Former cabinet member, congressman, and vice-presidential nominee Jack Kemp died Saturday at the age of 73. My former co-worker (and occasional BreakPoint writer) Leslie Carbone has a heartfelt tribute to Kemp's leadership, energy, and encouragement at her blog. R.I.P. to a strong and principled leader.

(Image © Reuters)

Comments

[Dave the Swede]

Chuck Colson released a statement on the passing of this fine man:

http://www.prisonfellowship.org/generic.asp?ID=11725

[Rolley Haggard]

“A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other. A solemn consideration, when I enter a great city by night, that every one of those darkly clustered houses encloses its own secret; that every room in every one of them encloses its own secret; that every beating heart in the hundreds of thousands of breasts there, is, in some of its imaginings, a secret to the heart nearest it! Something of the awfulness, even of Death itself, is referable to this. No more can I turn the leaves of this dear book that I loved, and vainly hope in time to read it all. No more can I look into the depths of this unfathomable water, wherein, as momentary lights glanced into it, I have had glimpses of buried treasure and other things submerged. It was appointed that the book should shut with a spring, for ever and for ever, when I had read but a page. It was appointed that the water should be locked in an eternal frost, when the light was playing on its surface, and I stood in ignorance on the shore. My friend is dead, my neighbour is dead, my love, the darling of my soul, is dead; it is the inexorable consolidation and perpetuation of the secret that was always in that individuality, and which I shall carry in mine to my life's end. In any of the burial-places of this city through which I pass, is there a sleeper more inscrutable than its busy inhabitants are, in their innermost personality, to me, or than I am to them?”
--- Charles Dickens, “A Tale of Two Cities”, Book 1 Chapter 3

Farewell, friend Jack. I so look forward to getting to know the good friend I never knew.

[Leslie Carbone]

Thanks, Gina. This is a tremendous loss.