Supposedly, Otto von Bismarck — the first chancellor of a unified Germany — said in 1869: "Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made." The same thing can be said about deal-making, tRump-style. If you've wondered why you dread the mucking fess that is today's news, The New Yorker's Drollster (Calvin Trillin) imagines the deal-making process that occurred at 725 5th Avenue in NYC in 2013 and flash forward and think about the reason for a government shutdown in 2019 and also think about sausage-making: a messy, gross business. (Full Disclosure: this blogger skimmed the Trillin essay when it first appeared several days ago and only returned to it in today's funk (and dread) of the unending messy, gross news featuring the image and sound of the Horse's A$$ in the Oval Office.) It is likely that Trillin's imagined reconstruction of a real-estate deal in 2013 has actually run endlessly in the White House since January 20, 2017. If this is (fair & balanced) gallows humor, so be it.
[x New Yorker]
No Wonder He Kept Going Bankrupt
By The Drollster (Calvin Trillin)
TagCrowd Cloud of the following piece of writing
SCENE: Corner office, Trump Tower, New York City.
DATE: Circa 2013.
IN ATTENDANCE: Donald Trump; Michael Cohen; Donald Trump, Jr.; Eric Trump; Allen Weisselberg, CFO of the Trump Organization.
DONALD TRUMP: All right, we’re here to decide if we should buy the Garfield Arms apartment building, on Lexington Avenue, from Stan Lewis for ninety-six million dollars, assuming that the financing from the Herzegovina Savings and Loan is still there after the investigation. Stan is a terrific guy, by the way—one of the original members of Mar-a-Lago and the author of that letter of appreciation about how my club is a lot better than any other club. “Out of the league of any other club” were his exact words. A really great guy. Donald, Jr., what do you have?
DONALD TRUMP, JR.: Well, I spoke to the commissioner of the New York City Department of Buildings, and he confirmed the existence of the inspection report that our spy in the DOB warned us might be coming. The inspectors think that the building will fall down before the end of the year.
DONALD TRUMP: Stan denies that vehemently.
DONALD TRUMP, JR.: The commissioner says that the department is preparing a condemnation order.
DONALD TRUMP: Stan strongly denies that. He was very strong in his denial. Very, very strong. He denied it to me personally, on the phone, and he denied it to me last week, when he presented me with that plaque naming me the Carpet Manufacturer Association’s South Florida Man of the Year. Michael?
MICHAEL COHEN: I called the commissioner of the Buildings Department and told him that if he condemned the Garfield Arms we would get him fired, we would crush him like a bug, we would litigate him into abject poverty, we would burn his crops, and we would kill his firstborn son.
DONALD TRUMP: What did he say to that?
MICHAEL COHEN: I think when I said that, he’d already hung up the phone. I was afraid to call back and find out.
DONALD TRUMP: Eric. You have your hand up. What is it?
ERIC TRUMP: I have to go potty.
DONALD TRUMP: Go. Don’t come back. Somebody lock the door. Allen, what have you got?
ALLEN WEISSELBERG: Well, it turns out that the owners’ financial statement is a crock. Putting a soup kitchen in the lobby didn’t drive out nearly as many rent-controlled tenants as they thought it would, and it brought on a lawsuit that’s bound to cost millions before it’s over. Their income projections for next year are strictly fantasyland. Our accountants say that, even if the building doesn’t fall down, it will be in the red for at least the next forty years. They say that investing in the Garfield Arms makes the Kushners getting suckered into buying that white elephant on Fifth Avenue—the one Henry Geldzahler said looks like the box the Seagram Building came in—seem like getting in on the Amazon IPO.
DONALD TRUMP: Stan denies that very strongly. He denied it once before, and then he denied it again when I phoned to thank him for the letter he wrote to the Palm Beach paper saying that I was the best businessman ever, and possibly the Messiah.
DONALD TRUMP, JR. That was a great letter, Dad.
ERIC TRUMP: (shouting through the door): I framed that letter, Dad.
DONALD TRUMP: OK, that does it. We buy. That’s why I’m so much better at this than anyone else—I hear from the experts I’ve surrounded myself with, and then I make an executive decision.
ALL (in chorus): You’re the greatest! You’re the greatest!
ERIC TRUMP (still shouting through the door): You’re the bestest ever in the whole wide world.
(Exeunt, brushing by Eric) ###
[Calvin Trillin began his career as a writer for Time magazine. Since July 2, 1990, as a columnist at The Nation, Trillin has written his weekly "Deadline Poet" column: humorous poems about current events. Trillin has written considerably more pieces for The Nation than any other single person. Trillin also has been a regular contributor to The New Yorker since 1963, when the magazine published “An Education in Georgia,” his account of the desegregation of the University of Georgia. More than three hundred of Trillin’s pieces have appeared in The New Yorker. His most recent book is Quite Enough of Calvin Trillin: Forty Years of Funny Stuff (2012). A native of Kansas City, MO, Trillin received his BA (English) from Yale University (CT) in 1957.
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