Dear Friends,

Before I eat crow for my huge misread of Robert F. Kennedy Jr, I want to invite you (yes, all 7,000 of you receiving this email) to a party Kathy and I will host on September 7 at Birds & Bees Urban Farm. In addition to providing drinks and nibbles, Kathy will read from the book she’s writing about her grandfather and I’ll play piano selections from my “Chopin Nocturnes Plus” project. Here’s the flier:

HERE’S THIS WEEK’S PODCAST:

(01:29) Maybe blame RFK Jr’s poor judgement on that brain worm;
(20:26) Harris, Trump both pledge to stop taxing tips;
(37:27) The new eugenics;
(52:42) Raising (and braising) rabbits, with Kathy Byrnes Fallon.

Ed eating crow. (Note: No actual crows were harmed or eaten in photoshopping this image.)

To eat crow is defined as “admitting having been proven wrong after taking a strong position.” Before I figuratively ingest a healthy portion of said bird, I’ll remind my readers of a few times I got it right.

In an article published in Bleeding Heartland in August 25, 2016, I said, “I think this whole election is so volatile and so many people dislike Clinton that it could go that way. I mean, Trump could win.”

In my May 17, 2023, blog, I wrote, “Democrats should be in panic mode about Biden’s poll numbers. The way things are going, Joe Biden is going to lose to Donald Trump in November, 2024.”

A year later, Biden’s poll numbers were only getting worse. In my June 26 blog, the day before the historic debate between Biden and Trump, I wrote, “Pundits and commentators will, however, rate Biden’s performance somewhere between mediocre and a total bomb. Over the course of the next two months, the Party Elites will roll out Biden’s chosen successor.”

While I think I can make a good case that I read the political tea leaves correctly more often than not, I was way off when I wrote in my November 9, 2023 blog, “my prediction as to who will win the presidency: Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.”

That prediction (not an endorsement, to be clear) was based on an assessment of five key points:

(1) The broad unpopularity of both Donald Trump and Joe Biden;

(2) The growing disdain for the two-party system, especially among young voters;

(3) The favorable name recognition that comes with being a Kennedy;

(4) Kennedy’s fundraising ability due to his personal wealth and connections; and

(5) Kennedy’s message — elements of which appeal to both the Left and Right.

Those are all solid factors. But I underestimated the power of three other elements that tanked Kennedy’s campaign:

(1) The Republican Party and, even more so, the Democratic Party.

(2) The Mainstream Media, whose limited coverage of Kennedy was almost always disparaging; and

(3) Kennedy himself, who was (and is) his own worst enemy. More than anything, what became clear over the past year is Kennedy’s profoundly poor judgement. Dumping a dead bear cub in Central Park. Cutting the head off a whale and strapping it to his car. His views on vaccines and autism.

Yet Kennedy saved his most disturbing incident of poor judgement for when he endorsed Donald Trump for president. Given Kennedy’s laudable record as an environmental attorney who had great success suing corporate polluters, how can he possibly justify supporting Trump, arguably the most anti-environmental president in US history?

So, yeah, I got that one wrong. And I’m not alone in being duped by Kennedy. In 1995, Time named him a “hero for the planet,” and Kennedy was featured on the cover of New York Magazine with the caption, “With the deal he just brokered to save the city’s water supply, Robert F Kennedy Jr suddenly becomes a NY political player with a future.”

A political future indeed. Perhaps if he’d stuck with his work as a champion of environmental protection. Perhaps if he hadn’t been prone to so many profoundly poor personal decisions. Perhaps if America’s political system were friendlier to independent challengers. Perhaps if most of the media weren’t controlled by a few huge corporations.

But maybe Kennedy does have a political future — in a Trump presidency, though I imagine few of us find much comfort in the possibility of Kennedy in charge of Health and Human Services.

Thanks for reading, listening and taking action.