Reviews
Kumar combines her years of observation in the White House press room and hours of frank discussion with current and former officials to create a fascinating—and sometimes disheartening—history of how [the] dance has evolved over the last century.
Having been a regular in the White House Press Room since the early years of the Clinton administration, Kumar can offer an insider's view... Political science and journalism scholars will appreciate the rich detail and scholarship here.
A must-read for political junkies.
Some of the book is historical research, but much of it comes from the days and days that Kumar spends in the belly of the beast, hanging out in the press room in the West Wing of the White House.
Kumar's insightful Managing the President's Message provides much-needed insight, charting the recent changes in presidential media management strategies and in the routines practiced by the two most-recent White Houses, and provides an important addition to the academic discourse on political communication, framing, and leadership.
Its place among scholarship on the presidency was quickly sealed when the presidency section of APSA awarded it the 2008 Richard E. Neustadt Award for best book on the presidency. The book is rich with detail regarding the Clinton and Bush communications and press operations... there is much to be mined in Kumar’s descriptions and explanations.
This is a well-written and detailed book and an ideal starting place from which to study the White House communications operations before moving on to fuller autobiographical accounts or the study of individual presidencies.
Tapping access to various administrations and the reporters who covered them, Dr. Martha Kumar traces the history of the often fractious relationship between the White House and the press, the schemes each devises to cloak or reveal information; she tells why some succeed and others fail. A valuable addition to a presidential book library.
Kumar has nailed it. This is a scholarly and fascinating account of White House communications in the modern era. Painful as it sometimes is for past press secretaries, this is a remarkably accurate picture of how presidents deal with the press.
Book Details
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. Creating an Effective Communications Operation
2. The Communications Operation of President Bill Clinton
3. The Communications Operation of President George W. Bush
4. White
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. Creating an Effective Communications Operation
2. The Communications Operation of President Bill Clinton
3. The Communications Operation of President George W. Bush
4. White House Communications Advisers
5. The Press Secretary to the President
6. The Gaggle and the Daily Briefing
7. Presidential Press Conferences
8. Managing the Message
Postscript
Notes
Index