Okay, conservatives, your turn

Who is the most popular Republican politician among extreme conservatives? Setting aside the ghost of Ronald Reagan, whom they would continue to vote for if they could, the top contender would seem to be Randy Paul, the eye doctor who decided the best way to become board certified, which is kind of the gold standard for medical specialist recognition in the United States, was to make up his own board to certify him.

Anyway, this isn't about that, it's about another area of dishonesty from young Randy. This time it's his plagiarism in a speech, and Rachel Maddow has been all over it.

Here's Rachel:



Pretty damning, right? I think she lets him off a little easy by allowing that he might not understand what plagiarism is, but there's no getting around the facts.

Now here's where the challenge to conservatives comes in. Back in 1987 Joe Biden plagiarized a speech by Neil Kinnock, a Welsh politician who made some great observations about the nature and reasons of his success. It was great when Kinnock said it and it would have been equally great if Biden had pointed out that the same lessons were true in his own life. What was not great was for Biden to adapt Kinnock's story to his own life and tell the story as though it had just occurred to him on his way into work.

Conservatives have never let him forget it.

The extreme right wing of the Republican Party is particularly receptive to the message of Ron Paul. By some weird quirk, they also embrace this weird self-image as intellectually rigorous independent thinkers, so this is their chance to prove it.

Let's hear some Republicans call out Randy Paul for plagiarizing Wikipedia and lying about it.

We'll wait.