The story is still a tragedy, it's a real shame that stuff like this could happen in the U.S. today.

I think there are two problems here. I agree that the main point to focus on should be the health care crisis and how to fix it. I agree with another_reader in that respect. And I do think Hillary has been fighting for health care much of her adult life. Unfortunately I think she has been fighting badly, losing fights she ought to win. She should have won the democratic nomination--she had more name recognition, and a powerful machine going into the fight-- but like her fight for health care, her tactics were wrong. It's not enough to be a fighter, you have to be a winner. And Hillary, with her constant claims of victimization, is a loser.

Second, I do not think that Hillary has been vindicated by the story. She did not fact check it. She took a story she heard second hand on the trail, embellished it, and put it out there like truth in support of her key argument. It was reckless and irresponsible to use the story. It could have just as easily turned out to be wrong. The core problems with the story are unchanged by the fact that it might turn out to be more true than not. She didn't know it was true when she said it. She should have.

But she wasn't.

"I'll tell you a quick story that I heard in Ohio when I was campaigning there," she said. "A deputy sheriff told me about a young woman who worked at the pizza parlor there and she worked for minimum wage, she didn't have any insurance. [SHE HAD INSURANCE AT THE TIME SHE DIED] She got pregnant, went to the hospital — [NOPE, SHE WENT TO A CLINIC IN HER HOME TOWN] and I don't blame the hospital. The hospital said, 'We can't take any more charity care. You have to give us $100 before we can examine you.' She didn't have $100. Went back another time, they told her the same thing."[DOESN'T SOUND LIKE SHE WENT BACK AGAIN]

Sen. Clinton said the woman returned a third time [SHE DIDN'T RETURN TO O'BLENESS; IT WAS HER FIRST VISIT THERE] "in an ambulance. [MAYBE; THE STORY DOESN'T SAY] And they worked hard to stabilize her, and she lost her baby. Then they airlifted her to Columbus to the medical center, and for 15 days they tried to save her life, and she died."

I don't think Clinton should be pilloried for this, but it certainly seems like the story could have been properly vetted and told accurately and still been an effective story for Clinton to use to illustrate her point.

To the person who called Senator Clinton a progressive liberal, she's part of the DLC. Senator Clinton is not a progressive liberal.

I appreciate her work on Healthcare, but let's not give her credit she does not want.

Good grief. The ugliness, that is why so many of us fear the future general election. Pay more attention to Bob Somerby, never let the media go after one of ours even if you detest that person. The media will eventually have a go at your candidate and what will be your defense?

The real story actually undercuts her talking point that mandated insurance coverage is the same thing as universal healthcare.

The Deputy Sheriff that told Hillary the story, had no first hand knowledge of any of it, and did not even know the woman who died. He was passing on hearsay, and Hillary just ran with it.

Yes we need to fix the health care system, but we also need to deal in facts.

Was the woman turned away because she did not have a $100.00 or not. What is the truth.

If she did not go, because she assumed she would be turned away because she did not have a $100.00 then that is a far different thing. Is that what happened.

What is her family situation. Did she have other children. She was 35 years of age. Did she have a husband, or was there a father involved. Could she not get $100.00 from any family member or friend for a medical emergency.

Please flesh out the truth, instead of pretending that Hillary was spreading the gospel truth. She was not.
She was telling a bunch of hearsay from a person she never met before, and who did not have any first hand knowledge of what actually happened.

Hillary was very careless in how she choose to accept what a stranger told her, and just run with it.

What next, will she run with a story about a woman finding a finger in her chili at Wendys!

No, sorry. She wasn't vindicated. I don't think its a big deal (cause I hardly believe anything she says anyway) but there is absolutely a difference between being asked for $100 at an emergency room and refusing to go to an emergency room because someone might ask you for $100 dollars.

Sure, the AP thinks she's "partially vindicated" by this completely garbled version of the truth because they've been one of the leading abettors in the Bush Administration's eight year campaign to redefine what the word "truth" means.

The story waqs that the lady, God rest her and her child's souls, died for lack of insurance or a hundred bucks. The truth is that she did not die for lack of insurance and a hundred bucks. Period. Yes, at some point before she died, she she put off getting medical at a nearby clinic because she owed the clinic money from before she had insurance, but there's no actual evidence that that had anything to do with her death.

Seriously, people, this is not about Hillary or her story or any wish to cut her down. Everyone makes mistakes and she got a little sloppy (okay, it is about her a little bit, because it does appear to fit a pattern, but I digress). This is about the MSM.

At what point did the media's definition of "truth" become so flexible that a politician gets a "close enough" pass when the actual facts completely undermine the point of a politicians anecdote? Is this not part and parcel of the same kind of disregard for the difference between objective fact and a "something that some guy said to someone who knows someone I know" story that got them beating the WMD war drums in 2002?

If the Republic is to survive, one of the many things we have to do is roll back acceptance of truthiness as an acceptable substitute for truth, not internalize it just because our favored candidate can now benefit from it the same way the Republicans did.