Hillary Clinton Ducks (the Truth)

Hillary Clinton has been hyping her foreign policy experience lately, for instance, by claiming to have landed Bosnia in March, 1996, under sniper fire from the enemy.

Mrs. Clinton has recently said that her flight into Bosnia came “under sniper fire” that required her and her party to “run to our cars,” and that due to the danger, there was “no greeting ceremony.”

The Washington Post checked the facts of the 1996 Bosnia visit and had this to say:

Clinton’s tale of landing at the Tuzla airport “under sniper fire” and then running for cover is simply not credible. Photographs and video of the arrival ceremony, combined with contemporaneous news reports, tell a very different story. Four Pinocchios.

“Four Pinnochios” is the Post’s way of judging the truthfulness of a statement, which ranges from “The Gepetto Check Mark,” which means a statement is entirely valid, to a scale from one (”some shading of the facts”) to four (”a whopper”) Pinnochios.

In two telling video clips, CBS News contrasts a recent speech in which Mrs. Clinton mentions her harrowing trip with a March 1996 video clip in which Clinton and daughter Chelsea are seen smiling as they leave a military aircraft, where they’re greeted by Bosnia’s acting president and an eight-year-old Muslim girl.

Sharyl Atkisson, a reporter who accompanied Hillary and Chelsea Clinton on the Bosnia trip, writes,

… the mood upon first landing at the Tuzla airport was light. Children were there on the tarmac to greet the first lady, Chelsea was by her side, Bosnian dignitaries had gathered: It felt safe.

Even the comedian Sinbad, who also accompanied the Clintons, has weighed in on the matter. The prescient Sinbad notes, “I think the only ‘red-phone’ moment was: ‘Do we eat here or at the next place?’”

Mrs. Clinton has been quoted as saying, “We used to say in the White House that if a place is too dangerous, too small, or too poor, send the First Lady.” What could Bill have been thinking? (Oh, yeah.)

Senator Clinton may not have been ducking incoming fire in Bosnia in March of 1996; she sure is ducking the truth, and the flak that comes from lying, in March of 2008.

Newsprism