On Jan. 17, 1998, President Clinton denied in a deposition that he had engaged in sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky. Days later, as evidence to the contrary surfaced, Clinton launched a campaign to spin his way around the question of whether he had lied. Two years later, George W. Bush is running for president to restore "integrity" and offer "a fresh start after a season of cynicism." But in the final days of Bush's campaign, evidence has surfaced that he, too, falsely denied a shameful episode in his past. And far from cleansing the presidency of Clinton's evasive tactics, Bush has adopted them.

Here are the key facts. In 1998, Wayne Slater, the Dallas Morning News Austin bureau chief, asked Bush whether he had been arrested after 1968. This was a logical question because the National Guard application Bush filed in 1968 was the last form on which he was known to have disclosed his previous arrests. A November 1999 New Republic profile of Bush communications director Karen Hughes described Slater's account of the 1998 interview this way:

Slater pressed Bush about whether he had ever been arrested. "He said, 'After 1968? No.' I said, 'What about before 1968?' He said, 'Well ...' and at that moment Karen stepped in and said, 'Wait a minute, I've not heard this.' She clearly wasn't prepared for whatever it was he was about to say, and he shut up." Slater argued that it was better for the governor to deal with any revelations sooner rather than later, and Bush agreed to get back to him on the matter. "To this day I have no idea what he was going to say," says Slater. "After she got to him, he shut up."

Last week, Fox News obtained, with the help of a Democratic activist, a police report showing that in 1976, when he was 30 years old, Bush had been arrested for driving while intoxicated and had pleaded guilty. Confronted with this evidence Thursday, Bush admitted to the arrest. That night, Slater filed a story noting the contradiction between the new disclosure and Bush's 1998 denial. As Slater recalled that denial, "Asked whether he had been arrested on anything 'after 1968,' the governor replied, 'No.' " In a follow-up article, Slater modified his account: "Asked specifically whether he had been arrested by police since 1968, Mr. Bush said, 'No.' He then hesitated, saying, 'Well, wait a minute, let's talk about this,' when Ms. Hughes stepped in and stopped the interview."

According to Saturday's Washington Post, in a breakfast conversation with other reporters Friday, Slater "said Bush's 'No' was clear." Nevertheless, after the interview, Slater "was left with the impression that Bush had something further to say. Slater said he asked Hughes about it twice more. He said that at first, she said to wait until after Bush was reelected governor in 1998. He said that after his second inquiry, it was clear that Bush would not go beyond his stock statement that he had made mistakes in the past."

Furthermore, according to the Post, Bush "was asked on at least one other occasion about whether he'd been arrested, when he was sent his 1996 jury questionnaire [in a drunken-driving case]. It contained 38 questions. Eleven were left blank, including one that asked: 'Have you ever been an accused or a complainant or a witness in a criminal case?' " According to the New York Times, "There was a space next to the word 'accused' that was to be checked if the answer was 'yes.' " According to the News, "Mr. Bush's attorney, Al Gonzales, who Mr. Bush subsequently appointed to the Texas Supreme Court," arranged to get Bush "dismissed from the panel before the potential jury members were questioned about their histories of drinking and driving. [The county attorney] said that if Mr. Bush had not been excused from jury service in the drunken-driving case, he most certainly would have been asked about his own history."

That, in sum, is the evidence that Bush evaded and gave misleading answers to questions about his arrest record. And how has Bush responded this week to questions about that evidence? By evading them and giving misleading answers, just as Clinton did.

1. Deny what can't be proved. In his August 1998 grand jury testimony, Clinton denied anything that couldn't be deduced from Lewinsky's semen-stained dress. He was asked, for example, "If Monica Lewinsky says that while you were in the Oval Office area you touched her breast, would she be lying?" He replied, "That is not my recollection."

Last Friday, when asked about Slater's report of Bush's 1998 denial, Hughes told the press, "The governor disputes that. We do not believe that is accurate." The Post noted that "Slater said his notes back him up," but Hughes dismissed Slater's account on the grounds that it "was not reported." When a journalist asked why Hughes hadn't challenged Slater's quotation of Bush's comments in the New Republic, Hughes brushed it off, saying of the article—which was a profile of her—"I don't remember seeing that in print."

2. Concoct alternate meanings. Clinton told the grand jury that his "encounters" with Lewinsky "did not constitute sexual relations as I understood that term to be defined, at my Jan. 17^th, 1998 deposition." When asked why he hadn't corrected his lawyer's claim that "there is no sex of any kind" between Clinton and Lewinsky, Clinton explained, "It depends upon what the meaning of the word 'is' is."