Diary of the week

Malcolm Tucker is one of the great comedy creations of recent times – a brutal, shouting, sweary thug of man, trying to manage the nation’s media through bullying, censorship and intimidation. Of course, the scary thing about Malcolm Tucker is that he is based on a man who was at the centre of the NU Labour Project – Alastair Campbell.

Now if I were Campbell, then I would want my memoirs to perhaps show me in a slightly different light. Perhaps a wiser, more erudite character than the arrogant, bullying public façade so often presented in the media. I mean, he has already confessed that he has edited the diaries so as to not embarrass certain people. You might have thought that he would try to avoid embarrassing himself as well…

This review in The Guardian nicely sums the way Campbell presents himself and the government he served in:

"It captures strikingly the laddish, hungry, boastful side of New Labour, a thuggish competition to acquire and use power. The details are realistic and for the most part depressing."

It also notes the vitriol he felt towards people who worked within the New Labour hierachy:

"Short - "God, she does turn my stomach""

I’m inclined to agree, but as a right of centre Libertarian you might expect that. But Campbell? Short was acclaimed in some circles for her work in International Development, and fundamentally Blair – Campbell’s boss – was the one who employed Short. A little support from Campbell would be no bad thing.

"Campbell is far crueller about those who cannot hit back than those who can. He loves power and the men who hold it."

Yes, the man who idolises Robert Maxwell and physically attacked someone for dissing that fat cock after he drowned. And of course Campbell is crueller to those who can’t hit back – he is the very definition of a bully.

"He tells Blair that the section of the diaries sent to the Hutton inquiry contains "a fair bit of bad language". "Fuck?" asks Blair. "Yes." "Cunt?" "Probably." "Bloody hell, Alastair.""

Proud to reveal to his boss – the Prime Minister – that he is foul mouthed. And now has to embarrass his boss – the Prime Minister – by confirming that he is foul mouthed.

"He revels in brutality: he wants to "kill Gilligan""

Very nice- makes Campbell come across as a vicious pig of a man. And I wonder what would have happened if Campbell wrote that he wanted to "kill Kelly"? Thinking about it, he may well have done for all we know – even he must have been sensible enough to realise that he would have to excise such a comment…

But perhaps the most depressing revelation from The Guardian comes in this sentence:

"Tellingly, Stephen Byers' adviser, Jo Moore, is criticised not for thinking that 9/11 was a moment to bury bad news, but for saying it."

To sum up, Campbell’s diary shows that there was a boorish, nasty, foulmouthed bully. And Blair’s government was spin obsessed to the point of distraction. Of course, we already knew that, but it is depressing to have this confirmed by Campbell. And it is even more depressing to realise that Campbell, for all of his spin skills, cannot spin his own diaries despite admitting to editing them.

Perhaps Rachel Slyvester in The Daily Telegraph best sums the impact of the Campbell diaries:

"Politically, the diaries are not particularly revealing. Emotionally, however, they are fascinating. Mr Campbell should be lying on the psychiatrist's couch rather than walking down the corridors of power."

Couldn’t agree more.