Would Bobby Kennedy have been elected president?
It’s now 50 years since U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was murdered on the night of his victory in the California Democratic presidential primary, on June 6, 1968. The shooter, a Palestinian immigrant with Jordanian citizenship, was apparently angry at Kennedy’s support for Israel.
Kennedy, generally referred to as Bobby, was a controversial figure in life. To some, he was a ruthless, rich opportunist who believed the Kennedys were entitled to the White House. To others, he was an idealistic politician who’d conquered his earlier demons and was en route to secular sainthood.
Even a half-century on, the tantalizing question remains – unanswered and perhaps unanswerable: If Bobby Kennedy hadn’t been killed, would he have been elected president in 1968?
Like a lot of people who mourned John F. Kennedy’s death, I was rooting for Bobby. When he grew his hair longer and began criticizing U.S. President Lyndon Johnson’s Vietnam policy, he seemed to be attuned to the mid-1960s zeitgeist. He was like a rock star.