Is President Barack Obama guilty of plagiarism? That's what former White House speechwriter Marc Thiessen insinuated Tuesday night after the State of the Union speech.
Thiessen said some of the passages in Obama's speech were "eerily familiar" to remarks he penned for George W. Bush's 2007 address.
"Barack Obama has gone from blaming George W. Bush to plagiarizing George W. Bush," Thiessen told Fox News' Megyn Kelly after the speech.
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"There were lines like 'Our job is to help Americans build a future of hope and opportunity, a future of hope and opportunity begins with a growing economy, a future of hope and opportunity requires that all citizens have affordable and available healthcare, extending opportunity and hope depends on a stable supply of energy,' all of that came from the 2007 State of the Union from George W. Bush," Thiessen said.
After a comparison of each speech,
Politico determined that "no lines were directly lifted from Bush's 2007 speech in the one Obama gave on Tuesday" but said "there are some minor similarities between the two."
"Obama use a version of the word 'opportunity' more than 10 times in his speech, Bush used the word at least eight times. Both speeches also ended with a moving story about a wounded veteran," the site reported.
When asked by Politico via email if he was accusing Obama of blatant plagiarism, Thiessen responded, "Seriously? Get some sleep," but included a link to a
September Washington Post column he wrote that claimed Obama had lifted lines of a speech on Syria from Bush.
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