Publisher's Weekly

The thesis of radio host Flanders's searing, incisive polemic is that prominent female conservatives in the current administration are the candy coating in which George "W. Is for Women" Bush enrobes a bitter, radical policy. Devoting a chapter to each, Flanders (Real Majority, Media Minority) takes to task women like National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and Labor Secretary Elaine Chao for betraying the causes-affirmative action, civil rights and feminism-that helped them rise to prominence, while allowing the Republican Party to use them as identity politics puppets for expanding its minority voting base. They, along with former EPA head Christine Todd Whitman, Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman and Secretary of the Interior Gale Ann Norton, have, Flanders contends, been given an easy ride by national media more interested in their fashion choices and family history than in the jobs, lands and freedoms they've eliminated during their tenure. Then there are what Flanders says are the Bushwomen's conflicts of interest and government valentines to corporate concerns, such as destroying previously protected grizzly bear habitat to please logging interests. Along the way, Flanders provides a powerful account of how the government's social agencies have been systematically disabled-or so she claims-over the past 20 years by the very people hired to head them. Fierce, funny and intelligent, Bushwomen fills in an important gap left by other anti-Bush books. (Mar. 8) Forecast: To launch this title, Verso has obtained endorsements from Susan Sarandon, Eve Ensler, Amy Goodman, Jill Nelson and Blanche Wiesen-Cook; 11-city author tour. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

<Back

National Library Journal

According to Flanders, "Bushwomen" are President Bush's female appointees who act as an "extremist administration's female front." In this witty, entertaining expos , Flanders (Real Majority, Media Minority) holds that if women were taken more seriously by the media, the Bushwomen would be more carefully scrutinized and their contradictions revealed. Flanders examines the backgrounds and the legislative and administrative activity of six powerful female appointees-Condoleezza Rice, Karen Hughes, Ann Veneman, Elaine Chao, Christine Todd Whitman, and Gale Norton-arguing that, with each, what the electorate thinks it sees is not what it gets. Although billed as maverick or moderate, each woman had a decidedly conservative, pro-business history that she continues to advance in her position of authority. Flanders's bias against the current administration is never in doubt, but extensive research and thorough documentation bolster her argument. Recommended for all libraries.-Jill Ortner, SUNY at Buffalo Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

<Back

Kirkus Reviews

Progressive journalist Flanders sketches sharp portraits of six women in the Bush administration. The author works in the best tradition of muckraking, less concerned with her subjects' personalities than with their vested interests and ideological sways, which Flanders (Real Majority, Media Minority, not reviewed) understands to be the meat and potatoes of political journalism. Here, we rendezvous with the "politics of masquerade" and the women who provide George W. Bush with good cover against charges of racism or sexism. Far from window-dressing dummies, Flanders writes, these are canny, profoundly conservative politicians versed in the wordplay of Washington. National security advisor Condoleezza Rice, so often held up as an exemplar of American opportunity, is a board member of Chevron, which props up a corrupt Nigerian military government that suppresses Ogoni activists and killed the writer Ken Saro-Wiwa. Communications director Karen Hughes "narrowed the terms of debate to a few emotive words: evil v. good. . . . It's simple and profoundly undemocratic." Christine Todd Whitman was "an attractive shill" with touted liberal credentials, but she came to head the EPA with an abysmal environmental record as governor of New Jersey. Interior Secretary Gale Norton in her days as an attorney filed lawsuits for grazing permits, against the surface mining act, and against the windfall profit tax; her strategy, writes the author, is to "first assure your audience that you are committed to ˜preserving and protecting the environment,' but that it can be done more ˜wisely and effectively.' " As for the information we receive about these women from the news media, Flanders is justly appalled bypublications that concentrate on their mascara more than their records. The New York Times, for example, tells us not about Rice's corporate and political connections, but that "she is always impeccably dressed, usually in a classic suit with a modest hemline, comfortable pumps and conservative jewelry." Reporting that matters, delivering information necessary to make knowledgeable decisions at the voting booth.

<Back