Wah wah wah. Sen. Hillary Clinton is accusing her Democratic rival of plagiarism, claiming that his history of doing so casts doubt on his credibility and suitability as a presidential candidate.
At a fund-raising dinner on Saturday night, Sen. Barack Obama borrowed a few lines once used in a speech by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, one of Sen. Obama’s biggest supporters. Sen. Obama says he used them at Gov. Patrick’s urging and dismissed the allegation as not “too big of a deal.”
Sen. Clinton’s campaign disagrees:
“If you’re asking the public to judge you on your rhetoric and your promises and you’re breaking your promises and lifting your rhetoric, there’s not much else there,” argued Howard Wolfson, Clinton’s communications director.
“His candidacy is fundamentally premised on the strength of his rhetoric and the strength of his promises,” Wolfson said. “So when he is found lifting the rhetoric from another politician, it calls into question the premise of the candidacy.”
However, Sen. Obama’s campaign fired back with times when Sen. Clinton’s speeches have closely mirrored Sen. Obama’s. Example:
BARACK OBAMA (2007): “Fired up! Ready to go” is the catch phrase of Obama’s campaign and has been the close of his campaign speeches for months.
HILLARY CLINTON (January 2008): “We are fired up and we are ready to go because we know America is ready for change and the process starts right here in Iowa.”
What we need is a super slogan that covers everything. It doesn’t even need to make sense. I suggest WE ARE FIRED-UP READINESS FOR THE TIME FOR CHANGING PROGRESS IS NOW!
I’m so glad there’s nothing else in the world that Democrats can fight over. They sure have a way of blowing it don’t they? If they think they’re being hard on each other now wait ’til the Republicans get a hold of one of these two. On the plus side if Obama becomes president, Alfred E. Newman can always be brought out of retirement to fill the void as a stand in for the eventual political cartoons so that should be cool.