Gerald Ford - Rest in Peace

The rise to power of Gerald Ford was as improbable as it was fortuitous for this country. Here was a man who became President and validated the maxim that the person most suited for the job is the person who does not seek it. Yet he answered the call of his country when perhaps it needed him most.

Torn asunder by a Viet Nam conflict that much of the country neither understood nor supported, and shaken by the revelation of extreme venality and cynical corruption by the President of the United States, the country needed a humble and essentially honest man. That commodity is something one would not expect to find in great supply in the halls of Congress. Yet from the ranks came Gerald Ford, a man who was more concerned about doing the peoples' business than doing side deals to line his pockets or increase his personal power.

Many question his decision to grant Nixon a pardon. Ford believed that history would judge Nixon, and in retrospect he was right. It was more important for the country to focus its energies upon healing and unification than persecuting a fallen leader who had resigned in disgrace. That decision seems so inconceivable in the context of the Congress that we have had for the past decade, one so immersed in political extremism and vendetta. The GOP led Congress would allow the country to sink into the sewer while focusing its energy upon scoring political points against the "enemy" Democrats. And the Democratic Congressional leadership has been quite willing to play along with the game while the White House has led an administration of global corruption that would make the puny efforts of Nixon look like those of a schoolyard punk.

The calm grace and humanity of President Ford, his support of Betty Ford at a time when many politicians would have turned their back upon an ailing wife {consider Newt Gingrich), and his ability to shift focus away from his person to the job he was determined to get done requires that history judge him kindly and with great respect. He deserves our thanks and our prayers. Rest in Peace, Mr. President.