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Tea Party Candidate Christine O'Donnell Falsely Claimed to Have Attended Universities

people who lie on their resume, about attending a prestigious university such as Oxford, are not fit to be Senator.

being stupid about Evolution, lieing, premaritial sex, is one thing. but this is a little different.
 
Thunder said:
people who are stupid enough to believe they can successfully lie on their resume, about attending a prestigious university such as Oxford, are not fit to be Senator.

being stupid about Evolution, lieing, premaritial sex, is one thing. but this is a little different.
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I fixed your post.
 
The Tea Party has me wondering ... Do dumb people warrant representation in Washington?

What would Jefferson, Adams, et al say?
 
FWIW: http://www.linkedin.com/in/christineodonnell

If it is a fake, they went to a lot of trouble to make it absolutely credible except for that one area. It would also be easy enough for LinkedIn to check, as they require an email validation. If it was opened with an email that belongs to her, she's lying.

On the other hand, the dude that broke the story could have set up a fake profile in advance of his "story". ...and made 84 connections.
 
Brainster said:
Actually, since this is Joe Biden's old seat, lying about your academic record would seem to be a qualification.
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Old news. Ho-freaking-hum.

There is a bit of a difference between speaking without thinking and being utterly out to lunch.

O'Donnel's last rational thought died of loneliness.

We know almost nothing about her other than that she is ignorant and under-qualified and that her stated academic record and what can be documented don't match at all.
 
Kegeshook said:
"There have been reports that I have released false information on a LinkedIn profile under my name. This is categorically untrue. I never established a LinkedIn profile, or authorized anyone to do so on my behalf. I have always been clear about my educational background. I completed undergraduate work at Fairleigh Dickenson University. After my undergraduate work, I completed a summer program run by the Phoenix Institute, at the Institute's Oxford University location. The Institute runs programs around the world at various universities, and participants study issues of human dignity. I also completed a Lincoln Fellowship at the Claremont Institute in Claremont, CA. We would encourage LinkedIn to remove this profile.
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Interesting that her clarification contains a misleading statment. I read the highlighted and thought that it was some sort of education achievement but alas, according to the Claremont Institute

Founded in 1979, the Claremont Institute publishes the Claremont Review of Books, sponsors Publius and Lincoln Fellowships for rising young conservative leaders, and administers a variety of public policy programs, including Americans for Victory Over Terrorism, our Ballistic Missile Defense Project, the Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence, the Center for Local Government, and the Salvatori Center for the American Constitution.
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It's just a conservative propaganda center that gave her money
 
The disturbing lie (assuming it's a lie which seems likely but I admit not proven) is that she isn't responsible for setting up this LinkedIn profile. If she had said, "Look, I took classes at Oxford, but now that you mention it, you're right, they weren't Oxford courses, they were Phoenix courses on the Oxford campus, and maybe I should change my LinkedIn to make that distinction more clear," then I'd say nothing to see here.

With that in mind, Brainster's post looks less like the tu quoque it was intended to be, and more like a study in contrasts...
 
Kegeshook said:
*Update: Greg Sarget just updated his Plum Line blog with a statement from O'Donnell in which she says she says the LinkedIn profile is not hers. Here's the statement:

"There have been reports that I have released false information on a LinkedIn profile under my name. This is categorically untrue. I never established a LinkedIn profile, or authorized anyone to do so on my behalf. I have always been clear about my educational background. I completed undergraduate work at Fairleigh Dickenson University. After my undergraduate work, I completed a summer program run by the Phoenix Institute, at the Institute's Oxford University location. The Institute runs programs around the world at various universities, and participants study issues of human dignity. I also completed a Lincoln Fellowship at the Claremont Institute in Claremont, CA. We would encourage LinkedIn to remove this profile.
​
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Doesn't pass the smell test.
 
It doesn't look good for Christine:

LinkedIn responds to O'Donnell

"We have taken the profile down. That's all we are confirming," LinkedIn spokesperson Shannon Stubo emailed me. "It was taken down in response to Christine O'Donnell's request. This is not an acknowledgment that the profile was fake."

To reiterate: O'Donnell's campaign spokesperson didn't indicate that the profile was unauthorized when I contacted her for comment last week, or when I contacted her yesterday before publishing.

* Also: When the O'Donnell campaign was pressed by a skeptical Associated Press reporter to answer why they didn't challenge the veracity of the profile when I asked about it, the campaign declined to answer directly:

Asked Wednesday to explain why she did not challenge authorship of the profile when talking with Sargent, O'Donnell spokeswoman Diana Banister replied simply, "Ms. O'Donnell has clarified any questions about her education and the LinkedIn page."
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We are witnessing a truly epic political fail. :popcorn1
 
johnny karate said:
Seems like a long way to go to gin up something that's ultimately not that big of a deal.
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Faking an account is an hour or two for a mischievous somebody. Hardly a long way to go. I'll grant you, it's not planting a deliberately misspelled flash card with "potatoe" on it.


And in his follow-up article, Sargent claims that O'Donnell's spokesperson didn't deny the existence of the Linkedin account on the two separate occasions he inquired about it.
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Well, maybe it says a lot, or maybe nothing if he hadn't talked to her.
 
Puppycow said:
It doesn't look good for Christine:

LinkedIn responds to O'Donnell

We are witnessing a truly epic political fail. :popcorn1
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While there isn't enough information to determine whether or not the account, and thus the embellishment, was hers, I agree that this is a political fail in terms of how she handled it.

The biggest hole in the whole story is that someone created a phony account that is otherwise more or less accurate except for this one thing that makes her look better than the reality. If it was an O'Donnell opponent, surely they would have made her look worse. If it was an O'Donnell supporter, wouldn't they have embellished other things as well, why just education?

The only way the "fake account" story works, as I said, is if it was the blogger who made the account, which is entirely possible based on what little we know.

The other possibility that makes any sense is that O'Donnell made the account herself and, as we all do, "artfully phrased" the weaker points of her resume. After all, it's just a LinkedIn account. Who's going to fact check it?
 
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