Populist leader alleged to have ‘copied word for word’ a monologue by TV show’s fictional president Jed Bartlet

Populist leader alleged to have ‘copied word for word’ a monologue by TV show’s fictional president Jed Bartlet

Argentina’s rightwing populist president, Javier Milei, has been accused of plagiarising a chunk of his recent speech to the United Nations general assembly from the political drama The West Wing.

“It seems like fiction, but it isn’t,” the left-leaning Buenos Aires newspaper Página 12 reported on Friday, claiming Milei had “copied, word for word, a monologue” by the television show’s fictional president, Josiah “Jed” Bartlet.

Suspicions over Milei’s address surfaced this week when the political columnist Carlos Pagni flagged the “extraordinary” similarities between part of the president’s speech and words uttered by Martin Sheen’s Bartlet 21 years earlier. “Didn’t anyone else notice?” Pagni wrote in the newspaper La Nación, before transcribing the words of both men.

  • spector@lemmy.caEnglish
    12·
    1 month ago

    So which is this guy? A more left or right libertarian?

    Libertarian in the US tends to mean more right leaning. The left social issues they support tend to be rather superficial self serving issues like decriminalization.

    • Maggoty@lemmy.worldEnglish
      8·
      1 month ago

      He’s exactly what we think. Criticizes international bodies, aligns with Trump, Bolsonaro, and Netanyahu. He silences critics and uses force against unions.