Oh boy, more videos of Obama supposedly stealing rhetoric from Gov. Deval Patrick have surfaced. The Clinton’s have been banging this drum all day and it’s starting to work.
The Politico lays out the newest set of similarities…
Here is Deval Patrick on June 3, 2006, according to an 11-second YouTube video posted Tuesday afternoon:
“I am not asking anybody to take a chance on ME. I’m asking you to take a chance on your OWN aspirations.”
Here is Barack Obama on Nov. 2 in Manning, S.C., according to an 11-second YouTube video posted nine minutes later:
“I’m not just asking you to take a chance on ME. I’m also asking you to take a chance on your OWN aspirations.”
Does it really matter if Obama is borrowing some lines from others? No. But does it diminish the power of what he’s saying? You bet it does. And that’s what Hillary is banking on.
February 19th, 2008 at 10:01 pm
Nope. Hillary got this one wrong too. See:
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2008/02/patrick_defends.html
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Patrick defends Obama on national TV
Feb. 19, 2008 01:01 PM
Governor Deval Patrick went on a network news show this morning to defend Barack Obama against charges that the Democratic presidential hopeful plagiarized Patrick.
Patrick said on ABC’s “Good Morning America” that the allegations were an unfair attempt to “belittle” Obama’s “ability to motivate people.”
The governor and Illinois senator have long shared similar principles and policies, Patrick has stumped for Obama, and Obama has borrowed rhetoric from his friend. The issue arose again over the weekend at a Democratic Party event in Wisconsin when Obama — taking the stage after Hillary Clinton said she offered solutions, not just speeches — used similar language about the power of words as Patrick did in a 2006 speech. They both quoted Martin Luther King Jr., the Declaration of Independence, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt to argue that words do matter — and can influence history.
Clinton told reporters Monday that, “If your whole candidacy is about words, they should be your words.” Representative James McGovern of Massachusetts, a Clinton backer, told reporters that the country deserved a president who was “not just someone who can copy someone’s homework.”
Obama has downplayed the issue, though acknowledging he should have credited Patrick.
Patrick sought today to lower the volume on the issue as well, calling the plagiarism allegation “an elaborate charge and an extravagant one.”