For at least the fourth time, The Washington Post has falsely reported that former President Bill Clinton claimed (or, according to one article, “insinuated”) that Democratic presidential candidates engaged in “Swift boat”-style attacks on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (NY) during an October 30 debate. In a January 18 article, Post staff writer Peter Baker wrote: "[President Clinton] has likened [his wife's] Democratic rivals to Republican 'Swift boat' attackers." In fact, as Media Matters for America previously documented, President Clinton did not compare Democratic presidential candidates to “Swift boat” attackers. Rather, he condemned Republican attacks on Democrats and the role the media play in contributing to such attacks.

In his November 5 speech, President Clinton said:

CLINTON: [T]he point I'm here to make to you is whoever you're for, this is a really big election. We saw what happened the last seven years when we made decisions in elections based on trivial matters. When we listened to people make snide comments about whether Vice President [Al] Gore was too stiff. When they made dishonest claims about the things that he said that he'd done in his life. When that scandalous Swift boat ad was run against Senator [John] Kerry [D-MA].

When there was an ad that defeated [former Sen.] Max Cleland [D] in Georgia -- a man that left half his body in Vietnam. And a guy that had several deferments ran an ad with Max Cleland's picture with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, because he dared to vote against the president's version of the Homeland Security bill.

[...]

Why am I saying this?

Because, I had the feeling, at the end of that last debate, we were about to get into cutesy land again. “Ya'll raise your hand if you're for illegal immigrants getting driver's licenses.” So, we'll then let the Republicans run an ad saying, “All the Democrats are against the rule of law.”

I don't -- look, I think it's fine to discuss immigration. We should. Illegal immigration needs to be discussed, and it's fine for Hillary and all these other guys to be asked about Governor Spitzer's plan -- but not in 30 seconds, yes, no, raise your hand. This is a complicated issue. This is a complicated issue.

In a November 8 report, Post staff writer Dan Balz made the false assertion that Bill Clinton “compared the attacks on his wife by Democratic opponents [Sen. Barack] Obama [IL], former senator John Edwards (N.C.) and Sen. Chris Dodd (Conn.) to the television commercials aired against Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) in the 2004 presidential race and to GOP ads targeting then-Sen. Max Cleland (D-Ga.) in 2002.” Similarly, in a November 14 article, Post staff writer Michael D. Shear wrote: “With less than two months until voting begins, the Democratic front-runner [Hillary Clinton] has become a target for rivals in her own party as well, prompting her husband, the former president, to accuse them of 'Swift boat'-style piling-on during the latest debate.” In a November 29 article by Post staff writers Glenn Kessler and Anne E. Kornblut, the paper again misreported Clinton's statements: “After the Democratic debate in Philadelphia last month, the former president insinuated that his wife's Democratic rivals were mounting attacks on her akin to the 'Swift boat' campaign Republicans launched against Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) during the 2004 race -- an explosive charge that prompted some of Hillary Clinton's rivals to lash out more aggressively than ever.”

In fact, as is clear from the transcript above, President Clinton was warning that “cutesy” debate questions would provide fodder for unfair Republican attack ads.

From the January 18 Washington Post article:

As Clinton travels the country campaigning for his wife with characteristic intensity, he is fighting not only to promote Hillary Rodham Clinton's candidacy but also to set the record straight on the two terms he spent in the White House. And if some cast the Democratic nomination battle as a test of whether the party wants to turn the page on the Clinton years, then he is determined to win the referendum.

Friends describe a man who has made peace with the past since leaving the Oval Office, but with his wife's campaign now on the line, Clinton's frustration seems to be boiling over. He has likened her Democratic rivals to Republican “Swift boat” attackers and castigated Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) for making up a “fairy tale” about Obama's war position. Just this week he berated a television reporter who asked about a dispute over Nevada caucus rules.

“What he perceives is a lack of fairness -- equal scrutiny, equal accountability,” said the Rev. Carolyn Staley, a longtime friend from Arkansas. “While their lives have been an open book for all these years they've been in public service, other candidates have not been subject to that sort of scrutiny.”