The electorate seems particularly quiescent as the Presidential election of 1996 approaches. It's as if the voters have heard it all before and aren't going to be moved from their preconceived ideas. Even four highly visible Presidential candidates - Clinton, Dole, Perot, Nader - haven't electrified their constituencies. If there are national campaign headquarters on the South Fork, they aren't visible, and the only Presidential signs on trees and poles around town seem to be for Perot.

In endorsing President Clinton for a second term, we are cognizant of the fact that he has gained a solid reputation during his first term as a waffler. He has bent to political influence more often than his supporters like to admit. The Whitewater miasma that surrounds the White House and the First Lady also is hard to dispel: The Clintons were hard to keep on a pedestal.

Nevertheless, the Clinton Administration has accomplished feats even the President's supporters might not have thought likely. The deficit has been reduced by large measure. Wars, famine, disease, and fear are not under control in the world at large, but there is no overall war, and, at least for the moment, Bosnia and Haiti, to which the President committed American troops, have seen an end of outright violence and a beginning at democracy.

What we don't buy, however, is the conventional wisdom in some quarters that Bob Dole deserves to be President because he is the man of higher character. We need our national leaders to be of high moral character, but the morality we need, and the exercise of judgment that comes from it, has to do with principles that affect the lives of us all rather than with personal relationships. For our part, it is clear that Mr. Dole, who supported Richard Nixon blindly, who insulted the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, who did an about-face on supply-side economics, which he once dubbed "voodoo," and who is against family leave, has shown lesser character on the basic issues of our time. President Clinton has learned a lot about policy, foreign and domestic, in the last four years. We look forward to further progress in the term ahead.

Critics and art historians have spent years picking apart Jackson Pollock's Abstract Expressionist masterpieces. Now art fans and jigsaw buffs are devoting their time to putting them back together.

Jackson Pollock jigsaw puzzles. The thought is enough to intimidate even the most jaded puzzle pro.

"Autumn Rhythm Number 30" reduced to 500 maddeningly identical puzzle pieces? That's exactly what one can order through the 1996 Christmas catalogues of such prominent art repositories as the Metropolitan Museum and the Smithsonian Institution.

Three Jigsaw Puzzles

Painted in 1950, "Autumn Rhythm Number 30" is the third Pollock work to be licensed by the Pollock-Krasner Foundation for reprint as a jigsaw puzzle. It joins the 1952 painting "Convergence," published by Battle Road Press in New Hampshire, and the Guggenheim Museum's "puzzle-in-a-can" version of "Alchemy" (1947).

The Guggenheim, incidentally, has also worked its "Alchemy" on a scarf, diary, baseball, and "note cube."

With their layers upon layers of dripped paint and chaotic color fields stretching from one end of the canvas to the other, Pollock's paintings would certainly present a challenge to reconstruct from a pile of puzzle pieces.

"It's challenging, all right," said Helen Harrison, the director of the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center. "A girlfriend of mine was given ["Convergence"] by a friend who wanted to twist the knife a bit."

Her friend "agonized over it for days," said Ms. Harrison.

The Study Center sells copies of the "Convergence" puzzle, along with a small collection of other Pollock merchandise, in a gift shop it set up this year.

The center does not own any of Pollock's paintings nor any licensing rights to them - that is done through the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, which was established by the artist's wife, the painter Lee Krasner, in her will.

The Floor Store

The center does, however, own Pollock's studio, with its paint-dribbled floorboards carrying the legacy of the master. Some people regard the floor as a work of art in itself.

Hence, "The Floor Store." That's how Ms. Harrison refers to the center's new museum shop.

First, there's the solar-powered T-shirt. The shirt, made by a company called SunWorks, depicts the studio floorboards in somewhat drab tones. But once activated by sunlight or any ultraviolet source, the colors jump to life and glow off the shirts.

Then there's the studio-floor computer mouse pad. The mouse pad was the Study Center's own idea.

"Your mouse can run all over the Pollock-Krasner floor without damaging anything!" Ms. Harrison said with sales-pitch inflections. The mouse pads are produced by Town and Country Photo in East Hampton.

The studio floor is also seen in the cover design of a compact disc the Study Center sells, featuring interviews with Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner.

But do posthumous Pollock puzzles, solar-powered T-Shirts, and "Alchemy" baseballs trivialize the artwork?

Trivialization?

"I'm somewhat ambivalent about it," said Ms. Harrison. "It depends on the product."

"The floor? No problem. A floor's a floor. But when you're talking about a work of art, it's different."

"Of course, once you complete 'Convergence' you have a beautiful piece of art. Doing the puzzle also makes you look at the painting in a very intense way, and that I don't think is trivializing it. The note cube? That's a toughie."

Museum merchandise and fine-art reproductions are, of course, big business, and the modest "Floor Store" has been catching on fast. The Study Center sells its items - which also include books and postcards - by mail order as well as on-site.

"We even got an order from someone in Bosnia," Ms. Harrison marveled.

The Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center is quartered in the former home of the two artists, at 830 Springs-Fireplace Road in Springs.

The numbers are in for the Hamptons International Film Festival, which ran from Oct. 16 to Oct. 21. This year's overall attendance - a figure that represents each time a person presented a ticket or pass to enter a festival event - topped 17,600, the organizers said. More than 61 percent of the seats at the East Hampton Cinema were filled throughout the festival, and opening and closing nights were completely sold out. The house was more than 80 percent full on Saturday. All told, attendance was approximately 17 percent higher than last year.

Organizers had said earlier that ticket sales were up over last year. They were right: Specifically, individual ticket sales rose from 9,025 to 9,545, a 6-percent increase. The overall take in ticket sales was up $20,000, or 11 percent, over the previous year's take.

One hundred and eighteen representatives of the film industry attended this year, according to the festival organizers' records. That number is three times last year's.

Judging by the number of press passes issued this year, some 140 publications and TV shows were represented this year, as opposed to 87 last year.

Corporate sponsorship was up 10 percent.

As reported earlier, there were more films this year: 45 narrative features, 14 documentaries, 38 short films, 3 archival ones, and 10 student ones, as opposed to 41, 9, 28, 3, and 10 last year. Thirty-two films made their American or world premieres at the festival, as did 17 shorts.

Weslia Whitfield, dubbed by The New Yorker the most assured and affecting jazz-cabaret singer to arrive in New York in many years, will appear at the Bay Street Theatre in Sag Harbor on Saturday at 7 p.m.

Accompanied by the pianist and arranger Mike Greensill, she will present an evening of cabaret called "My Shining Hour."

Often described as a singer's singer, Ms. Whitfield has won critical acclaim all over the country, including New York's Algonquin Hotel, and particularly in her regular spot at the Plush Room in San Francisco's York Hotel.

According to the theater, she makes a refreshing choice of standards, alternating between audience favorites and lesser-known surprises, and often unearths long-forgotten verses.

Tickets are available from the theater's box office on Long Wharf.

Nine years ago Jean Lindgren and Tony Hitchcock built a house in Sagaponack, using a Vermont architect's plans and framing, with finishing by a local builder.

Two years ago their friend Ross Runnels decided to build the same house. He ordered plans and frame from David Howard, the same Vermont architect, and hired the same contractor, Tom Pappas.

Mr. Runnels's imitation was definitely flattering, but his requirements and his life style were a bit different.

Ms. Lindgren and Mr. Hitchcock are year-round residents who need some home office space when they are not out running the Hamptons Classic and other horse shows across the country. Mr. Runnels works as a management consultant in New York City and his Sag Harbor home is a retreat from his business life.

Extra Bedroom, No Office

Both houses occupy the same footprint and are the same size. Designed as solar collectors open to the exterior landscape, they are oriented to the south, with a long wall of glass-paned doors in the "great" room.

However, where the Hitchcock-Lindgren team heat their house with a wood-burning stove that is the focus of their living area, Mr. Runnels opted for a free-standing brick chimney and fireplace.

In the older house, the master bedroom is on the second floor. In his house, Mr. Runnels reduced the home office space to a small bedroom and carved out an extra bedroom and laundry and a large master bed and bath suite, all on the first floor.

He also eliminated one wall of French doors to provide hanging space for his growing collection of contemporary art.

The houses also differ stylistically.

The tone of the Hitchcock-Lindgren house is warm, contained within the now darkened and mellowed oak timbers and underlined by a random-width knotty-pine floor. In contrast, Mr. Runnels has kept his space open and airy, with a lighter color scheme and simple, contemporary furniture. The oak timbers are still golden in color and the floor is random-width white oak.

The imitation was flattering, though the requirements were different.

The kitchen appliances and cabinets in both houses run along the west wall, with the added luxury of a walk-in pantry to hold the refrigerator and microwave oven and to provide lots of shelving for dinner, cookware, and supplies.

The kitchen in the older house has red oak cabinets and black appliances, including a six-burner cooktop. In the Runnels house, the cabinets are of bleached oak and the appliances are white.

Hitchcock-Lindgren House

The Hitchcock-Lindgren house is furnished with a relaxed combination of arts and crafts and antiques, a colorful melange of pattern, painted finishes, and collections of artifacts.

In the long "great" room, decorative green side chairs flank a dropleaf table behind spring-green sofas. A large oak desk is topped by a Victorian painting of dogs, overlooking a rack of deer antlers. The walls on the north side are lined with shelves, filled with books and collections of antique toys.

Bears of all sizes reign over the living room, while a gathering of early 20th-century pigs is ensconced in the kitchen among the many cookbooks. A Chinese rug anchors the country table and chairs there, and an oversized chaise longue has a sunny spot by the windows.

Spaciousness

Mr. Runnels's decoration, still in process, will include bookshelves but they will be shorter, to accommodate paintings above. At the moment, a Priscilla Bowden painting hangs on the south wall opposite an even larger work by Michael Paraskevas.

The floors are mostly bare, with small rugs scattered underfoot where needed. Borrowing that famous phrase, Mr. Runnels says less is more and the "stripped" look makes him very happy. His furnishings will remain small in scale, surrounded by lots of open space.

Mr. Runnels's wooded site is just being landscaped. The Hitchcock-Lindgren house sits in deeper woods on flatter terrain, with plantings that have had almost a decade to mature.

Common to both houses are many indoor trees, potted palms, and blooming houseplants. The sun streams in and forms patterns and shadows among the angled timbers and pools of warmth in the winter light.

These houses have good bones and wear their varied clothing very well.

Other than a healthy set of bugs, the East End's 1996 scallop crop seems to offer little to crow about.

There is something to crow about in Southampton, however. After over two years of work, the Town Trustees have succeeded in bringing Mecox Bay back from the dead. As soon as the certification process is complete, some 500 acres of bottomland - about half the bay - will be open for the first time in decades. Much of the bay has been closed to shellfishing since the 1970s.

"This is huge. A big development," Southampton Town Trustee Scott Strough said on Monday, still ecstatic over a letter the town received from the State Department of Environmental Conservation on Oct. 16.

Corwith And Semlear

"The department has just completed a water quality analysis and determined that approximately 500 acres meets the water quality criteria to be reclassified from uncertified to seasonally certified. . . . This reclassification will open shellfish lands not available to the local baymen since the late 1970s," Lisa Tettelbach, a marine resources specialist with the D.E.C., wrote.

Mr. Strough credited Trustees Peter Corwith and Jon Semlear for leading the effort to restore Mecox to health, an effort that included repeated dredgings of the gut between the bay and the ocean. Road runoff was diminished, and wetlands along the edges of the pond were recreated to stem the flow of coliform bacteria and other pollutants.

The relative number of individual coliforms is used nationally to determine the risk of contamination in shellfish.

Spring Start Seen

Once it is formalized by the state, the certification of Mecox will allow shellfishing from Dec. 1 through April 15, except under unusual circumstances. The official opening of the beds could occur by spring.

The Trustees' next job will be a survey to determine just what the condition of scallops is in the long-closed bay, Mr. Strough said.

In East Hampton, the Town Trustees also are working to reclaim closed shellfish beds. At a work session on Tuesday, the nine-member East Hampton board discussed the possibility of the town's establishing its own water testing laboratory.

James McCaffrey, a Trustee, said he had been assured by the D.E.C. that the town could test its own water (and save time in the process) if it created a lab that met state criteria.

Meanwhile, the state waters of Northwest in East Hampton as well as those in Orient Harbor on the North Fork were reported so denuded of scallops that few baymen even tried to go out when the season opened last week. East Hampton Town waters were opened to commercial scallopers on Monday, and, although they were ordered closed because of the rains over the weekend, scallopers say they don't expect to find much when they do venture out.

AMAGANSETT

Opper estate to Joseph Opper, Schellinger Road, $251,000.

BRIDGEHAMPTON

Martino to Judith Saner, Bull Head Lane, $420,000.

Bet Tov Constructs Ltd. to Priscilla Garston, Alfie's Way, $390,000.

Wheatley to William and Adair Beutel, Ocean Road, $1,750,000.

EAST HAMPTON

Bourie to Elaine Siegel, Georgica Road, $245,000.

Town of East Hampton to John and Carmella Intermaggio, Accabonac Road, $155,000.

Embrey to Walter Halucha, Indian Hill Road, $207,500.

Sharlin to Robert and Irene Bodendorf, Sherrill Road, $382,500.

Greenfelder estate to Luis and Clara Barco, Wooded Oak Lane, $162,000.

Kern to Sagaponack Const. Inc., Montauk Highway, $186,000.

MONTAUK

Davis to Alan and Ann Mott, South Fairview Avenue, $265,000.

NORTH HAVEN

Andes (referee) to Citibank N.A., Forest Road, $154,500.

Coolidge-Shore Assets L.P. to Willard Gentile and Donna Reese, North Haven Way, $460,000.

NOYAC

Leonard to Robert and Christina Burns, Eastview Court, $225,000.

SAG HARBOR

Mullen estate to John, Robin, and Christopher Brancato, Widow Gavitt's Road, $705,000.

Sakellarios to Joan Carey, Noyac Road, $266,000.

SAGAPONACK

Georgica Pond House Inc. to Bristol Pond Partners L.P., Sagaponack Main Street, $1,200,000.

SPRINGS

Hunt to Caroline Upcher, Windward Lane, $220,000.

Grethel to Gennaro and Elizabeth Cavalieri, Sandra Road, $178,000.

WAINSCOTT

Montoya estate to Greenacre L.L.C., private road in Georgica Association (listed in deeds as Eel Cove Road), $3,425,000.

WATER MILL

Mahoney to Suzanne Seitles, Water Mill-Towd Road, $535,000.

Spagnolo Jr. to R. Jeffrey Lobb, Huntington Lane, $570,000.

The Montauk telegraph had word out of Ken Moschitta's catch the length and breadth of Long Island almost before the 50-pound striped bass was carried off the beach just north of the Montauk Lighthouse on Sunday afternoon.

Surfcasters immediately descended on the Point.

It was a massive fish, fat from eating bunker with the rest of a large school that inundated the heavy surf left over from the northeaster that had rained and rumbled past on Saturday.

The bass blitz began in the surprising calm and coffee-colored water after the storm. It lasted for three tides as a large ocean swell continued to sweep around the Point, taking more than one rock-perched surfcaster with it.

On Sunday evening, one caster with a big bass on his line got pitched from a rock along with another fisherman. In the process, a fishing rod was lost underwater and then found with luck and the help of one angler's miner-style head lamp. The fish was landed, too, and a dozen or so surfcasters were greatly amused.

The conditions were the kind that casters dream of: lots of white water, big bait fish pressed up against the cobblestone shore, and the presence of the "air force." There were not many of the big, blue-billed gannets, but enough to prove that the bigger bait, and the bigger fish that feed on them, were in the area.

Most of the fish seemed concentrated at "the bluffs," an area just to the north of the lighthouse. As the tide dropped on Sunday morning, casters began hooking up.

Pope Noell, a veteran of the rocks, estimated that at least 50 fish weighing 20 pounds or more were landed over a 36-hour period. Perhaps a quarter of the bass weighed more than 30 pounds, with a number of 40-pound-plus fish and Mr. Moschitta's 50-pound giant adding incentive along the way.

The monster bass seemed to have passed on to greener pastures by Monday afternoon, although one caster was said to have walked off the beach with a 371/2-pound striper on Tuesday morning.

After the blitz and the weigh-ins, Richie Michaelson took the lead in the ongoing Montauk Locals surfcasting tournament with a 371/4-pound bass caught after only five casts on Sunday afternoon.

Insult was added to misery for Dennis Gaviola, who told Mr. Michaelson about the bite. Mr. Michaelson's catch knocked the informant out of second place.

Mr. Moschitta's 50-pound bass was not in the running, although you'd never know it by the crowd it drew outside the Montauk Bakery Monday morning. You'd a thought it was a child.

The "For Sale" sign outside the long-vacant Hotel James in Water Mill is gone, after many years. The one-time nightclub and longtime landmark on Montauk Highway was sold last month to Konner Development Inc., a Bridgehampton development company.

Carol Konner, the principal in the company, said she had no plans yet for the stately turn-of-the-century house or the 10.5 acres behind it stretching to Mecox Bay. The "Konner Development" sign in front of the house, with phone numbers posted, "is merely a sign that indicates it has been sold," she said.

Ms. Konner declined to discuss the details of the purchase, and local real estate brokers were unsure of the asking price.

That the commercial use of the James will be resurrected is unlikely, since the residentially-zoned parcel has sat idle for so long. Past commercial operations on the site enjoyed "pre-existing nonconforming" status, because they began before zoning laws were enacted, and continued.

It takes only one year of inactivity for a nonconforming use to be abandoned.

Subdivision could also be difficult. A lot split proposed in the '80s was derailed after archeologists said there might be Indian artifacts buried on the site.

Thought to have been built around 1890, the house served as a private home for many years before it was converted to commercial use. After World War II, it was Paton's Wild Duck Inn.

Many Incarnations

Thomas James, a retired mortician, bought the house as an investment in 1953. During his ownership, it went through numerous incarnations, including Frank Law's Fourth Estate, the Mecox Inn, the Plantation, and Mitty's General Store.

Mr. James finally stopped leasing and opened a nightclub on the site in 1962. Called the Hotel James, the club became one of the East End's hottest, spotlighting big-name rock and soul acts such as Wilson Pickett and Etta James.

Mr. James ran the club into the 1980s before deciding to pack it in. Stalled in his subdivision plans, he put the property on the market.

Konner Development

The purchase of the hotel is the latest of a string of recent real-estate activities in which Ms. Konner has been involved. Konner Development this year renovated the former Bridgehampton Water Company building on Main Street into new office and retail space.

Konner has now proposed a new 2,500-square-foot retail/office building on a vacant parcel between the Water Company building and the Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, a proposal that has drawn criticism from the Bridgehampton Citizens Advisory Committee. The company is also involved in several proposed subdivisions, including a plan to divide the 28-acre Babinski Farm on Mecox Road, Water Mill, into 17 half-acre house lots.

Ms. Konner, who lives in Southampton, has been active in real estate in the area for 25 years. She was a partner in the Konner-Steilen car dealership in East Hampton until the dealership closed earlier this year.

This will be a weekend full of guided hikes, along more paths than any trail-walker, no matter how enthusiastic, could possible cover. All of them are free of charge, and reservations are not required.

The occasion, the first of its kind, is "A Celebration of South Fork Trails," a cooperative venture among local, county, and state environmental organizations. Altogether, the weekend features seven walks and two rides, on horseback and by bicycle.

Setting off at 9 a.m. Saturday from Third House in Montauk County Park will be an ambitious group led by Ed Slaughter, who will take them on an eight-mile trek through Montauk's moorlands, forest, and beaches. Hikers have been asked to pack lunch and be prepared to be out most of the day; the hike ends at 4 p.m.

At 10 a.m. Saturday Mike Bottini will meet hikers at the entrance of Camp Hero State Park in Montauk for a three-mile "Point o'Woods" hike along the Montauk bluffs. That trek runs until noon.

Horseback riders who bring their own four-footed transportation will gather at the corner of Narrow and Norris Lanes in Bridgehampton at 10 on Saturday for a ride through the hills of Sagaponack, led by Dai Dayton-Smith.

Also in Montauk Saturday, Peter Liss, supervisor of the county park, will guide a two-hour, full-moon hike around the park starting at 7:30 p.m. Hikers can meet Mr. Liss at Third House at that time.

On Sunday the celebration continues with another challenging eight-mile hike, this time through Hither Woods in Montauk. Hikers will meet their guide, Rick Whalen, at the Hither Hills overlook at 9:30 a.m. and will trail-walk until around 4.

A trek around Montauk County Park's Big Reed Pond, guided by Richard Lupoletti, will also take place Sunday morning. Forest, wetlands, and remnants of a Montaukett Indian village will be featured. Hikers have been asked to meet at the East Lake Drive entrance of the park, two miles north of the Montauk Highway at 10.

Bikers will get their day in the sun, and on the bike trails, on Sunday from 10 until noon, on a guided tour through the Hither Hills trails system. Helmets are required. The leader, Kurt Pfund, has asked bikers to meet him at the entrance to the Montauk Recycling Center, east of the Hither Hills overlook off Montauk Point State Boulevard.

Farther west on Sunday, Sara Davison will guide a walk through the Big Woods preserve in Southampton from 10 a.m. until noon. Trekkers have been asked to meet at the intersection of Millstone Brook and Scott Roads in North Sea.

Still farther west, two treks are scheduled in Flanders. One is an eight-miler at the Sarnoff Preserve; hikers have been asked to call the Group for the South Fork's Bridgehampton office for the meeting place and time. The other will go through the Smithers Preserve, and hikers will gather at the Big Duck on Route 24, south of Riverhead, at 10 a.m.

The organizations sponsoring the weekend's events include the Group for the South Fork, the East Hampton and Southampton Trails Preservation Societies, the Suffolk County Department of Parks, Recreation and Conservation and its New York State counterpart; the Long Island Greenbelt Trails Conference, the Nature Conservancy, and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

Remember, daylight savings time begins at 2 a.m. on Sunday. Don't forget to set the clocks back or you'll miss your hike.