An excellent speaker and a slick politician with a talent for making speeches that were both firm and decisive, while alienating as few people as possible. It was his ability to persuade the center ground of British electorate without losing the left that swept him to power in 1997 with a massive majority. It was his policies that eventually made him so unpopular, not his oratory. As another reviewer noted, Blair had a penchant for coining a phrase, but at times he took this a little too far, as in this quote: "This is not the time for soundbytes, but... *pause* I feel the hand of history on our shoulder."

We're talking about style here, not substance, and Blair certainly had a fair bit of the former.

Like a lot of politicians honed in the parliamentary tradition, Blair is quick on his verbal feet, and has a knack for turning a phrase.

Skillful orator that (almost) made dubya's foreign-policy disaster sound (almost) like a good idea. . .but like any good orator or skilled professional- siding with dubya means career suicide. . .

Tony Blair is a very good speaker, very polished and concise. I don't agree with a lot of what he has to say, but we're talking about style here. Bi-weekly parliamentary debates keep his public speaking abilities up to par; Prime Ministers have to think on their feet in order to answer back his opponents quick. US politicians are spoiled in that they don't have to go through that. Compare George W. Bush's speaking abilities to Tony Blairs and you'll see what I mean.