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According to Hatfield this is from one of Bush's former Yale classmates:
I was wondering when someone was going to get around to uncoverig the truth," he replied, surprisingly unruffled by my direct approach. "Evidently, you kind of glossed over in the book like a lot of other reporters have done in their newpaper and magazine articles. It doesn't fit, does it?
George W. was arrested for possession of cocaine in 1972, but due to his father's connections, the entire record was expunged by a state jusdege whom the elder Bush helped get elected," he explained. "It was one of those 'behind closed doors in the judge's chambers' kind of thing betweenthe old man and one of his Texas cronies who owed him a favor. In exchange for successfully completing communtiy service at Project P.U.L.L., where Bush senior was a heavy contributor and honorary chairman, the judge purged Gorge W.'s record.
In the Afterword of his book Hatfield states:
On August 4, 1999, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle publicly Charged the Press with giving George W. Bush a 'free ride' in regards to the persistent rumors of past cocaine use, adding that it was a "a legitimate question" to expect any presidential candidate to answer to determine if he or she is morally fit to hold the highest elected office in the U.S.
In response to Senator Dashcle's challenge, later the same day the New York Daily News asked Bush and his other eleven political rivals where they had ever used cocain. All of them--except the presidential front-runner, who refused to answer the question--denied ever experimenting with the illegal drug. When the Associated Press asked the same candidates about the general use of the drugs, eight said no, and two acknoledged trying marijuana. Once again, Bush refused to answer the question, contributing to the media's feeding frenzy regarding allegations of his prior drug use by evasively responding: "I've made mistakes in the past and I've learned from my mistakes," branding such rumors "ridiculous and absurd," but declining to lable them false." (pp.299-300)
.......Fresh from a first-place showing in Iowa GOP straw poll on August 14 the Texas governor was forced to amend his stock message when Sam Attlesey of the Dallas Morning News asked whether, as president, Bush would insist that his appointees answer drug-use questions contained in the standard FBI background check. (As president, Bush would nominate candidates for the Supreme Court, other federal judges, cabinet secretaries, foreign ambasadors, and federal prosecutors. All would be required to answer questions "fully and truthfull" regarding illegal drug use on the questionnaire for national security decisionrs, a part of the FBI background check).
After receiving advance word that the new slant on the drug question was going to be asked, Bush conferred with campaign finance chairman Don Evans, finance director Jack Oliver, media adviser Mark McKinnon, chief strategist Karl Rove, and communications director Karen Hughes.
"Imagine the ad our opponents could make if we didn't answer the question" said one Bush campaign adviser. "As president, George W. Bush would maintain a double standard when it comes to illegal drug use by White House employees--one for him and one for everybody else."
Bush's inner circle of campaign officials agreed that the leading presidential candidate should confirm to the Dallas Morning News that he would meet all the standards himself, a response that would "hopefully put a stake in the heart of the coke-use stories."
"As I understand it, the current form asks the question, 'Did somebody use drugs within the last seven years?' and I will be glad to answer the question, and the answer is 'No'," Bush responded during a news conference he called to introduce his new state education commissioner.
However, the Texas governor once again refused to say whether he had ever used cocaine in particular and angrily claimed that his political enemies were peddling unsubstantiated rumors of illegal drug use. "I know they're being planted," Bush said, obviously irritated. "They're ridiculous absurd, and the American people are of sick of this kind of politics." Earlier, he had chided reporters for agian raising the drug issue . Somebody floats a rumor and it causes you to ask a question, and that's the game in American politics, and I refuse to play it," he stated. "That is a game. And you just fell for the trap."
The following day at another media event in Roanoke, Virginia, Bush decided to move the boundary markers yet again, volunteering that at the time his father was inaugurated in 1989 he could have passed even the fifteen-year background check in effect then, dating his drug-free years all the way back to 1974, when he was twenty-eight and a graduate student at Harvard.
But the presidential candidate suddenly drew the line and defined a statute of limitations for only the past twenty-five years after NBC's David Blom noted that current White House appointees were required to list any drug use since their eighteenth birthday.
"I believe it is important to put a stake in the ground and say enough is enough when it comes to trying to dig up people's backgrounds, " Bush said, reverting to his previous position of firmly standing against "trash-mouth politics", and refusing to discuss details about his past. If voter, didn't like that answer he announced, "they can find somebody else to vote for . I have told the American people all I am going to tell them."
Later in the day, Bush continued his stonewall strategy, saying only that parents should counsel their children about the perils of alcohol and drugs. "I think a baby boomer parent ought to say. 'I have learned from the mistakes I may or may not have made, and I'd like to share some wisdom with you, and that is: Don't use drugs. Don't abuse alcohol.' That's what leadership is all about." the presidetial front-runner told reporters while touring oan Ohio Homeless shelter that offered treatment for drug addicts.
Bush has essentially admitted to something. But he refused to say what, creating a political paradox." wrote the editors of USA Today. "If his offense is trivial, why hide it? Voters have shown little inclination to punish candidates for youthful drug use, at least in the cse of marijuana. And if it's substantial, why should those voters be denied the facts?"
"He's been drawing all kinds of distinctions, rather than just giving an anaswer which will put these queries to rest for good," said Mark Rozell, a political scientist at Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. "It's sort of piecemeal, hopin-it-will-go-away approach. But this line of inquiry will not goa aaway until he does what only he can do to end it: Tell the flat-out truth about what happened."
Bush flip flops on the drug use question only heightened the mystery and invited deeper scrutiny by the media. On August 25, the online magainze Salon reported on allegations that "back int he '60s or '70s," Bush "was ordered by a Texas judge to perform community service in exchange for expunging his record showing illicit drug use and that this service was performed at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Servie Center in Houston.
Then Hatfield cites replies from one of his sources as he pursued the line about Bush's community service:
This is from one of Bush's former Yale classmates:
I was wondering when someone was going to get srounud to uncoverig the truth," he replied, surprisingly unruffled by my direct approach. "Evidently, you kind of glossed over in the book like a lot of other rporters have done in their newpaper and magazine articles. It doesn't fit, does it?"
"George W. was arrested for possession of cocaine in 1972, but due to his father's connections, the entire record was expunged by a state jusdege whom the elder Bush helped get elected," he explained. "It was one of those 'behind closed doors in the judge's chambers' kind of thing betweenthe old man and one of his Texas cronies who owed him a favor. In exchange for successfully completing communtiy service at Project P.U.L.L., where Bush senior was a heavy contributor and honorary chairman, the judge purged Gorge W.'s record. "
Can you tell me more about the incident involving his arrest of give me a name of the police officer or, better yet, the judge?" Hatfield asked.
"I've told you enough already," he replied, sounding unchracteristically apprehensive. "There's oly a handful of us that know the truth. I'm not even sure his wife knows about it." Then he paused and added, "Just keep digging, But keep looking over your shoulder.
From another source "a longtime Bush friend":
Take this anyway it sounds, but do you think George would take time out from speeding around town in his TR-6 convertible sports car, bedding down just about every single woman--and a few marrie ones--and patying like there's no tommorrow to go work full-time as a mentor to a bunch of streetwise balck kids? Get real, man, this ia a white bread boy fromt eh tother side of town wer're talking about. (page 300--05)
Although Texas requires renewal of a driver's license every four years on one's birthday, Bush obtained a new number (a nine digit 000000005) on March 31, 1995 as a renewal instead of on his birthday, July 6, which the texas Department of Motor Vehicles called "highly unusual". Online Journal correspondents Bev Conover and Linda L. Starr also noted in their investigation that in Texas, "every infraction of the law--from a parking ticket to homicide--appears on you Texas Driver's License Detail. It was publicly reported that George W. shot and killed a protected species while bird hunting in 1994 and paid a fin of $130 on September 2,1994. That is the sort of thing that gets listed on a Texas Driver's License Detail, bu it doesn't show up on George W's because when he received a new license in March 1995, the record of paying the fine--along with anything else that was cited--was deleted with his old license number". Ironically, the Texas Department of Public Safety (which issues state driver's licenses is headed by James Byrne Francis, Jr. one the governor's closest friends and fundraisers. (Fortunate Son, Hatfield. FN page 303)
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