Plagiarism is illegal. BORROWING, on the other hand, is perfectly acceptable.

Bicoastal

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Mon Feb-18-08 05:50 PM
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Plagiarism is illegal. BORROWING, on the other hand, is perfectly acceptable.

It's interesting that this whole plagiarism charge came up now, since it's applicable to the paper I'm supposed to be currently writing. :(

The assignment was a "reading summary": to take an article in a scientific journal or chapters in an applicable book, and translate the scientific mumbo jumbo in our own words. However, we are ALSO required to add in plenty of fully annotated quotations from said reading, complete with bibliography (even though in this case, the "biblio" consists of only ONE author.) Our professor made sure to remind us that copying passages directly out of our sources without quotations and annotation was ILLEGAL--you would be thrown out of school, and even be made to pay a fine, if you did such a thing. Our Prof told us he had had the pleasure of catching two students plagiarizing a book he HIMSELF had written! Naturally, he noticed it right away...:dunce:

I bring this all up to make a point. People have been throwing the word plagiarism around as if it was the same thing as borrowing and paraphrasing words from other sources, which is something that nearly ALL politicians are guilty of. It ISN'T. Plagiarizing is what Joe Biden accidentally did several years ago--he quoted someone else's speech, WORD FOR WORD, in his own stump speech, but forgot (and most people agree he genuinely forgot, since he had done so on other occasions) to give credit to where that quotation came from. Naturally, Hillary's campaign, desperately searching for a perceived weakness, remembered Biden's campaign-destroying gaffe and decided to graft onto Obama's recent speech. And, predictably, they shouted from the airwaves--"He's plagiarized!"

But Obama has NOT done this. He borrowed some language and phrasing from a supporter and friend of his, Deval Patrick, who apparently genuinely gave him approval to do so. But the consent doesn't really matter--it's the parsing that counts. And if you place Barack's words and Deval's words side by side, you would see that Obama has NOT copied. He borrowed. He paraphrased. He put in his own words, as I am currently doing with my own text. Now, I would say that Obama's only crime is the (very mortal) sin of carelessness, except for the fact that Deval Patrick gave permission for Obama to borrow these themes for his own use. So he's not guilty of carelessness, either. And when you consider how much speaking Obama is doing, hour after hour, day after day, the only wonder is that something like this hasn't become an issue sooner. I, for one, never doubted that some of Barack's remarks were conceived by others, in addition to the ones dreamed up by himself--nobody can speechify 24/7 without a little help from their friends.

So let me say it one more time, for the kids in the back. Obama did not plagiarize--he borrowed. The only thing I have to add to this discussion is that by using this word and painting Obama as a thief, Hillary Clinton has taken what was once a rather negative campaign and turned it into an ENTIRELY negative campaign. And other than partisans and a few suckers who aren't taking the time to do their own research, nobody is going to be taken in by such a cheap ploy this late into an unstoppable campaign.