Associated Press, March 25, 1996:

MARKOVICI, Bosnia-Herzegovina - Protected by sharpshooters, Hillary Rodham Clinton swooped into a military zone by Black Hawk helicopter Monday to deliver a personal "thank you, thank you, thank you" to U.S. troops.

"They're making a difference," the first lady said of the 18,500 Americans working as peacekeepers in Bosnia.

Mrs. Clinton became the first presidential spouse since Eleanor Roosevelt to make such an extensive trip into what can be considered a hostile area, though others have visited hot spots. . . .

But the highlight of her trip were visits to two fortified posts outside the U.S. base in Tuzla. Even President Clinton, restricted to the base by bad weather in January, did not see as much of this war-wracked region as Mrs. Clinton did Monday.

The troops seemed to appreciate it: cameras chirped like a thousand crickets as she chatted with mine-disposal experts, examined huge tanks and met a hero or two. Chelsea, 16, kept her usual low profile but remained constantly at her mother's side, posing for soldiers or talking softly with them.

Watching the first lady troop around in muted trench coat and pants, Sgt. Michael Tucker of Miami said, "She's a very important person. For her to take time to come and see us means a lot."

Another contemporaneous account:

At a second outpost, Camp Bedrock, Mrs. Clinton visited a M.A.S.H. unit, the only full-service U.S. Army hospital in Bosnia. The three-hour tour of the frontlines of the international peacekeeping mission were filled with the gritty reality of a military operation, a far cry from traditional first lady photo opportunities, and Mrs. Clinton seemed more than comfortable with that. CNN, 3/25/96

Let me make another important point.  Being in an airlpane under sniper fire, or under the threat of sniper fire, is not the same as standing on the ground being shot at.  If snipers did fire at a plane, nobody would know unless they were hit.

In a combat zone, especially in modern combat, being "under sniper fire" is more a condition than an event.  Snipers, for example in the hills surrounding a U.S. base, will take 2-3 quick potshots, then scurry for cover before the choppers arrive and fire rockets at them.  However, until officers on the scene can become confident that the threat has been eliminated or has dissipated, the area that was taken under fire will be considered to be under the threat of sniper fire pretty much on a continuing basis.  Shorthand for that is just to say that the area is "under sniper fire."  It's a very common condition in combat zones.  It's not Condition Red Alert DANGER DANGER, but it's a condition for caution: people travelling on foot will avoid open areas and hurry through them when they can't be avoided, airplanes landing will use steep or stealthy approaches, etc., and most assuredly arriving dignitaries will take precautions.

Clinton never said she had bullets whizzing past her ears, she said they were under sniper fire while landing, which is perfectly consistent with her having been informed on the plane that the plane was "under sniper fire," which could simply mean that the plane was landing in an area that had not been called clear since the last time snipers fired on it.  Especially with a dignitary travelling like that, the rule would be to assume danger and take precautions first unless there is absolute assurance of safety.

As a civilian, I imagine her heart was racing a bit over the fairly normal precautions.  Based on what I know and describe below about human memory, her memory of the excitement over 10 years later is more likely to be inaccurate and exaggerated than to be accurate.

On Michael Dobbs

By the way, here are some blast from the past horseshit "fact checks from conservative "Fact Checker" Michael Dobbs:

For the Massachusetts senator's critics, who include three of the five Swift boat skippers who were present that day, the incident demonstrates why Kerry does not deserve to be commander in chief. They accuse him of cowardice, hogging the limelight and lying. Far from displaying coolness under fire, they say, Kerry was never fired upon and fled the scene at the moment of maximum danger.

Establishing the facts is complicated not merely by fading memories and sometimes ambiguous archival evidence, but also by the bitterly partisan nature of the presidential campaign.

An investigation by The Washington Post into what happened that day suggests that both sides have withheld information from the public record and provided an incomplete, and sometimes inaccurate, picture of what took place. But although Kerry's accusers have succeeded in raising doubts about his war record, they have failed to come up with sufficient evidence to prove him a liar.

Anybody who knows anything about the real story behind the Swift Boat Liars and Kerry's medals knows how very very very very very very far this version comes from capturing the truth of what happened.  What Dobbs conveniently leaves out is that each of Kerry's principal accusers was proven to be a liar, and that the entire enterprise was initiated by a decades-old enemy of Kerry's who had actually been ordered by Nixon to take Kerry down.

Or how about this award-winner?

The former vice-president has won plaudits around the world for his work on global warming, publicized in a best-selling book, an Oscar-winning movie, Power Point lectures, and now the Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel prize announcement coincided with the conclusion of a months-long court case in Britain examining whether An Inconvenient Truth can be shown to British school children. The judge ruled this week that the movie can be shown in classrooms, but only if accompanied by teacher guidance notes balancing Gore's "one-sided views."

After listening to government witnesses, environmental campaigners, and skeptics on global warming argue their case, the judge described Gore's film as "broadly accurate" in its presentation of climate change. At the same time he also listed nine significant errors in the movie which, he said, reflected a general context of "alarmism and exaggeration" surrounding climate change.

Obviously, it is impossible to adjudicate this argument with a quick post. But it is worth while at least taking a look at the judge's nine objections to the Gore movie, which are as follows:

1. Burton found that Gore's assertion of a rapid rise in sea-levels caused by the melting of icecaps in Antarctica was overly "alarmist."

2. Gore claimed that the disappearance of year-round snow from the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa was expressly attributable to global warming. The court was not convinced. According to Burton, the scientific "consensus" is that the reasons for the snow recession on Kilimanjaro cannot be established.
   
3. Gore cited a scientific study showing that polar bears had drowned by "swimming long distances--up to 60 miles--to find the ice." Evidence backing up this claim was not produced to the British court. The judge wrote that the only scientific study shown to him indicated "that four polar bears have recently been found drowned because of a storm." See early news story on bear drownings here.
   
4. Gore attributed the Hurricane Katrina devastation to global warming. The judge found that there was "insufficient evidence to show that."
   
5. The Gore movie depicted the drying up of Lake Chad as a prime example of the effects of global warming. Expert testimony in front of the British court suggested that "far more likely causes" were "population increase, over-grazing, and regional climate variability."
   
6. Gore suggested an "exact fit" between the rise in carbon dioxide levels and the rise in temperatures over a period of 650,000 years. According to the judge, scientists generally agree that there is "a connection," between the two phenomena, but claims of an "exact fit" cannot be established.
   
7. An "Inconvenient Truth" claimed that citizens of some low-lying inhabited Pacific atolls "have all had to evacuate to New Zealand" because of the inundation of their islands caused by global warming. The judge said that he found no evidence of "any such evacuation having yet happened."
   
8. The movie suggested that global warming could shut down "the Ocean Conveyer," a process by which the Gulf Stream is carried over the North Atlantic to Western Europe. The judge cited a study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the co-winner of the Nobel Peace prize, which concluded that it was "very unlikely" that the Ocean Conveyer would be shut down completely, although it might slow down.
   
9. Gore argued that coral reefs all over the world were bleaching because of global warming and other factors. The judge cited the IPCC view that it was difficult to separate the impact of stresses on coral reefs caused by climate change "from other stresses such as over-fishing and pollution."

Both sides claimed a victory of sorts after the verdict was delivered. The man who brought the case, Stewart Dimmock, said he was "elated" with the result, but disappointed that the film could still be shown in schools. He said that the judge's order for balancing material to be included with the movie would keep British school children from being "indoctrinated with this political spin."

A Gore spokeswoman said that the former vice-president was "gratified" that the court had agreed with "the central thesis of the film--that global warming is real and caused by human activities." She noted that the judge had only disagreed with a handful of the "thousands" of facts in the movie.

The Pinocchio Test
It is way too early for a Pinocchio ruling on this one.

Take a look at those nine "facts." They didn't need debunking. They fall on their own--unless it's Michael Dobbs doing the "fact checking."

And another:

The data provided by Gen. Petraeus on sharply declining Iraqi casualty rates is certainly open to analysis, debate, and challenge. We plan to take a closer look at them in a future post. However, MoveOn.org does not provide adequate factual support for its larger assertion that Petraeus is "constantly at war with the facts" and is "cooking the books" for the White House. In the absence of fresh evidence, we award MoveOn.org three Pinocchios.

Our hero.

What's It All About?  Alfie?

Coincidentally enough, I once handled a number of matters for the Dalkon Shield Claimants Trust.  In each case, an issue was whether a Dalkon Shield user's recollection of events that occurred 10-25 years ago was accurate.  In connection with the litigation, I worked with memory experts and did some fairly extensive research on long-term memory in humans.

Here's the word: your memory of long-term events would have to improve dramatically to reach the threshold of "pitiful."  Most of it we forget and the part we remember is extremely unreliable.  Our memories of past events become mixed-up with things that have occurred since, especially things that become associated with those memories.  Example: you're thinking about some long-ago event with the TV on, and then a commercial for some brand of coffee comes on.  Two years from now, when you think about that event again, you think you were drinking that brand of coffee when the event happened.  A similar (fictional) example:

Hillary (at a party a couple of years after the event): When we landed at Bosnia we were told that the area was under sniper fire, and they made us sit on our bullet-proof vests while the plane came in for a steep landing.

Unknown Reveller: Wow, I'll bet the Secret Service hated that.  I can just picture them making you sprint to your limo after you landed.

Hillary, ten years later, giving her best recollection: We landed under sniper fire and the Secret Service made us run to our cars.

That's the way human memory works.

Now, I can hear you out there: hey, you're being inconsistent.  Are you claiming that it really happened the way she said it happened--or are you claiming that it was an ordinary lapse in human memory?

I'm claiming both--and neither.  Because what I'm really claiming, and folks it's not just a claim, it's a statement of fact, is that we don't know.  Take it from an experienced litigator who has learned not to trust one-sided accounts, here is far too little information available to conclude that what she said happened didn't happen--but even if it didn't, it's just ignorance of the nature of memory that would lead to the conclusion that she is intentionally lying.  Really, there's no reason to conclude that at all: unless you're one of those folks that starts with the assumption that whatever she says is a lie, in which case i've got nothin' for ya.

The real moral of this story is not that Hillary Clinton is a Monster Who Will Say Anything To Win--it's that Obama has so little positive to say that his campaign is reduced to nit-picking his opponent's statements, even hiring a top-notched litigator, Greg Craig, who is basically conducting the public relations portion of this campaign as a litigator.  There's a lot to be said for litigation in a pinch, but one of these things is most assuredly not that it's the best way to determine truth.