Another week, another candidates’ debate, propelled by yet another gimmick.

This week’s gang bang on CNN promised to connect the Democratic hopefuls with voters pitching high-octane questions in low-resolution video.

At last, we were led to believe, the wannabe presidents would face the real issues really troubling real people. As it turned out, like every previous Democratic debate, we were left watching Hillary and the Seven Dwarfs.

Unlike Disney’s homunculuses, the Dem dwarfs come in various sizes. The diminutive Dennis Kucinich looks more than a little like Happy and has everything to be happy about. Although a person of scant political ability, he has leveraged himself into prime time simply by turning up.

There is little between the Kucinich campaign and a run-of-the-mill blogger, but by pretending to be a genuine candidate, Mr. Kucinich not only gets airtime but a trophy wife.

While heavyweights like John McCain near extinction as their campaign teeters on the edge of bankruptcy, the tiny Mr. Kucinich, funded in part by pornographer Larry Flynt, simply gets on a Greyhound to the next televised debate.

The other Democratic non-starter whose absurd ambition the news networks dignify, Mike Gravel, a dead ringer for Grumpy, also has no visible means of support. His real claim to fame, while senator for Alaska, is prompting the end of the Vietnam War by ending the draft and facilitating the publication of the Pentagon Papers. By now, however, he is an ageing oddball, barking from the sidelines like a farm dog chasing cars.

Two of the candidates, Joe Biden and Bill Richardson, are aiming high in the hope of winning themselves a place in the administration of whoever wins. Both men know that they will never be president and both fancy themselves as secretary of state. Mr. Richardson came close to acknowledging this sub rosa two-man race when he joshed that Mr. Biden would be welcome as his secretary of state. Their true ambition — to serve the winner — means never challenging anything about those who stand a real chance.

Chris Dodd is an anomaly because he is under the impression that the race is as it appears: eight candidates in search of a single nomination. His apparent naivety is touching. The nuances of the jostling do not appear to have influenced him at all. He is there because he — or perhaps his wife — wants to live in the White House, which he should know is not enough to win. To win you have to not merely enjoy the idea of power, but to lust after power, and be ready to stamp on your rivals at every turn.

Of the big three, John Edwards understands full well that he is involved in a life and death struggle. Either he becomes president, or it is back to chasing ambulances. If he were to be more amenable to Mrs. Clinton, he might negotiate himself into the vice presidency. But that is not what he wants. He has played sidekick before, to John Kerry, and he did not like it one bit.

His game plan is simple: to win the first primaries and thereby acquire momentum so money and free publicity start pouring in. His attitude to Mrs. Clinton, the only candidate he fears could beat him, is cold, determined, charmless, and unflinching. In response to a question asking him to name one thing he did not like about Mrs. Clinton, he said he did not think much of her orange outfit. In fact, the outfit is the only thing he likes about her.

Barack Obama has raised a lot of money on the back of his, by all accounts, sizzling personal appearances. But charisma is of little use unless it works on television. Instead of gasping at his dazzling performance, as one did at Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Jack and Bobby Kennedy, or even in his prime Donald Rumsfeld, the viewer is left pondering why those who have seen Mr. Obama in the flesh continue to rave about him.

Already some Democrats are whispering about a Clinton/Obama dream ticket, and that may well be the outcome in six months’ time, though in the dream — or, for Mr. Edwards, the nightmare — Mrs. Clinton is always firmly on top. The thought of having to become yoked to Mrs. Clinton may explain why Mr. Obama is so hesitant to strike, his turgid answers punctuated by endless ums and ahs, and why he retreats so quickly after criticizing her, like a boy prodding a snake with a stick.

Which brings us to Snow White. From the start, she alone has ignored her rivals to concentrate on the general election. She looks straight into the camera and blasts away at the president, at Republicans, at the mismanagement of the war, at the scandal of inadequate health care. She is the mistress of the caustic soundbite, yet she is so confident of reentering the White House that she is careful to reserve for herself a position she will have to defend.

No clearer evidence of her mastery of the art was her response to whether she would promise to talk directly to the leaders of Cuba, Venezuela, Syria, North Korea, and Iran. Mr. Obama was quick to say yes. Mrs. Clinton, however, knows better how the world works. No, she would make no such promise, she said, “I don’t want to be used for propaganda purposes.” It was the reply of a president in waiting.