Word: forded
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...great President, F.D.R., and two very good ones, Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower. None of the next six could be put in either of those categories. John Kennedy perhaps had a potential for greatness; the actual accomplishments of his presidency were meager. However, his short presidency and Gerald Ford's short presidency, for all the differences of style, were the best, or least unsuccessful, of the 1960s and 1970s. Lyndon Johnson's Great Society legislation was a noble achievement (though the programs went wildly out of control). But the L.B.J. presidency is forever blighted by the tragic failure...
...must be steady and stable, housing his exceptional combination of gifts within a personality approximately "normal." Among the modern Presidents, the most nearly "normal" personalities are probably Truman, Ike, Ford, Reagan. "I am disgustingly sane," said Ford. It may be significant that Ford and Truman had not aspired to the presidency, and Ike began to think of it only in his late 50s, when he had already won world fame in a job about as big as President. Reagan had had two satisfying careers in the public eye, as actor and after-dinner free-enterprise speaker, before turning to politics...
...Nixon and L.BJ. all won elections (two of them landslides) without being compelling TV personalities. Nixon was excellent on radio. L.B.J. was an overwhehning persuader close in, a gripper of elbows, clutcher of lapels. We have not had high presidential eloquence since Ted Sorensen was writing for J.F.K., though Ford (speechwriter: Robert Hartmann) came close at times, and Reagan, a heavy contributor to his own speeches, can be forceful and moving. The arts of presidential communicating should also include a sense of when to keep quiet. No recent outstanding examples...
...since World War II, is in grave danger of derailment. The cause: a tendency by hard-pressed governments to erect trade barriers in attempts to safeguard their ailing industries at the expense of those of other countries. So serious is the problem that former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford issued a rare joint statement calling for a halt in "the drift toward economic anarchy." In his weekly radio address, President Reagan sounded a similar warning. Said he: "When governments get too involved in [hampering] trade, economic costs increase and disputes multiply. Peace is threatened...
There are a few signs, however, of a revitalization of Soviet studies. The Ford Foundation made grants of $7 million for this academic year, and the Rockefeller Foundation is considering a $2 million program to stimulate Soviet foreign policy studies. Columbia's Russian Institute received last month a $10 million gift from W. Averell Harriman, Ambassador to the Soviet Union from 1943 to 1946. Says Harriman: "Policy that is based on ignorance and illusion is dangerous...