Hillary Clinton is suffering 100% painful blowback on her apparently 100% bogus claim that she landed in Bosnia under sniper fire. Here's the overview from Newsbusters and here's the latest must-see CBS video. Watch the video.
So who's candidacy is toast now? Obama was looking like toast about a week ago, but now it's HIllary's turn.
To mix metaphors, one of these two Democrats will stumble to the finish line first, because somebody has to, but they both are already looking sweaty, tired and bruised.
And from Investors Business Daily, a must-read editorial:
The official response of the campaign of Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., regarding her claims of being under sniper fire upon arrival in Bosnia as first lady 12 years ago is that she "misspoke" — and that's all her team has to say about it.
But this particular fib is not likely to be explained away as easily as, say, her claim that she was named after Everest conqueror Sir Edmund Hillary — more than five years before the New Zealander achieved his feat. . . . .
In the case of Bosnia, there is videotape from CBS News that incontrovertibly conflicts with Hillary's emphatic descriptions of what she experienced on her trip.
"I remember landing under sniper fire," she said during a speech on Saint Patrick's Day last week. "There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base."
In a press conference after the speech, she repeated her contentions. "There was no greeting ceremony, and we basically were told to run to our cars," Sen. Clinton said. "Now, that is what happened."
But the video record of her arrival documents something very different — no danger, no running, and the first lady and Chelsea calmly and happily walking across the tarmac, meeting a dignitary or two, embracing a young girl, then taking part in the greeting ceremony she now claims never took place.
All very civilized. And on tape.
Her campaign's alibi that she misspoke and that perhaps she was mixing it up with one of her many other trips as the president's wife does not bear scrutiny.
Let's hear about that other trip in which Hillary really was under sniper fire. Such an incident would have led the TV news the day it happened and would never have been forgotten by the reporters and others who witnessed it.
This is clearly just the latest link in a chain of untruths that have ranged from claiming to have tried to become a Marine and an astronaut to the Chicago-born former Arkansas first lady assuring New York voters she is a lifelong Yankee fan.
Semi-retired New York Times columnist William Safire seems increasingly vindicated for calling Hillary "a congenital liar" in 1996.
And from Charles Hurt at the New York Post:
You know it's bad when Bill Clinton is the honest one.
Shrouded in what history will remember as her Blarney Scarf, Hillary Clinton regaled reporters for the umpteenth time last week with her fairy tale about a heroic landing through a hail of sniper fire 10 years ago to bring peace to Bosnia.
This is no simple exaggeration, embellishment or fuzzy memory about details from long ago. Nor is this just a little padding of the résumé. This is pure, calculated fabrication.
Lies, all of it.
And it goes to the very heart of her campaign that eight years as First Lady somehow made her experienced and battle-tested to be commander-in-chief.
That her crowning case in this argument is completely made up gives grave pause.
Fraudulence of this scope and severity makes Al Gore's claims that he invented the Internet look downright quaint.
But the real scandal is that anyone is surprised by this anymore.
Throughout even the most polarizing of political eras, there is one thing both sides have always been able to agree upon: The Clintons lie with abandon.
After an exhaustive investigation into the 1993 firing of the White House travel staff, investigators concluded Hillary gave sworn testimony that was "factually false."
In 2000, The New York Times said she is clearly "less than truthful" and noted her "fondness for stonewalling." And that was part of an endorsement of her!
Fellow Democrats and even former supporters have acknowledged the depth of the Clintons' deceits.
"The bigger the lie, the better the chance they think they've got. That's been their whole approach," former NJ Democrat Sen. Bill Bradley said earlier this month.
Clinton defector and Hollywood mogul David Geffen explained his exodus from the Clinton Camp last year, saying they lie "with such ease, it's troubling."
This from a guy who's in the acting business.
Yet for some reason, we in the press are the biggest suckers in the world when it comes to the Clintons.
Given her performance, there is no reason Hillary Clinton should still be in contention for the Democratic nomination.
Update: From The Australian:
Now, predictably, everyone is looking for something new to cover in the Obama-Clinton horse race.
And in this case Bosnia-gate is bad for Clinton. It goes to the heart of the issue around her and her husband: their stunning ability to stare you in the eye and lie.
"You know it's bad when Bill Clinton is the honest one." Hillarious.
A great interview with Hillary’s pilot in Bosnia - http://www.breitbart.tv/html/68124.html ‘Not only were there no bullets flying around, there was no bumblebee flying around.”.
What person would let his wife and 16 year old daughter enter a war zone and be exposed to sniper fire? No one would. You think you would remember running from sniper fire. She said it the first time she misspoke in 12 years; that might come back to haunt Hillary "Mount Everest-Not" Clinton.
There were 4000 armed men, Navy SEALS, Secret Service, 40 tanks, and attack helicopters overhead. As one military man said, “There was nobody coughing the day she showed up”. It is insulting to those protecting her.
Posted by: John Austin TX Personal trainer | March 26, 2008 at 11:31 PM