Long time no blog. I am in Warsaw to give masterclasses in Negotiation Skills to Polish officials.

I have just spent the best part of an hour dictating into the computer someone fascinating observations on the latest revelations about Western electronic eavesdropping and the renewed political unrest in Egypt. All was going well until the whole lot got abruptly deleted.

Bloody hell. So you’ll just have to wait until I get back to England later in the week.

Suffice for now to say that during my time away on the Baltic Cruise I have made some solid progress on my Speechwriting book. It’s not easy to separate out the best principles of speechwriting from the best principles of public speaking. I want to drill down deeper into the detail of how subtle messages (and indeed unsubtle messages) are drafted and delivered. President Obama’s ill-fated speech in Cairo now looks like a splendid example of how not to frame the issues.

Normal service will be resumed in due course.