Maybe Patrick’s the messiah.

“In a telephone interview on Sunday, Mr. Patrick said that he and Mr. Obama first talked about the attacks from their respective rivals last summer, when Mrs. Clinton was raising questions about Mr. Obama’s experience, and that they discussed them again last week,” the Times’ Jeff Zeleny wrote. “Patrick said he told Mr. Obama that he should respond to the criticism, and he shared language from his campaign with Mr. Obama’s speechwriters.”

But Obama was quoted using Patrick’s language before the Summer of 2007…

Patrick in June 2006, at the Massachusetts Democratic party convention: “I am not asking anybody to take a chance on me. I am asking you to take a chance on your own aspirations.”

Obama one year later, as quoted in USA Today: “I am not asking anyone to take a chance on me. I am asking you to take a chance on your own aspirations.”

Team Clinton’s milking it with both hands. Mark Hemingway at NRO says Hillary needs to start pounding him post haste on the fluffiness of his rhetoric, but er, haven’t she and Bill already been doing that? The problem with her having to be the one to pop the “hope and change” balloon is that she comes off as such a thoroughgoing phony, so madly ambitious and cutthroat, that you can’t help but side with the balloon against her. Of course she wants to stamp out hope; she’s Hillary. Someone like Edwards (another phony, but of a different sort) would have been more effective in this role, but oh well. It falls to Maverick now to peel away the marshmallowy rhetorical layers and expose the liberal underneath — something, needless to say, Hillary’s also uniquely unsuited to do.

Exit question: When has Her Majesty ever worked “the night shift”?

Update: A fair point by MKH:

[W]hat the story takes a whack at, effectively, is Obama’s authenticity, which is his No. 1 selling point. Hillary’s camp is smart to play up the fact that the supreme orator, the Messiah of American politics, the man of change above all else, could really just be another politician with a flair for speechifying, a calculating player with no compunction about inspiring with rehashed copy if it suits his purposes.

This incident will prompt much closer looks at Obama’s words from here on out, which will naturally be rougher than the positively orgasmic reviews he’s been getting up until now. This is good for Hillary and good for the GOP in the general if he ends up being the nominee.

Again, is Hillary the person you want holding aloft the banner of authenticity?

Update: Side by side.