Between Trump and Kevin McCarthy, it appears no good deed goes unpunished
No good deed goes unpunished.
No good deed goes unpunished.
Those are words to always remember, especially in politics. When James Michael Curley was mayor of Boston, occasionally he would get reports back from the neighborhoods that someone or other had turned against him.
Hizzoner would always feign shock, shaking his head and mentioning the back-stabber by name.
“I can’t believe he would be speaking ill of me,” Curley would say. “I’ve never done anything for the man!”
I was thinking about this phenomenon the other day when news came that Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the U.S. House Speaker-in-waiting, had told other GOP congressmen in 2021 that President Trump should resign after the fedsurrection — I mean, insurrection — on Jan. 6.
McCarthy, a slippery swamp creature, tut-tutted that he’d “had it” with Trump, and that there was “no way” that he could defend him.
On Thursday morning, McCarthy denied he’d ever said any such things. On Thursday night, the tape was played on MSNBC.
Early reports are that Trump is willing to forgive and forget. Maybe he’s mellowing — he’s also endorsed J.D. Vance in the GOP Senate primary in Ohio.
I’m somewhat surprised, because to me Vance gives off serious Kevin McCarthy RINO vibes, and he’s been even more open about sliming Trump than McCarthy ever was in public — before Thursday night, that is.
I was introduced to McCarthy in 2020 — by Donald J. Trump. They were having dinner together at Mar-a-Lago on the night that Iranian terror boss Gen. Qasem Soleimani collected his 72 virgins after he was turned into a grease stain on the Tehran airport tarmac by a CIA drone attack.
“Who’d be better for me to run against?” a very relaxed Trump asked. “Bernie or Biden?”
“Bernie,” I instantly said, and Trump nodded and looked over at McCarthy.
“That’s what Kevin says too,” he said. “That’s what everybody says.”
Everybody was right, obviously. Even the Democrats’ COVID-19 mass hysteria couldn’t have saved Sanders.
The point is, for some reason Trump seems to like McCarthy. He’s called him “my Kevin.”
McCarthy was the first national Republican who visited him in Palm Beach after he left office.
But this wasn’t the first time that somebody who’s been rather royally treated at Mar-a-Lago returned the favor to Trump with an “Et tu Brute” shiv in the back.
In fact, if they ever wanted to rename the palatial retreat, the Trumps could call it Casa de No Good Deed Goes Unpunished.
Last week, Trump sat down for a long taped interview with Piers Morgan, a Fleet Street hack who just got picked up on waivers by Rupert Murdoch, the former owner of this newspaper who still runs the Fox News Channel and so much more.
Morgan is starting a new TV gig for Murdoch, so he wanted a big bombshell interview. Probably as a favor to Murdoch or maybe Sean Hannity, Trump sat down with Morgan for a one-on-one interview at Mar-a-Lago’s “palatial” bar.
Afterwards, Morgan immediately put out a deceptively edited video teaser about Trump having a “meltdown” and stalking out of the interview. Luckily for Trump, he’s learned the “60 Minutes” lesson — run your camera so you can put out the real version.
Which he did, and Piers Morgan looked as dishonest as Leslie Stahl did after she was caught lecturing Trump on the journalistic “standards” of “60 Minutes,” that pioneer of Very Fake News.
Speaking of networks, remember “Access Hollywood?” Trump may have been NBC’s number-one earner for all those years on “Apprentice.” (Morgan was one of his contestants.)
So for 12 years, NBC had that audio tape from the bus and they sat on it — until October 2016, when they tried to take off his head for Hillary Clinton. Only the Peacock network didn’t have the stones to do it themselves — they farmed out the hit to the despicable Washington Post.
You know who else used to spend a fair amount of time at Mar-a-Lago? “Mourning” Joe Scarborough of MSNBC, who in a just universe would have ended up at CNN+ with Comrade Chris Wallace.
Mourning Joe used to be a jack-leg lawyer in Pensacola. Now he winters on “the Gold Coast.” I used to see him at another bar at Mar-a-Lago. I was running a tab, but I can’t speak for anybody else, if you get my drift.
On New Year’s Eve 2016, after ripping Trump for months and parroting all of what has now turned out to be one preposterous Clinton-FBI hoax after another, Scarborough and his third wife showed up for the big soiree — not in formal attire, of course.
When he got busted on social media for his duplicitous social-climbing, Joe claimed he was only there to seek out an interview with the president-elect.
If they’ll lie about something like that …
Then there was a magazine called National Review. They’re on the Weekly Standard treadmill to oblivion now — RINO orthodoxy is not good box office. But in 2016, their bosses were in South Florida, rattling the tin cup.
They had a “time” at Mar-a-Lago. It featured the usual Trumpian spread — top-shelf booze, spare-no-expenses hors d’oeuvres. I’m guessing the future president charged them about as much as the late Anthony Athanas used to assess Billy Bulger for his annual birthday bash at Pier 4.
A month or so later, National Review devoted an entire issue of its moribund dead-tree edition to a parade of RINO worthies denouncing Trump.
Sometimes as a boss you inherit a megalomaniac (Anthony Fauci) or you get bad advice (Christopher Wray) or you don’t pull the trigger fast enough (James Comey).
Other times, the guy you pick just turns out to be in over his head (Jeff Sessions).
The worst thing, though, is when you get stabbed in the back by someone you thought was your friend. Just ask James Michael Curley … or Donald J. Trump.
