BUSH SAYS HE HASN'T USED ILLEGAL DRUGS IN THE PAST 25 YEARS

Politics: He Says He'S Not Explaining Any Further,But Some Say The Door
Might Already Be Open.

Washington-republican presidential candidate George W.Bush said Thursday
that he has not used illegal drugs in the past 25 years, declaring that if
voters object to his refusal to reveal more "they can go find somebody else
to vote for."

Under mounting pressure, Bush has abandoned his strategy to dodge
have-you-ever questions and - for two straight days - has tried to establish
a new statute of limitations for questions about past drug use. The Texas
governor said he could pass White House anti-drug standards set by President
Clinton and his father, former President Bush.

Far from putting the issue to rest, Bush's parsed replies raised more
questions that his campaign team in Austin, Texas, said he won't answer.

"I was asked what I thought was a relevant question about whether or not, if
I became president, I will have background checks for the people that work
for me at the White House. And if I did, could I pass the challenge of a
background check. My anser is absolutely," Bush said during a news
conference in Roanoke, Va.

"Not only could I pass the background check and the standards applied to
today's White House, but I could have passed the background check and the
standards applied on the most stringent conditions when my dad was the
president of the United States - a 15-year period," he said.

Spokeswoman Mindy Tucker said Bush had effectively denied drug usage in a
period beginning 15 years before his father took office in 1989 - or since
1974, when the 53-year-old Bush was 28.

A day earlier, Bush told The Dallas Morning News that he had not used drugs
in the past seven years - the time frame used in normal FBI background
checks. Bush said Thursday that his father's White House had the FBI apply a
15-year test to his employees.

Bush, confronting the first contretemps of his front-running campaign, might
have inadvertently exposed himself to questions about drug use into his
teens by saying he could "pass the background check and the standards"
applied at the White House today.

The Clinton administration requires the FBI to ask White House applicants
about drug usage since their 18th birthdays. Bush refused to answer that
question Thursday.

According to Tucker, the campaign had been told that the Clinton White House
does not disqualify applicants who had used drugs in the past 15 years.
Therefore, she said, the current White House has no "standard of
disqualification" for Bush to follow.

C.Boyden Gray, the top lawyer in the Bush White House, said in a telephone
interview that there was a 15-year statute of limitations but he suggested
that there was some discretion about applying it.

"Of course it was not disqualifying," he said. There were legions of people
in the Bush administration who had used illegal drugs but for whom it was
not disqualifying because it was in the distant past."

Bush was not asked if he could have met the standard when his father was
vice president, from 1981 to 1989 - which would require a denial dating to
at least 1971.

Tucker said he won't answer that question. Bush said he needs to draw a line
somewhere.

"I believe it is important to put a stake in the ground and to say enough is
enough when it comes to trying to dig up people's backgrounds in politics,"
Bush said.

Yet he did respond to a question about possible drug usage during his stint
in the Texas Air National Guard from 1968 to 1973. "I never would have done
anything to endanger mayself," he said.

In a statement signed at the start of his National Guard service, Bush said
he was not - nor had he ever been - addicted to narcotics or barbiturates.
Similarly, he stated that he had never been a "chronic user to excess" of
alcoholic beverages.

Defending the change of strategy on drugs, a senior Bush adviser said the
governor felt the background-check question was relevant - and said it gave
Bush the opportunity to define what he means when he says he was "young and
irresponsible."

Trying to keep GOP followers from getting jittery, the Bush campaign shipped
"speaking points" to the offices of several lawmakers and governors.

Still, some rank-and-file Republicans are displaying signs of anxiety about
Bush's background. Mike Francis, chairman of the Louisiana COP, said party
members might eventually demand that Bush say more about whether he used drugs.

"I don't think it's right as a leader of the state party to demand this or
that (of candidates), but I do think it's a very interesting question that
Louisiana Republican voters will very soon force a 'yes' or 'no' on,"
Francis said.

"He should have stuck with, 'I'm not talking about it," said Democratic
operative David Brown of Washington.

A Republican consultant who advises Bush, speaking on condition of
anonymity, said the governor had been advised not to give any ground on the
question and that he now might be forced to de3ny ever using illegal drugs
or admit that he did -and explain why.

Refusing to take part in what he called the "politics of personal
destruction," Bush told reporters Thursday, "I am going to tell people I
made mistakes and that I have learned from my mistakes. And if they like it,
I hope they give me a chance. And if they don't like it, they can go find
somebody else to vote for."