Melania Trump plagiarism/rickroll megathread

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Lols Vox. Might as well be coming directly from the DNC.

Do you refute the content of the article?

Of course I do. For starters, it's not even close to word-for-word.

The concepts themselves? They are hardly novel in a political speech. I am sure, if you did enough research, you can see that Michelle "plagiarized" those two graphs from some other politician or politician's wife.

I challenge you to tell me that you've never heard those words come out of a politician's mouth other than Michelle Obama or Melania Trump before. Give me a break. This is beyond a joke.

It's good to see all you eager Democrats and "Republicans" on here on the attack though. Your friends at Vox are imploring you to do so....

Must be some good Koolaid at the RNC.  Lol.

The Trump campaign has got a big problem.  I'm a Hillary supporter and I think the Clintons have been unfairly persecuted by Republicans.  But having said that some of their behavior definitely invites scandal.  Just because you support a candidate doesn't been you have to drink every drop of Koolaid.

Lol, the mental gymnastics an otherwise well-read or educated person has to jump through to support Trump's antics would be amusing if they weren't indicative of a scary trend towards anti-intellectualism.

Naw.  Just plain vanilla Koolaid drinking.

Ummm, I'd consider myself a feminist...whatever you say though. Women can be criticized without using 'bimbo'

I bet that quiet little village in Slovenia is looking mighty tempting right about now.  Poor girl got in over her head.  Should have stuck to the original plan.

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I think that beautiful woman, Melania shouldn't have 'plagiarized' 22 words. It's really not a big deal she didn't directly plagiarize Obama. She used 22 words that Obama used. They should fire the writer though. This is an non-issue that only the liberals are caring about because of the great night yesterday!

I have serious concerns for your mental condition.

Well, I actually have no mental disorders or disabilities, so those attacks just came out of left field. The speakers were very good last night, especially Sheriff Clark, Mrs. Smith, Marcus, Rudy and MELANIA Michelle Obama!

FTFY

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I don't understand why they dont just bring out some no name low level staffer and fire him. While Trump doesn't like to admit mistakes they fired Roger Stone and Cory Lewendowsky. In fact Trump could make it part of his brand ("you're fired") to show he can be quick and decisive when there is a problem. They can get Melania out to Jimmy Fallon and turn it into a joke like have her read the gettysburg address or something. There are ways to fix this.  What they are doing isn't helping.

Any campaign with common sense would do something like that.  But this is Trump we are talking about.  Personally if my wife was some poor girl from a little Slovenian village who took her clothes off for money I wouldn't push her into a situation like this.  If my wife was an Ivy League trained litigation attorney I would be iffy about putting her on a political stage like that.  I'm just far more protective of the people around me.  Trump really is a terrible husband.  Trump should never have exposed his wife like this and even if he was dumb/selfish enough to do that he should at least publicly sacrifice someone to defend her honor.  If he will allow his vulnerable wife to be savaged like this with zero accountability what will he do to the hundreds of millions of complete strangers he would be charged with protecting as president?

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I don't understand why they dont just bring out some no name low level staffer and fire him. While Trump doesn't like to admit mistakes they fired Roger Stone and Cory Lewendowsky. In fact Trump could make it part of his brand ("you're fired") to show he can be quick and decisive when there is a problem. They can get Melania out to Jimmy Fallon and turn it into a joke like have her read the gettysburg address or something. There are ways to fix this.  What they are doing isn't helping.

I don't know what employment law is like in America, but couldn't a patsy staffer sue for unfair dismissal? I wouldn't want my career publicly ruined to defend Manafort

You just pay the guy some hush money and get him a job somewhere in the Republican apparatus.  I here there is an opening at Fox News.  Frankly this could be the biggest break some complete nobody ever gets.

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Objectively, even if you think this criticism is unfair, this is going to be perhaps the single thing people remember from this convention, unless, as someone else pointed out, someone does something even more blatant and stupid. This has the potential to put a major dent in the post-convention bounce that Trump was counting on and sets up the Democrats well going into August.

We have three more days of insanity I have my doubts this will be it.

Yeah, Crumpet is being very optimistic.

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Here's the part of this I expected, but still am annoyed about: The media won't call a spade a f***ing spade. From what I've seen this morning to now, CNN and MSNBC have been framing this as "Did Melania take from Michelle Obama's speech?" YES. Why are you even asking? Facts have now become a left and right issue in this country.

I'm not asking for a Melania witch hunt, but I'm sick of this whole "let the viewers decide" crap when it comes to facts. She plagiarized, stop going out of your way to make it seem not that way.

I don't know how true this is but I heard an MSNBC host say that for "legal reasons" they can't call it plagiarism.  She wasn't making a big deal out of it.  It was an off hand remark.  It was like she was about to say plagiarism and stopped and made the remark and continued on.  I thought it was odd.  But Trump is known for claiming he will sue people and it is pretty obvious what Melania did so why even mess with it.  Just play the tape and move on to the discussion part.  We all know what we are looking at.

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Here's the part of this I expected, but still am annoyed about: The media won't call a spade a f***ing spade. From what I've seen this morning to now, CNN and MSNBC have been framing this as "Did Melania take from Michelle Obama's speech?" YES. Why are you even asking? Facts have now become a left and right issue in this country.

I'm not asking for a Melania witch hunt, but I'm sick of this whole "let the viewers decide" crap when it comes to facts. She plagiarized, stop going out of your way to make it seem not that way.

I don't know how true this is but I heard an MSNBC host say that for "legal reasons" they can't call it plagiarism.  She wasn't making a big deal out of it.  It was an off hand remark.  It was like she was about to say plagiarism and stopped and made the remark and continued on.  I thought it was odd.  But Trump is known for claiming he will sue people and it is pretty obvious what Melania did so why even mess with it.  Just play the tape and move on to the discussion part.  We all know what we are looking at.

If only that were true... I've encountered several people who say it's just a coincidence that there are "similarities", and that there is no evidence of copying. I don't know how these people even function.

Yeah, but the first post was asking why they don't call it "plagiarism".  I just don't see the point.  All the open minded honest people look at the tape and they know what it is.  Everyone else isn't going to care if God himself came down and told them it was plagiarism.

I agree that the press often looks ridiculous trying to be impartial.  But as the Republican debates showed the Republican base loves them some liberal media conspiracy theories.  If you are constantly being accused of being a "liberal" just because you state the facts I suppose you get into this warped mindset where you just cease making factual reports and frame everything as a "two sides" issue.

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Any campaign with common sense would do something like that.  But this is Trump we are talking about.  Personally if my wife was some poor girl from a little Slovenian village who took her clothes off for money I wouldn't push her into a situation like this.  If my wife was an Ivy League trained litigation attorney I would be iffy about putting her on a political stage like that.  I'm just far more protective of the people around me.  Trump really is a terrible husband.  Trump should never have exposed his wife like this and even if he was dumb/selfish enough to do that he should at least publicly sacrifice someone to defend her honor.  If he will allow his vulnerable wife to be savaged like this with zero accountability what will he do to the hundreds of millions of complete strangers he would be charged with protecting as president?

When was the last time the spouse of a major party candidate didn't speak at the party convention?  After a quick internet search, I'm pretty sure every spouse has spoken at the conventions this century.  A candidate's spouse not speaking would be what's out of the norm and unusual.

When was the last time a major party's nominee's wife paid the bills by taking her clothes off?  A lot of firsts this time round.  Would you not agree?

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Here's the part of this I expected, but still am annoyed about: The media won't call a spade a f***ing spade. From what I've seen this morning to now, CNN and MSNBC have been framing this as "Did Melania take from Michelle Obama's speech?" YES. Why are you even asking? Facts have now become a left and right issue in this country.

I'm not asking for a Melania witch hunt, but I'm sick of this whole "let the viewers decide" crap when it comes to facts. She plagiarized, stop going out of your way to make it seem not that way.

I don't know how true this is but I heard an MSNBC host say that for "legal reasons" they can't call it plagiarism.  She wasn't making a big deal out of it.  It was an off hand remark.  It was like she was about to say plagiarism and stopped and made the remark and continued on.  I thought it was odd.  But Trump is known for claiming he will sue people and it is pretty obvious what Melania did so why even mess with it.  Just play the tape and move on to the discussion part.  We all know what we are looking at.

What are those legal reasons? That Trump might sue for libel or something? Give me a break, FLOTUS could sue Melania if she really wanted to for copyright infringement. This only reinforces the idea that the media loves Trump for ratings and won't tell it like it is. Of course, Trump is aware of this, so he has played the media like a game and knows how to get all this free publicity.

I have no idea.  That's just what I heard.  I don't know how valid that reason is.  I was just putting that out there.

The media definitely loves Trump.  They are getting a heck of a lot more ratings and $$$ with him in the race.  I have zero recollection of any spouses' speech in my lifetime but I will remember Melania's till the day I die.

Having said that I can't say there is an across the board Trump lovefest.  Keep in mind he has banned certain news organizations so I can see why some reporters would tread carefully without actually liking the guy.

I was worried about Trump a few weeks ago but given his gross incompetence I'm pretty confident he will lose in November.  At this stage it is probably best to let the media play with its new shiny object and let Trump and family continue to makes fools of themselves.  I hear you on a lot of your points but if ultimately the guy loses isn't that good enough?

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(5) Unless the criticism being leveled against Melania is coming from someone who can point to similar comments which were just as critical of Joe Biden's plagiarization history, this is simply politics as usual;

Three things.

(1) Biden dropped out of the race.  There was a severe price that was paid.  So your analogy is telling us this is a big deal.

(2) Biden quoted a Labor leader.  He didn't quote the person that his party had been demonizing for 8 years.  It just makes you look like a liar when you demonize someone for 8 years then stand their cheering for someone who is quoting that person word for word.

(3) It's over.  Stick a fork in it.  Post all you want.  The verdict is in.  The RNC was a disaster.

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(2) I don't know of anybody who has "demonized" Michelle Obama.

I would say you just lost all credibility but we all know that happened a long time ago.