> Being able to tell people "using hmac.total_compare will make you
> less vulnerable to timing attacks than using ordinary short
> circuiting comparisons" is a *good thing*.

No, it's not. It's a *bad thing*. The two issues that have been
opened since the function was first submitted indicate that people
will keep inspecting the code and find out that it's not
time-independent. If they had been relying on that it is, they will
be upset. Since it's inherently impossible to make the function
time-independent, people will be constantly annoyed about this function.
I can't find anything good in that.

If nobody else does, I'll revert the addition before the beta. Note
that there is no *actual* issue that is being resolved by this function;
it was added only because of its cuteness value.