What is maddening here is how overboard the media are going here over the death of a 93-year-old man who had been in declining health for several years.  I have yet to hear/see anything at all negative about the Ford Interregnum.  You’d think they could find ONE person connected with the New York City bankruptcy of the mid-70s (Daily News headline:  “Ford to City: Drop Dead”) who might not say the man’s political legacy is 100% beyond question.  Or how about some energy expert who can speak to the fact that he did nothing to move the country toward energy independence, which set Carter up for massive failure due to the three oil price shocks/energy disruptions that plagued his one four-year term.?  Or how about someone from the industrial Midwest who might speak to the lack of action to help saving America’s dying industrial heartland?  Or the loved ones of the 41 servicemen who died on an island off Cambodia trying to rescue the crew of the Mayaguez (who were nowhere to be found on that island by the time the U.S. military got there)?

The pardon is being portrayed as some great healing act (hmmmmm … I thought the pardon was one of the 4 major reasons why he lost to Carter, the other three being the economy, his withering nomination fight against Reagan and his ridiculous statement about a free Eastern Europe).  The man who angered more than half the populace with his inexplicable pardon is being hailed as a healer.  Sorry.  He didn’t heal me.

After Reagan’s death, many in the media admitted they might have gone a tad overboard in covering that interminable staged media event.  Any lessons that might have been learned at that time obviously have been forgotten.  If Herbert Hoover were still alive and if he died tomorrow, our glorious media no doubt would portray him as an unparalleled economic genius and a compassionate friend of working families everywhere.  If William Henry Harrison died tomorrow the media no doubt would hail his durability and perseverance as leader of the nation.  Gimme a break!


Add to your list of Ford’s noteworthy accomplishments:
* Putting Cheney in a position of power
* Putting Rumsfeld in a position of power
* Kept Kissinger in power
* Setting the wonderful precedent for boosh II by getting 41 Navy/Marine personnel killed in an amateurish effort to free 30 crewmembers of the Mayaguez, which had been seized by that feared world power, the Cambodian Khmer Rouge.
As boosh II continues to get American servicemen and women in Iraq killed each day for no good reason, other than to justify the sacrifice of the 3000 who fell before them, we can thank Ford for this wonderful legacy.
* Participated in the Warren Commission Charade/Coverup as a member of that august body.

OK, in fairness, we should acknowledge some of the more positive aspects of the man:
* He apparently was a generally nice guy
* Unlike boosh II he honorably served in his country’s military during time of war
* He must have been an OK golfer
* He was smart enough to know that his greatest political asset was to allow comics to make him the butt of countless jokes and pratfalls
* He did not constantly spew hatred and bile toward anyone labeled a Democrat
* His wife was pro-choice and, unlike all men named boosh, he did not cudgel his wife into changing her position for his own political benefit
* Ditto for the Equal Rights Amendment

At the time, none of these seemed particularly noteworthy.  After 18 years of GOP stewardship in the form of Reagan-boosh-boosh in the WH, Ford’s genuine accomplishments now make him look like one of the great leaders/humanitarians of the ages.

But here’s the most important thing that Ford’s death does:  It puts Nixon back in the headlines.  And it therefore reminds the vast majority of Americans who hate, loathe and despise Nixon that the unthinkable has occurred:  That compared to boosh II, we’d take Nixon as president in a heartbeat.