ARTHAGE, Tenn. - The focus may be on the latest legal whiplash in Florida or Washington, but the folks in this tiny town nestled beneath the Cumberland Hills know the real story of Al Gore's political plight lies a lot closer to home.
Oh, of course their Al won his hometown of Carthage and the surrounding county. But Tennessee, whose electoral votes could have put Gore over the top and made him president, went for Bush, a political rebuke that pains a lot of people here but is one they, more than most, understand.
''What are our chances of ever having a president from Carthage again?'' wonders Penny Pelotta, a hairdresser at Carthage House of Beauty who does Mrs. Pauline's hair. (That's all anyone around Carthage ever calls Al Gore's mother.)
Pelotta, who is 33, was on the courthouse square the day Gore announced for the presidency. Her mother's farm is within shouting distance of the Gore farm just outside of town. Pelotta says Gore's loss in Tennessee - a victory in his home state would have made the Florida mess moot - has ''devastated'' her.
''I am a Christian,'' she starts up, angling in the direction of a hot moral issue that many across this state believe tripped up the vice president, who began his career as an antiabortion congressman but now favors abortion rights. ''I am against abortion, but I don't think the government should tell a woman she should have a child or not,'' Pelotta says.
Beverly Good is the owner of Carthage House of Beauty. She won't divulge whom she voted for, but she pours emotion into her voice when she begins assailing the vice president for his support of not only abortion rights, but the rights of gays and lesbians. She won't stop the attack, either, until she's verbally spanked the vice president for his attacks against the tobacco industry. In Tennessee, attacking tobacco is a no-no.
''Same-sex marriages goes against what the Bible teaches,'' she says. ''A lot of Christians I know have had a tough time with it. This is, after all, the Bible Belt,'' she says, taking a seat and brushing out a gray wig.
For months before the election, the national and international media had been poking around this town, taking the measure of Gore's home turf, sampling the grits and fried chicken at City Cafe. There never was much of a concern that the vice president wouldn't carry his home state. But the Republicans waged an aggressive and savvy campaign: They conceded Memphis and Nashville and zeroed in on the suburban sprawl across the state. They sent National Rifle Association giant Charlton Heston to Tennessee to talk to gun owners. They told Hank Williams Jr. to hit the road and strum that guitar. In the end, they slapped the vice president hard: Bush, 51.1 percent, Gore, 47.3.
Before it was over - at least the first time it was over - Al Gore, through the Republican mirror, was made to look like a cross between George McGovern and Senator Edward M. Kennedy and the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, liberal stalwarts all.
''Did Al lose touch with Tennesseans?'' asks Jerry Futrell, a hospital CEO in town who has known the Gore family for three decades. ''Well, his job took him to Washington as vice president.''
Futrell is behind the wheel of his pretty, black Lincoln Town Car, rolling down a country road and waving over the Gore farmland. On election night in Nashville he had the Lincoln ready to go to the ''victory party.''
''The Democratic Party here in the state is probably at its weakest,'' says Futrell, noting that Tennessee's governor and US senators are Republicans.
Futrell says that should Gore lose, his state will live to regret it. There are those in Carthage who come to him because of his access to the Gore staff, and they too, he says, will suffer.
''Come January 21st, when these people come to me for help, I will have to say, `I'm sorry, I can't make a phone call, I don't have a contact anymore, I don't have an avenue.'''
As the crow flies, Columbia is about 90 miles from Carthage. Gore lost Columbia, though he and Clinton captured it in '96.
Gary Ledbetter lives in Columbia. He's worked on Gore campaigns for two decades now. He has a fervent belief as to why his good friend Gore failed to capture Tennessee.
''He lost touch,'' says Ledbetter, taking a breakfast of biscuits and eggs the other morning. ''I make no bones making that statement.''
Ledbetter says that when Gore was in Congress and the Senate, he made frequent trips back home, a luxury not provided a vice president.
Still: ''They packaged him bad,'' Ledbetter says of Democratic strategists. ''Gore didn't remind me of the Gore 25 years ago. Everybody said, `Who is Al Gore?' Well, they were right.''
Ledbetter wonders whether Gore will ever possess the energy, luck, and circumstance to mount a potent presidential campaign again. Ledbetter is not so sure.
''If only he would have had someone on his staff call Tennessee every day during the past eight years, just to check up on things,'' he says.
And, he says, ''I love Al Gore.''
But he adds, if Gore loses this long campaign, he's ''going to have to look in the mirror.''
