Right at the end of February CTV claimed that the campaigns were attacking NAFTA but that Canada had been assured this was mostly campaign rhetoric. The Clinton campaign denied this as did the Obama campaign. Later, one news cycle before voting in Ohio, Texas, Vermont and Rhode Island, the Obama campaign was fingered as having reached out to reassure Canada about its campaign rhetoric, a charge we now know is false.

It turns out that the conservative Harper government created a sensationalized leak based on a memo which the government now admits innacurately characterizes events. In other words there were lies built upon untruths being circulated for the political gain of the Harper government who needed to downplay attacks on NAFTA. Consider how the Clinton campaign reacted to these claims from the Canadian right about both them and Obama.

Faced with accusations about the Clinton campaign which it knew were substantially false it chose to embrace similar accusations about the Obama campaign. They siezed the opportunity to insinuate that Obama wasn't the honest broker he claimed to be and this was just the start of things to come as he was properly vetted. Makes you wonder about the poor judgment shown by the Clinton campaign in going from "They are lying about us," to "They must be telling the truth about the other guy."

Failure to learn from experience is sad. When faced with a lie the Clinton campaign wanted to be true they bought it hook, line and sinker just like the angry right bought into every scurrilous accusation about the Clintons. Hillary Clinton may have a lot of washington experience, especially of being the target of unfound accusations and innuendo, but she seems to have learned little. In the end Clinton chose to let political expediency triumph over getting to the truth of the matter on important issues giving us yet another example of her poor judgement.