Gore/Bush in a catch 22?

Great Debates
1

Wow, how come I haven’t seen any political threads in SDMB lately? :rolleyes:
OK, so anyway, I haven’t seen one exactly like this one. I was watching Hardball last night and one of the approximately three million newly appointed “political analysts” brought up an interesting point.

Gore is kinda screwed. He will never just give up, because if he does that, he loses. But, if he fights this election, what happens? He can win, and half the senate and half the House feels that he stole the presidency and will NEVER support anything he’s done…or he can lose, and half the senate and half the house will feel that Bush stole the presidency.

So what does Gore do? Give up now for the good of the country, even though he doesn’t believe that Bush is good for the country, or fight for the presidency knowing that his fight will ultimately cause a presidency that will be a four year struggle no matter who wins?

2

Assuming Bush wins after the recount and the court challenges, if Gore has any interest in running again in 2004, he has no choice but to do the Nixonian thing and graciously accept defeat, rather than create a constitutional crisis and more divisiveness for our country. The same is true for Bush. It’s also possible that the Florida Secretary of State will refuse to certify the votes regardless of the outcome thus throwing it to Congress where the Republicans control 28 delegations. The wonderful irony in all of this is that we’re looking at a hamstrung President with no mandate whatsoever–certainly, Bush isn’t going to risk losing Congress in 2002 or the White House in 2004. So, those who think they need to move to Canada if Bush wins, think again–we’re looking at 4 years of moderate, do-nothing government regardless of who wins.