Biden, Dowd, Kennedy—and Lord

Jeffrey Lord recalls listening to Biden in 1987.

I was stunned. Why? Because I realized as I watched Biden that I was getting to the end of his sentences before he was. Up from the mists of my teenage years, every sound, every memory of those Bobby Kennedy speeches came rushing out in a torrent. Most startling of all, it was very, very clear that Joe Biden was leaving the impression with these on-fire California Democrats that every last word he was uttering was -- Joe Biden's. Of Bobby Kennedy there was not a word. I was witnessing out and out plagiarism....

I picked up the phone and did what Robert Redford did in that old Three Days of the Condor movie. When all is lost, spill your guts to the New York Times. In my case, I went to then-reporter (and now NYT columnist) Maureen Dowd. We'd never met. She drove Reaganites crazy. But she had been covering Biden, and I liked her writing.