First, Do No Harm

I've never been a Republican, nor did I vote for Gerald Ford when I cast my first vote at age 18 in 1976. Yet, I respected him and I see his passing as representing the end of an era. He was one of the last of the generation of old school moderate Republicans, the type of Republican that we need in Washington today.

Ford was a regular guy, who hadn't sought glory, nor was elected to be President. Yet he stood up and did his duty to help the country move forward after the debacle of Watergate. Many criticized him, then and now, for pardoning Nixon, but he wasn't afraid to make an unpopular decision and stick with it, even though it probably cost him being elected in his own right in 1976.

I was in high school during the Ford years and I remember that time as one of general stability. He didn't do anything momentous while president, but neither did he do any harm. Returning the nation to stability after a time of great turmoil will likely be how history most remembers Gerald Ford.