quote: Now, let's look at what Obama said in a fair, reasonable, and unself-serving unhysterical perspective.
Everything you say after this sounds unfair, unreasonable, very self-serving, and hysterical.
quote: Hark working citizens have been screwed so often by failed self-serving economic policy that there really isn't much point in addressing that issue. The economy is controlled by the rich for the rich, and what should 'trickle down', never does. The rich get rich and the poor get screwed. Despite the polls indicating that the economy is a major issue with voters. They know they are powerless to affect it or control it.
To blame 'the rich' for an individuals economic troubles is just wrong. There is nothing stopping anyone from making more money...except themselves. Some people will have to work harder and will have to make a bigger sacrifice but you can earn more if you really want to. Most people don't want to take the risk and do the work required. You have power over your own finances. You have the power to change your life. The rich cannot and will not stop you. Why would they?
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quote:I have not suggested that the only reason people would turn to religion is out of bitterness. But that seems to be what you're taking offense at.
Once again: I haven't said "only." That is intentional.
quote:Note that I am not even suggesting correlation between them, just observing them.
You made a correlation - you did it again right above ("The numbers of churches rise as the local income falls.") That's a correlation. Moreover, you've strongly implied causation:
quote:They knew that politicians weren't going to help them economically so they didn't vote based on economic issues. Instead they focused on issues close to home, and some of them became bitter and clung too hard to their religion, guns, and anti-immigrant stances because they were easier, they were cut and dried, and because politicians kept tossing them knee-jerk issues to vote on rather than address the larger issues.
...Some people do pay more attention to religious arguments or gun control or anti-immigration issues instead of, say, the American economy or the war in Iraq or the way the executive branch is trying to become 2/3 of the government because those are issues the people feel they can actually do something about.
Both these statements suggest causation (by the use of "instead" implying a choice to focus on something else), let alone correlation.
Let's look at what Obama said once again:
quote:"It's not surprising, then, they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
There are at least two ways to take this. One of the ways is consistent with Tom's whole string of commentary on this topic. This is one form of a very common accusation made by a certain set of people, many of whom are closely aligned with Obama. There was a whole book about Kansas that came to much the same conclusion. I don't blame someone for choosing that interpretation of it when Obama has purposely aligned himself with the political agenda associated with that view.
The ongoing defenses of the statement fall into the same trap. It comes across as "we know better than the people in the actual situation." Anyone who can't see why that's a reasonable interpretation - even if they think it's not the best interpretation - is out of touch with the large portion of Americans who are tired of people telling them that someone else knows better than they do what is good for them.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Well, he was talking to a crowd in San Francisco, so I don't know how blue collar the crowd was.
I agree it was awkward, and maybe he was directing his speech to his audience, as politicians are wont to do. I dunno that that is a bad thing in and of itself, but I can see where can cause some offense, though from the clarification I read, I don't see why it's caused such a kerfuffle.
posted
Of course, the problem with the last sentiment in your post Dagonee is that everyone I have met across all political spectra feel that way (tired of having other people tell them what is best for them).
It isn't a large portion, it's the entire portion.
The problem is in part, IMO, that the majority is relatively comfortable, and being the majority, anything that upsets them is by definition "out of touch".
posted
The ongoing defenses of the statement fall into the same trap. It comes across as "we know better than the people in the actual situation."
Dagonee, I am in the actual situation. I am not speaking from the top of my stack of money. I am living more or less paycheck to paycheck in an area where most of my relatives and neighbors are doing the same thing. Oddly enough, many of the people I talk to daily agreed with Obama's speech and are kinda puzzled what the big deal is.
The message I got from Obama's speech was not that he knew better than the people in the situation. The message I got was that he was listening to people in that situation, and this was what many of them told him. Obviously I have not expressed it any better than he did.
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posted
Obama's comments don't seem to be hurting him much, according to polls.
quote:Clinton has polled at 55, 53, 56 and 54 percent in the SurveyUSA polls, while Obama has polled 36, 41, 38 and 40 percent. However, the contest remains tight in Southeast Pennsylvania, which includes Philadelphia. The poll also found that Obama gained ground among Democrats who attend religious services regularly.
posted
I think Obama clarified his own comments pretty well in this statement.
quote:The problem is our politics doesn’t let the American people get heard. People know that it’s not easy solving some of these problems but they want to feel like at least someone is fighting for them.
It’s interesting. Lately there has been a little typical sort of political flare up because I said something that everybody knows is true which is that there are a whole bunch of folks in small towns in Pennsylvania, in towns right here in Indiana, in my hometown in Illinois who are bitter.
They are angry.
They feel like they have been left behind. They feel like nobody is paying attention to what they’re going through.
So I said well you know when you’re bitter you turn to what you can count on. So people they vote about guns, or they take comfort from their faith and their family and their community.
And they get mad about illegal immigrants who are coming over to this country or they get frustrated about how things are changing.
That’s a natural response.
And now I didn’t say it as well as I should have because you know the truth is that these traditions that are passed on from generation to generation those are important. That’s what sustains us
But what is absolutely true is that people don’t feel like they are being listened to. And so they pray and they count on each other and they count on their families. You know this in your own lives. What we need is a government that is actually paying attention. A government that is fighting for working people day in and day out making sure that we are trying to allow them to live out the American dream. And that’s what this campaign is about.
I've read several comments from Obama including the context from the original quote. It seems quite clear to me that what he was saying is that its difficult to get some working class people excited about his political message because they have been let down so many times on issues like jobs and medical care that they have become cynical and bitter about broken promises. As a result they vote on other issues that are important to them like gun rights or moral issues not because they care more about gun rights than they do about medical care but because they are cynical that politicians will actually do anything about jobs and medical care.
Because they are angry about their situation, they often lash out at outsiders like immigrants. Because they are bitter about broken political promises, they don't get involved in politics but instead they get involved with their church's aid programs and such.
Yes, taken alone and out of context you can understand Obama's comments in a lot of different ways. And many of those ways look insulting to people of faith and people in small towns and people who want immigration reform. But it isn't fair to look at his comments alone when we have a large body of Obama's own words on those issues and these people in addition to this one comment. It isn't fair to keep repeating what he originally said without noting that he has sense then clarified what he meant.
How many times right here on hatrack has one of us said something only to have people lay into our original word who won't desist no matter how many times we try to clarify that our original words were poorly chosen?
If you've ever been in that situation, you should recognize that Obama isn't being treated fairly on this one.
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posted
I don't know, Chris. Of the three candidates, Obama is the one that I like the best - part of that comes from knowing what it takes to come out of Illinois politics with as little dirt as he has on him. Part of it is looking at the work he did here in the state legislature. I was also influenced by reading his memoir "Dreams From My Father."
I *think* Obama meant things the way you're interepreting it - and maybe the way he's handling it is good enough to continue on to the Democratic nomination.
But I also think that the way Dag and others are interpreting these remarks aren't really that unreasonable. I'd like Obama to do something along the lines suggested by Bob Herbert in the column you linked and quoted earlier.
quote:If I were advising him, I would tell him to confront the matter head-on, meeting as often as possible with skeptical, and even hostile, working people in Pennsylvania and elsewhere. Let the questions rip, and answer them honestly.
No one has an obligation to vote for Mr. Obama, and it’s certainly not racist to vote against him. But the senator can make it clear that it is wrong to dismiss a candidacy out of hand solely because of the race or ethnicity or gender of the candidate.
One of Mr. Obama’s strongest points early in this campaign was his capacity to make people feel good about their country again. If I were him, I’d try to re-ignite that flame.
(this is similar to what I said Obama should do earlier in the thread, but Herbert says it better. )
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posted
Oh, yeah, I thought that last night and forgot to post it. Where's my younger, hipper Ronald Reagan Obama? That's what the quote seemed a betrayal of.
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quote:There was a whole book about Kansas that came to much the same conclusion.
The book is titled, "What's The Matter With Kansas? How Conservatives Won The Heart of America." By Thomas Frank. It's an interesting book, so long as you realize you are reading from an author with a strong liberal bias.
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quote:To blame 'the rich' for an individuals economic troubles is just wrong. There is nothing stopping anyone from making more money...except themselves.
You state these things as facts, when in reality they are merely opinions.
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quote:To blame 'the rich' for an individuals economic troubles is just wrong. There is nothing stopping anyone from making more money...except themselves.
You state these things as facts, when in reality they are merely opinions.
In some cases, this is not even a valid opinion it is factually incorrect.
Let me give an historic example.
In the 1920s and 30s in the Caribbean islands, 80% of the land was owned by sugar conglomerates less than 1/4 of which was in cultivation. Those sugar companies were raking in enormous profits, in some years they paid dividends to their stockholders exceeding 50%. At the same time workers in the sugar cane fields and factories were literally being paid starvation wages. Malnutrition was rampant. Workers lived in in human conditions.
Time and again over the previous century there had been efforts to get the owners of the sugar plantations and then the big sugar conglomerates to sell a portion of the uncultivated land so that the unlanded peasant could have property to grow food crops. Repeatedly this permission was denied which left the peasants no alternative but to work for the sugar industry at rock bottom wages. There were no alternatives and there were no alternatives because Big Sugar made sure to squash any alternatives that arose. And in case you missed it, any argument that the sugar companies couldn't afford to pay better wages is contradicted by the fact that they were making massive profits paying as much as 50% dividends to stock holders. Those peasants were being kept in poverty specifically so that the rich stock holders could make higher profits.
While that is an historic example, I assure you that I could go to Indonesia and China today and find virtually exactly the same conditions.
And I should add that it isn't just stock holders and CEOs who are reaping the benefits of poverty. If the workers in Indonesia and China were paid more, then the prices I pay for goods would rise. So though my wealth in dollars might not decrease, my real wealth as reflected by purchasing power of those dollars would go down. So I am indeed richer because the poor are kept in poverty. So are you.
[ April 15, 2008, 05:53 PM: Message edited by: The Rabbit ]
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:Originally posted by DarkKnight: *what everyone else is taking issue with*
You act like the rich are wrongly accused of something they do everyday, namely exercise enormous power and influence over the economy and politics.
When key phrases and words are inserted literally in the dead of night into legislation that affects millions of people negatively while benefiting one industry or even just one company, why shouldn't we blame the rich for many (not all) of our personal economic misfortunes?
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posted
I think they are fair game, so long as we blame Congress for going along with it, and ourselves for reelecting these guys who go along with it. It's never as easy as blaming one guy with issues like this.
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quote: Rep. Geoff Davis (R-Ky.) has apologized for using the word “boy” to describe Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) at a Republican fundraiser Saturday night in Kentucky.
"I’m gonna tell you something. That boy’s finger does not need to be on the button,” Davis said, according to an audio recording of the event that was obtained by The Hill. The lawmaker told the crowd that he participated in “closed, highly classified national security simulations” with Obama.
If the media was paying more attention, there might be more discussion of the reaction to the comments Davis made at the fundraiser:
quote:The comment, which was first reported by the Lexington Herald-Leader’s blog Pol Watchers, was met by laughter and applause.
A bunch of big money Republicans in the south hear Obama referred to as "that boy" and applaud. To me, that's more noteworthy than the comment itself.
To be fair, as the title of the link says, Davis has apologized, but to me the "apology" is pretty worthless:
quote:In the written apology to Obama, which he personally delivered to his Senate office, Davis wrote “my poor choice of words is regrettable and was in no way meant to impugn you or your integrity. I offer my sincere apology to you and ask for your forgiveness.”
The issue, of course, doesn't have anything to do with "impugning" Obama or his "integrity." If that's all he'd done, it wouldn't be news. Dems are doing that to McCain and Republicans are doing it to both Clinton and Obama.
The issue is the use of the term "that boy" to refer to an African-American man just 3 years younger than himself. In a state where, not too long ago, this was accepted terminology for *any* white man (or child) to call a black man, no matter how old.
So does Davis not "get it" - or does he just hope the rest of us don't?
quote:Originally posted by sndrake: The issueis the use of the term "that boy" to refer to an African-American man just 3 years younger than himself. In a state where, not too long ago, this was accepted terminology for *any* white man (or child) to call a black man, no matter how old.
I didn't know that -- I'd been wondering why, of all the words he might have used to denigrate Obama's judgment in that context, he chose "boy."
That makes a lot more sense now.
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posted
Yeah that's a pretty seriously bad choice of word. It's condescending and steeped in a racist past, and sadly all too often present. sndrake has it dead on I think, this would be a much bigger story if not for the "bitter" feud going on now, but I wouldn't be surprised if this claws its way into the news cycle before the end of the week.
And people say the media is in love with Obama.
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posted
I was wondering when someone would break out that word. That's as condescending and patronizing as you can get.
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In many ways I find "boy" to by worse than "ni**er". It is certainly more condescending and has the same racist over tones.
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quote:I’m gonna tell you something. That boy’s finger does not need to be on the button
quote:my poor choice of words is regrettable and was in no way meant to impugn you or your integrity.
I'm sorry even if you over look the racist and condescending language, you end up with a statement which pretty much couldn't have been intended to do anything except "impugn" Obama and his "integrity"
What could Davis have possibly intended by this statement if his intent was not say that Obama lacked either the integrity or or the wisdom to be President?
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posted
I think he was calling him a kid. "Boy" hasn't been common in my twenty-seven years, and we had parts of my county black folks just didn't go after dark. Many statements can be racist if you want them to be or not if you don't.
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quote:Originally posted by AvidReader: I think he was calling him a kid. "Boy" hasn't been common in my twenty-seven years, and we had parts of my county black folks just didn't go after dark. Many statements can be racist if you want them to be or not if you don't.
A 49-year old was calling a 46-year-old black man a kid using "boy"? No, just fairly tone-deaf dog-whistle politics.
posted
Davis hasn't been in Congress much longer than Obama, so it is a bit surprising if he just meant he's young and inexperienced. And he's an older guy. He could have just slipped and used a term he used to hear as a kid. I don't know the guy so I'm not going to guess.
I'm just saying we Southerners aren't always as sinister as folks think.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
First off, considering that Davis is only 3 years older than Obama, it would have been both arrogant and condescending for Davis to call him a kid.
When it comes to using racist terminology, there is a world of difference between someones experience who is now 27 years old and someones experience who is now 49 years old.
As someone who is also in their 40s, I can't imagine anyone of my era using calling a grown man "boy" without recognizing the extremely condescending and racist connotations of the term.
I would have considered that a condescending racist statement coming from anyone not just a southern. I recognize that not all southerners are "sinister" but the few who make openly racist comments like Davis sure don't help your image.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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Guess a lot of people are reacting the way Tom and Chris are. The site also links this FoxNews YouTube video, FoxNews interviewed a McCain supporter in Allentown, PA about Obama's bitter comments. His response? "No, no, definitely bitter. I've been here 30 years, people are definitely bitter."
posted
Howdeh, all! I've been gone for a bit but I wanted to give a quick two cents on the primaries.
First on the lighter side/cool finds side, has anyone been looking at the website www.fivethirtyeight.com ? It's a pretty cool collection website of polls of polls, and predictions, this guy seems to have a pretty good formula going.
Either way, he once gave this pretty good analysis on why it seems that more Clinton voters are saying they wouldn't vote for Obama than Obama voters for Clinton. (I bring this up because people were saying it was 'interesting' that this was happening back on page 58) Essentially the reason is that Clinton's support pool is drying up, and those who still support her are the diehard fans who wouldn't dream of voting for another candidate. Thus if you interview a candidate's support group thats in decline, those who are left, the percentage of them, who say that they wouldn't vote for any other candidate goes up.Here's the analysis they gave in full.
The other penny I'd like to drop in this thread is on the bitterness issue. I dunno, it really does seem too overblown to me. His language was, at best, ambiguous to what his meaning really was. It seems to me like he was saying in that parsed comment that when people are angry, they like to find comfort in things like religion, and security and become wary of those who would take it away. Sure, his initial rhetoric could be seen as offensive, but I really don't think he meant it that way. So to see the McCain-Clinton dogpile on the comment seems... I dunno... desperate?
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posted
Rabbit, I'm with you on the condescending and arrogant. I'm just more hesitant to assume racism. It's a common word that hasn't been a default racist term for African-American men during the last quarter century. It could easily have just been a stupid thing to say.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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quote:It's a common word that hasn't been a default racist term for African-American men during the last quarter century.
That's where we disagree. Yes boy gets used in lots of context, most of them referring to male children. Sometimes people even use it as and exclamation "oh boy!". However, when it is applied to an adult male (which has become rare) it is, in my experience, almost always a racist remark.
Tell me, how often have you heard an adult male refer to another adult male of nearly the same age as "That boy"?
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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No real change because of bitter comments. I'm think the ARG poll is an outlier. They do have a bad history this election cycle.
I'm with Dionne's view in his editorial below: how McCain who has been a senator for decades, the son of an admiral who married into Budweiser money, and the Ivy Leaguer Clintons who've earned over 10 million per year recently can straightfacedly portray themselves as one of the little people is shameless.
Goofiest pander of this election cycle: Clinton: I shot a duck once!
quote:It has been sickening over the years to watch Republicans, who always rally to the aid of the country's wealthiest citizens, successfully cast themselves as pork-rind-eating, NASCAR-watching, gun-toting populists. To have the current White House occupant (Yale, Harvard Business School, son of a president) run as a good old boy should have been the final straw.
But here are the two remaining Democratic candidates, Obama by speaking carelessly and Clinton by piling on shamelessly, doing all they can to make it easy for Republicans to pretend one more time that they are the salt of the earth.
posted
Even if that holds out and he loses by 5%, that'd still be spun as a win for him. Given the expectations gain, a win would be colassal, a loss by 5 points or less would probably be as good as a win. He was down 20 points a few weeks ago, and now, it's six days away (wow time flies) and it's down to nearly a statistical tie. Win almost assured wins in Indy and NC two weeks later that will wipe out any gains she makes and further his lead, I think he has some good press coming.
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posted
I have to agree with Jon Stewart- elite should be a good thing. Shouldn't we want our president to be smarter and better educated than the rest of us?
As far as the boy comment, I am two decades younger then Davis and I know boy has racist connotations. Early in the election cycle, Edwards said something smart and I said, "that's my boy" (Obama was my third choice candidate initially) and immediately thought, you know, if I said that regarding Obama, that would be a racist statement.
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posted
I don't think that'd be racist, not in the context you were using and what you were going for. But it could be borderline.
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posted
The "bitter" comment seems to have improved Obama's standing vis-à-vis Clinton. I suspect the overly large differences between polls has to do with the weight given to the preferences of McCain-supporters who intend to vote in the Democratic primaries as opposed to primary voters who lean toward voting for the DemocraticNominee in the GeneralElection. Poll results are not a direct result of random sampling, but rather a reflection of the pollsters' guesses as to who will vote, then sampling from that restricted pool of probable voters. The problem with such guesses is that it allows LARGE seepage of the pollster's own political biases into poll results.
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posted
I have a friend who's an Obama supporter. Once during the early primary season, when Obama was just breaking through in some of the states, I remarked to her "I hear your boy did well last night." I would've said the same thing if Edwards or Richardson or any other male candidate had had similar success. It was only later that I realized that that statement could have been interpreted as racist. When I realized this, I felt absolutely sick to my stomach that I may have caused offense. I have never purposefully said anything racist, but that statement could've been taken that way.
Now I don't know anything about this Geoff Davis fellow, or whether or not he actually is racist. If he has made similar statements in the past, or is the product of a really racist upbringing, then we might be able to state more categorically that his use of "boy" in this statement was because of racism. My point is that it is hard to determine one's motivations based on one statement alone, without knowing the context or how it was said.
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quote:Originally posted by scholarette: I have to agree with Jon Stewart- elite should be a good thing. Shouldn't we want our president to be smarter and better educated than the rest of us?
Elite is a good thing; elitist is not.
And as far as choosing a good President I think there are things more important than being smarter and better educated. I think being an elite negotiator may be more important. An elite diplomat. An elite manager. None of these is (necessarily) dependent on having an elite intellect. Although I do find intelligence a desirable characteristic, it is by no means the sole, nor the defining characteristic I would look for in a President.
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quote:The freshest fruits of bittergate: Obama is a Marxist! Opiate of the masses, yadda yadda.
quote:Originally posted by pooka: If he's lucky, conservatives don't draw the connection between this remark and "religion is the opiate of the people".
It's actually not that surprising. The right has been spinning Obama as a communist ever since Super Tuesday.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
It has already been conceded that there are circumstances where using the word "boy" would not have racial connotations.
If somebody does something alittle cooky I could say, "that boy ain't right" and it would have zero racial sentiments.
Or I could refer to rich white oil men as, "good ol boys."
But Davis comment was directed to one individual who happens to be part African. If Obama was white and Davis had made that comment, perhaps it would have largely gone by as unnoticed except that it's strange to call somebody a mere 4 years younger then you boy. That's a comment more reserved for 60+ year olds because everyone is a boy to them, even those who are older.
But in the South and amongst Southerners there has been a long time use of the word, "boy" when addressing African Americans as a means of demeaning them at worst, and playfully addressing them at best. In that context even teenager white boys could call an old black man, "boy." I find it unlikely that Davis had NO such sentiments on his mind when he uttered the phrase.
I'm three years older than Davis and I've been aware of the language issues on this since I was a child - my parents having to explain the protests and fire hosing of children, among other things to me, as we watched the evening news. Not that it was used in my household - I was raised in Upstate NY.
But that doesn't mean that racism was absent in my city. During my childhood, I lived in an all-white suburb. Major companies in the town only allowed blacks in the lowest levels of their employment - janitorial, for example.
As a teenager, I'd encounter other white teens using the term once in awhile, assuming that a white kid like me would share their assumption of superiority. They were wrong.
Like you, I find it difficult to believe that Davis is clueless regarding the context and history of this term used against black men.
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posted
I learned about "boy" from reading Asimov. It always made me feel bad for the robots when they were called that after I learned the history.
quote:Once during the early primary season, when Obama was just breaking through in some of the states, I remarked to her "I hear your boy did well last night."
For what it's worth, I wouldn't have blinked at this.
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posted
My boss just mentioned there's a debate tonight. I don't know how stuff like this sneaks up on me.
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quote: “Everybody knows you and your husband are elitists,” Mr. Colbert said right off the bat. “Tell me about your elite upbringing on the South Side of Chicago. How many silver spoons in your mouth?”
“We had four spoons,” deadpanned Mrs. Obama during her late night talk show debut.
She added: “And then my father got a raise at the plant, and we had five spoons.”
“That sounds posh,” replied Mr. Colbert.
There's a video link embedded on the blog. I haven't watched it all, but the stuff I've seen is pretty funny.
quote: ABC News' Jan Simmonds Reports: While most of the political world has been focused on controversy surrounding Barack Obama's "bitter" comments, there has also been another scandal brewing in the political kitchen.
A savvy New York Attorney noted and cited a report on the Huffington Post website yesterday that a batch of recipes listed on John McCain's campaign website, under the headline "McCain Family Recipes", were actually taken word for word from the website of the Food Network.
The recipes in question – including Ahi Tuna with Napa Cabbage Slaw, Passion Fruit Mousse, and Farfalle Pasta with Turkey Sausage, Peas and Mushrooms — were all credited on the website to McCain's wife Cindy. Another recipe also appears to be very similar to a recipe of TV personality and chef Rachael Ray.
posted
Agreed Juxtapose. I can see how someone might get the wrong idea, but not as easily as you do from the perspective of a middle-aged white politician. I say this because I've heard phrases like that many times when talking about someone your friend supports, such as an athlete. I can definitely imagine someone remarking something similar in regards to a baseball player on someone's fantasy team.
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quote: Oh, I think the recipe thing is fine. "Family Recipes" to me means recipes the family loves, not that the family invented.
Credit should be given, but I don't consider it plagiarism.
I should have made it clear that I just consider it amusing.
According to one report I heard last night, the website originally said that the recipes had been handed down over three generations or something like that.
My immediate assumption was that some staffer really botched this up - which turns out to be the case if you read the complete story there.
But the "fault" for this little piece of fluffy goofery isn't with John or Cindy McCain - just some staffer cutting corners they shouldn't have - regarding something pretty unimportant.
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posted
I thought this analysis of the Pennsylvania polls was pretty interesting on pollster. I like numbers and graphs. They make me feel like someone knows what's going on. It's an illusion, of course.
P.S. I'll suggest from this that there were some people who didn't like what Obama's "bitter" remarks, but there were also many people who were put off by Clinton's response. One thing that seems clear to me is that Obama's upward curve has flattened in the last week, and so has Clinton's decline.
quote:Originally posted by katharina: Oh, I think the recipe thing is fine. "Family Recipes" to me means recipes the family loves, not that the family invented.
Credit should be given, but I don't consider it plagiarism.
It certainly is plagiarism if the recipes were quoted word for word from another source that was not cited. That is virtually the definition of plagiarism.
But I don't have any problem with the idea them calling these "family recipes" even though the family got them from someone else.
Something about the fact that so many of the McCain family recipes posted were copied word for word from other websites makes me question whether Cindy McCain has ever even cooked them.
I don't think this matters in the least. I do wonder why anyone in the McCain campaign thought it was a good idea to put up phony "McCain Family Recipes" on their campaign site. I suspect it was a botched attempt to make them seem more like a regular folks.
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