My Friend Rand Paul Continues To Give "Haters And Hacks" Ammunition To Hurt Him, This Time It's Over Plagiarism. Duel, Anyone?!

From the Courier-Journal Editorial:

Lately, its been difficult to tell if U.S. Sen. Rand Paul is a politician or a parrot.
Sometimes he is pandering and demagoguing and showing his politician side, raising fear among constituents about outlandish things he’s seen in science fiction movies a generation ago.
Other times, he’s acting like a parrot — repeating things verbatim he has read on the internet and in news stories, magazine articles and conservative think tanks.

All we know for certain is Mr. Paul’s words aren’t always his own. And he’s unrepentant.

He’s not a thief in the sense of Clyde Barrow or Willie Sutton, but recent news accounts make it clear that Mr. Paul has made a habit out of using, without attribution, other people’s words, thoughts and ideas.

In two speeches he has taken phrases and sentences directly from the website Wikipedia. In another, he took words from an Associated Press article and didn’t give credit. In a book, he lifted three pages from reports written by conservative and libertarian think tanks like the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute.

Most recently it was learned that Mr. Paul used another author’s thoughts and words when he wrote an op-ed piece for the Washington Times. He lifted, almost verbatim, several passages Dan Stewart wrote in the magazine The Week.

The website Buzzfeed, which has uncovered most of Mr. Paul’s plagiarism, reported Tuesday that part of his book “Government Bullies” was also lifted from Forbes magazine.

As a proponent of real property rights who opposes action by the EPA to infringe on those rights even if it means polluting our environment, it’s shocking that Mr. Paul doesn’t have the same fealty toward intellectual property rights.

Mr. Paul’s reaction so far has not been to plead guilty and beg forgiveness. That’s not his style.

He has instead claimed to be victim of a “witch-hunt” by “hacks and haters.

His staff cleansed his U.S. Senate website of transcripts of his speeches that could be used against him, Buzzfeed reported. Tuesday, he acted as if it was just a minor dustup over proper footnoting techniques. An adviser announced footnotes will now be available upon request.

On ABC’s “This Week” he said he said he would challenge those who have accused him of plagiarism to duels if it didn’t violate Kentucky law.

And he said takes it as an “insult” that people would accuse him of being “dishonest, misleading or misrepresenting. I have never intentionally done so.”

The real insult here is that Mr. Paul would expect voters to believe his half-baked, nutty explanations. The real insult is that he would expect us to believe he’s not at fault and this is the result of partisan opponents.

But the biggest insult is that he would use a writer’s or researcher’s words, claim them as his own and expect everyone to look away when he gets caught.