Why Melania Trump's plagiarized speech should be fatal to Donald Trump's campaign

[KamaAina]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/07/19/1549601/-Why-Melania-Trump-s-plagiarized-speech-should-be-fatal-to-Donald-Trump-s-campaign

Melania Trump’s stunning plagiarism at the Republican National Convention should by all rights be fatal to her husband’s campaign for president, not merely because she plagiarized but because of who she plagiarized from. Melania, who claimed beforehand that she wrote her speech "with as little help as possible," stole from none other than Michelle Obama, whose family has been the target of the right’s most bitter hatred and ridicule for a decade now.

Donald Trump has argued again and again that Barack Obama is an incompetent danger who is trying to drive the country aground, yet it’s the words of Obama’s own wife that the Trump family has seen fit to appropriate as its own. Those two things are impossible to square. If the Obamas are so odious and hazardous, how could their values be worth adopting? Or to reverse the equation, since the Obamas’ values are so evidently worthy of adoption, as Melania demonstrated through her theft, then the case against the Obamas falls apart.

The particular passage that Melania chose to lift makes her transgression all the more devastating. Michelle Obama spoke eloquently about working hard and treating others with respect and dignity. “Your word is your bond," she said—and so, in an extraordinary irony, did Melania repeat after her. If you copy without attribution a passage about hard work, dignity, and your word being your bond, then you lack all dignity yourself.

Donald Trump did not speak these words himself, but he cannot disavow them. He personally introduced Melania on stage before she spoke, and the very purpose of her address was to promote an image that her husband wants to see promoted. Indeed, in a statement, Trump’s campaign stood behind Melania’s speech and refused to acknowledge any plagiarism.

[TexasBushwhacker]

1. One would think if she was going to steal from someone

it would be Ann Romney, Laura Bush or someother Republican woman. Then again, Trump didn't marry her for her brains.

[yeoman6987]

6. They were saying on CNN that Melina really likes michelle

And looks up to her. We don't even know if trumps wife is a Repug. Heck he only became one a few years ago to run for president. Craziest election ever!

[Jim__]

2. It really indicates either a total lack of discipline or deliberate sabotage in the Trump campaign.

Melania Trump is a political naif. She never should have been allowed to write her own speech for such an important event. At the very least she should have had to pass it through some type of validation process. If the speech was written by someone else, a political pro, it had to be deliberate sabotage.

[Journeyman]

3. Josh Marshall has a great take on how the speech came to be. See it here . . .

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-scythian-slice-of-trump-s-razor

The Brutal Slice of Trump's Razor

Over the weekend, I outlined my heuristic of Trumpian action which my high school classmate John Scalzi has now dubbed 'Trump's Razor' in honor of 'Occam's Razor', the foundational mode of reasoning devised by the 14th century scholastic theologian William of Occam. According to Trump's Razor: "ascertain the stupidest possible scenario that can be reconciled with the available facts" and that answer is likely correct. Last night ran very late at TPM thanks to the Melania/plagiarism debacle. As I was walking to my apartment well past midnight I started considering the implications of Trump's Razor and I shuddered and recoiled at what it told me. To phrase the principle in Occam's terms, it tells us 'the stupidest scenario is always to be preferred'. And what was the stupidest possible scenario? Right: Melania wrote the speech herself.

More. A very amusing more . . .

[Chiyo-chichi]

4. Exactly!

When Melania said that she and Donald were raised to "treat people with respect," she was lifting those words from Michelle Obama.
They are true of President Obama.
Is "he treats people with respect" something ANYONE would say of Donald Trump?

I'm betting that an order has been handed down to say the name "Obama" as little as possible for the remainder of the convention... because to say it will just remind the public of this fiasco.

They'll say "Washington" instead of "Obama."

[gg4usa]

5. I think Trump was the one who wrote the speech -

he figured no one would think to check against Michelle's speech; another GOP speaker, yes.

It was obvious Melania was just reading from a teleprompter.

[pamela]

7. #TrumpFamilyValues

She spent 6 weeks trying to think of a Trump value she could talk about and when she couldn't come up with any, she stole a few from the Obamas.

[Johonny]

8. They could have stolen from Clinton Nixon Johnson...but they stole from the Obamas, it is too funny

The family we are told to hate the most, that are the greatest failures in history, that's who they stole from.


Trump's whole act is a con. They clearly secretly admire Obama enough to take their words from their mouth.

[C_U_L8R]

9. It's unbelievable, Trump surrogates are in total denial

They are FORCIBLY arguing that this the most basic and
obvious theft of Michelle Obama's words... isn't
plagiarism !!! They're trying every lame excuse in the book
(and they'd be instantly bounced from any good classroom).
Trump fail. Big time !!

They could have laid this to rest in an hour
and paid off some poor staffer to take the fall.
But no... they want to fight. They want to make
their own definition of plagiarism. And they
say their obvious cheating is nothing at all.

This is bullshit. Trump is bullshit.

[Travis_0004]

10. I would guess the average voter doesn't know about this, and doesn't care.

[63splitwindow]

12. Should they know and should they care? nt

[Travis_0004]

15. I don't think so

Melinda is not running for president. If we want to point out why Donald should not be the next president, there are probably 100 better reasons I could come up with.

[63splitwindow]

16. If Don the Con cannot staff, supervise and manage a campaign...

how in the world could he possibly handle the much more complex job of being President of the United States? The obvious answer is that he is wildly unqualified to do so.

[63splitwindow]

11. "Michelle Obama, whose family has been the target of the right’s most bitter hatred and ridicule "

ABSOLUTELY disgustingly true. The RW scumnuts repeatedly refer to her as "Mooch" and an ape.

[Cosmocat]

13. Their spin is a fastball down the middle of the plate

their spin is that was simply speaking to real american values.

Every democrat with a damn needs to thank them for conceding that in order to speak for real american values republicans needs to plagiarize democrats!

[ffr]

14. I'm sorry, I'm still in tears over this.

What'll it be tomorrow? I can't wait!