Sunday, June 17, 2007
I Admit it - I'm Starting to Like Alastair Campbell
This is now getting deeply worrying. I am starting to like Alastair Campbell. He's got a great post on his blog today which almost shows him in a human, rather than feral, light. OK, OK, I know what you're thinking but I can't help it. The guy writes like a dream and from the heart. I can just feel my blog readers reaching for the sick bucket and vowing never to return. I'm sorry - OK?!
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42 comments:
Hmmm.
Anyway, on another matter:
PINKO ALERT
I've always liked him.
Gary Bushell - TV celebrity?! Next thing you'll be telling me is a scotsman is going to become PM? Oh shit......
Come on Iain - just because you want to sell lots of copies of his book!
Anyway, I think he "over writes" and could do with a good editor. Perhaps you could help him out?
Oh dear me, Iain
for the first time I worry that you are too close to the trough.
campbell does not have a blog. he has a website plugging his book.
A blog implies comments and interaction.
None of that with campbell.
A correction required, I feel. \it goes to your credibility.
John
Unfortunately, Campbell was a turd, is a turd and continues to be a turd and as we all know.........You cannot polish a turd.
Word confirmation gyizz
You couldn't make it up.
He hounded Davis Kelly to his death. I strongly believe that Campbell was behind a call to Kelly warning him that if he was found guilty in an internal inquiry of talking to the media he would be sacked and lose his pension.
The only think Kelly could do to protect the financial future of his wife was to 'die in service'.
Campbell is a close to a murderer as you'll get...
Oh dear Iain. It's one thing to admit that the guy can write or that he can be occasionally entertaining (even through the permanent lizard impression)... but to say you "LIKE" Alastair Campbell.. no, no, no. You can't even call him a likeable bastard. He's one of those people whose mere presence makes you want to punch their arrogant, smug face.
Many journalists (and others)have an excellent command of the language and can consequently produce beautiful stylish writing. The problem comes with the crap content they so elegantly churn out.
Iain
I think you need to go and lie down in a darkened room, or have you been speaking to David Cameron as it sounds like the sort of thing he would say.
Iain
At one time not very long ago you appeared to be on the outside looking in. Now you appear to be on the inside looking out...
Now we already have to many of these.
Iain you need to get out more into the real world before its to late. I see you in the whirlpool in the bath and you are about to go down the plug hole.
When do you return from your hols, Iain? This imposter standing in for you is messing up your site.
You're right. Off to get a bucket. Bye.
How much is the biography going to sell for? Thirty pieces of silver sounds about right.Take your cut from that.
Not falling for that again Iain. I read Cambpell's blog last time on your recommendation (which at the time I thought was tongue in cheek). I don't understand why you keep plugging this evil man.
Grrrr, Campbell is an odious little man.
Surely the big story this morning is that the Scottish Tories may now be about to back an early vote on Scottish independence. Yes, the TORIES!! Ive already blogged my glum thoughts about this:
http://toryheaven.blogspot.com/2007/06/and-now-conservatives-want-vote-on.html
Forget Campbell, yesterday's man.
The whole crumbling edifice of Brown's hollowed out economy is coming to an end and the "decadent decade" of phenomenal borrowing and spending is hitting the buffers.
The next 3 years are going to be a nightmare for our new Prime Minister who has been largely responsible for all this, and those millions of profligates drowning in debt. The spending merry go round fuelled by the house price bubble and easy access to cheap credit is over and recession/stagflation/asset price crash is on the way.
Read the whole of this article in today's Sunday Telegraph for a taste of what's to come and which will drive New Labour into the electoral wilderness in 3 years time:
"The day of reckoning has arrived for a debt-soaked nation living for too long on easy credit. And it's going to hurt...."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/06/17/ccom117.xml
When the news of David Kelly's death was breaking I remember Andrew Marr commentating on tv and being quite visibly shocked.
He said something like 'this will be a great shock to Alistair Campbell who is actually a very nice man' (my words but they convey the meaning I think). I was very intrigued at the time as I couldn't imagine even Alistair Campbell's mother describing him as 'nice'.
Whatever one thinks of Marr one has to admit that he's a pretty level headed cove and, perhaps because the sentiment came from him and it seemed so outrageous a statement, it has lingered in my memory ever since.
Nowt so strange as folk.
"Quem Deus vult perdere prius dementat" Whom God wishes to destroy, he first makes mad.
Like or loath his views it would be hard to deny how passionately Alastair believes in them or what an effective communicator he is (ditto you, Iain).
I'm sure that many of the people who comment on your blog hold equally as passionate views (although perhaps not as coherently thought through as his or yours are) but unfortunately not many of them can match the skill, wit, succinctness and good humour with which you and he can put them across...
I'm sure Idi Amin had a pleasant side! Even old Khadaffi is said to be humorous even though he farts a lot. Or what about Sadam I sure he could charm a lot of people and I daresay a few people liked Adolf H but their is NO WAY EVER that I would sing there praises.
As for that turd C********l (I don't even want to type his name!) don't even suggest that he may a a good side!
I would rather eat a bowl of sick with a turd hamburger than read his blog!
That particularly nasty piece of work will never be forgiven for the deceit that led this country into an illegal and ruinous war, as well as the death of Dr Kelly. The "normal" sins of spin and deceit pale into insignificance.
I personally hope that he will nervously be glancing over his shoulder watching for Middle Eastern type gentlemen for the rest of his days. Thanks to his efforts, many British, American and Iraqi lives have been cut short.
Well Iain, now you know how I feel about Boris Johnson. Welcome to the world of the untouchables.
I suggest you go and lie down in a dark room until you recover and remember exactly what Campbell is responsible for over the last decade.
Alastair Campbell was very amusing on the documentary about premiership players donating a days pay to Nurses.
He has a certain panache.
What's not to like?
Only kidding. Though if you put up a post extolling his better half Fiona Millar I'll publish the whole of the Eton boating song with a rave review.
His remark when Piers Morgan was sacked by Sir Alan:
"What, again?"
Was beautiful.
Perhaps could team up with new socialist Dave-id cameron as AC/DC?
No one ever said that he wasn't capable. Just that he was an amoral, liar who debased Britain's politics so deeply that the damage will last a generation. That damage is not just measured in a loss of public trust, but in fractured policy that has affected the lives of millions and ended the lives of some.
Apart from that, I quite like the bloke.
Alistair Campbell has been rightly demonised but there is a clear tinge of jealousy when Conservatives do so. They may have enjoyed a little bit more success if they had someone like him or Mandleson over the past 14 years and not the Fink and his baseball caps.
Seperate personal from professional - you cannot help but admire the way Campbell helped change the Labour Party into a political force. This goes back to before Blair became leader. Whilst Mandy was still deciding whether to support TB or GB in the leadership election, Campbell had chosen his horse a long time before.
One only needs to read George Obornes attempted character assasination. The book is full of rightful indignation and disgust from a man who was clearly bullied in school yet Campbell still comes out of it well.
As for David Kelly. Oops.
So you're saying that even feral journos have a heart? Silence is golden...
shits are often charming - it's how they manipulate.
++++'s are ofen charming. It's how they manipulate.
Iain's judgemeny of people is often coloured by his intense almost technical interest in politics, and a kind of assumption that all people are as reasonable as he is.
In the words of the great Mrs T. NO! NO! NO!
Undoubtedly this is your worst posting ever. Campbell is a disgusting man who has done disgusting things, end of.
"They may have enjoyed a little bit more success if they had someone like him or Mandleson."
Not "may". "Might"
Steve said....
"Seperate personal from professional - you cannot help but admire the way Campbell helped change the Labour Party into a political force."
In much the same way as Hitler and the Germans.
Nice people eh!
You surprise me. The most corrupting influence on the body politic in the last 60 years and you are seduced by some of his promotional porn. Shame on you.
A good way to bury bad news, eh? Diversionary tactics.
Iain, you are only the latest in a very long line of political media people who have fallen for the man's charm - as wonderfulforhisage points out, Andy Marr was another so you are in good company. Campbell is, of course, a complete shit, and was morally culpable for the death of David Kelly even if it wasn't him who actually leaked the name. But he was and is, at a certain very basic level of social interaction, an amusing and likeable shit, and therein lay the secret of his success.
One only needs to read George Obornes attempted character assasination. The book is full of rightful indignation and disgust from a man who was clearly bullied in school yet Campbell still comes out of it well.
assume you mean Peter Oborne. But he does come out of it well. Manipulative, obsessive, somewhat amoral, yes, we know. But professional. There's a reason the Tories have been useless for the last decade. Perhaps if they stopped shouting "it's not fair, they won't let me play" and learned how to communicate (not spin, necessarily, but communicate) they might get back in one day. Hopefully. Perhaps.
Part of the problem with Campbell was that he was more than just a spin doctor.He was both sewer and sewage.
Paul Linford and Penlan - well said. The truth is Campbell is a moral bankrupt. Of course he has charm. He is using it to create a new image and dupe those of short memory and those who do not grasp the full extent of his pernicious methods. He is directly responsible for Kelly's death. Kelly's face will be the last image he sees when he draws his own last breath. Do not be fooled by this evil shit.
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