Sad News: Kennedy Has a Malignant Brain Tumor
America's second longest-serving senator has a malignant brain tumor of the left parietal lobe. While my saying so will no doubt generate all sorts of glee from the more twisted feathers on the right wing, those who espouse pro-life policies while finding joy in the likely lingering death of a man who has served his country to the best of his ability and conscience longer than I have been alive, I'll say it anyhow.
I'm deeply saddened by this news. We would seem to be losing not only one of our most devoted public servants but also a man who has long been a link to a much more optimistic period in our history.
Sen. Kennedy has brain tumor, hospital saysI wish Senator Kennedy nothing but the best and hope that he is among the lucky 50% who survive this terrible affliction.
Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy has a malignant brain tumor, his doctors said on Tuesday, of a type considered potentially very dangerous.
Kennedy has a glioma and likely will require chemotherapy and radiation therapy, neurologist Dr. Lee Schwamm of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and Dr. Larry Ronan, a primary physician there, said in a statement.
Kennedy, 76, has been hospitalized since he had a seizure on Saturday. He was airlifted to Massachusetts General Hospital on Saturday morning after being rushed by ambulance to a local hospital near his family's Cape Cod vacation compound...
According to the Society for Neuroscience, about 20,000 Americans are diagnosed with a glioma every year and more than half die within 18 months...
...preliminary results from a biopsy of the brain identified the cause of the seizure as a malignant glioma in the left parietal lobe...
At the same time, I also hope that Senator Kennedy is putting some thought into stepping aside. It's time for him to retire and recuperate, or at least to spend more time with the people he cares for and less worrying about the affairs of American government. He's done that for the past 46 years already. If anyone deserves a break right about now, it's Ted Kennedy.
His will be some tremendous shoes to fill.
As a matter of editorial policy on this, I will not permit any comment that smacks of glee about Kennedy's condition. If you're one of those people, you already know plenty of other places to act like a schmuck. Now would be a good time to go there.
