In 1988 there was no Internet and yet people still found Plagiarism in a Biden speech.

[LynneSin]

I still remember that because at the time someone had uncovered the Plagiarism, Joe Biden was one of the top Democratic Candidates for the 1988 Democratic Primaries. That small act of plagiarism, which I suspect that Biden just didn't properly cite when he wrote it, derailed his chances to be the 1988 Democratic Nominee.

Fast forward almost 30 years into the future where the internet is everywhere including on one's cell phone. They have websites dedicated to finding plagiarized passages of any speech.

Why did ANYONE in the Trump campaign think they could get away with lifting part's of Michelle Obama's 2008 DNC Convention speech and NO ONE would notice.

Someone planned that speech to be a huge fail for the RNC. But I'm sure the Tea Party folks who blindly support Donald Trump are too clueless to realize that!

And if I am correct there was some form of internet in 1988 but it was not readily available for everyday folks.

[unblock]

1. the internet was alive and awesome in 1988. just no world wide web.

ah, the good ole days.

there certainly wasn't the instant wealth of information online then, though.

[PJMcK]

2. The Plagiarism couldn't have been an accident

In another post, I wrote:

The quotes from Mrs. Obama's speech are too accurate to have been mistakes. Were they done on purpose? Did the writer(s) want to sabotage the campaign knowing that the plagiarism would be found out? Or were the quotes the result of sloppy copy and paste work without editing or consideration of the source?

Donald Trump's campaign can't manage the easiest speech of the convention without a screwup. Mrs. Trump's speech was a yawner and, in the context of the convention, it was merely a footnote. But because of their dumb mistake, that's the story we'll hear all day.

As an example of his management and personnel skills, Donald Trump fails to exhibit the abilities required for the office he seeks. He's an idiot.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. Plagiarism is the easiest thing in the world to detect,

internet or no internet. I teach a couple of college courses and sometimes I require a final paper. I always tell the students not to even think of copying anyone else's work without attribution because I will notice and they'll get an F. Plagiarism always sticks out in the first place just because it doesn't read or sound like the rest of the piece, and you can start from there. And when some high-profile person writes or speaks, whatever they wrote or said will be closely scrutinized. In the case of Melanoma's speech somebody was bound to think a couple of things: First, when applied to Donald Trump, Michelle Obama's words didn't fit. Second, somebody would certainly have thought those words sounded familiar because Michelle's speech was heard by damn near everybody. A little googling, et voila. It literally took minutes before the tweets started up.

I don't know how whoever wrote the speech thought nobody would notice. But then, I couldn't figure out how the campaign didn't notice that their short-lived TP logo had obvious homoerotic connotations, either. There's some industrial-strength incompetence going on, if not outright sabotage.

[Fluffdaddy]

4. BBS aka bulletin board system

If my memory serves me right was all the rage back then. Nowhere close to what we consider the internet is today.

I'm showing my age. Can you say 24K modems I knew you could.😁

[LynneSin]

5. I can say 1440 Modems

Just saying

[Wednesdays]

6. My first modem was 1200 baud

Much faster than the more prevalent 300 baud modems of the time.

[randome]

7. Biden also had a brain tumor, didn't he? So I gave him a pass at the time.

In this case, Donald and Melania ARE the tumors. Fortunately, they don't appear to be metastasizing but they sure as hell are not benign, either!
[hr][font color="blue"][center]No squirrels were harmed in the making of this post. Yet.[/center][/font][hr]