Fair enough, although that position doesn't shield others from being hassled over their activities as private citizens. As the drug war escalates, Uncle Sam's reach extends further. In 1998, Congress amended the Higher Education Act in an effort to exclude students with past drug convictions from receiving financial aid. According to Students for Sensible Drug Policy, some 8,600 college kids have lost some or all of their benefits during the current school year after revealing a drug conviction on their application form. Another 278,000 refused to answer the question; Congress is poised to tighten restrictions further to de-fund those students, too.

In other words, between drug busts and aid cuts, young people and pot is a big story. So why has there been utter silence -- a database search finds not a single reference to the Enquirer story in the two weeks since its publication -- on the Jenna Bush allegation?

Three explanations present themselves. First, reporters have found no evidence to corroborate the Enquirer's allegation. Fred Zipp, managing editor of the Austin American-Statesman, said in an interview, "From time to time we have pursued tips about the behavior of the Bush daughters" -- that is, Jenna and her twin sister, Barbara -- "but we didn't find anything newsworthy."

A second possibility, of course, is that the major media aren't much interested in marijuana-crime stories. Why not? Maybe because reporters, who may have had countercultural-pharmaceutical-type experiences in their own pasts, tend to empathize with marijuana dabbling. And so journos might not think that dope smoking is a crime worth getting revved up about. According to a Pew Center poll released this week, 38 percent of Americans admit they've experimented with marijuana. Extrapolated to the entire U.S. population, that's over 100 million experimenters. So maybe the media deserve credit for realizing that marijuana use is no big deal -- even when, allegedly, the "criminal" in question is a president's daughter.

A third possibility is that the non-tabloid pressies are simply afraid to follow the truth if they think it will lead them into trouble. Jane Hall, professor of journalism at the American University in Washington, observed in an interview, "It's not going to win reporters any points with the public to go after this story." But what about the law, which goes after plenty of pot users? Hall answered by noting the current split between popular culture and the legal culture: "The American public is forgiving; the penal system is not forgiving."

Needless to say, President Bush and the entire White House apparat would probably not feel forgiving toward the media entity that pursued a story about drug use in his family. That means no state dinner invitations for Enquirer editor Steve Coz. But it also might leave people wondering what revelations are being squelched by the reporters and editors who do show up at presidential fetes.

Who could blame Bush for feeling unforgiving and unfriendly toward those who would violate his family's privacy? But who could blame any other father for feeling similarly -- but perhaps unavailingly -- protective toward his own children as they are drug-busted?

This much is certain: The law is not nearly as forgiving to the nonwhite and the non-protected. According to the Sentencing Project, African-Americans account for 13 percent of the drug-using population, but a disproportionate 55 percent of those convicted of drug offenses.

Jenna Bush, of course, has been convicted of nothing. But the legal system her father now oversees looks increasingly guilty of discrimination against the weak and hypocrisy in favor of the strong.

And that should be a big story.

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