The Quiet Man

May 4, 2015
Sununu, an engineering dean at Tufts University and three-term governor of New Hampshire, became President George H.W. Bush's White House chief of staff after playing a key role in the contentious 1988 New Hampshire primary. Since leaving government, he has been a prominent talking head on cable television. This chronicle recounts the 1989â1993 Bush presidency. It's easy to see why Bush and Sununu got along in respective roles as Good Cop and Bad Cop. Both were smart, capable technocrats. Bush was calm and personable; Sununu was protective, brusque, and partisan. The author's loyalty to his former boss is absolute, unswerving, and reverential. He witnessed profoundly important transitions in geopolitics, including the Gulf War and fall of the Soviet Union, recounted here in valuable detail. Readers encounter Margaret Thatcher and Mikhail Gorbachev working behind the scenes during the collapse of the USSR. They also encounter the riveting backstory to Operation Desert Storm. Supporting players in this account include Brent Scowcroft, George Mitchell, Bob Dole, Richard Darman, and Tom Foley. It is marred by the unwise choice to stress Bush's unmemorable domestic record along with his adroit foreign policy. The boastful, idiosyncratic superstructure precludes much distanced analysis or balanced assessment. This seemingly unghosted, honestly wrought political memoir nonetheless makes for a valuable addition to the literature on the 41st president of the U.S. Agent: Keith Urbahn, Javelin Group.

May 15, 2015

George H.W. Bush's (b. 1924) administration as president of the United States was a significant hinge of American history. Sununu, who served as governor of New Hampshire from 1983 until 1989 when he assumed the role of White House chief of staff, views Bush's achievements, domestic and international, as underestimated and unappreciated. This work is an apologetic of the achievements of a leader reticent to discuss his accomplishments. (Bush has publicly stated that he will not write a memoir.) The former president is best credited as a successful war commander during Desert Storm and for shepherding the United States through a potentially treacherous post-Cold War transition after the fall of the Soviet Union. Sununu believes Bush is not given enough credit for his domestic policy achievements, and he seeks to remedy that oversight by maintaining that Bush's service as Congressman, CIA director, Republican National Chairman, ambassador to China, and vice president, prepared him--more so than anyone else--to lead during a sensitive period in American history. Sununu falls short of providing a completely realistic behind-the-scenes account of the policies Bush championed as a "compassionate conservative;" his narrative nearly crosses into hagiography. VERDICT Best suited for readers interested in the Bushes as a political family and as background to Jeb Bush's potential candidacy. Those seeking a more scholarly analysis should consider John Robert Greene's The Presidency of George H.W. Bush.--Glen Edward Taul, Campbellsville Univ. Lib., KY

Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2015
A droning, 400-page toast to George H.W. Bush. In his first book, Sununu, the former New Hampshire governor and longtime chief of staff known as "Bush's Bad Cop," tries to set the record straight on his old boss, relying mainly on willful blindness to his faults, a flattering reinterpretation of his failures, and a gross exaggeration of his accomplishments. Readers inclined to the view that Bush was underrated, or at the very least a decent, ethical, and kind man (no argument there), might be put off by Sununu's starry-eyed perception of Bush as a leader whose life is a testament to his selfless love of country and whose grasp of domestic and international politics was so sure and subtle that no one saw how brilliant it was. The president's slowness to act on getting rid of Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega was just an example of a master gunslinger biding his time for the right moment. In the author's view, Bush's actions in Desert Storm were sure and unwavering; the Margaret Thatcher who said, "Don't go wobbly on us, George," is nowhere to be found. The Bush who blundered so badly by saying, "Read my lips-no new taxes" isn't the one that's important; it's the Bush who saw the error of his ways and nobly raised taxes anyway. All of this might be regarded as pardonable bias if the book were at least an interesting portrait. Although Sununu does have his share of anecdotes and some glimpses of life inside the White House, the book is primarily written in press release prose, thickly woven with cut-and-paste positions, platform planks, and robotic quotes from the commander in chief. For true believers only-and even they are going to have a hard time lasting through this dull book, which actually encourages more skepticism than it erases.

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