Alert Herald reporter Dave Wedge noticed (perhaps with some assistance from a rival campaign?) the following in a recent Gabrieli speech:
During a recent candidates forum at Dedham Town Hall, Gabrieli offered this gem: I genuinely believe that Massachusetts has so much right with it, that whatevers wrong with Massachusetts can be fixed by whats right with Massachusetts.
Thats a pretty nice little catch phrase. Too bad its near verbatim what President Bill Clinton told the nation in a Dec. 16, 1994, address. I still believe, deeply, that there is nothing wrong with America that cant be fixed with what is right with America, Clinton said.
Apparently, Gabs told the Atlantic Monthly the same thing way back in March 2003. Though it appears he’s not the only Dem in the country to have borrowed Clinton’s clever phrase without attribution.
Say, how does Gabs feel about recycling, anyway?
You sign up cause you want to be a speech writer and you get with the only campaign that doesn’t need one.
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Mike, Volunteer, Deval Patrick for Governor
Must’ve been a slow news day at the Herald. If this was put forward by a rival campaign’s oppostion researchers, then they’re grossly overpaid.
Pushed by at least one desperate campaign. Anybody with basic knowledge of recent political history knows that phrase, and knows Clinton used it to powerful effect. This isn’t a case of lifting obscure material, rather it’s shaping known matieral for one’s own purposes?
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Should we blame Martin Luther King for not officially crediting Abraham Lincoln when he used the Xscore and Y years ago formula in “I Have a Dream”? Should the next person to say “God Bless XX” at the end of a speech rush to credit Reagan?
I knew George Washington, George Washington was a friend of mine, You sir, are no George Washington.
Didn’t Joe Biden get a lot of grief for doing something similar the last time he ran for president? I think he ended up pulling out of the race because of it. Any one know?
Democratic presidential candidate Joseph R. Biden Jr., a U.S. senator from Delaware, was driven from the nomination battle after delivering, without attribution, passages from a speech by British Labor party leader Neil Kinnock. A barrage of subsidiary revelations by the press also contributed to Biden’s withdrawal: a serious plagiarism incident involving Biden during his law school years; the senator’s boastful exaggerations of his academic record at a New Hampshire campaign event; and the discovery of other quotations in Biden’s speeches pilfered from past Democratic politicians.
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And there you see the difference between Biden and Gabrieli. There was a pattern of Biden using several passages from numerous sources that could not be reasonably expected to be recognized as unoriginal. He’d done this for years, and often chose out-of-the-way sources and speeches that would be difficult to identify.
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If someone hears Gabrieli and doesn’t realize he’s borrowing Clinton’s language, the problem is frankly a lack of knowledge on the part of the listener, not a lack of credit on the part of the speaker.
Thanks for the confirmation.
There’s no way that “Fourscore and seven years ago” or “I have a dream” is comparable to Clinton’s “wrong/right with America” line. Clinton’s line isn’t close to being as famous, or as much a part of the American lexicon, as the other two are. I’d go further: only a political junkie would immediately recognize the Clinton line as recognizably Clinton’s. So Gabrieli should have credited Clinton: wouldn’t have hurt him a bit (actually, it would have helped, since Clinton’s a popular guy), and he should know (based on Biden if for no other reason) that cribbing from other pols is bad form.
by saying Gabby’s standing probably will be hurt with people who know better and recognize the cribbing for what it is. The junkies surely gasped a bit here, and that’s not likely to be forgotten soon. Didn’t help Gabby’s case with me one bit, I have to say. I’m particularly sensitive to the plagiarism issue given what I do for a living.
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John Q. Public, though, probably couldn’t care less.
Gary Hart had some problems back then too. I remember hearing a BBC story about the campaign and honestly not being able to tell at first whether I’d tuned to the news or a broadcast of a Monty Python sketch.
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There was a joke making the rounds: George Bush (the 1st), Richard Nixon, Gary Hart, and Joe Biden are on a ship. The ship starts to sink, and the captain orders everyone to the lifeboats.
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George Bush says, “We should let the women go first.”
Richard Nixon says, “**** the women.”
Gary Hart says, “Do you think we have time?”
Joe Biden says, “Do you think we have time?”
Gabrieli should have attributed the sentiment to Clinton, as such attribution would not have diminished Gabrieli’s point one iota. Instead, he gives the impression of cribbing someone else’s clever turn of phrase to a press that generally recognizes these things and is armed with an “exact phrase” check at a keystroke. Dumb, unnecesary gaffe on Gabby’s part. In the big picture, though, it’s meaningless and won’t hurt Gabrieli a bit. Unfortunately, however, they’ll be pouring over every eloquent turn of phrase he offers from here on in. He better stay honest.
In the winter of 2003/2004, Howard Dean said he wanted to represent “the Democratic wing of the Democratic party” in a number of speeches. In some of those speeches, he said it was Paul Wellstone’s line; in other speeches, he neglected to mention it. Mostly he was speaking to audiences like DNC meetings, where everyone recognized it anyway. Yet some newspapers still ragged on him for using Wellstone’s line, as if they thought he intended to keep it a secret that that’s where he got it from.
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It didn’t hurt Dean and it won’t hurt Gabrieli. It does lead me to wonder, though, whether he’s used this line on multiple occasions, and if so, whether he did credit Clinton sometimes, and didn’t other times, when it didn’t fit the flow of the speech or conversation and didn’t seem important.
Here is another borrowing report, the Globe’s Trail Report also has a story about Gabrieli’s slogan about result’s was from a Congressman Mike Capuano Ad.
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Who should be Governor? Here is another Gabrieli campaign move with results.
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The Chris Gabrieli Campaign is over running Quincy with 4×8 foot Gabrieli for Governor Signs
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3 and 4 signs on the same business properties
3 and 4 signs on state property on Quincy Shore Drive
and many other locations around the City
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They care more about winning and election they about our state, our cities and our towns.
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We need a Governor that looks out for the interest of every city and town in the Commonwealth.
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This person needs to understand our laws, our needs, and our wants. These are the things that a state government does for its people, its towns, and its cities.
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A person that runs for office needs to run under the rules of the Commonwealth and the ordinance of its cities and towns, to do less should send a message to everyone in Massachusetts that you should not vote for that candidate. If we confront this candidate on this issue of law breaking, they we will use the blame game, it was a low level people in the campaign and it is not the policy of the candidate. If this candidate is elected many of the low level workers will be part of his administration and that is what we need to stop. When we elect a Governor, we are accepting all of his appointed workers into our Government. If his workers in the campaign can not follow simple election rules, how will they be in running our state government?
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Quincy City ordinances:
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Section 17.08.030 Sign and sign area definitions
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Section 17.32.080 Other Specific regulations
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p> R. Political Signs. 1. No political sign shall be erected in any residential or PUD district until ten days prior to the date of a primary or preliminary election. 2. No political sign shall be erected in any Business or Industrial district until thirty days prior to the date of a primary or preliminary election. 3. No political sign may be larger than four feet by four feet. 4. All political signs must be removed within seventy-two hours following a final election. 5. In no case shall more than one political sign per candidate be erected on any one parcel of property. No more than three political signs shall be erected on any one parcel of property. 6. No political signs may be affixed to any public property including utility poles, city trees, bushes, shrubs, fences, lamp posts, mailboxes, or any public street furniture. In the case of such violations, the department of public works or other appropriate city department may remove such violating signs and be held harmless in doing so. 7. All political signs located on private property shall be installed only with the permission of the property owner(s).
This Quincy City ordinances are available on-line at http://ci.quincy.ma…. Municipal Codes
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Who can stop this from happening, you can by Voting.
Thank you Mr. Reilly, or is it Mr. Patrick, for the Quincy sign by-law lesson.
Thank you Mr. Reilly, or is it Mr. Patrick, for the Quincy sign by-law lesson.
It’s hard to believe he was not aware of the similarity to Clinton’s quote, but I’ll give him a pass on this one.
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I would recommend that if in the future you do use someones quote, not only give them credit but at least use it as well as the person you are taking it from.