FRIDAY ON MY MIND

It’s a White House tradition to delay the release of unpleasant news until late Friday, in the hope that everything will blow over by the time they return to work on Monday morning.  Yesterday’s Friday afternoon news dump may have set some sort of record. 

On the spousal abuse front, the White House Chapter of the He-Man Woman Haters Club took another hit, no pun intended, when one of Trump’s speechwriters, David Sorensen, was outed as a domestic abuser.  As we all know, Donald Trump hires only the best.  He’s hired enough men with conspicuous anger management issues (e.g., Steve Bannon, Anthony Scaramucci, Seb Gorka, Corey Lewandowski, and Rob Porter) to suggest that “demonstrated ability to show women who’s boss” is one of his preferred characteristics.   

Lewandowski and Porter have “dated” Hope Hicks, the current White House Communications Director, and Donald Trump's chief pants steamer.  I’m not trying to slut-shame her; her love life is her business. 

But it’s interesting that, uniquely among members of Trump’s inner circle, Hicks had avoided the spotlight.  Now it appears that someone has decided that it’s her time in the barrel.  Or maybe they’re trying to save her from a beating at the hands of Rob Porter.  

Porter’s whistleblower might have been one of his exes, trying to protect Ms. Hicks.  Perhaps it was Corey Lewandowski, her former lover, seeking revenge against the man who took his place.  Another, perhaps less likely, revenge scenario is that the FBI leaked the information as a warning that they don’t intend to be Donald Trump’s punching bag.  Of course, in order for such a subtle warning to be effective, there’d have to be someone in the White House smart enough to interpret the message.  It’s not clear that any such person is employed by Donald Trump.  Men who beat women tend not to be subtle.

The ultimate casualty in the Porter affair may turn out to be John Kelly, who defended Porter and lied about his own role in Porter’s dismissal.  Kelly has turned out to be a more disciplined version of Donald Trump, which is not a compliment.  Trump is reported to have told Ivanka and Jared to find him a new Chief of Staff, and is meanwhile plotting ways to make Kelly’s job miserable enough to induce him to resign.  It couldn’t happen to a nicer guy, as far as I’m concerned.      

It’s easy to mock the disarray in Trump’s White House.  But while the clown car rolls along, two much more consequential pieces of news were released late Friday.  First, Trump refused to release the memo written by Democrats on the House Select Committee on Intelligence.  No surprise there.  Trump surely didn’t read the memo – reportedly he no longer reads much of anything – and he’d certainly never approve the release of information that would show him in a bad light. 

But the most important news of the evening may have been the resignation of Rachel Brand, Associate Attorney General, third in command behind Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein.  She’d been on the job for only nine months.  It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that she’s leaving because she suspects, or has even been told, that Donald Trump intended to fire Rosenstein (and maybe Sessions as well), promote Brand, and then ask her to fire Robert Mueller. 

Maybe the Trump equivalent of the Watergate Saturday Night Massacre started yesterday.