MAUREEN CALLAHAN: Prince Harry is bleating about family reconciliation – why the hell would they?

At least we get a break during the holidays, right?

Fresh off that six-hour Netflix marathon, which began airing just three weeks ago, Prince Harry is back with another round of interviews, trailers for both dropping Monday morning.

Care to guess the theme?

You know, just before Harry and Meghan met Oprah Winfrey two years ago in March, the couple declared that interview would be their “last word.” They would have nothing more to say, and everyone, would you please respect their privacy?

They then wonder why the general public has trouble believing everything they say.

His friends in the media though, that’s another story, as we’re seeing with Tom Bradby, a friend of H&M, and Anderson Cooper.

UK’s ITV and CBS News’ 60 Minutes are breathlessly hyping seemingly explosive new interviews.

Finally, this time, for real, promise and swear with your little finger, will Harry tell ‘his’ truth? Is she going to divulge all the gruesome, gory details, you know, things we haven’t heard of in her six episodes on Netflix, Oprah’s interview, Meghan’s podcast, ‘Finding Freedom,’ Meghan’s cover stories on The Cut and Variety , or any of his numerous media leaks?

If the past is a prologue, that’s highly unlikely.

Now Harry is publicizing his upcoming memoir, and like everything else the Sussexes have tried to sell us, it seems to be thin on substance, heavy on victimhood, devoid of personal responsibility, and worse than any of that, hackneyed, hackneyed and unoriginal.

UK’s ITV (above) and CBS News’ 60 Minutes are breathlessly hyping seemingly explosive new interviews.

In other words: according to Brand Sussex, it’s an overall disappointment.

When your publisher is slashing the price of your book by 30 percent as a pre-sale promotion before it goes on sale, it sounds like your book is in trouble. When no major print outlet is running an excerpt ahead of publication, well, that’s a clue that there’s really nothing in it.

Harry should have been on the cover of People this week, a four-page sampler on the inside.

Instead: Nothing.

Harry seems unfamiliar with the concept of diminishing returns. He, too, seems unfamiliar with the stupidity of doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

‘I would like my father back. I would like my brother back.

This is the headline for Harry’s interview with Tom Bradby, a snippet that also contains more virulence towards, who else? — His father and his brother.

“They feel it’s better to keep us as the villains in some way,” he said. “They have shown absolutely no willingness to reconcile.”

Harry and Meghan need absolutely no help looking like the villains here. They’re doing a great job on that on their own. In reality, it may be your only real measurable success.

Once upon a time, these two had such goodwill. Harry was once the favorite prince, considered more charismatic, down-to-earth and carefree. Now we see what a great job the palace did in managing his image.

And we see how much gratitude Harry has for all that hard work: none.

As the Netflix reality show made clear, these two are pampered megalomaniacs marinating in spite and jealousy, trying to slide down the greasy poles of fame (Beyoncé texted me!), and paltry prizes. (a humanitarian honor hosted by a celebrity who accidentally shot his co-worker to death), and hypocritical virtue signals (“Be nice!”) as you betray Harry’s entire family.

Hypocrisy at its most impressive.

When your publisher is slashing the price of your book by 30 percent as a pre-sale promotion before it goes on sale, it sounds like your book is in trouble.

Just before Harry and Meghan’s meeting with Oprah Winfrey two years ago in March, the couple declared that interview would be their “last word.”

The moment Meghan taunted the late Queen with her theatrical bow, well, it’s hard to see how one recovers from that. A beloved Queen who, by Meghan’s own account, treated her with nothing more than warmth and motherly guidance, acknowledging the obvious: Meghan’s success in her family would only add to Harry’s happiness.

Oh, and Harry hinting that his brother hadn’t been allowed to marry for love. That was a particularly ugly thing to say.

It all raises the obvious question: Why the hell would King Charles or Prince William, or any member of the royal family, trust that a private conversation with either of these two would be kept private? It is clear that Harry and Meghan have no other asset than the royal secrets and they are not ashamed to sell them to the highest bidder.

So what makes more sense, for the sake of emotional and reputational preservation, than for the royals to stay away from the two people hell-bent on destroying the family and the institution?

That is clearly what is happening here. Harry and Meghan won’t be satisfied until they burn down the monarchy, dragging down all the family members they envy to their underground level.

Seriously, for all his proselytizing about mental health, doesn’t Harry seem full of anger? He’s trying to sell his new life in California as some sort of self-fulfilling nirvana, a ‘live, laugh, love’ existence that isn’t available to him as a working-class royal, but he’s never seemed angrier, more unhappy, or more agitated. the drift.

He perseveres in the same family that, by his own words and actions, he has lost. He and Meghan take no responsibility for his role in these fractures. They get involved in minor score keeping, making sure to post a photo or gossip every time Kate and William have a big event or win. They tell blatant lies, big and small. Remember Meghan lamenting her choice not to wear bright colors, to dim the light on her against the future Queen, and shedding a tear, right?

Oh, and Harry hinting that his brother hadn’t been allowed to marry for love. That was a particularly ugly thing to say.

Is she going to divulge all the gruesome, gory details, you know, things we haven’t heard of in her six episodes on Netflix, Oprah’s interview, Meghan’s podcast, ‘Finding Freedom,’ Meghan’s cover stories on The Cut and Variety , or any of his numerous media leaks?

It’s intellectual dishonesty and emotional immaturity at its most excruciating, and a tired audience has heard enough.

Yet here is Anderson Cooper, scion of another rich and famous family, entertaining Prince Harry in a trailer for this Sunday’s ’60 Minutes’ interview. As these two stroll through a large sun-dappled garden, Harry tells the pained story of him as the boring wind-up doll he has become.

The palace leaked against him and Meghan, he tells Cooper. They were used as red meat for the tabloid media, and when they asked for help they were coldly denied.

If it’s really true, as Harry says, that his father and brother have been “leaking and planting” stories against Harry and Meghan, why would he trust them? Why would you want to reconcile?

“When we’ve been told for the last six years, ‘We can’t put out a statement to protect you,’ but you do it for other family members, there comes a point where silence is betrayal,” Harry says. .

Does anyone else remember whispers of Meghan harassing palace staff, of an internal HR investigation, of Prince William and the late Queen berating her for such behaviour? If the palace really wanted to hurt Harry and Meghan, one gets the feeling they might.

But they do not. His silence actually seems like a kindness here. A kindness that Harry will no doubt repay with future betrayals.