# In which I pit Mary Jo Kopechne **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 27, 2009, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871 "2009-08-27T03:47:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/141 "2009-08-27T20:11:58Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > My point is that they both made a similar mistake (auto accident), with similar outcomes (two lives lost). Remarkably little similarity to their actions following their accidents. Yet they had an identical level of success in subsequently getting elected president. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/142 "2009-08-27T20:25:46Z")
What was Mass law at the time on DUI causing a death (I know that there probably wasn’t such a law then but the equivalent)? What time of punishment would Kennedy have faced if the cops had showed up and there he is sitting on the bank stinking drunk with the girl dead in the water? ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/143 "2009-08-27T20:42:47Z")
The presiding judge at Kopechne’s inquest, James Boyle, “found ‘probable cause’ for believing that Kennedy was guilty of criminal negligence and even possibly manslaughter.” In any other state this would have led to the issue of an arrest warrant. But this was Massachussetts. A Kennedy was involved. And Boyle knew his duty as a good Democrat. [National Review, 'Chappaquiddick Revisited, July 2009](http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=YzMyNTgxMmExNzBiOTMzZWY2YjZmZTQ1MjZkZmQ2MDY=) ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/144 "2009-08-27T20:44:46Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > What is that evidence? ["He left the party, having drunk heavily, with one of the young women…Only when the car and the body had been discovered did he report the accident. Thereupon the dean of the Yale Law School and other high-powered lawyers were summoned to help the senator extricate himself from his legal difficulties, and Kennedy aides spirited away the witnesses who had been at the party.](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/edward-kennedy-liberal-american-senator-who-never-escaped-his-brothers-shadows-or-the-whiff-of-scandal-1777540.html)". There were [other incidents](http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/11/03/alcohol.politics/) where he was involved in allegations of criminal activity after drinking heavily. He even publicly apologized for his drinking. Do you need a cite for that? Members of his family have stated that they believe alcoholism runs in the Kennedy family ([cite)](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/kennedy-says-alcoholism-in-is-the-family-genes-1236397.html). No, this is not likely enough to convict him of anything. There are other standards than that. However - A person with a fairly well-documented problem with alcohol, married to a person with a well-documented problem with alcohol, many of whose blood relatives also encountered problems with alcohol and other drugs, leaves a party where he admits having consumed alcohol. He then gets into an accident, and behaves in a way that is appallingly irresponsible where it is not blatantly self-serving and deceptive. All this on the one side. On the other side, we have - his word for it. Knowing as we do that he has lied about the other facts of the case. It seems more likely than not that part of his motivation for not reporting the accident until many hours later was to give himself a chance to sober up enough. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/145 "2009-08-27T20:44:52Z")
> [@Xema](#): > > Why is it not circumstantial evidence? Yeah, I thought that was kind of a textbook case of circumstantial evidence. Lets examine the circumstances. 1. He was drinking at a party. 2. He was known for being a drunk. 3. He drove off of a bridge. 4. He left the scene of the crime to go take a nap rather than calling the authorities. Now of course we can attribute his afterward actions to head trauma too, but see circumstances 1-3. ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/146 "2009-08-27T20:56:31Z")
BTW some of you may have missed Newsweek’s Ed Klein telling guest host Katty Kay about Kennedy’s love of humor a couple of days ago on the Diane Rehm Show. I did myself but luckily [Jules Crittenden](http://www.julescrittenden.com/2009/08/27/dems-in-mourning/) didn’t. “How the late senator loved to hear and tell Chappaquiddick jokes, and was always eager to know if anyone had heard any new ones”, chuckled Klein. > [@](#): > > Not that Kennedy lacked remorse, Klein quickly added, seeming to intuit that my jaw and perhaps those of other listeners had just hit the floorboards. I gather it was a self-deprecating maneuver on Kennedy’s part, exercised with the famous Kennedy charm, though it sounds like one of those “I guess you had to have been there" things. What a card that Teddy was! ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/147 "2009-08-27T21:00:05Z")
> [@Xema](#): > > Why is it not circumstantial evidence? Sorry, I misspoke. I meant to say all it is is circumstantial evidence. People keep asserting that he drank at the party. Neither he nor anyone else testified that this was the case, AFAICT. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/148 "2009-08-27T21:13:41Z")
I don’t care which way people go on the ‘was Ted Kennedy drinking that night?’ question, but I think people should be consistent. I think the evidence that Dick Cheney was drinking when he shot a guy in the face is very similar - there was drinking going on during the hunt, and he didn’t talk to police (in fact, he asked them to come back the next day, and they obliged) right after the incident. And he’s got a history of drinking too. If you think there’s no good evidence for Kennedy drinking, you are entitled to think Cheney wasn’t drinking that afternoon. If you’re pretty sure he was, you should also think Cheney was hiding his drinking when he shot a guy. I think they were both drinking. As a recovering alcoholic in my family likes to say, “bad things didn’t always happen when I drank, but whenever anything bad happened, I’d been drinking.” ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/149 "2009-08-27T21:22:34Z")
> [@bup](#): > > I don’t care which way people go on the ‘was Ted Kennedy drinking that night?’ question, but I think people should be consistent. > > I think the evidence that Dick Cheney was drinking when he shot a guy in the face is very similar - there was drinking going on during the hunt, and he didn’t talk to police (in fact, he asked them to come back the next day, and they obliged) right after the incident. And he’s got a history of drinking too. What’s your point? We all pretty much universally think Dick Cheney is a fucking bastard. I definitely think Dick Cheney was more deeply corrupt than Ted Kennedy. > [@](#): > > If you think there’s no good evidence for Kennedy drinking, you are entitled to think Cheney wasn’t drinking that afternoon. If you’re pretty sure he was, you should also think Cheney was hiding his drinking when he shot a guy. This is an abuse of rational processes. Two unrelated events are unrelated. Though Dick Cheney was likely drunk too. > [@](#): > > I think they were both drinking. As a recovering alcoholic in my family likes to say, “bad things didn’t always happen when I drank, but whenever anything bad happened, I’d been drinking.” lol ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/150 "2009-08-27T21:32:28Z")
If only he’d made a video in which he pretends to look for poor Mary Jo in his office. Then we could all have a good laugh, brush off his incompetence (and mendacity) and the lives it cost, and let bygones be bygones. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/151 "2009-08-27T23:39:31Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > She was never charged with a _crime_. She did get a traffic ticket. > > Anyway, nobody said she should “get a pass”. The point you don’t seem to get is that Ted Kennedy holds a public office, which makes him a valid target for criticism. Laura Bush does not- and never has- which means criticizing her is pointless and makes you look all of eight years old- “well, _she_ did it too!” But I thought the whole point of this thread was the tragedy, not how famous the person who caused the tragedy was. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2009, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/152 "2009-08-27T23:54:10Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > But I thought the whole point of this thread was the tragedy, not how famous the person who caused the tragedy was. It is. ---
**Author:** ![El\_Kabong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/el_kabong/32/496_2.png) [@El\_Kabong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Kabong)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/153 "2009-08-28T00:33:01Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > It is. O Rly? [Quote=mswas] BTW, if it isn’t clear, I am pitting the nasty vile and hateful members of this board who feel they have to shout down or censor people, who are so narcissistic that they cannot imagine that someone might actually have felt sad over Mary Jo Kopechne today. [/Quote] ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/154 "2009-08-28T01:09:09Z")
> [@El\_Kabong](#): > > O Rly? Ok, I should say that’s what the original thread was about. The Pit thread is about being pissed off that people couldn’t handle a thread on Mary Jo Kopechne. Which I am no longer pissed off about. I’ve moved on, now it’s just sort of comical in its silliness. Nothing is funnier than hobbits with pitchforks as long as they don’t get too close. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/155 "2009-08-28T01:44:33Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > But I thought the whole point of this thread was the tragedy, not how famous the person who caused the tragedy was. There are like 13 of these damn things. I can’t remember which one is which and frankly neither can anyone else. In any case, the tragedy in question is the Chappa… Chappaq… that chick that got killed when Kennedy drove off a bridge. Not Laura Bush’s ex. ---
**Author:** ![CrazyCatLady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dfb087/32.png) [@CrazyCatLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrazyCatLady)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/156 "2009-08-28T02:12:54Z")
What I think the OP fails to realize is that, while it sucks big floppy donkey dick that Mary Jo probably won’t be remembered by anyone but her family here in a few years, _if she’d been riding with anyone else, she would have been forgotten by everybody but her family 40 years ago._ My aunt was killed by a drunk driver on her way to work in 1966, leaving a young husband and a 2-month-old baby. You know who remembered her by 1967? Her family. That’s it. She didn’t get the benefit of the public flagellating the man who caused her death for decades, because the man who killed her and 2 other women was a nobody. Mary Jo Kopechne hasn’t gotten all that she deserves, no. But she’s gotten far, far more than a lot of people who die young and tragically get. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/157 "2009-08-28T02:16:11Z")
> [@CrazyCatLady](#): > > What I think the OP fails to realize is that, while it sucks big floppy donkey dick that Mary Jo probably won’t be remembered by anyone but her family here in a few years, _if she’d been riding with anyone else, she would have been forgotten by everybody but her family 40 years ago._ You think I failed to realize that which was blindingly obvious and went without saying huh? > [@](#): > > My aunt was killed by a drunk driver on her way to work in 1966, leaving a young husband and a 2-month-old baby. You know who remembered her by 1967? Her family. That’s it. She didn’t get the benefit of the public flagellating the man who caused her death for decades, because the man who killed her and 2 other women was a nobody. Right. That’s very sad. > [@](#): > > Mary Jo Kopechne hasn’t gotten all that she deserves, no. But she’s gotten far, far more than a lot of people who die young and tragically get. Yes, I agree. But I think people are looking at this all inverted. We shouldn’t forget Mary Jo Kopechne merely because others are forgotten. It just means that there is more than one tragedy that deserves to be remembered. Your aunt deserves remembering, and that is a very heartbreaking story. I hope that your cousin grew up to have a healthy and good life. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/158 "2009-08-28T02:31:47Z")
Mary jo said to Teddy" I think I am pregnant" He said" Don’t worry we will cross that bridge when we come to it" I read some on the incident. I got the impression that the small time lawyers in Chappaquidick were intimidated by the big time Kennedy lawyers and did not give much trouble to them. They had little ability to gather evidence and they did not present a very strong case against him. With today’s forensics we might have gotten a better understanding of what really happened. But it was a long time ago,. ---
**Author:** ![emcee2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7bcc69/32.png) [@emcee2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emcee2k)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/159 "2009-08-28T02:32:32Z")
So we all should remember everyone who dies tragically? I don’t think I have that kind of storage space in my brain. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2009, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871/160 "2009-08-28T03:11:44Z")
> [@emcee2k](#): > > So we all should remember everyone who dies tragically? I don’t think I have that kind of storage space in my brain. No, and really the idea that if we remember one death we are doing disservice to others is an incredibly cynical outlook. With the exception of **CrazyCatLady** I think anyone else bringing up other examples were doing so for cynical reasons. The implication is, ‘this isn’t important’, rather than just expanding the compassion to other people. It’s like people are looking for a reason not to feel compassion. But every story that has been brought up I have looked it up and read the circumstances because yes, those tragedies are sad too. You don’t have to remember every one, it’s unrealistic to expect you to, but if you’re going to join the thread why not just do so with an open heart? All of these things are tragedies, they are all sad, there’s no reason for the comparative misery game. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-which-i-pit-mary-jo-kopechne/507871.md?page=9)