Tilting at Windmills.

• Author: PETERS, CHARLES

Botox In Botswana * Wise Choices In West Virginia * Gays For The Draft! Gender-Bending Eels * Naughty Lawyers * Nervous Pitchers

I'M SURE ONE REASON THAT THE rich always think they have to get richer is that the world continues to offer such tantalizing opportunities to spend more money. For example, there's a new service for those who want to get their faces lifted and their tummies tucked but who worry about peeping friends, neighbors, and business associates. Orient-Express Hotels and an organization called Surgeon & Safari offer the services of a renowned plastic surgeon in Johannesburg, South Africa combined with a recuperation package featuring "pampering health and beauty treatment," amid the "opulent surroundings" of luxury hotels providing a "discreet layout and sense of embarking on an exciting safari following their treatment at Orient Express' Gametrackers camps in Botswana." A 14-day package includes "procedures such as eyelid surgery, full-face laser resurfacing, liposuction, and breast lifts."

NORMALLY, WHEN PRESIDENTIAL campaigns come down to the wire, I can rest assured that my home state will vote Democratic, since West Virginia rarely votes for Republican presidential candidates. Indeed, it has only done so three times in 80 years and each of those times was part of a national landslide to re-elect a Republican incumbent. But this year, it seems that George W. Bush has a chance of changing that record. If he succeeds, Bush would be the first Republican presidential candidate that West Virginia has supported for a first term in all those years. The reason is that Gore's pro-environment record makes him suspect not only to mine owners but to mine workers as well. The same is true of the chemical industry. And steel industry doesn't like his advocacy of free trade.

According to the most recent poll in the Charleston Gazette, he trails Bush by a margin of 39 to 37 percent. Bush may also help re-elect Republican governor Cecil H. Underwood, who is running against the veteran liberal congressman Bob Wise. This is unfortunate because Underwood's lifetime of devotion to the interests of large corporations should not be rewarded. I hope my friends back home will realize before it's too late that whatever their deficiencies, Gore and Wise are the better choices.

GAYS SHOULD SUPPORT A draft, says my friend Charles Moskos, a professor at Northwestern and an authority on military manpower issues. Here's his argument: Because of the military's prohibition against self-proclaimed gays, a draft would inspire those who didn't want to serve to claim they're gay. So many people would try to use this avenue of escape that the military would have to say, "That's no excuse, we accept gays." I love it!

ONE OF THE MOST SACRED TENETS of George W. Bush's compassionate conservatism is that "no child should be left behind." But if you look at Bush's record on health care for kids, you realize that a lot of Texas children are being left behind because they're too sick to keep up. 734,000 Texas children have no health insurance. One reason Bush was able to cut Texas taxes by $2.7 billion was because he underfunded Medicaid. Of all Texas children who are eligible for Medicaid, 40 percent do not receive it.

THE MEDIA'S approach to George W. Bush's misrepresentations, as opposed to those of Al Gore, has been notably sotto voce, even though it seems to me that Bush's have been a good deal more substantial than Gore's. After the third debate, however, The New York Times' Jim Yardley and The Washington Post's Glenn Kessler did nail the highly misleading statements Bush made about his support for a Texas patients' bill of rights and a bill allowing women direct access to the ob/gyn of their choice. "The reforms happened despite him, not because of him," the reporters were mid. Still, both the Times and the Post buried their stories on inside pages.

ANOTHER ITEM FROM CHARLIE Moskos. Earlier this year, he surveyed 430 Northwestern undergraduates on their attitudes toward military service. The results showed little enthusiasm for joining up. Then Charlie gave a five minute talk in which he described his own experience as a draftee in Germany during the 1950s, and his experience studying peacekeeping operations in Somalia, Haiti, and Bosnia:

"I sought to be as candid as I could by noting the potential dangers as well as the physical demands and regimentation of military service. But I also mentioned the fun and laughter in the company of a cross-section of Americans I would otherwise never have met. I described peacekeeping as an ennobling experience and the chance to march with history. I concluded by saying that doing something so different for a year or two was the best way to refresh oneself before going on to graduate school or a career."

After his short talk, Charlie took a second survey. This time "the propensity to enlist doubled for the two-year option and trebled for the 15-month one."

Nicholas Thompson makes a similar point in his article about why young people aren't attracted to government service. They simply don't know how interesting and fulfilling it can be.

In my own life, going from private practice of law to...