Hillary Clinton just can't help herself. The lust for the presidency that has animated her adult life was not extinguished by her loss to a man nobody she considers a friend predicted had even a minimal chance of defeating her. So when she was asked during an onstage "conversation" – the no-effort means of putting on a show for the rubes – if she would run again, she seemed to resort to the truth as she prattled on.

"Do you want to run again?" Recode’s Kara Swisher asked during a Friday night Q&A with Clinton.

"No," Clinton replied quickly, sparking laughter from the audience. But when Swisher pressed her further, she added: "I’d like to be president."

Clinton went on to say that "there’s going to be so much work to be done" after a Democrat "hopefully" wins the next presidential election.

"The work would be work that I feel very well prepared for having been in the Senate for eight years, having been a diplomat in the State Department," she said, listing off the qualifications that she often touted during her previous run.

She added that she's not going to think about a possible run until after the upcoming midterm elections.

This is utterly Clintonian. Her party desperately needs new blood, depending on young voters to elect its candidates, but is led by a cohort of politicians who have been eligible for Medicare for decades. Kamala, Pocahontas, Bernie, Spartacus, and all the others can just go pound sand.

The Clinton Machine has already demonstrated its ability to rig the nominating process, so anyone contemplating a run has to face the possible futility of even a candidacy that ignites the grassroots.

I for one encourage Hillary to keep her powder dry and let the peasants (everyone not named Clinton) wait for her to make up her mind and keep guessing.

My own take is that she will not run. She's too sick and too tired. This is mostly an effort to sell tickets to her speaking tour with Bill and keep donations flowing to her slush fund foundation, while Chelsea prepares to launch her own political career.

Photo credit: YouTube screen grab.