Wait, let me try to recall my Thomas Kuhn ... eventually all these orphaned facts add up to something impossible to ignore and then we have a narrative paradigm shift?  But doesn't this already play into the media's Clinton vision, i.e. unprincipled and willing to say anything that might benefit her?

Anyway, I don't think it's that big a deal.  Harmless exaggeration, really.  It's not like getting shot at really qualifies you to be President.

This may be one of those times where running a negative ad about this is appropriate.  No need to "draw conclusions" just put the story out there with a 30 second piece showing Hillary's words contrasted to reality and asking if her argument that she has "a life time of experience" in foreign policy really holds water in light of this "reality gap" between what she said happened and what actually happened.

The truth is that it is part of a much larger pattern of "Resume Padding" and once the ad is out there the press will have no choice but to address it in some fashion.

Sorry, what do you mean that it's treated by the media as not a big deal?  The WaPo (one of the two most important national newspapers) runs the story in its front section, and puts on p.1 a teaser for the story showing four Pinocchio heads, as the story is part of the Post's series assessing the truth of assertions by various candidates, and awarding up to four Pinocchio heads for misrepresentations.  How much bigger a deal do you think the Post should make of this story?

A lie.  A silly, empty, pointless, annoying, disheartening and saddening lie.

One more reason why she is now, essentially, unelectable.

We all exaggerate from time (well - except maybe for my wife, who seems incapable of taking the least credit for the amazing things she DOES do, let alone stretching the truth in her own favor), but it's one thing to do this over a beer with your buds, quite another to do it on a resume, and entirely off the reservation to do it repeatedly in self-promoting speeches.   One almost expects her to break into the third person, a la Macarthur or Nixon next.

It is not in this case the dishonesty of the exaggeration that bothers me - I don't really expect people in her situation to be wholly honest anyway; rather it is the abominably poor judgment someone shows by taking the risk of being caught out at a critical juncture in their campaign, on something that really doesn't mean anything anyway (heck, if getting shot at makes one presidential material, we got a lot of front runners waiting for a flight home from Bagdhad right now, and all of Cheny's hunting buddies are prequalified).  The question is, will this candidate take thee type of risks with the public policy of the united stated, or  when negotiating with Putin or Wen Jiabao?

Tarfon- you're right about the print media, but the story has gotten no play whatosever on television, where it would have the most impact.

www.observer.com/.../wolfson-clinton-misspoke-her-tuzla-account

*siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh*

Easily the best take on this is here . . .

www.youtube.com/watch

Pass it on to your friends, courtesy of the Jed Report . . .

BTW, Howard Wolfson  is now admitting that Hillary "misspoke."

Why are we bothering with any of this BS? Suppose she really did duck sniper fire. So what? How is that relevant to being president?

Nor, by the way, was Hillary named after Sir Edmund Hillary, despite claims.

www.snopes.com/.../hillary.asp

Pattern?  We report, you decide!

ralphnelle, what's relevant is truth telling.  If we're going to question Obama's integrity based on what he says is his relationship to Pastor Wright, well, two can play at that game . . .

ralph, at this point it's all BS.  Unless I'm missing something (and please, anyone, feel free to let me know), there is nothing more of substance that needs to be, or even can be, said about the Democratic primary race at this point.  It's become a slow, tiring and dispiriting lurch to the finish line.

"Misspeak" is when you say "Sunni" when you mean "Shiite." "Misspeak" is the word to describe the act of using accidentally inaccurate words in the course of saying a true thing.

What Hillary said about her Bosnia trip was a lie. There was no underlying truth to the point she was making; this is not a case where poorly chosen words got in the way of a true statement. This is a case where the underlying point being made was false and was known to be false by the speaker. (Unless of course Hillary actually remembers her brief, peaceful trip to Bosnia as being a collection of scenes from "Clear and Present Danger" and "Air Force One", in which case she's a senile madwoman.)

Which is all to say, even using the word "misspoke" to describe what Hillary did is itself a lie. Hillary's campaign has now officially gone meta: It tells lies about its own lies.

ralphnelle , why are we bothering about this?

Because she was the one who brought it up, as a classic example of her "experience."  And some people really, really wanted to believe that she had gone in harm's way just like McCain.  

When a politician lies, it's no big deal.  

But when they get caught telling a great big whopper, now that's news!  

I like Sinbad's take on Bill Clinton's thoughts about that trip:  "Hey, it's way too dangerous for me to go there.  So I'll send my wife, a guitar player, and a comedian instead."  

Or maybe the media discounts Clinton's claims of experience and implicitly views the race as little more than a choice between the first serious woman candidate and the first serious black candidate.

I'm reading David Foster Wallace's non-fiction collection "Consider the Lobster" right now, and I was surprised to find a lengthy article he had written for Rolling Stone while tagging along with McCain on the campaign trail in 2000.  Wallace goes into some very unpleasant detail of McCain's capture and treatment in Vietnam.

Say what you will about McCain now, he endured an astonishing ordeal.  There's simply no way that Hillary Clinton can compete with him on personal history, no matter how many fibs she tells about her travels.  It only makes her look smaller and smaller when she tries.

(My chosen candidate, Obama, can't compete here either, of course.  But at least he's smart enough not to take that angle.)

"Hillary's campaign has now officially gone meta: It tells lies about its own lies. "

Rhubarbs, what would I do without you?

It's just like Al Franken's book: "Lies, and Lying Liars Who Tell Them."

Actually, Tim, Obama's challenged RE: Wright for judgment, not integrity.

Ya, I get the honesty/integrity stuff, and I agree Hillary should be slammed for lying about this, now that we've dignified her original idea by accepting it for so long.

What I object to is the extent to which our media, even many of the best, have been reduced to bobble-headed idiots about these stories. This sniper argument = relevant experience is a joke through and through. We miss the point entirely (accept the premise of her argument) if we focus on the lie instead of the absurdity.

Imagine what the GOP would have done to her had she become the nominee on her experience argument. I can see Rove and his minions salivating at the mere idea: "Hillary sang songs with Sinbad. McCain was subjected to torture for five years. Who do you think suffered more for our country?"