They say “history has a way of repeating itself.” �

Especially if you’re Doris Kearns Goodwin or the late Stephen Ambrose.� These noted historians and accused plagiarists are but two in a long line of those who have taken liberties with the (already) written word.�

Wallace Stegner, the so-called “dean of Western writers,” was branded a plagiarist for his Angel of Repose.� A plagiarism scandal forced Democratic presidential contender Joe Biden out of the race in ’88.� Boston Globe columnist Mike Barnicle resigned for plagiarism and the paper suspended columnist Jeff Jacoby for similar allegations. Even Milton was plagued by accusations of plagiarism in Paradise Lost.�

In today’s electronic age, where the quill and parchment have been replaced by the laptop and broadband, an alarming number of students, authors, journalists and politicians are increasingly finding the power of “copy/paste” is mightier than the sword.�

The advent of the Internet, and its vast sea of endless research, makes getting to the top of the literary world faster and easier than ever. �But it also makes the detection of plagiarism that much easier, and many a sloppy or sticky-fingered scribe has been chewed up and spit out, left to pick over the flotsam of a shipwrecked career.

The latest castaway hails from none other than the “Gray Lady,” better known as The New York Times.

Robert Rivard, editor of the San Antonio Express-News, recently sent a letter of complaint to The New York Times for the stark similarities between a story Express-News reporter Macarena Hernandez wrote on April 18 about a Texas woman whose son was a soldier missing in Iraq and a Times story published on April 26 by Jayson Blair about the same woman.�

Turns out Blair and Hernandez were interns together at The Times five years ago.� After seeing Blair’s story, Hernandez told the Washington Post, “I was shocked.� I thought, ‘Oh my God, this sounds like me.’”�

According to the Washington Post, The Times says Blair, who resigned from the paper on May 1, “was tired and has admitted making mistakes, including mixing up a quote ... and a paragraph from the Texas paper’s story with his own notes.” The old “I was sloppy” excuse — a familiar refrain of plagiarists, one that worked well for Ambrose and Goodwin.

The “sloppy” defense even has some notable champions.� Federal Judge Richard Posner, who is also a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, explained at a recent American Historical Association meeting in Chicago that plagiarism is more a matter of degree, of intention, than a black and white issue.�

On Goodwin and Ambrose, The Chicago Tribune quotes Posner as saying “I take a benign view of the celebrity plagiarism of Stephen Ambrose and Doris Kearns Goodwin... They left footnotes, which made their plagiarism more detectable.”� Sloppy plagiarists are infinitely more excusable, don’t you know?

The Blair episode is the second black eye for The New York Times in recent days.� Sports columnist Ira Berkow admitted last week to borrowing a quote from former North Carolina basketball coach Dean Smith from an article written in the Chicago Tribune without proper attribution.� There were other similarities to the Tribune piece as well.

As for Express-News editor Rivard — who said of the Blair piece, “It’s a story I’d be embarrassed to have my byline on if it were me” — he admits having to reprimand one of his own sports writers for plagiarizing a story about Tiger Woods.

With the rampant pirating of music on the Internet and other intellectual property being defended as a First Amendment “right,” who knows, maybe the “sloppy” defense will one day give way to the “Free Speech” defense for literary pirates.

A Times spokesperson assured the Washington Post that every member of the staff receives an integrity statement and a “pamphlet on journalistic ethics.”� Without ethics and integrity, what’s a Times scribe left with but a poison pen?

Author’s Note:

What would a story on plagiarism be without an official acknowledgment?� In writing this article, the author relied heavily on a story written by the Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz on April 30, 2002, entitled “New York Times Story Gives Texas Paper Sense of D�j� Vu.”