Editor's note: The Globe has invited writers from around the world to drop in on Campaign 2000 and tell us what they see. Today: A Dutch journalist's take on New Hampshire.

By Wim Roefs, Special to the Globe, 2/2/2000

It was white-line fever for the Straight Talk Express.

NEW HAMPSHIRE RESULTS Republican 98% of precincts reporting McCain 49% Bush 31% Forbes 13% Keyes 6% Bauer 1% Democrats 98% of precincts reporting Gore 52% Bradley 47% Percentages will not necessarily add to 100. FROM THE GLOBE Democrats fight to a close finish Independents turn GOP contest Contrarians speak up, leaders get wake up call Arizona senator has found strength in his weaknesses Independent voters say character was key to decision Why they voted the way they did Result no setback for Bush backer Cellucci Primary shows off NBC synergy Independents seen taking up the insurgents' fight Bauer, Keyes unbowed as they vow to soldier on Forbes hopes to make it a three-way race Bush campaign says it's ready to move on In Granite State diner, a final helping of politics First primary settled, campaigns mull new tactics On campaign trail, it's a frantic pace Vow of tenacity keeps Bradley's spirits high, focus keen For vice president's campaign, no letup in asking for votes NECN VIDEO Forbes praises McCain win, asks for more support Keyes will stay in race, despite big N.H. loss Gore wins the Democratic N.H. primary over Bradley Bradley greets voters at polls Will Bradley triumph? Turnout heavy in Granite State Can McCain pull off a victory? Gore makes a last minute effort These video clips are viewed using RealPlayer. Get RealPlayer | Help EARLIER COVERAGE Gore wins close race among Democrats McCain savors big win over Bush in GOP race True to tradition, N.H. tests front-runners McCain impressed voters as straight shooter GOP voters happier with candidates than in '96 Independents say character was key to vote Granite State voters have their say N.H. Secretary of State again predicts high turnout Keys to reading the New Hampshire returns Bradley, McCain win Dixville Notch, Hart's Location

There we went, John McCain in his campaign bus and this reporter in his rental car, desperately trying to keep up as the Arizona senator stormed down Interstate 495 in heavy traffic at 90 dark miles an hour.

McCain was on his way from one town hall meeting, in Plaistow, N.H., to the next, in Nashua, and the reporter was scared witless. Asked by the Globe to report on the New Hampshire primaries through foreign - in his case, Dutch - eyes, the reporter now feared he would not live long enough to complete the task.

Of course, McCain, too, was in danger of crashing, which could have defeated the purpose of his attempt to become president of the United States. He also seemed to be taking the law a little lightly while striving to become what should perhaps be the country's number one role model.

Still, the wild ride seemed as good a metaphor as any for the contradictions and oddities, and the manic pace, of a primary campaign that seemed both strange and often strangely alluring to a writer born in another land.

First, there are the voters - in the end, an oddly inspiring lot. Viewed from abroad, the American voter seems an electoral layabout, ill informed and little inclined to vote at all. Then one comes to New Hampshire and keeps running into folk who are sincerely and gladly going about the business of getting informed, gauging the candidates, fine-tuning their views.

''The issues that I am interested in are Social Security, prescriptions, and heating oil,'' said 80-year-old Leah Marcotte during a town hall meeting with Al Gore Saturday for undecided voters in Lebanon, N.H. The day before, she had listened live to Gore's Democratic opponent, Bill Bradley.

But the unexpected virtues of the voters find no match in the primary process. It seems unfathomable that a great country would entrust so much of the task of choosing presidents to such a tiny, quirky wedge of itself.

And why is it that primaries, which are party votes rather than elections per se, are decided by people who are not party members?

In states such as New Hampshire and South Carolina, voters don't even have to register for the party whose nominee they want to help select. The Western European mind boggles at that because back home, only dues-paying members of the many, many parties decide whom to present to the population at large for election as president or prime minister. Then the population at large laughs at most of the choices.

The primary process does give serious underdogs such as McCain a chance to build momentum, but not, it would seem, by design. It also gives the likes of Gary Bauer and Alan Keyes a soapbox and a chance to raise their post-primary speaking fees. Much of what they have to say sounds hilarious to these European ears.

''The United States should leave the World Trade Organization because of that organization's socialist programs,'' Bauer told a regular at Pete's Gun and Tackle Shop in Hudson last Thursday.

Bauer's stand apparently wasn't lost only on the foreigner in the place.

''I didn't care for that,'' a rugged type in the crowd mumbled as he joined his buddies elsewhere in the store.

But Bauer didn't come to discuss the WTO. He mentioned his disgust with ''men marrying men'' but was really there to defend the Second Amendment right to bear arms.

''Is CNN here yet?'' he asked his communications director.

A few minutes later, Bauer bravely started without CNN.

While Bauer's campaign is a relatively small affair, with an entourage that fits in a single SUV, all of the campaigns operate at an unearthly pace.

''It's a big difference compared to the Netherlands,'' said Hans Anker, a Dutch Washington-based political consultant who attended the New Hampshire debates last week. He recalled taking some American colleagues to the election ''war room'' of the senior government party in the Netherlands.

''At eight at night, the place was empty. The candidates were still on the road, but virtually nothing was going on in their election headquarters. It has a lot to do with the 24-hour news cycle in America. But that, of course, is changing in Europe, too.''

Substance, however, can't keep up with the speed of the US primary campaign, and so candidates simply say just about the same thing every day.

The reporters hang in there, despite the mind-numbing routine, dutifully recording speeches they've heard and recorded many times before.

Many of them are bored, though, and it shows. At the Nashua fund-raiser, in the overflow press room in front of a big screen, the crowd got a little disrespectful as vice president Gore reached hard for oratorical splendor.

Some reporters moaned, others groaned as Gore once again told a homespun joke about his dad's 1952 election for the US Senate, a joke he has told over and over again. When the vice president reached the punch line, the reporters were already there.

''Think some more, vote for Gore,'' members of the media proclaimed in unison, reciting the senior Gore's hokey slogan, drowning out the man on the monitor. Still, the laptops went tap, tap, tap.

The next day, of course, Gore, would deliver the line again and get another big laugh, underscoring what the carnival craziness of it all can obscure: This process belongs to the voters. Not the observers.

Certainly, that is the New Hampshire way, and its people could do much worse.

''You see somebody live or you see somebody on TV, it's a whole different thing,'' said 53-year-old Richard Ray of Atkinson, N.H., after a McCain event. ''Live, you get a measure of the man.'' Ray should count himself fortunate that he lives somewhere where he can say just that.

Wim Roefs is a freelance journalist who has written for major national newspapers and magazines in the Netherlands and in other European nations. He is also the author of a book on sectarian divisions in Ireland.