Fresh Plagiarism Charges Raised Against Rand Paul

[DonViejo]

Source: TPM

CATHERINE THOMPSON – NOVEMBER 5, 2013, 6:59 AM EST

Add another outlet to the growing list of sources Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) allegedly plagiarized: parts of an op-ed the Kentucky senator wrote in September closely resemble an article published days earlier in The Week.

Buzzfeed reported Monday night that paragraphs from Paul's Washington Times op-ed on mandatory minimum prison sentences, published on Sept. 20, appear to lift language from an article by The Week's Dan Stewart published on Sept. 14.

To give one example, Stewart wrote in his "Rethinking mandatory sentencing" that "By design, mandatory sentencing laws take discretion away from prosecutors and judges so as to impose harsh sentences, regardless of circumstances."

Paul's op-ed contained a virtually identical sentence: "By design, mandatory-sentencing laws take discretion away from prosecutors and judges so as to impose harsh sentences, regardless of circumstances."

Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/fresh-plagiarism-charges-raised-against-rand-paul

[Berlum]

1. Wow - Rand Paul has a wicked bad case of Republicon "Family Values"

Right out of the cesspool, as usual. Republicon "values" -- not as falsely advertised by their overpaid propaganda pimps -- but as Republicons actually live them out and lie about them day after day after lie-encrusted day.

[pkdu]

2. Why is he sniffing hs fingers? Nt

[DonViejo]

10. He's not sniffing them, but rather,...

consciously trying not to suck them.

[Berlum]

24. That is a "tell"

People who cover their mouth with their hands while speaking are trying to hide the fact that they are lying.

[QuestForSense]

29. He's making kissing noises.

It's tea-billy code for 'kiss my ass.'

[PeoViejo]

5. Somewhere, a Village is glad

..that their Idiot went to Washington.

[bemildred]

3. Going to be a lot of duels. nt

[Zorro]

19. That boah gonna be a duelin' fool

[KelleyD]

28. Tweety pointed out last night that Rand took that threat from Zell Miller...

Zell Miller threatened Tweety, I think in the 2008 election, to a duel for something Tweety said.

[bemildred]

30. It really tells you who they are. nt

[groundloop]

33. Good 'ol Zig Zag Zell - haven't heard about him in a while

The damned traitor.

[greymattermom]

4. Do you think he did all this himself?

Or maybe just hired an underpaid staffer or ghost writer? There are programs you can use to check text against previously published work. I do that all the time.

[Zoonart]

16. SURE

He probably did hire someone who did the cut and paste. The point is, that at the very least Rand is so intellectually incurious about the words that come out of his own mouth, that alone should disqualify him for higher office. This man wants to be President, yet he will repeat anything that scrolls up on the teleprompter and sign on to anything in a book attached to his own name without checking out what it says? REALLY?

We've already been down this read haven't we? We had a nincompoop recently... oh... what was his name?... his evil VP ran the country, while working the POTUS with his hand up the back of his shirt. Oh, yeah...W!

[Stuart G]

7. Welcome to DU...His dishonesty is as bad as it gets...nt

[CANDO]

8. I get this plagiarism stuff.

But I don't get that with 5 billion humans on earth, there are only so many words and sentence structures to convey an idea in a particular language. Somewhere, someplace people are going to use the identical words and sentence structure in print or speech. But when you have multiple instances such as Ayn Rand Paul, well, I guess your busted!

[FailureToCommunicate]

11. It could happen...

[CANDO]

13. That's funny!

But then we're talking wikipedia, not Shakespeare. I get accused of plagiarism when I cut and paste on a newspaper discussion forum. I always attribute it to the original source, and still get accused of plagiarism. Is it plagiarism to cut and paste something with attribution?

[Tansy_Gold]

14. Not plagiarism, but....

It could be copyright infringement.

[CANDO]

15. I should clarify.

I'll do it in the same manner as here at DU on the LBN forum. You know, you post the original headline and snip the first few paragraphs. I do it to responses of "well you didn't prove your point and where do you get this information"? That kind of thing. I also cut and past with attribution polling information so the wing nuts know where I'm getting it. And then they say "plagiarism!"

[Tansy_Gold]

32. same thing

It's not "plagiarism" if you correctly and properly attribute it, since plagiarism means claiming the work as your own. But depending on the individual case, it may still be copyright infringement.

[Bradical79]

43. Nope

As long as you don't post the full text and provide a link if it's online, then I'm ok with it. Don't know why anyone would consider that plagiarism.

[bemildred]

12. There are rules and tools, it's not that hard.

If you take the trouble to write something serious, you should take trouble to make sure it's really yours and things that you use are properly attributed. If nothing else you should go look for the duplications so that you can use them and attribute them, it looks better, more scholarly, than repeating as your own what you should have known about.

And that is not even getting into the moral and ethical issues.

[reflection]

42. I agree and would like to add

that I don't get that with 5 billion humans on earth, there are only so many words and sentence structures to convey an idea in a particular language. Somewhere, someplace people are going to use the identical words and sentence structure in print or speech. But when you have multiple instances such as Ayn Rand Paul, well, I guess your busted!

[global1]

17. Where Did Rand Go To College? Somebody Needs To Re-Check His....

school work. This current behavior is probably a carryover from his school days.

[Stuart G]

18. Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha.....!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!nt

[beerandjesus]

20. The real tragedy in this case is that he's RIGHT on the substance

We SHOULD rethink mandatory sentencing, at the very least. And Rand Paul was damn near the only one in Washington saying so--he was definitely the only one saying so and benefitting from the coverage the mainstream media lavish on the latest crackpot right-winger.

The plagiarism thing doesn't much affect my opinion of Rand Paul--it was pretty low to begin with. My fear is that this scandal will bring discredit to an issue--ending the drug wary--that few enough have the courage to raise, even though we as a nation desperately need to address it.

[Dopers_Greed]

35. But he's so wrong on other issues

We should rethink mandatory sentencing sure, but this crackpot is also against the minimum wage and Civil Rights Act.

[appacom]

39. You are right.

What do I do when I read a comment like yours and want others to read it. Can I recommend comments too?

[beerandjesus]

41. Thanks! Don't think comments can be recommended though...

A little sub-thread like this tends to draw the eye, though

[Beacool]

21. Ooohhhh, this is getting good.

Randy is in trouble, Randy is trouble........

[Buddha_of_Wisdom]

22. Do the honorable thing and resign...

Oh wait, you're not honorable, so you can just get kicked out via ethics charges.

Reid, it's time to start throwing these idiots through the Ethics Committee for expulsion.

[FairWinds]

23. When you give an attribution for a source . .

you should ALSO use "quotation marks" around any exact words that you borrow.
If you don't do that, people will think you are paraphrasing even if you are not.
One can do this in a speech as well by saying, "As my hero Ayn put it, . . . . unquote. "
It's not that hard.
Mr. Paul appears not to know this, among many other things he does not know.

[malthaussen]

25. Does this mean he gets sentenced to 50 years in prison? n/t

[gopiscrap]

26. what a dumb ass

god I pray he gets ousted in the next election

[appacom]

40. If the people in places like Lexington, Louisville and Hopkinsville get out to vote

that state can turn blue. We have got to vote everywhere. That's the lesson in the VA gov.'s race.

[slingsam]

27. man with dead animal on his head thinks like every teabagger.....who never thinks for himself

I think it's an old Chinese saying....or at least it was in the last fortune cookie I ate.....

[Blue Owl]

31. I love the smell of fresh plagiarism charges in the morning

[Javaman]

34. ayn rand paul is furiously scrubbing his website. nt

[calguy]

36. What?? You mean...

Rand Paul didn't write the Gettysburg Address??
Who Knew?

[Gothmog]

37. Rand Paul is now throwing his staff under the bus

It took a while but Rand Paul is finally making the move that most pundits have been expecting. Rand Paul is now blaming his staff for these issues http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/rand-paul-blames-plagiarism-on-staff-implements-new-citation-policy

Sen. Rand Paul's office on Tuesday admitted in a statement that some of the Kentucky senator's speeches were poorly sourced and not properly vetted, after several news reports accused him of plagiarism.

Doug Stafford, Paul's senior advisor, said that the senator always uses his own ideas, but relies on staff to provide support.

"Sen. Paul also relies on a large number of staff and advisers to provide supporting facts and anecdotes – some of which were not clearly sourced or vetted properly," Stafford said in the statement.

It is clear that Paul did not write these speeches and so it was only a matter of time before Rand Paul used his staff as scapegoats.

[Bradical79]

44. Would be believable if only a one time thing

If it were simply a lazy/stupid staffer I would think any professional politician would take care of the issue the first time it came up rather than start throwing out crazy talk about duels after this has occurred multiple times.

[Flying Squirrel]

38. There was a significant different in the two sentences...

Rand Paul added a hyphen between the word "mandatory" and "sentencing"!

[Gothmog]

45. A Baylor Journalism Professor has some choice comments for Rand Paul

Rand Paul attended Baylor for three years but never earned a degree. Rand Paul was accepted into Duke Medical School and so Paul never graduated from Baylor.

A Baylor journalism professor has some choice comments about Paul's lack of ethics. http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/journalism-professor-would-flunk-rand-paul-for-an-unambiguous-case-of-plagiarism

But on Wednesday, Paul lashed out at his critics once more.

"I'm being criticized for not having proper attribution, and yet they are able to write stuff that if I were their journalism teacher in college, I would fail them," Paul told National Review's Robert Costa.

Darden was not moved by that assessment.

"It appears that the Senator from Kentucky is choosing to attack the messenger rather than specifically address what appears to be an unambiguous case of plagiarism," he said in an email. "Had one of my Journalism students made the same mistakes, I would fail them for each individual assignment and refer the case to the appropriate university office that deals with honor code violations."