I’m on the record as enjoying trash teevee, especially The Real Housewives of New Jersey, Atlanta, Beverly Hills, and New York. I should be ashamed of it but I’m not. Boozy conflict is always entertaining unless you’re on the receiving end.

In the featured image, I have surrounded one of my favorite political targets, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy aka KMac, with two of the crazier real housewives: Ramona Singer and convicted felon Teresa Giudice. Why? Yesterday, KMac executed a classic reality teevee move.

The move in question involves denying something that can be verified by video or audio recordings then continuing the lie after proof is produced. Lying and denying is a staple of the Real Housewives franchise.

Last night, the NYT broke a blockbuster story: KMac initially planned to turn against the Impeached Insult Comedian and demand his resignation after the Dipshit Insurrection.

“In the days after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol building, the two top Republicans in Congress, Representative Kevin McCarthy and Senator Mitch McConnell, told associates they believed President Trump was responsible for inciting the deadly riot and vowed to drive him from politics.

Mr. McCarthy went so far as to say he would push Mr. Trump to resign immediately: “I’ve had it with this guy,” he told a group of Republican leaders, according to an audio recording of the conversation obtained by The New York Times.

<SNIP>

Mr. McConnell’s office declined to comment. In a statement on Twitter early Thursday, Mr. McCarthy called the reporting “totally false and wrong.” His spokesman, Mark Bednar, denied that the Republican leader told colleagues he would urge Mr. Trump to leave office. “McCarthy never said he’d call Trump to say he should resign,” Mr. Bednar said.”

The Turtle also crawfished on turning against Trump but KMac was the first to deny his moment of fleeting courage. Besides, pairing KMac in the featured image with Ramona and Tree is funnier. Additionally, the Turtle has actually fallen out with the Kaiser of Chaos whereas McCarthy is, if anything, more subservient than before.

KMac desperately wants to be Speaker of the House. His ambition was thwarted in 2015 by a series of gaffes that I wrote about in Untrustable In Hungria. The latest twist in the KMac story could kill his support among the nuttier members of his caucus.

My Gret Stet bête noire Steve Scalise is also caught up in this tawdry tale:

“Other Republican leaders in the House agreed with Mr. McCarthy that the president’s behavior deserved swift punishment. Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the second-ranking House Republican, said on one call that it was time for the G.O.P. to contemplate a “post-Trump Republican House,”

Scalise denied the story to the New Orleans Picvocate. I wonder what Scalise plans to wear to the reunion special. For the uninitiated, that’s where most of the lying and denying takes place on the Real Housewives franchise.

I briefly considered pairing Scalise with some real housewives but decided to use this old standby instead:

Who among us doesn’t love the Steve Scalise butt plug?

On a more serious note, it’s depressing to see the leaders of a major political party acting out reality show tropes. It’s what they get for supporting our first reality show president* It almost makes me angry enough to do this:

Before the table flip heard round the world, Tree called her nemesis a “prostitution whore.” A phrase that surely applies to KMac, Scalise, and the rest of that rotten lot.

Tempering my glee over this lie and deny story is the fact that it comes from an upcoming book by the NYT’s Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns. They’ve pulled a Woodward and withheld information that would have damaged the liars and deniers earlier. Oy just oy.

It will be fun to watch this story play out. The audio is embedded in the NYT story and on the Tweeter Tube:

Here’s the McCarthy tape @alexburnsNYT and I obtained https://t.co/7ELJsvQJcj

— Jonathan Martin (@jmartNYT) April 22, 2022

In more bad news for KMac, Liz Cheney was on the call and has confirmed its contents. The Cheneys only lie and deny about things like war and peace, but I digress. Dick Cheney’s kid is on the right side of history for a change. The world is truly upside down, but it keeps going round.

Stay tuned.

The last word goes to the Kinks followed by the Smithereens: