Joseph Sabino Mistick: Joltin' Bolton's gift to Democrats

If you’re a Democrat, it’s getting hard to figure out who you’re supposed to be rooting for these days. And it’s a safe bet that you never thought you would hear some of your own people chanting, “Go, John Bolton, go!”

But that is what’s happening. The New York Times reported last week that Bolton has claimed in his upcoming book that Donald Trump told him that military aid to Ukraine would be withheld until Ukraine agreed to investigate Trump’s political rivals — the Bidens.

That directly contradicts Trump’s express denials of the charges for which he has been impeached, forcing Republicans to pick a side in his Senate trial. And that has brought some old political lessons home to roost.

On Fox News, Bolton has gone from a hero to a bum in a flash. Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, Lou Dobbs and Laura Ingraham have completely turned on him. He was their colleague for 11 years, in apparent political lockstep, but now they portray him as a backstabbing betrayer.

A couple of conservatives stepped up for Bolton. Andrew Napolitano, the Fox news senior judicial analyst, called out his colleagues for hypocrisy, stating that Bolton was “a conservative icon until two days ago.”

And Trump’s former chief of staff, retired Gen. John Kelly, reportedly said, “If John Bolton says that in the book, I believe John Bolton.”

As the old saying goes, the enemy of your enemy can be your friend. We are not talking about a true friend (more about that later), but perhaps someone with a momentarily shared purpose.

Journalist Dexter Filkins, in “John Bolton on the Warpath,” described Bolton in The New Yorker in April as a hawk who has proposed armed interventions around the globe.

Young Bolton’s heroes included Barry Goldwater and Spiro Agnew. He helped Robert Bork campaign for Senate confirmation to the Supreme Court. Justice Clarence Thomas is a college buddy, and Dick Cheney was an early political sponsor.

In December 2000, Bolton was part of George W. Bush’s legal team in the Bush-Gore Florida recount battle. Democrats have always hated the well-known story that Bolton charged into a Tallahassee polling place where votes were being recounted, and shouted, “I’m with the Bush-Cheney team, and I’m here to stop the count.”

Most Democrats will never forgive all that. But Bolton’s firsthand account of Trump’s actions is what matters most right now. If his story is as good as its billing, it will be a recurring gift throughout the 2020 election.

Finally, if you want a friend in Washington, get a dog. Harry Truman often gets credit for that advice, and it sounds a lot like the way that “Give ’em hell, Harry” ran things. Truman knew that Washington was a tough place to make and keep true friends, so he just spoke his mind.

And that seems to be Bolton’s approach here. He has lost his political friends among Trump supporters and Fox News personalities, and he will never make true friends with the Democrats. But none of that seems to matter to him. He acts like a guy with a good dog.