I recently wrote about how Sen. Hillary Clinton dug herself into a hole with misstatements about her Bosnia trip and an Ohio hospital.

On Thursday, in an attempt to defend his wife from media attacks, Bill Clinton just kept on digging. Clinton said his wife made the Bosnia mistake “one time late at night when she was exhausted” and that she “immediately apologized for it.” He also said he thought Clinton “was the first first lady since Eleanor Roosevelt to go into a combat zone” and referred to the trip as being in 1995.

The AP swiftly debunked his statements:

His wife didn’t make the sniper fire claim “one time late at night when she was exhausted.” She actually told the story several times, including during prepared remarks on foreign policy delivered the morning of March 17.

It’s also not true that she “immediately apologized for it.” Clinton has never apologized for the comments and only acknowledged that she “misspoke” a week after the March 17 speech when video of her peaceful tarmac reception emerged.

It’s also not true that she was the “first first lady since Eleanor Roosevelt to go into a combat zone” — a claim that Hillary Clinton has also made when talking about the trip. Pat Nixon traveled to Saigon during the Vietnam war and Barbara Bush went to Saudi Arabia two months before the launching of Desert Storm.

The trip also was not in 1995, but 1996.

Ouch. Definitely not the point he was trying to make.

Yesterday, The Boston Globe posted an article analyzing how “The Bill Factor” is affecting Hillary’s candidacy:

It is one of the central challenges of Hillary Clinton’s campaign: How to take credit for the accomplishments of her husband’s presidency and profit from his popularity while distancing herself from his past and present positions on which they disagree.

The balancing act came into sharper relief this week as she took contrasting positions from Bill Clinton by opposing the Colombia trade deal and favoring a boycott of the Olympic opening ceremonies.

Click here to read the full story. What do you think about “The Bill Factor”? Leave a comment to weigh in with your thoughts.