As we continue our investigation of Lies on the Internet, our search take us to two of our
modern era politicians. Personally, I thought Dan Quayle was the most embarrassing excuse
for a front-line politician in history. And to think he tried to run for
President!! Maybe politics is all he is competent to do.
Why former President Bush ever selected this man to be his running mate is completely
beyond my comprehension.
Our story unfolds back in March, 1999. Again, it was my friend Robin Wagner who got the
ball rolling by sending me an email with the quotes of Dan Quayle. I just rolled with
laughter! Some of the things attributed to him brought tears to my eyes! The
email was so funny that I decided to add it to the SSQQ Web Page as part of our Vine
Lines section. In order to understand what I have added below on this page, first I
request that you visit the original page right now.
Please click here
Imagine my surprise when at the end of July, I received the following
email from SSQQ Student Susan Schroeder. The quotes previously attributed to Dan
Quayle are now attributed to Al Gore word-for-word. And I mean Word for Word. The only
differences I can tell are the years are changed, but not the month/day, and the order of
listing.
For example my favorite Quayle quote was #26 on the original list :
"For NASA, space is still a high
priority." -- Vice President Dan Quayle, 9/5/90
Now Gore is given credit for saying it, but it is 2nd on the list (see
below) :
"For NASA, space is still a high
priority."-Vice President Al Gore, 9/5/93
Note the only difference in the date is the year. Obviously someone didn't
work very hard. I would imagine using cut and paste the entire job took 10 minutes. In
fact, I wouldn't be surprised if it was a visitor to the SSQQ web page who did it.
The plagiarism was so obvious that it actually inspired me to write this
article. I sent Susan the following email :
Tue 08/03/1999 11:57 AM
Susan,
I am starting to see why people say never to trust anything you
read on the internet.
http://ssqq.com/archive/vinlin03.htm
Above are the quotes submitted to me attributed to
Dan Quayle. After checking my own web page and your email list, now I see almost word for
word the same stupidities belong to Al Gore. Obviously anyone can say anything they want
on the internet.
Susan never responded to my letter so I do not know who to credit with the
nifty cut and paste job. Perhaps some of our readers received a similar email since this
all happened fairly recently.
At any rate, this minor event illustrates clearly just how simple it is to
make stuff up and pass it around as "Truth".
