What is wrong with Hillary Clinton and her advisers? In an effort to promote her foreign policy experience — and thus draw a contrast between the NY senator and Barack Obama, she boldly claimed on March 17 that she went on a harrowing, brave trip to Bosnia in 1996 as First Lady.
“I certainly do remember that trip to Bosnia… we came in in an evasive maneuver… I remember landing under sniper fire… there was no greeting ceremony… we ran with our heads down, we basically were told to run to our cars… there was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, we basically were told to run to our cars, that is what happened.”Now as First Lady, she and her crack team of high-paid consultants should have known that there were not only reporters on the trip (and video) to blow away this account. But no, they stuck to their story, and the end result is that the video evidence has surfaced, making her look like a prevaricating resume padder.
Below the fold, a video that makes the campaign look incredibly bad/incompetent again; they should have seen this coming.
This is from the JedReport:
Harrowing? Not that Sinbad recalls. He just remembers it being a USO tour to buck up the troops amid a much worse situation than he had imagined between the Bosnians and Serbs.Now help me out here — why lie about this? It doesn’t make any sense, and only allows for this nonsense to be raised in the general election if she were to be the Dem nominee. I know pols can be professional prevaricators, but usually it’s to their benefit, not their embarrassment.In an interview with the Sleuth Monday, he said the “scariest” part of the trip was wondering where he’d eat next. “I think the only ‘red-phone’ moment was: ‘Do we eat here or at the next place.’”
…”I never felt that I was in a dangerous position. I never felt being in a sense of peril, or ‘Oh, God, I hope I’m going to be OK when I get out of this helicopter or when I get out of his tank.’”
If you think the above is bad, a media conference call today with the Clinton team managed to make things worse. Howard Wolfson actually said that Hillary “misspoke” about the Bosnia daredevil trip. It’s pretty hard watching that video and seeing a mere slip of the tongue. Come on, people. You don’t tout experience that you don’t have. Though based on the campaigning so far, it’s less about whether something is true or not, it’s whether you can do damage to your opponent, which the GOP does so well. Swift Boating works, regardless of who’s doing it. That’s what they pay the big bucks to the consultants for.
54 Responses to “Why padding your 3 AM-ready resume is a really bad idea”
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People were still getting killed in Bosnia in 1996.
It’s not hard for me to believe that Hillary Clinton came under fire - or at least, was in a place where the people responsible for her safety were afraid she would and told her to put her head down and run.
I know that for Americans Bosnia was pretty much a casualty-free war because US involvement largely consisted of dropping bombs from a great height. But people were shooting at other people, and they went right on doing it even after the peace accords were drawn up.
Nor would it amaze me if Hillary Clinton went places Sinbad the stand-up comic didn’t.
Nor do I regard this as particularly important either way, even if it is a lie.
Ohhhh, I get it- Hillary was having a bad DREAM at 3 am!
Laying off the chimichangas and margueritas usually fixes this within a day or so.
Pardon me, Jesurgislac, but are you on drugs? She deliberately lied about an event that was videotaped. Not only is she a liar, but a pretty inept one as well–how can we trust her to run the country when she’s so clearly inept at deception?
No, not a bad dream. She’s Channeling Ronald Reagan!
Yes! Hellcats of the Navy!
So, Jesurgislac, lieing about your foriegn policy experience is better than having none because why, exactly? Five years of lies in favor of puffing up our leader’s ego isn’t enough, you’d maybe prefer a few more?
Jes-
Was is also okay when Reagan talked about liberating a concentration camp (which never happened) after all somebody did liberate that camp?
The thing that really strikes me is the pointlessness of this lie, I mean seriously why claim a glorified USO tour was this trial by fire, this is the kind of stupid lie that leads to a person being viewed as a patholigical liar.
The real cost of this lie isn’t short-term embarassment, but the futherance of the meme that Hillary is a liar (already she’s viewed as untrustworthy by the majority), after all if she lied here why should we believe any of her claims about her record as first lady (this is unfair, but very hard to refute) especailly since there is no evidence to back those claims (as is the case for virtually all presidential claims, but now we can’t take her word or the word of her confidants obviously). Remeber how Gore was branded a fibber? Well none, of the bullshit that was used to do that was nearly as blatant as this, most of Gore’s fibs were actually true when you saw the whole thing, this is a blatant lie.
I’m wondering if her advisers, who are apparently inept bordering on stupid, are so used to padding their own resumes and pretending to be much more qualified for their jobs than they are that they simply can’t draw a line between reality and fantasy.
In so many ways, gaffs like these show just how antiquated Clinton’s campaign feels. There is a sense of politics as usual that makes it hard for a lot of people to support her. More importantly, I just don’t get the sense that she is a strong leader if she is letting her advisers lead her down these increasingly mistaken paths.
This is a prime example of the entire “eye-witness testimony” issue. People have very different memories of events, memories that are quite different from reality.
Now help me out here — why lie about this?
This is just such a strange mistake to make I can’t help but suspect that Sen. Clinton was getting two events confused. Could there have been some other diplomatic mission somewhere where Clinton was running in off the tarmac under threat of sniper fire, and Clinton got mixed up and thought that was the trip to Bosnia with Sinbad?
I have one simple question:
Why won’t either of the Clintons attack McCain?
I mean, at all? Has one negative word about his wisdom or his policies ever been uttered by them?
I can’t imagine, if there was sniper fire, that they’d actually land with the first lady and her daughter and have them run to cars. I just can’t see why that would happen.
That said, I can’t believe she would actually lie about something so blatant. Either she’s mixing it up with some other event or her memory is just confused. Perhaps something did happen at some point that was scary in the context. I just don’t know.
No no no, Ms Kate- it wasn’t a dream; it’s that unlike Bill, she DID inhale!
That explains Sinbad’s munchies attack.
Agreed Tam; sounds like a badly made Tom Clancy movie! Where is Harrison Ford???
I knew Clinton’s danger story was b.s. as soon as I found out Chelsea was on the trip.
Clinton is a good mother. She was very protective of Chelsea during the ’90s. There is simply No Way In Hell that she would have taken her teenaged daughter on that trip if she’d believed it would be dangerous.
The real reason for this lie is simple,
Hillary, Bill, and McCain, GW DC and just about all the other millionaires who seek to ’serve’ thru the acquisition of greater and greater power and adulation are quite simply sociopaths.
Just as the average US CEO would literally throw his mother under a moving train in the hunt for profits, the normal politician would do the same for power.
Why in the world would someone spend $50 million of their own money to get a job that pays $325,000 - because their pleasure center is so warped by their mental illnesses that they need the ultimate power trip - to simply feel anything at all.
I join Hill and Bill in this mix for the simple reason that they are worth approx $50 million and have both proven that they will say or do anything to win.
Obama by contrast is worth about $1.5 Mill with most of that in the family house. I don’t get the same power hungry vibe from him…
Have you all seen the video of the sleeping blonde girl in the 3 a.m. ad (Casey Knowles, now 17) endorsing Obama?
Pam wrote:
It’s very simple: it it were a choice between telling a lie that couldn’t help them or a truth that wouldn’t hurt them, the Clintons would tell the lie, out of habit and general principle!
Seebach asked:
Because, whether as a deliberately considered policy or simply a subconscious drive, Hillary Clinton is determined that if she can’t win the presidency, then no Democrat will win the presidency.
There’s even logic behind that. If Mr Obama wins the presidency, Mrs Clinton cannot run again until 2016, when she’d be 69 years old just before election day, and when she’d either be following a two-term Democratic presidency or facing a first term Republican incumbent, who was strong enough to defeat Mr Obama’s re-election in 2012.
But if Mr Obama is the nominee and loses the general election, Mrs Clinton can run in 2012, when she’d be 65 rather than 69 just before election day, and while she’d (probably) be facing a Republican incumbent, he’d be running on twelve years of continual Republican control of the White House — exactly the situation her husband faced in 1992 when he won.
While Mrs Clinton’s chances are best this year, her only real remaining opportunity is 2012.
Hillary Clinton isn’t interested in helping you or me or anyone else not named Hillary Clinton.
While I definitely agree that Clinton did a little too much padding here. This update of the WaPo article mitigates it somewhat in my eyes:
I know I’d definitely remember if I needed to be put in a flak jacket because my life might be in danger, and it’s not surprising that it maybe could be remembered more vividly than reality. Or maybe she exaggerated on purpose. We don’t know. I do know that she seems highly intelligent, and I don’t think she’d tell her story if she considered it a falsehood precisely because it’s a dumb thing to lie about as everyone has pointed out.
CBS News. w/ video (first national TV that carries the story?)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/24/eveningnews/main3964921.shtml
Compare that to Clinton’s account…
“I remember landing under sniper fire,” she said. “There was no greeting ceremony and we were basically told to run to our cars. That is what happened.”
But there was no sniper fire either when Clinton visited two army outposts, where she posed for photos. And no sniper fire back at the base, where she sang in a USO show starring Sinbad and Sheryl Crowe.
Referring to the CBS News video, Clinton aides said Monday, it “was not quite as dramatic as Clinton put it.”
“She meant that there was fire on the hillside around the area when we landed, which was the case,” said Clinton campaign aid Lissa Muscatine.
Mike Allen of Politico.com said: “Who knows if she misremembered, misspoke, exaggerated, whatever. It makes the case for Sen. Obama that all this experience that she’s been talking about is at least partly in her imagination.”
The video is a great illustration, but the bottom line is that there are a lot of examples in the papers released by the Clinton campaign last week wherein Hillary claimed to have been off doing some big important world saving type stuff, but it turns out she was actually attending a tea.
Even if Clinton ‘misspoke’ or ‘misremembered’ or whatever on this particular occasion, it’s a pretty bad sign if she also misspoke or misremembered every other time this seems to have happened.
Either Clinton is a shameless liar, or she has some serious mental issues that might preclude her being qualified to lead the nation.
Keith Olbermann brought down the hammer again tonight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsRqispBIRA
oh come on Cagey
little discrepancies between the two stories I could buy the “eyewitness testimony” argument - but these are big enough to drive 5 Mack trucks, 3 Hummers and a Vespa motor scooter through, sideways.
Keith Olbermann is a misogynist asshole. Certified member of the kewl boyz’ club.
According to an article that I read, the areas of the brain activated by memory almost completely overlap the areas activated by imagination. I think that’s why when someone wants to make a point about an event in the past, it’s easy to slip from recalling actual events to making up new ones.
I wasn’t able to locate that article, but did find some other interesting research in the archives of New Scientist (a British science magazine).
From a related article. A little off the main point, but still interesting:
but the bottom line is that there are a lot of examples in the papers released by the Clinton campaign last week wherein Hillary claimed to have been off doing some big important world saving type stuff, but it turns out she was actually attending a tea.
Yes, that was the notorious “Experience? What experience? She was just meeting with women and children and hearing about their lives, that’s not proper experience!” bombshell. Women and children, after all, do not actually count.
*waves* Missing you at Slacktivist, btw.
meeting with women and children and hearing about their lives
Yet that’s precisely the kind of experience Clinton discounts when she says that McCain, the fighter pilot and war hawk, is fit to be CinC, but Obama, the community organizer, is not.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jB97_FMYVC4
I would far rather have as POTUS someone who doesn’t have open-miked hallucinations of events from a decade ago.
Stick to telling the truth, Hillary, and then those pesky “millions of words every day” won’t come back to bite you in the ass. Idiot.
Yet that’s precisely the kind of experience Clinton discounts when she says that McCain, the fighter pilot and war hawk, is fit to be CinC, but Obama, the community organizer, is not.
And which Hillary herself discounts, when she claims she was doing more “daring” and “manly” things than she actually was. She’s validating the whole macho narrative of the conservatives - again. She ALWAYS runs to the right, she ALWAYS has, and it’s never done her any good, and it never will (didn’t do Bill any good, either) - they still were tarred with the “OMG LIBERALCOMMIE!” brush, and can’t shake it, so they might as well have been hanged for the sheep instead. Why vote for Republican-lite, as is often asked here, when you can get the real thing.
And Jesu, we don’t need our own Maggie-Lite here. Least of all one with the honesty and integrity and above all, *spine* of Tony Bliar. Just because she’s built XX instead of XY doesn’t mean she’s a better person or a better leader. I wish to God she were, but we should be so lucky.
From democraticunderground (I gotta go wipe my eyes):
Apparently the inflight movies for Hillary et al was all of the Rambo series.
“were”, not “was”.
Our recollections aren’t something that are ours alone. If I had gone to Bosnia in the mid-90s, I would no doubt have remembered it as more dangerous than it was. Just as the past is remembered as better than it was.
By all means call her on this, but don’t try to make it into “habitual lying”, the normative statements about the Clinton campaign are way too overblown as it is.
The interesting and sad part will be when the media latches onto such narratives about Obama in the general, and we can all, Clinton and Obama supporters, once again come together and throw our hands up in the air at the idiocy of the media and its narratives.
Which is why it’s a bit wearying to read blog entries and such about “but look how eeeeevil she is”. I still firmly believe we have two candidates who are competent and far stronger than John McCain, but I also believe democratic voters are way too easily swayed by irrational standards and bullshit media narratives, so.. Yeah, this will be frustrating.
seebach, they can’t. Ronald Reagan’s well-known 11th Commandment is “thou shalt not attack other Republicans”.
Yes, that was the notorious “Experience? What experience? She was just meeting with women and children and hearing about their lives, that’s not proper experience!” bombshell. Women and children, after all, do not actually count.
When you try to pass off your experience eating blintzes with Mrs. Yeltsin as “diplomacy”, you either don’t know what diplomats actually do, are lying about your level of experience, or you ‘misremembered’ in a way that would imply you are either senile or schizophrenic.
It’s kind of like the way I don’t put my stint in the rank and file of NOW on my resume as “political leadership experience”. Is NOW a perfectly valid group to be a part of? Does it take all kinds of members to make the organization work? Does my time with NOW add to my professional character? Yes, yes, and yes. But that still doesn’t mean I used to sit on the board, and I would be either lying or absofrickinglutely nuts if I claimed that it did.
AndersH wrote:
As I noted here [shameless blog plug alert!], Mrs Clinton has to know that every last word she utters or writes is going to be scrutinized, by the professional media, by bloggers, by opposition candidates, and by us in the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. She ought to be the most careful candidate in the world when it comes to saying things, because she knows full well that anything which can be picked apart and used against her will be picked apart and used against her. This is the kind of thing you check before you say it, because it’s painfully obvious that there are records out there.
You know, I could understand about her lying about a particular policy that would be a political liability, but this was a meaningless lie, a lie which serves no purpose, a lie which could only hurt her if discovered to be false, and which doesn’t really help her if taken to be the truth.
If someone as smart as Mrs Clinton lies when it serves no useful purpose and when she knows full well it will be scrutinized, I think you have to wonder if there’s something really wrong with her.
I know the Hillary supporters think that Obama supporters are mesmerized by an empty suit BUT do they seriously think these “misremembered, misstatements” and her actual record won’t be pounced on by Republicans and their 527s like C.U.N.T.
This type of stuff is moving her in the direction of “unelectable” and it is inflicted by her own hand.
Ah, back when Hillary’s little white lies were sweet:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/clintons/hillary.asp
If she did experience anything close to this landing-under-sniper-fire story she should talk about it, um, NOW.
It would be totally acceptable and understandable if she could point to a true, documented event where something like this did happen. I don’t think she can, if she could she would have done so already. Not to mention she has told this story more than once and you know now there is going to be a major effort to find another story like this– which will point to other examples of her exaggerating her experiences as first lady.
Unfortunately I think an actual fall-from-grace needs to happen so Hillary’s supporters won’t be bitter and everyone can come together.
All in all it sucks, really, because I respect and admire her.
“If someone as smart as Mrs Clinton lies when it serves no useful purpose and when she knows full well it will be scrutinized, I think you have to wonder if there’s something really wrong with her.”
Or maybe she misremembered? As you point out, it makes no sense for her to lie about this. Occam’s Razor, when not believing the HILLARY IS A CONNIVING BITCH-meme is of course that, you know, she misremembered.
Everyone, hop into the Wayback Machine for a minute and pop on back to Mar 26, 1996- one day after this supposed event.
Are there ANY newspapers with 1 inch headlines screaming how the First Lady and daughter were in danger? No? Yet the press was there. Hmmm. Okay, turn on the telly- any reports there? No?
Oh, I get it. It was so top secret that there was a complete block on releasing the information for security reasons.
Let’s just go with that one.
AndersH wrote:
I’m sorry, but what does “misremembered” mean? Is there anyone here who seriously believes that you wouldn’t remember whether or not bullets were flying toward you?
But more, she’s got staff to help, and she surely knows that every last word she utters is going to be parsed and examined and checked for verification. It makes no sense, none at all, to lie about something like this, or even to say something like this if you aren’t completely positive.
Look, I’m one of those evil Republicans, and I’d be a card-carrying member of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy, if only they actually had cards! But I seriously think that this indicates that there is something just plain wrong with her; you don’t do stuff like this otherwise.
Or maybe she misremembered?
Are you saying she ‘misremembered’ her entire tenure as first lady? If so, does that make her more electable?
Personally, I like to think the people I vote for can at least remember a recent 8 year span of their own lives.
Also, the interesting part of the papers is that the times when she really did appear to have big important meetings in the Oval Office turn out to be stuff like pardoning her brother in law. Which is something that is inevitably going to be brought up in the general election.
—By all means call her on this, but don’t try to make it into “habitual lying”—
That would have a whole lot more mileage if, once she was called on it, she corrected herself. Real people do make mistakes, remember things incorrectly, and all that. But whether or not any given statement is a lie, when the truth is clearly presented and you continue to say the same thing, then there is no possibility of question - she’s lying now, whether she did at first or not.
And can we please get off the whole “people see things and remember things differently” BS train?
It’s one thing to say “I remember in ‘92 when my car got totalled on the way to Grandma’s for Thanksgiving Dinner.”
If it gets pointed out that it was actually ‘93 - remember, it was the year AFTER grandpa died, or if it gets pointed out that it wasn’t for Thankgiving, but for celebrating her November birthday a week before Thanksgiving, then you have a valid “misremembered” situation.
If someone tries to call you a liar because, yes, there was a terrible accident that day, yes, you spent a week in traction, yes, your car was damaged and you missed the whole holiday, but that since the dealership was able to repar the car, technically, it wasn’t, strictly speaking, “totalled” — so you are a liar and the whole incident never happened, you bastard, then you’ve got cause to cry SwiftBoating.
But if someone pulls out a video of you showing up 5 minutes late to that party, happy and laughing, and your spouse looks at you and says “I’ve been with you to every family party since we met and that never happened, and besides, the car is out in the driveway right now!” then you’re a liar. Pure and simple.
If Clinton was disputing some detail like the time of day or the inflight menu, or whether it was a little girl or boy who met them at the plane, then I’d give her a break. But you don’t confuse being greeted by smiling children with sniper fire. Doesn’t happen.
“misremembered”is a Bushism
“misremembered”is a Bushism
At this point, I see the Bushisms repeated so consistently in the media that I’m starting to think they’re actual words, as in, the kind that may be found in the dictionary. People ask me every once in a while whether something they’ve read or heard is an actual word. I used to be able to answer after a brief moment of thought. Now I don’t trust my judgment anymore. That’s another Bush legacy I’m suffering from.
“No, not a bad dream. She’s Channeling Ronald Reagan!”
That was exactly my reaction, and it is not a good one. A good staff protects the candidate from him/herself but the lie is no one’s fault but her own. This is bad and recalls the worst part of Bill’s term– a disregard, even an indifference to the truth. They just make crap up. Bill and Raygun were better liars because it was tougher to check their lies. By the time you disproved the lie nobody cared about the story anymore.
The why of telling an obvious lie is quite a mystery. Remember Bill saying he was the first president to know anything about agriculture? It kinda boggles the mind.
I am a fan of Hilary’s in many ways but this was bad.
deep6 wrote:
Well, I’ve seen misunderestimate used so many times that I’ve deliberately used misoverestimate a time or two!
And I even coined a new word, in a comment on someone else’s blog, to cover such a whopper of a misstatement: it was a misspokement.
You may use it freely!
Poeple eliminated her first lady experience. Bill Clinton is the best guru for her. She never said she was in 35 in commander in chief, she sais she ready is in commander in chief. She said her husband will help, it is honest.
I am working as engineer position, I could learn to make a desision what I saw even I did not make decision. Hillary Clinton is not stupid.
Very hard for her to get impression, because people watched her, easy for Barrack Obama to acted if he is clean. Who knows him, Mr ” Superstar”
Being a first lady made her should bury her ability. May be as a first lady, she could do very limit, it was rule.
But i believe she will be a good president. She should be not embarassed as a first lady. But she is a brave woman.
Even Monica Lewinsky did not say Hillary was a bad woman.
Media manipulated her. I am a woman, and I know to be a Hillary Clinton.
Hmmm #29’s handle leads me to believe that somebody got herwomynself banned?
Tynfoylhattie, care to elaborate on Olbermann? I mean, not like HRC hasn’t been rather hamhandedly playing old boy and old girl and establishment cards right and left throughout the Northeast.
Isn’t her beloved pet pitbull Carville an old boy too? What about that extensive list of Old Boys on HRC’s endorsement page?
@opoponax
*swoon*
Major General (Retired) Walter L. Stewart, Jr. has written an open letter to Hillary Clinton in which he calls on military service persons and veterans to renounce their support for Hillary Clinton:
Valor theft degrades every service member and veteran, and, as a point of honor, I call on the former admirals, generals, and service veterans who are publicly in support of Senator Clinton to renounce that support. Continue it, and her dishonor is your dishonor.
Hillary Clinton’s “misremembering” of sniper fire has made her a joke in many circles (e.g., hello Sinbad), but for the veterans I know (and I know lots of them), they’re actually pretty pissed.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/3/28/111610/066/70/486058