Maverick Blues

Wednesday morning, even before John McCain and Bill Bradley had folded their tents, the talk was everywhere: the fun's over, get ready for BOOOORING.

Bradley and McCain - especially McCain - had generated more political excitement than the country had seen in 40 years.

But they had been done in by two plain vanilla sons of the Establishment - and the people they had energized were sick about it.

So were a lot of other people who were enjoying a good political story after the drab and seamy politics of recent years.

The mavericks had entertained us all and made politics fun again.

But Bradley never really got a good speech together until his concession statement and McCain's reform talk made his own party too nervous to nominate him so they lost.

Which raises the question: Will the people they turned on turn cynical and tune out?

Let's hope not, because we may be on the verge of something really unusual: a campaign about issues.

From gun control, abortion and campaign finance reform to foreign policy, education, gay rights and tobacco, this time there really are differences.

So there's still plenty to talk about.

Having said that, it was fun - these past couple of months - wasn't it?