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Posted on 10/05/2001 12:34:39 PM PDT by Utah Girl

BOSTON — Before Sept. 11, eyes would have rolled. "Saturday Night Live" skit writers would have dashed to their keyboards. Comedy Central would have found fodder for its fold.

But this time when President Bush told CIA workers that the enemy not only "underestimated" America, they "mis" underestimated the will and determination of the commander in chief, too," not a word was uttered. When he uttered his favorite malaprop three times in three sentences, not a titter was heard.

The "mis" take was edited from the CNN transcript. It was dropped from the excerpts in most newspapers. It appeared in a rather gentle piece in The Washington Post suggesting that things are back to normal when the president is back to mangling his words.

This is how life changes. One line at a time.

Before Sept. 11, Jay Leno could say, "We make fun of George Bush, but this morning he was at work bright and early. OK, he was early."

Before Sept. 11, a humor columnist wrote Dubya's Dayly Diary on the Internet.

Before Sept. 11, Bush himself told a graduating class at Yale, "To those of you who received honors, awards and distinction, I say well done. And to the C students, I say you, too, can be president of the United States."

Deprecation and self-deprecation were in. Now they're out. It's not that the country has become permanently humor-impaired. Grimaces and grins already are reappearing around the edges of mourning. Humor has reappeared on the Internet's The Onion under gently risky headlines: "Hijackers Surprised to Find Selves in Hell" and "U.S. Vows to Defeat Whoever It Is We're at War With."

Nor is it just that the folks who wondered whether Bush was up to the job now collectively need to believe that he was misunderestimated.

It is rather that the carefree ridicule of presidents and politicians, the casual focus on personal foibles of public leaders, now seems to be based on a distant premise that these people really didn't matter.

How long has it been since politics was approached like a rather grubby form of entertainment, and politicians were treated like tabloid celebrities? Since Gary Hart was asked the A-word during his presidential quest? Before that?

The old feminist slogan, the personal is political, was turned upside down into the assumption that all politics is personal, and the personal is trivial. We went from covering up FDR's infirmity and hiding JFK's infidelity to exposing every pratfall and scandal and malaprop of leaders.

Now once again, the political is, well, political. What matters is what the politicians do — in public, for the public. The funny business is sober.

Remember when Rudy Giuliani was gossip fodder with an estranged wife in Gracie Mansion and a girlfriend by his side? Was that only a month ago? Now he is king of New York, preacher to the United Nations, and when he credits the support of Judith Nathan, no one hisses.

Remember how Gary Condit dominated cable all summer? Now that congressman is a part of a local missing persons case, not a national obsession.

And remember Monica? On Monday when the Supreme Court opened its session by suspending Bill Clinton from practicing before the bench, it seemed like the last blast from another era when we waited breathlessly for news of a president's sex life, not his response to terrorism.

I'm not suggesting that we will censor criticism. It's true that when Bill Maher countered the president's idea of cowardly terrorists — loose lips sink sponsors — he discovered the true meaning of "politically incorrect." But Ari Fleischer's lip was equally loose when he said Americans "need to watch what they say."

I am struck, however, by how quickly we have reordered our priorities. In one day, the attention switched from the trivial to the terrifying, from malaprops to the maze of foreign policy, from sex and silliness to civil liberties and safety. We remember what's worth worrying about and arguing about.

Before Sept. 11? Cartoonist Gary Trudeau used to portray Bush as the ultimate lightweight with a feather as his icon.

But on Oct. 1, he drew his bimbo, Boopsie, offering the exclamation point to the new era: "Oh my goodness, I can't believe it. I no longer care what Madonna had for breakfast!"

As her husband responded, "Welcome back."

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