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Today, on the eve of the first true national primary, we celebrate the decline, fall and collapse of conventional wisdom.

As voters in 24 states and one territory across the United States gird for Super Tuesday, when more than half the nation votes in the races for the presidential nomination, it is impossible to predict the outcome on the Democratic side, while the Republican contest seems all but over.

This is exactly the opposite of what the pundits and pollsters had predicted for months. Once again the talking heads have been confounded, as the voters decide to decide for themselves.

Last-minute polls show support for Illinois Senator Barack Obama surging across the country. New York Senator Hillary Clinton, who enjoyed a double-digit lead in California, for example, is now virtually tied with Mr. Obama in that all-important state

Her support within the Latino community may be starting to erode, thanks to the efforts of Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy, who endorsed Mr. Obama last week and who has been campaigning for him in heavily Latino districts. That, plus the endorsement of the Los Angeles-based La Opinion, the country's largest Spanish-language newspaper, may help weaken Ms. Clinton's popularity among Hispanics.

Or it may have no effect at all.

Consider how badly all previous prognostications have failed: Throughout the first half of last year, Arizona Senator John McCain was thought to be the establishment choice for the Republican nomination. Then his fundraising effort collapsed, and he was written off. Instead, the fight was supposed to be between former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who had a large lead in the polls, and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who was outspending everyone, in part with his own money.

Then Mr. Giuliani's popularity suddenly evaporated, and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee emerged from nowhere to take the Iowa caucuses, thanks to the fervent efforts of Christian evangelicals.

But those evangelicals failed to deliver South Carolina to Mr. Huckabee, and Mr. Romney's money couldn't win him New Hampshire. Both states went to Mr. McCain, whose campaign was reborn, and who today is so far ahead in the polls that his victory seems all but certain. At least, as certain as anything can be, in this crazy race.

Ms. Clinton was the inevitable candidate on the Democratic side, until Oprah Winfrey's very public endorsement of Mr. Obama, and the crowds she was able to deliver to him in December, re-energized his campaign. After Mr. Obama won Iowa, the polls and pundits declared he would all but certainly take New Hampshire, which would have placed the Clinton campaign in mortal peril.

Instead, Ms. Clinton went retail, got personal, and took the state, and then took Nevada, deflating Mr. Obama's campaign. But that campaign was reinflated with a huge win in South Carolina, which also showed the Democratic race fissuring along racial and class lines.

Now, with the polls narrowing and the fact that delegates are awarded on the Democratic side through proportional representation (the Republicans use a winner-takes-all method), it appears entirely possible that the Democrats could be headed to a brokered convention, with no candidate assured of victory, something that hasn't been seen in decades.

It was only in January that political observers began speculating openly about the possibility of a brokered convention. Except we were all convinced it would happen, if at all, on the Republican side. Which makes us 0-for-22, or thereabouts.

There may be a reason for all this, at least on the Democratic side. Both Senators Clinton and Obama are exciting candidates; each represents a tremendous breakthrough in U.S. presidential politics, for women and for blacks. Pundits, undeterred by their past record, are already speculating on a Clinton-Obama or Obama-Clinton ticket, in order to unite the party and offer voters the best of both demographic worlds.

Yet Democratic voters are themselves uncertain about which choice they prefer. Ms. Clinton has the experience and toughness to run the White House and, perhaps more important, to face the inevitable onslaught from the Republicans over the coming months.

It was a point she took pains to make, repeatedly, in a television interview yesterday.

"Frankly, you know, in his prior election in Illinois, Senator Obama didn't face anyone who ran attack ads against him," she told host George Stephanopoulos on ABC's This Week. "He ran against a very weak opponent, without resources or credibility."

But Mr. Obama, though a relative novice, represents an even more exciting choice, a chance for reconciliation in a nation that has been riven by race-based conflict since the day of its founding.

And he would defuse the opposition from voters of all parties who would give anything not to see Billary back in the White House.

"I think I can get some votes that Senator Clinton cannot get," Mr. Obama, declared on CBS's Face the Nation. "That broadens the political map. I think it bodes well for the election."

And so support sloshes back and forth, with the polls and the talking heads trailing behind the repeated shifts in voter intentions.

The question for Mr. Obama is whether he has the time to imprint himself and his message of hope and reconciliation on voters who may only now be waking to the dynamics of the Democratic race. As Washington Post columnist George Will has pointed out, it would be far better for the Illinois senator if Super Tuesday were a week away, rather than tomorrow.

The only thing we really know is that the outcome is unknowable, that the race may or may not be decided Super Tuesday, that some combination of Mr. Obama, Ms. Clinton, Mr. McCain or Mr. Romney will emerge on top.

And that whatever the outcome, conventional wisdom is bound to be embarrassed once again.