Rand Paul's Death Spiral--He Admits His Job Is Too Difficult For Him

Today we will have the first of ten thousand posts discussing Sen. Rand Paul, what he knew about his plagiarism, when he knew it, who else knew about it, and who will be held accountable for it. Then we will discuss, over three thousand more posts, how Rand Paul's plagiarism proves that he should have asked Democrats for permission to do, well, anything*, and refuse to carry out any plans that were not approved 100% by 100% of Democrats. This is only work, however, if Democrats promise publicly that they will not rest until Rand Paul and all his works are destroyed. Kind of like how Republicans promised that Obamacare would be a disaster or they would die trying.

Mr. Paul attributed some of the sloppiness to the hectic life of a senator in high demand.

See, plagiarism is the same thing as sloppiness. Students everywhere will be thrilled with this new excuse. "But Mrs. Crabapple, I didn't copy Wikipedia, changing around a few words in the moronic belief that that would let me get away with stealing others' work. I was just sloppy in my accreditation!"

The fact that words were changed proves that the plagiarism was deliberate. If the problem were sloppy accreditation, the passage being quoted would be identical to Rand's passage.

“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.”

 Says the man who wants to run for president. It's a good thing that presidents aren't busy!

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.

His staff copies his speeches from Wikipedia? I hope they are not highly paid. He could get a sixth grader to copy speeches from Wikipedia for him, and pay the lad in gumballs and shoelaces.

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.”

I can't wait to see Paul try to supervise a country. Woops, we bombed Israel because I have no idea what my sixth-grade level staff is doing!

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.

A "bunch of hacks and haters." Is that what he is going to call heads of state when they get irate at our bombings or spying? "Sure, my staff took out Tel Aviv, but everyone who pointed that out is a hack and a hater!" Then he will stomp to the Oval Office, slam the door, and throw a few knick-knacks around until Vice President Rafael Cruz tells him to come out because dinner is ready.


*Kind of like Megan McArdle's insistence that Obamacare could only be implemented with Republican approval, meaning never.

A smart leader knows that big strategic thinking and giving orders are the smallest parts of her job. The biggest is persuading people who are not invested in her agenda to carry out her grand plans -- and, equally important, figuring out which plans to abandon because they can never get enough support to work.