The Family: The Real Story of the Bush Dynasty
by Kitty Kelley
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Book Summary Information
Author: Kitty KelleyEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2004-09-14
ISBN: 0385503245
Number of pages: 736
Publisher: Doubleday
Book Reviews of The Family: The Real Story of the Bush Dynasty
Book Review: Kitty speaks!
Summary: 5 Stars
Another reviewer pointed out that if there are actual lies in the book, bush and his family should sue. They won't.
...Good morning to you. Thanks for being here today.
KITTY KELLEY, AUTHOR: Hi, Heidi.
COLLINS: You do make some very unflattering accusations against all of the Bush family. You worked on it for four years.
KELLEY: Four years.
COLLINS: And yet, it all came together just weeks before the general election. Do you have...
KELLEY: Oh, I wish it did all come together that way.
...
COLLINS: Do have you any hopes of actually having an impact on the political elections here?
KELLEY: No, that wasn't the point of writing the book. The point of writing the book was to go beyond this crafted public image of the Bush family to the reality behind them, what they're really like, how they accumulated their wealth, how they accumulated their great power. It is not negative or positive. It just is very, very real.
I'm surprised, though, that the White House is so exorcised about this. My previous books have all been about people who are alive. I don't write about people who are dead. I write only about people who can defend themselves. And each book has stood the test of time, and this one will, too, because everything in it is corroborated.
Also...
COLLINS: ... You write that the president did cocaine at Camp David while his father was president. Let me just ask the question.
You say your source for that was Sharon Bush. And we have heard her publicly deny that she ever said that to you.
In fact, we have the exact quote from Sharon Bush from "The Today Show" with Matt Lauer. It says, "I never saw the use of cocaine. And I am sticking by it. I mean, I have to set the record straight."
"I was stunned. I looked at her and I said, 'Who would ever tell you that?'"
Does it become a problem for you as a writer, as a person, when someone comes out that you say you have spoken to and they say, "Whoa, I didn't say any of that"?
KELLEY: No, it doesn't. It doesn't become a problem at all.
First of all, I never said that she saw George W. do cocaine. I have an independent witness who was sitting at the lunch when she said it.
COLLINS: The independent witness was?
KELLEY: Lou Colace Wagner (ph).
COLLINS: Your agent?
KELLEY: No, hers.
COLLINS: Her agent.
KELLEY: Right. And he has confirmed it.
I then read the notes the next day to my editor, called her on the phone, confirmed it. His name is Peter Gethers (ph). Two independent sources that were there when I went over information.
But I don't blame Sharon Bush. She's scared. People are scared.
COLLINS: Of what?
KELLEY: Of what? Of the family, of the most powerful family in America, of a sitting president, of a former president who has a long and influential reach.
COLLINS: All right. Let's talk about one of the other questions that you had here in your book, the president's time in the National Guard.
Of course, you speculate that he failed to show up for his physical. This was in April of '72. But the reason, you say, was because that was when the Air Force started this random drug testing.
In fact, you write, "While there is no indication that George W. Bush was institutionalized for substance abuse, legitimate speculation arose after he failed to show up in 1972 for his annual physical with the National Guard and was suspended from flying."
You talk about speculation here, but what evidence do you have of that?
KELLEY: Well, first of all, we have George W. Bush himself, who has never, ever denied his cocaine use. He was a drug addict and he was an alcoholic. His substance abuse is a matter of public record. And in this book...
COLLINS: Are you saying that George W. Bush has never denied that he was using drugs while in the Texas National Guard?
KELLEY: I am saying that. He has never, ever denied it. And he could easily settle this whole thing by opening up the flight inquiry board record.
COLLINS: And what would that show?
KELLEY: That would show what happened, why his last recorded flight was in April of 1972, why he couldn't fly again. That would show... COLLINS: Well, I think we're missing one of the main points here, and that is a determination and an (UNINTELLIGIBLE) of the word "speculation" versus evidence. You do see a difference?
KELLEY: No, not in this book.
COLLINS: You don't see a difference between speculation and evidence?
KELLEY: In this book, what is speculated says "legitimate speculation." What is corroborated says "corroborated."
COLLINS: I don't know what legitimate speculation is.
KELLEY: You just read it.
COLLINS: I don't know what it is still.
KELLEY: A legitimate speculation, if someone has a drug problem, has never denied his drug problem. The Air Force is instituting random drug testing. And this man cannot take a physical -- legitimate.
COLLINS: Kitty Kelley, we appreciate your time this morning.
KELLEY: Thank you.
COLLINS: Thanks for being here.
Summary of The Family: The Real Story of the Bush Dynasty
They have wielded enormous financial power and dominated world politics for more than half a century. They have been appointed to positions of great power and have been elected as governors, congressmen, senators and presidents. They have shaped our past and, with our country at war under the leadership of their number one son, they are, more critically than ever, shaping our future.As the Bush family has risen to dominance, so too they have been master orchestrators of their own public image, acting and operating under the shield of privacy their money and status have always afforded them. Until now.
Number One bestselling author and investigative biographer Kitty Kelley has closely examined the lives of Jacqueline Onassis, Nancy Reagan, Frank Sinatra, and the British Royal family. Now the First Lady of unauthorized biography reckons with the first family of the United States?and the result is at once a rich and shocking history and a very human portrait of the world?s most powerful dynasty.
An important work on wealth, power, and class in America, The Family is rich in texture, probing in its psychological insight, revealing in its political and financial detail, and stunning in the patterns that emerge and expose the Bush dynasty as it has never before been exposed. Ms. Kelley takes us back to the origins of the family fortune in the Ohio steel industry at the turn of the last century, through the oil deals and international business associations that have maintained and increased their wealth over the past hundred years. The book leads us through Prescott Bush?s first entrée into government at the state level in 1950s? Connecticut, to George Herbert Walker Bush?s long and winding road to the White House, to his son?s quick sweep into the same office. Along the way, we see the complex relationships the Bushes have had with the giants of the century?Eisenhower, Nixon, Joseph McCarthy, Kissinger, Reagan, Clinton?as well as the often ruthless methods used to realize their goals.
Perhaps most impressive?and surprising?is the way the book delves behind the obsessively protected public image into the family?s intimate private lives: the matriarchs, the mistresses, the marriages, the divorces, the jealousies, the hypocrisies, the golden children, and the black sheep.
At a crucial point in American history, Kitty Kelley is the one person to finally tell all about the family that has, perhaps more than any other, defined our role in the modern world. This is the book the Bushes don?t want you to read. This is The Family.
Kitty Kelley, author of exhaustive and highly unflattering biographies of Frank Sinatra, Jackie Onassis, and the British royal family, among others, has never received much cooperation from her subjects. Likewise, none was given for The First Family: The Real Story of the Bush Dynasty, and it's not hard to understand why. In the book, the family that has produced two presidents as well as an assortment of other politicians, businesspeople, and a number of lesser-known black sheep is portrayed as a powerful empire that leverages wealth and influence to grow ever stronger while stringently covering up numerous instances of drug abuse, infidelity, poor judgment, and scandal. While charges about George W. Bush, including that he snorted cocaine at Camp David while his father was president, garnered the most attention upon the book's release, Kelley's history goes back several generations, detailing the rise to power of Senator Prescott Bush and his son, the first President Bush. Those seeking a salacious peek at the inner sanctum of a wealthy and powerful family will not be disappointed by The First Family--Kelley always delivers on that count--and will likely devour allegations of Barbara Bush's sour temperament, George H.W. Bush's long-standing affair with aide Jennifer Fitzgerald, and George W. Bush's obnoxious drunken frat boy days that stretched, according to Kelley, well into adulthood. Those seeking a rock-solid and airtight indictment of the Bushes, however, will be disappointed, since Kelley leans on anonymous sources and rumors for some of the juicier bits. Interestingly, although it tells the stories of a family built on politics, The First Family mostly avoids the subject, clearing the decks of all political substance in order to put the style on wider display. --John Moe
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