Political Plagiarism, the sincerest form of flattery?

I had the privilege of sitting with John Gorena for 2 hours this afternoon over lunch, and discussing various issues. This post was one of the topics, and though he was gracious, Gorena was not pleased with this post.

In retrospect, knowing that I was dealing with an imperfect human being, rather than someone putting himself out there as if he were perfect, I should have been a little less "gotcha" with this story. It's not as if Gorena was a polished politician preaching about campaign ethics.

I'm learning this "citizen journalism" thing as I go. One of the things I've learned this year is the need to seek input from all sides. I failed to do that with this post.

Gorena notes that he was working 60 -70 hour weeks during the time this happened and that someone gave him this content, and he used it without really considering the source. Since I didn't call him to verify the source, (I checked with Guerra instead) he didn't know until after my blog was posted.

To his credit - and I think I've mentioned this in another post - Gorena not only fixed the plagiarism, but took responsibility for the oversight. I believe he's telling the truth, and I would urge people not to hold this one-time transgression against him.

None of this means that I'm getting soft, or that I'll back off from calling out what I consider to be bad ideas or bad behavior from anyone in the public eye. I'm just saying that I'm also an imperfect person, and I am always striving to improve the way I do things: even this expensive hobby called blogging.

You can help me by signing up with an account on this blog. Once you have an account, you can post unmoderated comments and keep me honest and fair - though I pledge to remain biased.