Gerald Ford (with Update)

There's some good stuff over at Washington Monthly with regard to Gerald Ford. This is interesting (via the Washington Post):

Former president Gerald R. Ford said in an embargoed interview in July 2004 that the Iraq war was not justified. "I don't think I would have gone to war," he said a little more than a year after President Bush launched the invasion advocated and carried out by prominent veterans of Ford's own administration.

In a four-hour conversation at his house in Beaver Creek, Colo., Ford "very strongly" disagreed with the current president's justifications for invading Iraq and said he would have pushed alternatives, such as sanctions, much more vigorously. In the tape-recorded interview, Ford was critical not only of Bush but also of Vice President Cheney -- Ford's White House chief of staff -- and then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who served as Ford's chief of staff and then his Pentagon chief.

"Rumsfeld and Cheney and the president made a big mistake in justifying going into the war in Iraq. They put the emphasis on weapons of mass destruction," Ford said. "And now, I've never publicly said I thought they made a mistake, but I felt very strongly it was an error in how they should justify what they were going to do."

And this post by Steve Benen addresses the different styles of Bush and Ford, even though many commentators are now "drawing parallels between Ford's presidency and that of George W. Bush." Ford would "force the strong egos that surrounded him to make their case in person during lengthy White House sessions, where he would constantly question the most minute details."

I have a hard time imagining the Idiot Bush doing the same thing.

UPDATE: The virtuous Bill Bennett isn't all that happy with Gerald Ford these days:

Since "decency" seems to be the watchword of the day and the consensus modifier for Jerry Ford (a view with which I generally concur), may I nevertheless be permitted to ask this: just how decent, how courageous, is what Jerry Ford did with Bob Woodward? He slams Bush & Cheney to Woodward in 2004, but asks Woodward not to print the interview until he's dead. If he felt so strongly about his words having a derogatory affect, how about telling Woodward not to run the interview until after Bush & Cheney are out of office? The effect of what Ford did is to protect himself, ensuring he can't be asked by others about his critiques, ensuring that there can be no dialogue. The way Ford does it with Woodward, he doesn't have to defend himself...he simply drops it into Bob Woodward's tape recorder and let's the bomb go off when fully out of range, himself. This is not courage, this is not decent. The manly or more decent options are these: 1. Say it to Bush's or Cheney's face and allow them and us to engage the point while you're around, or 2. Far more decently, say nothing critical of Bush will be on the record until his presidency is over. There's a 3. Don't say anything critical of George Bush to Bob Woodward at all.

You're a former President Mr. Ford, show a little more decency to the incumbent who is in a very, very tough place and trying to do the right thing....you may recall those days and positions yourself.

Although I wish that President Ford would have spoken up publicly in July 2004, I can understand why he decided not to. Kagro X at Daily Kos sums it up this way:

* * * Ford's comments were embargoed precisely because it was already impossible to have an honest dialogue about opposition to the war in this country before he ever made them.

What does it say about the American political climate when a Republican ex-president -- a 90+ year old man, by the way, who hasn't been moving in DC circles for years -- feels intimidated in expressing his views on the biggest and most important issue of the day?

Yes, there's a tradition of ex-presidents holding their tongues. And yes, Bennett is astute enough to recognize that the terms of Ford's embargo are very pointedly not aimed at preserving that tradition. But if that wasn't the point of the embargo, then what was it? Clearly if it wasn't just outright fear, it was at least Ford's anticipation -- and one that's obviously quite correct given this "administration's" track record -- of the headache of harassment and smearing he'd be in for, for daring to express his doubts and opposition. * * *

I have a question -- exactly how many prominent Republicans were openly criticizing Bush's Iraq policy back in July of 2004? I think two of them were, but it might have been as many as three.