A&M will welcome David Priess on Oct.19th for a presentation covering his new book dealing with the inner workings of the CIA.
Priess’ book, “The President’s Book of Secrets: The Untold Story of Intelligence Briefings to America’s Presidents from Kennedy to Obama”, was released earlier this year, and focuses on the process of giving top secret security briefings to the President on a daily basis. Priess, along with a panel of 3 other former CIA operatives and analysts, will be giving a presentation dealing with the subject matter of the book and the overall process of delivering and compiling intelligence.  
David Jones, head of the George Bush Library Foundation, said the presentation will be put on by the George Bush Library’s Annenberg Center.
“Dr. David Priess will be speaking first about his new book on the daily security briefings every President receives, to be followed by a panel discussion that he will moderate,” Jones said. “The panel will be made up of James Olson, professor of International Affairs and former CIA operative, Dick Kerr, former deputy director of the CIA during the George H.W. Bush administration, and Carmen Medina, who served as deputy director under George W. Bush.”
David Priess, who also worked as a CIA analyst under the George W. Bush administration, said the book includes information from many different sources on the use of top secret intelligence.
“For this book, I interviewed all of the living former presidents, as well as many former vice presidents, CIA directors, and secretaries of state and defense,” Priess said. “Afterwards, I will moderate a discussion panel that includes the former deputy director of the CIA during the George H.W. Bush administration. That section will focus on the use of that high-level, top secret intelligence by Bush during the years of his presidency.”
James Olson, professor of International Affairs and one of the panel members, said his role in this event is a little different from the others on the panel.”
“The daily briefings to the president are prepared by intelligence analysts,” Olson said. “I bring something a little bit different. I was a CIA operative, those who actually collect the intelligence secrets, for 31 years. I worked undercover, doing espionage and covert action, all over the world. So I’ll be talking about how we actually gather the intelligence.”
The event will begin at 6 p.m. in the Annenberg center.