HOUSTON NOTEBOOK : How Soon They Forget

John H. Sununu was walking around the convention floor Tuesday morning, trailed by reporters and an occasional autograph-seeker. Eventually, he sat down for an interview. “Who is that?” a woman delegate asked a reporter. It was Sununu, the reporter replied. “Who is he?” the woman responded. Sununu was chief of staff during George Bush’s first three years as President, the reporter said. “Oh,” she said. “I’m a little tired.” And then she wandered off.

The Great Misquoter

As Honest Abe once said . . . “Not! “ In his Monday night address to the Republican Convention, Ronald Reagan said Democrats did not understand “the principle so eloquently stated by Abraham Lincoln: ‘You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot help the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer . . . ‘ “ Only problem is, Lincoln said no such thing. The lines Reagan quoted are part of a list of 10 maxims that Lincoln scholars say are commonly--and mistakenly--attributed to the Great Emancipator. “They’ve been exposed time and time again since 1949 and they keep cropping up,” says Harvard University Professor David Herbert Donald. “A few of them bear a vague resemblance to ideas Lincoln held at one time or other, but they are not his words and not his views.”

It’s Called a Hammer, Al

Not to be upstaged by the Republicans, who have chosen family values as today’s convention theme du jour, Democrats Bill Clinton and Al Gore will try to pound home their own pro-family message--using real hammers and nails. The running mates and their families arrived Tuesday in Atlanta, where they dined with former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Rosalynn. This morning, the Clintons, Gores and Carters will help Habitat for Humanity volunteers build a new home in a poor section of Atlanta.