PROFILE CAROLINE KENNEDY:John F Kennedy's daughter Caroline is stepping into the spotlight, but can she bring the family name back to the forefront of American politics?
WHEN CAROLINE Kennedy hit the hustings for Barack Obama earlier this year, many of those who turned up at town halls and showgrounds to hear JFK's daughter stump for the Democratic candidate were seeing her for the first time since her days as a child at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
The endearing six-year-old who rode a pony named Macaroni across the south lawn of the White House and inspired Neil Diamond's hit song Sweet Carolinewas now a woman in her 50s, the tousled blonde hair of childhood replaced by a well-tended tawny mane framing angular features that were unmistakably those of a Kennedy.
The only surviving child of JFK re-emerged on the national scene in January after decades spent shrinking from the limelight. She chose the opinion pages of the New York Timesfor her re-entry into the public consciousness, endorsing Obama's candidacy in a fulsome piece headlined A president like my father.
The opinion, which appeared days before the Super Tuesday primaries, electrified the campaign as political commentators rushed to assess the significance of Kennedy's imprimaturdespite the fact several of her cousins supported Hillary Clinton's candidacy. "I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them," she wrote. "But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president - not just for me, but for a new generation of Americans."
The next afternoon, she hit the campaign trail, standing alongside her beloved uncle Ted at a Washington rally. "Camelot Crowns Obama," read the tickertape as the two Kennedys appeared on ABC News to discuss their endorsement.
From that day, tongues began wagging in DC and New York as people wondered if Caroline Kennedy's tentative foray onto the national stage meant she nurtured political ambitions of her own.
There were clues along the way. "People are somewhat surprised sometimes to see me out here, and I'm sometimes surprised myself, because I haven't been that involved in political campaigns," she acknowledged while addressing a rally in Indiana. "But I do believe this is the most important election since I was a child. I just turned 50, and I figured if I'm going to get out there, now is the time."
When Obama secured the Democratic nomination, he brought Kennedy into the campaign's inner fold as a director of his vice-presidential search committee. After the historic victory in November, speculation over Kennedy's intentions grew. In the guessing games over who would be appointed to what in the Obama administration, her name came up in relation to the post of US envoy to the United Nations before long-time Obama aide Susan Rice was tapped for the role. Kennedy was also mentioned as a possible ambassador to Ireland, a post once filled by her aunt, Jean Kennedy Smith. But it was the whisperings of Kennedy's possible Senate ambitions that became fact this week when it emerged that she would seek the New York seat soon to be vacated by Hillary Clinton, and once occupied by her uncle Robert.
WHILE THE NEWS has prompted some to indulge in misty-eyed reminiscing about the glory days of the Kennedy White House, a time when Caroline was known as the Princess of Camelot, others have cast a more critical eye over her bid for the Senate, questioning her experience and credentials for the post. As one Democratic congressman acidly put it, Kennedy has name recognition, "but so does J-Lo". Others have bristled at what they view as a sense of entitlement by the scion of America's most storied political dynasty.
A rather stern New York Times editorial this week did not mince its words. "As someone who has guarded her privacy, is she ready for the heat and the criticisms that are about to bear down on her? How would Ms Kennedy fare in dealing more publicly with the crowds and the media scrum? . . . Another question being asked quietly among government and business types in New York is whether Ms Kennedy has the legislative skills . . . Finally, will she, as Mrs Clinton did, do the hard political work to show she would represent New Yorkers who live outside Manhattan's best zip codes?"
Others, wondering what the famously private Kennedy has been doing all these years, have picked over her resumé for clues as to how she might perform in a role that would force her into the spotlight she has so assiduously avoided up to now.
The tragedy that has punctuated her life is, of course, well known. Both her father and her uncle, Robert F Kennedy, were assassinated. Her brother John Jr died in a plane crash along with his wife and sister-in-law in 1999. Another brother died within days of birth in 1963. Kennedy had her own brush with death in London in 1975 when the IRA placed a bomb underneath the car of family friend and Tory MP Hugh Fraser with whom she was staying while completing an internship at Sotheby's. The bomb exploded just before the two were due to leave for work that morning, killing a passer-by.
On her return to the US, Kennedy graduated from Harvard and later studied law at Columbia. One of her fellow students at Harvard remembers she kept a low profile. "She was very self-effacing and shy," he told The Irish Times. "You could describe her as the un-Kennedy, in the sense that she didn't display any of the rascally tendencies associated with many of the other Kennedys."
The experience of being chased by the paparazzi as a child and teenager left its mark. In his recent memoirs, Ted Sorensen, a Kennedy White House adviser and family confidant, noted Jackie Kennedy's observation that Caroline had inherited her "horror" of the press. "She used to put her hands over her face when she saw cameramen," Jackie remembered.
After meeting her future husband, exhibit designer Edwin Schlossberg, while working at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1980, Kennedy settled into a life of privileged domesticity on the Upper East Side. She wrote a number of books on legal and civic issues while raising three children - Rose, Tatiana and Jack. The death of her brother in 1999, leaving her the sole survivor of the Kennedy White House, was a turning point. The following year she spoke at a Democratic convention for the first time, departing the stage to the theme from Camelot. In 2002, Kennedy began working for the New York City Department of Education, raising funds for a private charity that supported public schools. She is a noted philanthropist and fundraiser for civil rights causes and the arts.
As president of the John F Kennedy Library Foundation, she helps select the winner of an award named after her father's book Profiles in Courageabout senators who risk their political careers to take a stand on principle. While promoting a book of essays about some of the award-winners in 2002, Kennedy was asked if she would ever consider running for public office. "I don't have any plans to do that right now,"she replied. "I don't plan ahead. My kids are young."
But family friends have said that despite Kennedy's carefully cultivated privacy and the widespread perception that she possesses more of her mother's elusiveness than her father's drive for politics, the family legacy has pressed more heavily on her shoulders in recent years. Her uncle Ted, patriarch of the Kennedy clan, is battling cancer, and few others in the family have shown a willingness or ability to carry the torch. "Caroline is the keeper of the family flame," as Ted Sorenson put it in his memoirs.
LAST SUNDAY, Barack Obama spoke of her in glowing terms on Meet the Press.
"Caroline Kennedy has become one of my dearest friends, and is just a wonderful American, a wonderful person," he said, before declining to speculate on her prospects for the Senate for fear of getting "involved in New York politics".
How Caroline Kennedy will fare in making the leap from what has been a relatively cosseted and rarefied Park Avenue life to the rough and tumble of New York politics remains to be seen. One thing her supporters and confidants do not doubt is her commitment.
"She's played a very significant role in the presidential campaign, and I think that has very much crystallised her interest in serving," John Shattuck, who has worked with Kennedy since 2001 in his role as chief executive of the John F Kennedy Library Foundation, said last week. "But this is something that's been a long time coming."
CV: CAROLINE KENNEDY
Who is she?Caroline Kennedy, the unassuming scion of America's most famous political dynasty and lone survivor of the Kennedy White House.
Why is she in the news?After decades of living the quiet life on Park Avenue, JFK's daughter has followed up on her much-publicised involvement in the Obama campaign by declaring her interest in Hillary Clinton's soon-to-be-vacated New York senate seat.
Most appealing characteristic:Her discretion and craving for privacy have distinguished her from the more unruly members of the Kennedy clan.
Least appealing characteristic:Some critics detect a whiff of entitlement in her bid for the Senate, though supporters say she is the real thing. Time will tell.
Most likely to say:"Yes, we can"
Least likely to say:"About that grassy knoll . . ."