Two More Reactions To Hillary’s Bosnia Lies

The inimitable New York Post continues to take Mrs. Clinton to the woodshed.

First whack:

TALL TALE PLANE NUTS: PILOT

By CARL CAMPANILE

March 27, 2008 — The pilot who flew Hillary Rodham Clinton into Bosnia shot down her fairy tale of facing sniper fire during her visit there as first lady in 1996 - saying the trip was so safe that "not only were there no bullets flying around, there wasn’t a bumble bee flying around."

Col. William "Goose" Changose said in a radio interview that he was surprised by Clinton’s story and obliterated it.

Clinton had said the military plane used an "evasive maneuver" to escape detection, that there was no greeting ceremony on the tarmac in Tuzla, and that the visitors were told to run to cars for cover.

"Yeah, so, no evasive maneuver. OK?" Changose said on the Rusty Humphries radio show.

"I gotta tell ya, I will give it to the commander of Air Base Eagle. He had that place - you know, not only were there no bullets flying around, there wasn’t a bumble bee flying around," Changose said.

He said he noticed "tanks pointing all the way around the perimeter" with ground troops everywhere and fighter helicopters monitoring the area. Changose stressed he wouldn’t have landed the plane if there had been sniper fire.

"We wouldn’t have let her outside of the plane . . . We have contingencies for just in case of something like that . . . But the fact that we landed tells you that there’s nothing gonna happen. At least at that moment it was secure."

Second whack:

‘SHOOTER’ MARINE FUMES

By DAPHNE RETTER, Post Correspondent

March 27, 2008 — WASHINGTON - One of the Marines’ most-accomplished snipers took dead aim yesterday at Hillary Rodham Clinton’s claims of facing fire in Bosnia, saying she has dissed the real heroes.

"She doesn’t care about our service members - that’s the feeling that gives me," said retired Staff Sgt. Jack Coughlin, a 20-year Marine sniper who detailed his real-life drama in the powerful 2006 book, "Shooter: The Autobiography of the Top-Ranked Marine Sniper."

"This is not a verbal snafu. She is using us," he told The Post.

Coughlin, who once recorded 13 enemy "kills" in a single day during the Iraq war, said Clinton committed "the ultimate sin" by trumping up a frightening scenario for political gain.

"She puts it out there so she can say she’s been tested under fire - especially in the smug way she was talking about it," Coughlin said, referring to Clinton’s account of running across a military tarmac in Tuzla, Bosnia, while under sniper attack.

Clinton has said this week that she misspoke.

"So I made a mistake," she told reporters Tuesday in Pennsylvania, where she was campaigning before the state’s April 22 primary.

But Coughlin’s not buying it.

"She tried to punch her ticket in the ‘warrior club,’ like, ‘I’ve been there, done that, and I’ve got the T-shirt,’ " Coughlin said. "If you do it for political gain - that’s where you cross the line."

Now retired from the military, Coughlin recorded more than 60 "confirmed kills," and retains the record as the Marines’ top sniper, according to his book.

Coughlin said he found himself in the cross-hairs of enemy snipers "more times than I can count."

The former sniper said he finds Clinton’s memory lapse incomprehensible.

"That is something she would never forget - I still remember what gear I was using when I came under fire." …

"This has nothing to do with politics - this is just about right and wrong," Coughlin said.

"It seems like she’s just going to be thinking about ‘What makes me look better?’ not ‘What’s better for the country?’ "

And as the Marine says, this was no "verbal snafu."

In fact, Hillary first floated this lie as a stinging rebuke of Mr. Obama’s (highly accurate) claim that the FLOTUS’s foreign policy experience consisted of attending a few teas. (Which in the case of her Northern Ireland experience is literally true.)

Funny how the media continue to ignore that, and portray this as an innocent slip of the tongue.