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'I Have a Dream' Becomes Obama's 'I Have a Con'
When Senator Joe Biden was found to have lifted pieces of someone else's speech he was politically humiliated. One wonders what the reaction to Senator Obama will be, now that we find out that those all important words he's been spouting are not his own. Will the standard be different for him?
During a conference call this morning, Howard Wolfson had this to say. Via Mark Halperin:
"If you're going to be talking about the value of words, the words ought to be your own." - Howard Wolfson
Rhetorical flourishes are inspiring, especially when they're authentic. The problem comes when they're canned. Jake Tapper has a good run down on Obama's convenient oratory. It would be one thing if they came from the heart, or if what he was saying was actually original. Unfortunately, they don't and they aren't. They've all been said before. "Yes, we can reuse slogans!" says Ben Smith. "You bet your life we can," quips Deval Patrick. Si Se Puede. The word bamboozled comes to mind.
Deval Patrick in October, 2006:
" ... All I have to offer is words, just words. 'We hold these truths to be self evident. That all men are created equal.' Just words. Just words. 'We have nothing to fear but fear itself.' Just words. 'Ask not what your county can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.' Just words. 'I have a dream.' Just words."
Barack Obama in Wisconsin, February 16th, this past Saturday, as he tries to con Wisconsin voters in preparation for Tuesday's primary:
"Don't tell me words don't matter. 'I have a dream.' Just words. 'We hold these truths to be self evident. That all men are created equal.' Just words. 'We have nothing to fear but fear itself.' Just words. Just speeches."
A reader from Massachusetts emailed me this last night:
... Guess what the lead-off story was on the local broadcast news tonight? Yes, "Plagiarism?" It was all about how Obama's "just words" riff was strikingly similar to Deval Patrick's speech from 2006. The story included a grainy video of Patrick delivering his speech, and then the clip from Obama's speech the other night. The reporter mentioned that the two shared campaign strategist, and that borrowing from others' campaigns wasn't that uncommon. However, it could cause a problem for Obama because it raises the idea that he may be just reading from a script. Then cut to the Hillary Clinton saying it's going to take more than speeches, it will take hard work.
It's what the New York Observer wrote about earlier in January. Via writer Steve Kornacki:
One small Obama-related detail from last night: The "Yes we can!" refrain that Barack Obama trumpeted in his concession speech was actually the campaign theme adopted by Deval Patrick, a top Obama supporter who rode the slogan to the Massachusetts governorship in 2006.
Oh, but wait! Before the bleachers come crashing down, Governor Deval Patrick issued a statement on the mutual mission of Patrick and Obama, which also just happens to include mirrored language and speeches that are exactly alike. Patrick's statement comes complete with... wait a minute. Excuse me, but the word gypsy must have run all out. Tapper offered Patrick's ramblings in an update:
UPDATE: The Obama campaign has issued a statement from Gov. Patrick: "Sen. Obama and I are long-time friends and allies. We often share ideas about politics, policy and language. The argument in question, on the value of words in the public square, is one about which he and I have spoken frequently before. Given the recent attacks from Sen. Clinton, I applaud him responding in just the way he did."
Tapper's comments afterwards are spot on.
The Boston Globe joined Deval Patrick with Barack Obama back in April of 2007. That was two months after I reported on Obama's flyover to skip the first issues debate in Carson City, Nevada, which was followed by his subsequent phone in presentation, as he showed up unprepared for the first health care debate. (This all happened long before I became a partisan for Clinton.) Now it's all these months later and all we've got today is a gullible traditional media sharing the same hope soda, while aiding and abetting a political con job that's sucked in independents by the droves in a DEMOCRATIC primary race.
Cons eventually catch up with you. Obama's played his supporters for suckers. They bought into the hope hype, sucking up this stuff with a straw, only to find out Obama's not an original, he's a knock off, of a governor, no less. Siphoning off of a winning campaign to try to win the presidency with a formula. Hey, it's politics. One campaign model fits 'em all. Put your twenty bucks in the bucket and shut the hell up!
The traditional media, cable talking heads, and quite a few large progressive blogs have regurgitated the Obama story like a pack of nomads wandering in the political desert in search of sustenance; people bankrupt of political or factual integrity looking for the answer and refusing to see what was in front of their faces all along. The question is whether the journalists who bought into the Obama hype, along with the cable talking heads who propped his campaign up, and the Obama blogs who didn't care one whit about the facts or his record but were only interested in spreading their Hillary hatred, have got so much invested they won't have the honesty, the integrity, and the moral courage to back peddle on their craven cave in before it's not only too late for them, but too late for the Democratic party.
Barack Obama isn't an original. He's the first 21st century L. Ron Hubbard of politics, Elmer Gantry, name your huckster.
"I have a dream" just became "I have a con."
Read more news and blog posts on accusations of plagiarism against Obama
Follow Taylor Marsh on Twitter: www.twitter.com/taylormarsh
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Hillary voted for the Iraq war.
This endless refrain of Clinton's "35 years of experience" falls really flat when - at best - most of that seems to have been "borrowed" from her husband.
Plus, it seems to me that if you're going to now run a candidacy based on insults, they out not to be so obviously written for you by someone else.
Which, Ms. Marsh, is not a good thing....
Whose rule is it that inspiring rhetoric can only be used by one person or one campaign?
And how does Hillary Clinton get a pass for decrying "Republican-style attacks" while her supporters clog the blogs with the sickening meme that Obama is the leader of a cult movement?
Excluding Florida and Michigan, Obama is leading Hillary by nearly a million in the raw popular vote so far. I'm pretty sure that once you're in the majority you've outgrown "cult" status.
Wow!
Almost fun to see Hillary's surrogates lick the gutter in search of ways to boost their candidate.
Why is it they seem to have nothing good to say about their candidate, and only slime her opponent?
L Ron Hubbard?!?!
Elmer Gantry!?!?!
Stick a fork in Hillary. She's done!!
just because we haven't heard the speech before doesn't mean it wasn't made.
watch this new video and try to be open-minded then you be the judge.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuB_W8o_UsU
We got "99 Problems but Taylor Marsh Ain't One"!!!
Taylor, respectfully, I researched all of the candidates. I care passionately about our country. I can't get over how blockheaded your line of reasoning is.
I sigh at being condescended to and told that I am an idiot, duped by a snake oil salesman, part of a cult, etc. These are just sound bites that show a lack of anything substantial to say. I am a teacher. This plagiarism thing is ridiculous. They collaborated, as all candidates do, end of story. If you uphold your silly argument, then all candidates should footnote their spouses, speech writers, historical figures, campaign advisors, etc. every time they address the public. I actually did want to know who wrote that banal "Xerox" comment for the debate last week..I kind of hope that Senator Clinton "plagiarized" it, as it was beneath her, and it looked like it made her a little sick to even say it.
(Come to think of it, wow, maybe I am really stupid. I know that I drink lattes...God help me, I like good coffee!!! That must mean that I am unable to think for myself!)
What's truly ironic about all the "con" rhetoric is that it conveniently ignores how something as commonplace this stuff is in politics.
For those of you jumping on this bandwagon, consider that JFK's legendary "ask not what your country can do for you..." was NOT "his"
In 1884, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said:
"It is now the moment when by common consent we pause to become conscious of our national life and to rejoice in it, to recall what our country has done for each of us, and to ask ourselves what we can do for our country in return."
... so by the Peanut Gallery Bandwagon Theory:
JFK was a con man
Billary supporters are just blatantly desperate these days; I guess you should be. After all the following 2 minute video shows Billary at their shining divisive and hypocritical best:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_mcgO3Iva0
Well then Hillary must "have a con" too!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJ7Cs3QvT3U
That final line she gave so famously at the Texas CNN/Univision debate - and lauded by the pundits in the press as being her best moment, was ripped completely from Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign speech, word for word.
I wonder, Ms. Marsh if you will be as quick to call Senator Clinton on her plagiarism, as Obama on his?
Try this:
(Just substitute "Hillary Clinton" anywhere that you've typed "Barack Obama," because it would seem that your denouncements above are applicable to Hillary Clinton, as well.
It's easy, see:
"[Hillary Clinton] isn't an original. [S]he's the first 21st century L. Ron Hubbard of politics, Elmer Gantry, name your huckster."
Associating Obama, with Hubbard borders on criminal. What saying hes no better than Hitler is too passe?
Hubbard was a lunatic cult leader and a pedophile.
I've read a bit about Hubbard but never heard the pedophile charge. Do you have any sources to cite? Thanks in advance!
Earthlings Unite!
amen and thank you!! GO hillary!!
:)
Yes, please, GO hillary.
GO -- far away -- and take your spouse with you.
You both need some R&R and you both should think through how you will 'suspend' your campaign gracefully. And quickly.
If Barack loses, it's a defeat for hope. No, not "hope" as we commonly understand it to be, but "hope" as a tactic and organizing principle for the Dems. It leaves us with "getting real", as the organizing principle around which--what-- Hillary will rally people to defeat McCain? I guess we could all just hunker down and eat our broccoli (the equivalent of voting for Hillary--which I endorse wholeheartedly), but where will the millions energized by Obama's campaign have to go? Whither the near-certain guarantee of a dem sweep of both houses to a veto-proof majority? The Obama movement can be a tsunami that buries the Republican party--the only way for us to buy enough time and political capital to start truly fixing the mess they've made. Whither the 50 state organization that Howard Dean established as the goal for our party? The 50 state organization that Obama has brilliantly built, and will deliver, thank you very much. Does it just go away? Why engage in a knife fight with the Republicans when the moral might of the Obama landslide renders all of the endless tit-for-tat with the Republicans irrelevant? Oh, there will be fights for sure, but Obama's coolness and ability to outmanuver the opposition will prevail. But a protracted, endless war with the Clintons and the Republicans? Who needs that when we've got Barack? I'll take the untested, but energizing leader to the (sort of) tested heir-apparent every time.
Cant wait till March 4 and the end of Billary. Texas will be her last losing stand. Hook her horns. Been waiting months for that concession speech. What a great moment for the Democratic party and the American people- the defeat and humiliation of Billary
"Honk Your Horns?" Isn't that what you do at a High School Football game?
As I watch Obama's "speeches" ( SO lifted from Robert F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.) I am reminded of a high school "pep rally". I watch the mindless faces, not listening at all, but instead loking around, just waiting until he pauses, and then break out in cheers and chanting.
Thre's a lot of talk of "the youth vote", those thinking this is "American Idol", and "the senior vote", the wizened ones who want better-but know what works.
No one mentions how very SMALL these groups are,and leaves out those between 30 and 60.
If it weren't for all these "OPEN" cauceses and primaries, where ANYONE (read registered republicans and independants) can cast a vote for a democratic candidate, Hillary would have had the nomination a long time ago.
What you need to realize is that the republicans want to stay in control of the White House. And if you make over 200,000 a year or more, (as a LOT of Americans do), you really want to keep the current tax cuts for wealthy people and businesses in play.
And so, their plan from the beginning was to get the weakest candidate nominated, the one who is weakest on experience, weakest on foreign policy, weakest on national security, weakest voting record and the most naive views on how to deal with other world leaders.
And so, the republicans mustered the troops to literally invade all the "open" primaries and caucases they possibly could, voted overwhelmly for Obama, laughed, and went back to the GOP. They have NO INTENTION of voting for Obama in November- and they have suceeded greatly with the help of the media.
IF, by some slight chance, Obama should get the nomination, I HAVE to go with McCain.
Say what you will about John McCain, but as a veteran myself (to earn money for college), I respect and trust this guy to at least KEEP US SAFE.
Something that Obama doesn't yet know how to do.
Yeah, god forbid you vote for someone that has actually been right the whole time! Yeah, that's weakness for ya.
There's a reason why Rove goes on fox news and says that Barack Obama would be a tougher candidate to beat, and it's not because he's "the weakest."
Maybe you were one of those Republicans INFILTRATED as you say they were. Now you are INFILTRATED here as well trying to make a case for Mccain based upon YES to Hillary but no to Obama? You and others making this non-sense argument are either afraid of change or like I said earlier Republicans of the worse kind.
crystalsapphire:
Some of us were at a rally with 17,999 of Obama's supporters.
We didn't see the "mindless faces" you seem to see. Do you watch cable through a beer or pot haze?
The people we were with were black, white, young, old; and
their concerns were being voiced in clear and concise and articulate terms.
We waited for three hours to be admitted to the rally; plenty of time to discuss and interact. Lot of progressive and forward thinking Americans were there.
Too bad you weren't there. You might be able to get beyond your blind loyalty to Hillary or your resistance to change. Of course it does take a bit of effort to engage people face-to-face and talk; can't hide behind your monitor.
Trust us, Billary won't make it. Nothing to do with hate; we reject the politics of the past. And we look for a better future, with Obama in the White House.
Or if you gotta go with the perpetual war and lobby guy, waste your vote on McCain.
if you notice, hillary doesn't give concession speeches. where'd you get the idea she would? from her brief moment of grace at the debate? that was just suckering up to the crowd. the next day she was all red meat toss and same old lecturing school principal voice. she's the female version of the principal in ferris bueller's day off!
There is too much hate on this board towards Hillary. A party divided will not win in November. I for one will never vote for Obama, not because I want him humilliated, he is just not ready.
It pains me to attack any Democrat because I see too much of it leveled toward Hillary Clinton on these pages.
Truth be told, I'll vote for whomever wins the nomination.
While the rhetoric question is hardly worth all the fuss, what concerns me is Obama's over-reaction to any type of criticism.
The trouble with placing candidates on pedestals is witnessing their inevitable falls when they put a toe out of line.
He was very pissy when he got caught, and again he's relied on his zealous fan base to go on the attack and protect him from criticism.
This is not a time in our history when a thin skinned candidate can survive. He either needs to Man-Up, or leave it to a tougher woman to bring us victory in November.
he wasn't "caught" - it's his national co-chair dummies. pay attention.
Finally, someone i know, just decided to support and vote for Obama. Dang, it took 19 debates and Hillary talking about plagiarism. And now pushing the crap. Thank you Hillary, now i can have some piece in more ways then one.
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