The dress code was established initially by the first Bush administration, and, at the time, it specified that women wear knee-length skirts and stockings in the West Wing. In other words, during the administrations of Ronald Reagan and Bush the Elder, only the boys wore pants. Because this was an idea whose time came -- and went -- in the Paleozoic era, the minor style revolution that followed with the election of Bill Clinton was totally inadvertent.

"On Inauguration Day, I was wearing a pantsuit," Dee Dee Myers, Clinton's former press secretary, told Chris Bury on "Nightline" two days after George W. Bush's inauguration. "It was a very cold day in Washington and when I came into the West Wing, I actually broke what had been a Reagan and Bush protocol rule, which was: Women weren't allowed to wear slacks. And so we sort of changed that protocol right from the very beginning, accidentally. I don't think any of us realized there was a dress code that officially or unofficially discouraged or barred women from wearing slacks."

The no-pants rule was never rehabilitated, so after the recent dress code announcement, many feared the worst: nude pantyhose. When Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer eventually declared that "the [women's] pantsuits can stay," women outside the Amish community breathed a collective sigh of relief. He made it clear, however, that in this administration, West Wing women would be required to wear "appropriate business attire" and men would be expected to wear suits and ties at all times. The point, as one aide told the New York Times, was "to treat the office with respect."

Some people might find this statement ironic.

The implication -- OK, it's pretty spelled out -- is, of course, that Clinton's staffers were not expected to be properly attired and that in fact they dressed in a manner that did not accord the office of the president the respect it deserves. Bush supporters have done their part to paint such a picture and have hailed the return of the dress code as a return to the halcyon days of order and discipline.

"Mr. Bush is restoring the dignity that used to be associated with the Presidency," wrote Tom Barrett on Christianlink.com. "Gone are the blue jeans, tie-dyes, T-shirts and jogging shorts that were considered appropriate attire during Clinton's Presidency."

"Out are the 20-something, denim-wearing, pony-tailed Clintonites known for strewing pizza boxes throughout the halls," wrote Joseph Curl of the Washington Times. "In are the 30- and 40-something, box-cut, scrubbed-clean, suit-and-tie-wearing Bushies."

The media has echoed this sentiment, or at least repeated it, pretty much uncritically. The New York Times referred to the "remarkable relaxation of the White House dress code" after Clinton's inauguration in 1993, saying that "aides frequently attended meetings in jeans and T-shirts."

It's all very evocative of the "no son of mine" longhair debates of yore -- debates that raged before some of us were out of diapers. But in fact it's grounded in pure fantasy -- one in which the Clinton White House resembles a Broadway revival of "Hair." Not surprisingly, former White House staffers find the suggestion that they dressed inappropriately or disrespectfully quite surprising, though not all that surprising.

Order "Mothers Who Think: Tales of Real-Life Parenthood" from the editors of Mothers Who Think.