Carson took a seat in the curve of the couch and proceeded to explain that his staffers had let him down. Spent too much money. Kept trying to get him to change — to be more pugnacious, Trump-esque, even. A shake-up would come as soon as the next day — or maybe not for a few weeks — but it would come.

The Post would report his remarks a couple of hours later. By nightfall, Carson had walked them back and expressed “100 percent confidence” in his staff.

Nevertheless, a shake-up wasn’t all that Carson talked about over the course of the 45-minute interview. He also reflected on his improbable year, discussed the role that race has played in his campaign, opened up about his struggles with foreign policy and, without ever naming him, detailed many things he doesn’t like about Donald Trump.

There was a backbeat of bitterness to much of what Carson said — especially about perceptions in the Republican Party and in the media of Trump as strong and he as weak, and that someone of his stature could somehow be unqualified for the nation’s highest office.