- Barack Obama: During the presidential campaign of Barack Obama in February 2008, Obama was accused of plagiarizing a speech by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, given in October 2006. Obama’s speech, given in Wisconsin, included quotations from several other speeches, which he credited to Martin Luther King Jr. and John F. Kennedy, as well as a quotation from the Declaration of Independence. PlagiarismToday.com noted that after comparing Deval’s speech with Obama’s, one could see that Obama "used many of the same quotes as well as very similar phrasing." Obama apologized for not giving credit to Deval after the two had worked on his speech together, and Deval made a public announcement, calling the whole incident "unfair," and supporting Obama’s speech, according to Boston.com.
New York Times : Obama Plagiarism (Chrissy)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/19/us/politics/19campaign.html- The campaign of Barack Obama was a historical one, but it did have some bumps in the road. According to this article, Barack Obama plagiarized in one of his speeches. Well, he did use many other famous political people for quotes he did cite that the words he was speaking came from them. He didn't however give credit to Gov. Deval Patrick. This did not go unnoticed by the Clinton Campaign. They accused him of this and of course being Obama he took credit for the plagiarism and apologized for it, but not before he said some words about the Clinton campaign.
- I feel that this site would be very beneficial to visit to get information because it is very knowledgeable and reliable. They have direct quotes and are able to back their information. It is a good idea to see this because it could be very different from other sites that you would normally go on. It also shows how he was able to defend himself in a swift way.
Obama's Plagiarism. Gasp! He's a Public Figure! (Monica)
http://www.plagiarismtoday.com/2008/02/20/the-obama-plagiarism-scandal/This website is in reference to a scandal Barrack Obama caught wind of after a speech he gave on February 16th 2008 was accused of plagiarizing governor Deval Patrick's speech which was given October 15th 2006. The politicians shared similar quotations to well known speeches in US history. In Obama's non-combative way of dealing with accusations, he simply said that he should have cited Patrick's words (who the two are allegedly good friends) when saying his speech.
The article on the website brings up the sticky situation of accusing a public figure of plagiarism. When a public figure is accused, for the most part it doesn't destroy their legacy depending on the figure. In Obama's case, you don't really hear about this scandal anymore since it has been defused. The article also brings up that even though you could be famous and well liked it's no excuse to engage in plagiarism. Although in the case of politicians most people realize that they have speechwriters and most of the words coming out of their mouth isn't from their own mind.
Obama Plagiarizing (Laurel)
Obama was accused by Clinton of plagiarizing Deval Patrick. The website shown describes in detail, how Obama had plagiarized Deval and how it got out so quickly. The website used is very informational, it summarizes what happen but you can also choose to get more details about the topic. It was very helpful in finding more information and helping me understand the material. Also this website is reliable because it is from an organization.
The plagiarism that Obama had been accused of was that he used similar words and phrases as Deval Patrick. Obama speech was during his 2008 election; he had been speaking in Wisconsin, where he had answered allegations from, Hillary Clinton, his political rival at the time. While answering her charges, Obama had quoted a few other speeches, which is acceptable. The problem came up when, Clinton accused Obama of plagiarism. When comparing Obama’s speech and Deval’s speech from 2006; Obama had used similar words and phrases, ultimately Obama was accused of plagiarizing Deval. As a way to clear the air Obama had said him and Deval are friends and they share ideas, Obama acknowledged that he should have given credit to Deval and he apologized for that. Also Deval had defended Obama and didn’t accuse him of plagiarism. The point is that sometimes the person that is being plagiarized isn’t the one who accuses the person that uses their work because they are okay with it; but others will accuse the person the make them look bad.
With the Obama Plagiarism Scandal there had to be and accuser right? You might think that the person who he copied part of his speech from would be the accuser. Well if you thought that, then sorry, but you are very wrong. During Obamas first run for office against Hillary Clinton, he was accused of plagiarism. During one of his speeches he used many quotes from other politicians, however he said all their names and gave credit where credit was due. There was on politician he had forgot to give credit to and that was Deval Patrick, the governor of Massachusetts. It would be thought that gov. Patrick would speak up himself about this, however he did not. It was Hillary Clinton and her campaign. This is not a surprise because they were rivals in getting the spot for president. Like in most campaigns one candidate always tries to show the others flaws. That could be the reason that she outed him like she did. Well she did out him to the public, Obama graciously accepted his mistake and gave Deval Patrick credit. He even stated that they were friends in the New York Times article. He also said that he has written two books which Mrs.Clinton had used lines from in some of her speeches. He did not get her in trouble for plagiarism though. ( I would say he is a pretty cool guy for that). He did apologize and obviously because of how things worked out today he did not receive any major reprocussions for this. Even Patrick didn't seem to care.
