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Book sales suspended for Trump aide accused of plagiarism

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  • ASSOCIATED PRESS

    Monica Crowley, on Dec. 15, in the lobby of Trump Tower in New York. The publisher of Crowley’s “What the (Bleep) Just Happened?” said, Tuesday, it is halting sales of the book, pending the “opportunity” for the aide to President-elect Donald Trump to revise her text. She is accused of plagiarizing numerous passages in the 2012 book.

NEW YORK >> The publisher of Monica Crowley’s “What the (Bleep) Just Happened?” said Tuesday it is halting sales of the book, pending the “opportunity” for the aide to President-elect Donald Trump to revise her text.

Crowley is a syndicated talk show host and Trump’s pick to serve as director of communications at the White House’s National Security Council. She is accused of plagiarizing numerous passages in the 2012 book, an anti-Obama work that was praised by future Trump supporters Sarah Palin and Rudolph Giuliani, among others.

On Tuesday, HarperCollins announced the book and its 2013 edition, “What the (Bleep) Just Happened … Again?” will “no longer be offered for purchase until such time as the author has the opportunity to source and revise the material.”

Both editions have the same basic material, but the 2013 book includes a new foreword, in which Crowley responds to Obama’s re-election.

The hardcover of “What the (Bleep) Just Happened?” is out of print, but the 2012 edition has been available as an e-book. As of Tuesday morning, “What the (Bleep) Just Happened … Again?” was available as a paperback.

By midday Tuesday, links to both books had been removed from Amazon.com, but remained on Barnes & Noble.com.

CNN first reported over the weekend that Crowley appeared to have plagiarized large sections of her book. Their review found more than 50 examples of apparent plagiarism from sources that include news articles and Wikipedia.

Trump’s transition team came to Crowley’s defense, dismissing the allegation as “nothing more than a politically motivated attack that seeks to distract from the real issues facing this country.”

Politico Magazine published evidence this week suggesting Crowley had also plagiarizing several sections of her doctoral dissertation at Columbia University. The publication found more than a dozen instances in which Crowley appeared to lift from other works without providing proper attribution.

Transition officials have not responded to questions about the allegations regarding Crowley’s academic work or HarperCollins’ decision to suspend sales of her book.

Crowley also faced plagiarism allegations in 1999 after a piece she wrote on the 25th anniversary of President Richard Nixon’s resignation ran in The Wall Street Journal.

“There are striking similarities in phraseology between ‘The Day Richard Nixon Said Goodbye,’ an editorial feature Monday by Monica Crowley, and a 1988 article by Paul Johnson in Commentary magazine,” the Journal noted a few days later. “Had we known of the parallels, we would not have published the article.”

HarperCollins is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. Murdoch has been critical of Trump in the past, tweeting in 2015, “When is Donald Trump going to stop embarrassing his friends, let alone the whole country?” But the two have apparently become closer. On Monday, Trump tweeted, “Rupert Murdoch is a great guy who likes me much better as a very successful candidate than he ever did as a very successful developer!”

Associated Press writer Jill Colvin contributed to this report.

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  • On one hand, she appears to be a serial plagiarist (check out national articles for the breathtaking scope of how she cut and pasted the writings of others in both her book and media pieces). On the other hand, if she’s the “spokesperson” for an organization run by others, I suppose it might even be viewed as a positive skill to be able to accurately reflect others’ positions. OH NO!!! That sounded so Trumprational. It’s infectious.

  • Apparently, all criticism of anyone associated with trump will be dismissed as “politically motivated.” Still, for trump’s director of COMMUNICATIONS to be accused of plagiarism multiple times going back years is extremely disturbing. This will be the most truth challenged administration ever.

    • Fortunately for Trump, his followers will dismiss everything he denies. The will blindly follow him because of his promises. He has already backed out on some of his pro uses including not pursuing Hillary Clinton (you know, the one they called a liar whilst Trump was caught lying about his comments about grabbing the ahem). Then his promise about not touching Medicaid. We all know what happened with that. Then there is the wall he promised to build. I suspect that ain’t happening.

  • Crowley’s 20-year history as an unapologetic plagiarizer qualified her to work for Fox News and now for the Trump White House, where she’ll fit right in with Trump’s inability to stop lying, even when they evidence that exposes his lies is on videotape

  • Hmm… I’m not sure why so many of the commenters here are so “Down on Crowley”… after all, isn’t she the “Perfect Politician”?
    She steals words, phrases, ideas from other people and takes 100% credit for them and profits handsomely from it…

    • Bravo!!! Just like he ended his Presser today, “You’re Fired” he still thinks it’s a TV Show…That’s why it’s so FUNNY…Trump is a 2nd helping of GWBush…#MAGA

      • It is a TV show with great ratings. Hope you all are enjoying the show. He sure did a job on CNN Clinton News Network. I guess the Kenyan won’t put the book in his Chicago library.

  • I wonder if Aleister Crowley was her pappy? In any case, with both her books obviously larded with plagiarized passages, now she’s in “double, double toil and trouble”.

  • Plagiarism doesn’t lie. It’s right there, in black and white, for everyone to see. I just looked at some of the examples in a couple of articles: Alex Caton and Grace Watkins’ “Trump Pick Monica Crowley Plagiarized Parts of Her Ph.D. Dissertation” (Politico Magazine, 1/9/17) and Andrew Kaczynski’s “Trump National Security Aide Monica Crowley Plagiarized Lines in Washington Times Columns” (MoneyCNN, 1/10/17). No wiggle room here. Crowley’s a plagiarizer, stealing others’ intellectual property for her own gain. This type of dishonesty in someone who will play “a top national security communications role” (Kaczynski) in PE Trump’s administration is unacceptable. This revelation is like opening a can of worms. In the coming days and weeks, we’re going to see similar media scrutiny applied all of Trump’s appointees, including Trump himself. If Crowley is any indication, then we ain’t seen nothing yet. The world is having a great big laugh at our expense, and the show hasn’t even started. With Trump, the joke’s on us.

  • everybody plagiarizes from someone else for the last 80 years or more listen to those famous words that JFK used what you can do for your country and so on he got that saying from the bible he only changed the word god for country so he copied that speech too.

  • The evidence is in plain sight for anyone who cares to see for themselves. There is no way to spin this one–of course Trump will still try say it is a political smear. Obvious plagiarism. What a winner we have to speak for our new President. ZERO credibility already.

  • Why is this news on the SA? Somehow any news item that will mar the PE’s reputation is qualified as significant? Monica Crowley is an intelligent, articulate and charismatic analyst. She is well read, and its very possible she may have plagiarized, but how does this even relate to the PE? Ridiculous.

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