Trailhead: A campaign blog.

Paging Sheryl Crow

Everyone has weighed in on Hillary Clinton’s fantastic voyage to Bosnia—Sinbad, Clinton’s former speechwriter, military men, and reporters who were there at the time. Everyone! Except, that is, for Sheryl Crow.

Crow, who accompanied Hillary, Chelsea, and Sinbad on their trip in 1996, has kept mum on the subject. Repeated e-mails to her publicist, Dave Tomberlin, yielded this response: “We're not going to take part in this circus ... our focus is on her music right now.”

Probably a smart move. Unlike Sinbad, Crow’s career survived the '90s. She doesn’t exactly need the publicity. Hillary, on the other hand, could use a little help here.

Sinbad Was Right!

Yesterday marked possibly our favorite chapter in possibly our favorite subplot of the 2008 election—the controversy over Hillary Clinton’s 1996 trip to Bosnia. Clinton’s story, in which she describes being hustled off the tarmac because of warnings of sniper fire, had already been pecked to death. The Washington Post’s indispensable “Fact Checker” ripped her version apart, as did Sinbad, who was along for the ride. (I love how news stories identify him as “the comedian Sinbad,” as if to differentiate him from all the other Sinbads out there.)

But yesterday the Jed Report issued the coup de grace, with a mashed-together faux trailer of the hypothetical film “Hillary in Tuzla.” The juxtaposition of Clinton saying "we were basically told to run to our cars" with video of an unhurried greeting ceremony on the runway is fairly withering. If that’s not enough to get Clinton to stop telling her now-thoroughly debunked version of the story, I’m not sure what will.

Update 1:14 p.m.: In a noontime conference call, Howard Wolfson read from "contemporaneous accounts" of Clinton's trip, which confirmed the gist of her story, that Bosnia was a dangerous place at the time. But he doesn't dispute the challenge to her specific anecdote about running off the tarmac: "It is possible in most recent instance she discussed this that she misspoke with regard to the exit from the plane," he said.

Sinbad Blows the Whistle

When Barack Obama characterized Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy experience as “having tea” with diplomats, Clinton fired back with anecdotes about a trip she took to wartime Bosnia in 1996. “Somebody said there might be sniper fire," she said, describing a dangerous corkscrew landing her plane had to make. "I don't remember anyone offering me tea on the tarmac.” But now that account is being disputed. By Sinbad.

Turns out the comedian, who was along for the ride with Sheryl Crow, remembers things differently, the Washington Post reports. "I never felt that I was in a dangerous position,” Sinbad said. “I never felt being in a sense of peril, or 'Oh, God, I hope I'm going to be OK when I get out of this helicopter or when I get out of this tank.' "

He also disputed Clinton’s claim that first ladies get sent to all the poorest and most dangerous countries. “What kind of president would say, ‘Hey, man, I can't go 'cause I might get shot so I'm going to send my wife ... Oh, and take a guitar player and a comedian with you.’ ” The ridicule goes on. (Keep in mind that Sinbad is a fervent Obama fan.)

Clinton spokesman Phil Singer came back with this quip: “It appears that Sinbad's experience in Bosnia goes back further than Senator Obama's does. In fact, has Senator Obama ever been to Bosnia?” Good question—perhaps Pauly Shore could tag along?

Needless to say, it's kind of rough to become the punch line of a joke by a man who is himself a walking punch line. I guess we’ll need Sheryl Crow to break the tie.