Why there aren't millions of us encamped around the White House with torches and pitchforks is a mystery. Soon? This nation can't take another two years of this insane treason.

Because half the country is made of right wing morons and the other half is afraid. Look what happened to Cindy Sheenan.

In 2004, when he talked to Woodward, the war was an election issue and Ford probably thought it likely his voice would have simply been ignored, with the White House accusing him of spending too much time hanging around with Jimmy Carter. After all, Ron Reagan’s appearance at the Democratic Convention had little effect.

But as John of Gaunt puts it in “Henry II” (note by the way, how well the Duke of York describes President Bush):

Will the king come, that I may breathe my last

In wholesome counsel to his unstaid youth?

Duke of York:

Vex not yourself, nor strive not with your breath;

For all in vain comes counsel to his ear.

John of Gaunt:

O, but they say the tongues of dying men

Enforce attention like deep harmony:

Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain,

For they breathe truth that breathe their words in pain.

He that no more must say is listen'd more

Than they whom youth and ease have taught to glose;

More are men's ends mark'd than their lives before:

The setting sun, and music at the close,

As the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last,

Writ in remembrance more than things long past:

Though Richard my life's counsel would not hear,

My death's sad tale may yet undeaf his ear.

Ford could clearly see that the war would drag on and that it would outlive him. So a minor note of protest in 2004, quickly buried in RNC inspired talk radio vituperation, suddenly becomes front page news on the Washington Post – and around the world. Ironically, a thundering dissent that becomes Gerald Ford’s proverbial last words – and just as Bush is about to escalate the war.

By the way, this passage leads into the “Sceptered Isle” speech, the last and least quoted part of which goes:

This land of such dear souls, this dear dear land,

Dear for her reputation through the world,

Is now leased out, I die pronouncing it,

Like to a tenement or pelting farm:

England, bound in with the triumphant sea

Whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege

Of watery Neptune, is now bound in with shame,

With inky blots and rotten parchment bonds:

That England, that was wont to conquer others,

Hath made a shameful conquest of itself.

Ah, would the scandal vanish with my life,

How happy then were my ensuing death!

Gerry Ford and Shakespeare, perfect together.

Yet another in the endless parade of Asshole Cassandra Statesman who, years late, when it's all gone into the shit, come out and crow "See! I was against all this from the start!!"

Well fuck you and the cabal of comicbook shitheads you spawned. Fall down some stairs in Hell, Gerry. Regret THAT.

And while we're on task, let's review:

Unelected Vice President and President

Former Warren Commission member

Shortest Presidency of the 20th Century

Cried for reconciliation and then fought Congress every day

Pardoned Nixon

Threw Rockfeller to the wolves

Opened the door for Reagan

Opened the door for Carter, another failure

Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz.....

You couldn't smash the ship into the iceberg any harder if you tried.

Great stuff!

I knew these traitors to everything America stands for had been doing their damage for a long time, but this put it in good perspective.

Thanks!

Three criminals enjoying a laugh at our expense.

Bush and Cheney praised President Ford for his pardoning of Nixon as a reflection of their desire to have the crimes that they have commited somehow absolved. While that mechanism exists in domestic law, it does not in international law, where their collective crimes against humanity and crimes against the peace should be tried. Perhaps, that is why the Bush family bought up land in Paraguay, hoping to elude the long arm of extradition. As I am against the death penalty, I hope that they are simply put in jail, as opposed to having their necks snapped while listening to the taunts and hatred of their enemies.

It just occurred to me that it takes more talent to be elected president, or to any other office, than to be one of these conniving, Randian, behind the scenes types like Rumsfeld, Cheney (pre-VPOTUS), Rove, Wolfowitz, et. al.

To be elected, you have to be able to convince anywhere from tens of thousands to tens of millions of people to vote for you. To be "the power behind the throne" so to speak, you only have to bullshit to guy who went out and got elected.

While Ford had the talent to win 13 straight House elections, he didn't have the talent - or let's be honest, the ambition - to be elected on a national ticket. His "The Soviet Union does not dominate the Eastern Bloc" flub during the '76 debate was proof of this. But then again, if it was maybe 10 or 12 years later, that same statement would've been seen as brilliantly prophetic. I guess it's all in the timing.

What a creepy photo. I am often amazed at how a small group of men have managed to stay close to the levers of American power (especially the CIA and military) since at least the Nixon years. George H.W. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Scowcroft, Baker. Especially given some of the colassal screw-ups they've been involved in. It's scary.

While Ford had the talent to win 13 straight House elections, he didn't have the talent - or let's be honest, the ambition - to be elected on a national ticket. His "The Soviet Union does not dominate the Eastern Bloc" flub during the '76 debate was proof of this. But then again, if it was maybe 10 or 12 years later, that same statement would've been seen as brilliantly prophetic. I guess it's all in the timing...

...or a broken clock is right twice a day.