THE TALKING HEADS across America's television networks, still jabbering in overdrive since September 11, like to opine that it will be months and possibly years before the full impact of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington becomes clear. But already, it seems, one of the hidden casualties will be the political career of Al Gore.
Mr Gore was the vice-president who ran as the Democratic candidate against then Texas governor George W. Bush in the national election last November.
Both weak candidates, they fought the most controversial election in United States history. Mr Gore won the popular vote but lost 5-4 in the crucial judgment by the Justices of the Supreme Court that assured Republican Mr Bush of victory by stopping the counting of disputed votes in the state of Florida.
With Mr Bush's legitimacy in question, Mr Gore was expected to have a powerful weapon to rally Democrat sympathies going into 2004. But less than a month after the terrorist strikes, everything - to quote the cliche of the moment - has changed. The crisis of November last year suddenly looks small.
The supposedly illegitimate Mr Bush is now enjoying approval ratings of 90 per cent, as high as any post-war president. He has delivered the speech of his life - faint praise admittedly - to the US Congress.
And as Americans rally behind the flag and his 'new war' on terrorism, no one is in the mood to laugh at his foreign-policy inexperience either.