I hate to say this, but attacks don't stick unless there's a grain of truth in the audience's mind. If people think Clinton's a liar, it won't be just because of this story. Rather, it's something that's built up since her Bosnia claims. NYT definitely needs to get the story right and put it in big letters for all to see, but it probably won't change the narrative very much in the end.

I have generally steered away from "Blame the Media" arguments. They have an inherent odor of tactical calculation, or worse - whining.

However, there are exceptions to every rule. As in so many other things, the Clintons are that exception. The only public figure I can directly recall being similarly treated is Nixon - and he at least had the excuse of being as openly and directly hostile to most of the media of his day as they were to him.

Why does this pathology exist? A few speculations:

(1)Using the Nixon template with Bill Clinton, we have 2 imperfect personalities with truly brilliant intellectual and policy gifts: Men who (whatever their faults) knew their business cold, and actually made important things HAPPEN. Men who didn't much need the media (or any one else, really) to advise them how to go about things.

Press people in general like to feel a little smarter than the people they cover. Nixon and Clinton sorely tested that illusion, in a way that most other modern Presidents have not.

(2)With Bill Clinton (and Hillary, by association) we have an additional, age-old malady: pure, green, high-school JEALOUSY.

I've seen this first-hand recently at a Bill Clinton campaign event. Like it or not he is a true SUPERSTAR in every modern sense of that modern word: Nothing or nobody around him gets any attention when he's on the scene. All the earnest little fellows in the back with their cameras and microphones might as well have been lamp-posts. It's not hard to imagine how that feels to driven, ambitious types, talented in their own right. More than a few are certainly class presidents, BMOC's, scholars of note, people of the sort of mild fame that you might otherwise recognize them on a busy street To be reduced to the status of just another bystander, a prop in the circus that is any Clinton event, is hard for a certain type of personality to take.

The actual story is not one about a broken healthcare system. Clinton got it wrong. There are factual elements in her story, but she still got it wrong.

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 Wendy's!

It is time for many of us to apologize.

I criticized this incident as another demonstration of the incompetence of the Clinton campaign staff. With the additional information that has now come to light, I don't think criticism at that level was fair. I also said there was a risk of undermining legitimate criticism of the healthcare system by using an example that turned out not to be factual. Well, there's more information now and the weight of it backs what I consider the most salient aspects of Hillary's story.

Hillary's story was in essence true. The story came to Hillary firsthand from a credible source. That doesn't mean she insisted on seeing affidavits sworn by everyone involved, but that is not a reasonable standard for a candidate on the stump.

Hillary was talking about a failed healthcare system. A system that leaves people with medical bills they can't pay, for care they must have, fails in many ways. One of them is discouraging people from seeking care. That has harmful, sometimes life-threatening, effects. This is true even if by law people are entitled to emergency treatment. It is also true in this particular instance even if one hospital appears to have provided treatment for this poor woman without insisting on payment up front. It would be true even if delayed care didn't cause the woman's death. We know enough to admit that the facts do not justify accusing Hillary of fabricating a story for political purposes.

The NY Times owes Hillary an apology, too. It was their reporting, together with a real hospital's asking Hillary to stop telling an inaccurate story, that led many of us to jump to conclusions. We can say in our defense that we didn't pull our criticisms from thin air. Nevertheless, we were wrong.

We can also keep looking for factual deviations in Hillary's retelling of this story from a full and accurate narrative that may emerge. But trying to pick holes in the story to find some justification for continuing to fault Hillary is the wrong thing to do.

The right thing is to admit that we owe Hillary an apology. This is mine.

O'Bleness Memorial Hospital in Athens OH started out in 1921 as a maternity hospital and it's still a major part of their business. There is no hospital in Meigs County where Bechtel lives though there are two medical clinics, one run by O'Bleness and one by Holzer Hospital Foundation. Kornblut doesn't seem to get these facts right. Holzer sued and got a judgment against Bechtel in 2002 for $4000+ in unpaid, uninsured medical bills which was paid off in 2005.

Bechtel was insured at the time of her death and worked as a Pizza Hut manager, probably for more than minimum wage but probably not a whole lot more if she was on salary when the hours such a job requires due to high turnover among minimum wage employees are factored in. It's not surprising to see chain restaurant managers working 70 hour weeks sometimes when they're shortstaffed. She might have been putting in extra hours to earn herself some days off or cash she'd need for the baby.

It's quite possible in light of her previous healthcare financial nightmare and long hours Bechtel wasn't keen about taking the time off or and thought having her medical/legal/financial records humiliatingly brought up in the waiting room was a hurdle she didn't want to jump to seek medical attention at the one clinic in town she'd dealt with. A lot of people don't go to the doctor, not recognizing or trying to wish serious medical problems away especially when the diagnosis might disrupt their life, the time off might cost them their job, or might result in medical bills their less than comprehensive coverage won't pay for.

It's a very sad case but if Clinton had learned the facts and told it that way instead of slandering O'Bleness Hillary still could have used the story to make the case for a better healthcare system where the profit motive isn't sancrosanct.

I doubt there's anyone in the area who hadn't heard the barebones of this story as it was reported in the local media long before the OH primary. Since then Hillary - who won SE OH overwhelmingly and has credibility there - gave a wrong account of it her stamp of approval as part of her standard stump speech all over the country.

It put the O'Bleness people in a terrible position: watching a major political candidate erroneously damage their reputation and their business, possibly fatally. Of course they had to speak out and correct the record.

Athens is a small town, Middleport where Bechtel is from even smaller. There aren't enough doctors or medical facilities to go around in rural America as it is. If she'd been talking about a hospital in a major city like New York where there dozens of such places and occurrences the supposed offenders might not have been identified.

If Hillary had repeated this story for another month or two it might have driven O'Bleness out of business. That would have left a hole in SE OH's health infrastructure, made these small towns even less viable, and getting healthcare for local people that much more of an onerous experience.

In short she screwed up and erroneously and intentionally tarred a hospital with negligence.

It's a fact that Obama pays people to "work the web." I keep asking around how much you guys get paid to try to damage.

Really? They've never offered me any.

How do you get on the gravy train and get some of that sweet Obama money?

I think it is definitely wrong to accuse Clinton of lying in this case.

But Clinton damaged the health care debate with this. Because of her and her staff's incompetence, this is now the strawman that can be used against her--and Obama--by the right. If she had only stuck to a true anecdote, we would not be in this situation.

She got pretty much all of the facts of the case wrong, starting from Bechtel being an uninsured minimum-wage earner to what actually happened and whose responsibility it is.

First off, you are nowhere near the writer that Hunter S. Thompson is.

Second, I get it, you like Hillary, and I have read where you rail against the mean spirited attacks of Obama supporters. Just for clarification, did you really wish someone could be reincarnated as a woman so they could feel what it is like to loose a child? I believe the phrase you used is "and I hope you feel your guts implode". Nice, classy discourse.

After reading all accounts provided, it seems like Hillary got it about 60% right, which means she was also 40% off. This does not mean healthcare is not a problem, or that I do not have sympathy for the woman and child, it does mean that hillary has a problem getting all the facts out there correctly. This seems to be a recurring problem with her (as listed numerous times), and one that she does not seem too concerned about.

I guess my question to you would be, what is your objective, because I do not think this type of over the top outrage and complaining is going to bring anyone over to the hillary camp. Just for the record, I hope your guts never implode and you live a healthy happy life.

First off:

I feel very bad for the woman and the baby. I have a 2 1/2 year old boy at home, I can't imagine losing a baby, or my wife.

Second:

I think we can ALL agree the NYT sucks. From "Obama a bit drug user" to "McCain had an affair with lobbyist" to this Clinton hack job, it's obvious the NYT is more interested in selling papers then doing any kind of real journalism.

I'm an Obama supporter, I think that his plans to reform health care are more realistic than Hillary's and have a better chance of passing.

And in the end, that's what matters. We must improve the health care system, and we can't afford another Clinton failure.

Also, the OP assumes that all cops always tell the truth and don't ever stretch it.

Boy - are you naive.

From ABC News:

First, years ago, Bachtel was told she needed to pay $100 before she would be seen by a doctor not because they wanted the money up front, but because she owed the clinic money.

Second, this did not happen at a hospital, but at a private physicians' clinic. Specifically, Holzer Clinic in Gallipolis, Ohio. Hospitals are legally not permitted to deny care to anyone. The rules are quite different for clinics.

Holzer Clinics Inc. is a private series of clinics (not to be confused with Holzer Hospitals). Holzer Clinic Inc. has nine offices throughout southeastern Ohio and West Virginia. They take in about 500,000 patient visits a year, including more than 100,000 Medicaid patients a year and maybe 25,000 patients with no insurance.

Holzer Clinics Inc. tries to work with patients who accrue medical debts. But there are times when a patient mounts up debts and the clinic system believes he or she needs to make more of an effort.

When that happens, the patient enters an "advanced payment status." Before the doctor will see the patient at this private clinic, he or she is asked to pay $100. If the patient says he cannot pay, he or she is counseled to go to a hospital emergency room.

This is what happened to Trina Bachtel, who at the time had no health insurance.

There are exceptions. Doctors at Holzer Clinics Inc will see patients in "advanced payment status" if, for instance, they have been referred out of an emergency room, if they've since gone onto Medicaid, or if they're receiving workers compensation. Cancer patients in chemotherapy, and pregnant patients will be seen whether or not they pat the $100.

Which brings us to the third point: when Bachtel was told she needed to pay the $100 before the visit -- and court records show that she'd owed thousands of dollars to the Holzer System -- she was not pregnant.

Bachtel got pregnant and in 2007 suffered through a difficult pregnancy, suffering from preeclampsia, characterized by high blood pressure and the presence of protein in the urine, effecting 5-8% of all pregnancies.

At that time she had health insurance.

For whatever reason, she thought that she would need to pay Holzer Clinics Inc. $100 and she did not go to the clinic.

"She was told she had to have $100 upfront and that's why she never went there when she got pregnant," one of her family members told me.

Later she went to O’Bleness Memorial Hospital when it was an emergency.

Her son was stillborn there on August 1, 2007. She was airlifted to OSU Medical Center in Columbus, where she died two weeks later.

It is all sad. It is all tragic. The family is grieving, and the renewed scrutiny of it all by the media -- prompted by Sen. Clinton using the ancedote -- is bringing them back to those dark days last August.

Those are the facts. A young woman lost her life and the life of her child. But no hospital or clinic denied her coverage as a pregnant woman. She had insurance when she died.