Greetings. Long time no blog. I have been racing around the planet and just don’t feel like opining from a weary hotel bedroom. My peregrinations have included the IAEA in Vienna to deliver with other colleagues a senior leadership course; Astana in Kazakhstan, for a speechwriting course for top Kazakh officials, […]
Here’s my latest piece at PunditWire, looking at President Obama’s UN speech (both substance and technique) and what it says about negotiating: Even the President of the United States drifts into the tritest clichés on such occasions: We come together at a crossroads between war and peace; between disorder and […]
In case you’re all wondering, my eBook Speechwriting for Leaders is coming along very nicely. A bold and amusing cover is being designed (every e-Book needs a bold and amusing eCover) and the substance is entering the layout and final edit phase. The problem for any great artist with any work […]
Mulling over my latest piece for PunditWire I started to look at one of President Obama’s rhetorical tics: his use of the word ‘clear’. Take, for example, his 10 September statement on US policy towards ISIL/ISIS. Three hits! Now let’s make two things clear: ISIL is not “Islamic.” Our objective is […]
A reader has sent me this fascinating email with many points of historical interest (reproduced with his permission) on the general subject of ‘diplomatic asylum’ (and the Assange case): Dear Charles I’m a retired DS officer, who follows your website with interest. I enjoy what you say and how you […]
Now and again I give presentations to schools on Lessons for Life. These boil down to some simple ideas: Things grow Keep your balance Be honest Don’t be stupid Guard your reputation A good way to illustrate most of these ideas is to present a lively example of someone thinking he’s been […]
This ever-interesting subject is featured in my e-book, Speechwriting for Leaders. Coming to your tablets soon, I hope. Here’s part of what I say: How do you achieve that strong start? For a speechwriter it’s mainly about words. But a speaker engages an audience on many different levels simultaneously: eyes, […]
It’s always good when a Pope picks up one’s ideas and gives them mass appeal. Here is Pope Francis warning that a ‘piecemeal World War Three‘ may have already begun: “Even today, after the second failure of another world war, perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, […]
As regular readers know, for several years now I have been writing regular articles for London’s DIPLOMAT magazine. The general idea is to talk about diplomacy in a light-touch but accessible way, with ideas and themes of interest to both professional DIPLOMAT readers and anyone else who comes along. Here is […]
In dismal times like this one’s mind invariably goes back to James Thurber, the wonderful mid-C20 American cartoonist and humorist (sic). Here he is describing an unusually dim but extra burly Polish-American student grappling to answer a VERY simple question: One day when we were on the subject of transportation […]
