What’s worse than being bilked by a con man? The humiliation of seeing his girlfriend — who lived extravagantly off your money — landing one super-flattering cover after the next. Following the arrest of Anne Hathaway’s slimy fellow, W claims “chic is [her] best revenge”; Entertainment Weekly wonders, “Is Oscar next?”; French Vogue compared her to Julia Roberts; Lancome crowned her its new face; and Vanity Fair called her a “Hollywood Princess” in an expose about her shyster ex. But I have a feeling this French Vogue image conveys the true Anne Hathaway: an ultra-cool customer whose huge ambition and not inconsiderable sense of entitlement is neatly tucked behind an obsessively well-scrubbed demeanor. She did, after all, abandon her man when he needed her most but no longer officially fit a carefully constructed image of clean.

After ad nauseum recessionista stories in the September books, I pity the poor monthly-magazine editors who are currently on holiday-gift-guide duty, following last week’s banking debacle. It’s one thing to have to meet the need for “style on a budget” stories, which have become both a mainstay in this long slump and a joke, what with all the splurges that editors can’t resist including. But it’s another thing entirely to have to encourage shopping — magazines’ raison d’etre  — as well as holiday generosity and good cheer, when the word “bonus” has basically been eliminated from the English language. Here’s a thought: Just this year, eliminate the gift guides that transform every book into a catalog, so we can find out whether they are truly the advertising windfalls they’re reputed to be. Wouldn’t it be fierce if the claim turned out to be a farce?