The three members of the Palm Beach County canvassing board have been here recounting the last batch of approximately 14,500 "questionable" ballots for more than 31 hours, but the question of this hour is: Will it be enough?

At 1 p.m. EST, the raison d'etre of Burton's shirt and tie is made clearer when he strides before the assemblage of cameras and announces that the canvassing board is faxing Secretary of State Katherine Harris a request for a deadline extension from 5 p.m. Sunday to 9 a.m. Monday.

After all, Burton's letter states, the task of reviewing each of the ballots has "creat(ed) an extraordinary and unprecedented challenge for the Canvassing Board."

"We know you are interested in counting all votes as accurately as possible," Burton's letter reads, noting that he and his colleagues are "committed to reviewing each and every one of these 'questionable' ballots as quickly as humanly possible, including working through this evening. We do not believe this extension would prejudice the State in any way, in light of the Florida Supreme Court's opinion" -- a reference to the court's opinion, issued last week, that enacted the Sunday deadline with the caveat that the Monday morning deadline could stand in its place if Harris didn't want to open her office on Sunday.

Word comes back quickly that Harris -- whose office is decidedly open -- doesn't feel that she has the discretion to extend the deadline.

Inside, the three keep counting, under the watchful eyes of some higher-profile supporters of Gov. George W. Bush than just the regular observers they've been dealing with. Namely, Republican Muckety-Mucks: Gov. Jim Gilmore of Virginia, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, and Gov. Bill Janklow of South Dakota.

Also present is one of the self-described "volunteers" from Saturday's demonstrations outside the Broward County Courthouse in Fort Lauderdale. Faithful readers might recall the blonde, bespectacled 30ish political operative in the "Jeb" oxford, distributing free T-shirts to the excitable pro-Bush crowd. He refused to give his name or say who was paying for the T-shirts, which accuse Vice President Gore of "stealing" the election and refer to the hand recount as a "GOREY mess."

"I'm just a volunteer," he said.

Well, not really. He's Phil Muster, a paid staffer on the Bush political team, and today he's charged with escorting Gilmore around the Emergency Operations Center where the hand recount may be finishing up.

Why do the Bushies refuse to tell the truth about their role here? They're certainly legally allowed to hand out free T-shirts, or to protest peacefully.

I guess they don't want to acknowledge that at the so-called "spontaneous" demonstrations, they're the ones beating the drums -- literally in the case of Bush advance staffer Todd Beyer, who beat a drum to anti-Gore chants on the streets of Fort Lauderdale on Saturday.

Paid members of the Bush campaign excite the partisan crowds with their overheated rhetoric, hand out free T-shirts with incendiary slogans and otherwise engage in various under-the-radar shenanigans that worked so effectively for Bush in his South Carolina primary campaign against Arizona Sen. John McCain. The tactics are legal, but hardly statesmanlike. Within the laughable claims that all the Bush staffers are just "volunteers" lies, apparently, Bush's plausible deniability.

Rep. Peter Deutsch, D-Fla., walks in and sits across the aisle from Hutchison, Janklow and Gilmore. No pleasantries are exchanged. No friendly acknowledging glances. Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., also wanders in. Then he wanders out. Soon Rep. Corinne Brown, D-Fla., joins Deutsch.

Will they finish in time? And even so, will there be enough votes for Gore in the chad? If not, it sure feels like the beginning of the end for Gore, despite the saber-rattling one hears from his surrogates and legal team.

The last hard numbers given to the public came at 6:40 a.m., after a review of precinct 17 revealed an additional Bush vote and 19 additional Gore votes.

The Bush side looks at the process and sees the invention of Gore votes by Democrats. Meanwhile, the Gore legal team has already declared its intentions to contest the Palm Beach numbers, judging the canvassing board -- which consists entirely of Democrats -- to have been too sparing in their judgments of when a dimpled chad constitutes a vote.

"Hey hey! Ho ho! Al Gore has got to go!" chant the pro-Bush protesters outside the Emergency Operation Center. "Thou shalt not steal," reads on sign.

"Who let the chads out? Who? Who? Gore Did!" reads another popular printed sign.

A smattering of pro-Gore protesters is here as well. "Bush hates all minorities," reads a sign from their number.

"One-ninety-three C," Burton says inside.

"Who's got 193-C?" Roberts asks.

As I walk from my car to the Emergency Operations Center, I pass a woman who has camped out on the sidewalk, waving a Bush-Cheney sign for the motorists who pass by. I ask her how she's doing.

"Good," she says. "Who are you with?"

"Salon.com," I reply.

"Oh," she says. "You're one of those."

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