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December 30, 2006

Gerald R. Ford, the last great Republican President

I'll never forget the Summer of 1974. I was ten years old and had somehow acquired a crystal AM radio. One day late that Spring I happened across a local radio station in Medford, Oregon broadcasting the House Judiciary Committee hearings and later the Nixon Impeachment hearings.

I was instantly hooked on politics and avidly followed Republican politics in particular for the next ten years, starting with Gerald Ford's bid to be elected President in 1976, whom I enthusiastically supported.

The televised coverage of the Ford funeral on Capital Hill just finished. It was moving and I'm not ashamed to say that I shed a few tears.

More than anything else I was struck while watching and listening to first Senator Stevens, then Speaker Hastert and finally Vice President Cheney describe the congenial to a fault and steadfastly honest Gerry Ford how polar opposite this current crop of Republicans have behaved in stark contrast to the very qualities they praised Ford for possessing and practicing.

It made me angry. Particularly when the camera would pan across the image of Cheney. I kept remembering when he cursed out Senator Leahy on the Senate floor. In that exchange it was Leahy who followed in the path of Ford and refused to rise to the bait and respond in kind, later suggesting that Cheney was just having a bad day.

Once again our nation is deeply divided, just as it was in the aftermath of Watergate and the later years of the Vietnam War. Unlike President Ford, this current crop of Bush-led Republicans, particularly Cheney, have stoked the divisions in a cheap ploy to first strengthen and then maintain political power.

Ronald Reagan and later George H.W. Bush presided over and did everything in thier power to obfuscate the investigation into the patently unconstitutional Iran/Contra subversion. George W. Bush has... Well, you all know what he's done, the least of which has been to surround himself with alumni of Iran/Contra.

Gerald R. Ford was the last Republican President who, in my estimation, took seriously the sworn obligation and duty to uphold and defend the Constitution.

God speed, Mr. President.

You will be missed.

Posted by Kevin at December 30, 2006 05:20 PM