Self-penned political memoirs by politicians with presidential aspirations are not credible as critical biographical sources.

Those tomes are propaganda of a self-promotional, commercially exploitable nature in contemporary US politics. Every major candidate either pens one (or several in some cases) themselves or, more often, has a ghost writer do it.

Publishers and editors of such biographies and memoirs are notorious for not fact checking these types of books.

From a recent Slate article on this very subject (the credibility of political autobiographies):

How "true," for example, are real autobiographies, written by real people, describing real events? Coincidentally, I was first taught to ask this question by Gay, now an emeritus professor of history, during a seminar on autobiography that he taught some 20-odd years ago. As I recall it, we were debating Rousseau's Confessions when Gay pointed out some element of the story that could not possibly have been true. He then invited us to think about why, in that case, Rousseau had changed it. For unconscious emotional reasons? Or consciously, in order to shape his reputation?

Beyond "setting the record straight," none of these books was ever intended to have deeper literary or historical significance. They don't do careful self-analysis, but neither do they add much to the bigger picture. They don't necessarily lie, but they are intended to shape public perceptions of the author, which is why many read like extended versions of those candidate-life-story films one sees nowadays at political conventions.

And that is all the cut and paste, or further discussion you will get out of me in an Obama thread here.

I cannot abide people who refuse to acknowledge the fact their personal hatreds of public figures reflects their personal prejudices, not "facts" or "truth".