Julia's service has taken on the highest family profile. Her college internship while at Randolph Macon Women's College with Sen. Ted Kennedy led to subsequent jobs with Arkansas Rep. Ray Thornton, Hillary Clinton, Vice President Al Gore and finally, the president himself. She was promoted last year from handling regional press for Clinton to being appointed assistant press secretary. Along with her brother, Charlie and her mom, who share a townhouse in Arlington, I visited Julia at the White House last week and got an insider's look at the seat of power. My first impression was how small it all was, from the briefing room where Julia's boss Joe Lockhart takes reporters' questions to the Rose Garden and the Oval Office itself.
Television makes it somehow seem much larger.
Julia's little nook in the press office isn't cavernous either, though its small size belies its function. She and the other three who work directly under Lockhart get out the president's message, as well as handling all the logistics for the chief executive and the press corps that follows. One minute I'll be explaining the president's new Medicare program, and the next I'll be answering questions about where he'll be when on the Fourth of July, she said. The Stafford High grad said she and others on Clinton's press staff endured a tough stretch as the Monica Lewinsky scandal played out last year. Sure, they all had their own personal feelings about it.