Gerald Ford and the Cover-Up

[Michael Hogan]

"Mushrooms":----KIDFOHS--------Kept in Dark, Fed only Horsexxxx:-----The Son Tay Raiders!

Blame it on "faulty intelligence."

[Myra Bronstein]

More from the book intro of "Misplaced Loyalties: The Assassinations of Marilyn Monroe & the Kennedy Brothers" by Victor E. Justice (pseudonym). More discussed at: http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.ph...amp;#entry80655

"President Ford had pardoned his predecessor, Richard Nixon, the man who had appointed Ford as President of the United States, for crimes he committed, or may have committed. When in history has a man received a presidential pardon for undiscovered crimes? What could Nixon have done that required such a carte blanche pardon; perhaps some assassinations?

...

Prior to 1976, political assassinations were not considered illegal in America. It was not until 1976 that President Gerald Ford issued Executive Order number 11905 stating, "No employee of the United States Government shall engage in, or conspire to engage in, political assassination.

...

Ask yourself why President Gerald Ford signed an executive order making it illegal for the United States to commit assassinations for political purposes. Think about how the Constitution contains a motive for murder, in that upon the death of the President of the United States, the vice-president ascends immediately to the presidency without the evaluative process of an election."

http://www.trafford.com/4dcgi/robots/05-1804.html

I haven't double checked the "facts." But of interest to me is the "fact" that Nixon was pardoned for crimes he may have committed. This is a clincher, not that I needed one.

Also, given LBJ's legal problems with Baker/Estes, the VP was probably the safest place for him. Safer than being a private citizen, a VP, a Senator... again not that I needed a clincher.

And, of course Ford didn't seem to have a problem with killing presidents until he was one.

[David S. Brownlee]

The game is now changing. IMO because the "Democrats" are going to put a stop to some things. My "Dem" is a previous Secretary of the Navy. He's a Dem like I'm an astronaut.

But the smarter folks are gonna get things a right.

[John Simkin]

When Spiro Agnew resigned in October, 1973, President Richard Nixon appointed Ford as his new vice-president. He became president when Nixon was also forced to resign over the Watergate Scandal in August, 1974. Ford therefore became the first man in history to become the president of the United States without having been elected as either president or vice president.

Ford nominated Nelson Rockefeller as his vice president. During his confirmation hearings it was revealed that over the years he had made large gifts of money to government officials such as Henry Kissinger.

On 8th September, 1974, Ford controversially granted Richard Nixon a full pardon "for all offences against the United States" that might have been committed while in office. The pardon brought an end all criminal prosecutions that Nixon might have had to face concerning the Watergate Scandal.

In December, 1974, Seymour Hersh of the New York Times, published a series of articles claiming that the Central Intelligence Agency had been guilty of illegal activities. In his memoirs, Ford said that he feared a congressional investigation would result in "unnecessary disclosures" that could "cripple" the CIA. He and his aides quickly decided that he needed to prevent an independent congressional investigation. He therefore appointed Nelson Rockefeller to head his own investigation into these allegations.

Other members of the Rockefeller Commission included C. Douglas Dillon, Ronald Reagan, John T. Connor, Edgar F. Shannon, Lyman L. Lemmitzer, and Erwin N. Griswold. Executive Director of the task-force was David W. Belin, the former counsel to the Warren Commission and leading supporter of the magic bullet theory. In 1973 Berlin had published his book, November 22, 1963: You are the Jury, in which he defended the Warren Report as an historic, "unshakeable" document.

In her book, Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations of the CIA and FBI, Kathryn S. Olmsted, wrote: "His choice for chairman, Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, had served as a member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, which monitored the CIA. Members Erwin Griswold, Lane Kirkland, Douglas Dillon, and Ronald Reagan had all been privy to CIA secrets in the past or noted for their strong support of governmental secrecy."

The journalist, Joseph Kraft, argued that he feared that the Rockefeller report would not end "the terrible doubts which continue to eat away at the nation." This was reflected in public opinion polls taken at the time. Only 33% had confidence in the Rockefeller Commission and 43% believed that the commission would turn into "another cover-up".

At a meeting with some senior figures at the New York Times, including Arthur O. Sulzberger and A. M. Rosenthal, President Gerald Ford let slip the information that the CIA had been involved in conspiracies to assassinate political leaders. He immediately told them that this information was off the record. This story was leaked to the journalist Daniel Schorr who reported the story on CBS News. As Schorr argued in his autobiography, Staying Tuned: " President Ford moved swiftly to head off a searching congressional investigation by extending the term of the Rockefeller commission and adding the assassination issue to its agenda."

Rockefeller's report was published in 1975. It included information on some CIA abuses. As David Corn pointed out in Blond Ghost: "the President's panel revealed that the CIA had tested LSD on unsuspecting subjects, spied on American dissidents, physically abused a defector, burgled and bugged without court orders, intercepted mail illegally, and engaged in plainly unlawful conduct". The report also produced details about MKULTRA, a CIA mind control project.

Rockefeller also included an 18-page section on the assassination of John F. Kennedy (Allegations Concerning the Assassination of John F. Kennedy). A large part of the report was taken up with examining the cases of E. Howard Hunt and Frank Sturgis. This was as a result of both men being involved in the Watergate Scandal. The report argued that a search of agency records showed that Sturgis had never been a CIA agent, informant or operative. The commission also accepted the word of both men that they were not in Dallas on the day of the assassination.

The Rockefeller Commission also looked at the possibility that John F. Kennedy had been fired at by more than one gunman. After a brief summary of the Warren Commission (1964) and the Ramsay Clark Panel (1968) investigations, Rockefeller concluded: "On the basis of the investigation conducted by its staff, the Commission believes that there is no evidence to support the claim that President Kennedy was struck by a bullet fired from either the grassy knoll or any other position to his front, right front or right side, and that the motions of the President's head and body, following the shot that struck him in the head, are fully consistent with that shot having come from a point to his rear, above him and slightly to his right."

Nelson Rockefeller also looked at the possible connections between E. Howard Hunt, Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby and the CIA. He claimed that there was no "credible evidence" that Oswald or Ruby were CIA agents or informants. Nor did Hunt ever have contact with Oswald. The report argues: "Hunt's employment record with the CIA indicated that he had no duties involving contacts with Cuban exile elements or organizations inside or outside the United States after the early months of 1961... Hunt and Sturgis categorically denied that they had ever met or known Oswald or Ruby. They further denied that they ever had any connections whatever with either Oswald or Ruby."

This section of the report reached the following conclusions: "Numerous allegations have been made that the CIA participated in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The Commission staff investigated these allegations. On the basis of the staff's investigation, the Commission concluded there was no credible evidence of any CIA involvement."

The report was condemned as a cover-up. Dr. Cyril H. Wecht accused the Rockefeller Commission of "deliberately distorting and suppressing" part of his testimony as to the nature of Kennedy's head and neck wounds. Wecht demanded that a full transcript of his testimony be released. Rockefeller refused on the grounds that the commission proceedings were confidential.

Dissatisfaction with the report resulted in other investigations into the CIA taking place. This included those led by Frank Church, Richard Schweiker, Louis Stokes, Lucien Nedzi and Otis Pike.

[John Simkin]

I highly recommend Kathryn S. Olmsted's book, Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations of the CIA and FBI (1996). She teaches at the University of California and is currently writing a book called Governing Conspiracies: Conspiracy Theories about the U.S. Government from World War I to the present. I think I will ask her to join the forum. This is what she has to say about Ford and the Rockefeller Commission.

Beyond his ideological reasons for opposing a CIA investigation, Ford was also influenced by partisan and institutional considerations. Hersh's initial stories had accused Richard Nixon's CIA of domestic spying - not Lyndon Johnson's CIA or John Kennedy's CIA. If, indeed, the improprieties took place on the Republicans' watch, then too much attention to these charges could hasten the GOP's post-Watergate slide and boost the careers of crusading Democrats. Ford also opposed wide-ranging investigations because he felt responsible for protecting the presidency. "I was absolutely dedicated to doing whatever I could to restore the rightful prerogatives of the presidency under the constitutional system," he recalls. His aides list Ford's renewal of presidential power after Watergate as one of the greatest achievements of his administration. This lifelong conservative believed that he had a duty to control the congressional investigators and restore the honor of his new office.

Within days of Hersh's first story, Ford's aides recommended that he set up an executive branch investigative commission to avoid "finding ourselves whipsawed by prolonged Congressional hearings." In a draft memo to the president written on 27 December, Deputy Chief of Staff Richard Cheney explained that the president had several reasons to establish such a commission: to avoid being put on the defensive, to minimize "damage" to the CIA, to head off "Congressional efforts to further encroach on the executive branch," to demonstrate presidential leadership, and to reestablish Americans' faith in their government.

Ford's aides cautioned that this commission, formally called the Commission on CIA Activities within the United States, must not appear to be "a 'kept' body designed to whitewash the problem." But Ford apparently did not follow this advice. His choice for chairman, Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, had served as a member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, which monitored the CIA. Members Erwin Griswold, Lane Kirkland, Douglas Dillon, and Ronald Reagan had all been privy to CIA secrets in the past or noted for their strong support of governmental secrecy.

In a revealing move, the president also appointed General Lyman Lemnitzer, the same chairman of the Joint Chiefs whose office in 1962 had been charged by Congressman Jerry Ford with a "totalitarian" attempt to suppress information. In short, Ford's commissioners did not seem likely to conduct an aggressive investigation. Of the "true-blue ribbon" panel's eight members, only John Connor, a commerce secretary under Lyndon Johnson, and Edgar Shannon, a former president of the University of Virginia, brought open minds to the inquiry, according to critics.

Many congressmen, including GOP senators Howard Baker and Lowell Weicker, found the commission inadequate. Some supporters of the CIA, such as columnist Joseph Kraft, worried that many Americans would view the commission as part of a White House cover-up. Although Kraft personally admired the commissioners, he feared that their findings would not be credible and therefore would not reduce "the terrible doubts which continue to eat away at the nation." A public opinion poll confirmed these reservations. Forty-nine percent of the people surveyed by Louis Harris believed that an executive commission would be too influenced by the White House, compared with 35 percent who supported Ford's action. A clear plurality - 43 percent - believed that the commission would turn into "another cover-up," while 33 percent had confidence in the commission and 24 percent were unsure. The New York Times editorial board, also suspicious of the panel, urged congressmen not to allow the commission to "become a pretext to delay or circumscribe their own independent investigation." A week later, the Times again reminded Congress of its duty to conduct a "long, detailed" examination of the intelligence community: "Three decades is too long for any public institution to function without a fundamental reappraisal

of its role."

[John Simkin]

Gerald Ford died on December 26, 2006. It is interesting to do a search at Google for Ford. Number one is Wikipedia (it is even higher than official government websites on Ford. (See debate on the power of Wikipedia).

It of course does not include any information on how in 1997 the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) released a document that revealed that Ford had altered the first draft of the report to read: "A bullet had entered the base of the back of his neck slightly to the right of the spine." Ford had elevated the location of the wound from its true location in the back to the neck to support the single bullet theory.

I have added my biography of Ford to Wikipedia's links section. It will be interesting how long it stays there.

[John Simkin]

I have also included this passage to the Wikipedia entry. Again, I wonder how long it will stay there:

In his later years new documents emerged that suggested that Ford had played a vital role in the cover-up of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The original first draft of the Warren Commission Report stated that a bullet had entered Kennedy's "back at a point slightly above the shoulder and to the right of the spine." Ford realized that this provided a serious problem for the single bullet theory. As Michael L. Kurtz has pointed out (The JFK Assassination Debates, 2006, page 85): "If a bullet fired from the sixth-floor window of the Depository building nearly sixty feet higher than the limousine entered the president's back, with the president sitting in an upright position, it could hardly have exited from his throat at a point just above the Adam's apple, then abruptly change course and drive downward into Governor Connally's back."

In 1997 the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) released a document that revealed that Ford had altered the first draft of the report to read: "A bullet had entered the base of the back of his neck slightly to the right of the spine." Ford had elevated the location of the wound from its true location in the back to the neck to support the single bullet theory.

[John Simkin]

I have also included this passage to the Wikipedia entry. Again, I wonder how long it will stay there:

In his later years new documents emerged that suggested that Ford had played a vital role in the cover-up of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The original first draft of the Warren Commission Report stated that a bullet had entered Kennedy's "back at a point slightly above the shoulder and to the right of the spine." Ford realized that this provided a serious problem for the single bullet theory. As Michael L. Kurtz has pointed out (The JFK Assassination Debates, 2006, page 85): "If a bullet fired from the sixth-floor window of the Depository building nearly sixty feet higher than the limousine entered the president's back, with the president sitting in an upright position, it could hardly have exited from his throat at a point just above the Adam's apple, then abruptly change course and drive downward into Governor Connally's back."

In 1997 the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) released a document that revealed that Ford had altered the first draft of the report to read: "A bullet had entered the base of the back of his neck slightly to the right of the spine." Ford had elevated the location of the wound from its true location in the back to the neck to support the single bullet theory.

This has already been removed from Wikipedia. How can they justify this behaviour?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Ford

[Dawn Meredith]

I have also included this passage to the Wikipedia entry. Again, I wonder how long it will stay there:

In his later years new documents emerged that suggested that Ford had played a vital role in the cover-up of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The original first draft of the Warren Commission Report stated that a bullet had entered Kennedy's "back at a point slightly above the shoulder and to the right of the spine." Ford realized that this provided a serious problem for the single bullet theory. As Michael L. Kurtz has pointed out (The JFK Assassination Debates, 2006, page 85): "If a bullet fired from the sixth-floor window of the Depository building nearly sixty feet higher than the limousine entered the president's back, with the president sitting in an upright position, it could hardly have exited from his throat at a point just above the Adam's apple, then abruptly change course and drive downward into Governor Connally's back."

In 1997 the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) released a document that revealed that Ford had altered the first draft of the report to read: "A bullet had entered the base of the back of his neck slightly to the right of the spine." Ford had elevated the location of the wound from its true location in the back to the neck to support the single bullet theory.

This has already been removed from Wikipedia. How can they justify this behaviour?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Ford

Beacuse they are the Mocking bird of the Net. Disgusting. Sounds like the are monitered 24/7.

Dawn

[Jack White]

What other conspirators (crime and coverup) are still living? Arlen Specter, Ladybird and...?

Who is now in charge of keeping the coverup alive...and why?

Jack

Edited December 27, 2006 by Jack White

[Guest John Gillespie]

It would be nice to think that Ford might consider clearing his conscience in his dotage but there's no chance.

__________________________

Mark,

Good idea. Maybe a Gerald Ford clinic - or perhaps a Gerald Ford Wing of his widow's clinic - ought to be founded for the ethically challenged. One can only delight in the court-mandated referrals that might have been. Nonetheless...

Gerald Ford, Requiescat In Pace,

Regards,

JG

[Dawn Meredith]

What other conspirators (crime and coverup) are still living? Arlen Specter, Ladybird and...?

Who is now in charge of keeping the coverup alive...and why?

Jack

E Howard is still hanging on.

Why? Because they never want the truth revealed. The conspirators passed on their power and

will continue to, from generation to generation. Unless a Grand Jury forces otherwise.

Dawn

[David Collins]

A bit of formatting will increase the probability of a text to last a little longer. Still curious how long it will remain online now.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...;oldid=96748602

Rest in peace, loyal boyscout who made a career out of covering up for others. Gerald wasn't entirely evil like LBJ, Nixon, Poppy and Dubya, but was more a clean and cover up artist with little or no original plans as was clear during his presidency which could only be described as dull, grey and maintaining the status quo without any original plans whatsoever.

Then again covering up seems to be very good for one's career, because Bill Clinton got the job because he looked the other way at Mena were the CIA was importing massive amounts of cocaine to finance George H.W. Bush's Iran-Contra. Why did they try to impeach him for a blow job when there was a snow job as well or was it because he worked with George H.W. Bush and the CIA on that little affair.

Since Dubya will probably be succeeded by Hillary Clinton (2008) and Rudi "WTC" Giuliani (2016), we'll only have Carter so my request to John Simkin is not go skull digging in Jimmy Carter's career, because he'll be the only half decent president in the Era of Rogue Presidents (1963 - 2024).

Edited December 27, 2006 by David Collins

[David Collins]

Rest in peace, loyal boyscout who made a career out of covering up for others. Gerald wasn't entirely evil like LBJ, Nixon, Poppy and Dubya, but was more a clean and cover up artist with little or no original plans as was clear during his presidency which could only be described as dull, grey and maintaining the status quo without any original plans whatsoever.

Then again covering up seems to be very good for one's career, because Bill Clinton got the job because he looked the other way at Mena were the CIA was importing massive amounts of cocaine to finance George H.W. Bush's Iran-Contra. Why did they try to impeach him for a blow job when there was a snow job as well or was it because he worked with George H.W. Bush and the CIA on that little affair.

Since Dubya will probably be succeeded by Hillary Clinton (2008) and Rudi "WTC" Giuliani (2016), we'll only have Carter so my request to John Simkin is not go skull digging in Jimmy Carter's career, because he'll be the only half decent president in the Era of Rogue Presidents (1963 - 2024).

[Myra Bronstein]

I highly recommend Kathryn S. Olmsted's book, Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations of the CIA and FBI (1996). She teaches at the University of California and is currently writing a book called Governing Conspiracies: Conspiracy Theories about the U.S. Government from World War I to the present. I think I will ask her to join the forum. This is what she has to say about Ford and the Rockefeller Commission.

Beyond his ideological reasons for opposing a CIA investigation, Ford was also influenced by partisan and institutional considerations. Hersh's initial stories had accused Richard Nixon's CIA of domestic spying - not Lyndon Johnson's CIA or John Kennedy's CIA. If, indeed, the improprieties took place on the Republicans' watch, then too much attention to these charges could hasten the GOP's post-Watergate slide and boost the careers of crusading Democrats. Ford also opposed wide-ranging investigations because he felt responsible for protecting the presidency. "I was absolutely dedicated to doing whatever I could to restore the rightful prerogatives of the presidency under the constitutional system," he recalls. His aides list Ford's renewal of presidential power after Watergate as one of the greatest achievements of his administration. This lifelong conservative believed that he had a duty to control the congressional investigators and restore the honor of his new office.

Within days of Hersh's first story, Ford's aides recommended that he set up an executive branch investigative commission to avoid "finding ourselves whipsawed by prolonged Congressional hearings." In a draft memo to the president written on 27 December, Deputy Chief of Staff Richard Cheney explained that the president had several reasons to establish such a commission: to avoid being put on the defensive, to minimize "damage" to the CIA, to head off "Congressional efforts to further encroach on the executive branch," to demonstrate presidential leadership, and to reestablish Americans' faith in their government.

Ford's aides cautioned that this commission, formally called the Commission on CIA Activities within the United States, must not appear to be "a 'kept' body designed to whitewash the problem." But Ford apparently did not follow this advice. His choice for chairman, Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, had served as a member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, which monitored the CIA. Members Erwin Griswold, Lane Kirkland, Douglas Dillon, and Ronald Reagan had all been privy to CIA secrets in the past or noted for their strong support of governmental secrecy.

In a revealing move, the president also appointed General Lyman Lemnitzer, the same chairman of the Joint Chiefs whose office in 1962 had been charged by Congressman Jerry Ford with a "totalitarian" attempt to suppress information.

...

Furthermore, Lemnitzer is the guy President Kennedy apparently canned over the Operation Northwoods plans which were finally implemented on 911:

"In March 1962, Lyman L. Lemnitzer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, presented the Operation Northwoods plan to President John Kennedy and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara. The plan was rejected. Lemnitzer then sought to destroy all evidence of the plan. [baltimore Sun, 4/24/2001; ABC News, 5/1/2001] Lemnitzer was replaced a few months later, but the Joint Chiefs continued to plan “pretext” operations at least through 1963. [ABC News, 5/1/2001] One suggestion in the plan was to create a remote-controlled drone duplicate of a real civilian aircraft. The real aircraft would be loaded with “selected passengers, all boarded under carefully prepared aliases,” and then take off with the drone duplicate simultaneously taking off near by. The aircraft with passengers would secretly land at a US military base while the drone continues along the other plane’s flight path. The drone would then be destroyed over Cuba in a way that places the blame on Cuban fighter aircraft. [Harper's, 7/1/2001] Bamford says, “Here we are, 40 years afterward, and it’s only now coming out. You just wonder what is going to be exposed 40 years from now.” [insight, 7/30/2001] Some 9/11 skeptics will claim that the 9/11 attacks could have been orchestrated by elements of the US government, and see Northwoods as an example of how top US officials could hatch such a plot. [Oakland Tribune, 3/27/2004]"

http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/entity....an_l._lemnitzer