Jan Kruger/Getty Images — via slate.com.

Look at this article in the Washington Post — the most “mainstream reasonable liberal” of all newspapers in the country. If you want your finger on the inside-the-beltway political pulse, this is the paper of record. If any paper should be in the tank for Clinton, this is the one.

The headline is: “Bill Clinton unloads on Bernie Sanders ahead of crucial New Hampshire primary”. Okay, that’s fine as far as it goes. I clicked on the link expecting to read about WJC’s criticism of the Green Mountain State Senator.

I’ve copied the first two paragraphs from the article below:

For weeks, former president Bill Clinton has been the doomsday device of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign — a mighty weapon capable of doing great good or harm to her campaign — and held in reserve until absolutely needed. Now, as Hillary Clinton — who barely won the Iowa caucuses last week — seeks to seize momentum from Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont in his own back yard, days before the New Hampshire primary, that moment of truth has come. The former president, uncharacteristically quiet in recent weeks even as Republican contender Donald Trump called him “an abuser,” lashed out at Sanders on Sunday, according to reports from Bloomberg Politics, Politico and the New York Times, while campaigning for his wife in New Hampshire, leveling charges that the senator is hypocritical and that some of his followers are sexist

Oh…my…god. The newspaper of record for national politics couldn’t actually get to the former president’s substantive criticisms of Bernie without first throwing in a line about Donald Trump’s own substantive (and not invalid) criticisms of Bill Clinton’s character and treatment of women!

You know what I didn’t catch in that excerpt until I read it a second time? The fact that Bill Clinton called Sanders “hypocritical”.

All I can think is that Hillary really should’ve listened to The Donald’s warning last year….

ETA: Yet again, Dilbert creator Scott Adams’ take on Trump’s persuasiveness has been pretty prescient.