HuffPo's Geoffrey Has Come Undunn over Palin

Geoffrey Dunn, in an unhinged huff piece at HuffPo, has charged Gov. Palin with plagiarism. In a dubious diary titled "Palin Plagiarizes Gingrich in Anchorage Speech," Dunn declares, "It's a pure case of unadulterated plagiarism":

Palin acknowledged that "Recently, Newt Gingrich, he had written a good article about Reagan...." (Recently? It was four years ago; and she said "good," with an obvious disdain, since Gingrich has been rather dismissive of her recently.)

2. Palin: He said, regarding your dad Michael, he said that we need to learn from his example that courage and persistence are keys to historic achievement.

Gingrich/Shirley: Courage and persistence are the keys to historic achievement.

Merriam-Webster defines plagiarize as:

"...to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own : use (another's production) without crediting the source..."

But Gov. Palin acknowledged both Newt Gingrigh and the article the former House Speaker wrote, as Dunn admits twice. How can paraphrasing be considered plagiarizing when both the author and the source are cited?

It cannot. So Gov. Palin clearly did not plagiarize Newt Gingrich. That's not plagiarizing. This classic is a proper example of plagiarizing:

NEIL KINNOCK at Welsh Labour Party conference May 1987:

"Why am I the first Kinnock in a thousand generations to be able to get to university? Was it because our predecessors were thick? Does anybody really think that they didn't get what we had because they didn't have the talent or the strength or the endurance or the commitment? Of course not. It was because there was no platform upon which they could stand"

JOE BIDEN IN Sept 1987 during his first presidential campaign:

"Why is it that Joe Biden is the first in his family ever to go a university? Why is it that my wife... is the first in her family to ever go to college? Is it because our fathers and mothers were not bright? ...Is it because they didn't work hard? My ancestors who worked in the coal mines of northeast Pennsylvania and would come after 12 hours and play football for four hours? It's because they didn't have a platform on which to stand."

Dunn is guilty of the same "screwing" of intellectual integrity he falsely charges Sarah Palin with. He and the rest of the Palin-haters have become completely unhinged in their ridiculous and hypocritical attacks.  

- JP

Cross-posted at RedState.com