Is Melania trying to throw her husband's campaign?

do not marry Donald f***ing Trump

Who added the Michelle material is the big question.

She simply lifted that stuff figuring everybody is too dumb to notice.

This is the sort of convoluted thinking that pops up all the time, and it's not in any way sensible or believable. Plus, for her to think, "Oh, I don't really want the Donald to be President so, let's see, what can I do to completely sabotage his campaign? I know! I'll plagiarize part of my speech from Michelle Obama! That's the ticket! If I do that there's no way he'll win!" is a non starter.

I mean, think about it. Right now everyone -- well a lot of Democrats anyway -- is in a huge uproar about this. But trust me, this will blow over in a day or two. Plus, why in the world would she seize upon that particular thing to do? Why would she think anyone would notice or care.

I'm sure that whoever took the phrases from Michelle Obama's speech just doesn't quite understand what plagiarism really is. People are so used to cutting and pasting from the internet all the time that it does not seem like a big deal. And they're quite surprised when anyone notices.

Someone who is a fashion model is not someone who doesn't like the limelight or want a lot of attention.

Just was wondering!

Whenever you, or anyone else, asks a question like that, it is helpful to think it all the way through, try to puzzle out at least some of the ramifications.

Not to mention you should always hold Occam's Razor firmly in mind, that the simplest answer is likely the correct one.

But I'm not so sure about anybody not seeing or understanding what they were doing as plagiarism. What really bakes my noodle is that republicans have historically been masters of message...to the point where, let's be real here, we on the left get outgunned pretty often in this department. So how did this happen? It's unbelievable to me that the Capital-R, Capital-P Republican Party would just be like 'you do you, Melania' and roll with it, especially given their history.

If you're about to have someone in your party give an internationally high-profile speech, wouldn't you for sure have some staffer run everything through Google first? That to me would be, like, step 1. So who made the oversight? I haven't the slightest idea and it totally blows my mind.

run everything through Google first is so incredibly sensible, that I'm even more convinced that such a thing simply wasn't done, and that whoever strung those words together simply has not understanding of what plagiarism really is. It's a vast and growing problem.

It's slightly possible that whoever cribbed those phrases may have thought they came under the fair usage umbrella.

or on a screen. They didn't have to google their final against whatever is out there *i.e. Michelle's speech. They KNEW it was Michelle's speech.

I still maintain that the people who put those phrases into Melania's speech simply don't understand what plagiarism actually is.

Not saying he's abusing her but people
say that he's an abusive guy so it
makes you wonder. There's something
going on there. There's definitely something
going on there. Right back at ya Donald.

someone is.

to need help. Some people accuse Bill Clinton of doing the same, but he's only done a fraction of what Trump has done to himself.

they are doing so.

Many American students do not really understand what plagiarism is, so they often unintentionally commit what is called patchwork (or mosaic) plagiarism because they just don't understand how to properly integrate ideas and information from their source material. Unless they are carefully taught how to use sources properly, most students wrongly believe that if they just change some words or rearrange words and sentences borrowed from their sources, that is enough to avoid plagiarism.

They end up lifting bits and pieces of sentences or even whole sentences--maybe borrowing the bits from just one source, or maybe from more than one source--and then putting them together like a jigsaw puzzle. They change a few words in some or all of the bits, maybe rearrange some parts of some sentences, and then use words of their own to stitch the bits and pieces together. They are typically astonished and appalled when their teachers accuse them of plagiarism, because they thought they were doing everything necessary to avoid plagiarizing their sources.

OTOH, many of my otherwise excellent international students actually have trouble at first even understanding why we consider plagiarism to be such a big deal here. Not all other countries are blasé about it, but a few definitely are.

It seems possible to me that after receiving a preliminary draft prepared by a professional writer, Melania tweaked the speech herself. Quite possibly she went online to watch speeches given by other nominees' wives and, liking Michelle's style and sentiments, decided to incorporate some of her comments and phrases into her speech, assuming it would be OK as long as she made a few minor changes, just as I have seen untrained students do when they don't realize that sort of thing is still considered plagiarism.

It is the most likely scenario. Perhaps the Rick roll was the original speechwriter's prank then, which might have gotten a giggle but probably not much attention were it not for her finishing touches. I think you're right in that she felt it was probably fine to reiterate stock phrases.

It's still very very amusing

I think she decided last minute to toss shit in that she liked from Michelle's speech and probably didn't realize it's wrong to plagiarize. It slipped past the clowns running this circus.

but the more crazy he get, the more they love him.

create some "outraged love-my-wife, love women, type emotional moment" in defense of people piling on. But, he didn't.

Still think his marks all over this. But why?

After all, being President is a high-risk job, and Don might croak after a few years. Honestly, I don't think Trump is really out to win, considering his outrageous behavior during his campaign trail.