Tucker Carlson on Bush's 1976 DUI arrest: "[I]t's not like he was wasted"

On the November 14 edition of MSNBC's Tucker, host Tucker Carlson downplayed President Bush's 1976 drunken-driving arrest: "[H]is blood alcohol level -- I'm not defending drunk driving, of course -- but, you know, it's not like he was wasted. He -- he wasn't at all. It was like three beers or something." Carlson's speculation about how much Bush had had to drink, "like three beers or something," is inconsistent with Bush's reported blood-alcohol content (BAC) at the time of his arrest.

A November 3, 2000, CNN.com article reported that Bush was pulled over in Maine after "consuming a number of beers. His blood-alcohol content was determined to be 0.10 [percent], the legal limit at the time [since reduced in Maine to 0.08 percent]." According to an August 7 ABC News article, Bush weighs 196 pounds. Assuming he weighed 180 pounds in 1976, a BAC calculator at DiscoveryHealth.com estimates that Bush would have likely had more than five drinks if he had been drinking for an hour. If Bush had been drinking for four hours, the calculator estimates, Bush would likely have had to drink seven drinks to reach 0.10 percent. If, as Carlson claimed, Bush had had only three beers, drunk them in the short span of a half-hour, and weighed only 165 pounds, according to the DiscoveryHealth.com calculator, his estimated BAC would still be only 0.0643 percent, 35 percent lower than his actual level.

From the November 14 edition of MSNBC's Tucker:

CARLSON: What do you think of that? Is the fact this is a man [former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani] who's been married three times, are those sort of facts relevant still?

BUCHANAN: Well, certainly it's relevant in the Republican primary, which is a very, very conservative -- conservative ordeal. You saw what happened to Harold Ford when it was simply mentioned that he had been at the Playboy mansion or the Playboy party. That was clearly directed at the Christian conservative community and probably damaged him to a small extent.

A lot of these folks are very traditionalist folks, and they're not into Manhattan values.

CARLSON: Manhattan values like the fact that when Giuliani moved out -- when his second marriage collapsed, he moved in with a couple of gay dudes? And -- I mean, is that -- I actually -- this is an honest question.

BUCHANAN: Holy smoke.

CARLSON: I mean, I think that's literally true. I mean, I'm not even taking a stand on it. I just -- I don't --

BUCHANAN: I know. I heard that. I didn't -- you know, I don't know that. I've used the example he marched in the gay-pride parade at the same time North American Man-Boy Love Association had a float, you know, a few yards from him.

And things like this -- I mean, New York just -- these things just go right by the board. But you tell folks in Iowa that and South Carolina and places like that, and they say, well, that's a mark -- you know, that city's decadent and he's right in the middle of that and that's not us. That's not our values.

So look what happened to George Bush over the fact that he'd got -- you know, he had been arrested while he had imbibed 25 years before. That sank him three or four points in the national polls.

CARLSON: No, that's an excellent point. And his blood-alcohol level -- I'm not defending drunk driving, of course -- but it, you know, it's not like he was wasted. He -- he wasn't at all. It was like three beers or something. No, and you're absolutely right.

—B.J.L.