The Kitty Litter has hit the fan

Type-phoon Kitty arrived in your local bookstore today by way of Kennebunkport, Houston and Washington DC.

The celebrity biography/character reviewer (some would say assassin) took her pen to the Bush Family Dynasty and with her latest book “The Family: the Real Story of the Bush Dynasty.” She laid waste to the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue; while at the same time took on his father a former President, his mother the ever popular Barbara and host of other Bushes major and minor.

With bits and pieces of it being leaked over the last couple weeks, there’s probably not much more to discover between the covers for the 736 pages of this most unflattering portrait, full of telling tales recounted by those that have been associated with or victimized by this particular American political dynasty.

MSNBC published an excerpt from the just released tome and it paints a picture of a vindictive, at times petty family who remember their friends and take care of their enemies. Kelley explores the many advisors and hangers on who have helped to protect the President’s image through the years, suggesting that they have the power to make people disappear or change their opinion in a minute’s instance. Which makes you wonder if true, how long Ms. Kelley’s professional career will continue? Then again they said the same thing when she published her Sinatra expose and she managed to keep all her fingers attached.

In this book, she recounts how George Bush believes he was chosen to be the President of the United States at this time, a sentiment shared by his cadre of insiders and his own mother. However, Papa Bush apparently spent many dumbfounded moments trying to understand how his son became the new saviour of the Republican Party, Papa never expecting his first son to ever amount to anything according to Kelley’s sources.

The MSNBC primer gives us the names of the big money in Texas that funded his run for the leadership of the Party. How George parlayed a 500,000 dollar investment in the Texas Rangers baseball club into a 15 million dollar win fall as Tom Hicks purchased the club in 1998. Hicks, as it turns out, was one of the largest contributors the senior Bush campaign for President. And as that circle went round and round, George would find himself set for life financially.

The lost years of his National Guard service get another go over from Kelley, who spends time examining his days as a pilot who frequently found himself grounded. Considering all the talk over missing documents and conflicting opinions on that issue, one wonders why Ms. Kelley’s sources haven’t offered up their information to all the other investigations into the issue.

Kelley suggests of the current first lady an entrepreneurial streak, having according to one source worked as a retail/wholesaler in the marijuana trade in her college days. The “go to” girl as she’s described in the book, Kelley also recounts the various rumours surrounding the President’s past use of drink and drunk. Accounts of the parties they attended, his adulterous moments and the marital turmoil as a result, also meander their way through the article.
All of which paint a picture of a rather dysfunctional first family in their formative days. An image that is at odds with the perception of America’s clean cut, God fearing family unit presently in place in Republican ads and background pieces.

The irony of a then Governor of Texas with a hard on drugs policy while in office was not lost on the author, as she recounted the many “sources” who listed Bush’s many adventures in that same scene, some seemingly while in office.

As with most of her other works, Sinatra, The Royals and Nancy Reagan to name a few, much of the book seems heavy on innuendo and less so on hard fact. Undisclosed sources remain nameless, a rather handy device when painting a picture steeped in negative images.

With the release of The Family, all the old disreputable questions about the Bush’s will come back to the forefront, joined by new ones about odious issues not previously known. However, one suspects that like the other epic works about Sinatra and the Royal Family, this too will simply titillate and intrigue a public, some of which seems always desperate to hear the dirt on someone in the public eye.

The Royal family never fell after her book and Sinatra’s image never seem too tarnished after Kelley’s poison pen letters, so all in all the Bush’s probably aren’t overly worried about her efforts. In fact, the dirtier things get, more sympathetic leanings could end up being directed to the Bush’s. Unless the secretive sources come out of the shadows and produce their facts and arguments in the light of day, this effort will seem more like one of those tabloid stories that you read for sheer lunacy of it all.

As a biographer of political dynasties, Ms. Kelley is no Ted Sorenson or Doris Kearns. As a purveyor of gossip, innuendo and scandal she’s found her niche. Described by her PR people as "the book the Bush's don't want you to read." It’s up to the reader to determine if there is any fire in all of her smoke, any reflection from all those mirrors!

Though the Bush's can take solace in one thing, according to some reviewers Ms. Kitty was actually a pussy cat as opposed to a tiger, still out there is a "real" tell all biography waiting to be written.