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Hypocrites thy name is Democrats! [paraphrased, not plagiarized]

At some level, however, the aggregated chunks of all these common pieces get to be too much. Instead of authorship that shares a common language, the writer — not author — is engaged in misappropriation of another’s work. At what point is the line to be drawn? I don’t know of any hard and fast rules — instead, it’s “we’ll know it when we see it.” And that makes it a difficult subject to teach.

And if the subject is avoided because it’s difficult to distinguish the subtle cases, then there are no impediments to developing egregious ones. I would guess that nobody ever said, “hey, Tim — gettin’ pretty close to plagiarism there, aren’t you?” when Mr. Goeglein was in school.

This same difficulty, with defining an absolute border, also means that plagiarism becomes one of those subjects — like porn, torture, and promiscuity — that will be doomed to oscillate between lax and fervent prosecution. Further, there will be those who wish to “amp up” these oscillations for reasons unrelated to the actual transgression. Many of the commenters here are noting partisan differences relating to views on plagiarism — but this is true for many issues where “you know it when you see it.”

And, again, it’s not because the horrible cases aren’t horrible. It’s that each of the subjects begins with something good — plagiarism begins with using a common language; porn begins with representational art; torture begins with the control of prisoners; promiscuity begins with courtship. If you begin with something good, and confuse and politicize the border, then the things that go bad can be very bad indeed.

Plagiarism is unacceptable in any context, but it’s simply inexplicable that anyone would plagiarize for a column. Almost by definition, the columnist is expressing his idiosyncratic perspective, or else — in the case of a news-oriented columnist lik…

TheBigOldDog on March 1, 2008 at 12:58 PM

Michelle wrote about it on 2/21 (initial report) 2/22(re: Memorial Fund) and 2/27 (followup) at michellemalkin.com

radjah shelduck on March 1, 2008 at 10:09 AM

Actually, there is now a tool on the internet where students have to upload their papers and it checks other papers ever turned in and other works and determines if it’s been plagiarized. I just saw a demo of it. I know that some schools are already using it. It’s awesome!!

Sorry, I ripped that off. I can’t remember from where.

radjah shelduck on March 1, 2008 at 10:09 AM

Yes, this is true. I frequently used Google to catch plagerism in my students’ papers, but it would take me hours of extra time. In-class essays that I watched them write took much less time to grade because I didn’t have to check every odd phrase, and there weren’t really any odd phrases. One of the reasons that I quit teaching when I had children of my own is because I didn’t think I could devote the time required to adequately prepare lessons and grade papers. Hours to check for plagerism is one of the things that I would no longer have, and since every case of plagerism that I found also required intense defense of my position to both the parents and my bosses – well, many teachers felt it wasn’t worth it. I was too stubborn to let it go.

Most people who plagiarize do so under time constraints — they have deadlines to meet and start looking for short cuts. However, Goeglein didn’t have deadlines. His column was occasional, not scheduled, as 38 appearances in eight years indicates. So why steal at all? Why risk career and reputation by plagiarizing for a local newspaper column?

We will never know the answer to that question. However, his departure was entirely necessary. Unlike the Armstrong Williams case, though, this doesn’t reflect on the administration. This is one man’s curious and unnecessary compulsion to undo himself — for what appears to be no reason at all.

IMO anyway.

Republicans ALWAYS resign and slink off, while democrats who do bad things are feted by the party establishment and eventually named Time Man of the Year.

Rational Thought on March 1, 2008 at 9:40 AM

Larry Craig? Ted Stevens? Bob Ney?