April 13, 2008

Clinton A Varmint Hunter Too, Who Knew?

Like Romney, Clinton brings up hunting in last ditch drive to save fading campaign

Hillary Clinton is a hunter. Who Knew? Grasping for straws as her campaign tries to come up with anything to appeal to voters in Indiana, Clinton came up with a whopper on Saturday.

Clinton described herself as a pro-gun churchgoer, recalling that her father taught her how to shoot a gun when she was a young girl and said that her faith "is the faith of my parents and my grandparents."

"You know, my dad took me out behind the cottage that my grandfather built on a little lake called Lake Winola outside of Scranton and taught me how to shoot when I was a little girl," she said.

"You know, some people now continue to teach their children and their grandchildren. It's part of culture. It's part of a way of life. People enjoy hunting and shooting because it's an important part of who they are."

UPDATE: 9:32 am AKDT - On Sunday's "Meet the Press," Vice President Dick Cheney said that a hunting contest between him and the New York senator was "the only way" to determine whether Hillary Clinton's hunting tales were real.

"To be frank, Hillary Clinton's stories about her adventures with guns don't exactly pass the smell test," the vice president told host Tim Russert. "If she really wants to show that she knows how to handle a rifle, there's an easy way to do that: meet me in the woods."

Hillary backtracks - fast

On Sunday morning after hearing of Cheney's challenge, Clinton is now claiming that she had "misspoke" about her hunting exploits as a child.

"I fired a gun once, but I didn't like it, and I didn't recoil," she said.

Romney's varmint hunting gaffe

Mitt Romney's presidential campaign was dogged by a statement he made in April of 2007, "I purchased a gun when I was a young man. I've been a hunter pretty much all my life."

Turns out he only went hunting a handful of times.

"I'm not a big-game hunter. I've made that very clear," he said. "I've always been a rodent and rabbit hunter. Small varmints, if you will. I began when I was 15 or so and I have hunted those kinds of varmints since then. More than two times."