An Officer And A Gentleman

“Honor and shame from no condition rise. Act well your part: there all the honor lies.”
—Alexander Pope

President Gerald R. Ford died the day after Christmas, 2006.

A kinder, gentler president this country never had. To look on the smiling visage of the young naval officer in 1944 one would never surmise that he would be vaulted into the presidency over a series of bizarre occurrences, handed a can of worms by the country and ridiculed by a man who would create his career by performing pratfalls at the president’s expense.

He had to be a big man to pardon the Machiavellian monster, R.M. Nixon simply to get on with the business of state. He was lucky to get out of Washington intact. He may have been the last honorable president this country ever had.

The good, the innocent, the naive, the sincere are often duped or betrayed by those who survive them.