You're a Plagiarist! No, You Are!

I thought that Barack Obama had closed this plagiarism debate last night, declaring it evidence of "the silly season" in politics, and that Hillary had sealed off the cave with her boo-inducing "Xerox" line. Apparently not. According to ABC News' Political punch, there are fresh charges:

The Clinton campaign sent this out last night.

Sen. Barack Obama said in last night's debate, "In Youngstown, Ohio, I talked to workers who have seen their plants shipped overseas due to consequences of poor deals it's like NAFTA that have literally seen equipment unbolted from the floors of factories and shipped to China."

Which the Clinton campaign says is similar to this comment from Sen. John Kerry from the 2004 Democratic National Convention: "What does it mean in America today when Dave McCune, a steel worker I met in Canton, Ohio, saw his job sent overseas and the equipment in his factory literally unbolted, crated up, and shipped thousands of miles away along with that job?"

This as the Obama campaign flung it's own plagiarism poo back at Hillary with this video, embedded after the jump, and to be fair, only in retaliation.

Then, there's the video below, perhaps the most complete summation of this issue, by an enterprising Youtuber.
When I was a kid, and two of us kids would be fighting, there was only one way to settle it. After the jump, some more plagiar-ideo treats, and the whole argument gets settled by my mom.

OK, first, here's that Hillary video:


Now, I get the idea of retaliating against a smear, but if there was nothing wrong with it when Barack did it (and there wasn't), then that's the end of your argument. Throwing this out there is like saying, "Well, she took a cookie, too!"

As promised, my mom, Lady of Light, has the whole thing worked out:

The dictionary definition of plagiarism is "to pass off words or ideas of another as one's own." Must we fear that every time we open our mouth, an idea has been expressed by someone somewhere?

...If you look at Acts Chapter 7 in the bible, you will see that in Stephen's famous last speech before he was stoned, he makes reference to many things that were expressed in the Old Testament and I am sure were spoken by others, but would we accuse him of plagiarism? When people make reference to something of common knowledge - a common experience or common expressions, to me, this doesn't constitute plagiarism in the true sense of the word.

When Jesus made reference to things that were spoken in the proverbs by Solomon, would we accuse him of plagiarism? Although the bible translators do cross reference the verses in Jesus' words and Stephen's speech, I do not think that either of these men is guilty of plagiarism just because these ideas are expressed prior or elsewhere. It is kind of like in the law of copyright where after a certain amount of time something becomes "public domain" and anyone can use it.

Barack, Hillary, why do you want to make Jesus cry? So knock it off, before she has to come back there and teach you two a lesson!



For anyone who missed them, here are the Barack Obama and Deval Patrick videos that started it all.