Ted Kennedy, Chappaquiddick and public broadcasting

A comment on WAMU about Sen. Ted Kennedy enjoying jokes about the notorious Chappaquiddick incident is generating a lot of press, particularly on conservative news sites. Edward Klein, biographer of the senator who died last week, told Diane Rehm's guest host Katty Kay that one of Kennedy's "favorite topics of humor was, indeed, Chappaquiddick." He added as an explanation: "Not that he didn't feel remorse about the death of Mary Jo Kopechne but that he still always saw the other side of everything and the ridiculous side of things, too." NPR ombudsman Alicia Shepard writes about Kennedy coverage in her latest column, noting that of 23 NPR stories on Kennedy's death, "only one mentioned the name Mary Jo Kopechne and 5 mentioned Chappaquiddick."