Kennedy in Denver to attend Democratic convention

DENVER -- Sen. Edward Kennedy, the liberal lion who is battling a brain tumor, will attend the Democratic convention Monday night as he has for 40 years, but is not expected to speak, said Bill Burton, spokesman for Barack Obama's presidential campaign.

"I'm getting chills just thinking about it now talking to you," said Gus Bickford, a member of the Massachusetts delegation which heard the news at a breaking meeting. "This morning every delegate in the room was just so excited about getting to see him tonight in person. Everybody will be on their feet when he comes out on the stage."

"We're thrilled, just thrilled. This will really set the right tone for the convention," said MarDee Xifaras, a longtime Kennedy supporter and member of the Massachusetts delegation.

Kennedy, 76, whose immune system has been weakened by treatment for brain cancer, had been scheduled to be honored in absentia Monday night with a videotape and a speech by his niece, Caroline Kennedy.

Kennedy arrived in Denver Sunday night and was taken to a hospital for a precautionary medical examination.

His appearance, even in a non-speaking role, will provide a touching and exciting moment for delegates and party members who have viewed the Massachusetts senator as an essential fixture at these gatherings for four decades. His vigorous speeches have done more to rouse, amuse, tease and just plain fascinate these conventions than any living politician.

Xifaras said she spoke with Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Kennedy's niece and the former lieutenant governor of Maryland, and "We agreed it was really important for (Kennedy) to pace himself while he's here."

"He's been a vital part of every convention since 1972," says Phil Johnston, a convention delegate and former Massachusetts Democratic Party chairman. "It's very poignant now to think where we've come after so many years."

If Kennedy does take the stage, it would be one more great moment for a politician that Gus Bickford, a Massachusetts delegate, calls "the Michael Phelps of conventions."

Since 1960, when Kennedy stood with the Wisconsin delegation as it put JFK over the top on the first ballot, he has missed only two conventions: 1964, when he was recovering from injuries suffered in a plane crash in western Massachusetts, and 1968, after his brother Robert's assassination. Even though he stayed home that year, he held the convention in suspense before rejecting a move to draft him onto the ticket.

In 1980, the one time he sought the nomination, Kennedy roused the crowd in a concession speech that ended, "the dream will never die."

Xifaras was at Madison Square Garden that night, in front with the rest of the Massachusetts delegation. "You felt you had a front row seat, literally, at an historic moment," she says. A signed copy of the text hangs in her living room: "It's an example of the many ways he'd reach out to you personally."

In 1988, he bashed Vice President Bush with the gleeful refrain, "Where was George?"

Equally memorable were Kennedy's parties for the Massachusetts delegation, such as a cruise around San Francisco Bay in 1984 and a soiree at Manhattan's Water Club in 1992. Each was enlivened by Kennedy's renditions of Irish ballads.

Forgotten at conventions, or at least unmentioned, are Kennedy's role in the 1969 accident at Chappaquiddick in which a young woman was killed; his defeat for re-election to a top Senate leadership post in 1971; and the years of drinking and carousing that preceded his marriage to his second wife.

At some conventions, Kennedy has displayed sharp elbows.

Denied a major speaking role in 1976 by Jimmy Carter's forces, he turned down an invitation to appear on stage with Carter.

Four years later, Kennedy did join Carter, but conspicuously failed to raise the president's arm in a traditional show of unity.

Regret over the presidency

And yet these largely celebratory occasions always have reminded Democrats — particularly liberals, particularly those from Massachusetts — of what might have been. That he never became president "is always attached to Ted Kennedy — 'He coulda, shoulda, might have,' " says Thomas Whalen, a Boston University professor who studies presidential politics.

"For some people of my generation, there's still this feeling that there could have been something more," says Johnston, who met the senator while working on Robert Kennedy's 1968 presidential campaign. "There's enormous regret that neither Bobby nor Ted became president."

Kennedy's admirers console themselves with several thoughts: that his family needed him; that there might have been an assassination attempt; that, in the words of his former chief of staff Paul Kirk, Kennedy "may have accomplished more in the Senate than some presidents did in the White House."

Many of the Massachusetts delegates remember the first time they met him. For John Walsh, chairman of the state party, it was on the main street of his native Abington, Mass.

He was 4 years old. It was 1962, Kennedy's first Senate campaign. According to Walsh family memory, "I shook his hand, and I almost pulled his arm out of its socket," he laughs. "I couldn't let go."

Eight-minute video to air

On Monday night, Kennedy's career will be the subject of an eight-minute video by documentary filmmakers Ken Burns and Mark Herzog, and extolled in a speech by his niece Caroline, who served on Barack Obama's vice presidential selection team.

Kennedy, who with Caroline gave Obama a crucial endorsement during the primary campaign, recorded remarks for the video at his home on Cape Cod.

"I'd never count Ted Kennedy out of any event," Walsh said. " If there is a plan, his staff knows how to keep a secret."

He and others cite Kennedy's surprise appearance in the Senate in July, a month after having brain surgery, to break a potential tie vote on a Medicare bill.

Xifaras, who urged Kennedy to challenge Carter in 1980, said she has no expectations: "I got a note from Vicky (Kennedy's wife). She said they were enjoying their time on the Cape and Teddy was doing as well as could be expected."

Walsh says that even seeing the senator on video will be dramatic. "Few people can do something like that through video, but he can."