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"Has the man who writes best selling books about his ?Conversations with God? also heard God?s commandments? Thou shalt not steal...."

Well, if you have conversations with God, you're pretty special. Maybe you get some special rules. Perhaps, those generic commandments are for the little people.

Neale Donald Walsch accused of plagiarism, would like you to believe that "he made a mistake in believing the story was something that had actually happened to him."

Except for a different first paragraph in which Mr. Walsch wrote that he could ?vividly remember? the incident, his Dec. 28 Beliefnet post followed, virtually verbatim, [Candy] Chand?s previously published writing, even down to prosaic details like ?the morning of the dress rehearsal, I filed in ten minutes early, found a spot on the cafeteria floor and sat down.?

Aw. Come on. Give him a chance. Here's how I'm picturing it:

GOD: Yo, Walsch. Conversation time.

WALSCH: What is it now, Lord?

GOD: You know that that thing Candy Chand wrote? Where she went to that Christmas pageant and one of the kids holds the M upside-down? "Christmas Love" becomes "Christ Was Love."

WALSCH: Why you lap up that sentimental crap, I will never understand.

GOD: LOL, do not try to understand my ways, Walsch. I invented cute. And I also invented practical jokes, so here's my idea. I want you to copy that story, word for word, and publish it on the intertubes...

WALSCH: That's supposed to be funny?

GOD: "Intertubes"? That will never stop being funny.

WALSCH: No, I mean me blatantly plagiarizing something.

GOD: You copy the whole thing word for word, but then ? here's the hilarious part ? you add a first paragraph all about how you "vividly remember" that time you went to the Christmas pageant.

WALSCH: This will be so easily discovered...

GOD: Yeah, it used to be just me that knew about all the lying and cheating. Now, with the intertubes...

WALSCH: Am I allowed to say that gets on my nerves?

GOD: Now, with the intertubes, a lot more people can discover lying and cheating. Hijinks ensue. And when you are discovered, because, of course, you will be discovered...

WALSCH: Obviously...

GOD: When you are discovered, I want you to claim ? really sincerely ? that you actually mistakenly believed that you remembered the incident as if it had happened to you. You can be all: "I am chagrined and astonished that my mind could play such a trick on me."

WALSCH: You think that's funny?

GOD: Mmm-hmmm.

WALSCH: People aren't going to believe that.

GOD: The believe you have conversations with God, don't they?

Full post as published by Althouse on January 06, 2009 (boomark / email).