January 8, 2018--666 Fifth

How did I miss this one?

Not able to stop myself from thinking about Trump, his family of co-conspirators, and Robert Mueller, it slipped right by me that son-in-law Jared Kushner is involved in a mega-real estate deal at Fifth Avenue and 52 Street in New York City. A building, in a small way, I helped construct back in the late 50s when I was a sheetmetal worker.

Sheetmetal workers were responsible for installing the heating and air-conditioning systems, the HVAC, mainly through a complex network of ducts mainly fabricated off site from sheetmetal and suspended from the ceilings and through risers that paralleled the elevator shafts. 

I was not that skilled a mechanic and so I spend little time on the installation and more on the bull gang, unloading trucks that brought the factory-built ducts to the site and then getting them to the floors where they were needed by using the outside hoist, or work elevator, affixed to the exterior of the rising building.

I made a lot of money doing this--enough to help pay for college--and through the manual work got myself into the best physical shape of my life. I also made longterm friends and witnessed some horrific events--including a number of fellow workers injured and killed in construction accidents. One of which decapitated Joe Murey who was a member of my work gang. Still, as I look back on my work life it was the best job I ever had.

One bonus was hanging out on the 52nd Street side of the building site during lunch hour where we woofed down huge hero sandwiches and knocked down a few quick cans of beer. The job was adjacent to the 21 Club (Donald Trump's favorite New York place for dinner) and one treat was to see who showed up each day for lunch. My favorite sighting was Mike Todd and his then wife, Elizabeth Taylor. In true construction-worker form we whistled at her and not only did she turn our way to flash us a glamorous smile but walked over to shake our work-soiled hands. 

So how did I miss knowing that the Kushner family, led by Jared, back in 2007 bought the building for $1.8 billion and that they have been struggling ever since to carry out an ambitious $7.5 billion project that includes tearing it down (it's 41 stories tall) and building a new place of twice that height that would include a hotel, luxury apartments, and high-end retail shops. Very Trumpian. 

They have not been able to secure financing and have thus had difficultly meeting debt payments. It seems possible that the Kushners could lose up to a billion on this fiasco.

But here's where it gets more interesting--

To secure financing for additional debt and to carry out the ultimate plan, Jared Kushner has apparently sought the help of business interests in China, Qatar, and Russia. Including likely borrowing laundered Russian money through Deutsche Bank.

No wonder the Kushner and Trumps are in a panic and running scared.

In the meantime, there is my little Tishman Building Zelig experience.

One more thing--unnoticed by me at the time and I assume by the Kushners is the building's street address--666 Fifth Avenue.

The number 666 itself has quite a curious history.

Chapter 13 of the Book of Revelations reads--

Let one with understanding reckon the meaning of the number of the beast, for it is the number of the man. His number is 666.

The "beast" is the antichrist who rises from the sea which represents the nations of the world and thus 666 is the number associated with the antichrist. 

The conjunction between Kushner and Trump and the antichrist, ironically, requires little elaboration.