The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

RAY SUAREZ: Good evening. I'm Ray Suarez. Jim Lehrer is off tonight. On the NewsHour this evening, Betty Ann Bowser and Margaret Warner explain the thicket of post-recount legal cases in Florida; Jeffrey Kaye reports on the challenges facing Mexico's new President; we examine the politics of global climate control; and essayist Clarence Page considers an exhibit of photographs by and about black Americans. It all follows our summary of the news this Wednesday.

NEWS SUMMARY

RAY SUAREZ: The presidential election fight headed back to the Florida Supreme Court today. Vice President Gore's lawyers asked a state appeals court for an immediate recount of thousands of disputed ballots from Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties. The appeal was expected to be passed directly to the state Supreme Court. Last night, a state judge in Tallahassee refused to start a recount before he considers Gore's challenge to the statewide results. He scheduled a hearing Saturday. Also today, the Republican- controlled Florida legislature considered calling a special session to name its own 25 Presidential electors. But several Democratic Governors warned against such a move. They spoke in Tallahassee.

GOV. PAUL PATTON: Until the judicial process is completed, I think any legislative involvement is changing the rules. The judiciary is interpreting the rules and where they are confusing or incomplete, it is the judiciary's responsibility to interpret what the rules are. That is what the judiciary of Florida has been asked to do and I believe that's what the judiciary will do and I believe that is the correct forum.

RAY SUAREZ: Vice President Gore told NBC today he thinks he has a 50/50 chance of winning his legal battle and the presidency. And in Washington, he met with several aides and others who might be cabinet members in a Gore administration. Governor Bush returned to his ranch in Crawford, Texas, while running mate Dick Cheney opened a transition office outside Washington. Cheney was asked if Bush should take a more public role in the planning.

DICK CHENEY: I think it's perfectly appropriate for him to spend time on his ranch and to continue to spend time in Texas. On the one hand, we've been criticized for being too forward leaning. Now you suggest maybe we are too laid back. I would suggest you can't have it both ways. He is still the Governor of Texas. He has very important responsibilities to carry out there. That is why he spent a lot of time in Austin and time out on the ranch.

RAY SUAREZ: We'll have more on the fight for the presidency right after this News Summary. Plans to hold early elections in Israel moved forward today, and the first challenger to Prime Minister Barak entered the race. We have a report from Kirsty Lang of Independent Television News.

KIRSTY LANG: Ehud Barak might be their most decorated soldier, but he's perceived by a growing number of Israelis as an ineffective prime minister. He's failed to stop some of the worst fighting yet between Israelis and Palestinians. Barak is now gambling on reaching a peace deal with the Palestinians for which the general election will effectively serve as a referendum. Without such a deal, the right-wing Likud Party's Ariel Sharon could well be the next prime minister. Today he declared his candidacy. An even more dangerous opponent for Barak would be the former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Opinion polls suggest that Bibi, as he's known, would defeat Barak, a mark of how quickly and dramatically Israeli public opinion can change. It's only 18 months since Netanyahu himself was thrown out of office in a landslide victory to Barak. Netanyahu has certainly upped his profile in recent weeks, giving speeches and television interviews, but so far he's kept quiet about whether he'll be standing.

RAY SUAREZ: There was more violence today between Israelis and Palestinians. Israeli troops fired on Palestinians trying to cut through a border fence in Gaza. The army said there were fatalities, but it did not say how many. And in the West Bank, an Israeli motorist was critically wounded in a shooting ambush. The U.S. economy had its slowest growth in nearly four years over the summer. The Commerce Department reported today the Gross Domestic Product expanded at an annual rate of 2.4% from July through September. That was less than half the rate of the previous quarter. Economists had expected this slowdown after a series of interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. That's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to Florida's legal labyrinth, Mexico's new President, the politics of global warming, and a Clarence Page essay.

FOCUS - LEGAL LABYRINTH

RAY SUAREZ: Even with the U.S. Supreme Court preparing to hear arguments Friday, there seems to be more legal activity than ever continuing on in Florida. Betty Ann Bowser helps sort through the various cases.

JUDGE SANDERS SAULS: It reminds me of, like, getting nibbled to death by a duck.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Reporter: That's the way Tallahassee circuit Judge Sanders Sauls summed up the myriad of law suits, legal motions, appellate pleas, and dueling arguments being considered by courts from southern Florida to the panhandle to the nation's capital. They're all aimed, in one way or another, at trying to prove through the courts that their candidate won the presidency on November 7. The Gore campaign has placed special significance on its suit before Judge Sauls. It wants thousands of ballots counted by hand, votes the Gore lawyers say would give the election to the Vice President. Gore attorney David Boies addressed the court yesterday.

DAVID BOIES: We submit that the issue before the court is what is the right resolution of the contested ballots. We have contested certain ballots. We have said that certain ballots, we believe, should have been counted for Vice President Gore were not counted for Vice President Gore and we have identified what those ballots are. We believe that under Florida law, we have a right to ask for a judicial determination as to whether or not those ballots should or should not be counted for Vice President Gore.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Under Florida law, a candidate has the right to challenge the outcome of the election after the votes are certified. That certification came on Sunday when Secretary of State Katherine Harris named Governor Bush the winner by 537 votes.

KATHERINE HARRIS: I here by declare Governor George W. Bush the winner of Florida's 25 electoral votes for the President of the United States.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Yesterday Gore's lawyers lost round one when the judge refused to approved a fast-track schedule for deciding the issue. And Governor Bush's attorneys made it clear they are opposed to any more vote counting of any kind.

BARRY RICHARD: It is absolutely inappropriate for this court and I think the court has no authority, for your honor to begin counting ballots again. I'm not sure how in the world you would do that, and there is no authority for Your Honor to appoint a special master to begin counting ballots and there is no basis for ballot counting to begin before Your Honor has determined that the relief is appropriate.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Judge Sauls has scheduled a Saturday hearing which could lead to a decision on whether or not he will allow any more ballots to be counted. Still, he ordered more than 14,000 contested ballots from two south Florida counties be moved to Tallahassee, along with a voting booth and a voting machine. This came after a lengthy discussion about logistics with Miami-Dade election official Murray Greenberg by telephone.

MURRAY GREENBERG: ... Get the ballot ready to be brought up to Tallahassee if that is what Your Honor ordered. It will take us tomorrow to do that. We will then need specific instruction. These ballots are under 24-hour security and have been since November 7. We would need specific instructions as to how the ballots are to be shipped, what kind of security if any, what mode of transportation, who will accept them. The statute requires that these be under the supervisor of election control unless the court orders differently. We will comply with the court's order, but there needs to be some definite guidelines before we can release the ballots, Your Honor.

JUDGE SANDERS SAULS: I understand.

SPOKESMAN: Thank you, Your Honor, the supervisor is here with me and he is saying it would be his recommendation that they be driven up by Miami-Dade police.

JUDGE SANDERS SAULS: You'll have to go talk to the police department now I suppose.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: This morning, election officials began packing the ballots for transport Tallahassee, while the Miami- Dade Police Department said its antiterrorist-trained swat team would escort the ballots under tight security tomorrow. Governor Bush's attorneys, who didn't want the 14,000 disputed ballots moved, today asked Judge Sauls to order all one million ballots cast in Miami Dade and Palm Beach counties sent to Tallahassee. And late today, the judge agreed.

JUDGE SANDERS SAULS: Now, if you don't have any objection to that, basically you are willing to furnish these ballots in the same fashion and we will proceed accordingly.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: One flight down in the same courthouse, a separate case was being heard today. A Democratic voter not officially part of the Gore campaign pressed his case to have 15,000 absentee ballots thrown out from Seminole County. The suit claims Republicans there fraudulently altered thousands of absentee request forms by adding voter identification numbers that hadn't been filled in. In that same case today, a group of voters asked to intervene, claiming their absentee ballots should be counted regardless of whether they were part of a fraudulent scheme. If the court should throw out all 15,000 of those absentee ballots, it would give the election to Gore. Trial is scheduled to begin on December 6. Late today, the Bush lawyers asked an appeals court to combine both of these cases under one jurisdiction. Across the street, attorneys are waiting to find out if the Florida Supreme Court will hear another case brought by a group of Democrats. They're seeking a new election in Palm Beach County claiming the so-called butterfly ballot confused thousands of voters. On another front, civil rights activists continued to complain that the rights of minority voters were suppressed in Florida. NAACP President Kweisi Mfume said his organization may take legal action.

KWEISI MFUME: Everybody has to have the right and the ability to vote. If we ever do away with that, or get away with it or minimize it, I think we've done more to hurt this republic than the Civil War and any other war could have possibly done.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Meanwhile, the Bush legal team has filed suits in five Florida counties asking them to include previously rejected military absentee ballots in their vote tally. But the most high-profile case will be argued Friday before the United States Supreme Court. At issue is whether the Florida Supreme Court overstepped its bounds when it delayed the deadline for certification and allowed the hand counts to proceed. And in case the legal matters aren't resolved by December 12, the Republican-controlled Florida state legislature is considering a special session to elect its own slate of electors to the electoral college. Florida Governor Jeb Bush, Texas Governor Bush's brother, thinks that makes sense.

GOV. JEB BUSH: The challenge for the legislature is that they have to project out to December 12 and determine whether there is a need for one. And so I think that is why they are planning for it, but it may not be necessary to do. So, you know, I think it's appropriate to have these hearings. I think that is a thoughtful way of going about this. The courts may decide this and clear all this up prior to December 12 in which case there may not be a need for a session. But, I mean, let's face it: If the electors are not, if there is indecision about how the electors are by December 12, I think it would be a travesty not to have electors seated in the electoral college from Florida.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: A special session could be called as early as next week.

RAY SUAREZ: Margaret Warner takes it from there.

MARGARET WARNER: For analysis of this blizzard of cases, we're joined by former Florida Supreme Court Justice Gerald Kogan-- he retired from the court two years ago after 12 years there, including two as chief justice-- and Richard Briffault, a professor and election law specialist at Columbia University Law school. Welcome, gentlemen, Professor Briffault, I hope I'm saying your name correctly.

No problem.

MARGARET WARNER: I'll start actually with Justice Kogan. Let's start with the recount case in front of Judge Sauls, because that is where Gore is concentrating most of his legal firepower. What, whoever decides this, what are the issues that courts have to take into account now in deciding whether to order either a full or partial recount of the ballots in these two counties?

GERALD KOGAN, Former Justice, Florida Supreme Court: Well, first of all, they've got to make a decision as to whether or not the recount would, in fact, produce enough votes to overcome George Bush's lead at this particular point, because if all the machinations do not produce what will be a change in the election results, then there is no need to go any further. Once they discover, I guess, from expert testimony or testimony from the people who have taken that 1% sample, that in fact it would affect the outcome of the election, then the judge has to go ahead and decide whether or not there should be a hand recount, and the problem they're running into right now is that December 12 is not too far away. And I understand as far as the Miami-Dade ballots are concerned, that will take a while to do. There is an additional issue and that is whether or not the judge set a stand around as to how you count the votes. By now people are familiar with the so-called pregnant chads and the chads that are only attached, you know, in one corner or two corners. Or what should be the standard used by the counters? That is a question. Does the judge set that down, or does the judge merely say, look, I'm going to leave it up to the ballot counters to ascertain from what they see, what they believe to be the intent of the voters. It is not an easy issue.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Briffault, if you are Judge Sauls and you have that hearing before you on Saturday, let's say it says with -- stays with him, how do you make these determinations that Justice Kogan just outlined? In other words, what are your precedents?

RICHARD BRIFFAULT, Columbus University: Well, there aren't many specific precedents on these particular issues. The judge has to consider, as Justice Kogan has suggested, whether the recount or -- whether some change would make a difference but also whether there was some problem in the certified results. I think the arguments I take it the Democrats are pressing is that in Palm Beach County where the hand recount was concluded two hours late, and in Miami, where the hand recount was never undertaken, the error, there is an error under the statute which says that the certification may be overturned if ballots that should have been counted were not counted. So there is kind of a legal concern. There is an evidentiary concern, would it make a difference then a practical concern can that be done in time? The contest calendar normally could take months. Under on the other hand circumstances, they have about two weeks.

MARGARET WARNER: Justice Kogan taking the deadline has a lot to do with it. Let's look at the two developments today. On the one handled the Bush team successfully persuaded Judge Sauls to bring not just the 14,000 disputed ballots but a million ballots up to Tallahassee. What is that all about? Secondly, the Gore team went into the appeals court and said, we want this recount to begin immediately, which Judge Sauls had refused to do last night. Explain the strategy here and what do you think are the prospects that the Gore team will succeed in getting that recount advanced?

GERALD KOGAN: Well, the strategy is obvious, and that is on the Bush side, you want to delay this as long as possible. And if you bring up a million ballots, and you say that you have to count a million ballots, if that is what Judge Sauls rules, there is a big difference between that and counting only the 10,000 so-called under count or under vote ballots. Now as far as the Gore camp is concerned, they need to speed this along because they don't have a second to waste. The longer this remains open, the less of a chance they have of meeting that December the 12 deadline.

MARGARET WARNER: I want to go on to what happens after the deadline passes, but, first, professors, let's look at the Seminole County case. That is one Gore isn't officially a party to but this is dealing with the absentee ballots. There the hearing will be next Wednesday I think is December 6 before Judge Clark. What does she have to consider and what does she look to in deciding whether to throw out these 15,000 absentee ballots?

RICHARD BRIFFAULT: She has got to consider the seriousness of the illegality in question. Remember the, what the Republican workers did in Seminole County will not directly affect the absentee ballots. They supplied some information on the application that is necessary. That alone might not be fatal but as I understand it only Republicans workers were able to do that for people they assume were going to vote Republican. Democratic workers weren't given the same opportunity. So here you have got the situation in which Democrats as well as Republicans were allowed to vote in Seminole County by absentee but the county using Republican workers made it a lot easier for Republicans to do so. Normally the Florida courts I think are loathe to reject ballots which themselves are not tainted by fraud but here you have a sense is that there was a partisan imbalance it making it easier for absentee voters to vote. And that's a hard question. I don't think they've had to consider that question before. There was no direct tampering with the ballots themselves, but there was a scheme in which the group of voters for one party found it a lot easier to get their absentee ballots and therefore to cast their votes. It's a very tough question.

MARGARET WARNER: Justice Kogan, what would you like to add to that?

GERALD KOGAN: Well, I think quite frankly the way Gore can win best of all is to have these so-called ballots that are now under contention in Seminole County thrown out, because without those absentee ballots, then as I understand the vote count, he will go ahead substantially and will carry the state. So I think this is a very, very important lawsuit that is going on in Seminole County.

MARGARET WARNER: All right, Professor, we can't get through all the other cases obviously because I want to get to some general questions. But what about the so-called butterfly ballot case? This is where the Democratic voters are saying to the Supreme Court I was confused by the ballots, what are the prospects there?

RICHARD BRIFFAULT: That's another tricky one. I would say it is uphill but not out of the question. Normally the courts say and the Florida courts have said that confusion alone is not enough. Indeed, it's easy enough for a voter after the fact to come and say, oh, gee, I was confused. What you have in the butterfly ballot, though, is a combination of circumstances. One is there is the argument that the ballot is itself illegal although authorized properly that it's inconsistent with provisions of Florida law that say - the marks to - the place to mark your choice has to be to the right of the candidate's name, and here because of the butterfly structure, somewhere to the right and somewhere to the left, and so the state --

the county was causing the confusion. The other is you have the statistical evidence of much higher than expected Buchanan vote -- a much higher than normal double vote so a court would have to look at the legal question - make a decision as to whether this ballot was in fact illegal, not clear, there is an argument that it is and the court would have to consider did it have an impact and that you would require statistical evidence suggesting that there was a higher level of confused voters than you would expect and maybe even send affidavits or testimony by voters. Again, there are both difficult legal questions and some difficult factual questions. The question is can this all be done within the brief time allotted.

MARGARET WARNER: So Justice Kogan, back to you. What are the chances now that you think that time is going to run out on al Gore, on these various challenges before December 12 and what happens if that happens?

GERALD KOGAN: Well, patently it's going to fall to the Florida legislature to select who the electors are going to be if they cannot be certified by the secretary of state's office. You see, there is also an additional problem in that Palm Beach case. Even if the court found the ballot to be confusing, and even if the court went ahead and found that voters were disenfranchised, and what does the court do? The court has to fashion a remedy. The only remedy that I know of that would be successful would be for the court to have a new election in Palm Beach County. But that is going to be impossible time wise.

MARGARET WARNER: So, Professor, going to the Florida legislature's role, today a couple of legal scholars told the legislative committee, look, you have a certified winner right now. It's George W. Bush. There is no confusion here. At what point is it appropriate or would they be called on to get involved do you think under law and Constitution?

RICHARD BRIFFAULT: It's a tricky question because it depends on what they think they are doing. It's a little confusing to me what they think they are doing. I think they think they are trying to determine who won the election. And that the statements by the leadership and by the Republican leadership in Florida to cast out on the actions of the Florida courts, leads me to think what they are trying to do is we don't want the courts messing us up; we know who won - it was Bush.

MARGARET WARNER: Let me interrupt you because we are almost out of time. Do they have the legal right after say December 12, legal right or responsibility to step in?

RICHARD BRIFFAULT: I don't think they can declare who won the election, but if there should be a situation in which no won one the election, we are not at that stage. For the moment there is a winner, Bush -- if no one won the election, they have an argument that under a federal statute they have the right to step in and declare who they would award the electoral votes to. They can't say who won the election. They may have the power to say we are giving the electoral votes to Bush.

MARGARET WARNER: Go ahead, Justice.

GERALD KOGAN: We have to remember one thing: The secretary of state as the professors pointed out has already certified Bush as being the winner so as long as she has certified Bush as being the winner, then obviously the legislature has no grounds to act. It would have to be a change in the certification or a withdrawal of the certification either by court order or by the voluntary action of the secretary of state.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Thank you both gentlemen. We have to leave it there.

RAY SUAREZ: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, the mandate for change in Mexico, the politics of global climate control, and a Clarence page essay.

FOCUS - MANDATE FOR CHANGE

RAY SUAREZ: Next, a North American country that managed to elect a president on schedule. The new president of Mexico takes office this Friday. Jeffrey Kaye of KCET-Los Angeles reports on the challenges he faces.

JEFFREY KAYE: The election of a new president on July 1 was an event many Mexicans compare to the fall of the Berlin Wall. For the first time in 71 years, an opposition presidential candidate defeated Mexico's ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, the PRI. Vicente Fox was the candidate of Mexico's right of center National Action Party. In his two-and-a-half year long campaign, Fox, a rancher turned Coca Cola executive, turned state governor, confidently promised to conquer such deep-seated problems as corruption, poverty, and crime. "Cambio," Spanish for change, was the campaign's rallying cry. Now, as he prepares to take office, 100 million Mexicans -- most of whom live in poverty -- are waiting for him to deliver on his ambitious promises. Adviser Jorge Castaneda, who will be Fox's foreign secretary, says change will be the hallmark of Fox's six-year term.

JORGE CASTANEDA: We will no longer be seen abroad as the country of corruption, of drugs, of violence, of sombreros, of Tequila, but rather, as a country of culture, of hardworking people which we are, of prosperity, of modernization, of democracy, of respect for human rights.

JEFFREY KAYE: Castaneda, a left-wing writer and political scientist, is part of a transition team which spans the ideological spectrum. Fox has cast himself as a pragmatist. Since the election, he has enlisted support from a cross-section of leaders ranging from business and labor officials to representatives of the nation's often-neglected indigenous communities.

VICENTE FOX (speaking through interpreter): Our democracy will be incomplete while indigenous communities continue to be discriminated against and excluded.

JEFFREY KAYE: Many Mexicans are taking Fox's promises of dramatic change at face value, literally arriving on his doorstep to press their case. At his Mexico City transition offices, delegations of petitioners show up from across the nation.

ISMAELA ORTEGA: (speaking through interpreter) We have been in this situation for many years. The sugar workers are the most exploited, the ones who live in the most poverty.

JEFFREY KAYE: Sugar workers came 250 miles from the coastal state of Vera Cruz to complain about union corruption and poor wages.

ORTEGA: (speaking through interpreter) The majority of people who live in my village, who are fighting here, they live in a house like this. They want to have a home that is a little bit more dignified than this.

JEFFREY KAYE: Fox's strongest supporters, Mexico's middle class, also have their expectations. Owners of small and medium size businesses were crucial to Fox's victory - people like Carlos Guzman, head of a soft drink company. Guzman supported Fox because of his business-friendly proposals to cut red tape, increase exports, and stimulate lending. For himself, Guzman wants Fox to open up soft drink markets at home and in Central America.

CARLOS GUZMAN: (speaking through interpreter) We think that Fox has good ideas. As a businessman we know him. He also knows what we are going through on the other side of the desk. He knows the problems of business. We have the hope, the businesspeople of Mexico, we have hope in Fox.

JEFFREY KAYE: While Fox will enter the presidential palace on December 1 with a mandate for change, perhaps the most significant change may have already happened -- the election of a president from an opposition party. Fox will face major challenges in actually implementing the reforms he promised in this tradition-bound country. Even Fox's advisers are cautioning Mexicans not to expect rapid reforms.

JORGE CASTANEDA: There will be dramatic change in the way Mexico is governed and in the way the Mexican people relate to their government, but over the entire administration, this is not going to happen overnight. I think the Mexican people know that the polls that the transition team has been carrying out show very clearly that people do not expect everything to change overnight.

JEFFREY KAYE: One of Fox's grandest promises, ending widespread corruption, is likely to be his most daunting task. Examples of official corruption are legion -- ranging from traffic cops on the take... to officials who have been tied to narcotics violence and trafficking... to a military accused by human rights groups of abuse of power in southern states where guerrilla groups have taken up arms. Reform of the police and justice system is such a tall order that many Mexicans are wondering aloud how much of a change the new president can actually make.

RAFAEL RUIZ: It's not more weapons; it's not more men.

JEFFREY KAYE: Criminologist Rafael Ruiz is a leading Mexican human rights activist.

JEFFREY KAYE: Should Mexicans expect dramatic change as far as cleaning up corruption is concerned?

RAFAEL RUIZ: No, I would not expect dramatic changes. HopefullyI expect some changes. But that's about all. Please do remember that in Mexico, corruption is institutionalized and it's systemic.

JEFFREY KAYE: So Systemic that Ruiz and other Mexicans point to a culture of illegality. Mexico's off-the-books underground economy is thriving and not hard to find. On a major street in downtown Mexico City, sellers of pirated computer software operate under the noses of police.

JEFFREY KAYE: So this is, this is illegal, to sell this.

MAN ON STREET: Yes.

RAFAEL RUIZ: Mexicans, we unfortunately are in constant contact with corruption, and we would like to see Fox to be more forceful and more clear in what he wants to accomplish. If we are somehow suspicious and not as happy as we would like, it's because we don't see clearly what he wants to accomplish and how he's going to do it.

JEFFREY KAYE: That same kind of skepticism can be heard in some of Mexico's poorest areas. In the indigenous farming community of Santa Ines Yatzechi in the southern state of Oaxaca, Spanish is a foreign language to most people, who speak Zapotec, an Indian dialect.

(PEOPLE CONVERSING IN ZAPOTEC)

JEFFREY KAYE: Residents try to get by on subsistence farming, but desperation has forced half the population to flee to the united states in search of work. Farmer Marcelo Martinez, who expects his 16-year-old son will soon make the trek North, has heard similar campaign slogans in the past.

MARCELLO MARTINZE, Farmer: (speaking through interpreter) Many political parties have come through here making promises, yet they don't accomplish anything. They say they are going to help the most vulnerable, yet they don't do it. (People chanting in Spanish)

JEFFREY KAYE: Fox will not only have to combat skepticism, there are several entrenched forces in Mexico likely to fight him if they feel their livelihood or clout is threatened. For the last several weeks, public employee unions demanding salary increases have staged demonstrations and put up roadblocks throughout the country. They promise similar actions if Fox makes cutbacks in his quest to streamline government.

LUZ MORENO: (speaking through interpreter) The only way they will listen to us is with an action such as this. We will wait until the government gets into power, but we have little confidence.

JEFFREY KAYE: Another potential obstacle, if not the largest, will come from competing political parties, particularly the PRI. Although the PRI's current fortunes are reflected in the stacked furniture in its headquarters lobby, from 1929 until the election of Fox, the PRI and the government were virtually indistinguishable. The PRI remains a formidable political presence. PRI governors rule in 18 of the nation's 31 states, and help determine how federal legislators vote in Mexico's congress. The PRI controls the largest bloc of votes, but falls short of a majority. If Fox is to turn much of his agenda into reality, he'll need to cut deals and broker alliances with opposition parties. Old-guard PRI legislators such as Gustavo Carvajal are staking out positions to the left of fox.

GUSTAVO CARVAJAL: (speaking through interpreter) We are not going to allow the workers to lose the rights they possess -- and then the sale of state companies? We are in agreement that there should be greater domestic and foreign investment in state companies, yet we don't want them sold.

SPOKESMAN: Como partido de opposicion en el plano...

JEFFREY KAYE: PRI leaders are embarking on a program of reinvention as they embrace reform and recast their party's authoritarian image.

DIPOLA DE LOS ANGELES: Reconocemos por supuesto... (speaking through interpreter) We recognize, of course, that on our journey there have been errors made, deviations, and serious omissions, yet the PRI has always shown the capacity to rectify things.

JEFFREY KAYE: A rising star within the PRI is Jose Murat, governor of Oaxaca. For now and for public consumption, Murat is charitable towards the incoming president.

GOV. JOSE MURAT: (speaking through interpreter) Even if Vicente Fox does not belong to our political organization, if he works on behalf of Mexico and Oaxaca, we will be allies in that work.

JEFFREY KAYE: Murat is setting high standards for Fox. He says he wants generous support for Oaxaca from Mexico City.

GOV. JOSE MURAT: No tenemos impresa... (speaking through interpreter) We don't have business, we don't have factories, and we don't have business development sufficient enough to help ourselves. That is why investments from the federal government are so important.

JEFFREY KAYE: Murat expects a honeymoon period after Fox's inauguration, but as his gestures make clear, unless Fox delivers quickly, the current climate of political harmony is likely to pull apart. Poor areas of Mexico like Oaxaca will see change in the long term, promises Fox cabinet member Jorge Castaneda.

JORGE CASTANEDA: Much more investment in education-- better schools, better administered, reaching more people in the poor areas of the 500 townships in the state of Oaxaca; health, unifying the health-delivery systems; housing; and most important of all, employment.

JEFFREY KAYE: Fox's team is setting ambitious goals. In six years, they aim to take the people of Santa Ines Yatzechi, as well as millions of Mexicans, on a journey that in U.S. terms will transport them from the 19th to the 21st century.

FOCUS - ROUGH WEATHER

RAY SUAREZ: Finally tonight, the politics of global warming get even hotter.

RAY SUAREZ: Though there is a growing consensus on the science of global warming, the politics remain fractured, even after years of debate. Three years ago, 160 countries met in Japan and drafted a treaty, the Kyoto Protocol, outlining how the world could reduce global warning. By 2012, the U.S. and other industrialized nations would cut emissions of global-warming gases 5% below their 1990 levels.

VICE PRESIDENT AL GORE: (1997) So on behalf of President Clinton I call on all Americans in our best bipartisan tradition to join together in this critical

RAY SUAREZ: Though the Clinton administration signed on to the deal, the U.S. Congress has not yet ratified it. This month, representatives from around the globe gathered once again, at the Hague in the Netherlands. The mission this time: Agreeing on specific ways to implement the '97 treaty. After marathon sessions and angry disputes, the conference collapsed this past Sunday.

SPOKESMAN: There is no deal. It's closed down.

RAY SUAREZ: European Union and U.S. delegates battled at the Hague. The United States releases 30% of the world's greenhouse gases, and it would pay the most for hitting the Kyoto targets. The U.S. wanted credit toward reaching Kyoto goals by using what experts call carbon sinks. In photosynthesis, trees and other plants draw carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, out of the air and stash it in the ground or in wood, forming sinks and helping to cool the climate. But other industrialized nations with fewer open spaces, like England and France, objected. They said the Americans were avoiding the tough steps of reducing their fossil fuels, and creating loopholes, essentially getting something for nothing. Another area of dispute: The trading of pollution credits-- in essence, whether and how to allow the right to trade pollution credits between industrialized and developing nations. The breakdown left many upset.

RODA VERHEYEN: I am incredibly angry. I am incredibly sad. I have already cried now, but anger prevails. I think this is an absolute disaster for the climate. It is a disaster for millions of people who have been watching governments here for weeks, who have been watching government for three years, try to come to an agreement that can be implemented.

RAY SUAREZ: And now we get two perspectives on the climate talks from writers Gregg Easterbrook, a senior editor at the "New Republic" and author of "A Moment on the Earth: The Coming Age of Environmental Optimism"; and Mark Hertsgaard, author of "Earth Odyssey: Around the world in search of our environmental future."

Gregg Easterbrook, for a long time Kyoto was portrayed at its core as an argument between the developing word and the rich industrial world. How did this end up in the Hague coming down to an argument between Europe and the United States?

GREGG EASTERBROOK, Author, "A Moment on the Earth:" I think because the United States and Europe have very different perspectives. The United States proposed a realistic, practical pragmatic plan that could be passed and put into effect. The Europeans were more interested in ideological posturing. Certainly not all of them but I think France and Germany saw that as an opportunity to denounce the United States -- were more interested in punitive restrictions on American industry than they were on practical economic tools such as carbon trading which have a much greater potential for reducing greenhouse gases in the world.

RAY SUAREZ: So you reject the critique specifically from those countries you mentioned that said the United States was trying to get through Kyoto the easy way?

GREGG EASTERBROOK: Oh, yes. This deal was torpedoed by the European Union and very foolishly so. Now, it doesn't mean that there won't be a better deal at some point in the future, but what the Clinton administration proposed was carefully thought through and practical. And, yes, it wasn't exactly what the Europeans want but the United States is the 500 pound gorilla of the global warming issue today, and if you want that gorilla to eat fewer bananas, you are going to have to give him a deal that he is willing to accept and especially that the U.S. Senate is willing to ratify.

RAY SUAREZ: Mark Hertsgaard, do you agree with that analysis?

MARK HERTSGAARD, Author, "Earth Odyssey:" I'm afraid I don't, no. Look, the United States was trying to get something for nothing -- largely with this talk about how forests are going to solve all the problems -- these sinks that you mention in your setup piece. But, look, those sinks are operating now and that is not getting us closer to solving the problem. And you know, when Gregg says that this was a practical program, it was practical in the sense perhaps of what was needed to get through the United States Congress. But you cannot blame other countries for being impatient with that line of reasoning. Look, the planet does not care that the United States Congress like an ostrich want to stick its head in the sand on this issue. This problem is here. We have to do something about it or the 21st century is going to be a very hot place and what the United States proposal offered was really not enough to get us where we need to go on that.

RAY SUAREZ: Some of the early reporting coming out of Hague, Mark Hertsgaard, mention that had even though it was very combative they were close and that some of the final clashes came over specific formulas. Were they really that close to coming out of the Hague with an agreement?

MARK HERTSGAARD: Well, you know, it's hard for to us know. We weren't there in the room, but it sounds like it was pretty close. There was a handshake deal between 3:00 in the morning between U.S. and European negotiators and what happened was when the European negotiators went back to their people, they couldn't sell it because there was loopholes big enough to drive a super tanker through in the view of the Europeans, and, you know, green politics and green points of view in Europe are simply much stronger than they are in the United States. And the NGO's and the green parties were not going to sit still for is that.

RAY SUAREZ: Is there a price to be paid for either side coming away from the Hague with no agreement?

GREGG EASTERBROOK: Well, I think Europe, especially France and Germany should pay a high price for looking very foolish. They talk greener than thou -- they say they want global warming progress but here they have the United States willing to agree to something and they torpedo the deal. And the deal that is being proposed is not just papering over the issue. Carbon trading would have the effect of transferring American capital and technology to the developing world to make energy use more efficient there.

RAY SUAREZ: Let me have you stop right there and explain for those who haven't been following the issue what carbon trading is. Would there be an exchange?

GREGG EASTERBROOK: The basic principle that has been endorsed by economists all over the spectrum -- from Paul McCracken, former chief economic adviser to Ronald Reagan -- to left wing environmental economists is that, we would trade the right to emit carbon dioxide, trade it mainly with the developing world where energy use is much more inefficient than it is in the West. The effect of such trades would be that American companies would pay power plants say in China that Mark is very familiar with, where he's traveled a lot, Chinese power plants burn six times as much coal per unit of energy produced and thus six times the greenhouse gases as powers plants in the United States. If we used American technology and American capital to improve the efficiency of those power plants, greenhouse glasses would decline, Chinese acid rain would decline, and this could be done at a much lower price than realizing marginal improvements in the United States. Economists across the spectrum back this idea.

RAY SUAREZ: Just so I understand this better, what would be the incentive for American capital to help put those investments in place to reduce Chinese emissions? Would they get some give on the United States side of the Pacific?

GREGG EASTERBROOK: Yes, they would get out of in the European language having to cut their own emissions themselves. There would be permits. You either have to cut your own emissions or you could buy reductions in emissions from other countries, and America certainly could more cheaply buy reductions from developing world countries than it could stage the reductions itself. This is at the heart of the European response. Europe emotionally wanted to see the United States suffer in this agreement. They wanted us to be hurt. And the proposal that we made would have been much better for the planet, cheaper, faster in terms of greenhouse reductions but it wouldn't have hurt us and that to Europe was emotionally unacceptable.

RAY SUAREZ: Mark Hertsgaard.

MARK HERTSGAARD: I don't know how Gregg knows that the Europeans want to hurt us. I would be interested to know how he is able to read their minds -- but I do want to agree with him about the importance of changing energy patterns in China, in India and elsewhere. Yes, there is a strong economic argument for doing that. I don't think you need the Hague proposals to make American capital profitable in this sense - there's a huge market out there. We should be going after it whatever happens in the Hague. But, the politics of this are very important. You cannot -- if you are the United States and you are the 800 pound gorilla -- you cannot expect the rest of the world to restrain its energy use when you don't want to do it at home. That is simply a nonstarter. In China, for example, when you talk to the officials there, they will say, look, we are not, how dare you preach to us about this when you don't want to change at home? You know, just this last week in India, there are riots in the streets of New Delhi? Because the supreme court of India is shutting down polluting factories. Those workers and the owners of those small factories are saying, look, how dare you put us out of work. The 55 dollars I earn a month is keeping my family alive; and yet Delhi is one of the most polluted spots on the planet.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, how did that visit itself on the deliberations in the Hague, though -

MARK HERTSGAARD: Not enough.

RAY SUAREZ: Did the third world end up being a bystander to a Euro American fight?

MARK HERTSGAARD: Well, I think that was one of the real oversights there. And that issue unfortunately does tend to get left to the end of so much of both the political discussions and the media discussions, but, look, this is where the climate change game is going to be won or lost, is in China, India, Brazil, Mexico, these countries that are going to have a better life in the next 20 years no matter what we do. And we have to find a way to power their economies with solar and non-carbon based fuels. We should be doing that no matter what happens in the Hague because it's profitable for our companies but it doesn't help for us to be saying, no, no, we can't possibly change here in the United States.

RAY SUAREZ: Gregg Easterbrook is Kyoto dead?

GREGG EASTERBROOK: No, it's not dead. The treaty itself, negotiations will continue. What has been, what was signed in Kyoto may fail, but if it fails, we revert to the framework convention on climate change, the treaty that has been ratified by the United Senate that would require us to continue negotiating and perhaps we'll come up with a better and more flexible deal. Other nations are interested and India that Mark mentions is a great example. Three years ago at Kyoto India was very opposed. They felt greenhouse restrictions were some kind of conspiracy to take away their economic development. Now they favor the treaty; they've realized it would result in a shift of capital to the developing world. India is one of the biggest backers of the Kyoto Treaty. So, I think many developing countries, once they understand that carbon trading will mainly benefit the poor nations of the world will be in favor of it. It's Europe that is standing in the way.

RAY SUAREZ: Really quickly, Mark, does who becomes President of the United States in January have a lot to say about the future of Kyoto?

MARK HERTSGAARD: I think not. Because you know, obviously Mr. Bush from an oil industry background is not going to be much of a leader but Mr. Gore wasn't either in the past eight years. The real problem is in Congress. 95-0 were against Kyoto before it was even signed. So that is the real issue is the fact that the Congress responds so much to big oil money and the public. You know, Americans are very used to and spoiled by having very cheap energy. And that is just not going to be able to continue.

RAY SUAREZ: Do you agree with that?

GREGG EASTERBROOK: In the short-term I think Mark is correct. In the long-term I think reforms are possible. A post-fossil fuel economy is in our interest regardless of what happens to the climate. Eventually, we will need to move beyond fossil fuels. And I think eventually Congress will understand that. Market forces may help bring it about. The United States certainly could benefit from higher energy taxes if other taxes were cut at the same time so the net effect on consumers would not increase - many economists have endorsed that as well. And at some point Congress may wake up.

RAY SUAREZ: Gregg Easterbrook, Mark Hertsgaard, gentlemen, thank you both.

ESSAY - REFLECTIONS IN BLACK

RAY SUAREZ: Finally tonight, essayist Clarence page of the "Chicago Tribune" considers America seen through the eyes of black photographers.

CLARENCE PAGE: It is not really surprising that black Americans embraced the camera enthusiastically from its birth. The camera offered power to a people who found too little of it elsewhere. After all, if the camera is an extension of the eye, it is also an extension of storytelling. The camera lets you preserve with the eye, what ancient African griots had preserved with the spoken word. That story is retold through many eyes and images in a new book, "Reflections in Black: The Work of African American Photographers from 1840 to the Present." It is also retold in a mammoth new exhibit that opened at the Smithsonian, and will be touring the country over the next two years. Gathered here, the work of black photographers, from the pre- civil war era to the hip-hop era, finally finds a grand stage on which to tell an epic tale. The camera enables us to look and see how early photographers tried to imitate painters. They were trying, at least at first, to show the world that this new gadget, the camera, could produce true art. Quickly their cameras became an extension not only of the eye, but also of the word. Painters would envy and try to imitate photography. The camera snatched moments in a frozen instant. It brought time to a halt long enough to bear witness to tragedy and struggle, and juxtapose it ironically next to triumph and celebration. Behind the walls of segregation, many black Americans seized opportunities and made the best of them in every corner of American life. Black photographers found images in black America that were reflected, ironically, in a richly textured parallel society. The themes of black photography shifted between its first hundred years and its second. Pre-1950s, we see a self- conscious formality in these efforts to portray black life as an imitation of white middle-class life. After 1950, we see a new wave of photography grapple with the emerging civil rights period. Photographers became more journalistic and self-aware. Over time, photographers engage in new emerging black consciousness. Photo art becomes more impressionistic, like the works of Dennis Alonzo Callwood. He photographs young inmates who have applied text to their bodies. Then he surrounds the pictures with more text. Mixed media formats offer today's photo artists an avenue to the inner mind of black America. The camera also is an extension of the ear. It helps you to hear the importance of writer Amiri Baraka's thoughts tapping their way across the page, or the soft slap of Muhammad Ali's jump rope as it punctuates his lonely preparation for a fight not limited to a boxing ring. The curator of this exhibit, Deborah Willis, uses the word "war" to describe what black photographers were up to. If so, it was a war of memory against indifference, a struggle against those who would try to oversimplify black life in America. In resisting stereotypes, the man or the woman with the camera, leads a fight for the right to be complicated. Photography mainly teaches us a new way to see. It becomes art in the way that every photographer sees something different. Studio photographer James Vanderzee wanted you to see the stately elegance of Harlem during its renaissance. Gordon Parks, the award-winning photojournalist, wanted you to see the everyday poetry in the lives of urban housing projects and rural poverty. Chester Higgins, Jr., saw something profound in the eyes of this young Muslim woman in Brooklyn, and so do we. Shrouded in faith, she looks confidently at us as we look curiously at her across the walls of parallel time. Take a good look. I'm Clarence Page.

RAY SUAREZ: The exhibition is currently on view at the American Jazz Museum in Kansas City.

RECAP

RAY SUAREZ: Again, the major story of this Wednesday was the Florida recount fight. Vice President Gore asked a state appeals court for an immediate recount of thousands of disputed ballots from Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties. The appeal was expected to be passed directly to the state Supreme Court. Last night, a state judge in Tallahassee refused to start the count before he considers Gore's challenge to the statewide results. We'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening. I'm Ray Suarez. Thanks and good night.