Yeah, yeah, I know, he was a president, he deserves respect, blahblahblah. Regardless of how the news wonks would like to rewrite history, the bottom line is, Ford was ineffectual.
He pardoned the highest-ranking criminal in American history.
He spawned the evil twins, Cheney and Rumsfeld.
And being in office at the same time the Vietnam War ended doesn’t mean he should be credited with ending it. America had already begun withdrawing from Vietnam in 1973, the same year he became Vice President. Ford just happened to be in office when Saigon fell in 1974, which is what most people consider the end of the war to be. It actually ended the previous year.
He was appointed Vice President when Spiro Agnew resigned in disgrace; he was appointed President less than a year later when Nixon resigned in disgrace. Nobody ever voted for him.
I don’t believe Gerald Ford to be a bad man, just an unproductive one. His wife actually did more good for the country than he did. Granted, to be thrown into office at one of the most tumultuous time in American History could not have been easy. But the best thing I can say about Ford is, in his two short years as president, he didn’t make matters any worse.
Kinda makes for a short eulogy.
His interview with Bob Woodward in 2004/05 is very interesting. In it, he disagrees with the Iraq war, and the Bush White House. "Well, I can understand the theory of wanting to free people”, Ford said. “But I just don't think we should go hellfire damnation around the globe freeing people, unless it is directly related to our own national security."
He also calls Dick Cheney “pugnacious”.
pug·na·cious:
1. Tough and callous.
2. Combative in nature; belligerent.
3. Ready and able to resort to force or violence.
And that’s all just dandy. Except for the fact that during his presidency, Cheney became Assistant to the President and then the youngest White House Chief of Staff in history, where it is possible that both he and Donald Rumsfeld began consolidating political power. An article in Rolling Stone said, "Having turned Ford into their instrument, Rumsfeld and Cheney staged a palace coup. They pushed Ford to fire Defense Secretary James Schlesinger, tell Vice President Nelson Rockefeller to look for another job and remove Henry Kissinger from his post as national security adviser. Rumsfeld was named secretary of defense, and Cheney became chief of staff to the president.”
(Yes, that's Rumsfeld and Cheney with Ford. Click to enlarge.)Ford, of course, remembers these as his ideas. We will never know. But what is a fact is that Ford is personally responsible for spawning these two evil geniuses. That, coupled with the act of pardoning Nixon, is enough to keep me from getting too teary-eyed this week...
3 comments:
I liked Ford, as I wrote about the other day. His Woodward comments are interesting, he could have spoken them in public and maybe brought some sense to others who were cow-tailing the President, but he didn't. However, he allowed them to be released upon his death, not Bush's departure, which is another slap in the face of Georgie Boy.
And I can't believe how skinny Chaney was back then (but so was I)
I voted for Ford in my first presidential election. He wasn't that bad. No charisma. Not too smart so as not to be a crook.
If he had been elected president in 76, this country wouldn't have elected Reagan and Bush in 80, and subsequently, probably not Bush and Cheney.
Somehow, crooks and Republicans seem to go together like fries and a burger.
But it should also be noted that Reagan & Bush and Bush & Cheney really aren't true Republicans. Just crooks and frauds.
I, too, think Ford wimped out by not letting his interview be made public until after his death.
Ya know, if you don't have the balls to say it while you're alive, I don't really care to hear your opinions after you're dead.
Take 'em with you, asta la vista, baby.
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