Remembering Tony Snow
Former White House Communications Director Kevin Sullivan remembers Tony Snow:
Tony certainly gave it everything he had in his all too brief time on this earth. Today marks the first anniversary of Tony’s death from colon cancer at age 53. He left behind his wife, Jill, and their three children: Kendall, Robbie and Kristi. Dana Perino, who worked alongside Tony and then succeeded him as press secretary, published a wonderful remembrance of him earlier this week in Politico. She did a terrific job of capturing Tony’s many facets: the gifted communicator who loved to parry with reporters in defense of President Bush; the talented writer; the man of the people (he actually worked the other end of President Bush’s rope line on a few occasions — people were drawn to him that much); the absent-minded professor (Dana documented the many lost Blackberries, but my personal favorite story is the time Tony realized in Dan Bartlett’s morning communications meeting that his suit pants didn’t match his jacket); and mostly the man of deep faith who was completely devoted to his family. As I remember Tony today, I am still inspired by the way he made his family his number-one priority. If the White House press secretary isn’t too busy for his wife and kids, nobody else has an excuse.