Free Republic

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - In 25 years of interviews with his hometown paper that could only be released upon his death, former President Ford once called Jimmy Carter a "disaster" who ranked alongside Warren Harding, and said Ronald Reagan received far too much credit for ending the Cold War. "It makes me very irritated when Reagan's people pound their chests and say that because we had this big military buildup, the Kremlin collapsed," Ford told The Grand Rapids Press. The best president of his lifetime, Ford said, was a more moderate Republican: Dwight D. Eisenhower. Harry Truman "would get very...

Unlike its network rivals, CBS News did not break into its programming for a special report on former President Ford's death, instead running a printed "crawl" at the bottom of the screen with the news. CBS said Wednesday it is bringing Katie Couric home from an overseas vacation to anchor the "CBS Evening News" on Thursday and any ceremonies for Ford over the weekend. News of the 93-year-old ex-president's death broke shortly before midnight on the East Coast, and during prime time Tuesday in the West. Terry Moran, already at work on ABC News' "Nightline," anchored a special report, and...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Comedian Chevy Chase, who became famous in the 1970s portraying Gerald Ford as an amiable klutz, praised the former president on Wednesday and said they later became friendly in spite of the biting comedy routines. Chase, 63, was an original cast member on the trend-setting late-night comedy television show "Saturday Night Live" and frequently opened the show pretending to be Ford stumbling and falling. The parody in 1975-6 helped reinforce a popular image about Ford's clumsiness, even though the president had been a star athlete in college. "He had never been elected period, so I never...