This never would have happened...

This never would have happened if Michael Dukakis had been elected.

People go to a Greek restaurant, they have a little spanakopita, a little retsina, they get caught up in the spirit of

things, they get up and boogie, Peloponnesian-style.

But the entertainment permit for the Great Greek restaurant in Sherman Oaks allows only the waiters to dance. Moreover, the neighbors complain, all those dancing diners make noise and, besides, their cars take up too much of the parking space on the streets where the residents reside.

It didn’t take the Trojan War to resolve matters. In a ruling by John J. Parker, the city’s associate zoning administrator, the diners can keep on dancing if security guards are hired to monitor noise, the number of patrons and parking. And, among other concessions, neighbors who live within 500 feet of the Great Greek can keep its phone number handy to call in complaints.

“The sole request here is to legalize the apparently spontaneous inclination of patrons to join the dancing done by waiters,” said Parker.

This may be the beginning of a legal odyssey: Some neighbors plan an appeal.

Caveat 4X4.

Seen driving down the 91 Freeway: a Suzuki Samurai--the kind criticized as vehicularly tipsy by some consumer researchers--with the personalized license plate 1ROLOVR.

As best as could be ascertained, the driver was not Ralph Nader.

Now it’s Winnie one for the Gipper.

Ronald Reagan will be honored with the Winston Churchill Award at a dinner here in May, the British consulate-general announced.

And doing the honors in Beverly hills will be HRH the Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth, Baron Greenwich--and that’s all one person, Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth II.

The Winston Churchill Foundation, begun in 1959 by admirers of Britain’s half-American wartime prime minister, has in years past honored three individuals--W. Averell Harriman, Margaret Thatcher and Texas electronics magnate H. Ross Perot.

Reagan, explained foundation President John L. Loeb Jr., “like Winston Churchill, is one of the great leaders of our time.”

In a city where people brush their teeth, play the harmonica and even fax in their cars, four-wheeled advertising seemed a sine qua non.

But Councilman Marvin Braude is proposing that we do away with the rolling promos, the huge signboards aboard otherwise empty trucks that travel “at very low speeds” through commuter-clogged parts of town, thus clogging them even more.

Braude has campaigned before to ban new stationary billboards only to be thwarted by colleagues amid heavy lobbying from the billboard industry, a big contributor to council campaigns.

This time, opines Braude, advertisers have taken their show on the road--and too far. “The use of public streets for advertising,” he declares, “is not justified at a time when traffic congestion is one of the most significant problems facing the city.”

Blow, blow, thou winter wind, raged Shakespeare. Thou art not so unkind as man’s ingratitude.

Depends on the man. Criminal lawyer Howard Weitzman, who beat the rap for client John DeLorean in two major cases, is suing DeLorean for $683,392 in unpaid legal fees.

The one-time auto maker wunderkind, acquitted on federal drug charges here, and on fraud, racketeering and income tax evasion charges in Detroit, was once videotaped in a hotel room by a hidden government camera, apparently crooning over a packet of cocaine that “it’s better than gold.”

DeLorean had already signed over to Weitzman his 48-acre, $2.5-million estate--La Cuesta de Camellia, in Pauma Valley in northern San Diego County--for legal services rendered in Los Angeles, but this account-overdue sum is apparently left over from the Detroit case.

“He owes me close to $700,000,” Weitzman said, “and if it wasn’t for me he’d certainly be in a different position than he’s in now.”