PRESIDENT'S WORDS:TAOISEACH ENDA Kenny has defended using without attribution part of a speech by Barack Obama when he addressed the crowd in Dublin ahead of the US president on Monday.
Mr Kenny opened his speech in College Green on Monday evening by using part of Mr Obama’s acceptance speech following his election as US president in November 2008, but substituting “Ireland” for “America”. He made no reference to the fact that he was repeating a section of an earlier speech by the US president.
Mr Kenny said last night he had used a small portion of Mr Obama’s speech “very deliberately” as a tribute to him, and said he felt there was no need for attribution because the speech was so well known.
“The man was here, one of the best orators in the world, a superstar in that sense. That’s the way I felt he should be honoured,” he said. “That’s one of his most famous speeches and it hangs in my office.”
The section of the speech refers to the doubts of a people, to its dreams and possibilities and to overcoming the doubts. Mr Kenny’s speech closely followed the words of Mr Obama’s 2008 speech but with one or two small amendment, and the addition of a longer sub-clause (see panel).
Mr Kenny said on RTÉ last night it was not a Neil Kinnock-Joe Biden moment.
This was a reference to accusations faced by the US vice-president when he was campaigning for the Senate in 1987 that he had plagiarised a speech delivered by former British Labour leader Neil Kinnock on being the first member of many generations of his family to have the opportunity to go to university.
“My speech was 470 words and the first 40 were a direct quote from Barack Obama in 2008, putting in Ireland instead of America,” said Mr Kenny.
When asked yesterday about criticism of the absence of attribution, the Taoiseach’s spokesman said the speech was so well known it would have been obvious to most people that he had used a portion of an Obama speech.
East Coast Radio, which is based in Wicklow, highlighted the close parallels between the speeches yesterday morning.
Asked who had written the speech, the spokesman said the Taoiseach was the “architect” of most of his speeches but also received assistance from a number of personnel in his office.
The spokesman refused to disclose the names of those who assist him in writing speeches. It is known that a number of long-standing advisers, including Mark Kennelly and Miriam O’Callaghan (not the Ms O’Callaghan who works for RTÉ), write scripts on behalf of Mr Kenny. Ms O’Callaghan wrote his ardfheis speech in 2007, portions of which he used in March this year when speaking at the White House during the shamrock ceremony.
The remainder of the speech is not derivative of any Obama speech although there are a number of stock phrases that have been used by many other writers and commentators to describe the US president, notably: “He is the American dream.”
TWO SPEECHES: OBAMA & KENNY
"If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer."- Excerpt from President Barack Obama's election victory speech at Grant Park, Chicago, in November 2008
"If there's anyone out there who still doubts that Ireland is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our ancestors is alive in our time; who still questions our capacity to restore ourselves, to reinvent ourselves and to prosper, well, today is your answer." -Excerpt from Taoiseach Enda Kenny's speech introducing President Barack Obama in College Green, Dublin, on Monday
