Whereas Mr Gerstner is blunt, Mr Palmisano's style has been described as "bluntness with a smile".
"Heath betrayed us and that was it," Burnside said later with characteristic black-and-white bluntness.
If there was a problematic trait connected to her background it was, say insiders, her Yorkshireness – a habit of bluntness with criticism, to which Cameron is allergic.
Such performances have inspired interest in the model from a clutch of developing countries, including India and Kenya.Mr Gove has been shunted aside for fear that his bluntness, and the intense loathing for him that many teachers feel, could be a liability at next May's general election.
"The fact that Orbán reacted this way shows just how vulnerable he is," he added,Even so, Mr Orbán's bluntness is unlikely to damage his standing at home, and nor will it derail Hungarian-German relations, which remain strong.
He places that episode in the broad context of the conflict, employing a bluntness about his own country which, if he were a western journalist and not a former Israeli foreign minister, would undoubtedly have Israel's supporters in America rushing to denounce him.For example, Mr Ben-Ami has no time for the myth that early Zionism posed no threat to the national aspirations of Palestine's Arabs.
But even Castlereagh, who ran Britain's foreign policy when it beat Napoleon, and shaped the post-Napoleon Concert of Europe, had a hard time getting things to go the way he wanted.Her splendid bluntness may be starting to work in ex-Yugoslavia.
"It's only make believe," says one rider, with a cowboy's bluntness.
But through inexperience or just Dutch bluntness, he spoke out of turn.
To forestall further easing, some advisers even speak about changing the Bank of Japan's 2% inflation target to a more modest one, of perhaps 1%.Meanwhile, in the face of a government that is reluctant to cut spending now, hoping for higher growth and tax receipts later, Mr Kuroda is airing his misgivings with unusual bluntness, preaching the need for immediate fiscal discipline.
The brigadier's "emperor's-got-no-clothes" bluntness seems to have drawn an angry reaction in high American places.So was his playing down of the Taliban threat a foolish throwaway line, which reflected the brigadier's personal view rather than the consensus among the British military?
