MCCAIN CALLS BUSH'S LATEST ATTACKS 'BEYONDS THE PALE'

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- John McCain called George W. Bush "untrustworthy"
Tuesday, as he continued their name-calling brawl, and called Bush's
attempt to say he'd abandoned veterans as "beyond the pale."

McCain said he would not tolerate the effort by Bush surrogates to
portray him as weak on important veterans issues and responded with an
ad that says Bush "twists the truth like (President) Clinton."

"That kind of thing is untrustworthy when someone says that I have
abandoned veterans," the senator said at a town hall meeting in North
Augusta.

"Sad, isn't it," Bush said in Hockessin, Del. "The true nature of John
McCain evidently is coming out. It's pretty sad to hear he's running
that kind of (negative) ad."

McCain was referring to statements made on stage at a Bush rally last
week by former military officers and an activist on POW-MIA issues who
denounced McCain while they offered their endorsement to the governor.

One accused McCain of not being committed enough in the fight by
veterans to win benefits for various illnesses, including the
so-called Gulf War syndrome, and another charged that the former Navy
pilot had turned his back on fellow prisoners of war after he was
released from his own 5 1/2-year imprisonment in North Vietnam.

Even though one of Bush's own foreign policy advisers, arms-control
expert Richard Armitage, said the attack on McCain's veterans record
was a mistake, Bush refused to take responsibility.

"Mr. (J. Thomas) Burch can speak for himself," Bush said of the
chairman of the National Vietnam & Gulf War Veterans Coalition who led
the attacks. "I didn't write Mr. Burch's script. He's obviously upset
with Sen. McCain, and he's got a right to express his opinion."

Both McCain and Bush are vying for the huge veteran vote in this
state, where an estimated 400,000 retired military personnel now make
their homes.

Later, to a crowd of about 1,000 people in Goose Creek, S.C., McCain
compared the crowd to turnouts late in his New Hampshire campaign.

"I am now, for the first time, convinced I will win the (South
Carolina) primary."

McCain expressed outrage Tuesday at an apparent push poll -- a survey
intended to influence instead of measure opinion -- by the Bush
campaign and called on Bush to take the "high road" in their contest
for GOP delegates in the state's Feb. 19 primary.

Bush said he would not pull down his own ads that slam McCain's attack
ads on Bush.

"I like a good battle. We're having one in this state and I'm going to
win," Bush said.

McCain's criticism of the Bush tactics came as he continued his
campaign across the state after a brief swing west over the weekend to
California, Arizona and Michigan. The latter two states hold their
Republican primaries Feb. 22, three days after South Carolina's. The
huge delegate prize of California holds its primary with a dozen other
states on March 7.

At a town hall meeting in North Augusta, McCain faced about 1,000
people who grilled him with some of the toughest questions yet in his
campaign. Most in the crowd appeared to be McCain supporters, but on
issues such as gay rights and abortion, he found many who disagreed
with him, including one Bible-quoting South Carolinian, who called
homosexuality "a sin."

"I do not believe it is a sin. It's a lifestyle I don't agree with,
but I don't believe it is a sin," said McCain, who also reiterated his
support for the Clinton administration's "don't ask, don't tell"
policy on gays in the military.

The statement was greeted by several "boos."

In a response to another question on abortion, McCain drew some
applause when he emphasized his 17-year anti-abortion voting record.

But some in the audience disagree with his support of fetal tissue
research associated with Parkinsons and other debilitating diseases,
even though he says the tissue samples should not come from abortions.

"I have a real problem with him on gays in the military and fetal
tissue research," said Davey Evans, a saddlemaker and transplanted
Texan who now calls Trenton, S.C., home.

McCain delivered a major speech on drug and crime policy here in
Columbia in which he called for "renewed commitment" in fighting the
problems of violence and drug trafficking. But it did not contain any
major new proposals, other than a call for a new program that would
match up veterans with young, recovering drug addicts and troubled
teen-agers to help them lead "more productive lives."

McCain criticized the Clinton administration for being absent from the
drug war.

""The next president must be a commander in chief in the war on drugs
and it must be fought on three fronts with unambiguous purpose --
vanquish demand, slash supply, and widen access to addiction
treatment," McCain added, promising to create "an international drug
strategy and a foreign policy that supports it."