Wednesday, March 20, 2019

Kellyanne Conway, a Future Hero

Years from now, it will be revealed that Kellyanne Conway, one of the most despised members of the Trump White House, was actually a hero, in the pattern of the late, great, Severus Snape.

The following is a work of speculative fiction, which I offer in support of the above proposition.

After Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, and KAC was promoted from presidential campaign adviser to counselor to the president, she realized just how unhinged the Man in the White House really was. But she also realized what happened to people in the White House who crossed the President.

She wanted to expose him and to neutralize him. She wanted to save the country, the constitution, and the government. She knew that she could only do that if she kept her hands on the levers of power. That meant she would have to stay in the White House, and to stay in Trump's good graces. So KAC decided that she would become a mole. Here's what she did:

  • She became the primary (and most trusted) source of leaks to the press. She made sure that the leaks didn't all go to the same media outlet. She varied the modus operandi of her leaks, their content and format, and even the medium - sometimes paper, sometimes USB thumb drives, sometimes anonymous emails, sometimes FedEx packages with bogus return addresses - so that the leaks couldn't be traced to her.
  • She anonymously or confidentially leaked things to Democrats in Congress, to the late John McCain, to the Special Counsel's office, and to the district attorney's office in the Southern District of New York.
  • She convinced other insiders to leak as well, sometimes overtly and sometimes more sneakily. She swore these co-conspirators to silence, promising them that she would never betray them. To this day, she has kept her promise and has not revealed their identities.
  • She was almost caught once. A major newspaper had put together enough clues to finger her as a leaker. Only her brazen dissembling on national television put an end to that speculation.
  • In public, she steadfastly defended the president, so that nobody would ever question her loyalty or suspect that she was betraying him behind his back. She knew that this would expose her to universal ridicule and contempt from the American public. This was a heavy price to pay, one that she was willing to pay for the good of the country.
  • Through it all, her only confidant and comfort was her husband, former Trump associate and then Trump antagonist George Conway. Being able to dump on George, in the safety of their home, was the only thing that kept her sane. When she had first had misgivings about Trump, she had talked to George about it, and the two of them had agreed to stand together in opposition to Trump. It was the ultimate "good-cop-bad-cop" act.
  • She was the main source of information for George's tweets and his public appearances.
  • Sometimes, she would spend hours each night crying on George's shoulder as she dumped the contents of her day on him. He was her greatest strength, and her greatest comfort. As a result, their marriage remained strong - strong enough to withstand Trump's dirty, vicious attacks on the marriage itself.
  • Her secret revelations were the key to finally bringing Trump down, although she knew that this could never be revealed. When Trump finally fled the White House in disgrace, KAC followed him out the door, enduring the jeers and taunts and flung detritus of the angry crowd. 
  • She continued to defend Trump in her public appearances long afterwards, in order to protect the identities and reputations of other White House insiders who had worked in secrecy to bring the President down.
It wasn't until many years later, that a reporter from the Washington Post, putting together the puzzle that was the Trump years in the White House, noticed that some of the pieces didn't fit. When he rearranged the pieces, a new pattern began to emerge, and he saw hints - glimpses - mere flashes - of Kellyanne Conway's underground activities.

He made discreet inquiries and got corroborating information from many other people, before he approached KAC directly. He asked her if she had been secretly sabotaging Trump all along. At first, she angrily denied the accusation. But then George, still her loving husband and greatest defender, met the reporter at a D.C. bar and told him the whole story, confirming the reporter's suspicions. Then George went home and told his wife that the cat was out of the bag, after which KAC contacted the reporter, reluctantly and tearfully admitting her part in saving the country from a tyrant.

Kellyanne Conway was finally hailed as a hero. Fortunately, it wasn't too late.

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