Readers of this blog may have noticed that I am borderline obsessive about sourcing and citing the materials I rely on in this blog. I do this all for fun, not personal advancement or gain. Yet, I wouldn't think about quoting anyone or anything without putting quotation marks around the material or indenting (four or more lines is the general rule for indents versus quotes) the borrowed product. Even if I paraphrase, I link and source. It is the honest and honorable thing to do. Period.
Now here comes the junior US Senator from Montana, John Walsh, who was appointed to the office by his crony, Steve Bullock, the Democrat governor of Montana. The seat became vacant when long serving senator, Maximum Baucus, quit to spend more time in his beloved Montana, which it turns out is in the general vicinity of Beijing. Walsh is running for a full six year term against the current Republican Congressman from Montana, Steve Daines.
It so happens that John Walsh plagiarized his masters thesis (later media reports changed that to required final masters paper), not when he was a snot nosed kid, but when he was 46-year old military veteran stateside, striving to adds stripes and stars to his shoulder and advance his military career.
Montana Democratic Sen. John Walsh plagiarized large portions of his final research paper for the U.S. Army War College, a revelation that could have a significant effect on the race to represent the state in Washington.
In an interview with the Chronicle on Wednesday, Montana's former lieutenant governor stopped short of apologizing. Although the paper includes large word-for-word sections from academic works, Walsh said the plagiarism was unintentional and that he was taking medication at the time.Walsh says he was taking Paxil. Common side effects include "nervous feelings, drowsiness, dizziness, nasal irritation, insomnia, or mild nausea," nothing about lying, cheating or stealing.
Walsh was outed, by among others, the New York Times. The Bozeman Chronicle went on to report.
Walsh submitted the 14-page paper in 2007. An analysis by the New York Times, which first reported the story online Wednesday, showed the paper contained words identical to those in academic and policy journals and books available mostly online. Walsh was 46 when he submitted the thesis entitled “The Case for Democracy as a Long Term National Strategy.”
An Associated Press analysis of the thesis found its first page borrows heavily from a 2003 Foreign Affairs piece written by Thomas Carothers, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and a 2004 book by Natan Sharansky with Ron Dermer called “The Case for Democracy: The Power of Freedom to Overcome Tyranny and Terror.”
Sharansky is a former Soviet dissident and chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel. Dermer is the Israeli ambassador to the United States.
One section of the paper is nearly identical to 600 words from a 1998 paper by Sean Lynn-Jones, a scholar at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, a research institute at Harvard.
All six of the recommendations that Walsh lists at the end of his paper are taken nearly word-for-word without attribution from a Carnegie paper written by Carothers and three other scholars at the institute.
Walsh told the Times he didn't think he did anything wrong in writing his thesis.
He couldn't write 14 pages on his own? He did nothing wrong? The man is a fraud and he doesn't even know it. My eighth grader has superior academic skills and kills Walsh when it comes to honor and ethics.
John Walsh should drive away on his motorcycle and disappear into a hole somewhere. He represents everything that is wrong with this country and his party.
Bye, Bye John Walsh.
John Walsh, driving his motorcycle in a parking lot.The man is the real thing.
Post by John Walsh.
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