This was "the week that was" for campaign finance reform. The stakes were high. The votes were close. You could cut the tension around the Capital with a knife. And when it was over, just like all the years in the recent past, there was no result. The only winner may well have been U.S. President George W. Bush, who doesn't really want to sign a campaign reform bill and may now be off the hook, at least for the moment.

Campaign reform is like an all-day sucker. It won't go away. The important question about it is: Do the American people really care? It fails to rank high on issues in the polls, but it certainly contributes to the distrust of government, which does rank high in the voters concerns. Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona showed how the issue could ignite the populace during his campaign for the presidency last year. He continues to provide leadership on the issue in Congress.

There are many areas of agreement on the broad issue of the financing of elections:

* The cost of campaigns has escalated out of reach and overwhelms the candidates. They spend so much time raising money that they get little else done.

* The influence of special interests has risen in proportion to their spending on elections. For people promoting narrow issues or commercial concerns, money put into one end of the political trough produces public policy at the other end.

* The second amendment provisions on free speech must be protected from control by limitations on spending.

* The present system is not satisfactory, except for those who are taking advantage of it.

There is less agreement on just how things should be changed. That is because many people like the way it is. It brings together weird combinations and coalitions on both sides. The minority community likes soft money because it is used heavily in the kind of political activity they need, registration and get out the vote drives. Fat cats like the current law because it gives them special access and privileges for their contributions. Democrats fear that Republicans want to stack the deck against them. Republicans fear that Democrats want to stack the deck against them. Both are correct.

Last week's consideration of the issue by the House of Representatives was instructive. The McCain proposal that had passed the Senate in May was presented to the House. The Republican leadership of the House made no secret of their opposition to this reform measure but they did not have the votes to defeat it. Eventually they came up with an alternative plan that made real reforms but changed some of the major elements of the McCain proposal. In particular, it provided for limited contributions to the political parties of "soft" money contributions that can be made now in unlimited amounts from corporate and union treasuries and used in any way the parties decide.

Soft money has become the current devil in the campaign finance debate. (Last year it was political action committees.) When the campaign finance law was passed in the mid-70s, it provided strict reporting requirements and limits on contributions to candidates and their campaigns. But it did not impose such conditions on money contributed to party organizations to be used by them for party building and general administrative expenses.

That has become the loophole through which creative campaign managers have driven truckloads of propaganda and hard-hitting communications toward the voters. During the 1980 campaign, the first that was held after the campaign law was passed, we tiptoed around with soft money. We used it sparingly for registration drives; get out the vote drives; and to support the local and state parties. We were careful to disassociate the soft money spending from any relationship to a candidates' campaign.

But times changed and the campaign managers and their lawyers developed elaborate schemes to use soft money for very direct candidate-oriented campaign propaganda. During the 1996 presidential race, the Clinton campaign had spent millions of soft money dollars on television advertising in the key states to "soften up" Republican candidate Bob Dole, long before he became the nominee. It was very effective and Dole never had a chance to get his message out. It had been drowned in a sea of soft money.

The soft-money issue dominated the debate in the House last week. The Republican substitute allowed political parties to raise soft money and use it for administrative purposes. That provision attracted the support of a large number of Democrats for the bill, mainly minority members who have depended on party-organized and financed voter drives for their elections.

But the consideration of the bill became a mess. The Republican leadership came up with a rule under which it would be considered that was onerous and designed to torpedo the chances of passage of the bill. In a rancorous session, 19 Republicans joined the Democrats in voting down the rule. Thus the bill could not be considered. It is unlikely that the leaders will bring the bill up again soon. Campaign reform is probably dead again for this year.

With Congress so closely divided between Democrats and Republicans, the discipline of the members to their party's leadership has become critical. On the vote in the House on the rule to take up the campaign reform issue, 19 Republicans, nearly 10 percent of the caucus, voted against their leaders proposed rule. That was a shocker. Voting against a rule is tantamount to a rebellion.

One of the principle advantages of the majority in the House is its ability to control the action on the floor. The House is a highly structured institution, with all of the action on the floor controlled by rules adopted for each measure considered. The leadership designs the rules and exercises its control by determining the manner in which legislation is considered. The most sacred form of party loyalty is supporting the leadership on rules questions.

So, when 10 percent of the caucus votes wrong, what is going on? Well, it is a sign of the strength of the moderates. The moderate Republicans and the moderate Democrats fill the middle and make the lot of the leaders more difficult. They provide the margins of victory for legislation. They are the tails that are wagging the dog.

The revolt last week was a major set back for Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican. He has had his hands full trying to guide his aggressive and conservative leadership team through the obstacles of the legislative schedule with the narrow Republican majority.

Hastert is the target of criticism from all sides for crafting the rule that his moderate members considered a slap in the face. With the House facing a number of important votes on key elements of the president's program in the next several weeks, Hastert will have his hands full to keep his caucus unified, and the president badly needs those House Republicans to keep his political agenda moving.

This moderate vs. leadership phenomenon is not limited to the House. The Senate is also under the strong influence of a group of moderate senators who work together to craft legislation that fits their philosophy and then gather the votes to pass it.

This makes Congress tracking an even more unpredictable sport. A case in point: The president is keen on expanding oil drilling along America's coastlines. The Republican-dominated House of Representatives, the driving force for passage of the president's agenda, voted a couple of weeks ago to cut his authority to allow drilling with a vote of about two to one. The Senate, those rebellious sorts who tend to tweak the Bush program, however, voted 67-33 this past week to increase offshore drilling. Hard to figure, isn't it.