NONFICTION - Oct. 25, 1992

THE SENATOR: My Ten Years With Ted Kennedy by Richard E. Burke with William and Marilyn Hoffer (St. Martin’s: $23.95; 328 pp.). From Chappaquiddick to his mea culpa speech at Harvard last year (“I recognize . . . the faults in the conduct of my private life”), it seems that scandal has pursued Ted Kennedy (or vice versa) as doggedly as bullets pursued his older brothers. Whether this book creates yet another will depend on your view of a senator’s primary job. If you think it is to see that policies represent constituents, then you’ll be inclined to dismiss the senator’s skirt-chasing, and even his alleged coke-snorting, as an unfortunate part of life in the Beltway’s fast lane. Realizing that power may well be the ultimate aphrodisiac, you won’t be surprised that women with names like Barbi and Lori may have visited the senator’s office, exploded in high dudgeon (“Kitty is ready to rip out Cindy’s hair”) and worn “filmy bright colored spaghetti-strapped sun-dresses that left little to the imagination.” If, on the other hand, you believe a senator’s primary job is to represent the nobler side of our national character, then you will have to join Richard Burke, a Kennedy aide through the 1970s, in suspecting that Kennedy failed his country.

Burke’s conviction seems driven partly by the trauma of being exposed in his early 20s to Kennedy’s sexually overbearing lovers (one opens her coat in front of the author on a Georgetown street, revealing only a birthday suit) and partly by his admitted need for money from a book deal. We are disinclined to dismiss all of Burke’s revelations, nevertheless, because he doesn’t appear to harbor much bitterness (as evidenced by his portrayals of the senator’s deep love for his children) and because we feel for his earnest attempts to play Kennedy’s boys’ games. “You can’t fail us, Rick,” the senator coaches just after challenging Burke and a young KGB officer to down three 10-ounce glasses of clear, undiluted vodka each. When the plane later lands in Tashkent, Kennedy walks behind Burke, steadying him as a group of dignitaries approaches. “Oh, Ricky, you’re swaying,” Kennedy whispers. “What, you’re not feeling well? You gonna be able to stand up? C’mon, c’mon, you gotta stay on your feet.” “I elbowed him,” the author reports, “and he responded with a boozy chuckle.”