Letters to the Editor
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@AKA Smith
AKA Smith: "Hillary was attacked with those old Republican talking points. I just don't like to see that sort of thing. I hate bullies."
Interesting, because I think you've behaved like a bully in these threads.
AKA Smith: "But you and I can drop it if you don't try to accuse Hillary of plagiarism as you did today. However, what about people like Hutman? I don't intend to back down from him."
Why should it be about "backing down" or "not backing down"? Shouldn't it be simply about whether the arguments make sense, are based on consistent reasoning, etc.? I don't care if you back down or not. I do care that you are logically consistent, intellectually honest, and don't try to apply different standards to one candidate than you do to another simply because one is the "underdog" or whatever.
Also, I fail to see what you would need to "back down" from. Follow back in the thread and see who used ad-hominem arguments first. It was you. What else was "Didn't any of you go to college?" or "You all have a hive mind"? What else was the non-sequitur, unsupported, and out-of-the-blue accusation of sexism? Who is the bully here?
I still don't buy any of your argument. You use a selective and narrow definition of "plagiarism" against Barack Obama for what was a cherry-picked example of three sentences Obama used with the permission of a friend. The only reason that was brought to light was to wield as a political attack. Obama appropriately apologized for it and explained the context. Yet Hillary Clinton played it up to the hilt anyway, trying to score debate points and zing with her dumb "Xerox" line.
Then it turns out that she used almost the exact same closing statement that Bill Clinton did. Nevermind the Edwards thing, the Bill/Hillary simiarlity with the "the hits I've taken are nothing compared to the hits the American people have been taking every single day" is, if not outright plagiarism, certainly an instance of a copycat, unoriginal line.
You're really into telling people that you would give Obama an F if he turned in that speech in class. So what grade would you give Hillary Clinton?
Frankly, I think the whole thing is dumb. I think it was dumb for Hillary Clinton ever to use it as attack fodder. I think Obama defended himself with dignity, and Clinton overreached with her continued attack. She wanted it to be a "You're no John F. Kennedy" moment, and it wasn't. I also think the YouTube video of her copying her husband's line makes her look even more foolish. If that's not Xeroxing, then what is it? A charcoal etching?
Anyway, I know you don't want to "back down." Because it's all about standing up to bullies. I am such a big bully. Excuse me while I go knock somebody's school books out of his hands and steal his lunch money.
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I'm scared for AKA's students
AKA wrote, "That is really all I want to hear people say."
And all we REALLY WANT TO HEAR YOU SAY is to admit that Hillary plagarized as well. I'm glad that everybody else is going for this goody-goody nicey-nice crap but you 're holding people to a double STANDARD. Admit that Hillary plagarized or really refute the charges.
And yes having a ghost writer, uncredited, is most definitely plagarizing.
What really scares me is the fact that you are a college professor. And you say 15% of students are trying to plagarize. I don't doubt that but if YOU'RE the one trying to fail them out I weep for the future. Please, PLEASE for the sad state of American education in this country learn what plagarism ACTUALLY IS before you fail out any more students. To be honest it really fuckin PISSES me off. Bright young people's futures and lives are in your hands and you're deciding their fate based on some odd, twisted warped sense of plagarism and gender politics you have. STOP IT NOW!
And please, for the love of God, do not bring perceived sexism into your decision to try and charge or defend students against this as you have Hillary. Otherwise no male student at your college stands a chance. And they wonder why the youth vote is riled up against the same old politics as usual?
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@Libertyson, I wouldn't worry
I bet when students come to AKA's class for the first time, read her no-doubt-lengthy syllabus, hear her no-doubt-windy "opening remarks" and the first of what promises to be many stern lectures about plagiarism, half of them immediately drop the class.
Plagiarism is the White Whale. AKA is Captain Ahab.
From hell's heart she stabs at it!
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"Bright young people's futures and lives are in your hands and you're deciding their fate based on some odd, twisted warped sense of plagarism and gender politics"
Libertyson, you're right. Posting here is all fun and games, but kids have had their GPAs ruined and probably been denied financial aid based on this frantic old hag's hazy and reckless ideas about what constitutes plagiarism. I've never seen a greater sense of self-important smugness -- except possibly in Hillary herself. Which explains a lot, when you think of it.
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Hillary Clinton's Texas-size moment
Hillary set herself up with exactly the same question she was asked in that diner in New Hampshire. Her closing words evidently tried to summon back the same emotive moment, hoping that Texas would be New Hampshire all over again. I won't be surprised if she does the same thing in Cleveland.
For me, that's a moment that you can Xerox.
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RFBorjal,
it sounds like you had the same reaction to the debate as I did. When she dropped that trifling "Xerox" line, it made me want to sit on a Xerox machine, Xerox my ass, and mail the copies to her campaign headquarters.
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Plagiarism is picayune compared with Obama's association with domestic terrorists, Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn
Timothy McVeigh paid the ultimate price for his crimes but Ayers and Dohrn got away with it, although they also killed people. The Weathermen, the ultra leftwing organisation they headed was just as ruthless and violent as Baader-Meinhof in Germany and the Red Brigade in Italy. The facts about Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn are there for all to read in Wikipedia and Politico (2/22/08) has made the connection with Obama. The young man from Hawaii has been groomed for political power by a Chicago clique and that doesn't have to include slum landlord Tony Rezko. All the hot air about plagiarism is only a distraction, even though it does suggest the idol has feet og clay. I'm more inclined to go with the adage "Show me your friends and I'll tell you what you are". I bet the relatives of those killed by bombers, Ayers and Dohrn, don't shout "Hosanna" when they see Obama delivering yet another saccharine speech about change and hope. The Republicans are bound to refrain from using Obama's grisly connections when, as they hope, he is the Democrat candidate. The sluice gates will open then but the Obama supporters should not be shocked. After all, you haven' done your homework on your idol.