Clemency suggests

Email registration

Free weekly email update

Great products and special offers for Spectator readers

Click here for great value reader offers and events

Click here for the latest Spectator Wine Offers

Shrum's own words

Stephen Pollard

Wednesday, 26th September 2007

Daniel Finkelstein has the scoop on the debt owed by Gordon Brown's speech to Bob Shrum:

"First of all there are plenty of phrases pretty directly lifted from speeches made by Shrum clients, many of which he admits he wrote. Here are just a few, there may well be many more:

Al Gore 2000 nomination acceptance speech: I know my own imperfections. I know that sometimes people say I'm too serious, that I talk too much substance and policy.
Gordon Brown: Sometimes people say I am too serious and I fight too hard and maybe that's true......
Al Gore 2000 nomination acceptance speech: I pledge to you tonight: I will work for you every day and I will never let you down. "
Gordon Brown: This is my pledge to the British people: I will not let you down.
John Kerry 2004 nomination acceptance speech: And what can I say about Teresa? She has the strongest moral compass of anyone I know
Gordon Brown: And this is my moral compass
Bill Clinton's State of the Union 1995: As we move into this next century, everybody matters; we don't have a person to waste.
Gordon Brown: This is the century where our country cannot afford to waste the talents of anyone

Then there's the structure. So many Shrum speeches begin with a story about the candidate's mother and father and what they taught him. So did Brown on Monday. And the pointing out John Smeaton was straight out of a Clinton State of the Union speech."

Danny ends by saying:

The only way in which this wasn't a Shrum speech? It wasn't good enough.

There's another difference from the usual Shrum speeches. This one is for a Presidential client (well, Prime Ministerial, but you get the drift) who's going to win.