ALBANY – President Clinton said yesterday that reports that a gay Republican is preparing to mount a political attack against his wife are “sad,” adding that the veteran strategist in question was either acting out of self-loathing or cynical political motives.

The Republican strategist, Arthur Finkelstein, has worked as a political consultant to conservative political candidates in New York and Israel for years and is credited with helping Governor Pataki unseat Governor Cuomo in 1994.

In recent days, two articles in the New York Times reported that Mr. Finkelstein married a man in Massachusetts late last year and that the consultant is establishing a political action committee aimed at defeating Senator Clinton in 2006. Mr. Finkelstein, 59, told the paper he hopes to raise $10 million to finance an independent campaign against Mrs. Clinton.

The comments from Mr. Clinton, reported by the Associated Press, came during a press conference on an unrelated issue at his Harlem office and prompted a sharp rebuke from state and national Republicans, who noted that Mr. Clinton and his wife both opposed laws that would legalize same-sex marriage in America.

“What is sad here is that President Clinton, the same president who signed the Defense of Marriage Act, implemented the military’s discriminatory ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ policy, and encouraged John Kerry to support anti-gay state constitutional amendments, thinks he has any credibility passing judgment on the like of Arthur Finkelstein or any other gay and lesbian American,” a national spokesman for the Log Cabin Republicans, Christopher Barron, said.

Another former aide to Mr. Pataki, Kieran Mahoney, went further, suggesting Mr. Clinton issue an apology.

“I think that the guy is incredibly hypocritical to go out and try to stereotype someone’s political views on the basis of their sexual preferences,” Mr. Mahoney, managing partner of Mercury Public Affairs, a political-consulting firm, said. “And the ‘self-loathing’ crack is worthy of an apology. It’s an embarrassment that he would take a shot like that.”

According to the AP report, Mr. Clinton’s comments came when he was asked whether the campaign against his wife made him angry.

“Actually I was sort of sad when I read it,” Mr. Clinton is reported to have said. “That fellow who used to work for Pataki is doing it. I mean, they give you two stories. One is that he went to Massachusetts and married his longtime male partner, and then he comes back here and announces this. I thought, one of two things: Either this guy believes his party is not serious and is totally Machiavellian in its position, or, you know, as David Brock said in his great book ‘Blinded by the Right,’ there’s some sort of self-loathing or something. I was more sad for him.”

A former writer for the conservative magazine the American Spectator, Mr. Brock said in the 2002 book cited by Mr. Clinton that he had lied during his time as a self-described “right-wing hit man” for conservative publications.

Mr. Brock, now president of Media Matters for America, an organization aimed at debunking conservative pundits, declined through a spokeswoman, Melissa Salmanowitz, to comment on Mr. Clinton’s remarks.

It was the second time in recent months that a prominent national Democrat, who is not openly supportive of gay marriage, has sought to portray Republicans as hostile toward homosexuality. Senator Kerry of Massachusetts, during a presidential debate last fall, twice mentioned the sexual preference of Vice President Cheney’s lesbian daughter, Mary. Commentators interpreted the remarks as a sign that Mr. Kerry, who has said he favors reserving marriage for heterosexuals, was looking to attract swing voters who oppose homosexuality.

Mr. Finkelstein did not return a call seeking comment, but Mr. Mahoney, who has worked with the veteran consultant for two decades, defended him.

“Arthur’s got every right to behave however he chooses and to support whoever he wants to support,” Mr. Mahoney said. “I hope he’s very successful in raising money to go after Hillary Clinton.”