Hillary Rodham Clinton, fabulist

It seems that even the life of a former first lady and current senator isn't sufficiently adventurous to fully satisfy, so Hillary is taking her turn at creating history from whole cloth, trimming the truth, and inflating her role beyond the limits of recognition… and reality.

According to HRC, "If a place was too dangerous, too poor or too small, send the first lady," became the operating standard of Bill Clinton's White House. This became the justification for the life-threatening "corkscrew" approach to landing in Bosnia and the sprint across the runway to avoid snipers. If so, the she was accompanied on the sprint not only by her Secret Service entourage, but also her 15-year old daughter, Chelsea, as well as the comedian Sinbad and country singer Sheryl Crow, USO performers who were part of the visit contingent.

Then there's "I have known Benazir Bhutto for a dozen years… I knew her as a leader… I knew her as someone who is willing to take risks…" Hillary Clinton knew Bhutto the way I know Henry Kissinger. HRC bumped into Benazir Bhutto in a reception line once and listened to her speak once. That's it.

And more. She speaks of involvement in every major decision made by Bill, but it's involvement that others never saw. She remembers strong-arming foreign leaders to bend to America's will, a vision we never saw. She remembers being the foreign face of the U. S., a perspective with which Secretary Albright does not agree.

Of course, fabulism is inevitable when "experience" means "front row seat," as it does in Hillaryspeak.

Of course, there are limits to the value of that sort of experience. Ask any high roller sitting in a game floor seat at an NBA game why he (or she) is sitting rather than playing.

Hillary Clinton, the heroine of the nineties.