Corrupt, unethical, and completely unfit for public office:

McCrory called the report "a story about nothing" and was critical of both WRAL News' original report and other outlets for following and commenting on it. "This is politics at its worst and journalism at its worst," McCrory said.

He added later, "There are always going to be issues going on with the largest companies in North Carolina. When do you not meet with these companies?"

Jebus cripes. You *do not* meet with these companies when various subordinates in your administration are investigating them for violations of regs and statutes, you do not meet with them days before deciding to sell investment shares in their company, you do not meet with them when their contract with state government is on the rocks and they need help "fixing" the problem, you do not meet with them before deciding whom to appoint to boards or commissions, and you do not meet with them when one of your Departments is about to decide how much work they need to do and dollars they need to spend to clean up their act. You were right when you said this is "politics at its worst," you just should have been standing in front of a mirror when you said it.

When your past isn't sexy enough, fabricate something:

“Long before I was elected governor, one of the hardest things I ever had to do in my life was to come home after my job was eliminated and tell Ann I didn’t have a job anymore,” the governor says in the video. When he took office in 2013, he continues, “I knew what too many families in our state were going through. Our state had the fifth highest unemployment rate in the country.”

According to a 2014 Greensboro News & Record story about McCrory’s Duke career, Duke eliminated his job as a recruiting manager in 1988, a few months before his wedding. Three weeks later, the company hired him back as its training director – a job with far more responsibility.

And it's very likely that new job didn't come as a surprise to McCrory. When you're planning on promoting somebody in this fashion, you don't keep them in the dark, lest they take a position somewhere else before they get that magic phone call. Meaning, this whole (attempted) tear-jerker about breaking the bad news to his fiancé is nothing but fiction. They probably celebrated.

Miserably failing the smell test:

In a memo from that day, “The meeting began with Gov. McCrory making a few remarks and turning the meeting over to Graeme Keith. “Mr. Keith began his remarks by stating that he had been working on private prison maintenance for 10 years and during that time had given a lot of money to candidates running for public office and it was now time for him to get something in return.”

McCrory denied hearing Keith say that, according to a transcript of his interview with The N&O. McCory said, “My secretary informed me that was said probably while I was in a side conversation and I don’t know if it was said to the whole table or not, but I did not hear it.”

Riiight. You turn the meeting over to your donor buddy, and then immediately strike up a conversation with somebody else. Not bloody likely. That's one of the problems with electing somebody who doesn't see anything wrong with political patronage: They're also too stupid to avoid getting caught. And this explanation from Keith made me bark in laughter: