Michael Bloomberg and his fellow Democrats should brush up on their Shakespeare: the debate stage is a tale full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

That’s assuredly how most every Democratic candidate, not named Bernie Sanders, felt Tuesday night after a caustic and inconclusive rumble in Charleston.

The putative frontrunner, in periwinkle, Senator Sanders cut a non-dominant figure. The Champlain socialist held his ground — easy to do if you sing from the same script — and his opponents, fellow “contestants” as former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said, circled the waters but left with empty stomachs. 

Bernie Sanders is winning this race. And his party’s brass think he’s losing the next one. None of that changed Tuesday night. 

Still, it’s a slog. Sanders’ movement is more organized but less rapturous than Donald Trump’s triumph in the 2016 primary. It’s not even St. Patrick’s Day and the near-octogenarian will have to thank his lucky charms if the American electorate by then isn’t still looping on his past affinity for Cuban communism. For camp Sanders, it’s the best of times; it’s the worst.

The picture is pitiful elsewhere. (Former) Mayor Pete Buttigieg was invisible, his most anonymous performance yet, a true triumph of the enigma candidate. Amy Klobachur was charming but her candidacy remains cantilevered- a DCCC pipe dream that a moderate, Midwestern mother will lead this ticket, not a socialist throwback. 

Tom Steyer, another billionaire in this race of billionaires and socialists, spoke from the heart. At nascent support, even in the states he’s invested, such as here in the Palmetto State, he may as well. Elizabeth Warren dissected her opponents, but provided limited dissertation on why she herself would be a good choice.

Former Vice President Joe Biden charmed the audience, well, the moderators. His flirtatious exchanges with the dias could be construed as creepy, and fair enough, but seemed more to remind America of the figure it tolerated for a half century. If he wins Saturday, the Democratic Party will have to tolerate him further. He stumbled but struck a nerve in his — relatively, anyway — finest performance in months.

On a February night in Charleston, winter is at an end. No evidence that that’s true for the Democratic Party. As Biden told CBS’ Major Garrett after the debate: “We’ll find that out. I don’t know.”