Hillary Clinton Accuses Barack Obama Of Plagiarism: Who Cares?

The gloves are apparently off in the race for the Democratic nomination…well at least Hillary Clinton’s gloves are off. Clinton has now accused Barack Obama of plagiarizing one of his speeches from Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick.

All I have to say is: Who cares? Obama responded that borrowing a few lines without attribution—and from a close friend I might add—was not a big deal. I agree that it isn’t a big deal, and I think most people would agree as well.

Message to the Clinton campaign: Focus your energy on stuff that matters…maybe the fact that Obama is proposing an enormous amount of new spending (even more than you) and has not yet explained how he intends to fulfill any of his wonderful promises. If you can force yourself to visit the GOP website, you might enjoy their Obama Spend-O-Meter.

Obama is certainly on a roll, and it appears Clinton is feeling desperate. Obama has done a great job drumming up support among the masses with his public speaking and rallying among youth and celebrities. Just for kicks, I even watched Obama’s YouTube video, and it was actually pretty amusing. More importantly, the video has received over 4 million hits, and there are other non-official Obama campaign videos with even more hits. A search for Hillary Clinton on YouTube brings up countless videos which poke fun at her, it takes some effort sifting through them to find a positive one. The point is, Obama is doing a much better job marketing himself and appealing to the masses than Clinton is.

I don’t think Clinton really stands much of a chance right now, but if she wants to make a run for it, she needs to start focusing her attention on things a bit more important than weak plagiarism claims. Considering that Clinton has herself been accused of plagiarism in the past it also seems a bit ironic. Accusing Obama of plagiarism of this sort just makes her look desperate. In addition it undermines faith in her maturity and belies a lack of confidence in her own campaign (and a potential hypocrisy, as stated in my last comment): unattractive features for a potential leader.