For A Guy Who Can't Win, RFK Jr. Has The U.S. Establishment Worried

In the welter of CGI-infested commercials for upcoming movies and lame turns by fading celebrities there was a Super Bowl LVIII TV commercial that was… different. Using a template from his late uncle John’s 1960 presidential campaign, Robert Kennedy Jr. burned through $7 million on a reminder that he was running as an independent candidate for the U.S. presidency.

The ad substituted photos of RFK Jr. for photos of his uncle while keeping the same “Kennedy Kennedy Kennedy Kennedy”  jingle. Except it appears not to have been RFK Jr. buying the ad after all. American Values 2024, the super PAC supporting Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s independent presidential bid, paid for the commercial. 

The candidate quickly announced that he was not responsible for the ad— even as his multiple brothers, sisters and cousins howled in disapproval at the stunt. Kennedy’s campaign issued a clarification. “We are pleasantly surprised and grateful to the American Values PAC for running an ad during the Super Bowl where more than 100 million Americans got to see that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is running as an independent candidate for President of the United States.”

At the same time RFK Jr. sought to placate cousins like Bobby Shriver, son of Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who fumed, ”My cousin’s Super Bowl ad used our uncle’s faces and my Mother’s. She would be appalled by his deadly health care views. Respect for science, vaccines, & health care equity were in her DNA. She strongly supported my health care work at @ONECampaign & @RED which he opposes.”

"I'm so sorry if the Super Bowl advertisement caused anyone in my family pain," RFK Jr. responded. But not really. Kennedy is determined to go ahead with his quixotic blend of anti-vaxx and Bernie Sanders economic cures, no matter who is impacted. How diverse is his policy scope? He has been on FOX TV (with former host Tucker Carlson), Joe Rogan and a series of far-left TV/ radio hosts.

Most know him for his strident position on vaccine dangers, a crusade that suddenly took on gravitas during the disastrous rollout of the untested Covid vaccines in 2020. Overnight he went from trust-fund kook to courageous crusader against lockdowns. That schmozzle gave him a platform to run against Waldorf and Stadler… er, Joe Biden and Donald Trump.

The idea from the DC Establishment had been to ignore him. But the Super Bowl reaching so many people changed that.  While no one gives Kennedy a real shot at the presidency, there are serious concerns in the mainline American parties— especially the Democrats— that he could have the same effect as a third-party candidate as did Ross Perot in 1992 when the maverick Texan took enough votes from GOP incumbent George W. H. Bush to award the White House to Bill Clinton. 

The intrusion of the 69-year-old Kennedy into the Super Bowl’s frothy festival last Sunday was a reminder of the uncertain times facing voters in 2024. Using nostalgia for the Camelot years of his uncle and father could revive a dominant meme in the American politics of the late 20th century. There are still plenty who recall the Kennedy brothers assassinations in 1963, 1968. 

Those concerns were exacerbated by last week’s special-counsel report on Biden’s storage of confidential materials, a report that explicitly identified the president’s senility as cause for not charging him. And by the ongoing distraction of politically generated charges against his rival Trump. Polling clearly shows that a majority of Americans want someone other than the decrepit duo as president.

How concerned is the establishment in Washington? So far the Secret Service is refusing to extend protection to Kennedy as a presidential candidate, a courtesy observed in the case of other 2024 long shots. Considering the tragic history of the Kennedys and the inflammatory nature of RFK’s claims about vaccines, Chinese collusion and the environment this is more than a snub. It’s an invitation to wackos. Writes Greta van Susteren, “Greta Van Sustere@greta47s What is wrong w/ our govt?? Give @RobertKennedyJr Secret Service protection! With his family history, the threats he has endured, I think it is outrageous he does not. Haley appropriately got it but he has not have protection. If something happens to him, blood is on the Biden…”

As if to magnify his outsider status, Kennedy is battling a rare throat ailment`(spasmodic dysphonia) that reduces his voice to harsh croaking much of the time. While there are cures, they can take years. Imagine a rasping RFK Jr. in a debate ring against the bulldozer known as Trump. To say nothing of Biden when he goes on one of his eye-rolling rants.

This also assumes that either— or neither— of Biden and Trump are on the ballot come November. There is a void in U.S. politics today that looks ready to be filled. Can the 50-year-old Kennedy mystique fill that gap? Or will he be shut down by the forces that tried to eliminate Trump? Shouid be fun.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster  A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, he’s a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. Inexact Science: The Six Most Compelling Draft Years In NHL History, his new book with his son Evan, was voted the seventh-best professional hockey book of all time by bookauthority.org . His 2004 book Money Players was voted sixth best on the same list, and is available via brucedowbigginbooks.ca.