WP: Ford, Nixon Sustained Friendship for Decades

[kskiska]

By Bob Woodward
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, December 29, 2006; Page A01

Months before Richard M. Nixon set a relatively unknown Michigan congressman named Gerald R. Ford on the path to the White House, Nixon turned to Ford, who called himself the embattled president's "only real friend," to get him out of trouble.

During one of the darkest days of the Watergate scandal, Nixon secretly confided in Ford, at the time the House minority leader. He begged for help. He complained about fair-weather friends and swore at perceived rivals in his own party. "Tell the guys, goddamn it, to get off their ass and start fighting back," Nixon pleaded with Ford in one call recorded by the president's secret taping system.

And Ford did. "Anytime you want me to do anything, under any circumstances, you give me a call, Mr. President," he told Nixon during that May 1, 1973, conversation. "We'll stand by you morning, noon and night."

more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/28/AR2006122801247.html

[stevedeshazer]

1. Woodward is clearly delusional. Gerald Ford healed America!

Um. Didn't he?

[antiimperialist]

2. Putting buddies ahead of America

I'm disappointed in Ford.

[Raine]

3. Carter and Ford also

sustained a friendship for years, so do Poppy and Clinton. Former Presidents all seem to be buddy buddy after leaving office.