Replies

Excerpts of the tapes have been published and also played on tv. Not only did I hear him say if anyone comes forward to say he did coke they'd be lying, but that is how several other respected people have interpreted his comments, too (I heard them AFTER I had heard/read that part of the tapes).

In addition, the tapes explain a bit more in-depth his rationale for deciding to not answer the drug questions...a rationale which he had publicly stated but more generally.

He did not ever directly take on the drug question, but he did give, in 1999, a 25 year window of saying there was nothing since that time.

There is nothing at all that indicates he did coke. Yes, you can hypothesize it was possible, but there is no witness, there were no hints, and now we have the tapes where he says if somebody shows up it will be made up.

Sorry, but it is time to acknowledge that there is no evidence for it and to drop it.

BTW, as to your point that he has not denied it. That is the very point he's made in public and on the tapes. He was not going to address the subject at all for the reasons he articulated.

And as I said earlier, it was the second half of the 70s when coke began to be wildly popular, not the early 70s.

"Not only did I hear him say if anyone comes forward to say he did coke they'd be lying, but that is how several other respected people have interpreted his comments, too."

Look, you made some snide comment about how you are capable of reading a transcript, insinuating I guess that I am too stupid to do so. I asked you to please produce the thing so that I could read it too. You did not. Now you expect me to take what you say at face value. I'm not going to do it.

"He did not ever directly take on the drug question, but he did give, in 1999, a 25 year window of saying there was nothing since that time."

I don't believe that he ever did give a 25 year window. I think he was very cryptic and coy about it and you could have interpreted what he actually said a bunch of different ways.

"There is nothing at all that indicates he did coke. Yes, you can hypothesize it was possible, but there is no witness, there were no hints, and now we have the tapes where he says if somebody shows up it will be made up."

I don't know. He's really left the question open. There has been a lot of rumor and speculation and he refuses to deny having used the drug. He's made some cryptic comments about how he could have passed government background tests which depending upon how you interpret what he said and depending on what time frame he was alluding to could have meant that if he used hard drugs he hadn't used in 25 years or it could have meant he hadn't used in something like 7 years. In the tapes he apparently said:

"GEORGE BUSH: (inaudible) it doesn't matter – cocaine, it'd be the same with marijuana. I wouldn't answer the marijuana question.

DOUG WEAD: Uh-hunh.

GEORGE BUSH: Do you know why? Because I don't want some little kid doin' what I tried.

DOUG WEAD: Yeah, and it never stops, the question.

GEORGE BUSH: But you gotta understand, I want to be President, I want to lead, I want to set… do you want your little kid to say hey Daddy, President Bush tried marijuana, I think I will?"

He could have been hinting there that he might have done cocaine. Maybe not. Unfortunately I can't find any transcripts of the tapes, only little snippets here and there. From what I have seen at least though there is no denial. He hasn't denied that he's ever used cocaine. There is certainly not enough for someone to declare as fact that he has used the drug, but on the other hand he has never denied having used the drug at some point in his past despite having been asked about it several times. It would be equally wrong to declare as fact that the man has never used the drug.

This really isn't worth arguing over. You don't think the president ever used cocaine. My suspicion is that he has used it before. Neither of us have much to back up our assertions. Maybe he did. Maybe he didn't. It's not all that important.