Robert F. Kennedy Jr. may not be the next president, but he is liable to make sure that Joe Biden isn’t either.
Kennedy, 70, has old Joe, 81, worried. As well he should be.
Which is why Biden brought out wingmen Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, both former, and younger, presidents to fortify his campaign at a New York fundraiser last Thursday.
He will need them — and more — because Biden is unable to win re-election on his own.
When an incumbent president like Biden brags about how much money he raises while he fails to raise the confidence and spirit of the people, you know he has problems.
Money can buy a lot of things, but it cannot by the respect Biden would have gained had he carved out time during his New York fundraising trip to attend the wake of murdered New York cop Jonathan Diller.
Diller, 31, was allegedly shot by an ex-con who should have been in prison.
Donald Trump, by invitation, did attend the wake and got more media coverage by showing Diller’s young widow Stephanie compassion and concern than Biden did sucking up to Obama and Clinton.
While he will not become president, Kennedy, a former Democrat with a famous family name, could take enough votes away from Biden in key states to elect Trump.
Hardly had Kennedy named wealthy and polished attorney Nicole Shanahan, 38, as his running mate than the Democrat National Committee launched a headhunting committee to go after both.
Its goal is to make sure that Kennedy and Shanahan and their independent candidacy do not get on the ballot in enough states to make a difference. So much for saving our democracy.
The committee is headed by Mary Beth Cahill, a Massachusetts-born long-time Democrat operative and one-time chief of staff to the late Sen. Ted Kennedy. She is known for her scorched earth approach to politics.
One veteran Kennedy family functionary described Cahill as “Mary Anne Marsh on steroids.” Marsh, a Democrat Party strategist, is an outspoken, aggressive panelist on Channel 5’s Sunday “On the Record” interview program.
Politics being what it is, it is not surprising that Cahill would go after Robert Kennedy, even though he is the nephew of her former employer, as well as the son of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, who was assassinated running for president in1968.
It is not surprising because members of the whole extended Kennedy family, including the late RFK’s wife Ethel, 95, the mother of Robert Kennedy Jr., are all opposed to Kennedy’s candidacy. They support Biden.
Several Kennedys hold prestigious jobs under Biden. These jobholders include Robert Kennedy’s sister Kathleen Townsend Kennedy, a Labor Department consultant; Joseph Kennedy III, his nephew, special envoy to Northern Ireland; Caroline Kennedy, JFKs’ daughter, as ambassador to Australia; and Vikki Kennedy, Ted Kennedy’s widow, as ambassador to Austria.
They owe Biden and have put politics above a family that has lost the strength and unity it had a generation ago when the three Kennedys, Jack, Bobby and Teddy seemed to rule the world.
There is not one Kennedy among the extended Kennedy family — not a brother, a sister, a niece, a nephew or a cousin — who supports Robert Kennedy for president, an office his uncle once held, and his father once sought.
Rory Kennedy, RFK Jr.’s loving sister, previously said, “We denounce his candidacy and believe it to be perilous for our country.”
And RFK Jr. has never been accused of illegally carrying a gun, like Hunter Biden, or cheating on his taxes, or spending wildly on hookers, and porn, or sleeping with his dead brother’s wife or refusing to acknowledge a child he fathered out of wedlock. Drugs we will not mention.
So, it is understandable why Biden preened for the cameras when more than 50 members of the extended Kennedy family (Ethel was absent) visited him at the White House on St. Patrick’s Day to endorse his candidacy.
And when even your mother, Ethel, despite a rocky relationship, supports Biden over you, then it’s time to consult William Shakespeare, or Sigmund Freud, or both.
Peter Lucas is a veteran political reporter. Email him at: peter.lucas@bostonherald.com
