I'm not sure what to make of this. From
Ben Smith at Politico:
On her victory lap of Iowa yesterday, Straw Poll winner Rep. Michele Bachmann paid repeated tribute to her local roots, and repeatedly mentioned her family reunion that day, citing it as an excuse for her late arrival at a local party event in Waterloo.
But Bachmann's mother and two cousins told POLITICO's Emily Schultheis that Bachmann didn't attend the reunion, though her husband and children did. Her spokeswoman, Alice Stewart, didn't respond to two emails asking for an explanation of the disparity.
On Sunday, she told Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday" that she'd be seeing her relatives at her "big family reunion." Later that day, after she showed up late to the Black Hawk County Republican Party dinner in Waterloo, she told a reporter:
“We had a big family reunion just north of Waterloo," she said. She also said she'd visited a local "shut-in."
So the reason she was late for events was that she had a busy day going to a family reunion that she didn't actually show up for? But her husband and children were at the reunion, so ... what, was Michele personally driving them all down there in the campaign bus? And then did she sit in the bus the whole time? Was she just such a wallflower at the event (mind you, this is Michele Freaking Bachmann we're talking about) that her own mom didn't notice her there?
I'm not really sure how to parse that. I guess the options are (1) she went to the event with everybody else, but stayed in the car the whole time because that's just how much she hates her relatives, or (2) it was a costume party, and she went as, I don't know, Darth Inheritance Tax or something, or (3) she's just lying about the whole thing.
Then there's a part about "visiting a local shut-in". That may be just as strange as the reunion thing: it sounds noble enough, but usually "visit local shut-ins" is far, far down the list of presidential campaigns. For starters, local shut-ins provide surprisingly few primary votes. "So, Mr. or Ms. So-and-So, can I count on your vote next year, as well as the votes of your many, many cats?"
I think what I would prefer to believe is that Michele Bachmann had promised to go to her family reunion by handlers who thought it would make a nice photo op, but at the last minute, Michele panicked over having that whole "I'm telling you mom, Marcus is as straight as you or me or Rick Perry" conversation for the umpteenth time, and bolted the scene behind the wheel of her own campaign bus. After a high-speed bus chase down the interstate, her campaign team in hot pursuit, she then holed herself up in the home of a devoted local cat fancier, vowing not to come out until she had watched Princess Fluffykins have all her kittens.
But it's probably not that exciting. She probably just got caught lying about going to her own family reunion.