There is a tendency of the unduly passionate to take the enemy of my enemy is my friend a bit too far. We saw this in the deification of Michael Avenatti, who became the darling of the woke and star of MSNBC. This happened again when Trump’s one-time fixer, former lawyer and prisoner Michael Cohen, took the witness stand against his childhood idol in the New York County criminal prosecution for the handling of Trump buying the silence of porn actress Stormy Daniels, upon whom he forced himself after Melania gave birth to Barron.

Cohen portrayed himself as a reformed lying tough guy who would do anything for Trump. Cohen, reviled for being as low a POS as possible, claimed to now be telling the truth and sorry for his miscreant existence. And when Cohen called Trump a liar and a conman, the Trump-haters swooned and forgave him his trespasses. They embraced Michael Cohen, the enemy of their enemy, and welcomed him back into the fold. At least some did.

Some of us understood the nature of a rat, and Michael Cohen was nothing if not a rat.

But Michael Cohen could never be anything but Michael Cohen, the rat. And rats gonna rat.

Mr. Cohen emerged from prison angry, saying he was determined to set the record straight. He released books titled “Disloyal” and “Revenge,” as well as a podcast called “Mea Culpa.” He also met with the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which ultimately indicted Mr. Trump for his role in the hush-money deal.

Mr. Cohen took the witness stand in that case. He also testified in a civil case that Ms. James brought against Mr. Trump, who was found liable for fraud.

He ratted on Trump, not because he had turned over a new leaf and became a good human being. Had he been a good human being, he never would have been Trump’s henchman in the first place. He didn’t flip on Trump because it was the right thing to do. He did it because that’s what rats do.

“If the country won’t forgive me, how can I ever forgive myself?” he wrote on Twitter in 2021. “It’s why I have and will continue to cooperate with law enforcement; to ensure Trump and company are held responsible.”

So sincere. So sorry. So…completely full of shit.

Mr. Cohen nevertheless has said he had some misgivings about testifying at Mr. Trump’s criminal trial. And some of Mr. Cohen’s friends have contended that he never wanted to break up with Mr. Trump and would have preferred remaining in his orbit, rather than enduring years of testimony and receiving accolades as a hero of the left.

After Mr. Trump returned to office last year, Mr. Cohen began to seek out his former boss.

When Trump was out of power, Cohen ran to the side that could best serve his interests. The rat left the sinking ship. But when Trump returned to power, the rat ran right back to the ship.

His effort gained traction last summer, when he met with Mr. Trump at Bedminster.

In January, Mr. Cohen made a vocal public turn: In a Substack essay, he argued that he was an involuntary participant in the cases against Mr. Trump, compelled to testify by subpoena. He also accused prosecutors of posing “inappropriate leading questions to elicit answers that supported their narrative.”

This did not please his erst-while sympathizers on the left, as one might expect.

So, Mr. Cohen said, he texted the president to thank him and express “my sincere hope that this long, exhausting feud could finally end.” Mr. Trump responded, Mr. Cohen said. According to people with knowledge of the matter, they met in Florida some time after the Substack essay. It all unfolded “about six, seven months ago,” Mr. Cohen said in the appearance.

“We rekindled our relationship because of a shared experience of betrayal,” he said.

This, of course, was complete and total bullshit. Trump has something Cohen wanted, a path to pardon and power. Cohen has something Trump wanted, a means to undermine his criminal conviction.

Mr. Trump — who has recently told aides and confidants that he felt sorry for his former fixer, lamenting his time in prison — could try to leverage Mr. Cohen’s recent criticism of prosecutors as he challenges the legal cases against him. His lawyers have already cited Mr. Cohen’s comments in court papers, part of a broader effort by the president to recast his own turmoil of the past decade, including the Russia investigation and his loss in the 2020 election.

To be clear, this doesn’t mean that the testimony Cohen gave against Trump was false, even if his credibility as a witness was always suspect because he was who he was, had a strong motive to lie and had spent his career engaged in thuggery on behalf of his liege lord. Then again, it doesn’t mean he told the truth either. Indeed, there isn’t a word out of Cohen’s mouth that is trustworthy, because Cohen isn’t trustworthy.

It should surprise no one that Cohen is doing what he can to achieve reproachment with Trump. Trump has somethin he wants, and he has something to offer in exchange. That’s how people who are purely transaction and amoral conduct their affairs. When Cohen desperately wanted the embrace of the left, he called Trump a “mobster.” Now that he wants something from Trump, he’ll say whatever needs to be said to get it. This is because Cohen is a rat. I told you so.