The New York Times, in its May 21 print edition, and online May 20, published an edited interview with Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell.

The text of the article in the print edition was the same as online, but the headline for the online posting apparently sought to drive home what the McConnell interview was all about, as you will see.

Here is the print headline: "McConnell Cites Ukraine Aid as Evidence of a Shifting G.O.P."

And here is the online headline: "On Ukraine, McConnell Tries to Show the World This Isn't Trump's G.O.P."

The online headline more accurately reflects the tone of the interview, which started out with McConnell asserting, in part, that he had traveled to Finland and Sweden recently to assure "the Europeans that skepticism about NATO itself, expressed by the previous president, was not the view of Republicans in the Senate."  (Finland and Sweden are on a course leading to membership in NATO.).

The interview ended with McConnell saying, with respect to Finland and Sweden as members of NATO, that Democrat Senate leader Charles E. Schumer "feels the same way I do [in support of their joining NATO]."

Given the extraordinary remarks by McConnell at the start and close of this edited interview with Times reporter Catie Edmondson, it was apparent that McConnell was trying to signal that Senate Republicans, under his leadership, are not part of "Trump's G.O.P."

Notice how McConnell avoided a major concern expressed by President Trump, vis-à-vis NATO: that the members were not honoring their commitment to spend 2% of their annual budgets for defense.  This July 2018 CNBC report pointed out that a former British defense minister, Michael Fallon, agreed with Mr. Trump.

Why, now, does McConnell conflate President Trump's valid criticism of NATO members with the dicey situation involving U.S. policy on Ukraine?  This observer finds chilling McConnell's braggadocio about how his Ukraine views coincide with Schumer's — and, therefore, McConnell must be at one with Biden's handlers.  And let's take that one step farther, with reference to another McConnell comment early in this edited interview: that some Trump-supporters are "isolationists."  That, however, is how a leftist would demean a Trump-supporter — and Mitch McConnell takes no back seat to a leftist anti-Trump vilifier.  It's as if McConnell is part of the Deep State.

A globalist like McConnell seems to hope that by falsely asserting that "America First" must be defined as isolationism, he can get the propaganda-driven New York Times to give him some positive publicity.

But in making clear he is in the NeverTrump camp, has McConnell strengthened his hold on Senate Republicans, or will his tenure as their leader end following the Nov. 8 midterms?

That is to say, is the Republican congressional campaign to succeed by bowing to leftist hegemony, the direction McConnell would take the GOP, going to prevail, or will the MAGA course established by Donald J. Trump lead Republicans to glorious victory Nov. 8?

With Mitch McConnell at the helm, it seems GOP revival in the Senate is a lost cause.

The thinking here is that Mitch McConnell will never be the majority leader of the United States Senate.  Either he will lead the GOP to continued minority status in the Senate, or the country will elect a Senate majority reflecting "Trump's G.O.P."

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.