President Ford.
Pardoned Nixon, brought an end to Vietnam (got us scrambling elbow-to-elbow for a space on a Saigon blood-stained barge). Since when does number 3, unelected by popular votes, preside over the fate of a nation and the world.
On this Presidents’ Day weekend, we celebrate their memories.
Chevy Chase used to play President Ford on SNL But the true Ford, emptying out his pocket change for the WH photographer, whom he trusted and who had no time for an ATM ( he had to catch a courier flight to cover Vietnam’s last day), won me over.
Yes, he was a bit clumsy (so was my Dad, both of them taller than the door’s beam) when holding one of the surviving orphans – the flight that did not crash out of TSN Airport (before it was deemed and declared in-operable, hence kick-starting Operation Frequent Wind).
From the football field to the political field, President Ford handled himself above-board, by the rules. Unlike the President’s men, most of them had been jailed by the time he took over (his unorthodox pardoning a month after taking office might have triggered anger resulted in two assassinated attempts by female shooters in CA.
In his last interview with Bob Woodward he mentioned he had to pardon Nixon for the good of the country (which could no longer endure a prolong Watergate trial). Mr. Woodward admitted that we thought we pursued the truth only to find out, the truth lies on the other side (of a dead-end trail).
The multi-facet truth is often times better understood in looking back than forward.
Still good judgment only comes after evaluating, judging and remembering those facts.
(That’s why reporters took a notebook with them). At the outset of dementia, we prefer the haunted over the happy times. After that arduous journey, I remember duffle-bag full of paper currency tossed to the four winds. Memory of a fallen nation. Memory of a father who did not want to join his family (much less keeping it all together as leadership requires).
President Ford kept his nation together (while parting with his cash). In times of need, who do you call ( late 70’s, call the Ghostbusters).
On campus we grew our hair, our cynicism and skepticism (journalism school enrollment went way up) hallmarks of a post-Watergate, post-Vietnam, post-Woodstock era.
We chew on the pain of being betrayed. They (president Thieu and Nixon) had the luxury to fly their furniture and erased tapes ahead of departure, while we, the uninvited foreign labor, fought tooth-and-nail for an unseat (how we wished we had been orphans on the non-crash flight out a few days before).
And so it goes. On this long weekend, we commemorate and commiserate past Presidents, their accomplishments and short-fallings. Presidents are first human, but more on the side of ambition and abuse. Once in a very rare while, number 3 got bumped up and bumping his head against the beam of the Oval Office.
Come to think of it, it’s refreshing to witness better exercises of power like “I have to pardon Nixon”…
Presidential Pardoning Power, well executed, just as the Oath of Office says..
Thang Nguyen 555 