Kennedy “ugly head” curse strikes again

Ted Kennedy died of brain cancer, while waiting for the passage of the universal medicare that might have paid for his treatment and saved his life. However, name magic experts say that the real problem for the Kennedys is not medical, but the curse of the family name – Gaelic for “ugly head”.

Lyle Abecedarian is an expert on the origins of names. “The surname was probably given to them as a curse a thousand years ago,” he said. “Most likely, they had offended an Irish spirit, or Sidhe, which snarled ‘ugly head’ in its native Gaelic. From then on, they were blighted with the Kennedy name.”

The ugly head curse has hung over the family ever since, producing a string of family disasters, all revolving around head injuries.

In 1963, Ted’s brother John F. Kennedy was shot – in the head – by a a mysterious second bullet, after a picnic on a peaceful grassy knoll. Another brother, Robert Kennedy was also shot, also in the head. And sister Rosemary Kennedy suffered a bizarre brain injury, after her father arranged for doctors to give her a harmless lobotomy. The brain is an organ of the human body – located in the head.

The ugly head curse has continued to the next generation of Kennedys. Robert Kennedy’s son David died of an overdose in 1984, after being “out of his head” on drugs, while his other son, died of a head injury while skiing.

And John F. Kennedy’s son, coincidentally named John F. Kennedy Jr. crashed his plane after sending it on the wrong HEAD-ing, flying it downwards instead of sideways.

Yet the Kennedys have never been afraid of the curse, instead confronting it with great bravery. When JFK’s torpedo boat was sunk in World War II, the future president saved his crewmates by diving into the water and towing the vessel using a rope he gripped between his cursed head’s trademark teeth.

And when Ted Kennedy’s car mysteriously went off the road in Chappaquiddick in a drunken screech, sending his female passenger beneath the water, the brave senator spent nine hours diving in, cursed head first, to find her, before finally giving up and reporting the incident to the police.

US Surgeon General Steven K. Galson dismissed claims of a curse. “Nonsense – these are fairy tales,” he said.

“And yet,” Galson continued, thoughtfully, “it seems whether we believe such things or not, these strange and inexplicable events continue to occur. Yes, perhaps there are forces we cannot understand, meddling with the lives of our leaders.”

But a lucky few have escaped the clutches of the curse. Abecedarian points out that when Jackie Bouvier married into the family and added the Kennedy surname, she immediately suffered the effects of the curse. Her husband was stuck down by an assassin’s bullet, and Jackie herself escaped only by inches.

But after remarrying a wise Greek ship captain, and changing her name to Onassis, the curse seemed to vanish as mysteriously as it had first appeared. Jackie Kennedy went on to live the life of a millionaress, receiving more than $26 million when the kindly old sailor died.

Abecedarian says there is one sure way for the Kennedy clan to rid themselves of the evil magic that hangs over them: “They must change their names immediately,” he says.