By Michael Jonas

Did Brian McGrory send any signals that he’d give Lawrence Mayor — and state Rep. — Willie Lantigua kid-gloves treatment in order to secure what McGrory boasts is the only interview the embattled pol has granted in recent days? You at least have to wonder after reading McGrory’s column,  which gets front-paged in today’s Boston Globe.

McGrory provides plenty of context and color on the controversy over Latingua, who was elected mayor in November but insists he’ll keep his State House post until his term ends next January, even as Lawrence reels from a budget meltdown that has it seeking a $35 million state bailout. McGrory tells us that Lantigua swears a lot, and that the mayor says his critics are constantly kicking at “parts of his own male anatomy.” And he shares Lantigua’s egomaniacal claim that to give up his state rep seat, as everyone from fellow lawmakers to Gov. Deval Patrick is urging, would be “letting people down, not only in Lawrence, but around the world.”

Nowhere, however, does McGrory actually tell us what he thinks of the whole mayoral mishegas. The McGrory that we’ve come to know over the years would have either offered a ringing defense of a misunderstood public servant or, more likely, added a swift kick of his own to those parts of Lantigua’s male anatomy that have already come in for such rough treatment.