Over the weekend, Barack Obama got two Kennedys (Kennedies?) for the price of one.
First, Caroline Kennedy, daughter of JFK, penned a
gushing op-ed
in the
New York Times
endorsing the senator from Illinois. Then on Sunday, the campaign announced that Sen. Ted Kennedy will be stumping for Obama this week.
Time ‘s Mark Halperin offers some compelling reasons why this endorsement, unlike most, actually matters. (Kennedy commands respect among demographics Obama doesn’t—namely Hispanics, working-class Dems, and union households.)
Naturally, Clinton’s team greeted the news with news (sort of) of their own. On Sunday, the campaign fired off a competing statement from Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, a former lieutenant governor of Maryland and daughter of Bobby Kennedy, pointing out her own support for Clinton as well as that of her brother Bobby and her sister Kerry. But if there were a formula to measure respective Kennedy influence, it would probably looking something like:
Bobby Jr. + Kerry + Kathleen + Caroline = Teddy