>> it is the glory and the greatness of our tradition to speak for those that have no voice. >> this week on inside -- "inside washington" the life and legacy of edward kennedy. >> an extraordinary life has come to an end. the extraordinary good that he did it lives on. for his family, he was a guardian, for america, the defender of a dream. >> ted kennedy followed his to brothers, jack and bobby into

politics, and after their assassinations, he became the family patriarch and eventually a political icon. in nearly five decades in the senate, he was the voice of the liberal party wing. in the 1980 speech, it was a ted kennedy classic. >> for all of those whose careers have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hobe still lives, and the dream john never die. -- the hope still lives and the dream shall never die. ♪ >> love him or hate him -- and there are still some ted kennedy haters out there -- washington will not be the same without him. he died at his home in massachusetts this week at the age of 77.

he was diagnosed with a brain tumor in may of 2008. we knew and he knew there was no cure, only delaying action. >> the torch will be passed again to a new generation of americans. the hope rises again endangering lives on. >> despite his weakened condition, kennedy made an appearance at barack obama's convention a year ago and the inauguration in january. he spent his final days in kate got surrounded by family. but clearly, washington -- his final days in cape cod its radovan family to become a washington was never far from his mind. >> everyone at some point in our lives needs an advocate and you never could have a better one than ted kennedy. if he was in your corner, it was forever. >> we became very good friends. he would get out there and flailing his arms and his face would get red and he would make all of those liberal comments

and just experience our side and come up afterwards and say, was that all right? you could not help but like him. >> senators chris dodd and orrin hatch. ted kennedy's final resting place is at arlington national cemetery next to his brother's jack and bobby. how will he be remembered? >> ted kennedy, to those who cover them and knew him slightly will be remembered as the remarkable public figure that he was because he understood that politics were a matter of addition, not subtraction. today's adversary with potentially tomorrow's ally. fundamentally, people liked ted kennedy. conservatives, constituents -- because of who he was and he genuinely liked them it was an incredible asset and strength as a political leader. >> he was the most important centers since lyndon johnson.

surely, the most important senator in u.s. history when he became majority leader. also, i think history will remember him as the man who took it from the centralism of his brother john to the left of liberalism of obama. he stand that era and held prepare that change. >> all of this is true and more. he can be remembered as a truly shakespearean figure -- tragic, flawed, who wrote achieved retention throughç greatness -- who achieved redemption through greatness and achieved this both in his personal and professional life before millions of people. >> those who remember the kennedys will remember john kennedy and robert kennedy as the promise, but ted kennedy was the fulfillment of the kennedy

mily. >> if you look at his record, people tend to say that health care was his central issue, but i think it was civil-rights because from his earliest days in the senate that was his issue of wage for the americans with disabilities act. he could argue that health care was a civil-rights issue. >> that is exactly right. people forget that one of his first legislative achievements in 1965 was to, as chairman of the judiciary subcommittee, rewrites the integration laws which at the time referred europeans and that allowed asians and africans to into -- to emigrate on the same level. >> where does that come from? he was the ninth child, that child of privilege, the son of the wealthy is a man in america at the time. where is this concern for others come from? >> too much is given, much is expected.

-- to whom much is given, much as expected. when he joined the senate he promised the civil-rights bill. ted kennedy came along when the civil rights bill was at its height. he moved into law. he was a fighter for civil rights and he would -- one thing people do not remember is the behind-the-scenes kennedy, who was really interested in the people, for example, during the vietnam war when we're talking about bringing them home out of vietnam at the end, there was a closed-door briefing with a general to talk about how to do this. the general was speaking in terms of units that would be moved through the pipeline to get them out of there and kennedy said, wait a minute, general, we are not talking

about units. we're not talking about pipelines. we're talking about people. that was kennedy's signature, he saw the people behind the numbers. >> also in 1968 he was somewhat ambivalent of the war and made a couple of trips over there and then after 1968 he was very against it. >> one of the great strengths he had was highlighted in most of the memorial's to him, he had a great self-deprecating humor. in january 1971, robert byrd upset him in t democratic caucus. he began 31-24. he had been senate democratic whip. kennedy handled it well. it damaged any national ambitions. he said, "i want to thank the 29

senators who pledged to support me, and i want to thank but together the 24 senators who did vote for me." >> [laughter] he had, for a senator anyway, relatively little ego. he was always interested in getting something done and not taking the credit. he often would come back year after year, decade after decade, to get a little more. >> he had a number of opportunities to run for president, but when he did run in 1980, the word he -- the word we heard over and over again with chappaquiddick. did that cost him the presidency? >> for sure. he was a member of the royal family. there was no way he would have been denied the presidency had that not happen. he is lucky that he was a candy and because of the proximity to his brother's -- but he was a kennedy and because of the

proximity to his brother's because chappaquiddick was a bad thing. e as said before that he would live with it every day of his life. he transcended politically. 1980 was not a good year. it is ironic that in that speech -- you all remember what we saw, "the dream shall never die." he was not running against a conservative. he was running against a çcentrist at the time, a democratic for president. and that is what he represented, he was always a struggle with that centralism. the centralism was somewhat personified by john kennedy. if he had ever run against jon, in theory, he would have been on the left and john in the center. >> those were obviously different times and a host of different issues and the cold war was over, but he changed the language from the 1980 speech

"the dream will never die" and he spoke at the 2008 convention of and what the dream lives on." he could have been the -- at the 2008 convention "the dream lives on." he could have been the candidate in 1968. and yet said, i do not mind being president, i just mind that somebody else is.

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>> ideas and ideals are stamped on scores of laws reflected in millions lives. the seniors who no new dignity, families that no new opportunity, and children that nknow education's promise and they can pursue their dream in

an america that is more equal and more just, including myself. >> president obama speaking from martha's vineyard where he has been on vacation. here in washington, caroline and ted kennedy pass the torch to obama. why did he go with obama instead of clinton? stated at that very stories speech at american university. he recognized the country was ready to go in a new direction and change was what they wanted. the clintons represented the past and kennedy saw the need to move forward and that was barack obama. >> would barack obama be president without kennedy? >> yeah, i think he still would be president. i do.

i think it was psychological, an important moment, but that is be president with the 18-year-old boat? -- could barack obama becom president with the 18-year-old vote? >> two things, ted kennedy said support obama over clinton. obviously, he was drawn to obama. one, he said that it is most important vote that he ever cast as a senator was to vote against the war in iraq. bill clinton, had in fact, from good sources been quite disparaging in conversations with ted kennedy of barack obama.

ted kennedy was offended by it. >> there is also a political, ideological component. the clintons represented centralism in a way andennedy was more on the left. i think that was part of the reason. iraq is one example of that. also, clinton is the one you abolish welfare, which kennedy opposed. -- is the one who abolish welfare, which can be opposed. although, i am not sure that the endorsement of obama release wait a lot of folks, but he used that symbolism. -- really swayed a lot of folks, but he is the symbolism of the torch. he spent the gap between 19th ceury to his.

it is a passing of an era and a change. >> let's talk about health care. you did some reporting on how the health care is shaping up çdespite the absence of ted kennedy. tell us about that. >> one respectable and prominent pollster put it very well this week. he said that president obama, people want him to succeed, people like him and republicans better understand that. the problem is, he has had his own case to make on the oba plan and the numbers and support have gone down. they had better come up with some repackaging in airy, with everyone to college, a new and improved, change plan if it is quite to be successful. quite honestly, ted kennedy is

missed in the sense that ted kennedy could have told very early on what the problems were and what to do about them. he understood not only the issues, but the dynamic of the institution. >> also he can sell. he could have sold it to the liberals. >> the expression that we have heard at the table before [unintelligible] but let's not close the book on this health care debate at this point. there is strong opposition, but by one count there is -- there are 45 hart senate votes for the public plan. 45 hard senate votes for the public plan and that is hard to

draw away. at this point, barack obama has to find the other votes to put him over the top. whether it is 50 or a little higher number, it is not impossible. i think the kennedy legacy is boy to help him push that over the top. -- is going to help him push that over the top. >> ok, we will discuss

>> the cia and post-9/11 interrogation techniques were released this afternoon -- this week with a heavily redacted stg mock executions, intimidation with a handgun, a power drill. attorney-general holder has named a prosecutor to look into this. >> i think it is very unlikely that they will actually --

there'll be any indictments. under the justice department regs, you have to state that u.s. a pretty good chance of conviction. the more people will say -- that you have a pretty good chance of conviction. the more people will say, they told us to do anything to get a confession. the more up the chain yugo, the more there is authorization. and the attorney general and the president has -- have both said that they're only going to prosecute unauthorized they do not want to see the picture because t pictures which are you how bad a condition the people were in. >> the guy next room screaming as if he is being tortured to get the fellow being interrogated to talk. >> we need to distinguish between firing a gun in the next room or threatening to hurt somebody's family and actually people being killed.

>> that is fair enough. >> i think that is where the investigation needs to focus, what happened to cause the death of individuals who were in the custody of the united states government? >> we have not seen half of this report. >> does it disturb anybody that we are debating this stuff in the open where america's enemies are able to read this? >> it disturbs me that we did it. >> the report itself makes it pretty clear that we got extraordinarily important is not unequivocal in saying that it came out of enhanced -- so-called enhanced interrogation, but if you look at the time line in this, it is not a coincidence that khalid shaikh mohammed in this report has said nothing ofç importance until he was suggested to the waterboarding and afterward, he became a rolodex of operatives,

including the guy in indonesia that plotted to blow up airplanes, attack our embassy, our consulate in karachi. the same is true of the interrogation of another detainee who was very uncooperative in the beginning. >> it really does not say that. >> it says exactly that over and over again. >> it is not clear from the report how much came from the fbi or the cia. >> the complication of the geneva convention on torture that was endorsed and embraced by president ronald reagan, but the u.s. ultimately did not ratify, it totally outlaw torture. that is the complication. the division that emerges politically is between those who served in the middlemilitary and those who did not. when you get people like tony

vinny and john saakashvili and john mccain saying it is not about who they are and what they do, but who we are. we talk about prisoners of war and i think we have to listen to

>> ted kennedy was an individual will rebate to you a special relationship they had as individuals. we know that what he did for the country and what he has done for the world, but oftentimes those acts of charity went unseen. they were never noticed. there was not a tv camera, a still photographer, there was not a reporter. but thousands of unreported acts of kindness. >> there are incredible stories.

you know, one plane, went to see the father, told him what a great job his son was doing and then sat with the sun for a couple of hours and then got on a plane back to washington. there probably tens of thousands of stories like that. >> my good friend and longtime colleague, robert novak, and died last week of the same illness, he was diagnosed shortly after ted kennedy was. in his autobiography by his own acknowledgement, he had not a kind word for ted kennedy. the first word that kennedy got, he got on the phone and recommended procedures, advising surgery's. he was overwhelmed by the time is. >-- by the time is.

>> his passion was as great in private as it was in public. that is what he will be remembered for. this man was a tremendous the caring individual. >> it feels as if i'm crashing an irish wake. he was a great senator. i will s is that history will judge whether his brand of liberalism was suited to late 20th-century america. >> thank you, charles. see you next week. captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org--