570News - Jeff Allan

There’s an old saying that is very appropriate to use today: “all’s fair in love, war, and politics.” With two weeks to go until Canadians go to the polls, Bob Rae and the Liberal Party released a video of Prime Minister Harper using the same words in a speech in the house of commons that former Australian PM John Howard used in the Australian legislature.  The Liberals and their counterparts in the opposition pounced on this screaming “foul”. This is plagiarism they said. In fact the academic, Stephane Dion,  suggested that Mr. Harper be “expelled” for his actions.

It’s important to point out that the speech Mr. Harper made was delivered in the house of commons back in 2003 when he was the leader of the opposition; that’s five years ago. The speech seemed to be a copy of Prime Minister Howard’s speech, there’s no doubt about that; but does it really matter?  To be sure, the opposition parties want to portray Mr. Harper as a war mongering bully. They want you to think of him as a follower of the “George Bush Led War on Terror” and this duplication of John Howard’s speech is proof  that Mr. Harper is in bed with President Bush because John Howard was so Pro-Bush. In addition the opposition parties want you to believe that Mr. Harper is also following Mr. Bush’s economic policies too. I guess they figure if you’re in for one, you’re in for all. The opposition must figure that “Bush” is such a bad name that any connection to it is bad news for Mr. Harper and good news for them.

Hats off to the Liberal “War Room” folks who found this gem and then edited it together for the beautiful visual presentation we all saw yesterday. It may help their campaign; but only if Canadians really care. It’s also worth noting that a bull always kicks the hardest just before the end,; and this may be the end of Stephane Dion’s Liberals, at least for this election.

I don’t really care about the “plagiarism” factor because I know that every politician has used speech writers and quotes from others since the dawn of time. In fact Australian economist John Kunkel, who served as John Howard’s speechwriter from 2004 to 2007, said plagiarism in speech writing is not uncommon in any political system and said he doubts Howard was offended by the incident.  How many of you have ever lifted a paragraph or two from a text book in your day to finish an essay? Be honest.  I’ll bet  a lot of you would admit to at least reading someone else’s work and rewriting it to suit your work.

In closing, I’d like to say that I’m not defending the actions of the Prime Minister who delivered an obviously copied speech when he was the leader of the opposition five years ago. The offending speech writer has resigned, but the damage has been done. However I would like to challenge the opposition to answer this question under oath; Have all the speeches and statements you’ve delivered over your career been completely original and checked for plagiarism? It is my opinion that none of the politicians in any party, including the current conservative government would or could say that they have. I believe their answer to my question would be “no comment” or ” I can’t possibly recall that far back”. The reason for that response is simple; they all do it and they’ve all done it.

                                                 Jeff Allan