Hillary Clinton and a Mount Rushmore moment

Ask stupid questions and sometimes you'll get a curt -- and appropriate -- response.

Before embarking on a full day of campaigning in South Dakota, Hillary Clinton this morning agreed to a last-minute suggestion from an aide and made a detour to the state's most famous tourist attraction: Mount Rushmore.

The Times' Louise Roug was part of the media entourage and relates that after Clinton heard about the site's history from a park official, another reporter asked whether the candidate could see herself someday carved into the mountain behind them. And still another wondered the same about her husband, ex-president Bill Clinton.

Replied Clinton: "Why don't you try to learn something about the monument?"

Touche.

-- Don Frederick