Bill Bennett: The Man of Virtues Has a Vice

In 1998, The Washington Times reported in a light-hearted front-page feature story that he plays low-stakes poker with a group of prominent conservatives, including Robert Bork, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and Chief Justice William Rehnquist.

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.

Friends of Mr. Bennett were reluctant today to criticize him directly.

"It's his own money and his own business," Grover G. Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, a conservative advocacy group, said. "The downside of gambling losses is that the government gets a third of the money, which is unfortunate and probably a sin in and of itself," said Mr. Norquist, whose group advocates smaller government.

William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard and another conservative ally of Mr. Bennett, agreed that this was a matter between Mr. Bennett, his wife and his accountant.

"It would be different if he had written anti-gambling screeds," Mr. Kristol said. "I'm sure he doesn't regard gambling as a virtue but as a rather minor and pardonable vice and a legal one and one that has not damaged him or anyone else."

Mr. Kristol said that Mr. Bennett was not being hypocritical. "If Bill Bennett went on TV encouraging young people to gamble the rent money at a Las Vegas casino or was shilling for gambling interests, that would be inconsistent" with his moral crusades, Mr. Kristol said.

Funny. I don't recall seeing a chapter in "The Book of Virtues'' that explains the virtue of pumping $1,000 chips into Bellagio's slot machines in the wee small hours of the morning.

Besides the slots, Bennett admitted that he favors video poker -- which, in the gaming world, and in states that have acted to ban the machines, is known as "the crack cocaine of gambling.'' The game requires no skill, only a deep compulsion. Serious gamblers avoid it; serious addicts love it.

It is an odd choice of relaxation for a man who has made his fortune by commenting on others' lack of restraint.

Bennett countered that he has won a lot of money, too, and that the magazine articles don't give him credit for that. He said he donated some of his winnings to charity and was scrupulous about paying taxes on the rest. All in all, he claims he has pretty much broken even at the casinos. (I've never met a gambler who claimed otherwise.)

That's fine. Gambling in those towns is legal, after all, and Bill Bennett certainly is an adult who can make his own choices. But alcohol is legal, too, as are some pharmaceuticals. It's the abuse of them that causes problems -- the lack of self-discipline, to borrow a favorite Bennett phrase.

If Bennett is telling the truth, that he has won as much as he's lost -- and the man has a reputation for honesty -- it means he has had nearly $16 million in play at the casinos over the past 10 years. Legal or not, that's hardly a resume item one would expect from a fellow who makes his living by ginning up morality lectures in which the rest of us are at fault for our vice, sin and the lack of self-control. As Bennett points out in the quotation atop this column, self-discipline is "an odd sort of relationship,'' and that "many of us don't handle it very well.''

Verily, verily. Perhaps he'll atone by showing up this morning on "Meet the Press'' and giving himself a good spanking.

But as an occasional bettor -- though certainly not in Bennett's league -- I'm offering odds of 8 to 5 that it won't happen.

Anybody want a piece of that action?

"It is true that I have gambled large sums of money," Bennett said in a statement. "I have also complied with all laws on reporting wins and losses.

"Nevertheless I have done too much gambling, and this is not an example
I wish to set. Therefore my gambling days are over."