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Melania Trump speech appears to plagiarize Michelle Obama

Lutherf said:
That and White Elevators.
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Saw that on facebook and my liberal friends(from gragde school) wringing their hands at it.

They seriously see racism everywhere and can't understand why thier moronic posts get zero likes and no responses.
 
Ikari said:
This was the RNC, this was a speech by the potential First Lady. Do you think that she wrote it? Or even if she did (hahaha, yeah right...when was the last time a politician wrote their own speech?), that it wouldn't be vetted. Well apparently it wasn't. Ripping off the Obama's when you're running on the other side...I mean, that's a huge gaffe. It demonstrates that the Trump campaign is not ready for the big leagues. If they keep up with this chump behavior, Hillary will devour them.
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True but maybe thats the point?
 
First off neither one of them probably wrote the speech without the help of a professional speech writer. They are both trying to get across the same message and values. Will they use similar words and phrases? Very likely. I am still much more concerned about the corruption and lies by the candidates and president than some speech from someone I am not electing to office.
 
JasperL said:
I don't know about 'outrage' but yes, people are commenting that she plagiarized several lines, virtually word for word, from a Michelle Obama speech. :shrug:

What's fascinating is the denial that it was in fact plagiarism. :roll:
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If she did that as a student in a university, she would be tossed on her ass.

Watching the trumpanzees trying to craft an answer to this obvious plagiarism is hilarious.
 
jmotivator said:
And no, none of the phrases used by Michelle Obama were coined by Michelle Obama. Was she plagiarizing those phrases?

It's important to a bunch of people who would never vote for trump anyway. But we have elected actual plagiarists so I fail to see how this is a big deal rather than just making a mountain out of a mole hill.
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I don't think you know what plagiarism is, so maybe you should look it up and then comment - you'll look less silly.

And I'm not claiming it's a "big deal.' It's a huuuuggge PR flub - seems obvious and also as undeniable as the plagiarism. CNN's headline on the landing page is, "STOLEN WORDS." It's also the lead story on ABC news, and NBC. Not the lead at Fox News.com (obviously), but the second story. The third major story at Red State. Etc...... It's not what the Trump team wanted the focus to be on at all today.
 
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JasperL said:
I don't think you know what plagiarism is, so maybe you should look it up and then comment - you'll look less silly.

And I'm not claiming it's a "big deal.' It's a huuuuggge PR flub - seems obvious and also as undeniable as the plagiarism. CNN's headline on the landing page is, "STOLEN WORDS." It's also the lead story on ABC news, and NBC. Not the lead at Fox News.com, but the second story. It's not what the Trump team wanted the focus to be on at all today.
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americanwoman said:
If the campaign is all a joke. Sometimes, I just don't see how he is truly serious about it all.
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Ahh, I see.

Yeah, as sad as it seems, Trump does make more sense as a joke.
 
JasperL said:
I don't think you know what plagiarism is, so maybe you should look it up and then comment - you'll look less silly.

And I'm not claiming it's a "big deal.' It's a huuuuggge PR flub - seems obvious and also as undeniable as the plagiarism. CNN's headline on the landing page is, "STOLEN WORDS." It's also the lead story on ABC news, and NBC. Not the lead at Fox News.com, but the second story. It's not what the Trump team wanted the focus to be on at all today.
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Plagiarism is "the act of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as your own". The phrases used by Michelle Obama were not uniquely her work or ideas. Those phrases and ideas have been used over and over again. Melania is no more guilty of plagiarism than is Michelle Obama because the phrases they both borrowed are common phrases not uniquely attributable to any person.
 
Captain Adverse said:
Hmm, I'd say plagiarized is a bit of a stretch when you parse out the sentence fragments from both speeches:

1. My parents impressed on me the values that you work hard for what you want in life;

2. That your word is your bond;

4. You do what you say and keep your promise(s);

5. That you treat people with respect;

6. They taught and showed me values and morals in their daily life.

Anyone notice how common these phrases are? How everyone has not only heard some version of them, but have used them in part or all together ourselves at one point or another?

I don't think anyone has a copyright to their sole use...do you? :coffeepap:
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I can understand any politician or their surrogates using such themes as "hard work, family/American values, child rearing, respect and having a strong moral compass" as part of their speech. We do hear those themes repeated over and over again with politicians on both sides of the isle. But when you put Michelle Obama and Melania Trump's speechs side-by-side, it's very clear that Melania used portions of Michelle's speech nearly word-for-word. That's plagiarism and there's no excuse for that.
 
jmotivator said:
Plagiarism is "the act of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as your own". The phrases used by Michelle Obama were no uniquely her work or ideas. Those phrases and ideas have been used over and over again. Melania is no more guilty of plagiarism than is Michelle Obama because the phrases they both borrowed are common phrases not uniquely attributable to any person.
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Ugggg...

It's like giving students a problem with several coupled equations and asking them to solve them. The answer is going to be the same, but there are a neigh infinite number of ways in which it can be solved. You see two papers that have solved all the equations in exactly the same way...is it plagiarism? I mean, the math is the math, right? No, clearly one of the students cheated off the other. There's no way to reproduce everything in the exact same order as someone else.

yes, the phrases used were common, but the combination in the word-for-word order was plagiarism of Michelle's speech. Y'all trying to make defense for this just makes it look worse, more juvenile. Need to own up to this and move on, otherwise if the Trump campaign keeps doing stuff like this, they are going to be eaten alive by Hillary.
 
Lutherf said:
Obama video...
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LOL, so the defense for Trump's wife is it's NOT!! plagiarism at all, but if it is, it doesn't matter because Obama did it too? Compelling stuff! :lamo

Like I said earlier, the denial on this thread is just hilarious and fascinating
 
Ikari said:
Ugggg...

It's like giving students a problem with several coupled equations and asking them to solve them. The answer is going to be the same, but there are a neigh infinite number of ways in which it can be solved. You see two papers that have solved all the equations in exactly the same way...is it plagiarism? I mean, the math is the math, right? No, clearly one of the students cheated off the other. There's no way to reproduce everything in the exact same order as someone else.

yes, the phrases used were common, but the combination in the word-for-word order was plagiarism of Michelle's speech. Y'all trying to make defense for this just makes it look worse, more juvenile. Need to own up to this and move on, otherwise if the Trump campaign keeps doing stuff like this, they are going to be eaten alive by Hillary.
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No, again, MIchelle's speech contained word for word phrases that have been used before you can't plagiarize work that wasn't original to begin with. "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country" is coined by JFK, and trying to pass that off as your own is plagiarism. "Your word is your bond"? Not so much.
 
This seems like a lot of upset over nothing. It is the wife of a candidate at a convention.
She spoke for over 35 minutes. The words in question were talking about values and bonds, treat people with respect.
A minutes worth?

This is a nothing blimp on the radar screen.
 
jmotivator said:
No, again, MIchelle's speech contained word for word phrases that have been used before you can't plagiarize work that wasn't original to begin with. "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country" is coined by JFK, and trying to pass that off as your own is plagiarism. "Your word is your bond"? Not so much.
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OMG...it wasn't the use of one common phrase. This was a paragraph that was word-for-word the same.

You can't lie about this and say it's not plagiarism, it is. Y'all just need to admit this and try to move on. Dwelling on it, keeping it in the new cycle, that's just going to help Hillary.

damn the Trump campaign is a bunch of novice chumps, letting something like this through.
 
JasperL said:
LOL, so the defense for Trump's wife is it's NOT!! plagiarism at all, but if it is, it doesn't matter because Obama did it too? Compelling stuff! :lamo

Like I said earlier, the denial on this thread is just hilarious and fascinating
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I already explained why it's not plagiarism. The video is just reinforcing the concept of "common usage" or "common knowledge".

Plagiarism is, in essence, the theft of intellectual property. There has to be an original idea there before someone can "steal" it and common platitudes about common values that commonly come up in political speeches isn't an original idea.
 
Ikari said:
OMG...it wasn't the use of one common phrase. This was a paragraph that was word-for-word the same.

You can't lie about this and say it's not plagiarism, it is. Y'all just need to admit this and try to move on. Dwelling on it, keeping it in the new cycle, that's just going to help Hillary.

damn the Trump campaign is a bunch of novice chumps, letting something like this through.
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You are really upset about this, I can tell. But it isn't plagiarism. If a phrase is in common use it isn't protected. What Michelle Obama said was not coined by her so it can't be plagiarized any more than she could be accused of plagiarism for writing it.

Obama lifted unique phrases written by someone else, and Biden took entire speeches and delivered them as his own. I fail to see where Melania's speech comes close to those transgressions.
 
jmotivator said:
You are really upset about this, I can tell. But it isn't plagiarism. If a phrase is in common use it isn't protected. What Michelle Obama said was not coined by her so it can't be plagiarized any more than she could be accused of plagiarism for writing it.

Obama lifted unique phrases written by someone else, and Biden took entire speeches and delivered them as his own. I fail to see where Melania's speech comes close to those transgressions.
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I'm not upset about it. But it is a bad start for Trump. It is plagiarism, no matter how much you want to deny it. It's a word-for-word copy of part of Michelle's speech. It wasn't A phrase, it was a paragraph's worth all arranged in the same manner.

listen, you are highlighting the true issue here. This case of plagiarism, and the defense of it, demonstrates not only does the Trump campaign have no idea what it's doing, but that they are as trustworthy as Clinton.

And "Obama did it"...that's your defense? I thought y'all were supposed to be so much better than Obama, not just some bad copy.

The Trump campaign...what a joke. When it grows a pair and can admit what it did, then maybe we'll start to move some where.
 
JasperL said:
LOL, so the defense for Trump's wife is it's NOT!! plagiarism at all, but if it is, it doesn't matter because Obama did it too? Compelling stuff! :lamo

Like I said earlier, the denial on this thread is just hilarious and fascinating
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So was Biden's and Obama's actual plagiarism a serious problem?
 
jmotivator said:
Plagiarism is "the act of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as your own". The phrases used by Michelle Obama were not uniquely her work or ideas. Those phrases and ideas have been used over and over again. Melania is no more guilty of plagiarism than is Michelle Obama because the phrases they both borrowed are common phrases not uniquely attributable to any person.
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Yeah, you still don't know what plagiarism is... :roll:

The ideas weren't unique to Michelle Obama but the words were. It's simply not plausible, and no professor or journal or any publisher worried about plagiarism would EVER accept, that whoever wrote the speech for Mrs. Trump just happened, coincidence!!, to come up with nearly identical words in the same order as Mrs. Obama to describe the same ideas. It just doesn't happen in real life - never.
 
My reaction. So what.

Melania use of commonly used phrases, which closely matches Obamas or

"I did not send or receive classified information from my email sever."
 
Ikari said:
I'm not upset about it. But it is a bad start for Trump. It is plagiarism, no matter how much you want to deny it. It's a word-for-word copy of part of Michelle's speech. It wasn't A phrase, it was a paragraph's worth all arranged in the same manner.

listen, you are highlighting the true issue here. This case of plagiarism, and the defense of it, demonstrates not only does the Trump campaign have no idea what it's doing, but that they are as trustworthy as Clinton.

And "Obama did it"...that's your defense? I thought y'all were supposed to be so much better than Obama, not just some bad copy.

The Trump campaign...what a joke. When it grows a pair and can admit what it did, then maybe we'll start to move some where.
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I'd suggest that it's actually a good start for Trump. The absurd criticism of Melania Trump's speech and the focus on a tiny section of it are sure fire indications that she knocked that speech out of the park.

How does that so often plagiarized phrase go...."when you're taking fire you know you're over the right target"?
 
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