By: Felix Marwick | Wednesday, September 05, 2012 6:00 AM

Every Prime Minister has their little foibles.

David Lange was incredibly close to his speech writer, Mike Moore was famous for his 2am calls to newsrooms, Jim Bolger for his whiskey diplomacy, and Helen Clark for her laugh that could turn the head of an entire colony of fur seals.

With John Key it's his language. Almost every month a new Keyism enters the linguistic lexicon. Textes, allegator, and regulize are just some of the gems he's dropped on us over the years.

Don't get me wrong, our Prime Minister's not an unintelligent man, it's just that sometimes his diction is a little wanting.

So it's probably not all that surprising that some poor US State department weenie got it colossally wrong when transcribing John Key's comments from his recent meeting in Rarotonga with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The heavy vowels and dark 'L's of the Kiwi accent were obviously to much to handle with an innocent comment about cooperating with the US, turning into a New Zealand commitment to support the United States in a future conflict.

That's a whoops with a capital 'W'.

If you want to know how dangerous it is for a Kiwi politician to commit military backing to the United States just think of the case of former National Cabinet Minister Simon Power.

In 2004, when in opposition, he said "where Britain, Australia and the United States go, we go". That comment saw him dumped as defence spokesman and is seen by some as the one act that stymied any leadership aspirations he may have had.

Conservative politicians, even those from parties with friendlier ties with the US, tread very carefully when talking about NZ-US relations.

John Key may be accused of being many things, but one thing he's not is an idiot. There's no way on this earth he'd have made such an explicit commitment as the political fallout would have been horrendous.

Now the transcript was seized on by some, particularly those in the activist and blogging communities as a sign of our Government's duplicity and insensitivity, and a sign of poor performance by the mainstream media.

How, they trumpeted, could such a significant statement be overlooked.

Because it was never made.

At least eight Kiwi journos were at that event. Does anyone honestly believe the Prime Minister could have made a comment like that and it not be reported?

Cock up. It beats conspiracy almost every time.

Photo: John Key (Getty Images)