Normally, when a public figure says something colossally stupid, there’s a moment of realization when he or she comes to grips with the fact that it’s time to dial things back. Some enter rehab, some hold news conferences to apologize, some get their shows dropped by MSNBC.

That moment, if it will ever come at all, has not arrived for Gov. Jim Gibbons.

After telling the Reno Gazette-Journal on Monday that he’d heard a rumor that Democrats had paid the Wall Street Journal to publish negative stories about him, Gibbons granted an interview to the Review-Journal, in which he made things worse.

"I’m not paranoid," Gibbons told the newspaper. "I’m not thinking people are out to get me. I just repeated that what I had heard was what was asked of me. … The question was had I heard, and I said yes, I had heard."

First, Gibbons telling people he’s not paranoid is hardly an acquittal. It’s like Darth Vader saying he doesn’t have problems with anger management, or Tom Cruise saying he’s just a normal guy. Second, saying you’re just repeating a rumor doesn’t let you off the hook. Here, allow us to demonstrate: We’ve heard a rumor that Gibbons is crazy. Whoops. We just accidentally accused the governor of being crazy. Our bad.

But wait, there’s more.

"Do I believe it? I don’t know if I believe it or not. It’s a rumor. I have no way of knowing. … It’s just a rumor. There are rumors all the time, and I’m the one who’s always subject to rumors being published. So I understand that fact about rumors. They’re just rumors."

Remember, Gibbons is not paranoid. But he is always subjected to rumors being published about him. Wow. He must have a lot of bad luck. Or do stupid things that create rumors that turn out to be true, which some people call facts.

But the fact that Gibbons repeated this rumor — assuming he actually heard it from somebody and didn’t make it up — and that he can’t say definitively that it’s false tells us all we need to know. Of course the rumor is false. Of course Gibbons has a way of knowing, just as all of us have a way of knowing when we hear total bullshit.

Unless, of course, he really can’t tell it’s bullshit, in which case we need to make sure somebody takes away his state credit card before he ends up ordering 1,000 Ab-Master 2000s and a couple dozen sets of King Cutter knives from a late-night television infomerical.

But wait, there’s even more.

"My answer is I don’t have any knowledge one way or the other. Is it possible? I mean, that’s the far side of the moon. You know, does the sun ever shine on the far side of the moon? There’s always a possibility of anything in life, but do I give great credit to that? No, it’s just a rumor," he said.

Why, yes, there’s always a possibility of anything in life. It’s possible, in fact, that we could walk outside to see a big suitcase of cash fall from the sky (like in that one Sly Stallone movie Cliffhanger!), which we would put in our trunk and use to buy a sweet custom home in the Macdonald Highlands in Henderson, the kind with the bathrooms where the shower head on the top of the shower, where it feels like you’re standing in the rain? Those are so cool.

Anyway, the fact is that Gibbons does give credit to the "rumor," every single time he repeats or discusses it. He knew when it he said it that people would ask about it, and if he didn’t know, he’s got a lot bigger problems than the Democrat-Dow Jones & Co. conspiracy to contend with!

No matter what else we can conclude, we can conclude this: Much like the far side of the moon, Gibbons’ head is also in a place where the sun never shines. (Yes, we know. We’re weak. Sue us.)