Obama the Master Plagiarist
By Larry Johnson on September 18, 2008 at 3:11 PM in Current Affairs
There he goes again. Are you hearing an echo?
Remember how during the primaries Barack Obama plagiarized the slogans and phrases of Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick? “Just words?” That was hardly a surprise because Obama’s media guru and ventroloquist, David Axelrod, also just so happened to have scripted Patrick’s words in his campaign for governor, too–the very same words.
Remember how Obama plagiarized John Edwards’ slogan from 2004, “Change We Need,” just so slightly changing the wording to “Change We Can Believe In,” and then at the Democratic National Convention this August how Obama changed his slogan to “Change We Need”? Shocked again? No need. Once again, David Axelrod was the author of all of the slogans above. The same ventriloquist.
Remember how Obama plagiarized Malcolm X’s speech about blacks being “bamboozled” and “hoodwinked,” as scripted by Spike Lee in his bioflick “Malcolm X”? You can see it here:
Now, in his new two minute TV commercial on the economy, Obama is plagiarizing again. He’s stolen a signature phrase from John Kerry–one that Kerry used prominently in his announcement speech for his presidential campaign and continuously in his stump speech: “This is no ordinary time.”
Don’t bother guessing where this one came from. The answer cannot be simpler. The source of that phrase is another behind-the scenes media guru and puppeteer, none other than Bob Shrum. Shrum is the champion, all-time loser of the Democratic Party consultants, having lost eight–count ‘em–eight–that’s right–eight–presidential campaigns beginning with George McGovern, right through dispensing rotten losing advice to Al Gore and John Kerry. He’s baaaaaaack!!!!!!!
In case nervous Democrats are wondering where Obama’s terrible campaign has been coming from, look no further.
“No ordinary time” is one of Shrum’s favorite phrases to insert into the mouth of political candidates. Where did Shrum steal the line? He got it from the title of Doris Kearns Goodwin’s history of the Roosevelt White House during World War II, “No Ordinary Time.” And she got it from a line spoken by Eleanor Roosevelt. And Shrum, poor slob, was once in love with Doris, but she rejected him in favor of former JFK speechwriter Dick Goodwin.
Now the desperate, idea starved Obama campaign has obviously reached out to the discredited Shrum, master of defeat, for more recycled words to put into the mouth of the candidate who only does well speaking from a teleprompter. No ordinary time!
Here’s Obama mouthing the plagiarized phrase:
http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/2008/09/obama-no-ordinary-time.html
Barack Obama TV ad, entitled “No Ordinary Time”:
“This is no ordinary time and it shouldn’t be an ordinary election.”
Now, here’s John Kerry:
John Kerry Announcement Speech
September 02, 2003
“This is no ordinary campaign because this is no ordinary time.”
Here’s Obama stealing from Deval Patrick:
And here’s Obama stealing from John Edwards, which is to say one of David Axelrod’s puppets speaking the lines of another:
http://sweetness-light.com/archive/obama-also-plagiarizes-from-john-edwards
Criticizing pharmaceutical companies’ ads, Obama joked: “You know those ads where people are running around the fields, you know, they’re smiling, you don’t know what the drug is for?”
Compare that with this staple of Edwards’s 2004 stump speech: “I love the ads. Buy their medicine, take it, and the next day you and your spouse will be skipping through the fields.”
The likely nexus: top Obama adviser David Axelrod, who played a similar role for Patrick in 2006 and for Edwards in 2004. That may explain the list of lines Obama lifted from Edwards — whose campaign compiled a list of the offenses before the candidate dropped out of the race.
Here’s Obama’s announcement speech in February 2007: “I know I haven’t spent a lot of time learning the ways of Washington. But I’ve been there long enough to know that the ways of Washington must change.”
Compare that with Edwards’s 2003 announcement speech: “I haven’t spent most of my life in politics, but I’ve spent enough time in Washington to know how much we need to change Washington.”
“We need a president not afraid to use the word ‘union,’ ” Edwards told a steelworker audience in July 2007. “We need a president . . . who is not afraid to mention unions,” Obama said a month later. Edwards, accepting the party’s vice presidential nomination in 2004, said, “Hard work should be valued in this country, so we’re going to reward work, not just wealth.” Obama, in turn, has been heard to say, “We shouldn’t just be respecting wealth in this country, we should be respecting work.”
“It’s no ordinary time.” You can say that again–and again. Better yet, do like Obama–let someone else say it and make it your own.
, the basis for the Best Motion Picture Nominee (Golden Globes) starring Brad Pitt.
, the novel by John Le Carre, a new motion picture starring Gary Oldman and Colin Firth.
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