ampaign 2000 started off with such promise. For once, the smart money looked stupid.
No such luck. The two candidates backed by the establishment - Vice President Al Gore and Texas Governor George W. Bush - will be facing off against each other in November.
It's too bad. The establishment did not have to win.
People wanted change. But the change agents - former US Senator Bill Bradley and Arizona Senator John McCain - ended up giving them too much of the same old thing: negative campaigning and hot-button politics. As soon as Bradley and McCain played by the establishment's rules, the establishment won back control.
In the weeks leading up to the New Hampshire primary, Republicans and Democrats talked about ideas and policy, about health care and Social Security, about campaign finance reform and national security concerns.
Ordinary people could feel like they were part of the conversation: the candidates were actually talking about issues that affect all of us directly.
Bradley was the first to cave to conventional wisdom. His handlers told him to fight back and not take punches from Gore. So he punched in New Hampshire, calling Gore a liar. The pundits cheered, but I think Bradley lost his allure with voters when he gave up the high road.
Buoyed by his tremendous New Hampshire win, McCain took longer to follow suit, but follow he did.
After winning New Hampshire, McCain declared that ''a great national crusade has just begun.'' If only he were able to keep the crusade alive.
People so wanted a healer and a hero; and McCain, at first, seemed so perfect for the role. Democrats and Independents were willing to overlook a conservative Republican agenda to embrace a candidate who did not want to be all things to all people, but would stand for some key things everyone could believe in.
But then, the gloss started to wear off. In the weeks leading up to Super Tuesday, the conversation got narrower on the Republican side. Trusting either bad advice or bad instincts, McCain did his part to narrow it further.
Bob Jones University and anti-Catholicism? Jerry Falwell and the evangelicals? They may be burning issues on cable talk shows, but they hardly seem relevant to most people. Religious intolerance is serious, but this debate was a fraud. It was all about pushing certain political buttons to get a certain political result. McCain touched the hot button and burned himself. What a disappointment.
And now it leads to the biggest disappointment of all - Gore v. Bush.
Joan Vennochi is a Globe columnist.
