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Lying, even when technically plagiarism, is still lying

By Lawrence B. Ebert, Esq.

A post on examiner.com by Laura Smith-Proulx made a straightforward comment about copying from someone else's resume:

It happens all the time - your friend has the same job, and you swipe a few sentences from his resume. While this is technically plagiarism, there's worse news for anyone who does this: your friend's resume ISN'T about you.

Keep in mind that a resume is really a marketing document, and YOU are the product.

For unapparent reasons, the business about Biden's copying from Kinnock's speech devolved into a discussion about whether this was or was not plagiarism. That really wasn't the significant issue. The important point was Kinnock's facts, copied by Biden, didn't apply to Biden. The Biden/Kinnock incident was an odd story in which plagiarism was used to sugarcoat something worse.

See IPBiz post: http://ipbiz.blogspot.com/2008/08/significance-of-joe-bidens-plagiarism.html -->

mediamatters obliquely referred to the FALSITY of the facts in Biden's copying:

Biden did appear to drop his own family something of a notch downward on the economic and social scale to appear more like Kinnock.

[IPBiz-->] Biden's father and grandfather were not coalminers, so there was nothing truthful in Biden's substituting himself into Kinnock's life story. Other members of Biden's family had gone to college, so there was nothing truthful in that aspect. One can only infer mediamatters doesn't really care about truth.

Also:

http://ipbiz.blogspot.com/2008/08/went-to-garden-party-joe-biden-hides-in.html

Full post as published by IPBiz on February 24, 2009 (boomark / email).