It was completely official that the Carl McCall campaign was toast when even the New York Times endorsed Pataki. What's sad is that McCall's trouncing may be taken in some quarters as evidence of the folly of an African-American candidate who, to his credit, has refused to play the race card, who made his name in statewide office rather than narrowcasting to a carefully gerrymandered legislative district, and has always run essentially as a moderate (Pataki's ads in the city have bashed McCall for being insufficiently liberal).