United States, had merely changed the story’s setting fromrnEngland to her native land, substituted Hindu for Christianityrnwherever appropriate in the text, and then purloined virtuallyrnverbatim whatever was left. The Goudge estate in Englandrnwas so incensed that it pressed Ballantine not only for a publicrncondemnation of the plagiarism but for a worldwide recall ofrnall copies of the fraudulent work.rnJacqueline Singh, writing last year in India’s Book Review,rnhad found it strange that “details of the physical surroundingsrn[described in Aikath-Gyaltsen’s book] seem more reminiscentrnof Europe or England,” that “villagers’ thatched-roofed hovelsrnare called ‘lodgers’ and villagers themselves ‘countrymen,'”rnand that the “rich landlords, more at home with English fairyrntales, nursery rhymes and Shakespeare than with Hindurnmythology and Tagore, are difficult to ‘place.'” But far fromrnsniffing out the scones beneath the curry, Ms. Singh concludedrnthat “all these anomalies on the Indian scene wouldrndoubtless make the setting more accessible to foreign readersrnat whom the novelette may be aimed.” And she may have beenrnright. After all, the Washington Post had praised the novelist forrnbelieving “we all live in one borderless culture.”rnAmerica’s literary establishment was once again embarrassed.rnPublishers Weekly had gushed that Aikath-Gyaltsenrn”dissects domestic life with the gimlet precision of JanernAusten.” The New York Times had called her novel “magic,”rn”full of humor and insight,” with “a countryside you suspectrnyou may have visited before.” The Washington Post had saidrn”exquisite,” a book “at once achingly familiar and breathtakinglyrnnew.” And I thought Henny Yongman was dead.rnEastern book publishers and news editors were appalled atrnthe “brazenness” of this “talented” writer, but was it really thernbrazenness that bothered them or just the yolk dripping fromrntheir faces? For too busy professing their shock and consternation,rnthey entirely missed the moral of this story: that arnbook which was originally panned by the critics as little morernthan a penny dreadful became a monumental work of literaturernforty years later once plagiarized and placed in a Third Worldrnsetting. Transnationalism and open borders, the politicizationrnof standards, an obsession with diversity, a culture hell-bent onrnself-flagellation—herein lies a tale about more than plagiarism.rnAn equally disturbing tale involves the plagiarisms of JoernCobb, the Heritage Foundation’s John M. Olin SeniorrnFellow in Political Economy. The Wall Street Journal’s PaulrnGigot had assured his readers in a May 5 column that the Clinton-rnbacked proposal of a World Trade Organization posed nornthreat to American sovereignty because the “independent”rntrade expert of the “opposition” party had analyzed it and declaredrnit safe and sound. “Mr. Cobb, the GOP economistrnwho’s studied the GATT text, says, yes [to the WTO], becausernthe WTO is no threat to American self-rule…. He says he’drnshutter both the Wodd Bank and International MonetaryrnFund if he could, but the WTO is different.” What Mr.rnGigot apparently did not know is that Cobb’s “independent”rnanalysis is a virtual duplication of a study by the AdvisoryrnCommittee for Trade Policy and Negotiations (ACTPN).rnWhole sections of Cobb’s “assessment” are lifted directly fromrnACTPN’s work. Composed primarily of corporate and bankingrninterests, ACTPN was hired by Clinton’s Office of thernU.S. Trade Representative, produced its study by governmentrncontract, and now leads the lobbying effort on Capitol Hillrnfor ratification of the GATT agreement that would create thernWTO. Perhaps this explains the praise for Mr. Cobb at a Mayrn25 speech at the Heritage Foundation by Clinton TradernRepresentative Mickey Kantor.rnIt is interesting to note that, though all the major newsrnoutlets were given detailed evidence of Cobb’s pilfering, onlyrnTime, in its June 13 issue, even mentioned the incident. Butrninstead of exploring the implications of the story like a goodrnmuckraker—what this says about the GOP, our one-partyrnstate, the duplicity that passes for scholarship and diplomacy—rnTime smoothed over this terrain with a two-sentence summary,rnwhich was barely more informative than its headline,rn”Conservative Copycats.”rnThe improprieties of the heroes and institutions of the Beltwayrnare often treated with kid gloves by the Establishmentrnpress, treated more like household squabbles best kept amongrnfamily than news stories that the hicks of the hinterlands needrnto hear about. This certainly was the case with Martin LutherrnKing’s plagiarisms, and the silence and political spin on thisrnstory continue to this day.rnProfessor Garry Wills of Northwestern University devotes anrnentire chapter to King and to an exegesis of the “I Have arnDream” speech in his latest book. Certain Trumpets: The Callrnof Leaders. Relying heavily on the research and conclusions ofrnKeith “voice merging” Miller of the University of Arizona,rnWills admits that “the most famous of [King’s] perorationsrncomes from another man, from Archibald Carey,” but he assuresrnus that “what is important… is not where King got it butrnwhat he did with it.” What Wills does not say is that Kingrnprincipally plagiarized “white sources”—the work of liberalrnwhite writers, white preachers, white scholars—^but that in therncase of his most famous speech. King robbed, copyrighted,rnand defended his legal “right” to the words and thoughts ofrnanother black man. The press and the academy have alwaysrnassumed that, because all blacks are alike, all blacks think alike,rnand all blacks backed the civil rights movement, ArchibaldrnCarey—ipso facto—felt honored to have his words stolen byrnsomeone of the stature of King. This may have been the case,rnbut no evidence of this has ever been offered. The speech byrnCarey that caught King’s attention was given, after all, at thernRepublican National Convention of 1952, not the DemocraticrnConvention of 1960.rnMoreover, black leaders have long complained that thernwhite community, and the white legal system in particular,rnignores the problem of black-on-black crime, that when blackrnvictims are involved it refuses to uphold the same laws and standardsrnthat apply to whites. But where is the black outrage at thernpatronizing community of liberal white scholars who continuernthis ignominy in cultural affairs? Fighting cruel indifference onrnthe one hand—in the social and political realms—while encouragingrnbenign neglect on the other—in the cultural andrnacademic—is hardly the best strategy for battling double standards.rnTo Wills’ credit, he does boldly condemn King’s “academic”rnplagiarisms:rnNormal as this kind of borrowing was among preachers,rnit is inexcusable in academic terms, and I believern[King’s] doctorate should be rescinded by Boston University.rn(I also think John Kennedy’s Pulitzer Prize, wonrnin an even greater exercise of false pretense [for Profilesrnin Courage, which Theodore Sorensen and his aidesrnprincipally composed] should be rescinded—for onern24/CHRONlCLESrnrnrn