Starting Gate: Sniper Fire

By: Vaughn Ververs
Topics: Starting Gate

(White House Photo)

As CBS News' Sharyl Attkisson reports, Hillary Clinton's 1996 visit to war-torn Bosnia wasn't quite the harrowing experience that she recounted in a campaign speech last week. While campaign "embellishments" aren't exactly a novel part of politics, their unveiling can be especially damaging when it involves the underlying argument a candidate is selling.

In recent weeks we've seen a bit of erosion in Clinton's claims of "experience," aided by the release of her public schedules as First Lady and an examination of her role in national security and international relations during the 1990s. That 3am phone call ad suddenly doesn't look like such a good idea right now.

When confronted with a different tale than the one Clinton had relayed in last week's speech, in which she said her plane had landed amid sniper fire and resulted in a dangerous dash to the waiting cars, Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson allowed that the candidate has misspoken. "The facts are clear from contemporaneous news accounts that she was entering a potentially dangerous situation," Wolfson told reporters in a conference call. "She has written about this before, she has talked about this before and there you have it. Now, is it possible that in the most recent instance in which she discussed this that she misspoke."

Clinton herself echoed that characterization. "I went to 80 countries, you know," she told the Philadelphia Daily News editorial board. "I gave contemporaneous accounts, I wrote about a lot of this in my book. You know, I think that, a minor blip, you know, if I said something that, you know, I say a lot of things - millions of words a day - so if I misspoke, that was just a misstatement."

That all doesn't quite add up to Roger Clemens' contention that his friend and colleague "Andy Pettitte "had "misremembered" about steroid use but it's not helpful all the same.

It was just a week ago when the feeding frenzy surrounded Barack Obama and his relationship with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and that's where Clinton needed it. Faced with a thread-the-needle campaign strategy that rests on winning big in Pennsylvania and carrying that through to victories in Indiana, North Carolina, West Virginia, Kentucky and Puerto Rico, every day spent on something like this only adds to the challenge.

At the end of the day, even if Clinton were to run the table in the next ten contests, it will be the superdelegates who will most likely decided this nomination fight. In order to make the sale with them, she needs to be nearly perfect. Misstatement or not, she can't afford those kinds of mistakes.

My Kingdom For A Fixed Rate Mortgage: John McCain will address the housing situation in remarks to the Orange County Hispanic small business roundtable today and, according to prepared remarks released by the campaign, will say he's prepared to approach solutions with an open mind. "I will consider any and all proposals based on their cost and benefits," the remarks read. "In this crisis, as in all I may face in the future, I will not allow dogma to override common sense."

McCain says he "will not play election year politics with the housing crisis. I will evaluate everything in terms of whether it might be harmful or helpful to our effort to deal with the crisis we face now." But he does say that he'll draw the line at rewarding what he calls irresponsible decisions. "I have always been committed to the principle that it is not the duty of government to bail out and reward those who act irresponsibly, whether they are big banks or small borrowers. Government assistance to the banking system should be based solely on preventing systemic risk that would endanger the entire financial system and the economy."

Democratic Enthusiasm Boosts PA Numbers: The number of registered Democratic voters in Pennsylvania ran past four million for the first time in the state's history as the registration period for the state's April 22nd primary ended yesterday. In the past year, Democrats have added 161,000 voters to their rolls, according to the AP while GOP registration declined about one percent to just over 3.2 million. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, 14,256 voters registered as Democrats in just the week between March 10 and 17th and over 29,000 switched their party affiliation to Democrat in that week.

Around The Track

It's getting harder and harder to envision but the very tone of the Democratic contest is keeping the idea of a dream ticket somewhat open, as the USA Today notes. "The fact is you've got a very close race … and people on both sides are getting more dug in with their particular candidate," says former Clinton Chief of Staff Leon Panetta. "That raises the potential that whoever gets the nomination, the other candidate will feel like he or she has been robbed." And what better way to soothe those feelings than a dream ticket?

The Democratic National Committee yesterday approved Puerto Rico's plan to switch its nominating contest from a caucus to a primary, opening the process up to a great many more voters for one of the final scheduled contest of the campaign, on June 3rd.

Bill Clinton continues to be the focus of the campaign's rural strategy. In recent days he's been in Indiana and West Virginia. Today, he's in Kentucky which holds its primary on May 20th.

"Obama Girl" is back and is on the attack in a new video, chastising Clinton for staying in the race and asserting that "we all have a crush on Obama." Obama Girl sings, "these attacks are insane, they just help John McCain."

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by stirg March 28, 2008 4:03 AM EDT: And this is a story because---Oh yeah, we are trying to change the subject of Obama and the reved up rev.Read the story in NYT on Mr Patrick-you know the original-hope and change guy..deja-vue-the same scenario awaits us-tune in next week as obama reveals his economic plan-one that he finally came up with on his own-A chain of gambling casinos to bolster the economy-whoops guess that won''t work, back to copying everthing Hillary is for-are you guys gullible or what?; Reply to this comment


by taddles-2009 March 26, 2008 3:27 PM EDT: "This story has been blown way out of proportion.

Posted by libra127 at 12:21 AM : Mar 26, 2008"

As have all of the "stories" concerning Hillary and Barak. Perhaps we could all get back to arguing issues rather than arguing juvenile cr4p.; Reply to this comment


by taddles-2009 March 26, 2008 3:25 PM EDT: "I read somewhere that Obama has never even visited Europe. Can this possibly be true ? Does anyone know for sure ?

Posted by libra127 at 10:37 AM : Mar 26, 2008"

I read somewhere that Hillary has never visited even the moon. Can this possibly be true ? Does anyone know for sure ?; Reply to this comment


by srose2--2008 March 26, 2008 2:34 PM EDT: What is it about the willingness of Americans to "believe"? Bush strung a line about a connection between Bin Laden and Iraq . . . resulting in a war. Hillary is cut from the same cloth . . .
She has made another "mistake"! Yeah right!; Reply to this comment


by libra127 March 26, 2008 1:37 PM EDT: I read somewhere that Obama has never even visited Europe. Can this possibly be true ? Does anyone know for sure ?; Reply to this comment


by threeleos March 26, 2008 6:53 AM EDT: Isn''t it nice that we can re-write the dictionary? A misstatement used to be on the order of "I said I had eggs on the morning of February third, 1998, but I am now informed I had oatmeal." Lack of impact and lack of any intent to deceive were elements. With Senator Clinton, the example becomes: "I said I had all this experience and trashed my opponent for his lack thereof, but nothing I said on the subject was remotely verifiable, and most of it has been discredited."

For Senator McCain, it becomes: "I can''t remember who is shooting at us, and I keep perpetuating the conflation of Iraq and Al Quaida, and I have no idea about the economic crisis, but I''ll keep saying I have plans to deal with everything."

Both of them are obvious deceitful in intent, and far from harmless.

It is vaguely possible that Lurlene might get nominated, but she may be the only candidate McCain can defeat. So is that why she gets so close to a free ride from the mainstream press? OK, nothing to the extent that McCain gets, but still close enough that her whining (second only to that of President Clinton) diminishes her gravitas on a continuing basis.

Senator Obama understands what Teddy Roosevelt called "the Bully Pulpit" -- and shows the ability to use it. He has been forthcoming in meeting every charge against him, and shows every sign of being able to deal with the welter of "guilt by association" charges attempted by the people who fear change.; Reply to this comment


by sgtrds March 26, 2008 5:33 AM EDT: It''s not a mis-staement. She got caught in a lie. She lied, people checked and now she''s trying to spin it. Shame on her.; Reply to this comment


by PulSamsara March 26, 2008 5:05 AM EDT: Hillary was actually bending over to treat the little girl for a shrapnel wound behind the shoulder. In the next photograph she is seen to roll out of that crouched position and navigate through mortar fire impacts - she circled around back of a Serbian position to take out a machine gun nest. Later she cooked everyone in camp a home-made turkey stew (her aunts recipe) - she stirred it with her rifle butt and served it into the helmets of those starving beside her. - She really is an amazing spouse of a former President. -; Reply to this comment


by libra127 March 26, 2008 3:21 AM EDT: This wasn%u2019t the first time she used that speech to pull in votes,

Posted by bane863 at 06:42 PM : Mar 25, 2008

I find it hard to believe that anyone would base their vote on a story about Hillary being under sniper fire. It has no relevancy to whether she would be a good president.

A lie told in order to "bring in votes" ? I think not. A lie to make the story more colorful and dramatic ? Perhaps. A confusion of warned-of danger with actual danger ? Perhaps. This story has been blown way out of proportion.; Reply to this comment


by danmiller20 March 25, 2008 10:10 PM EDT: "I%u2019m so fed up with the vile, degrading anti-Hillary bashing by women haters."

There is, of course, no way to tell which of the folks who are unhappy with Senator Clinton''s "misstatements" -- if she made any, as she says, or if she did so while sleep deprived as she says, or whatever -- are males. My guess, however, is that as many females are offended by out-and-out lies as are males. At least I hope so.

Pointing out that a candidate for the highest office in the land lied, in the circumstances here, to bolster her qualifications for office, is neither "vile" nor "degrading." The lies themselves are vile and degrading.

It is no defense that others have told whoppers as well. A campaign should not be reduced to determining who is the worst possible candidate. The purpose should be to determine who is the best.

Dan Miller; Reply to this comment