Very surprising that the so-called "progressives" on the issue would take the hospital's word as god.

Even when I don't agree with you, I respect you immensly for your ability to transcend petty disputes and to look at the bigger picture.  I think that is an honorable approach and I very much appreciate your trying to do that.

There's no formula for figuring out what the media best lies about (not even CDS does this); but it is clear to me their role in this process is completely destructive.  They are simply horrible.  People would be better off watching their color bars every second they spend watching the news.  Or limiting campaign coverage to CSPAN.  

Perhaps if campaigns were publicly financed the media would be a little less lascivious?  I don't know.  

"Universal healthcare is a moral imperative." -- Clinton

How is this not enough for you?  When did Clinton say that the hospital was "evil"?  Why are you blaming her for things she hasn't said?

Good God.

The woman is making a point about how our system --the whole thing, not one "evil" hospital--has failed us.  And yet you're so determined to find a flaw in the presentation that you slide right past the fact that the dead woman's aunt has publicly verified the story.  

By the time she got to a different hospital, it was too late to save her baby, and in the days that followed, her condition must have deteriorated such that she later died.

The tragedy is that people are so intimidated by the medical system that this woman made a decision that proved fatal.  

These kinds of things happen all the time.  All the time.

When Clinton related the story she had been told, she mentioned neither the woman's name, nor the names of amy of the medical insitutions that were involved.  She protected the privacy of the woman's family.  

Maybe it was never Clinton's intention to bring this family into the glare of the media spotlight, as much as she wanted to talk about health care and how it affects real people. You know, like us, like people who can't afford health insurance, or those who can't get health insurance because of pre-existing conditions.

Instead of focusing on the issues that face us, we have the media to contend with, aided by bloggers so blinded by their partisanship that they would accept the death of health care reform as damage collateral to the nomination of a particular candidate.  A candidate who does not seem all the interested in universal health care, who is still deceiving the voters about his health care plan, who shows signs of it just not being that high a priority.  If one of Obama's biggest cheerleaders is calling Hillary's plan DOA in the Congress, it does not bode well for any kind of reform.

What's next?  A KO special comment when Hillary says she had cereal for breakfast and it turns out she had an English muffin?  A Hardball clusterf**k when they find out that Hillary wore brown shoes with a black pantsuit?  And then denied it?  Oh, the horror!

The sad truth is that if Obama is the nominee, he will arrive on the threshold of the general election season with a media hungry to finally start to pick at his platform and policies - and even hungrier to rip him apart over the composite characters in his books, his relationship with Tony Rezko, his penchant for writing his own history to cast himself in the best possible light.

The Clinton Rules state that if any part of a story is proven true, the entire story is true. The corollary is that if any part of a story about a Republican is proved to be false then the entire story is false.

The point of the story is this: This is NOT a story.  It became one when the left blogosphere and the media turned it into one completely based on the fact that they hate Clinton to the point of literal insanity.

That the media and Obama surrogates, in their eagerness to finish Hillary's candidacy off wants to find anything that provides leverage to that end, the completely failed to recognize the story for what it was.

This is what an Obama nomination will do for Democrats...a candidate and main stream media continually failing to recognize the fact that this country is in deep trouble.

The rest is just about distracting us from this truth: a woman and a child died.

This is not about Obama, not about Clinton, because: a woman and a child died.

For lack of $100.  For fear of a creditor's letter.  That is what matters.  Will your candidate speak to it?  He should.  He could pick up this story, say it is true, and show real leadership.  

 Clinton relates an anecdote and the media and Obama blogs rush all over it.  Senator Obama says something less than forthright and the media and Clinton blogs rush all over it. Partisans on both sides line up and mete out punishments.  Memes are born, die, and are resurrected.  And out of the headlines, John "Nixon Part II" McCain and his political allies plan their strategy.  

 The public is not nearly as polarized.  I live in the Sacramento area, which is evenly split between the two, and even among discussions with friends nothing approaches the vitrol you find in the media and on the internet.  People here constantly bash Kos, but do you honestly believe this site is remotely objective?  And frankly, while I get MB's comments, the only appropriate response to this story is pretty much BTD's.  This is a nonissue, the details are not remotely important, she was discussing a tragic event that many people can identify with.  She did the same thing on Ellen today, discussing a health problem faced by a gay couple.  That's clearly her talking point.  At the same time, to listen to people on this site you would think that I and other Obama backers support Chris Matthews.  Jesus, the man voted for W in 2000.  Anyone with that lack of foresight can't criticize Senator Clinton on the war.

I will not endorse the tactics of the Obama campaign or the "hands-off" "wink, wink, nudge, nudge" tactics of the DNC with my vote. It will not happen.

The difference between these two candidates, as I see it, is that while Clinton may mis-remember something or be trusting enough of an Ohio deputy sheriff that she took him at his word, she at least is not gaslighting us on matters of policy.  She's not mischaracterizing her health care plan, she's not sending out surrogates to proclaim that his health care plan will be DOA in the Congress.  She's not speaking in right-wing talking points on Social Security.  She's not wiffling and waffling on the issues from day to day.  

And that for me is the real crux of all of this.  I can forgive her an anecdote that isn't microscopically precise in its details, because I know health care is a priority for her - she knows in her core that this is a priority for the millions of Americans who have no insurance, and the millions of others who still have sub-standard health care.  Obama has shown me nothing that suggests he has any interest or fight in him for this cause, and I find that disturbing.

It just strikes me that I don't think Obama supporters have any idea whether he believes in his message and is prepared to work his butt off for us, as much as he just wants to win, and so many of you have been taken over more by that need to win than you have by what it is you will get from him when and if he wins.  Bob Casey the other day could only lamely keep repeating the hope-and-change mantra.  Now, Bob Casey may be a Democrat of a sort, but I am not comforted that people whose views are decidedly not progressive or liberal believe they have found a kindred spirit in Barack Obama, because I see the liberal ideals that matter to me being sold out for the sake of some magical unity message.

Why worry that people die in our country every day for lack of adequate medical treatment so long as we can find some stupid, little nitpicking bit of incorrect or anecdotal information to hit Hillary Clinton over the head with? What is wrong with you people?

But why should that surprise me? You've made a campaign on smears and distortions in the guise of hope and change.

"Is this the kind of management you want in the White House?"

As opposed to Obama's blatant lies about Rezko, taking lobbyist and oil money, his "deep" ties to the Kennedy legacy, his funding a war he says he he was always against despite his words to the contrary.

But when you say here, BTD (as you have now done three times), that Clinton got it all right, you're mistaken, as your link to the WaPo story and the AP story both show. For one thing, she didn't lose her baby at the hospital that had turned her away. And that fact is where the original story emerged from when The New York Times wrote it up Saturday.

Now it can be argued - should be, in my view - that it's understandable how the details got a bit muddied in the retelling, but it cannot be argued that Clinton got everything right when she didn't. Her version distinctly implied that it was the same hospital which turned Bachtel away twice that, on the third visit, couldn't save her stillborn baby. Not so. And the insurance issue is more complicated than Clinton presented it.

I mean everyone seems to care about how this effects hillary, but no one is asking what hospital did this?

I mean if someone in your family got turned away for want of $100 wouldn't you at least ask what hospital did this?

I dunno am I the only one who would ask a family member this if it was my family? SOMEONE in her family has to know the hospital, and they should speak up, that Hospital needs to be taken to task on this, they need to be forced to defend this so everyone can see just how bad healthcare in this country is.

"The hospital said, `Well, you don't have insurance.' She said, `No, I don't.' They said, `Well, we can't see you until you give $100.' She said, `Where am I going to get $100?' "The next time she came back to the hospital, she came in an ambulance," Mrs. Clinton continued. "She was in distress. The doctors and the nurses worked on her and couldn't save the baby."

I believe that Clinton meant that the same hospital that the baby died was the one that turned the mother away twice.  (If you don't think she meant one hospital, get people unfamiliar with this issue to read the quote and ask them if they think Clinton meant one or two hospitals.  I bet a milkshake they say one.)

This was not the case, as stated by the sherriff in the video and by the hospital in question, and now I believe it is generally accepted that there were two hospitals.

I further suggested that, uncorrected, that error could have caused harm to the hospital, since its name was published and would likely be accused of turning a patient away when it had not done so.  Here BTD and I also disagreed, in that he believes that the hospital was in no danger of being outed so therefore could not have been implicated in any way by Clinton.

I also suggested that this matter is not insignificant, at least not to the particular hospital.

What is deletion-worthy about this?

Oh, I also said I was vindicated and I hoped that BTD would listen to Meteor Blades (who likes to get the facts straight and feels that Clinton didn't have them all correct).  However that seems excessively mild when compared to BTD's slam of me in a previous thread.  Why, he likened my thinking to that of a gasp Republican! and made several disparaging comments about my post.  I, on the other hand, have been quite polite, if a bit insistent as to my point.

All canidates have their little white lies, but that Bosnia thing, WOW.

She was in Bosnia. This has been covered quite well by standingup here.

Sen. Obama's healthcare plan and Sen. Clinton's are not the same. There are substantive differences, including mandates. Regardless, when Obama supporter Sen. John Kerry goes on TV and describes Sen. Clinton's healthcare plan as a "non-starter," I wonder why he is still a senator.

Yes, her campaign sucked. No question. Yet she's still there, kissing hands and shaking babies. But I would also argue that Sen. Obama's divide-and-conquer strategy has given him a short-term advantage that has already resulted in long-term damage.

The point is to win the general election, get a greater majorities in the House and Senate, and take Democrats into every elected office possible. That will be difficult without the support of core Democrats who find the Obama campaign's nasty habit of smearing of them, their candidate, and other Democrats as racist unacceptable.

Like with nuclear regulation.

Obama has exaggerated his legislative accomplishments on the campaign trail. He misspoke last December when he told Iowa voters that he had "passed" a nuclear notification bill. There are certainly legitimate questions to be asked about his dealings with senior Exelon executives, who have poured large sums of money into his campaign.

From the same article:

The revised bill never made it to the Senate floor in 2006, and was effectively shelved in last-minute partisan maneuvering. Obama re-introduced similarly worded legislation in October 2007, but it has not gone anywhere.

But it's great that you're calling all three presidential contenders out on this stuff. Holding them all equally to the same high standard is an important effort that we as voters require of our media, ourselves, and our fellow citizens.

You are calling all of them out, right?

"You" are not on the ballot, and yet you use the term "we" when claiming a majority.  That majority, by the way, is not among Democratic voters - Hillary has the majority there - and there are some of us who aren't interested in "adapting" to the views of Republicans and right-leaning independents who think Obama is of like mind with them.

I do not call Sen. Obama's supporters cultists or anything like it. Do not ascribe the words of others to me.

But now you say I should watch out? For what? The Rapture?

Sen. Obama is a politician. You can agree to that at least. Politicians lie. And distort. And fabricate. Even Sen. Obama. I offered evidence to that fact.

Your argument is that Sen. Clinton's Bosnia story meant she was not fit to be president. Did you read standingup's excellent post? Then-First Lady Hillary Clinton was in Bosnia, in a war zone, and there was a threat of sniper fire. These are facts.

Did she embellish her story on the campaign trail? Yep.

You believe this makes her unfit to be commander-in-chief. So if embellishment is your standard, then Sen. Obama is even more unfit for the office of the presidency.

You then imply that Sen. Clinton lied about Trina Bachtel. No, she didn't. Have you been reading any of BTD's excellent blogs on this?

You've also failed to cite any place where you have called out Sen. Obama or Sen. McCain on their lies, puffery, and other distortions. Please show me where you have applied your embellishment standard to any candidate.

I bet that the Rapture will come before you list any.

I have no opinion on this, other than that the contest isn't over yet---millions of people have yet to vote. Now, what is that saying about counting your chickens before they come home to roost?

Sara F, I have not called anyone such names. I have challenged your assertions. Your response is not to answer my questions or refute my argument, but to get upset at being called names.

Clinton supporters are called names all the time. No, that doesn't make it right. But are you calling people out to stop the schoolyard behavior on other websites?

All sort of people call Hillary Clinton all sorts of names. I'm sure you protested that. Just as you protested Randi Rhodes's performance.

confabulate:
1 : to talk informally : chat
2 : to hold a discussion : confer
3 : to fill in gaps in memory by fabrication

So, which definition are you going with? The third one? That's a far distance from confusing facts and fantasy. That is, according to Elizabth Loftus how memory works (as I recall---heh).

But if we're talking about confusing facts and fantasy, then wouldn't this apply to Sen. Obama's comments about Selma? Or the Kennedy connection to his father? Or dozens of other things he's said?

(And BTW, Sen. Clinton did get the facts in order in her book. But don't let that stand in your way.)

So by your silence on the other points, you seem to be saying that it's okay if Sen. Obama lies and Sen. McCain lies. And you haven't defended anyone else from the charges you throw around so carelessly.

So there is a double standard.