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Ted Kennedy as transpartisan
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In a recent New York Times column, David Brooks showcases the paradoxical nature of transpartisan, in his recent column on Senator Ted Kennedy as “The Great Gradualist”. Jim Turner and I are often asked how someone can be both strongly ideological and transpartisan.
Brooks shows that Kennedy was both a strong ideological liberal and a Burkean conservative, an incrementalist whose major legislative achievements were all done with Republican cosponsors. He mentions community health, the National Cancer Institute, the Americans With Disabilities Act, the Meals on Wheels program, the renewal of the Voting Rights Act and the No Child Left Behind Act.
Kennedy’s extraordinary role both as a leading liberal in the Senate and a leading transpartisan comes from his understanding that he could accomplish far more by focusing on reforms that bring people together than by focusing only on conflict. It is a pity that his example is not more widely followed in the current political environment.
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