A decades old grudge between former president Jimmy Carter and the late senator Edward Kennedy was renewed again Thursday when Carter criticized Kennedy's stand on the former president's health care proposal. CBS "60 Minutes" quotes Carter as saying "that Kennedy delayed comprehensive coverage for Americans for decades. ... It was Kennedy's actions to kill Carter's own health care bill that made Americans wait more than 30 years for meaningful coverage, says Carter in an interview with '60 Minutes' correspondent Lesley Stahl. ... In a diary he kept during his presidency, Carter vents about Kennedy's attacks and criticizes Kennedy's own health care bill" (9/16).
CNN: "'The fact is that we would have had comprehensive health care now, had it not been for Ted Kennedy's deliberately blocking the legislation that I proposed,' Carter told CBS correspondent Lesley Stahl. 'It was his fault. Ted Kennedy killed the bill.' Carter proposed health care reform in the late 1970s but was unable to sign any legislation. He said Kennedy blocked the bill in Congress out of spite in advance of the Massachusetts senator's unusual, and ultimately unsuccessful 1980 bid to unseat him. 'He did not want to see me have a major success in that realm of life,' Carter said" (Simon, 9/16).