Categories: Capital Read, Inside the Queensway

UPDATED: Seriously, y'all: Attributions. Use them!

by kadyomalley on Monday, October 6, 2008 9:51pm - 111 Comments

Because I love making conspiracy-obsessed commenters look silly:

A fresh allegation of plagiarism against Stephane Dion, who delivered a speech at the 2005 United Nations Climate Change Conference that included seven sentences from the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment without properly citing the source.

Bad former Environment Minister! Bad! Always err on the side of giving credit, even when quoting from a publicly available report that was, in fact, the subject of the speech in question!

UPDATE: Um. Y’all realize that this was’t one of the two major speeches which were given by Dion at the opening and closing of the Montreal conference, right? It was a much shorter address – remarks, really – that were delivered at a parallel event to mark Arctic Day, and not – as some commenters and bloggers seem to have mistakenly concluded – during what he has called a pivotal moment in his career.

Really, did the National Post - which seems to be the one other English media outlet to pick up this story – even look at the speech in question? Because this article – which seems to rely heavily on Steve Janke’s detective work – refers to Dion having “flown to a UN conference on climate change … to read — pretty much word for word — the executive summary of a year-old UN report.” The conference was in Montreal – a mere two hour drive from Ottawa, not in New York, or on the other side of the world – and, as noted above, this was not one of the two speeches that he delivered at the meeting.

EVEN UPDATEDIER: I have to confess to having suddenly been struck by bout of bepuzzlement over who, exactly, it was who uncovered this “story” in the first place. Was it Steve Janke, or Trusty Tory correspondent Paulsstuff? Although the two posts appeared at roughly the same time — yesterday afternoon — neither appears to have credited the other. Is it possible that the source may have been an unknown third party, who sent along a friendly tip to more than one blogger? The alternative scenario — that Janke and Paulstuff independently, yet virtually simultaneously, stumbled over the same speech, and came to the same conclusions — would seem to be a coincidence so statistically unlikely as to be impossible.

Tags: Election Watch, happy now sf?, plagiarism watch, stephane dion is not a climate change scientist, t1t for tat watch, United Nations

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I’d say this story from the Tory war room, via two friendly bloggers, has just about passed it’s best before date. Organized screaming by ToryBots in commentary submissions is unlikely going to revive the story.

However, at least it offers them another opportunity to convince themselves that the entire media universe is against them.

This claim of dastardly media bias has been central to Harper’s attempt to neutralize critics not just in the campaign, but long before that.

But alas, there is little evidence suggesting that this derivative Canadian effort effort has been anywhere near as successful as when Rove did it to silence critics of Bush’s (Harper-supported) illegal invasion of Iraq.

- JV
http://Krukb@MTS.net.ca Fay

An act of journalistic penance? That would be a first. What a scary narrow view you have Kady, and you are just getting started!!!
Jack Mitchell

“Organized screaming by ToryBots in commentary submissions is unlikely going to revive the story.”

Hey, just be glad they’re not cutting your brake cables.
TinTincognito

I still don’t have it straight. If the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment was A Flash of Genius, and Mitch Pileggi is playing Dion, who is Greg Kinnear playing? Dr. Corell, Gunter Weller or the Assessment itself?
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Dave

I hate to disagree with you but the two events are tied together.

Hence the title of the speech “Opening Ceremony Arctic Day Parallel Event United Nations Climate Change Conference” and Steve Janke, recognizes this “On December 6, 2005, Stephane Dion participated in the United Nations Climate Change Conference. At a parallel event attached to this conference, he read the speech below.”

“Janke put it this way: “In 2005, as Minister of the Environment, Stephane Dion opened a climate conference focused on the Arctic. The bulk of his speech consisted of reading the executive summary of a year-old UN report, word for word.”” again it appears to be a parallel event of the conference as noted above.

BTW, Dion didn’t read the report, he read a speech, he just poached the report without citation.
Mike T.

If the conservatives win and have to guide Canada through a market meltdown, let’s hope they show more competence than this attempt to discredit another politician.
Charles H

Mike T: The market melting down is clearly because the markets are Liberal supporters.
Brett

Sorry Kady, i just read the speech from the Minister’s archives and it does not mention any attribution whatsoever. For you to sit there and say this is somehow different because of the context is pretty rich. If plaguerism is a big deal for the conservatives, it is an even bigger deal for Dion because he is an academic and is supposed to know better. Even worse, there is no way for him to wiggle out of it since the Liberals and him claim that he writes his own speeches. Sorry Kady, you are showing your true Liberal red clours on this one and in my view have no shred of credibility on it.
el Ricardo the smooth man

Khedi al-Malli, I applaud your fairness and judgment. When cut-and-paste becomes cut-and-thrust, the result may not reflect our more generous natures.
Geiseric the Lame

Dion refers to a study which cites the study. I seriously doubt anybody in the audience thought he was running the experiments himself.
Peter

I knew this would happen. If a Conservative does something or even appears to have done something, it’s evil, premeditated, done to deceive and most newsworthy. But if it’s done by a Liberal, it’s a simple misunderstanding, perfectly acceptable, honest and not worth wasting time over. It must be nice to have the media in your pocket. Kinda like the Mafia, isn’t it? Donworryboutit!
http://whatdoiknowgrit.blogspot.com James Curran

I’ll try this again.

Notice how the unTrusty Tory utilized the “chaired by John McCain” line? A cheap attempt to link Stephane Dion (of all people) to Republican John McCain. The truth is the “report” (not the speech) was presented by Dr. Robert Corell.

Dr. Corell gave his report to a committee of the US Senate. In the report Dr. Corell credits his colleagues that helped put the report together.

Corell told the committee that he was testifying on behalf of “an international team of 300 scientists, other experts, and elders and other insightful indigenous residents of the Arctic region who have prepared this comprehensive analysis of the impacts and consequences of climate variability and changes across the Arctic region, including the impacts induced by increases in UV radiation arising from depletion of stratospheric ozone in the region.”

Are we now to conclude, by Janke and unTrusty Tory’s reasoning, that Dr. Corell was plagiarizing 300 of his fellow scientists by giving this report?

Further, at a parallel event in Montreal in 2005, Stephane Dion delivered the above speech, citing some of the findings in Dr. Corell’s report. It was a parallel event, not the opening speech at the Conference as Mr. Janke would lead you to believe. Janke, McParland, unTrusty Tory and LaPresse go on to say that that makes Mr. Dion a plagiarist.

Does it?

How did Dr. Corell’s report come to be? And who was entitled to utilize its findings?

The Arctic Climate Impact Assessment(ACIA)was commissioned by the intergovernmental group called the Arctic Council. Steve Janke would lead you to believe this was a United Nations study. It wasn’t.

The Arctic Council was formed in 1996 under the Chretien Government. The council has eight members and is independent of the UN. The eight members are Canada, Russia, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, The United States, Sweden and Finland.

So, back to my point. Canada was part of this group. We bought an paid for our portion of this report. All eight members of the Arctic Council were entitled to utilize any portion of the report.

What we have is Dr. Corell reading a report in front of a Senate Committee. The report that 300 people contributed to, including Canadians and the Ministry of Environment. The same Ministry of Environment that Stephane Dion was the head of. Then we have Stephane Dion including portions of that report in his opening statement to a group assembled as part of Arctic Day Parallel Event.

Unlike Stephen Harper’s direct copying of Prime Minister Howard’s address to Australia, Stephane Dion was entitled to utilize all materials found in the ACIA. In fact, in his speech, he acknowledges the Arctic Council, the oversight group of the ACIA. Harper never acknowledged John Howard. What’s more, Stephane Dion wasn’t asking to send our brave soldiers to slaughter. He was trying to save a planet.

I don’t see how anyone, ANYONE, can see this as plagiarism.
Geiseric the Lame

“I don’t see how anyone, ANYONE, can see this as plagiarism.”

lean a little further to the right and close your mind.
RyanD

bud- I don’t know why I’m wasting my time responding to such a classless and ignorant comment but- oh well. I assume you are implying that I am a “lousy teacher.” I take great offence to that. I work very hard at my job and I can honestly say I’m damn good at it. I make a difference in the lives of my students and that means a great deal to me. You know nothing about me and nothing about what I do. Thus, you have no basis for your insulting comment. If anything I said was factually incorrect please point it out. If you have nothing intelligent to say in the way of debate calling me names and insulting my proffessional competancy doesn’t really work as a substitute. If anything, your lame and insulting response reinforces one of the major truths I have dsicovered in teaching- while teachers are often blamed for the failures of their students (sometimes fairly, often not) at the end of the day there will always be those people who just never learn.
sbt

“What’s more, Stephane Dion wasn’t asking to send our brave soldiers to slaughter. He was trying to save a planet.”

You were doing such a fantastic job until you brought out the ends justifies the means argument. Oh well.
http://cork2toronto.blogspot.com Mark Dowling

Hmmm… Kady’s final note leads me to think that Janke has finally crossed the border into the land of Taylor and Bourque – a sockpuppet for whatever the CPC war room doesn’t want its letterhead directly over.
Paul

At least you don’t try to hide that you are a partisan hack Kady.

Don’t forget to vote…
The Liberals need your support at the ballot box, not just on your soapbox.
Geiseric the Lame

RyanD

It wasn’t a term paper. I cite common source the audience should be familiar with at a workshop I insult half the audience and embarass the other half.
RyanD

Geiseric- Sorry, you’ve lost me. I don’t really disagree with you so I’m not sure which of my comments you are referring to.
paulsstuff

Note to James Curran:

I showed all the reports, speeches, etc. to the two professors today, as you requested, as well as a third.

All maintain it is still plagiarism. Dion should have prefaced his talking points as coming from that report, or noted in his opening statement the points were taken directly from the report, which he did not.

By the way, I have no affilliation with the Tory war room Kady. Just an ordinary Canadian who has had enough of this smear crap, FROM ALL THE PARTIES. And it was I who e-mailed the links to various Tory bloggers, all at the same time.
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Geiseric the Lame

“Geiseric- Sorry, you’ve lost me. I don’t really disagree with you so I’m not sure which of my comments you are referring to.”

yeah. sorry about that.
Ken

Kady,, Serious question, Are you a member of the LPC. In all honestly, in all this time of reading your blog, I hard pressed to find where you have taken them to task on any serious issue all quick to jump on they other parties.
paulsstuff

By the way. all three pointed to this comment by Corell in the original testimony, lacking in Dion’s statement:

Corell said key findings of the report indicate that Arctic climate change is occurring at a rate much greater than climate change as a whole, and with more significant consequences.

Correll then went on to list the points Dion used in his speech.