Governor George Bush has launched his long-awaited plan to improve healthcare, while playing down an offensive comment picked up by microphone on a reporter who had written critical articles about him.
At the start of a rally in Naperville, Illinois, Mr Bush was overheard telling his running mate, Mr Dick Cheney, that the reporter, Mr Adam Clymer of the New York Times, whom he spotted in the crowd, was a "major league asshole". Mr Cheney replied: "Yeah, big time."
The exchange was not heard by most people in the crowd but was picked up by journalists' tape recorders.
Mr Bush said later: "I regret the comment I made to the vice-presidential candidate made it to the public airwaves." But he refused to regret the remark itself.
A Bush campaign spokesman said the remark was intended as "a whispered aside". He said that "most observers would agree his [Mr Clymer's] coverage was unfair". This is a reference to a series that Mr Clymer wrote weeks ago about Mr Bush's record in Texas.
The executive editor of the Times, Mr Joseph Lelyveld, said later this was the eighth campaign that Mr Clymer had covered and his work was "both fair and accurate". The Bush campaign had never complained about him to the newspaper.
The Gore campaign jumped in to say: "Al Gore and the Gore campaign hold the members of the fourth estate in very high regard."
The incident may not damage Mr Bush with voters, many of whom hold poor opinions of the media. Ironically, for months Mr Bush was getting more favourable press coverage than Mr Gore, who was much less accessible to the media following his campaign. Mr Bush is noted for his relaxed attitude with reporters, joking with them and giving them nicknames.
Mr Bush will be hoping the incident does not distract from what he regards as a centre-piece of his bid for the White House - a $158-billion plan to provide the elderly with improved healthcare and a subsidised prescription drugs scheme. He is hoping his plan will have wider appeal than Mr Gore's which was launched earlier this year.
Mr Gore has proposed spending about $253 billion over 10 years to add a prescription drug benefit to the present federal Medicare scheme for the elderly and disabled, set up by the late Lyndon Johnson in the 1960s as part of the "Great Society". The Gore scheme would mean higher premiums for the better-off. Under the present scheme, 12 million people on Medicare have no prescription drug coverage.
Mr Bush is proposing to spend $110 million over 10 years to "modernise" Medicare and provide more choice to recipients in their health plans. He would also give $48 billion to the states during the next four years to help low-income senior citizens with their medicine bills while waiting for the modernisation scheme to come into effect.
The Gore campaign has criticised the Bush plan as "by and for the big drug companies" and that it would "leave millions of seniors without any coverage." Reuters adds:
President Clinton's top aide mocked Mr Bush yesterday for insulting the reporter, tapping on a microphone and saying: "Is this mike on? You can never be too careful these days."
Mr Clinton, who threw back his head and guffawed at the joke by his chief-of-staff, Mr John Podesta, could not resist digging the knife in a little deeper.
"We like all of you," the President told reporters gathered in the White House Rose Garden. Asked earlier if Mr Clinton had ever used an expletive to describe a reporter, White House spokesman Mr Joe Lockhart paused and said: "Not in front of an open mike."
With the number of Americans without health insurance and the cost of prescription drugs rising, both Democrats and Republicans are stressing healthcare in the election.
Speaking in Columbus, Ohio, Mr Gore said there were major problems with Mr Bush's plan, including leaving millions of senior citizens without coverage and forcing others into managed health plans even if they do not want that kind of coverage.
But the "biggest problem", Mr Gore said, was "there is no money to pay for it if you give away all the surplus in the form of a giant tax cut for the wealthy at the expense of the middle class in a way that stops our prosperity and progress".
Mr Gore, who has drawn even or overtaken Mr Bush in opinion polls, hammered the Texas governor for details during a week devoted to campaigning on healthcare issues, finally challenging him to "put up or shut up".
Prescription medicines have become part of the debate as Americans are living longer thanks to better, more expensive drugs. But Medicare does not cover most drugs taken at home, even for serious conditions like heart problems or diabetes. That leaves senior citizens without prescription drug coverage spending $1,100 annually on average. Mr Bush levelled a litany of criticisms against Mr Gore's plan.