Sept. 11 Fallout: What Was Old Is New Again.(ISSUES & INSIGHTS)(VIEWPOINT)

Byline: DAVE SHIFLETT

The year 2001 will forever be linked with another number -- 911 -- and no doubt some of our famed numerologists will release helpful explainers as to What It All Means.

The Rev. Louis Farrakhan, who has wowed vast audiences by stringing together digits allegedly revealing deep plots of supernatural origin, is no doubt hard at work, as are a host of other determined cranks.

When the World Trade Center death estimate lingered at 3,001, you could hear their brains whirling: 3001 is exactly 1,000 more than the year in which the horror took place; if you add 911 to 2001, plus 89 -- which, as it happens, is the exact number of states in the union, give or take 39 -- you see the mists begin to part and the Larger Picture emerging.

As we await these great works, those of us who are manacled to words take a much more prosaic view. We merely agree that our world has been turned upside down, as the old Revolutionary War-era song put it.

That song -- "The World Turned Upside Down" -- was played after the British surrender at Yorktown. In that drama, the decidedly crazed George III had been defeated by George Dubya (for Washington), a wooden-toothed Virginian. This time around, the maniacal head of an international terrorist group has been stomped by George Dubya Bush, a fairly ordinary Texan who prior to the encounter was said to have a wooden head.

No longer. Dubya is now highly revered -- so much so that few call him Dubya anymore. His wife has become the world's greatest wife and comforter. Nobody talks about his daughters, formerly the world's most indiscreet users of fake IDs, except to offer them movie roles.