Wrong Attribution
It would be funny if it wasn’t in the Oval office.
President Obama’s new presidential rug seemed beyond reproach, with quotations from Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. woven along its curved edge.
“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” According media reports, this quote keeping Obama company on his wheat-colored carpet is from King.
Except it’s not a King quote. The words belong to a long-gone Bostonian champion of social progress. His roots in the republic ran so deep that his grandfather commanded the Minutemen at the Battle of Lexington.
For the record, Theodore Parker is your man, President Obama. Unless you’re fascinated by antebellum American reformers, you may not know of the lyrically gifted Parker, an abolitionist, Unitarian minister and Transcendentalist thinker who foresaw the end of slavery, though he did not live to see emancipation. He died at age 49 in 1860, on the eve of the Civil War.
Um, ok. If this is the biggest thing people should be concerning themselves with, then there really isn’t much to be concerned about at all. Sounds like it’s just another distraction from what the issues really are. Sad.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 0952 hrs
Um, ok. If this is the biggest thing people should be concerning themselves with, then there really isn’t much to be concerned about at all. Sounds like it’s just another distraction from what the issues really are. Sad.
Yeah, cause nobody’s been discussing the problems this country’s having…
Posted by Jed on September 05, 2010 at 1007 hrs
It is any surprise that our “president” uses quotes from socialists and then tries to hide the most socialist of them all” Theodore Parker.
“Champion of social progress” is lame stream media nicey-nice talk for sociaism.
Wake up!
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1040 hrs
Pat, your comment is good for a lol. Standard political statement when something happens that can’t be spun.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1128 hrs
If Bush did this - they’d all be calling him a dunce, stupid, etc etc.
It is funny for someone who prides himself as an intellectual.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1232 hrs
As noted, this goes to the bigger problem. This guy and his team aren’t that smart.
Now before the usual rapid response team notes that Bush wasn’t smart, the point is that we were all told Obama was.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1240 hrs
If this is the biggest thing people should be concerning themselves with, then there really isn’t much to be concerned about at all.
I guess I missed the point where Owen says this is the biggest thing people should be concerning themselves with.
It never ceases to amaze me that certain commenters (who don’t seem to have a blog of their own, or if they do, no one reads them) come here with the inane expectation that somehow Owen is the final arbiter of what is worthy of discussion on the internet. Get out on the internet more, look at other blogs, guess what! - most blogs reflect the political leanings of the blogger. I don’t know that Owen pretends to be apolitical in his blogging style.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1316 hrs
Sounds like it’s just another distraction from what the issues really are. Sad.
Well, we could certainly use a distraction from this governments grossly incompetent mismanagement of the economy and foreign policy. If you dwell on the failure to govern and the national economic tail spin too much you might wind up on the rails of the Hoan Bridge.
Thankfully, in addition to Barack’s bumbling, we have Pat to offer us a good chuckle now and again.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1640 hrs
I’m sorry. I stand corrected. This story is of major concern.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1707 hrs
Yes, and Abe Lincoln riffed on Parker too. What’s the story here, again?
Everyone should listen to this NPR story on the matter:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129609461Critics everywhere for anything, no surpirse again with this thread.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 1911 hrs
From Dr. King, March 25, 1965:
“I know you are asking today, “How long will it take?”....
“I come to say to you this afternoon, however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because truth crushed to earth will rise again.
“How long? Not long, because no lie can live forever.
“How long? Not long, because you shall reap what you sow….
“How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
There’s video at the link to prove it.
As George’s link notes, Parker did not say the words as the rug—and as decades of attribution to Dr. King—quotes them.
Posted by folkbum on September 05, 2010 at 1936 hrs
I think you are on to something there, Bootsie.
When you are using someone else’s words to make a point, you need to give credit where credit is due. Particularly when those words are so finely wrought, so precise, so moving, to true.
Martin Luther King should have looked up from his speech, raised both hands and made air quotes as he used the words of the original (white guy) author. The nerve of the man. Stealing a great thinker’s ideas and passing them off as his own.
By the same token, your screed, reading so smoothly, with just he right touch of censorious “gotcha.” has the same problem. Your blog is written with an opening paragraph that I am willing to accept as your work; I’d attribute it to you personally.
But, then, the little problem of stealing someone else’s words and passing them off as your own. The next three paragraphs, flow right onto the page with nothing like the decency of letting the reader know that they are stolen from a better writer. Maybe you raised both hands and made air quotes as you transcribed three paragraphs from a person you do not acknowledge as the author. You passed it off as you own work.
That’s theft. A person who does that kind of stuff should justly be dismissed as a common thief, someone who probably spent his youth sneaking around in the dark stealing chickens.
Posted by Jim Bouman on September 05, 2010 at 1944 hrs
Um… Jim? All four paragraphs are blockquoted with the link at the beginning for attribution. What are you talking about?
Posted by Owen on September 05, 2010 at 2027 hrs
I see it now. You’re right. Double on the bump.
Posted by Jim Bouman on September 05, 2010 at 2047 hrs
Not that I want to change the subject, but when you are talking about links and quotes. Becareful out there to all the bloggers. Our local paper, the Las vegas Review-Journal is suing bloggers who supposedly violate copyright laws and so far they have filed over 110 lawsuits in Las Vegas.
http://lasvegasbadger.blogspot.com/2010/08/las-vegas-review-journal-extortion.html
They have sued our GOP senate candidate, the democrat party, a cat woman and other small and big blogs.
So be careful what you post.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 05, 2010 at 2131 hrs
Why don’t we attack the rug maker?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on September 06, 2010 at 0140 hrs
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