Abandon All Hope

Hope Hicks is a former model who posed for a local magazine in her hometown of Greenwich, Connecticut, the sort of magazine with puff-piece articles and even and business listings that you get for free in your mail.   She was also the cover model for the cover of a novel in "The It Girl" series.  So it makes sense that Donald Trump's most trusted advisor - who never would have met Trump if Trump's daughter hadn't started a fashion line, which wouldn't have happened if Trump's daughter's name hadn't been Ivanka Smith - has long been an anonymous cipher.  Hicks spent most of her time under the radar, screening those who wanted access to Trump, promoting his lies and fake denials, serving as his personal valet - even steaming his clothes while he was wearing them because he wanted to look fresh up to the moment.  She was like a third daughter to  him - and given how he lusted after Ivanka and treated Tiffany as an afterthought, she was more like his only daughter. 

So it must have been really, really painful for Hicks to testify at Trump's 2016 election interference trial and, after lying for Trump to get him elected, tell the truth with the specter of perjury hanging over her pretty little head.  She pretty much confirmed what everyone had suspected all along - that Trump had made it clear that he wanted his alleged affairs with a porn star and a nude model covered up and sought to avoid embarrassment against him in the aftermath of the "Access Hollywood" tape.  No wonder she cried - you'd cry too, if you thought you were on somebody's hit list.

I'm glad Hope Hicks old the truth, but she gets no medal for being so brave and honest on the witness stand, which isn't likely and she doesn't expect, because she shouldn't have told the lies during the 2016 campaign that helped get Trump elected in the first place.  Even Hillary Clinton's awfulness as Trump's Democratic opponent doesn't excuse Hicks. 

Abandon All Hope

Hope Hicks, the former aide to Donald Trump, used to be a model, and she was not one of those famous star models who stand out as unique icons of fashion and beauty.  Hope Hicks was one of those small-time models you see in a magazine or on a book cover who come across as nameless, lifeless faces.  You don't know who they are or what they're like; they're just ciphers who stare back blankly from the page, have no identity and communicate nothing.

Which is exactly how she proved to be in real life when she testified before the House Judiciary  Committee about Trump in a closed-door session.

Backed by White House lawyers and advisers, Hicks refused to say anything that Trump didn't want out in official testimony.  She proved to be just as mute when she entered and left the committee room, reporters failing to get much out of her.  Calvin Coolidge said more when, replying to a woman at a White House dinner who said she'd bet a friend she could get the President to say at least three words, said, "You lose!"   

As did the House Judiciary Committee, which was unable to get Hicks on record or on camera refusing to go on record.

House Judiciary Committee chairman Jerry Nadler sees a blessing in disguise, though, because he thinks that Hicks' stonewalling will make it easier for a judge to force the White House to comply. Maybe.  But perhaps that's the reason why Trump is packing the courts - to make sure there are judges who do not allow that to happen.

And, like Hope Hicks, they're probably not going to say much.      

Hope and Change

Hope Hicks, the Trump White House communications director who looks like the model she used to be, has quit her job, bringing the number of people Trump trusts outside his family still serving him in the White House to zero.  She was made to testify before a congressional committee about the Russia investigation and admitted to telling "white lies" for the President but remaining tight-lipped on the big stuff.      

I say she was in the wrong job.  How is it that Sarah Hcuakbee Sanders, a manatees with a wig, is the White House press secretary while an ex-model like Hope Hicks has been serving behind  the scenes as Trump's communications director?  besides, Sarah Huckabee Sanders is a better liar. :-p

Meanwhile, officials in Mexico, the United Arab Emirates, China and Israel have been making efforts to manipulate Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law, as he sought financial backers to help his family's company with its debt while he was trying to get someone to buy into his building in Manhattan  - 666 Fifth Avenue (what an address!) - to alleviate the company's debt.  These foreigners hoped to able to influence Ivanka's husband on foreign policy matters, some of which Kushner has actually been trying to handle personally as Trump's White House assistant.  Kushner has since had his security clearance downgraded. 

As if that weren't all enough, H.R. McMaster, the President's national security adviser, may be forced out, even though he's the only dude standing between Trump and war with North Korea.  All this storminess on the eve of possibly the worst nor'easter to hit the American Northeast in eight years . . . I have to get this published now in case my electricity goes out. :-O