FORMER AMBASSADOR Douglas “Pete” Peterson filed papers yesterday to run for Florida governor, the most prominent Democrat yet to challenge Gov. Jeb Bush in 2002.
“We’re just making ourselves legal,” Peterson told journalists. “We’ll start tomorrow on a trip down to South Florida.”
Peterson, a former three-term northern Florida congressman, returned to the state six days ago after serving as the first US ambassador to Vietnam since the end of the Vietnam War.
He joins state House Minority Leader Lois Frankel of West Palm Beach, state Sen. Daryl Jones of Miami and Tampa lawyer Bill McBride in seeking the Democratic nomination. Also considering a run is former Attorney General Janet Reno.
Bush, the president’s brother, is trying to become the first Republican to win a second term as Florida governor.
The 66-year-old former ambassador, whose wife, Vi Le, is Vietnamese, is seen as more conservative than other Democrats in the race. Peterson was shot down over Vietnam in 1966 on a bombing run and held prisoner for 61/2 years.
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Breaking the rules
“I WONDER how many mothers are sitting down with their daughters to make sure they understand the real lesson on Chandra Levy?” writes nationally syndicated columnist Cal Thomas in yesterday’s Washington Times.
“For those who don’t know what that lesson might be, grandmothers would be a good source... Mothers might also try my favorite contemporary rulebook, Dr. Laura Schlessinger’s ‘Ten Stupid Things Women Do To Mess Up Their Lives’ (there’s a version for men, too, Congressman Condit, in case you haven’t figured out how you messed up yours)
“Chandra Levy, like Monica Lewinsky and the legions of other young women who preceded and will surely follow her to Washington, appears not to have benefited from any useful adult advice,” notes Thomas. “An aunt reportedly told Chandra to arrange the clothes closet of Rep. Gary Condit, D-California, or buy him a terrarium to make him like her more. Instead, she should have told her niece she was a fool and to get out of Mr. Condit’s apartment and his life.
“This will sound ancient, even Victorian to some, but when women were told to save themselves for marriage and a commitment from a man who truly loved them and not just their bodies, they suffered far less than they do today. Fewer suffered the ravages of poverty. Fewer carried sexually transmitted diseases. Yes, some women suffered physical and emotional abuse in ‘loveless’ marriages and there were other inequities, but Chandra Levy would most likely be walking around and enjoying her life in anonymity had she obeyed the ancient rules.
“Rule No. 1 in The Ethics Manual of the House committee on Standards of Official Conduct admonishes members to ‘conduct themselves at all times in a manner that reflects credibility on the House.’ No matter what one thinks of adultery (which remains a crime in the District of Columbia, although the law is not enforced), does the House wish to say that having sex with an intern reflects credibility on the institution?” asks Thomas.
“The Clinton years dulled our senses when it comes to ‘private character’ vs. public virtue. Even if a public figure could be a rogue in private and a prince in public, should he (or she) be rewarded with our highest offices?
“Do we wish to approve of a leader who keeps his hands out of the public till but won’t keep his hands off the private parts of young interns?
“What kind of lesson does that teach the next generation?”
