ASHINGTON - In courthouses, canvassing boards, party headquarters and television studios, there is action on every front. But in truth, the effort to bring the 2000 presidential election to a close is at a virtual standstill.
That's because now, 10 days after Election Day, the officials who are trying to sort out the Florida ballot questions are trying to convince the public of their legitimacy, the very problem that the eventual winner will confront on Inauguration Day.
Indeed, the political world is at an impasse because it is, in a word, political.
All the political arts that permit it to sort out the usual questions of taxes, treaties, and tariffs are ineffective in this unusual situation. On Capitol Hill and in the halls of diplomacy, those arts are tools to untie the knots of disagreement. In this election dispute, they are impediments, tugging the knots ever tighter.
Right now neither Governor George W. Bush's nor Vice President Al Gore's camp - and certainly not the two sides together - has figured out a way to make the final result seem like anything but a Florida fix.
From top to bottom - from the candidates themselves to the ballot counters, from the well-tailored lawyers to the party activists, even the judges and the state officials - there is not a single figure in this imbroglio who is free of career, friendship, or partisan connections.
The Florida secretary of state, Katherine Harris, was co-chair of Bush's campaign in Florida. The attorney general, Robert A. Butterworth, was chairman of Gore's campaign in Florida. The Palm Beach County canvassing board's decision to hold a hand recount was a strict party-line vote.
Even if the matter eventually goes to the state Supreme Court, which suddenly has become a central actor in the drama, that panel's heavy Democratic dominance is well known. Many of the state's leading officials were appointed by Governor Jeb Bush, a Republican and the brother of the GOP nominee.
In more than a week of claims, charges, and courtroom exchanges, not one action has occurred and not one proposal has emerged that is free of these sorts of ties.
So far the public is patient, tolerant, even indulgent. But the selection of a president at a time of deep skepticism of the political establishment would render the new president's job difficult in the best of circumstances.
Right now, the bellows of self-interest are so strong that the whispers of national interest are inaudible.
This may all be posturing for a grand summit (or for a surreptitious set of negotiations) in the days ahead, but the action and rhetoric issuing from the Bush and Gore camps thus far have conformed strictly to their respective interests.
Gore's proposal for new hand counts of ballots is part of the vice president's determination to find a solution that will favor him even at the cost of making it more difficult to claim legitimacy if he eventually prevails. Bush's determination to bring the impasse to a swift conclusion reflects the preliminary counts that favor his cause but could undermine the legitimacy of the presidency he might get.
This is a result, of course, of the most frustrating element of this entire episode: the difficulty of finding a course that will reflect the voters' intentions, preserve the candidates' chances, and uphold the public's demand for a president who has a fully credible claim to the power he will wield.
And so the biggest vacuum in the political world right now is risk and courage.
The two men displayed both in their campaigns. Gore took a risk in adopting a strong populist agenda at a time of economic prosperity, a formula for campaigning that was unconventional and controversial. He showed courage in selecting Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut, the first Jew to be named to a national ticket, as his running mate.
Bush took a risk in rethinking conventional notions about Social Security and arms control. And he showed courage in opening his convention and his party to blacks and other minorities.
Yet their positions today show no risk or courage, and neither has been able to hide his motivation - to muscle his rival off the stage. And the main reason this situation still remains unresolved is that neither Bush nor Gore - nor the political system that produced them and nominated them - has transcended the limitations that brought Americans to this dead heat in the first place.
