DOES WHAT WE DO IN PRIVATE COUNT IN PUBLIC?(MAIN)

Byline: CLARENCE PAGE

WASHINGTON -- Character, Rep. J.C. Watts of Oklahoma likes to say, is what you do when nobody's looking.

That's setting the bar pretty high. We do a lot of things in private that we wouldn't want anybody to know about in public.

Yet, most of us probably would agree with what Watts, the son of a Baptist minister and the only black Republican in Congress, is saying. We usually like to think that the things we do in private, when nobody's looking, are a pretty good measure of what we will do when everyone is looking.

What, then, are we to make of what President Clinton is alleged to have done when nobody but Monica …