Bobby

As a reporter there was only one criterion, get the facts, get the story, regardless of how famous or august the personage. It was hard to overcome the aura of major Hollywood stars like Liz Taylor and Richard Burton whom I found pleasant and interesting after they had overcome their reticence during a mass new conference. I did notice Burton was sweating a bucket when we started a very casual conversation, but smiled after I assured the famous couple that the press corps, in New York at least, kinda liked them. They appeared very grateful for the information, relaxed, and we enjoyed our talk.

But that discipline was really called into play when you had anything to do with Bobby Kennedy, because there was aura around him, the sense of great national and personal loss, which made him larger than life and a tragic figure at the same time. He was also tough, and nothing pissed him off more than some dumb-assed reporter asking a dumb-assed question. The fire was always near the surface.

A key to Bobby Kennedy was in his book, The Enemy Within, which, while not the stuff of a Pulitzer Prize, like his brother Jack’s Profiles in Courage, gave the ultimate clue to his intense feelings about the criminal empire then know as the “Mafia.” If you had read the book and wanted a powerful interview, you asked him about the rapine of this country by organized crime.

One day in Yonkers, we were wrapping up an interview with the carpetbagger Senator from New York, when a reporter asked a tough question to his retreating back after the news conference had been concluded. He continued walking away when the devil made me say in a loud voice, “You didn’t expect him to answer that one, did you?” As planned he stopped, turned, glowered at me for a second and said, “Ask me that question again,” and answer it he did and very well too. He gave me an “up yours” grin as he passed and I started to laugh out loud and his grin became wide as he looked at me and turned away. It’s a Celtic thing.

Years later, in Viet Nam, after a particularly deadly fight, I leaned against a hooch, took off my helmet, slid down until my arm rested on it and watched the armored personnel carriers roll by with our recently killed young troops draped over them as they headed for the rear. At least we were retrieving our killed in action.

One of my crewmen ran over and said, “They’ve assassinated Bobby Kennedy, it just came over Armed Forces radio. You knew him, didn’t ya?” I stared at him for a moment as if he were from another planet, lit up a cigarette and quietly watched the armored personnel carriers roll by.

It was a time and place and distance thing.

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