How do you feel about Ford's decision to pardon Nixon?

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It set the precedent that POTUS is a figure that operates above the law. Not good!

All the defences of it deeply disturb me in their implication.

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Of course, the courtesy that applies to letting top dogs get off scot-free doesn't apparently apply to the Republican Party. They has no problems in the 90's of Ken Starr magnifying the sleaze and sexual depravity of the Clinton administration into a Watergate tier scandal.

Meanwhile, the post-watergate precedent of allowing the President and his staff off on actual crimes has continued to mire other cases. Look at Iran-Contra - a scandal that showed the White House, the intelligence agencies and military in a clear treasonous conspiracy with full knowledge of Bush Sr and probable knowledge of the St Ronnie of Reagan. Look at the actions committed by the Bush Jr admin covering up their actions, and how willing Obama was to say "ah well, that's all in the past now, no lessons to be drawn from here". To a certain extent, a similar precedent was used to let off Wall Street after their actions led to the largest recession since the 30's. Ford's pardon enshrined as legal precedent that if you are powerful, people will just let you off breaking the law. It didn't make people "less angry" or "less distrustful in government", it just caused the waters to be ever further muddied.

The really alarming thing is how so many Americans are willing to treat their president as some manner of elected absolute monarch, and that the "symbol of the country" being arrested is equivelent to the Parliamentarians beheading Charles I. Just saying, but if you really think the entire system will collapse because a crook goes to jail, it's probably not a system worth saving.