I found Ted Kennedy's funeral and all the events and memorials surrounding it very moving. But at the time and since it's been this passage from Ted Kennedy, Jr.'s remarks at the funeral that I find most moving and most emblematic of the man ...

During the summer months, when I was growing up, my father would arrive late in the afternoon from Washington on Fridays and as soon as he got to Cape Cod he would want to go straight out and practice sailing maneuvers on the Victura in anticipation of that weekend's races. And we'd be out late and the sun would be setting and family dinner would be getting cold and we'd still be out there practicing our jibes and our spinnaker sets long after everyone else had gone ashore.

Well, one night, not another boat in sight on the summer sea and I asked him, 'Why are we always the last ones on the water?'

'Teddy,' he said, 'You see, most of the other sailors that we race against are smarter and more talented than we are, but the reason that we are going to win is that we will work harder than them and we will be better prepared.' And he just wasn't talking about boating. My father admired perseverance. My father believed that to do a job effectively required a tremendous amount of time and effort.

"No wonder Americans are scared" about health care reform, say the Republicans -- which makes a lot of sense, since the GOP are the ones who have scared people. That and other political news in today's TPMDC Saturday Roundup.

How many Democrats of good will would agree to endorse Chris Christie if he just agreed to stop driving?

NJ Gov. candidate Chris Christie, when asked for comment about the 2002 accident in which he hit a motorcyclist while driving the wrong way on a one way street.

"First of all, the motorcycle hit me. He was injured at the scene, he was taken to the hospital but I understand that he's fine now."

In case you missed it, here's Eric Kleefeld's post on the police report. And here's the account of Christie denying the victim filed a lawsuit before a reporter for NJN found a record of the lawsuit at the county courthouse.

As noted earlier, we sent Eric Kleefeld down to the Elizabeth, New Jersey police department headquarters to get the police report on gubernatorial Chris Christie's wrong-way collision with a motorcyclist back in 2002. And here's Eric's write-up on the report.

But just a few moments ago, another big development surfaced -- an apparent lie about the accident Christie was caught in by New Jersey public television station NJN.

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Can you be the heckler at your own health care town hall? Sounds like a zen koan. But Michael Steele gave it a try.

Video: Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) talks down a gaggle of Tea Partiers at state fair.

Earlier today we reported about NJ Gov. candidate Chris Christie's latest traffic incident in which he mentioned being US Attorney and didn't get a ticket.

We wanted to get more information on the accident -- since the initial reports suggested a high degree of negligence (i.e., driving the wrong way on a one-way street) and didn't go into specifics on the motorcyclist's injuries. So we sent Eric Kleefeld down to the police station in Elizabeth. And I just got off the phone with Eric after he took an initial look at the police report.

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Charlie Cook is out with another ominous political analysis/forecast for the Democrats, particularly when it comes to continued Democratic control of the House. The key issue for Cook is Obama's dramatic decline in support among political independents over the course of the summer. By Cook's reading, the economic bite of the recession only really kicked in in the early months of Obama's term and smacked right up against Obama's ambitious domestic agenda. But the part of Cook's analysis that jumped out at me was the last part of this graf ...

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Rep. Bachmann (R-MN): Dems are after me because they fear I'll become president.

Because of the state's size and statewide standards, Texas's choice of school books is often adopted by state's and school districts around the country. And the state is about to adopt a policy only to adopt textbooks which teach students to "identify significant conservative advocacy organizations and individuals, such as Newt Gingrich, Phyllis Schlafly, and the Moral Majority."

An earlier proposal to de-emphasize the American founding fathers in favor of biblical precepts didn't make the cut. But a new emphasis on the teachings of Newt Gingrich may be coming to a high school near you.

Barack Obama definitely the first black man to get attacked by the right for telling kids to study hard and stay in school.

John Ashcroft DOJ Chief of Staff and current business partner David Ayres apparently plans to take the fifth at the trial of accused Team Abramoff operative Kevin Ring.

Fmr. US Atty Chris Christie

Looks like more evidence that New Jersey governor candidate Chris Christie put his job as US Attorney to good use as a get-out-of-ticket or even get-out-of-jail free card back in the glory days of the Bush era.

The latest example: In 2002 he struck a motorcyclist while driving in the wrong direction on a one way street. Christie got off without even a ticket after mentioning his job title. Did Christie's status figure in to the cushy resolution? The local police director says: "I don't think I want to make that kind of deduction, but I think the facts speak for themselves."

I would say so.

I must say, not having paperwork is something that probably happens to a lot of people. And lotsa people speed. But this is pretty far out there. And when you put it all together it does seem to reach beyond the normal level of political chop busting. Hit a motorcyclist going the wrong way on a one way street? No ticket?

Sec. of Defense Robert Gates understands the public's fatigue with Afghanistan. "I don't believe that the war is slipping through the administration's fingers," said Gates. "The nation has been at war for eight years. The fact that Americans would be tired of having their sons and daughters at risk and in battle is not surprising." That and other political news in today's TPMDC Morning Roundup.

TPM Reader JF's lament ...

How long did it take the right to go from: "if you criticize the President you are a traitor" to "School children should not trust the President."

In all the rush of news on health care reform and bitten fingers today, I'd missed the news that an original Opera has been composed based on the transcripts of the Alberto Gonzales hearings from the US Attorney Scandal.

The "Gonzales Cantata" will be performed for the first time this weekend in Philadelphia. More details here -- with preview video.

"I see Gonzales as a tragic figure who's also simultaneously irredeemable," says the composer.

Nancy Pelosi: "A bill without a strong public option will not pass the House."

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) tells TPMDC: "We're not going through this to write some namby pamby bill so we can check a box and say we did health care reform."