Just when her opponent was stuck fast with one foot in the alternate universe of Pastor Jeremiah Wright, Ms. Clinton dialed up her own disaster. She told a story about how she landed in Bosnia during war and exited the plane under sniper fire. It was a good story, and she told it for the same reason that Michael Dukakis put on a helmet and climbed into a tank in 1988: she wanted to look Rambo-tough. The tank blew up on Dukakis, metaphorically speaking, because in the tank he looked just like Alfred E. Newman. Senator Clinton's story blew up on her because it was revealed to be a gross inexactitude, otherwise known as a big, fat, lie. What bothers me more than the mendacity is the lapse in judgment. She had to know that a lot of other people were on that plane with her, and that some of them (like the comedian Sinbad) aren't in her plane right now. What's more, there were cameras on that plane too.
Now I have some sympathy for Senator Clinton on this score. All fiction is probably heir to the embellished story: some cave man or woman told a tale and made it a little taller than the truth for the sake of dramatic effect. But it is one thing to embellish a story for the sake of laughs, or to more clearly illustrate a point. One of my favorite comic writers, David Sedaris, recently came under criticism for for telling comic stories about himself and his family that weren't exactly so. I am willing to allow Sedaris all the poetic license he needs. It's something else to fabricate a story about oneself in order to pad one's resume. Senator Clinton is a candidate for President, not a comedian (or at least, not intentionally).
Ms. Clinton's fat lie may be turn out to be the big one. Democrats have known for a long time what all the rest of us know: that the Clintons are incorrigible liars. They lie like birds chirp and frogs croak: by nature. They lie even when the truth would do about as well. Up until now, however, the party of the donkey has always felt it necessary to do everything in its power to protect the Clintons from the consequences of their mendacity. That spell may finally have been broken.
Kimberley Strassel, in the Wall Street Journal (and Real Clear Politics), has this:
Hillary Clinton's been all the news this week, after she "misspoke" about Whitewater, Travelgate, missing files, suspicious pardons, Johnny Chung and cattle futures. Oh wait, after she "misspoke" about Bosnia. Oh wait, same thing.
That's one way to make sense of the unrelenting, unforgiving, 24/7 news coverage of Mrs. Clinton's fictional telling of Bosnian sniper fire and the subsequent debunking of her every word. In a nasty primary battle that has already featured racial slurs and Chicago slum lords, missing tax documents, and a "monster," you might expect this slip-up to have been yet another blip in the media cycle.
But that would have been to deny the press, the pundits, Democrats, and even Barack Obama, the catharsis of finally -- finally! -- getting a chance to confront the Clintons' questionable mores. Hillary's and Bill's scandals have been the elephant in the primary room ever since she first signaled a run. Yet up to now everyone has been too scared, or too loyal, or too weary to touch the ugly past. Her Bosnia misspeak is now serving as proxy for all the truths about the Clintons' non-truths, allowing even liberals to break free from their Clinton dependence.
One can't imagine that the Democrats enjoyed being lied to all those years. Now, finally, they have a good reason to say "enough." The reason is that they need to get Ms. Clinton, who has almost as many delegates as Mr. Obama, and almost as many popular votes, off the darned stage.
The Democrats need closure, as Mr. Dean puts it. Dean is aiming for July, but that is a long way from now. As John McCain is already running for President, the Gargantua and Pantagruel of the Democratic Party are slugging away at each other with their fists, while struggling to extricate their feet from the stuff they stepped into. Dean needs to bring this show to a close as soon as possible. Patrick Leahy has urged Ms. Clinton to step down for the good of the party. Right.
The only way the Democrats get out of the mess they are in is for the super delegates to come together and, regardless of previous pledges, to throw their collective weight to Obama. That will probably happen eventually. It needs to happen tomorrow. It won't be any easier after Pennsylvania. Perhaps Ms. Strassel is right, and the Clintonian spell has finally been broken. But I wouldn't bet the funny farm on it. It looks like Ms. Clinton does have a firm grip on about half the Democratic electorate.
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