On Thanksgiving! Whoa. I hope this is true. It sure sounds like the old inconsiderate, self-centered Clintonian behavior:
U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton forced U.S. troops stationed at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan to wait for their Thanksgiving dinner last Thursday while she and her entourage arrived late, then cut in line and were served first.
Spread this tale far and wide, O my brothers … .
(Via Stone.)
(Stone also had a link to this astounding story, from Not Pretty, The Unkindness and Kindness of Strangers. It’s got nothing to do with Hillary, but damn. Hair-raising. Go read it.)
Looks like typical NewsMax gossip.
1. Source is unnamed, but then, what else is new?
2. E-mail sent to GIs, as quoted, mentions no names of Senators or Congressmen, so did any of them know that HRC was coming? In any case, the International Herald Tribune flatly contradicts the NewsMax account on several points, including the number of soldiers who dined with HRC and their reactions.
3. Statment that dinner started at 3 PM is contradicted by assertion that HRC et al “bumped everyone in line” at 3:30. Vague “1-hour wait” could simply mean the 1 hour between when line started forming and HRC et al showed up. An entourage large enough to lengthen line by 1 hour seems unlikely, to put it mildly. Especially since the stated number of soldiers present is 20 in the IHT story. And why were they late? Well, according to this, they’d just met “with U.S. forces involved in Operation Mountain Resolve, a special anti-terrorism effort being conducted in recent weeks in Nuristan and Kunar, two eastern provinces bordering Pakistan. The Senators also received a briefing from their host, Brigadier General Lloyd Austin, Commander of the 10th Mountain Division/CJTF 180.”
4. I did find one possible truthful element in the story. The Honolulu Advertiser says 7,500 soldiers from the 10th Mountain are in Afghanistan. If half of those are at Bagram AFB and the number of New Yorkers in the division is proportionate to their number in the American population, then at least 250 could have dined with HRC. That only 20 did so may indeed indicate that they are less than fond of her. But it could equally indicate that her trip was planned that way, so that all the NY troops who dined with her would actually get some face time.
5. Oh, and a search at the People magazine website finds nothing about the visit.
I wouldn’t spread this “story” around. The facts are too easy to check.
(To end on a lighter note, I learned some fun facts while grazing; the 10th Mountain invented the snowmobile; and in GlobalSecurity.org, I found: “Veterans of the 10th Mountain Division were in a large part responsible for the development of skiing into a big name sport and popular vacation industry after World War II. Ex-soldiers from the 10th laid out ski hills, built ski lodges, designed ski lifts and improved ski equipment. They started ski magazines and opened ski schools. Vail, Aspen, Sugarbush, Crystal Mountain, and Whiteface Mountain are but a few of the ski resorts built by 10th Mountain veterans.”)
stop being so friggin catty. Pols do that sort of thing (as do celebs) when they “entertain” or visit—do you think Bush is aboive and/or beyond this stuff?