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are our political leaders any more real than the narratives they sell?

How much reality is there in modern politics? Yes, the narratives rolled out are almost routinely false, at least in part, but what about the personalities presented to us as movers and shakers? How real are they? We’ve all seen David Cameron cringingly forgetting which soccer team he allegedly supports, and it’s pretty easy to figure out this is not because of “brain fade” but because Cameron’s love for Aston Villa/West Ham is just a creation of his PR team. We’ve all seen the video about Obama and the water bottles.

As it’s edited here the performance looks completely scripted. But then again people must faint at rallies pretty regularly, and maybe it’s not that surprising someone like Obama develops a habitual way of handling it. There is also footage of Bill Clinton handling fainters here and here, as well as Sanders and Trump doing the same, which both look reasonably real. Then again when Hillary Clinton has a go it looks, well, like this…

As many of you may know, back in 2003, while the US and UK were striving to whip up international support for an illegal war on Iraq based on what turned out to be fabricated evidence, an odd thing seems to have happened. On March 18 of that year the PM of Australia, John Howard, gave a speech to parliament that strongly supported action against Iraq. Two days later, on March 20, Stephen Harper, then Leader of the Conservative opposition in Canada, gave exactly the same speech to his own parliament. Not roughly the same, or just hitting the same talking points – we are talking about huge passages of identical prose. Word for word.

Some years later, after this video surfaced on Youtube, a staffer for Harper, Owen Lippert, fell on his sword and admitted “plagiarising” Howard’s speech for Harper’s use. “Pressed for time, I was overzealous in copying segments of another world leader’s speech,” he is quoted as saying.

Neither my superiors in the Office of the Leader of the Opposition nor the leader of the Opposition was aware that I had done so.

Of course that could be exactly what happened, but it’s not an isolated example. Here’s Obama again in 2008 reading from the same script Deval Patrick had used two years earlier:

In the 1980s Joe Biden reproduced all the allegedly biographical talking points recently hit by Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock, who at that time was busy trying to turn Labour away from socialism and into a copy of the Democratic Party.

The explanation offered for this later was that Biden “admired” Kinnock (and (presumably) expressed this admiration by duplicating portions of his autobiography). This begs the question of course – did any of Biden’s ancestors really work in a coal mine? Come to that – did any of Neil Kinnock’s? Joe and Neil both seem equally sincere, but at least one of them is just using a cue sheet of cool talking points gleaned from somewhere else. We have to accept the possibility they both are.

Do our readers know of any more example of this kind of oddness? If so let us know at [email protected]


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Schaefer
Schaefer
Apr 3, 2020 8:30 AM

obviously, they have to finish what they have promised to their people if they want to keep the job in the next term. Although there are many stresses, 2 player games still exist to entertain for many people

jag37777
jag37777
Jan 6, 2018 9:22 PM

They’re all just actors playing for big business.

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Dec 31, 2017 11:46 PM

So utterly scripted. https://youtu.be/UjbnK3Epw0c

candideschmyles
candideschmyles
Dec 31, 2017 2:28 PM

The last President to have any real power, as in he was a key policy maker behind the scenes, was George Bush senior. The rest have all been puppets. In the UK it may have been Callahan. Our “leaders” are indeed selected not elected. And Democracy is about as real as clairvoyance.

MoriartysLeftSock
MoriartysLeftSock
Jan 6, 2018 9:56 PM

Less real perhaps – given there is some small amount of hard evidence for clairvoyance 😀

Jen
Jen
Dec 31, 2017 5:06 AM

Not surprised that John Howard and Stephen Harper gave the same speech two days apart; if Harper’s speech-writer had been a bit smarter, he would have got his boss to give the speech at least a day before Howard did.

Fair dinkum
Fair dinkum
Dec 30, 2017 10:29 PM

Hollow men and women.
The narrative is greed, the deed is expedience, the need is power.
Pathetic really, because they’re all gonna die and be forgotten.
‘Twas ever thus.

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Dec 30, 2017 9:56 PM

OK so I have a one-track mind. The staged events they preside over bear the same hallmarks.
http://occamsrazorterrorevents.weebly.com/hallmarks.html

Jen
Jen
Dec 31, 2017 5:01 AM
Reply to  flaxgirl

Over in Iran, in several cities including Mashhad (Iran’s second largest after Tehran) there “spontaneously” appeared protests a few days ago, some of which initially began as protests against higher prices for everyday items and which then developed into chants against President Rouhani and the government, and even into chants calling for the return of the monarchy! In some demonstrations, some protesters even attacked the police and set police motorcycles and governments buildings ablaze.
Reminiscent of protests in Dar’aa (Syria) in 2011 and in Kiev in 2014, dontcha think?
How old is that choir sheet the “protesters” are singing from?
If the “protesters” want the monarchy back, maybe they had better hurry: of the last Shah’s children, five in total, only three are still alive.

BigB
BigB
Dec 31, 2017 10:36 AM
Reply to  Jen

Jen: the anti-Iranian rhetoric is being ramped up to deliberately provocative levels. The most moral security forces in the world, the IDF, have been peace bombing Gaza for the second night …blaming Iran, not Hamas! Nothing to do with the Orange Fatberg Trump (and Kushner’s) direct provocation via their unilateral recognition of West Jerusalem-al Quds as Israels capital …it’s all about Iran. Reminiscent of Dar’aa? They seem to have missed the pro-government rallies again?
https://www.rt.com/news/414655-iran-rallies-counter-protests/
I thought this was an excellent demonstration of M$M hypocrisy: how they featured Malala, but ignore Ahed Tamini – because it is not politically expedient and does not fit their narrative. If the IDF were seen for what they are (state sanctioned terrorists) …how can they keep reverse-blaming Iran???
http://www.mintpressnews.com/west-praising-malala-ignoring-ahed-tamimi/235952/

Basher
Basher
Dec 31, 2017 8:35 PM
Reply to  flaxgirl

Flaxgirl: Most parts in this above link are tinfoil hat nonsense. Why would they hoax a terror attack? Is it their morality that would stop them actually killing kids, like at sandy hook? Just actually do it, why take the risk with crisis actors etc? I’m not saying govts/ intelligence services aren’t behind or involved in terror attacks for advancing their own agenda, such as radicalising individuals to commit atrocities. Atrocities these individuals think they are doing on behalf of Isis etc. But when the US is using Isis as a proxy army in Syria anyway, these boundaries are meaningless. But to suggest that people didn’t actually die, based on the reactions of their grieving relatives is fucking lunacy. My own mum danced around the living room, the day my dad lost his long battle with cancer, to their favourite song. If you were looking through the window, you’d probably say she’d killed him for life insurance!! Grow the fuck up, and fight the real fight, vs billionaires, capitalism & warmongering.

Admin
Admin
Dec 31, 2017 11:22 AM
Reply to  Basher

We strongly discourage arguments from disparagement. Words such as “tinfoil hat” are designed to produce an unthinking Pavlovian response of rejection in readers, which is the very opposite of the informed discussion and sharing of information we want to host here.

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Dec 31, 2017 10:26 PM
Reply to  Basher

Bashet, I think exposing the truth about these events is part of the fight. I explain the what, why, how and precedence on other pages on the website. I have also issued a $5,000 challenge to anyone who can produce a 10-point Occam’s Razor exercise favouring the “official story” hypothesis over the “independent researcher” hypothesis for any one of three events including Sandy Hook – I have done the exercise myself favouring the “independent researcher” hypothesis and invited vociferous supporters of the “official story” to accept the challenge. No one has responded with an exercise although some have responded with comments similar in tone to yours. What do you make of that?
I suggest you recognise that “conspiracy theorist” is a propaganda weapon first promulgated by the CIA around the time of the JFK assassination and used to such dizzying propagandistic heights that now people believe that conspiracy and conspiracy theory are one and the same. I also suggest watching the film on YouTube, JFK to 9/11 Everything is a Rich Man’s Trick. That’s what first opened my eyes.
I think you must have missed the article in OffGuardian recently, The Death of Academic Freedom: Professor James Tracy Denied First Amendment Rights by Federal Court. James Tracy was an author of an article included in the book Nobody Died at Sandy Hook (free to download) about the strange behaviour of the Medical Examiner, Wayne Carver. This article is a must-read. Sorry, I’d put links but I only have access to a phone at the moment and with WordPress comment text annoyingly seems to vanish when you navigate elsewhere – or perhaps it’s just my poor phone skills.

Basher
Basher
Dec 31, 2017 11:20 PM
Reply to  flaxgirl

Flaxgirl: I think my comment clearly shows I don’t believe the official narrative. I don’t see dissent from MSM narrative as ‘conspiracy theory’, that can be written off. But I do believe that people did die in these real and/or staged events. Why would the powers that be spare 20 or so individual lives and involve actors and many others, that could slip up? Our lives matter not a jot to them. I want a response on that question. Only that one, please

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Jan 1, 2018 4:55 AM
Reply to  Basher

Basher, I’d call your question a form of the logical fallacy known as argumentum ad speculum, that is, you reason that, as you see no good reason for X it could not have happened. What I’ve learnt on my journey of truth is that one must always judge by the evidence. Evidence is top priority and the evidence shows that no one died at Sandy Hook. It’s that simple. If you are aware of any evidence favouring “real event” over “staged event” please let me know what it is. Everywhere I turn I only see evidence for staged event.

Chuck Finney
Chuck Finney
Jan 2, 2018 1:48 PM
Reply to  Basher

Here is a link to Sophia Smallstorms presentation of her Sandy Hook investigation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1yfJDCMU64 in it she gets into the area of Satanism and the idea that there may be a significant representation of Satanists in that community. (It’s been a while since I’ve watched the video but I remember it being quite compelling and revelatory of the multi-dimensional playing field that these controllers are operating on). A reasonable explanation for why they would use crisis actors and not actually go “completely live” would be that they may have learned, from previous events like the 9/11 attacks, that the amount of effort to keep actual victims and their families silent is not worth it. Given the depravity of the participants in these hoaxes, perhaps it may have been the case that children were murdered, allowed to be murdered or ritualistically murdered as this appears to be not uncommon among practicing Satanists as suggested by Mark Passio and in the work of other independent researchers.

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Jan 2, 2018 2:08 PM
Reply to  Chuck Finney

I watched the video but do not remember the Satanism element. Since watching the video, however, I’ve seen quite a lot of other stuff on Satanism. I might watch it again. I believe strongly, however, that no children died. An hypothesis is that the photos of the alleged dead children who, at least in some cases, were not children of their alleged parents, who also, at least in some cases, were not couples, were photos that were five or six years old. It is alleged that the supposed dead children sang at the Super Bowl the following year and because they are significantly older than they are in their photos are much less recognisable. Talk about chutzpah! I have matched the photos with photos at the Super Bowl as I see fit although most people I show them to don’t think they match. http://laverite.weebly.com/sandy-hook-children.html

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Jan 2, 2018 3:11 PM
Reply to  Chuck Finney

Also, just to say that in the case of 9/11 it seems it was a bit of a hybrid false flag. People certainly died: some because they were wanted dead by the perpetrators and others simply as collateral damage – see this 45 min illuminating film on who was in the buildings and who wasn’t – and where the were and what they were doing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_fp5kaVYhk. However, it seems the number was inflated – see http://www.septemberclues.info/vicsims_photo-analyses.shtml.

Jerry Alatalo
Jerry Alatalo
Dec 30, 2017 9:38 PM

Just as bankers and their bank boss/owners along with corporate CEOs and their corporation boss/owners pre-write favorable laws for politicians to push and pass in parliaments and congresses, the controlling process applies for political “leaders” handed pre-written scripts by their same bank and corporate boss/owners.

Willem
Willem
Dec 30, 2017 7:34 PM

More odness:
If you ever want to learn Dutch, here is a chance: see the following where Dutch politician Jesse Klaver delivers a speech in 2017 that is nearly exactly the same as an Obama ‘hope and change’ speech, translated in Dutch (starts around 4.40 minutes): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lsVGyKMHkKg

Alan
Alan
Dec 30, 2017 7:12 PM

Not too sure what is meant by ‘our’ political leaders? This infers we have something to do with their delusion of importance. Politicians share the same stage as gangsters, as such, best avoided.

mohandeer
mohandeer
Dec 30, 2017 4:36 PM

Who was it not so long ago, who plagiarised a whole passage from the hit TV drama “The West Wing”? It couldn’t have been Trump because he’d just look stupid in trying to carry off Martin Sheen’s aplomb. It could have been Tony Blair, his acting skills are quite exceptional. It eludes me presently, but it will come to me – eventually.

bevin
bevin
Dec 30, 2017 5:47 PM
Reply to  mohandeer

Wasn’t it May?
It is a little uncharitable-in this season especially- to begrudge the political drudges of the neo-liberal establishment the right to re-cycle one another’s old tropes. They haven’t had a new or original idea since about 1820. All else has changed but their social and economic policies remain, essentially,k the same.
Which is why A Christmas Carol always seems fresh and profound.

Harry Stotle
Harry Stotle
Dec 30, 2017 8:56 PM
Reply to  bevin

‘Wasn’t it May?’ – indeed it was.
If you look closely you can just about see Murdock pulling the strings.

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Dec 30, 2017 10:19 PM
Reply to  Harry Stotle

Excellent. Perhaps could be included in article?

flaxgirl
flaxgirl
Dec 31, 2017 8:44 AM
Reply to  Harry Stotle

Just occurred to me. The show is mocking the vapidity of political speech and STILL it’s plagiarised!

mohandeer
mohandeer
Dec 30, 2017 4:29 PM

Reblogged this on Worldtruth.

Schlüter
Schlüter
Dec 30, 2017 3:58 PM

Well,
„A Quotation We Should Never Forget!“ https://wipokuli.wordpress.com/2016/08/09/a-quotation-we-should-never-forget/
All the best for the new year to come!