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It can't be argued that the Patrick Kennedy adventure on wheels is being ignored by the media. But part of the coverage has been suffused in a bit of overweening Kennedy-dynasty sympathy. Washington Post reporter/columnist Dana Milbank, who danced a jig of mockery in orange hunter clothes over Dick Cheney's shooting accident, wrote in Saturday's Washington Post about the "miserable character" who suffered after the crash: Kennedy tried to ignore the din of shouted questions as he walked to the door, but he couldn't avoid the woman in the front row who asked if he would resign. He shook his...

<p>If there is one thing that Senator Edward Kennedy is adamant about, it is that government officials play by the rules.</p> <p>"The vast majority of Americans share our commitment to basic fairness," he lectured his fellow senators last May, when Republicans were threatening to trigger the "nuclear option" -- to change the Senate's rules to prevent judicial nominations from being filibustered. "They agree that there must be fair rules, that we should not unilaterally abandon or break those rules in the middle of the game."</p>

Rhode Island Democrats are expected to endorse Representative Patrick Kennedy for re-election when they meet tonight in West Warwick. Party members will endorse candidates for Congress and the state's top jobs -- governor, secretary of state, general treasurer and attorney general. Kennedy has checked himself into the Mayo Clinic for treatment for addiction to prescription drugs following a Thursday car accident in Washington. He says he can't remember driving to Capitol Hill or crashing his car. Kennedy's doctors say he was taking Phenergan for stomach and intestinal problems and Ambien, a commonly prescribed sleeping medication. Police say he appeared intoxicated.

Denny Scaffer in Atlanta brought up an interesting question today on his talk show. What was Patrick Kennedy wearing the night of his accident? For someone claiming to have risen from bed thinking he needed to rush to the Capitol to cast a vote, was he wearing his SpongeBob Sqarepants pajamas? Or was he still dressed in the clothes he wore the day before? Inquiring minds want to know.

It's hard to imagine that Patrick Kennedy would have gotten elected to Congress a dozen years ago without his last name. It's equally hard to imagine that the media would be going wild about his late-night car crash and prescription drug addiction if he weren't a Kennedy. The only lingering mystery is why national news organizations didn't pounce earlier on the Rhode Island Democrat's long history of alcohol and drug abuse, depression and a series of downright embarrassing incidents.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Rep. Patrick Kennedy was still in college when he took elected office as a state representative. Nearly two decades later, he has spent his entire adult life as a lawmaker. (snip) In Congress, Kennedy has pushed for greater mental health care coverage, citing his own struggles with depression and addiction. (snip) A tennis player and avid reader of biographies and autobiographies, Kennedy has a passion for sailing. "He can go out and be out of the public eye. It's tranquil, and it's something he enjoys," Marcella said. (snip) "He's a warm, nice, optimistic, kind person. That's what...

WASHINGTON - Detectives probing U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy’s early-morning car wreck interviewed workers at the Hawk ’n’ Dove bar yesterday while rank-and-file Capitol police are pushing prosecutors to throw the book at the well-connected pol. “Mr. Kennedy, by his own admission, was operating under the influence of narcotics, which is a violation,” said Lou Cannon, president of the Capitol police union. Cannon said detectives probing the Rhode Island Democrat’s 2:45 a.m. wreck visited several watering holes along Pennsylvania Avenue yesterday, asking bartenders and waitstaff if they saw Kennedy in the hours before the congressman crashed his Mustang convertible into a...

by Mark Finkelstein May 6, 2006 Let's imagine it was, oh, Karl Rove who had been involved in a car accident under circumstances identical to those surrounding Patrick Kennedy. Think the Today show would be focusing on his 'courage' and largely taking at face value his claim that prescription medicines caused the crash? Or would they be asking another question: was Kennedy telling the truth when he claimed that no alcohol was involved? That 'Today' was in a decidedly forgiving mood was clear from the show's very opening. Note the graphic Today attached to Kennedy's image: "Seeking Treatment". Not "Telling...

PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- Among the patrons at the News Café, an airy bar downtown, the debate erupted almost as soon as Representative Patrick J. Kennedy finished making his emotional appearance on a television above the liquor bottles and colored lights. Kennedy, the six-term congressman who represents this old factory city, said he would enter a rehabilitation clinic for his addiction to pain medication, a day after crashing his car into a barrier outside the Capitol in Washington, D.C. Bobby LaBonte was not impressed. ''He lost my vote, I'll tell you that," said the 58-year-old former Marine, who called himself a...

Capitol police investigate motive behind story By Casey Ross Saturday, May 6, 2006 - Updated: 02:16 AM EST Police are investigating whether U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy’s bizarre crash-scene story about being late for a 2:45 a.m. vote was a desperate attempt to escape an OUI bust by invoking a law that prevents members of Congress from being arrested while en route to formal sessions, authorities said. Kennedy, who yesterday admitted an addiction to prescription pain medication, told officers upon emerging from his Mustang convertible Thursday morning that he was “late for a vote,” even though formal business had ended hours...

A high-ranking official at the National Fraternal Order of Police cited the mishandling of Rep. Patrick Kennedy's (D-R.I.) car accident Thursday as just one more example of problems the Capitol Police Department is experiencing since Chief Terrance Gainer retired. Jim Pasco, executive director of the National Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), said the fact that no investigation was conducted after Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I) crashed his car into a security barrier at C and First Street SE was unacceptable but symptomatic of the way the Capitol Police Department is being run after Gainer's departure on April 6.Gainer retired after charges...

Patrick Kennedy & Double Standards 05/05 04:37 PM I don't wish anyone ill, except our nation's enemies. It's a good thing that Patrick Kennedy is going back into rehab. But I am very angry. For nearly three years we witnessed the persecution of Rush Limbaugh, who became addicted to painkillers resulting from back and neck problems. We witnessed leaks by prosecutors who spread lies about him being involved in money laundering, drug rings, and doctor shopping. But the media happily repeated them. Some mocked him. Rush got help. He has been clean for years. And in most cases, when someone...

CNN reports Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) will hold a press conference today at 3 p.m. in Washington, D.C. to discuss his recent traffic incident on Capitol Hill.

Congressman Patrick Kennedy said he does not recall the accident, or the citations from the Capitol Police. But a police union official charged senior officers ordered the patrol officers to leave the scene; blocked them from running field sobriety tests; and later gave Kennedy a ride home -- in the view of Fraternal Order of Police chapter president Lou Cannon, special treatment. "It's not the normal course of action," he said. "I think that he was given consideration in regards to his position, and that he was afforded the opportunity to be taken home." The Capitol Police issued a terse...

PATCHES Do you believe Congressman Patrick Kennedy's explanation for the car accident he had at the Capitol in the wee hours of Thursday morning? Yes 3% No 97%

Patches checking into rehab? Live Howie Carr show thread!

MAY 5--Here's the official Capitol Hill Police report on yesterday's early-morning crash involving a disoriented Patrick Kennedy. According to cops, the Rhode Island Democrat (and son of Senator Ted Kennedy) appeared unsteady on his feet, had red and watery eyes, and had slightly slurred speech upon exiting his Ford Mustang after crashing the vehicle into a barricade near Capitol Hill. The reporting officer checked off a box indicating that Kennedy was under the influence of alcohol and that the politician's ability was "impaired." Kennedy, 39, has denied that alcohol was involved in the 2:45 AM accident, claiming instead that he...

WASHINGTON -U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy insisted yesterday that he had consumed “no alcohol” before he slammed his Mustang convertible into a concrete barrier near his office, but a hostess at a popular Capitol Hill watering hole told the Herald she saw him drinking in the hours before the crash. “He was drinking a little bit,” said the woman, who works at the Hawk & Dove and would not give her name. Leaving his office late last night, Kennedy refused to say whether he’d been to the Hawk & Dove the night before. Earlier in the evening, Kennedy issued a statement...

For talk radio hosts seeking fresh fodder, it was just what the doctor ordered: yet another flap involving Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI), son of the notorious Teddy (D-Chappaquidick). Call it talk's instant battery recharge. How could anyone resist this one? Late Thursday, news spread like wildfire that Rep. Kennedy had been involved in his second car accident in just the past two weeks, this time at 3am, near the Capitol. Unlike his father's infamous 1969 wreck, there were no fatalities this time. One striking similarity, however: in all three crashes, based on available details, favoritism allegations seem to have substantial...

Bad news for Patches Kennedy, good news for Cynthia McKinney. At the risk of sounding like Jesse Jackson, do you think there’s a bit of a racial double standard at work here? White congressman swerving around Capitol Hill at 2:45 a.m., with no lights on, smashes up his car, staggers around outside, claims he’s on his way to a “vote,” inquires if the cops know who he is, and . . . is given a lift home. That’s how Patches Kennedy got treated. Then there’s Cynthia McKinney of Georgia, a black congresswoman who strides through a security gate, is chased...