{"id":226908,"date":"2016-02-21T23:56:58","date_gmt":"2016-02-21T23:56:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/clintons-experience-fact-and-fantasy\/"},"modified":"2016-02-21T23:56:58","modified_gmt":"2016-02-21T23:56:58","slug":"clintons-experience-fact-and-fantasy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/clintons-experience-fact-and-fantasy\/","title":{"rendered":"Clinton\u2019s Experience: Fact and Fantasy"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"\">By Barbara Koeppel (First published on April 15, 2008)<\/p>\n<p>The problem for presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is how to stop kicking herself in the leg. Although she\u2019s scored real achievements over the years, when repeating her 35-years-of-experience mantra, she pushes the facts too far.<\/p>\n<p>By now, her gaffes on Tuzla, Bosnia, where her claims of \u201clanding under sniper fire\u201d and \u201crunning for cover\u201d are well-known. Ditto her lines on Northern Ireland \u2013 where Nobel Peace Prize winner Lord Trimble of Lisnagarvey, Ireland, said she was \u201ca wee bit silly\u201d for exaggerating the part she played in bringing peace.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_17296\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" readability=\"32\"><a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c.jpg?82332e\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-17296\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-17296\" src=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/lazy-load\/images\/1x1.trans.gif?82332e\" data-lazy-src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-300x190.jpg\" alt=\"Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.\" width=\"300\" height=\"190\" srcset=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-300x190.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-768x486.jpg 768w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-1028x650.jpg 1028w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-560x354.jpg 560w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c.jpg 1599w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-17296\" src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-300x190.jpg\" alt=\"Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.\" width=\"300\" height=\"190\" srcset=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-300x190.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-768x486.jpg 768w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-1028x650.jpg 1028w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c-560x354.jpg 560w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/hillary-clinton-8b5ba9f07cc0fdc9153e423d8064882c.jpg 1599w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>But if we reality-check some other claims, what <em>can <\/em>we say of her 35 years, on which she hopes to distinguish herself from Sen. Barack Obama, who has actually logged more years in elected posts, counting his years in the Illinois legislature?<\/p>\n<p>To start with, for 14 of the 35 years that she\u2019s counting, Clinton was a full-time corporate litigator in Little Rock, Arkansas, at the Rose Law Firm. Further, for her White House years \u2013 aside from her work as chair of the President\u2019s Task Force on Health Care Reform \u2013 she served as First Lady, not policy maker.<\/p>\n<p>While First Lady in Arkansas, she did, as she claims, help \u201ctransform the education system.\u201d Teachers and others there agree that, as chair of a commission to re-write Arkansas\u2019 deplorable education standards, she was effective. Among other things, the new norms raised teacher salaries and amounts spent per pupil, and reduced class size.<\/p>\n<p>Since Arkansas ranked 49th out of America\u2019s 50 states in most educational measurements, and dead last in the percent of students who went on to college, the base was so low that any gains would be good. But it\u2019s a fact the numbers improved.<\/p>\n<p>Add to the fact column her work on child welfare boards, like the Children\u2019s Defense Fund and the Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Dubious Claims<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Other claims, however, are downright dubious, if not terminal twaddle. Let\u2019s start with her now-impassioned concerns for workers\u2019 rights. This is surely an eyebrow-raiser, since her record on labor issues is&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2016\/02\/21\/clintons-experience-fact-and-fantasy\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Barbara Koeppel (First published on April 15, 2008) The problem for presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is how to stop kicking herself in the leg. Although she\u2019s scored real achievements over the years, when repeating her 35-years-of-experience mantra, she pushes the facts too far. By now, her gaffes on Tuzla, Bosnia, where her claims of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-226908","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=226908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226908\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=226908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=226908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=226908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}