Sen. Biden’s Problems With Plagiarism
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The first presidential primary is still four months away, but already the press has knocked out two candidates on the Democratic side before the first vote has been counted.
How sad for all taught to believe that participating in government is an important duty of citizenship to now realize that so fundamental a right of a free society, the right to vote, has been usurped by the press.
The issue of Sen. Joseph Biden’s (D-Del.) withdrawal is not whether the press was justified in raising his failure to attribute quotations, I concede it was, but rather the degree to which the matter was raised--and on that question the press displayed an unyielding proclivity toward persecution.
The dilemma posed by the press in sacking two presidential campaigns is the troubling realization that while we cannot exist in a democratic society without a free press, we may not, on the other hand, be able to exist with it either. The woeful irony is the press luxuriating in the freedom of the First Amendment while the importance of the ballot box is made moot by that very freedom.
GEORGE MITROVICH
San Diego
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