"Snow plans books, speeches to pay bills"

Source:  LA Times – 9/1/2007

Thoughts:  The second announcement this week came from Tony Snow.  It wasn’t a secret that he would be leaving the position, but the date announcement came this week.  Tony Snow came into the office a year and a half ago and turned around a lagging PR department which the Bush administration desperately needed.  Being a recognized face and voice from TV and radio, Snow was experienced enough to take on the reporters and respond clearly and directly to bring the Bush message across in the media.  During this process, he’s also been battling cancer, something that the media also covered as Snow’s physical appearance has changed during all of his medical treatments.  The U.S. Common Sense web site wishes Snow all the best, and hope that his departure is truly based on economic issues and not medical.

Article:  “Snow plans books, speeches to pay bills”
By James Gerstenzang

WASHINGTON — White House Press Secretary Tony Snow, on the job 16 months, said Friday that he was leaving his post in two weeks “because I ran out of money.”

The former Fox News commentator, who was treated for colon cancer in 2005 and underwent surgery and chemotherapy this year after a recurrence, said he planned to make money by giving speeches and writing books.

(Article continues.)

The first book topic, he said, was likely to be “on how you deal with sickness.”

President Bush named one of Snow’s deputies, Dana Perino, as the press secretary. She will be the fourth in the nearly seven years of the Bush presidency.

The president, visiting the White House press room at the start of Snow’s regular daily briefing for reporters, said of his spokesman: “He’s smart. He’s capable. He’s witty. He’s able to talk about issues in a way that the American people can understand.”

Similarly, he called Perino “a smart, capable person who is able to spell out the issues of the day in a way that people listening on TV can understand.”

Snow joins several other senior administration officials who have announced their departures in recent weeks, among them Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales and one of the president’s closest aides, Karl Rove, whose last day at the White House was Friday. Dan Bartlett, who like Gonzales and Rove had worked for Bush since he was governor of Texas, resigned as the president’s counselor two months ago.

Snow, 52, his face gaunt, his hair thinned and grayed by his battle with cancer, called the press secretary’s job “a dream” and “a blast.”

(Read the rest of the article here.)