IF 18 IS ADULT, LET JENNA HAVE A BREW

It can't be easy -- or much fun -- being the daughter of the president of
the United States, especially if you're a college gal who enjoys a beer now
and then. Most do.

But, like it or not, Jenna Bush is the president's daughter, and what she
does matters more than what other people's children do. Her two recent
brushes with the law over drinking -- once in April and again last week --
have thrust her under the media microscope and renewed debates about
underage alcohol use.

On one side of the discussion are former college students who remember
acting like college students. So the kid had a beer. Bomb Baghdad. On the
other side are people like Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor of the Nation, who
see Jenna's "problem" as suggestive of the Bush administration's lax
attitude toward drug and alcohol issues in the United States.

Gee. George W. Bush has been in office a little more than 100 days and he's
supposed to have solved the drug- and alcohol-abuse problem in the Free
World. But then of course he can't, can he, because Georgie Boy had a
little drinking problem in his college days and thereafter. "I did not run
that red light with that woman, what was her name?"

I don't know whether Jenna Bush has "a drinking problem," though arguably
getting in trouble for underage drinking is a problem. The Problem,
however, isn't so much the fact of her drinking; it's the ludicrous law
that makes her a lawbreaker for making an adult choice when she is, in
fact, an adult.

Last time I checked, a 19-year-old girl -- er, woman -- could vote, get
killed in war, be prosecuted in adult court, but she can't tap a brewskie?
What do we mean by "age of consent" if not consent?

That said, I'm hardly leading the crusade to bring 18-year-olds to the
grown-up table. I've been an 18-year-old, and I've helped rear two humans
who passed through that arbitrary adult portal. Maturity isn't the first
word that comes to mind.

Indeed, under my dictatorship, no one would vote until they're paying the
bills. If you're 18 and helping me float the federal government, by all
means grab a ballot. Otherwise, do your homework and, as my Uncle Archie
would say, "Stifle yourself."

As for wars, I've always been an advocate of all-male armies, minimum age
40. We'd be in and out of those foxholes faster than you can say Kawasaki.
Why not women? Because, silly, women don't start wars (please spare me the
Cleopatra bio), nor do they demand a sword the instant Mom climbs off the
delivery table. If gender stereotypes offend you, you haven't had children.

All of which is to say, we could raise the age of adulthood to 35 and I'd
be perfectly happy. As a bonus, I'd be a young adult once again. But that's
not likely, nor is it likely that 19-year-olds are going to stop drinking
beer. What's more likely is that we're going to waste time and money
pursuing young adults and creating havoc in their lives for doing what was
legal when most of us were young.

Changing the national drinking age from 18 to 21 in 1984 -- following a
breathtakingly successful campaign by Candy Lightner, founder of Mothers
Against Drunk Driving -- was a colossal mistake. Understandable, given
Lightner's personal tragedy -- her daughter was killed by a drunken driver
- -- but a mistake nonetheless.

If an 18-year-old is an adult, treat her as an adult. Consequences and all.