Recovering Scandal-holics: We Feel Your Pain

So it’s ending. What a feeling, to get back to that regularly scheduled programming. What a feeling--except in poor Washington, D.C. Such emptiness, the morning after. Believe us, Washingtonians, we here in Southern California remember. One day, the stunning revelations are as thick on the ground as buffalo on the lone prairie. Then, before you know it, it’s buh-bye cameras. So long, chat rooms. Hasta la vista, CNN.

Oh, if anyone knows the void of scandal departed, it’s we Angelenos. We know just how you feel as your people sink back into America’s woodwork-- Bettie and Vernon and Monica and Linda and those wacky House Prosecutors and Ken (Wile E. Coyote) Starr. It was thrilling, wasn’t it? Seeing your neighbors on back-channel talk shows, being first with the cigar jokes. And then, suddenly, it ends. And the crews come and strip down the satellite trucks, and you’re just another backdrop, standing alone.

Oh, we know. How many goodbyes have we said to history and potential quickie book deals, lo, these last few years of serial outrage and shock? Heidi? Gone. The Menendez boys? Gone and gone. Good ol’ O.J.? O.J. who?

Takes one to know one, Beltway buddies, and here in the land of recovering scandal-holics, we know our kind. Here, sit down in one of these nice folding chairs. You’re just in time for the meeting. Our name is Los Angeles and we feel your pain.

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There is probably plenty to be said about the end of this latest Trial of the Century, and plenty of people will no doubt say it, until they’re blue in the face. It’s been a big year for character-driven drama, and not just when it comes to Oscar nominations. As tiresome as the Clinton farce got toward the end, there was also something poignantly, inexorably human about it: the pushy intern, the passive big shot, the rigid prosecutors who couldn’t stop thinking that, if they just argued a little longer, those hell-bound masses would somehow see the light.

No, there is plenty of deconstruction to be done, but don’t think it will fill in for the real scandal. The Capitol Gang and the E! Channel ain’t gonna fill your void. They’ll only postpone the inevitable moment when you awaken at 3 a.m., realizing that you have squandered great gobs of irreplaceable time and dignity over a shocking revelation that revealed nothing and shocked no one: The flesh is weak. Tell us something the hell-bound don’t already know.

So face it. These Trials of the Century bring out the worst in everyone who goes near them. And they’re especially hazardous to folks who have trouble connecting with reality. In this respect, Washington, D.C., you make Southern California look like a bastion of centered-ness. For which we are so grateful that we’re going to let you in on our 12 steps to post-scandal recovery.

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Step 1: Admit you are powerless over your weakness for headlines and that your lives have become unmanageable. Now concede that a Power greater than yourselves can restore your sanity. I know. You’re wondering what Power could possibly be greater than you are. I heard Ken Starr huffing to Dick Morris, there, in the back. So knock it off, and make a decision to turn your will and your lives over to the care of that Power, so we can move to Step 4--your specialty--a searching and fearless moral inventory. No, not of the nearest intern, Mr. President.

Now comes the hard part. Everybody has to admit their wrongs and say they’re sorry. Blumenthal, you have to apologize for calling Monica a stalker. Hitchens, admit that you ratted on Sidney, at least in part because you couldn’t resist the temptation to show off. Now all admit you’re ready to jettison your character defects. Pray for deliverance, list the wounded--this could take a while--and make amends.

Finally, straighten up, keep in touch with that higher Power and fly right. One day at a time, you will get your demons under control. Look at us. Why, they’re auctioning off O.J.’s Heisman Trophy tomorrow, and see? Our hands are hardly trembling at all.

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Shawn Hubler’s column appears Mondays and Thursdays. Her e-mail address is shawn.hubler@latimes.com