We turn now to a breaking scandal out of Washington, D.C.
BRIAN TODD (11/4/2013): He's one of the Tea Party's biggest stars, but now Senator Rand Paul stands accused of doing something our third grade teachers would nail us for.
Oh, snap!! What, did he use a magic marker to change Clifford the Big Red Dog to Clifford the Big Red Dick?
Cuz for the record, Ms. Ferguson, that crushed!
I'm sorry, what did he do?
BRIAN TODD (11/4/2013): ... plagiarism ...
STEVE KORNACKI (11/2/2013): Tea Party Senator apparently lifted several lines of his speech directly from Wikipedia.
SEN. RAND PAUL, R-KY (10/28/2013): In the movie Gattaca, in the not-too-distant future,
eugenics is common and DNA plays the primary role in determining your social class. Vincent Freeman is conceived, though, and born the old-fashioned way, without the aid of genetic selection.
Due to the frequent screenings, Vincent faces genetic discrimination and prejudice.
All right, I'm going to pretend here that the thing we're supposed to be concerned about is that Rand Paul is copying from Wikipedia, and not that he's warning Americans about the role of government by referencing an Ethan Hawke movie.
"You know, the other thing this country needs is a place where rookie cops have better training.
A place where men and women can really connect, but only for like a night.
And where one day a year, crime is legal.
And where, um...
days are... broken. And a world...
fuck! — where the finest things come from... Brooklyn. And...
I have no fucking idea! I don't know, I never.... How many of these....?"
All right, there's been a lot of movies I haven't seen yet.
(audience laughter at graphic)
But as far as the plagiarism goes, I'm sure there's a reasonable explanation.
SEN. RAND PAUL, R-KY (11/3/2013): I think the spoken word shouldn't be held to the same sort of standard that you have if you're giving a scientific paper. ... 98% of my speeches are extemporaneous. ... And so it is a little bit hard to footnote things accurately.
See? 98% of my speeches are extemporaneous. I mean, only 2% of his speeches are plagiarized! And the truth is, most of those are just Taylor Swift lyrics! (audience laughter) So really, what's to worry about?
But the problem is, it doesn't stop with speeches.
LAWRENCE O'DONNELL (11/6/2013): Three pages of Rand Paul's latest book were directly lifted from conservative think tanks' documents. ... Another entire section of the same book was lifted nearly word for word from a Forbes article.
RACHEL MADDOW (11/5/2013): A September op-ed written by Senator Paul in the Washington Times appears to have been largely lifted without attribution from an article that appeared in a magazine called The Week.
Also, some are raising questions about his memoir of life as a young black woman in the segregated South.
(audience laughter and applause)
And it is becoming increasingly clear that Mr. Paul has stolen his haircut from '80s icon Patrick Duffy.
You're welcome, Rory.
But at least the Rand man is handling these allegations in the appropriate manner.
SEN. RAND PAUL, R-KY (11/3/2013): I think I'm being unfairly targeted by a bunch of hacks and haters.
RACHEL MADDOW (11/6/2013): Senator Paul told the New York Times, "To tell you the truth, people can think what they want, I can go back to being a doctor anytime, if they're tired of me. I'll go back to being a doctor, and I'll be perfectly content."
"You know what? I'll... I'll start my own government where you're allowed to copy off other people! I'll start my own country! And, yeah, that's right. I'll call it Belgium. I came up with that name! Belgium!" (audience laughter)
We'll be right back.
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both talked about the controversy with NFL player Richie Incognito, and Jon's Best Fucking News Team staged a
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(hint, hint).