White Lies

Fun stuff in today's New York Times. Gossip maven Kitty Kelley -- who strikes me as rather disreputable -- has a book coming out that quotes Sharon Bush, the former wife of the president's brother Neil, saying the president used cocaine when his dad was in office. If that's true, Bush lied when he said he hadn't used an illegal drug in 25 years.
Sharon Bush issued a denial in the form of an "unsworn statement," according to the Times. That would be good enough for me, except that there's apparently a third person who was present when Sharon Bush allegedly made the cocaine allegation. And it isn't some Kelley assistant, either. It's Sharon Bush's former publicist. To quote the Times:

Doubleday, the book's publisher and part of the Random House division of Bertelsmann, said it stood by Ms. Kelley's reporting. The publisher said in a statement that Ms. Kelly met with Ms. Bush for a four-hour lunch on April 1, 2003, where an unnamed third party heard the conversation, and that Ms. Kelley's editor, Peter Gethers, discussed the same material with Ms. Bush over the phone.

Lou Colasuonno, a former publicist for Ms. Bush, confirmed that he was the third party at the lunch and contradicted her denial. "I have not seen the book, I have only seen news reports," Mr. Colasuonno said. "According to what I have seen, what has been reported, I would not dispute that."

So what's going on? First, I don't care if Bush did cocaine. And like I said, Kelley doesn't strike me as honest, and I don't like her. And it's possible that Lou Colasuonno is one of those "disgruntled former employees" we hear so much about.

Of course, the president doesn't strike me as very honest either. I'm sure many voters would be disturbed if he was proven to be a liar about cocaine, and his campaign is denouncing the allegations.

Is there anything better than watching a fight between two people you don't like?