Such is the way of adrenalin. It dissipates.

And along comes Angela Merkel, the adrenalin-free Ossi, who has been a chancellor of unmemorable steadiness, and who, barring an upset, will be re-elected at the head of her center-right Christian Democratic Union.

Merkel has been a leader in the image of a settled Germany. Everything about her screams drama over — Brandt on his knees in the Warsaw ghetto; chain-smoking Schmidt (“a politician with vision needs to see an ophthalmologist”) fighting the fight for medium-range U.S. missiles; Kohl clasping Mitterrand’s hand at Verdun and later inhaling unification with unabashed appetite. Every risk-averse fiber in Merkel’s body proclaims the social-market consensus has prevailed, even through financial crisis.

The extent of discord may be measured by the fact that Merkel’s chief opponent is also her foreign minister in the governing Grand Coalition: Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the Social Democrat leader. He’s a likeable technocrat who always seems to be wondering how he ever ended up as a politician.

None of the above should suggest there’s nothing at stake. There is: a little. If Merkel gets her favored option — a center-right coalition with the liberal Free Democrats — tax cuts, nuclear power and support for the Afghan mission (Germany has sent more than 4,000 troops) will get a boost. If not, well, more of the same is in order. My sense is most Germans feel market reforms of recent years have gone far enough.

Germans are hunkered down, not unhappy but uninspired. This has been a campaign of astonishing intellectual nullity. I spoke of hope and concern: The former springs from Germany’s absorption of its eastern third and passage into normality, the latter from the country’s numbness.