Knowing his thoughts better than anyone, my mom goaded him with a piece written by his friend Jack Newfield in the Village Voice, which she carried in her purse for that purpose. “If Kennedy does not run in 1968, the best side of his character will die. He will kill it every time he butchers his conscience and makes a speech for Johnson next autumn. It will die every time some kid asks him, if he is so much against the Vietnam War, how come he is putting party above principle? It will die every time a stranger quotes his own words back to him on the value of courage.”
