Regardless of this election cycle’s outcome, it is safe to say that we have avoided the worst of all possible fates– the dreams of a Rudy Presidency have been dashed like the brains of Babylon’s children.

My first stint in the city coincided almost exactly with his tenure as Mayor, and like all New Yorkers from the hey-hey pre-9/11 day-days, Rudy was a constant fixture of my personal landscape– an unhinged, sociopathic and gruesomely racist bully capable of saying everything and doing anything.

Jimmy Breslin summed it up best: “A small man in search of a balcony.”

Even so, I have a tinge of sadness that Rudy went out with a whisper, begging for votes through broken microphones. I wanted his campaign to fall apart, but I didn’t want the implosion of a lazy candidate surrounding himself with inexperienced yes-men. I wanted a red faced freak out, a screaming monster of a debate answer, or R.G. pushing a pie-faced kid in the mud amidst the laughter of Bronx goons.

Who could have imagined that Nosferatu would trade in his fangs for the mannerisms of a party hack, lisping out limp answers on economic policy and disaster relief?

Not me, anyway, and it seems like a strategic mistake. Somewhere in frenzy of post-9/11 adulation, the Mayor bought into his own hype. He began to believe that people liked him. The problem with this theory is that no one likes him.

His appeal as a candidate for any office had never been that of the amiable fellow. He had always been the jerk who’d show the sissies what needed doing; not so much George Bush as George Wallace.

What might’ve been if only he had embraced his fundamental repugnance of character and turned it into a campaign virtue? This year’s contest was too crowded with bland non-entities afraid of making mistakes. The new Rudy never had a chance of gaining traction, not while he was continually forced to address his personal life and past record.

But there’s always room in the circus for a firebrand.

Of course, he still would’ve lost– but he could have gone down a Lion rather than a lamb.

(And Florida? What vampire goes to the Sunshine State?)