Word: blaire
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...British Prime Minister Tony Blair's director of communications and strategy, Alastair Campbell was, for almost ten years, his most trusted adviser and confidant. One of the principal architects of New Labour, the reinvention of the ossified party of the working classes as a modern, centrist party with broad appeal, press chief Campbell was one of the biggest beasts to stalk the corridors of Westminster. His influence was immense, shaping and communicating Blair's efforts to overhaul the country-in attitude, as well as in its economy and public services-much as they had overhauled their party. An eyewitness...
...rival commentators battle to define the legacy of Blair's more than a decade in power (he left office on June 27), Campbell has joined the argument with characteristic force. Not for him the equivocation of a modern history or the introspection of an autobiography: on Monday, July 9, with a resounding thud, Campbell lobs The Blair Years, his voluminous personal diaries, into the middle of the debate...
...weeks, by Knopf in the U.S. Like a kind of Zelig, only less self-effacing, Campbell was present at key events of the decade. Royal biographers have mined for new material on Princess Diana for years. Campbell's diaries reveal a trove of meetings she held with Blair when he was opposition leader, and describe the interaction of Buckingham Palace and the Labour Party in the days after her death. Depicted in the Oscar-winning movie, The Queen, as a boorish bully who radiates contempt for the Palace, the author of the diaries instead betrays a respect for its residents...
...diaries contain a firsthand account of Blair's response to the terror attacks of 9/11 and a detailed narrative of the negotiations leading to the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, the foundation of this year's historic settlement in Northern Ireland that saw old enemies enter into government together. There's even a fair bit of Labour's dirty washing: its internal struggles as it moved towards the center, and a leader, glimpsed here behind the scenes, often impressive but sometimes fretful and indecisive...
...Blair got on famously well with President Bill Clinton, but the diaries also chart battles over Kosovo when Britain chafed at U.S. reluctance to commit ground forces to the conflict. "There were times that Tony and Alastair forgot the relative size and importance of the two countries," says a former U.S. official. "It was all well and good for Britain to offer up ground troops, but that was only going to happen if America was going to do so, too." During one angry call to Blair, Clinton accused Campbell of briefing against him. The row blew over and Campbell remains...