace and triumph in a life of epic proportions, Edward M. "Ted" Kennedy will be remembered as not only one of the most influential political figures of the era but for a life that was quite simply larger than life. For many Americans, he will be recalled fondly as the last of a generation of Kennedys who brought glamour, celebrity and a healthy dose of charisma to public life. But it was only after the untimely deaths of his older brothers that he stepped to the fore - and soon brought scandal to the family name with the drowning death of Mary Jo Kopechne at Chappaquiddick Island.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy wrote a letter to the pope. The urgency of the message was evident in the preeminence of the messenger: President Barack Obama himself had handed the letter to Pope Benedict XVI at the end of the historic first meeting between the two leaders in the Vatican last month. The papal spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, was peppered with questions by reporters from around the world. What did the letter say? Had the pope read the letter yet? Had President Obama asked the pope to pray for Senator Kennedy?

Palm Beach police say they may file obstruction of justice charges in the rape case involving Sen. Edward Kennedy's nephew, William Kennedy Smith. They don't say who they think may have obstructed justice. It is possible that the senator, himself, may have. He denies it unequivocally, but his conduct in the days immediately after the rape allegation strikes us as improper, to say the least.His conduct before the rape allegation was also improper. A 58-year-old man who wakes up a 24-year-old son and a 30-year-old nephew in the middle of the night to go drinking and seek out female companionship is a sad spectacle.

PALM BEACH, Fla. -- William Kennedy Smith, the suspect in the reported rape of a young woman at the Kennedy family mansion here, voluntarily gave samples of his blood and hair to a Palm Beach police detective in Washington, D.C., Sunday morning, his lawyer said.Mr. Smith declined to be questioned by the police, said the lawyer, Mark P. Schnapp of Miami, but had agreed to comply with the request for samples.Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D.-Mass., the suspect's uncle, was interviewed by the detective at his home in suburban Virginia outside Washington yesterday.

Few books have received such scathing advance reviews as Joe McGinniss' "The Last Brother." The "last brother" is Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, the surviving son of the political clan that has inspired or infuriated this nation for more than three decades.The book has been denounced as more fiction than fact, as cribbed heavily from other authors' works, as a cheap piece of tabloid journalism. Biography of a sort it purports to be. If so, we fervently hope "The Last Brother" is the last "biography" of its ilk.A review of the book as a piece of literature was published yesterday in The Sun. Our concern is over the corruption of journalism that it -- and the much-criticized New Yorker profile of a Freudian psychoanalyst -- represents.

WASHINGTON - Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski calls Sen. Edward M. Kennedy "one of the Galahads." When the Maryland Democrat arrived in the Senate two decades ago, Kennedy was ready to show her the ways of the upper chamber, to help her win a seat on the powerful Appropriations Committee, to team up with her on several measures to improve women's health. Yesterday, Mikulski called news of his cancer diagnosis "wrenching -- like a punch in the heart." "Senator Kennedy is one of my oldest friends in Congress," Mikulski, who wiped tears from her eyes yesterday as she entered the Senate chamber to vote, said through a spokeswoman.

PALM BEACH, Fla. -- The Palm Beach police chief said yesterday he was "99 percent sure" that a sexual crime took place at the Kennedy compound over the Easter holiday weekend."

Caroline Kennedy renews bid for Senate ALBANY, N.Y. : After wavering briefly, Caroline Kennedy renewed her determination yesterday to win appointment to the U.S. Senate seat once held by her uncle, Robert F. Kennedy, a person close to the decision said. After her uncle, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, suffered a seizure on Inauguration Day, Caroline Kennedy had misgivings about taking on the new job, the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak for Kennedy.

WASHINGTON - Sen. Edward M. Kennedy was awake and "feeling well" last night after suffering a seizure during a post-inaugural luncheon in honor of President Barack Obama, said a physician who treated him. Kennedy, who has been undergoing chemotherapy and radiation treatments since having surgery for brain cancer last June, was rushed from the Capitol by ambulance after he began shaking and convulsing at the luncheon, according to lawmakers and Senate staff...

When then-First Lady Hillary Clinton announced she was running for senator from New York in 2000, critics were quick to dismiss her as an unqualified, over-ambitious political neophyte aiming to cash in on her husband's name. Mrs. Clinton ran anyway and showed herself to be a formidable candidate, becoming the only first lady to run for office and the first female to represent New York in the U.S. Senate. Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of a former U.S. president, is, like Mrs. Clinton, a distinguished author, lawyer and longtime advocate of worthy causes, particularly in education and the arts.

WASHINGTON - Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski calls Sen. Edward M. Kennedy "one of the Galahads." When the Maryland Democrat arrived in the Senate two decades ago, Kennedy was ready to show her the ways of the upper chamber, to help her win a seat on the powerful Appropriations Committee, to team up with her on several measures to improve women's health. Yesterday, Mikulski called news of his cancer diagnosis "wrenching -- like a punch in the heart." "Senator Kennedy is one of my oldest friends in Congress," Mikulski, who wiped tears from her eyes yesterday as she entered the Senate chamber to vote, said through a spokeswoman.

Edward Kennedy, the U.S. Senate's second-longest-serving member and one of the most powerful political figures of the past half-century, has been diagnosed with a type of brain cancer that usually proves fatal. The diagnosis of malignant glioma was announced yesterday by his doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital, where the 76-year-old patriarch of the Kennedy family was taken by helicopter Saturday after suffering a seizure at his home on Cape Cod. The Massachusetts Democrat will be treated with chemotherapy and radiation, his doctors said, standard treatment that normally slows or stops the growth of the brain tumor but seldom cures it. The senator will remain at the hospital "for the next couple days according to routine protocol," his doctors said in a prepared statement.

WASHINGTON - I can't imagine what Sen. Edward M. Kennedy must feel. I mean, I know it's traumatic to see your brother shot in the head and killed. But what must it add to your pain to see that tragedy become a video game? It happened last week. The game, available online, is called JFK Reloaded, and it was released to coincide with the 41st anniversary of John F. Kennedy's assassination. Download the game at a cost of $9.99 and you find yourself on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository in Dallas.

Washington. -- Some liberal senators seeking wrongs to right have found a bountiful supply of them around playground teeter-totters, on school buses and wherever else kindergartners and grammar-school children congregate and misbehave with Babylonian abandon.The senators -- the usual suspects: Harkin, Simon, Moseley-Braun, Mikulski -- have authored ''gender equity'' education bills which attack, among other ''crises,'' that of sexual harassment among the young. The very young. Senator Kennedy, a co-sponsor of the bills, says:''You have first-, second- and third-grade harassers.

Boston. -- Massachusetts may be the Jurassic Park of American politics, where the dinosaur of liberalism lumbers on, oblivious to the fact that its era has long since passed. But the Tyrannosaurus Rex is endangered.For some while, whispers have been heard: This time, Ted Kennedy may actually have to break a sweat to get re-elected. Then last Sunday a poll by a respected Cambridge firm showed Senator Kennedy in a statistical dead heat with his likely Republican opponent, Mitt Romney.Mr. Romney, a 47-year-old venture capitalist, is approximately what Republicans would have asked central casting to send to them as the ideal contrast with Mr. Kennedy.

WHO AMONG US did not feel a little shiver of mean delight last week at the news that Sen. Edward M. Kennedy had not once but five times been told he could not board a commercial plane? The image of a genuine Washington pooh-bah falling afoul of the government's inane security system was one to savor. But now that we've had the advantage of a period of sober reflection, we're inclined to ponder: Is this idiotic, or what? The government keeps lists of suspected terrorists who aren't allowed to fly, and leaves it up to the airlines to enforce it. It's not at all clear how easy it is to get on one of these lists, but it's all too obvious that it's virtually impossible to get off one. Apparently the people who run US Airways had a no-fly list that included a certain "Kennedy," so that meant that the senior senator from Massachusetts -- incidentally the most famous member of the world's greatest deliberative body -- was kept off the plane by the airline's by-the-book gate agents until superiors were called upon to waive him aboard.

WASHINGTON - Edward M. Kennedy's voice, more monster-truck rally announcer than Boston Brahmin senator, booms through a packed hotel ballroom here as he warms up a crowd of donors for John Kerry. "There's a wave that's coming across this country," roars Kennedy. "You give John Kerry the opportunity to get his message across to the American people, he'll give America back the White House." It is a pitch Kennedy delivered loudly and often as a prominent figure in Kerry's campaign for the Democratic nomination.