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An emotional memory -- the truth behind Hillary's Bosnia recollections
I think Hillary was honestly relaying her emotional memories of the landing in Bosnia. I think she knew she was going into a dangerous area and was scared to death that something would go wrong. Years later in retrospect she remembered the internal feeling and not the external facts.
I also believe that she has never used this as a defense because she knows she would be labeled weak and too feminine and she is probably right. And that may be the root of the problem, not that the world would judge her for being emotional, but that in her heart of hearts, she agrees with them.
I do believe, however, that when the woman we will finally elect to be President of the United States runs for office, she will be able to finesse these issues in the same way Obama transcends race. When that woman runs; I will vote for her.
Comments (13)
Except that she recorded the right version of the Bosnia story in her book. So, you'd think she'd look back at what she wrote or rather had her ghost writer write. Sure, she might have been scared but to add sniper fire in her "emotional memory"? That's a little much. Kind of reminds me of James Frey and "A million little pieces".
April 19, 2008 1:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
what Hillary did relate accurately was the experience of Olympia Snowe, who flew into Bosnia the year before and was subject to hostile fire and whose plane did make evasive maneuvers. She just hijacked Snowe's experience. Which is a twisted psychological event that makes me far more uneasy than simple lying.
April 19, 2008 1:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think we often add facts to support our memories. That's why eyewitness accounts are so often faulty.
I wasn't there. I'm just suggesting that what she was afraid of was snipers and that is what she remembered when she gave the speech -- the memory of the fear. maybe all this will be more forgiveable when the primary is over. But she spend eight years as the first lady. Must be a bit scary considering how hated she felt she and her husband were.
And don't forget the ego -- the woman is the center of her own universe (as we all are, I suppose).
Still, mistakes are not the same as lies.
April 19, 2008 1:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
They are not mistakes, they are lies.
April 19, 2008 2:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, no, she was not repeating an "emotional memory." She was bullshitting. She's just a peanut who's trying to be somebody she's not: an experienced, competent, courageous public servant.
Hillary based her entire campaign on a chimera--her "experience"--and fortunately it's been subjected to enough public examination for her to stand revealed as a fraud and a bullshit artist.
Although Obama has pulled off a minor political miracle in defeating her, he really should have sent her packing a while ago. How anybody is not laughing at her candidacy at this point is beyond comprehension.
April 19, 2008 2:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, as noted above, she got the story right in written form. But when she stood in front of a bunch of uniforms, she began to confabulate. Interesting to wonder why that should be. Was she affected by the (imagined) testosterone in the room?
Worse, when the WaPo vaporized her bullshit story a day or so later, well after she had a chance to catch up on her sleep (remember, at one point she claimed that sleep seprivation was the cause of her lie) she returned with further embellishments. It's just like her to repeat, Rove-like, a lie hoping that the truth will get buried in the muck somehow, or hoping that having upped the ante so much, she will be cut some slack by the media.
Finally, she falsely says she has apologized about this, as if a simple apology, even if it had been made, could render the deep psychological flaws revealed harmless.
I usually hate to quote Dennis Miller, but lately he said something like: " When Hillary had just been born, took her first breath, and cried, it was a lie."
April 19, 2008 2:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
"I think Hillary was honestly relaying her emotional memories of the landing in Bosnia. I think she knew she was going into a dangerous area...."
Didn't she also take her daughter along on that little jaunt (sp?)? If so, what on earth kind of person is she to endanger her own child?
April 19, 2008 2:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Here is a portion of the transcript from the debate in Philadelphia.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/16/us/politics/16text-debate.html?pagewanted=9&_r=1
Here's Tom Rooney from Pittsburgh.
Q Senator, I was in your court until a couple of weeks ago. How do you reconcile the campaign of credibility that you have when you've made those comments about what happened getting off the plane in Bosnia, which totally misrepresented what really happened on that day? You really lost my vote. And what can you tell me to get that vote back?
SENATOR CLINTON: Well, Tom, I can tell you that I may be a lot of things, but I'm not dumb. And I wrote about going to Bosnia in my book in 2004. I laid it all out there. And you're right. On a couple of occasions in the last weeks I just said some things that weren't in keeping with what I knew to be the case and what I had written about in my book. And, you know, I'm embarrassed by it. I have apologized for it. I've said it was a mistake. And it is, I hope, something that you can look over, because clearly I am proud that I went to Bosnia. It was a war zone.
General Wesley Clark is here in the audience with me as one of my major supporters. He and I were talking about it before I came out. You know, our soldiers were there to try to police and keep the peace in a very dangerous area. They were totally in battle gear. There were concerns about the potential dangers. The former president of Bosnia has said that he was worried about the safety of the situation.
So I know that it is something that some people have said, "Wait a minute. What happened here?" But I have talked about this and written about it. And then, unfortunately, on a few occasions I was not as accurate as I have been in the past.
But I know too that, you know, being able to rely on my experience of having gone to Bosnia, gone to more than 80 countries, having represented the United States in so many different settings gives me a tremendous advantage going into this campaign, particularly against Senator McCain.
So I will either try to get more sleep, Tom, or, you know, have somebody who, you know, is there as a reminder to me. You know, you can go back for the past 15 months. We both have said things that, you know, turned out not to be accurate. You know, that happens when you're talking as much as we have talked.
But you know, I'm very sorry that I said it. And I have said that, you know, it just didn't jibe with what I had written about and knew to be the truth.
So, to recap, she says "I just said some things that weren't in keeping with what I knew to be the case..." also,
"...you know, it just didn't jibe with what I had written about and knew to be the truth".
April 19, 2008 3:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Didn't she also take her daughter along on that little jaunt (sp?)? If so, what on earth kind of person is she to endanger her own child?"
That was it for me. Once I heard that Chelsea was there I knew Hillary was lying. Has anyone watched the way she tells the story, laughingly, on St Patrick's Day?
April 19, 2008 9:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
You may be right. I don't think Sen. Clinton would lie when the truth was so accessible to the news media and her opponents. I'll bet she mixed emotion, the Snowe story and the actual events and came up with an emotionally true, but factually false result. I honestly don't believe she intentionally lied about Tuzla.
I am an Obama supporter, but I have long had an affection for Sen. Clinton. Before Iowa, I expected she would beat Obama handily and steadily secure the nomination. I thought Obama would make a good showing, establish a national reputation for himself and become well placed for 2012 or 2016. One of my biggest disappointments of this campaign has been some of Sen. Clinton's strategy failures and tactical missteps combined with her kitchen sink strategy. She has lost some of her luster.
I expect she will be back. She is an impressive politician and deserves great respect (just not the nomination.)
April 19, 2008 9:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree that Hillary is prone to hysteria, delusions, and fantasy-fueled misrememberings of things that only happened in her mind.
I'm sure that your well-reasoned analysis will convince everyone that she is the perfect candidate for Supreme Ruler of the United Realm of Fluffy Bunnies and Cute Puppies. Good job!
I already voted for her in my mind and she won in a landslide. The inauguation chariot was led by unicorns and Hillary looked as happy as I've ever seen her! All of the citizens threw glitter confetti and we all lived happily ever after.
April 19, 2008 10:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
What in my post made you think I would vote for her? Did you read the entire analysis or just assume because I don't see her as a one dimensional puppet that I support her?
I think being President is dangerous. I think being the President's family is dangerous and yet someone does it and many of them have had families. You make decisions every day, weigh the risks and still get out of bed.
I think Clinton has a tremendous ego with very capacity for introspection. Not an unusual combination, but not what I am hoping to vote for.
April 19, 2008 10:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
If the Lady says that she made a mistake, misspoke or whatever, I'll go with that. There are many things that she needs to be seriously taken to task for, but in my opinion, this is not one of them.
Mention it and then move on, kinda like Obama when he gave her the benifit of a doubt; then the brother moved on. Peace.
April 19, 2008 1:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
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