WASHINGTON -- Perhaps you wonder why principled conservatives, who have spent their lifetimes advocating states' rights and local control, might suddenly urge the opposite of their convictions and recommend federal preemption of state authority simply to get their guy into the Oval Office.
Perhaps it's confusing why a conservative state government, elected in part to protect community prerogatives, might toss its convictions and try to shut down the legal counting of election results by counties while it is ongoing, simply to get their presidential candidate Florida's 25 electoral votes.
And perhaps it's also hard to figure why much of elite opinion in the country is more inclined to accept this conduct than to contest it, why you are more likely to get invited to all the right salons by urging ''Give it up, Al'' than ''Give it up, Junior.''
Actually, it's not that complex.
For our current political mess to be properly understood, it is necessary to appreciate the key, cultural difference between those who lean toward the left and those who lean toward the right.
Toward the left, you get bleeders, hand-wringers, process freaks, and genuinely weird people who confuse ''the good of the country'' with the avoidance of tough judgments.
But toward the right, you get straight-ahead, Patton-like dedication to victory and disciplined advocacy even of contradictory positions.
The number of departures from the reservation is vastly fewer, partly because such departures are punished severely and partly because the focus on victory over process is so intense.
And among the elites, who still can shape more of public opinion than is realized, you have the right's natural patsies, preferring the false comity of acquiescence over conflict.
The perfect example occurred at the end of last week.
When the Gore campaign began raising the possibility of joining lawsuits targeting the legality of the famous butterfly ballot in Palm Beach, the Bushies spun like tops: no lawsuits, no lawyers, closure, good of the country.
Within hours ''Give it up, Al'' Democrats had bought into this, joined shortly by editorialists for The Washington Post and The New York Times.
But having lined them all up, the Bush crowd then humiliated them within 24 hours after Gore used Florida law to request recounts by hand in counties where he thought his total was anomalously low.
Bush could have done the same, but his campaign was too dumb and too slow.
Within 24 hours, Bush faced the realistic prospect as defined by his own political advisers that a full recount - not just in the four Gore-selected counties but statewide, if that should ever be permitted (and it could be) - would give Gore the plurality.
At that point, the spinning went in the exact opposite direction: Yes to lawsuits, yes to lawyers, no to closure.
The Bush campaign's abortive maneuver into federal court yesterday to stop a process that might result in Gore having more votes than Bush sets the stage for a more overtly corrupt attempt by Secretary of State Katherine Harris to stop the counting today.
Incredibly, she will seek to certify results before they exist - to stop counting while it is continuing. Incredibly, the Bush campaign will support her arbitrary acts under a state law the Bush campaign also argues is unconstitutional.
Harris's astonishing abuse of authority comes on the heels of her revealing comment that she might extend certification deadlines for a hurricane, but not for an election with international repercussions.
For perspective, Harris is not just the co-chair of the Bush campaign in Florida. She also campaigned door-to-door for the Texan in New Hampshire, was a delegate in Philadelphia, tried to use Bush surrogate Norman Schwarzkopf as the spokesman for state-funded voting ads this fall, and is seeking a Bush administration diplomatic job because the voters have terminated her elected position (she blew $100,000 on foreign travel last year and this).
It will be be interesting - and dispositive - to see how the ''Give it up, Al'' crowd and the elite opinion formers handle all that.
The meek ostriches among us will inherit much, but not the presidency.
Thomas Oliphant's e-mail address is oliphant@globe.com.
