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Today's Senate Won't Produce Another Ted

By Kevin Spak, Newser Staff

Posted Aug 27, 2009 11:29 AM CDT

(Newser) – If you ask leading Democrats who can replace Ted Kennedy as the Senate’s liberal standard-bearer, the most frequent answer is “nobody,” writes Doyle McManus of the Los Angeles Times. No one has a record to match Kennedy’s, and in today’s Senate, building one would be virtually impossible. "The Senate is much more polarized than it was when Kennedy arrived in 1962, and that makes legislating—especially legislating based on bipartisan compromise—more difficult," McManus writes.

Kennedy had the advantage of never having to worry much about re-election. That let him burnish his liberal credentials so that when he managed to forge a compromise with Republicans, he could convince Democrats to go along. His death "may also mark the end of an era in the Senate, from a chamber where legislators often crossed the aisle to make bipartisan deals to one where party unity has become the rule."

[Images (3)]

[Quotes (2)]

Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass, speaks at the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, N.M., Thursday, January 31, 2008. (AP Photo/Toby Jorrin)

In this May 8, 2008, photo, Chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., listens during a hearing on breast cancer in Washington. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

Ted Kennedy speaks to more than 650 visitors to the Del Mar College Richardson Performance Hall, February 20, 2008 in Corpus Christi, Texas. (AP Photo/The Caller-Times, Todd Yates)

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He has the confidence of the supporters of the Democratic Party, people who will listen to Ted Kennedy no matter what. I don't know of any other Democrat that has had that kind of swat. - Orrin Hatch

Ted was sincerely intent on finding enough common ground among us. When he made a promise to you, he kept it, no matter what. I will miss him very much. - John McCain

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