2008 Woodie Awards
Clinton campaign says she 'misspoke' of Bosnia trip
By: THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Issue date: 3/25/08 Section: Nation
WASHINGTON - Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign said she "misspoke" last week when she said she had landed under sniper fire during a trip she took as first lady to Bosnia in March 1996.
The Obama campaign suggested it was a deliberate exaggeration on Clinton's part.
Clinton often cites the goodwill trip she took with her daughter and several celebrities as a part of her foreign policy experience.
During a speech last Monday about Iraq, she said of the trip: "I remember landing under sniper fire. 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."
According to an AP story at the time, Clinton was placed under no extraordinary risks on that trip. One of her companions on it, comedian Sinbad, told The Washington Post he has no recollection either of the threat or reality of gunfire.
When asked yesterday about the New York senator's recent remarks on the trip, Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson pointed to Clinton's previous written account in her book, "Living History," in which she described a shortened welcoming ceremony at Tuzla Air Base, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Clinton wrote: "Due to reports of snipers in the hills around the airstrip, we were forced to cut short an event on the tarmac with local children, though we did have time to meet them and their teachers and to learn how hard they had worked during the war to continue classes in any safe spot they could find."
"That is what she wrote in her book," Wolfson said. "That is what she has said many, many times and on one occasion she misspoke."
The written account in Clinton's book contradicts the comments she made last Monday about the welcoming ceremony.
The Obama campaign suggested it was a deliberate exaggeration on Clinton's part.
Clinton often cites the goodwill trip she took with her daughter and several celebrities as a part of her foreign policy experience.
During a speech last Monday about Iraq, she said of the trip: "I remember landing under sniper fire. 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."
According to an AP story at the time, Clinton was placed under no extraordinary risks on that trip. One of her companions on it, comedian Sinbad, told The Washington Post he has no recollection either of the threat or reality of gunfire.
When asked yesterday about the New York senator's recent remarks on the trip, Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson pointed to Clinton's previous written account in her book, "Living History," in which she described a shortened welcoming ceremony at Tuzla Air Base, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Clinton wrote: "Due to reports of snipers in the hills around the airstrip, we were forced to cut short an event on the tarmac with local children, though we did have time to meet them and their teachers and to learn how hard they had worked during the war to continue classes in any safe spot they could find."
"That is what she wrote in her book," Wolfson said. "That is what she has said many, many times and on one occasion she misspoke."
The written account in Clinton's book contradicts the comments she made last Monday about the welcoming ceremony.
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Bob
posted 3/25/08 @ 11:26 AM EST
The CBS Evening News story broadcast last night that proves once and for all that Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton indeed continues to suffer from Partzheimer's (a. (Continued…)
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