Tye can often be refreshingly discerning about the mercurial nature of RFK’s growth as a person and a candidate, but he’s neither a curious nor a rigorous assessor of the facts.
Source: ‘Bobby Kennedy’ is an engaging look at the most enigmatic Kennedy – CSMonitor.com
More probable I think is that Bobby was, in the words of Lyndon Johnson, “a shit ass. Ike and Truman’s appraisal of Bobby also uses the word, “shit”.
It makes one wonder about the “Dark Prince”.
I’ve read that some of the Camelot crowd didn’t like Bobby either but I had never seen a quote before this one; “Ted Sorensen remembered him (Bobby) as “militant, aggressive, intolerant, opinionated, and somewhat shallow in his convictions…..more like his father than his brother.”
“Camelot’s Court; Inside the Kennedy White House”, page 44.
This coming from one of the biggest Kennedy apologist to walk down the road.
Bill Clarke
Robert Kennedy bit off more than he could chew when he went out to destroy Lyndon Johnson in the fall of 1963.
Ever read Gen. Curtis Lemay’s oral history? He knew Lyndon Johnson had murdered JFK and was quite happy the Kennedy “cockroaches” were out of power:
http://lyndonjohnsonmurderedjfk.blogspot.com/2013/03/curtis-lemay-in-his-oral-history-with.html
To be honest, this book sounds like a rehash of the same old cliches we’ve been hearing about Bobby Kennedy for decades, right down to the title: couldn’t the author think of a better way to describe this endlessly interesting man than “liberal icon”?
It does seem peculiar that writing in a positive way about either Kennedy opens you up to charges of “hagiography” or being a “Camelot apologist.” Imagine if biographers of Abraham Lincoln were accused of being “Lincoln apologists.”
J.D. A thoughtful comment. I have 2 photos of RFK in my office. One the actual Time Magazine cover from the week he died.