THE MAN OF VIRTUES HAS A VICE

Conservative Activist Bill Bennett Has Wagered Millions In Las Vegas And
Atlantic City Casinos During The Past Decade

May 2 -- In his best-selling anthology, "The Book of Virtues," William J.
Bennett writes: "We should know that too much of anything, even a good
thing, may prove to be our undoing ... [We] need to set definite boundaries
on our appetites."

DOES BENNETT? The popular author, lecturer and Republican Party activist
speaks out, often indignantly, about almost every moral issue except
one--gambling. It's not hard to see why. According to casino documents,
Bennett is a "preferred customer" in at least four venues in Atlantic City
and Las Vegas, betting millions of dollars over the last decade. His games
of choice: video poker and slot machines, some at $500 a pull. With a
revolving line of credit of at least $200,000 at each casino, Bennett,
former drug czar and secretary of Education under Presidents Reagan and
Bush, doesn't have to bring money when he shows up at a casino. More than
40 pages of internal casino documents provided to The Washington Monthly
and NEWSWEEK paint a picture of a gambler given the high-roller treatment,
including limos and tens of thousands of dollars in complimentary hotel
rooms and other amenities. In one two-month period, the documents show him
wiring more than $1.4 million to cover losses at one casino. In one
18-month stretch, Bennett visited a number of casinos for two or three days
at a time. And Bennett must have worried about news of his habit leaking
out. His customer profile at one casino lists an address that corresponds
to Empower.org, the Web site of Empower America, the group Bennett
cochairs. But typed across the form are the words: NO CONTACT AT RES OR
BIZ!!! Some of Bennett's losses have been substantial. According to one
casino source, on July 12 of last year, Bennett lost $340,000 at Caesars in
Atlantic City, and on April 5 and 6 of 2003 he lost more than $500,000 at
the Bellagio in Las Vegas. Some casino estimates put his total losses over
the past decade at more than $8 million. "There's a term in the trade for
his kind of gambler," says a casino source who has witnessed Bennett at the
high-limit slots in the wee hours. "We call them losers." Reached by
NEWSWEEK, Bennett acknowledged he gambles but not that he has ended up
behind. "Over 10 years, I'd say I've come out pretty close to even,"
Bennett says, though he wouldn't discuss any specific figures. "You can
roll up and down a lot in one day, as we have on many occasions," Bennett
explains. "You may cycle several hundred thousand dollars in an evening and
net out only a few thousand." But during the 18-month period, the documents
show, there were only a few occasions when Bennett turned in chips--worth
about $30,000 or $40,000--at the end of an evening. Most of the time, he
drew down his line of credit, often substantially. A casino source, hearing
of Bennett's claim to breaking even on slots over 10 years, just laughed.
The Washington Monthly's Story on Bennett

"I play fairly high stakes. I adhere to the law. I don't play the 'milk
money.' I don't put my family at risk, and I don't owe anyone anything,"
Bennett says. The documents do not contradict those points. Bennett, who
earns more than $50,000 per speaking engagement and made several hundred
thousand dollars in publishing advances for the more recent of his 11
books, says "I've made a lot of money and I've won a lot of money. When I
win, I usually give at least a chunk of it away [to charity]. I report
everything to the IRS." "You don't see what I walk away with," Bennett
says. "They [the casinos] don't want you to see it." Bennett says he plays
slot machines and video poker for privacy. "I've been a machine person," he
says. "When I go to the tables, people talk--and they want to talk about
politics. I don't want that. I do this for three hours to relax." He has
made no secret of his gambling, Bennett adds. He says he was in Las Vegas
in April for dinner with the former governor of Nevada and gambled while he
was there. "I've gambled all my life, and it's never been a moral issue
with me. I liked church bingo when I was growing up. I've been a poker
player." He says that after a recent speech in Rochester, he was asked
whether he would run for president in 2008 and answered that he might enter
the World Series of Poker instead. Bennett has long been known to be part
of a small-stakes poker game in Washington with Chief Justice William
Rehnquist, Associate Justice Antonin Scalia and lawyer Robert Bork. But his
high-stakes gaming comes as a surprise to many friends. "We knew he went
out there [to Las Vegas] sometimes, but at that level? Wow!" says one
longtime associate. Bennett and his organization, Empower America, oppose
the extension of casino gambling in the states. In a recent editorial, his
Empower America cochair, Jack Kemp, inveighed against lawmakers who
"pollute our society with a slot machine on every corner." The group
recently published an "Index of Leading Cultural Indicators" that reports
5.5 million American adults as "problem" or "pathological" gamblers.
Bennett says he has his gambling under control. When reminded of studies
that link heavy gambling to divorce, bankruptcy, domestic abuse and other
family problems he has widely decried, Bennett compared the situation to
alcohol. "I view it as drinking," Bennett says. "If you can't handle it,
don't do it."