Saturday, April 19, 2008

"My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over"

That line is probably Gerald Ford's most famous quote. It referred, of course, to the fact that Nixon was no longer president. The guy who wrote it, Robert T. Hartmann, just died. His obituary was in the LA Times (he was originally a reporter for the Times). I found out one tidbit of political historical trivia in the obit: Ford was reluctant to use it, but Hartmann threatened to quit if he didn't.

"Junk all the rest of the speech if you want to, but not that. That is going to be the headline in every paper, the lead in every story. . . . This has been a national nightmare and it's got to be stopped. You're the only one who can" stop it, Hartmann said he told Ford.

That's a great example of an aide willing to tell a president a very uncomfortable truth.

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