Plagiarism Schmlagiarism

The desperation and panic in the Clinton campaign reared its ugly head again as a spokesman for Hillary Clinton has accused Barack Obama of plagiarism.

Clinton campaign communications director Howard Wolfson said: “Sen. Obama is running on the strength of his rhetoric and the strength of his promises and, as we have seen in the last couple of days, he’s breaking his promises and his rhetoric isn’t his own.”

Wolfson's reference was even accompanied by video.

But is it plagiarism when the subject supposedly being plagiarized isn't the one calling foul and actually "applauds" it?

The Massachusetts governor said in a statement: “Sen. Obama and I are longtime 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 [for] responding in just the way he did.”

Governor Patrick has also been credited by Obama in the past when using an idea or paraphrasing a speech that Patrick has used. Keith Olbermann has already debunked the plagiarism swipe:

"...the purported victim of the plaigarism, Governor Deval Patrick of Massachusetts, says he and Senator Obama use each other's wordings all the time and he has no complaint. On at least one occasion Senator Obama explicitly credited the source anyway... And the issue of the overlap of language was discussed by both men in a Boston Globe article from April of last year."

He also goes on to add that if he can vet this story, then other reporters will as well. (On a side note, I'm skimming through comments sections in blogs and sadly see Hillary supporters so hungry for something positive to turn their way, they're eating up the plagiarism story like piranhas.)

But if we're really gonna play the "plagiarism" game, it really isn't all that hard to debunk. And I submit to you a couple of videos to show you just what I mean.

"Fired up and ready to go!"

"Yes we can."

Bob Cesca has plenty of examples of Hillary "borrowing" phrases from other speeches. Now granted, the "... and yes we will" portion of Hillary's line makes it her own. But "Yes we can" is the Obama catchphrase. Everyone knows that - so twisting it around as a cheap shot and then making it her own? Intentionally unintentional is how I would characterize it. My point is you can parse the words all you want, but it just smacks of more desperation for Hillary and her crackerjack campaign team.