Dan Quayle

YOU remember Bob Woodward, the young journalist in shining armor who smote down Richard Nixon almost 20 year ago. Well, Bob is all grown up now and he's gone on to other things. A couple of weeks ago he co-authored a seven-part newspaper series which boosts the political prospects of Dan Quayle.By itself, virtually regardless of content, a week-long focus on the vice president connotes that Quayle must be some fellow, all right, if that great big newspaper, the Washington Post, and its famous reporter are paying so much attention to him. Add to this unfortunate impression the fact that the articles were essentially favorable to their subject,and the bewilderment is complete.

WASHINGTON -- Television shots of President Bush being raised from the floor in a deathly pallor were not exactly the campaign footage the White House had hoped for from his Asia trip.But that is what the world saw repeated all day long, and that is the image top officials of the Bush-Quayle re-election campaign confronted yesterday morning when they discussed the president's collapse at a meeting at their headquarters here.One of those officials, Charles Black, said they didn't spend even five minutes on it "because next week it will be something else."

ON AND OFF THE AIR:* How do you know a presidential election year is in the works? One clue is that Vice President Dan Quayle is a scheduled guest tonight on ABC's "20/20" (at 10, Channel 13).Host Barbara Walters is the interviewer of not only Quayle but his wife, Marilyn. And while Walters can be counted on to ask some tough questions of President Bush's presumed ticketmate, such a national forum seems one more step in the rebuilding of the Quayle image.Just last month for example, he was well received in a speech to the Baltimore Council on Foreign Relations.

HAMLET" is probably the toughest of all stage roles, but vice president of the United States comes a close second and, the other day, J. Danforth Quayle blew it badly. The poor fellow doesn't know how to play vice president at all.We all know the script. The veep comes on as an amiable duffer, a combine of Hubert Humphrey and Jerry Ford. He's smirky, irresponsible, a political punching bag. He says something nice about the city. He tells a fairly funny story, preferably on himself. Loyally, he grinds out a little speech slung together for him by the second-string White House speech writer.

Vice President Dan Quayle will give a speech in Baltimore Sept. 19 on "American Foreign Policy." He will speak before the Baltimore Council on Foreign Affairs at the Hyatt Regency Inner Harbor Hotel.The luncheon program will run from noon to 1:30 p.m. Reservations are required. Ticket information may be obtained by called the council at 727-2150.

Washington. -- It's possible that when Dan Quayle was in law school two decades ago and learned about the so-called ''American rule'' -- that each side of a lawsuit bear its own costs, no matter who wins -- it struck him as absurd and unfair.And it's possible that he thought, ''By golly, if I should ever find myself Vice President of the United States and chairman of the President's Council on Competitiveness, I'm going to do something about it!''Possible, but not likely, is it? Not just because he's Dan Quayle.

WASHINGTON -- There is a small political time bomb sputtering here that is aimed at Vice President Dan Quayle. It will probably fizzle out, but in New Hampshire you never can be sure.The threat to Quayle lies in a provision of the presidential primary law here that allows candidates for vice president, as well as president, to run. They can place their names on the ballot by circulating petitions or simply run write-in campaigns, the latter even for candidates who do not give their permission.

Have politics in the United States evaporated? Has what political commentator Sidney Blumenthal called "the permanent campaign" given way to no campaign at all? Have we Americans, in our disgust with politics (a disgust that must include self-disgust, since it is no one but ourselves who vote the politicians into office) decided that politics has nothing to offer us?I do not believe in a Zeitgeist -- a hidden hand that, acting behind the backs of human beings, concerts their actions toward a predestined end -- yet several developments in apparently unrelated areas have seemed recently to create -- or at least to bring to light -- a striking national lull in electoral matters.

The status of President Bush's health, following his hospitalization and treatment for an irregular heartbeat, has touched off renewed speculation about Vice President Dan Quayle's future.Of 685 Evening Sun readers and other callers to SUNDIAL yesterday, 379, or 55 percent, do not believe that Quayle is qualified to serve as president, and 306, or 44 percent, believe that he is qualified.Of 682 callers, 374, or 54 percent, believe Bush should choose another running mate if he runs for re-election in 1992, and 308, or 45 percent, believe he should not choose another running mate.

"Mr. President" a reporter asked at yesterday's press conference, "what do you say to the pundits who suggested that as a result of your health scare over the weekend, you might reconsider keeping Dan Quayle on the ticket next year?" George Bush replied, "Do you want it by hand or do you want it by word? No, no! I'm no Nelson Rockefeller."Before President Bush's weekend hospitalization, we had tTC prepared an editorial with the above headline that concluded, "We remain as convinced today as we were in 1988 that George Bush owes it to the nation and to history to get himself a new running mate.