From Publishers Weekly
After the panic subsides when the local motorcade drivers desert your candidate on a presidential campaign stop in a major city, ingenuity can save the day. That's what businessman Stuart possessed in spades as an advance man for the notoriously exacting Richard Nixon. As a reward for his resourcefulness during the 1968 campaign (among other feats, scrounging up 135 hotel rooms in a booked-solid Boston and keeping protestors with "hippie propensities" out of a public event in New York), Stuart earns a coveted West Wing staff position as an aide to counsel to the president. During Nixon's first term, the author tangles with the rapacious Filipino first lady Imelda Marcos (Stuart calls her "Dragon Lady"), a curvaceous blond Soviet agent out to snag unwary American officials in Romania and more maddening motorcade drivers in the former Yugoslavia. The views of Nixon are largely from afar, though Stuart provides insightful portraits of other administration figures, particularly Ehrlichman and chief of staff Bob "H.R." Haldeman. Stuart clearly sympathizes with his old boss and colleagues, downplaying "dirty tricks" perceptions and disbelieving that Nixon ordered the Watergate break-in. He also castigates Mark "Deep Throat" Felt as undeserving of his whistleblower fame and being motivated by his failure to secure the FBI's top slot. The effect is one of a series of random snapshots providing interesting, although unspectacular, views of otherwise fascinating subjects.
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Review
Charles Stuart writes with heart and humor an insider s account of what it is like to be at the center of a campaign and a presidency. --Julie Nixon Eisenhower
Charles Stuart has written a fascinating, insiders book on what it takes to be a political advance man -- but he also delves into the pitfalls of blind loyalty to the President by White House staffers. --Helen Thomas, Hearst Newspapers, Dean, White House Press Corps
Stuart, a former assistant to Nixon administration officials John Ehrlichman and H.R. "Bob" Haldeman, here offers an anecdotal memoir of his time working on Nixon's campaigns in the White House. His intention … to present the "inconsequential" yet "illustrative" little stories, incidents, and anecdotes that give a sense of the drama of the Nixon presidential campaigns and White House. --www.booknews.com
