First to Speak, The - Hardcover

Taylor, Kristin Clark

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0385425104 ISBN 13: 9780385425100

Publisher: Doubleday, 1993

The former Director of Media Communications for the Bush administration describes her tenure as a member of the White House press office and the challenges she faced as an African-American woman

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From Kirkus Reviews:

In the tradition of soft, self-congratulatory autobiographies, a young former Bush Administration media-relations director reveals the secrets of her success. Taylor--youngest of seven children born to a Detroit factory foreman and a public schoolteacher--attended the Roeper School in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, and so encountered early the ``two worlds'' of African-American urban culture and WASPish power and prestige that she claims to have tried to bring closer to each other in the Bush White House. There are gaps in Taylor's story: It's not clear when or why she became a Republican; and it's somewhat mysterious why--after being recruited for then-Vice President Bush's press office from the editorial board of USA Today, where she was the youngest board member and a columnist--she put aside strong initial reservations and left a promising career in journalism to pursue political p.r. (today, Taylor handles media relations for a large corporation). In the course of three years in the White House (before she suddenly felt that it was time to ``move on''), Taylor became wildly fond of the President--who, we learn, shook hands with (and was vomited on by) her one-year-old son; lavished attention on her proud, dignified parents; frequently intervened with her bosses on her behalf; and contributed a personal check to a foundation set up in her mother's memory. In return, Taylor says, she removed from at least one of Bush's speeches the word ``nigger''; defended his Willie Horton ads among her friends; and introduced him to black publishers. Taylor seems to offer two lessons here: that with strong core values, African- Americans such as herself can do anything they set their minds to; and that the world of powerful white Republican men is a kinder, gentler place than had previously been believed. Harmless--but not particularly riveting or enlightening. (Twenty-four photographs) -- Copyright �1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly:

This inside look at the Bush White House comes from the unique perspective of an African American, conservative, Republican woman. Taylor, the youngest of seven children of a working-class Detroit family, was brought up to excel. Her parents strove to assure that she and her siblings had the best education available. After working at USA Today , she joined the White House staff in 1987, and at age 28 was appointed Vice President Bush's assistant press secretary. When she was named White House Director of Media Relations in the Bush administration, she became the first ever African American woman to hold that post. Taylor explains that she went to the White House because "I wanted to do my part to serve my country." Pages later, these idealistic words ring hollow as she ponders, "Was there an extra spin we needed to try to put on an issue?" We see the White House through her eyes, which, at times, can be both irritating and hilarious: John Sununu is the "plump python"; "Reagan was the ultimate actor who delivered his lines flawlessly"; Bush's people "were more laid-back and less anal-retentive than the Reagan types." Taylor portrays George Bush as an extremely personable and decent human being, but the reader is given little insight into such momentous events of his presidency as the invasion of Panama and Desert Storm. Taylor frequently refers to her own "cultural schizophrenia" (on the one hand, she urges that the word "nigger" be removed from a Bush speech and on the other, she defends the 1988 Willie Horton ad campaign, considered by many to be a blantantly racist attempt to exploit the fears of whites). And this book itself at times seems to be a justification of an administration that was viewed in certain quarters as insensitive to African Americans.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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