HOWARD STERN COMES UP SHORT IN GOOD HOUSEKEEPING POLL.

Byline: Daily News Staff and Wire Services

Howard Stern may be the king of all media, but he's just another court jester at Good Housekeeping.

Radio personality Stern had lobbied his listeners this fall to write in his name in Good Housekeeping's annual ``Most Admired Person in America'' poll - after he discovered his name was not on the original ballot.

When Good Housekeeping tallied the 45,000 ballots it received, however, Stern's name was on exactly 30 of them - leaving him several hundred votes behind, say, Rush Limbaugh, who finished ninth.

``Howard didn't quite make the top 10,'' joked a magazine spokesman. ``His listeners may be very loyal to him, but perhaps they don't admire him as much as he thinks.''

Stern isn't too likely to worry about this poll, of course, since Good Housekeeping readers are not his prime demographic. He also has a couple of fallback projects: He recently signed a multi-year, multimillion-dollar radio syndication deal, and his movie ``Private Parts'' is coming out early next year.

The 10 most admired men in the poll are Billy Graham, President Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Christopher Reeve, Colin Powell, George Bush, Ronald Reagan, Bob Dole, Limbaugh and Bob Hope.

Christmas dish: Did ABC announce its first schedule change for the 1997-98 season with a dash of Christmas spirit? On a holiday card sent to Walt Disney Co. employees from company chairman Michael Eisner, a list of important company events for 1997 includes the Sept. 21 premiere of ``The Wonderful World of Disney'' on the Disney-owned network in the 7-9 p.m. Sunday time period. While consideration of the program move has been reported, the network has never made an official announcement. An ABC spokeswoman would not confirm the scheduling even though it has the holiday blessing of Eisner. ``Scheduling is always subject to change and won't be finalized until May,'' the spokeswoman said.