I just voted for Bill Bradley. Yes, I know his campaign is done -- but I owe him this vote. Not just for all those wonderful years with the Knicks; I was a season ticket holder. I owe him for challenging a sitting Vice President of his own party when he needed challenging. I owe him for the class with which he entered the race and for the class with which he is leaving it. I owe him for calling on Democrats to vote for what could be, for something cleaner, for something we could be proud of. Because I am convinced most of us are not proud of the Clinton-Gore administration. Yet in the end, his decency is exactly what has made this campaign quixotic. He alluded to Gore's past and integrity, but he looked uncomfortable when he did it. In fact, his only real hope was to say I am Al Gore without the Buddhist temple visit. I am Al Gore without the endless praise of Bill Clinton. I am Al Gore without a history I have to deny. But that was not the course he took and when John McCain captured the reform mantle and the independents that coalesced behind it. You want to see Willis Reed coming out of that tunnel and lifting up this staggered campaign. But it's not 1970 and he's not Dollar Bill coming off a screen to sink the clutch jumper. He was just a footnote in presidential political history, the warm-up act for Gore's war against George Bush.

Ah yes, George Bush. The tide always figured to turn this week. The fact is, not counting his own state, John McCain has not won a state south of Pennsylvania. He has only won the vote among Republicans in New Hampshire. More and more his own party has turned from him. As I wrote earlier, this is not the way to win a nomination.

The big mistake in Virginia was the turning point. What were his advisers thinking? What campaign schedule did they have that showed this would help them get delegates? Who was going to suddenly reach the conclusion that he had to vote for McCain to stop Pat Robertson? He had the anti-religious right vote, all he did was push those conservatives on the fence in the other direction. He then decided to switch his message to try and appeal to California Republicans. The independent reformer suddenly became a Reagan Republican. Maybe if he had a month to drum in the new message it might have worked, but all he had was two weeks. Two weeks in which he also had to deal with NY and Ohio. The problem was always that the California Republican Party is one of the most conservative in the country. It doesn't matter that independent voters could vote for him in the open beauty contest, he can't win the delegates. In the GOP, California is the key, the Big Enchilada, 162 delegates, winner take all and it belongs to Bush.

In the end, McCain needed to create a bandwagon effect. He needed to break Bush, needed to make backing Bush look like a mistake. He couldn't do that, certainly couldn't by forcing the religious right to circle the wagons.

So the Bush delegate machine has started to roll. McCain has taken most of New England, but Bush has won Ohio and Georgia, with California yet to come. Maybe McCain will win a tight race in NY, but all he'll do is split the delegates, because that's not winner take all. Next week is the Southern Super Tuesday -- a Bush romp in all likelihood. John McCain fought his old friends, the right wing of the Republican Party and lost. They showed him and his supporters who was in control of the GOP. Where the McCain voters go in November will be the key to the election.

What to watch tonight: look at the popular vote in Ohio. Bush should outpoll Gore because his primary should pull more voters, but it is a good test of party organizations and general popularity. If this is close, it bodes well for Gore.