Stand-Up For Her Man

Laura Bush gets the laughs, but her mission is no laughing matter

The White House theater was not built for stand-up comedy. But two Fridays ago, Laura Bush was definitely, as they say at the Friars Club, "in the house." She was practicing a then secret, now acclaimed comedy routine that she would deliver the next night at the White House Correspondents' Association dinner, a tribal feast on the Potomac where some 3,000 reporters--and their sources--converge in a hotel ballroom for steak and fish, wine and laughs. Traditionally, the President does the wisecracking. But earlier this year, after surveying the string of press dinners on his calendar, Bush told aides, "Laura should give...

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