President Bush has been called for jury duty. And he says he’s going to do it.

Does Judge Strother expect him to show up?

Why, yes, the judge said by telephone, the White House assured him that “the president considers it an important civic responsibility and duty.”

And, he said he was told, “the president didn’t want to be treated differently than anybody else.”

It’s deja vu, all over again. In 1996, as Texas Governor, he was called to jury duty:

GOP Gov. George W. Bush, saying that it’s “a feeble excuse” to say he’s too busy or too important for the task, reported for jury duty today.

The 1996 case is notable because it demonstrated Bush’s clear intent in lying in order to hide his drunk driving arrest.

Seeing as how it would be a great “I’m just a regular guy” publicity stunt, Bush enthusiastically agreed to do jury duty as governor in 1996. However, he was then assigned to a drunk driving case, which sent him into a panic: jurors would be asked–under oath–if they had ever been arrested for drunk driving. Time for a feeble excuse!

Then-gubernatorial-counsel Alberto Gonzales got Bush out of that mess by coming up with a lame “the governor might be asked to pardon this guy for drunk driving” excuse, and the judge, who I can only assume rolled his eyes, allowed Bush to slither off. Gonzales in now the Attorney General, by the way, wonder how that happened.

And here’s the liberal media striking yet again: I checked about 30 different major media articles, independently written, and found only two–one local and one AP version–that mentioned that Bush had been called for jury duty previously. Only the AP version brings up how Bush left blank the part of his jury form that asked about his criminal record, and only alludes slightly as to how Bush used the “governor’s pardon” excuse to dodge having to lie under oath or admit to drunk driving.

Outside of The Boston Globe, that AP story ran only in local Texas papers. All other non-Texas papers completely ignored the 1996 incident.

Darn that liberal media!