His independent White House campaign has fizzled, but the flow of bizarre stories of Robert F Kennedy Jr’s unorthodox handling of the carcasses of wild mammals has experienced no similar suspension.

An environmental group is calling for a federal investigation into the former presidential candidate for an episode in which he allegedly severed the head of a washed-up whale with a chainsaw – and drove home with it strapped to his car’s roof.

The episode has parallels with another extraordinary tale reported earlier in August in which Kennedy confessed to dumping a dead bear cub in New York’s Central Park and attempted to make it look like the animal was killed by a bicyclist.

The latest grisly revelation, about the whale head, is not particularly new – it stems from a 2012 interview Kennedy’s daughter Kick gave to Town & Country magazine, in which she talks about a visit to other family members of the political dynasty in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, more than two decades prior.

  • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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    3 months ago

    His daughter:

    “Every time we accelerated on the highway, whale juice would pour into the windows of the car, and it was the rankest thing on the planet. We all had plastic bags over our heads with mouth holes cut out, and people on the highway were giving us the finger, but that was just normal day to day stuff for us.”

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      Note that he intentionally took his kids to watch him saw the head off and put it on the car and take it home. Because he apparently liked to “study” such things. Weird as fuck.

      • floofloof@lemmy.ca
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        3 months ago

        All his life he has spent an unusual amount of time around animal corpses. Dead animals are kind of his thing.

    • N0body@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      3 months ago

      Just a not weird family drive through the country. Seriously though, I’m betting the Harris campaign is sitting on several more of these stories that will roll out over the next couple months.

      I’m also wondering where his collection is right now. If he’s being investigated for a federal crime, there may be a search warrant in the works.

      • IamSparticles@lemmy.zip
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        3 months ago

        Look, guys… he already admitted that he’s not a choir boy. So just drop it, already. Sheesh. /s

          • tacosplease@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            There’s not always the little strip of metal across the top of the door. Some cars just let the glass press against a foam rubber seal when the door is shut. Infiniti G35 windows were like that.

            • Duamerthrax@lemmy.world
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              3 months ago

              You can still close the windows on the straps, assuming they’re flat straps.

              I’ve personally seen too many people try strapping things to their car through open windows because they didn’t plan on how they would get into their cars. It’s far too likely that mr. brain worms simply strapped the doors shut and crawled in through the windows.

            • GBU_28@lemm.ee
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              3 months ago

              And then the load shifts on the roof, and you get in. How will you tighten the straps?

              Why not just run the straps around with the doors open

              • curbstickle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                3 months ago

                Generally there are more than two windows…

                But I never said any of this was a good idea, just answering how you can do it. Some car doors won’t close with a strap in there (my old Chrysler Lebaron for example, $800 of “Its technically driveable”), so me and a friend went in through the windows.

                I had town car, all four doors would close just fine, but the station wagon only the front doors would close (so backseat meant crawling through the trunk, aka the fifth seat).

                You do what you gotta do

      • Dhar@lemmy.ca
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        3 months ago

        Normal Kennedy day. They only roll the windows up when things get weird.

      • catloaf@lemm.ee
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        3 months ago

        Based on what I’m hearing about the guy, I wouldn’t be surprised if the windows and/or AC were broken and they just left it like that.

    • Duamerthrax@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      people on the highway were giving us the finger, but that was just normal day to day stuff for us.

      Right, so when they’re not driving around with whale heads, he’s just a reckless driver. Must run in the family.

    • nova_ad_vitum@lemmy.ca
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      3 months ago

      Remember folks, there are delusional centrists who love this guy and think he speaks for the working man.