Dear George,

As you may know, I was roundly roasted in VA and elsewhere among Democrats for saying Gore and the Dems should censure Clinton for his lying to the public...or we might find that we had lost the moral high ground to go after Republicans when they were vulnerable to the same legitimate criticisms.

I urged a formal resolution of censure...it would only be a piece of paper...but my thought was if we did nothing...we were setting ourselves up.

At the time, it turns out Clinton agreed with me on the politics...but his folks at the DNC and other places tried their usual politics of character assassination...or so I am told by the press...

SO: You need principles in this business...and stick with them.

Gore has this thing won BIG...if he had publicly...or if he and other DEMS together...had publicly censured Clinton.

Game, set, match. Over.

Now...we struggle...

As for why George Bush kept the DUI secret...the answer is going to be clear...but perhaps not before next Tuesday. For example, when you renew your driver's license in VA, I believe they ask you whether you have gotten any tickets anywhere...your insurance company asks you...I bet when George Bush filled out the questionnaires for being a baseball owner, they asked him whether he had any convictions for anything..

Bank loans...etc. etc...these documents often ask whether you have been convicted of anything.

George Bush's love for his family and his clearly being a very good father...those are admirable traits and his daughters should feel great about that. I applaud him for that.

However, from my personal point of view, if I wanted to impress upon my son why he should not drive and drink...or ride with a drunk driver...I might feel a DUI arrest and conviction....would be something to tell him as opposed to keeping secret. I would want to show him that mistakes have consequences...

Parents can disagree on what is best here...and I will accept George Bush at his word. Still, his reason for not making the DUI public is...as he would surely admit...politically convenient...and surely it is fair comment to point this out.

Still: Bill Clinton's effort to avoid the draft without wanting to serve his country in any capacity as a youth...and now Bush's DUI 24 years ago...

If Democrats didn't think the GOP was acting fairly when they went after Clinton on that the way they did...then frankly, I have to apply the same basic standard when Democrats go after Bush on the DUI..

voters are rightly sick of the politics of personal destruction...and in case Democrats haven't notice...they are taking it out on our guy....

And to the extent the DUI frenzy sucks into this mindset...we get hurt.

My hope is come tonight and tomorrow...the press may be able to give the public some factual basis to support my sense articulated above.: to wit, Bush kept the DUI thing for reasons other than he has articulated and thus his claim to being the antidote to what voters believe is a problem in Washington will be shown to be as hollow as his candidacy.

Paul Goldman (electronic mail, November 5, 2000).