88m3
Fast Money & Foreign Objects
WASHINGTON — Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who in recent weeks has had to explain a series of plagiarism charges, said in an interview Tuesday that he was being held to an unfair standard, but that there would be an office “restructuring” to prevent future occurrences.
Related
"Since when are honesty and integrity unfair standards for any adult, much less for a US Senator?"Karin, Michigan
Sitting in a conference room in his Senate office complex, Mr. Paul, drawn and clearly shaken by the plagiarism charges, offered a mix of contrition and defiance. He said that he was not certain whether it would affect his prospects should he decide to run for president in 2016 — he said he would happily return to his Kentucky doctor’s practice — and he asserted that was being unfairly targeted.
Acknowledging that his office had “made mistakes,” he said he was putting a new system in place to ensure that all of his materials are properly footnoted and cited.
“What we are going to do from here forward, if it will make people leave me the hell alone, is we’re going to do them like college papers,” he said. “We’re going to try to put out footnotes. We’re going to have them available. If people want to request the footnoted version, we’re going to have it available.”
Mr. Paul also said he could not rule out that other examples of past plagiarism would come out, but he unequivocally added that no staff members would be fired.
“Adherence to a new approval process implemented by Senator Paul will ensure proper citation and accountability in all collaborative works going forward,” Doug Stafford, a senior adviser to Mr. Paul, said in a statement.
On Monday night, Mr. Paul, who previously had to explain why he used word-for-word Wikipedia entries in a speech, faced his most direct charges of plagiarism yet. In an op-ed article he wrote for The Washington Times in September on mandatory minimum prison sentences, Mr. Paul, a Republican, appears to have copied language from an essay that had previously run in the magazine The Week.
That article, written by Dan Stewart, an editor for The Week, included this sentence: “America now jails a higher percentage of its citizens than any other country, including China and Iran, at the staggering cost of $80 billion a year.” It was posted on the web on Sept. 14.
On Sept. 20, Mr. Paul wrote this: “America now jails a higher percentage of its citizens than any other country, including China and Iran, at the staggering cost of $80 billion a year.”
Mr. Paul’s article also mentioned a case involving a Florida man, John Horner, who was sentenced to a minimum of 25 years for selling painkillers. “John will be 72 years old by the time he is released, and his three young children will have grown up without him,” Mr. Paul wrote.
Mr. Stewart’s version: “He will be 72 by the time he is released, and his three young children will have grown up without him.”
Mr. Paul attributed some of the sloppiness to the hectic life of a senator in high demand.
“Things are done quickly and in a hurry, and sometimes I get some things sent to me while giving a speech — I’m looking down at my phone saying ‘read this for approval in 20 minutes,'” he said. “We write something every week for The Washington Times, and I literally am riding around in a car in between things trying to figure out if I can approve it.”
“We need to get stuff earlier, but it’s hard,” Mr. Paul said. “We probably take on more than we should be doing.”
In the interview, Mr. Paul said that the Washington Times op-ed article was adapted from a speech, which was one of the reasons it was not vetted beforehand. The apparent plagiarism was first reported by BuzzFeed.
Mr. Paul’s office acknowledged that it had made mistakes, but largely sought to play down the charges of plagiarism.
“In the thousands of speeches and op-eds Senator Paul has produced, he has always presented his own ideas, opinions and conclusions,” Mr. Stafford said. “Senator Paul also relies on a large number of staff and advisers to provide supporting facts and anecdotes — some of which were not clearly sourced or vetted properly.”
Mr. Stafford continued: “Footnotes presenting supporting facts were not always used. Going forward, footnotes will be available on request. There have also been occasions where quotations or typesetting indentations have been left out through errors in our approval process. From here forward, quoting, footnoting and citing will be more complete.”
In an interview on the ABC News program “This Week” on Sunday, Mr. Paul acknowledged he had been “sloppy,” but also lashed out. “I think I’m being unfairly targeted by a bunch of hacks and haters,” he said.
Mr. Paul has taken a high profile in the Senate for a relatively junior member and is widely seen as interested in pursuing the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/06/u...smid=fb-nytimes&WT.z_sma=PO_APC_20131105&_r=0
the comments section is a must read
Related
- Senator Rand Paul Faces New Charges of Plagiarism (November 5, 2013)
"Since when are honesty and integrity unfair standards for any adult, much less for a US Senator?"Karin, Michigan
Sitting in a conference room in his Senate office complex, Mr. Paul, drawn and clearly shaken by the plagiarism charges, offered a mix of contrition and defiance. He said that he was not certain whether it would affect his prospects should he decide to run for president in 2016 — he said he would happily return to his Kentucky doctor’s practice — and he asserted that was being unfairly targeted.
Acknowledging that his office had “made mistakes,” he said he was putting a new system in place to ensure that all of his materials are properly footnoted and cited.
“What we are going to do from here forward, if it will make people leave me the hell alone, is we’re going to do them like college papers,” he said. “We’re going to try to put out footnotes. We’re going to have them available. If people want to request the footnoted version, we’re going to have it available.”
Mr. Paul also said he could not rule out that other examples of past plagiarism would come out, but he unequivocally added that no staff members would be fired.
“Adherence to a new approval process implemented by Senator Paul will ensure proper citation and accountability in all collaborative works going forward,” Doug Stafford, a senior adviser to Mr. Paul, said in a statement.
On Monday night, Mr. Paul, who previously had to explain why he used word-for-word Wikipedia entries in a speech, faced his most direct charges of plagiarism yet. In an op-ed article he wrote for The Washington Times in September on mandatory minimum prison sentences, Mr. Paul, a Republican, appears to have copied language from an essay that had previously run in the magazine The Week.
That article, written by Dan Stewart, an editor for The Week, included this sentence: “America now jails a higher percentage of its citizens than any other country, including China and Iran, at the staggering cost of $80 billion a year.” It was posted on the web on Sept. 14.
On Sept. 20, Mr. Paul wrote this: “America now jails a higher percentage of its citizens than any other country, including China and Iran, at the staggering cost of $80 billion a year.”
Mr. Paul’s article also mentioned a case involving a Florida man, John Horner, who was sentenced to a minimum of 25 years for selling painkillers. “John will be 72 years old by the time he is released, and his three young children will have grown up without him,” Mr. Paul wrote.
Mr. Stewart’s version: “He will be 72 by the time he is released, and his three young children will have grown up without him.”
Mr. Paul attributed some of the sloppiness to the hectic life of a senator in high demand.
“Things are done quickly and in a hurry, and sometimes I get some things sent to me while giving a speech — I’m looking down at my phone saying ‘read this for approval in 20 minutes,'” he said. “We write something every week for The Washington Times, and I literally am riding around in a car in between things trying to figure out if I can approve it.”
“We need to get stuff earlier, but it’s hard,” Mr. Paul said. “We probably take on more than we should be doing.”
In the interview, Mr. Paul said that the Washington Times op-ed article was adapted from a speech, which was one of the reasons it was not vetted beforehand. The apparent plagiarism was first reported by BuzzFeed.
Mr. Paul’s office acknowledged that it had made mistakes, but largely sought to play down the charges of plagiarism.
“In the thousands of speeches and op-eds Senator Paul has produced, he has always presented his own ideas, opinions and conclusions,” Mr. Stafford said. “Senator Paul also relies on a large number of staff and advisers to provide supporting facts and anecdotes — some of which were not clearly sourced or vetted properly.”
Mr. Stafford continued: “Footnotes presenting supporting facts were not always used. Going forward, footnotes will be available on request. There have also been occasions where quotations or typesetting indentations have been left out through errors in our approval process. From here forward, quoting, footnoting and citing will be more complete.”
In an interview on the ABC News program “This Week” on Sunday, Mr. Paul acknowledged he had been “sloppy,” but also lashed out. “I think I’m being unfairly targeted by a bunch of hacks and haters,” he said.
Mr. Paul has taken a high profile in the Senate for a relatively junior member and is widely seen as interested in pursuing the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/06/u...smid=fb-nytimes&WT.z_sma=PO_APC_20131105&_r=0
the comments section is a must read
