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Gerald Who?
December 27, 2006
Former president Gerald Ford died Tuesday evening. Little of
significance occurred during his caretaker stint as 38th
president. Most people have forgotten him
altogether. Just to jog your memory, this is the man who
used his presidential privilege to pardon now-deceased
former criminal president Richard M. Nixon.
As is normally the case when a public figure dies, the media
is filled with reminiscences and anecdotes about this
forgotten president. Almost everyone with a comment to make
about Gerald Ford is striving desperately to invent
something positive that he accomplished during his
presidency. Good luck.
I remember Ford. He was a likeable fellow who reminded me of
the typical insurance-selling, next door neighbor. You
wouldn’t have minded having him over for the weekend
barbecue. He even engaged in a little public slapstick
comedy every now and then, probably trying to mimic Chevy
Chase. And that’s pretty much all there was. We didn’t elect
him president; he fell into that job because the then
criminal vice-president had to resign.
When Ford tried to become our elected president in 1976, the
American public rewarded him appropriately for his pardon of
Richard Nixon. He lost the presidential election to a peanut
farmer from Georgia. Can you imagine, losing to a peanut
farmer? The American public had exercised their opinion of
the Nixon pardon with their votes.
Today’s news commentaries seemed to focus on discussions
about reasons for Ford’s loss to former president Jimmy
Carter in the 1976 election. The commentators all appear to
miss the mark. Although they mention the Nixon pardon, they
attribute his loss primarily to the bad U.S. economy of that
time and his verbal slip-up in one of the pre-election
debates.
I’ll set the record straight. I was there. I do remember the
events and I voted against Ford (as much as I hated having
to vote for a Democrat for president). I voted against Ford
for one, and only one reason: because he pardoned Nixon at a
time when Nixon should have (and just might have) gone to
jail for the Watergate cover-up.
That one act in itself served to notify the American public
in no uncertain terms that a President is above the law.
Before the pardon, most people truly believed an American
president was required to uphold the highest possible
standards of morality, integrity and honesty. So much for
that perception. Nixon broke the law and Ford pardoned him.
Staff members of Nixon’s cabinet and administration were
prosecuted and went to jail. Nixon went free.
The American president is now exempt from example setting
behavior. Morals are out the window. Just look at the way
Clinton employed that cigar and look at the way Bush Junior
lied to the American public. Did the American public rise up
in righteous indignation? No, of course not; because now the
president is above the law. If you don’t believe that, then
tell me who is attempting to prosecute Bush for war crimes?
That’s right; nobody.
American flags will fly at half-mast for Ford. That is
Bush’s presidential tribute to a former president who
elevated the office of the president to a position above the
law. That has to be the reason. How many flags have you seen
lately, flying at half-mast for every American soldier who
dies in Iraq, supposedly fighting for our freedom?
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