It quickly became vogue for pundits to say we got nothing out of ABC's interview with Gary Condit, but regrettably that isn't so.
We got way more than we wanted, in one all-too-familiar way.
We got another sickening dose of the reality that, when personal-responsibility push comes to self-preservation shove, 999,999 times out of a million, a politician will behave more like a politician than a real human being.
The more the sad-sack cast of characters posing as public servants passes in front of our eyes, the clearer it becomes we might as well expect hogs to stop hopping into slop as think one will simply come clean with us.
They are likelier to sprout Tweety Bird wings and flap to the moon than do the down-to-earth, decent thing.
If you were among millions watching Condit's 30-minute funhouse-hall-of-mirrors dance with Connie Chung, maybe you were like me in feeling one particular sense of disgust.
This welled up every time Condit spoke in Scout's-honor tones about "doing every single thing asked of me."
When the cops asked, he answered. The FBI knocked, he opened. The lie detector scratched, he twitched. Chandra Levy's folks called, he responded.
Isn't that a beautiful page from the Bill Clinton political primer, "It Depends On What The Meaning Of Is Is."
Does it ever occur to one of these noble leaders that a real person doesn't do what is asked?
He does more than asked.
A young woman is missing.
A politician waits for police to approach while configuring a defense.
A real person goes to the parents the moment he knows something's amiss. He puts his arms around them and offers himself completely.
A real person goes over every nuance of his times with their daughter. He pores over her new friends and acquaintances — persons with whom the parents may not be familiar. Places she goes, things she does, about which they may not be aware.
The real person exhausts any recollection remotely meaningful in locating the daughter.
He does this, even if it is awkward discussing his "close" relationship with her.
Consoling people who are hurting is often daunting and discordant, even when they're dear friends. It's worse if we have strained feelings.
You do what you can anyway.
Especially you do this, if you have done nothing to harm the daughter; you have nothing legally to fear.
Instead, we have Condit, slippery and stalling from the first days of Levy's disappearance to the last seconds of the Chung interview.
We have his obscene premise that he isn't talking about his relationship with Levy because of the parents' "specific request" not to — he would "honor" that with "dignity."
Since the parents immediately and angrily denied making this request, could honor and dignity be more cheapened?
By eschewing straight talk, Condit missed a chance to be really human, if only for half an hour.
By opting to be rehearsed and shifty, he lived down to the politician's highest credo: Tap dance as fast as you can and hope the yokels buy the sideshow enough to give you another ride through the looking glass, back to Potomac make-believe.
The suspicion is, the too-clever handlers and Condit blew it, and next election he will become a former politician.
Like ooze in quicksand, another hunk of gunk likely will come and fill his space.
E-mail: gtwyman@desnews.com