Ben Domenech (born December 31, 1981, Jackson, Mississippi) ^[1] is a conservative blogger who co-founded the RedState group blog. In March 2006, he was hired to write a conservative blog for washingtonpost.com but resigned ^[2] after three days amid allegations of plagiarism during his college years, to which he later confessed. December 31 is the 365th day of the year (366th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1981 (MCMLXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Nickname: The Best of the New South; The Bold, New City Coordinates: Country United States State Mississippi County Hinds Founded 1822 Mayor Frank Melton Area    - City 276. ... This article does not cite its references or sources. ... American conservatism is a constellation of political ideologies within the United States under the blanket heading of conservative. ... RedState is an American political weblog aimed at Republicans and conservatives. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... The Washington Post is the largest and oldest newspaper in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. ... Plagiarism, the activity, denoted by the verb, plagiarise, is claiming anothers writing as ones own. ...

Domenech, who wrote for RedState under the pseudonym "Augustine,"^[3] was hired by the Washington Post's online arm to write a blog providing "a daily mix of commentary, analysis and cultural criticism."^[4] The blog, "Red America", launched on 2006-03-21. Domenech resigned 2006-03-24 after other bloggers posted evidence that he had plagiarized work from writers at The Dallas Morning News, The Washington Post, Rolling Stone, National Review Online, Cox News Service , and Salon, as well as that of humorist P. J. O'Rourke and several amateur film critics. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... March 21 is the 80th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (81st in leap years). ... 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... March 24 is the 83rd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (84th in leap years). ... The Dallas Morning News is the major daily newspaper serving the Dallas, Texas area. ... Rolling Stone is an American magazine devoted to music, politics, and popular culture that is published bi-weekly. ... National Review (NR) is a biweekly magazine of political opinion, founded by author William F. Buckley Jr. ... Cox Enterprises is the successor to the publishing company founded at Dayton, Ohio, by James Middleton Cox, who began with the Dayton Daily News. ... Screenshot of Salon. ... P.J. ORourke Patrick Jake ORourke (born November 14, 1947) is an American political satirist, journalist, and writer. ...

Upbringing

Domenech's father is Puerto Rican^[5] and his mother is Dutch-Irish^[6]. He is the son of Doug Domenech, who has been appointed as White House Liaison for the Department of the Interior^[7]. He was home schooled by his mother (and by correspondence for his last three years of high school)^[8]; he attended the College of William and Mary between 1999 and 2002 but did not graduate ^[9]. North façade of the White House, seen from Pennsylvania Avenue. ... The United States Department of the Interior (DOI) is a Cabinet department of the United States government that manages and conserves most federally-owned land. ... Home education, also called homeschooling or home school, is the process by which children are educated at home rather than in an institution such as a public or private school. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... The College of William and Mary (also known as William and Mary or W&M) is a small coeducational public university located in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States. ...

Career

Domenech claims to have been the "youngest political appointee" of the George W. Bush administration,^[10] though it is unclear to which position this refers. He has worked as a contributing editor for National Review Online; a speechwriter for Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson and two years as the chief speechwriter for Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX); and an editor at Regnery Publishing, where he worked on Michelle Malkin's book Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild, and Hugh Hewitt's book Painting the Map Red.^[11] He was also apparently editor for the new book by Ramesh Ponnuru, The Party of Death: The Democrats, the Media, the Courts, and the Disregard for Human Life. ^[12] George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is the 43rd and current President of the United States, inaugurated on January 20, 2001. ... A contributing editor is a magazine job title that varies in responsibilities. ... National Review Online is the online presence of the prominent conservative political magazine National Review. ... Look up speechwriter in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Tommy George Thompson (born November 19, 1941), a United States politician, was the 7th U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services and the 42nd Governor of Wisconsin. ... John Cornyn III (born February 2, 1952) is the junior United States Senator from Texas. ... This article is about the modern United States Republican Party. ... For other uses, see Texas (disambiguation). ... Unfit for Command, published by Regnery Publishing. ... Michelle Malkin Michelle Malkin (born October 20, 1970) is a Filipino American columnist, blogger, author and political commentator. ... Hugh Hewitt (born February 22, 1956) is a conservative American radio talk show host, author, and blogger. ... Ramesh Ponnuru (born August 16, 1974) is a Washington, D.C.-based Indian American columnist and a senior editor for National Review magazine. ...

The Washington Post had been criticized for hiring him.^[13] One line of criticism held that the Post should not have hired a non-journalist conservative partisan blogger—or at least, not without hiring a non-journalist liberal partisan blogger. Another line focused on Domenech's previous writings, including a recent condemnation of deceased civil rights activist Coretta Scott King as a "Communist." (on RedState.org, he wrote, "The President visits the funeral of a Communist. And phones in a message to the March for Life. I think we can get a little pissed about this." ^[14]) Domenech also was criticized for a post ^[15] quoting from a First Things article by Richard John Neuhaus ^[16] about Freakonomics and abortion. RedState co-founder Joshua Treviño defended the above statements (the first as hyperbole) on his blog.^[17] Civil rights or positive rights are those legal rights retained by citizens and protected by the government. ... Coretta Scott King (April 27, 1927 – January 30, 2006) was the wife of the assassinated civil rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr. ... This article is about communism as a form of society and as a political movement. ... Youth rally and Mass at the MCI Center. ... The cover of this version of Freakonomics has a picture of what looks like an apple on the outside but is really an orange. ... RedState is an American political weblog aimed at Republicans and conservatives. ...

Plagiarism

Allegations of plagiarism against Domenech arose March 23, 2006, shortly after he began blogging for the Washington Post. Plagiarism, the activity, denoted by the verb, plagiarise, is claiming anothers writing as ones own. ...

Domenech was first accused of appropriating a chapter from O'Rourke's 1990 book "Modern Manners" for an editorial in The Flat Hat, a weekly student newspaper at William and Mary.^[18] O'Rourke denied Domenech's claim that the humorist had granted permission to use his words, adding that he couldn't recall ever meeting the college student. ^[19] The Flat Hat is the student newspaper of the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg. ...

Blogs Eschaton and Daily Kos soon posted links to movie reviews of Bringing Out the Dead, The Bachelor, and The World Is Not Enough written by Domenech for the same student paper. The reviews appear to be taken nearly verbatim from reviews published by Salon.com and an amateur Usenet reviewer named Steve Rhodes. Dr. Duncan B. Black, known under his internet publishing pseudonym as Atrios, is the author of the popular United States liberal weblog Eschaton, which receives an average of over 100,000 hits per day. ... Daily Kos (IPA: ) is an American political weblog aimed at Democrats, liberals, and progressives. ... Bringing Out the Dead is a film released in 1999. ... The Bachelor is a 1999 movie starring Chris ODonnell. ... The World Is Not Enough is the nineteenth official James Bond film made by EON Productions and the third to star Pierce Brosnan as Ian Flemings secret agent, James Bond. ... Screenshot of Salon. ... Usenet (USEr NETwork) is a global, distributed bulletin board system (BBS). ...

The Flat Hat investigated and eventually concluded that the paper had published 35 articles by Domenech, including 10 with suspicious similarities to works by other authors, including ones by National Review editor Jonah Goldberg. ^{[20] [21] [22]} Commenters at Daily Kos also uncovered two examples of plagiarism in reviews written by Domenech for the National Review Online in 2000 and 2001. The first finding, a review of the movie Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, contained a lengthy passage nearly identical to one by Steve Murray of the Cox News Service ^[23]. The second, a review of a Wallflowers' album, borrowed passages from one published in Rolling Stone by Tom Moon earlier the same month^[24]. Jonah Jacob Goldberg (born March 21, 1969), is an American conservative commentator. ... Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within is a science fiction movie by Hironobu Sakaguchi, the creator of the Final Fantasy series of video games. ... The Wallflowers formed in 1990, in Los Angeles, California. ... Rolling Stone is an American magazine devoted to music, politics, and popular culture that is published bi-weekly. ...

Domenech's plagiarism appeared to have extended to the Post itself. DailyKos posters found passages in an article that mirrored ones in a 1999 story by Post staff writers Edward Walsh and Roberto Suro about the Waco Siege of David Koresh's Branch Davidian church^[25] and a 1998 story by Post staff writers Michael Powell and Saundra Torry reporting on the Russell Eugene Weston Jr. shooting in the U.S. Capitol^[26]. However, the editors of The Flat Hat later disputed the accusation regarding the Waco article, writing in an online editors note^[27]: Edward Walsh was an Irish poet, born at Derry in 1805; died at Cork, Ireland, 6 August 1850. ... ‹ The template below has been proposed for deletion. ... David Koresh (born Vernon Wayne Howell) (August 17, 1959 – April 19, 1993) was the self-proclaimed leader of the Branch Davidians millennial cult, believing himself to be the Messiah, until a 1993 raid by the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms and subsequent siege by the Federal Bureau... The Branch Davidians are a religious group originating from a schism in the 1950s from the Shepherds Rod, themselves former members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church who were excommunicated during the 1930s. ... Russell Eugene Weston Jr. ...

We believe this was a simple typographical error which could have been introduced at any point in the production process. As such, we do not believe the fault is with Ben Domenech or Marianna Toma, the writers of this piece. In this instance, any confusion about the sources of these articles was almost certainly not due to any misconduct or negligence by the writers.

On March 24 2006, the editors of The National Review confirmed on its blog The Corner ^[28] that Domenech appeared to have plagiarized at least one article he'd written for that publication: The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood is a book written by Baltimore Sun reporter David Simon and former Baltimore homicide detective Edward Burns. ...

As the previous links on the matter mention, at least one of the pieces Ben Domenech is accused of having plagiarized was a movie review for National Review Online. A side-by-side comparison to another review of the same film speaks for itself. There is no excuse for plagiarism and we apologize to our readers and to Steve Murray of the Cox News Service from whose piece the language was lifted. With some evidence of possible problems with other pieces, we're also looking into other articles he wrote for NRO.

Still later, The National Review announced that they had confirmed three other instances of apparent plagiarism. Side-by-side comparisons published on the site indicated that Domenech had also lifted phrases from Rolling Stone, the Dallas Morning News, and other sources.^[29]

Resignation

On March 24 2006, RedState contributor Erick (Erickson) called the plagiarism allegations "lies" and said that "permissions obtained" were not reflected in the online record.^[30] That same day, Malkin called the evidence for plagiarism "damning" and urged him to resign.^[31]. Other conservative bloggers followed suit.

At 1:17 p.m. ET on March 24 2006, Washington Post online editor Jim Brady announced Domenech's resignation^[32], explaining: James M. Brady, known as Jim Brady, is an American journalist and the Executive Editor of the washingtonpost. ...

When we hired Domenech, we were not aware of any allegations that he had plagiarized any of his past writings. In any cases where allegations such as these are made, we will continue to investigate those charges thoroughly in order to maintain our journalistic integrity.

Plagiarism is perhaps the most serious offense that a writer can commit or be accused of. Washingtonpost.com will do everything in its power to verify that its news and opinion content is sourced completely and accurately at all times.

Domenech initially denied the charges, blaming editors for similarities to other articles. On March 24 2006, after resigning but before admitting his guilt, he claimed that "Virtually every other alleged instance of plagiarism that I’ve seen comes from a single semester’s worth of pieces that were printed under my name at my college paper, The Flat Hat, when I was 17." ^[33] But in fact, the examples which had already surfaced spanned the years 1999-2001.

Domenech has taken a leave of absence from RedState. ^[34]

Regnery controversy

Domenech resigned from his editing duties at Regnery Publishing March 21, 2006 upon launching "Red America." ^{[35] [36]} Unfit for Command, published by Regnery Publishing. ...

Though Domenech still appears to be employed by Regnery "while finishing a few short-term projects," a company spokesperson told the New York Times says they will look into the allegations as well. The New York Times is an internationally known daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed in the United States and many other nations worldwide. ...

Wonkette subsequently cited an unnamed source at Regnery who said that the Post affair gave Regnery convenient cover for getting rid of a poor performer who neglected his editorial responsibilities to make connections and advance his political career. The source alleged that he displeased Malkin by removing a 27-word passage from her book Unhinged ^[37], but Regnery production staff denied this, saying the omission was a "layout error" and not Domenech's fault. Wonkette is a blog published by Gawker Media that details the goings-on of the political establishment in Washington, DC. The site focuses heavily on gossip, humor, and the downfall of the powerful, as well as more serious matters of politics or policy. ...

Notes and references

External links

• Redstate
• Red America at The Washington Post
• bendomenech.com - Ben's old blog with links to his past writing
• Conservative blogger recently hired by Washington Post appears to be serial plagiarist - Raw Story
• 'Wash Post' Launches Conservative Blog, Provokes a 'Firestorm' - Editor and Publisher
• Joe Conason on the alleged plagiarism Salon.com
• Ben Domenech Resigns
• The Flat Hat reports on plagiarized Fight Club review from Salon
• The Flat Hat reports on plagiarized National Review articles
• The New Republic's Rob Anderson on Domenech and The Washington Post