Posted on 12/27/2006 3:01:51 PM PST by wagglebee
WASHINGTON -- Over the past several years, Bob Woodward has been secretly interviewing Gerald R. Ford for a book to be published after the former president's death.
Woodward confirmed to NewsMax that he spent "many hours" interviewing Ford on condition that his comments appear after his death. In some cases, when Woodward interviewed key government figures for his latest book, "State of Denial," he asked about Ford as well.
Ford died Tuesday at his home in Rancho Mirage, Calif., where Woodward conducted most of the interviews.
Woodward said today that excerpts from his interviews with Ford will begin running in The Washington Post tomorrow. He said he is "not sure" whether the material will be his next book. However, Woodward has been telling Bush administration insiders the interviews with Ford and key government figures were for his next book.
In the forthcoming account, Woodward will address whether Ford made a deal with Richard Nixon to resign as president in return for the pardon Ford granted him on Sept. 8, 1974 for all federal crimes he had "committed or may have committed" when he was in the White House.
Woodward told me he covered that question in his book "Shadow: Five Presidents and the Legacy of Watergate." That book revealed that Nixon's chief of staff, Alexander Haig, entered Ford's office on Aug. 1, 1974 while Ford was still vice president and Nixon had yet to resign.
Haig listed pardon options, including leaving office in return for an agreement that the new president would pardon him. Ford never accepted the offer from Haig and later decided to pardon Nixon on his own terms, Woodward said in the book, which came out in June 1999.
Last April, Woodward gave a talk at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library in Ann Arbor, Mich., commemorating the 25th anniversary of the library. The library is located on the north campus of the University of Michigan, Ford's alma mater.
Woodward told the audience the pardon came as a surprise. The Washington Post reporter, then 31, was in a New York City hotel room when his Watergate colleague Carl Bernstein called him.
"The son of a bitch pardoned the son of a bitch," Bernstein told him.
Immediately, Woodward imagined Nixon and Ford had struck a backroom deal in which the disgraced president would resign and the vice president would take his place in exchange for a full pardon.
"It looked like the continuation of Watergate rather than the end of Watergate," Woodward said in the talk.
Woodward said he grew to admire Ford for his openness — a trait he sees as lacking in the Bush administration. As evidence, he cited Ford's first State of the Union address in 1975. In the speech, Ford spoke bluntly about the economic troubles of the nation, saying "the state of the union is not good."
Woodward said Ford once allowed a reporter from The New York Times to shadow him for a week, day and night.
"Can you imagine Bill Clinton doing that?" Woodward asked. But Woodward said Ford still has an incorrect view of Watergate, believing Nixon's top deputies were more to blame for the misuse of presidential power.
"He did not understand Watergate or Nixon, in my view," Woodward said.
Woodward said that 20 years after leaving office, Ford told him that spin doctors from both parties should be banished from the White House.
"Suppose they did that in the White House today," Woodward said in the talk. "What would they do with all the vacant office space?"
Woodward won the Gerald R. Ford Prize for Distinguished Reporting on the Presidency in 2003.
...Is Woodward, trying to compete w/ John Edwards? ....the T.V. Show Host...and/or Frm. Breck Girl / Vice Pres. Cand. / N.C. Senator
I hope Gerald Ford left plenty of documents behind so that Bob Woodward can't morph his opinion into that of President Ford.
And many happy returns.
...when all laws of libel and slander expire and no longer apply.
Including my tax return.
Yes, I was making an oblique reference to that very famous Woodwardistic moment.
Oh boy, here we go.... I can't wait to hear what unbelievable scoops Ford whispered to Woddward from his deathbed.
Pompous ass.
The obvious question is: Why wouldn't Ford simply dictate his memoirs into a.... whatever? Dictaphone. In his own voice.
Do you think that Woodward thinks that he is fooling anybody anymore?
Woodward's ambition is far greater than Nixon's ever was.
Why did you qualify the question?
Uh-huh. Sounds like Scrappleface to me. Sadly, Woodward is probably really doing this.
This can't be real damaging to Republicans. If it was it would not be released until 3 weeks before an election.
Note to the Beltway genius types. I am really tired of Woodward. Let him off his leash and scratch his belly for the last time.
No joke. Woodward was just waiting until there was only a dead man to respond to whatever lies he spins.
He's a regular "Ghost Whisper." I understand he's planning to write a book about his secret interview with Abe Lincoln next.
Well, the cocaine dealer Clinton half-brother seemed like a decent guy, in comparison.
Good point!
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