Word: personal
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...smarter, U.S. President Bill Clinton or Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak? James Carville, who has served both men, had to think a minute. "Barak is probably the most unique person I've met in terms of his range of skills," he explains. "Clinton is brilliant but nowhere near the mathematician or musician that Barak is." Then again, Carville notes, the President has astonishing people skills...
...lessons from his mother. By example, she taught him how to find and exploit zones of privacy, how to build an invisible barrier around himself when in public. It was a technique he might apply at the Xenon disco, where he hung out in the late '70s: first, use personal radar to sense the approach of a stranger, then move subtly until your back is turned to the person--a way of saying "Please, leave me alone, please." But if someone breached the barrier anyway, John would then be unfailingly polite, using the Kennedy charm until he could break free...
Kennedy could be affable and accessible, then capricious and enraged--all before lunch. "He was a little insensitive," says a former staff member. "It was his signature project, so he reserved the right to change anything around at the last minute." Bent on proving himself a serious person, he failed to take advice from more seasoned magazine people. "Sometimes he wouldn't see things that had the potential to make a very bad article." The product suffered, turnover was high, and ultimately the magazine ran into financial trouble...
While Kennedy was making something of George, his personal life was undergoing enormous upheavals. In 1994, his mother had succumbed to cancer, robbing him of the single most important person in his life. He issued a note-perfect statement to the press, grieved deeply and permanently, but got through it. It helped that he had fallen in love with Carolyn Bessette, an exquisitely sophisticated Calvin Klein public relations executive. As the relationship deepened and moved toward marriage, they realized that some serious press management was required. They leaked word that they were breaking up--and quietly made preparations...
...more musicians are losing the delicate art of infusing their music with soul. Not soul in the sense of smooth shakers like Barry White--I'm talking about the kind of soul that fights numb torpor and erases indifference. The kind that stirs powerful emotions inside of a person, the kind that can get a reaction...