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Gil Bang

Certifiably Surly
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Everything posted by Gil Bang

  1. Starring Raymond Burr (who loved cock, NTTAWWT)
  2. That's almost identical to my Charlie Christian, except for the two white blobs at the bottom. WTF are those?
  3. I'm not clicking on the list, but if Stills isn't in the top 25, it's a total bullshit list.
  4. mine was that exact model. I don't remember the purple one, but I do remember the "Orange Crate".
  5. I shit you not, I had that fucking bike.
  6. Allen Weisselberg, the longtime chief financial officer of the Trump Organization, lied in sworn testimony on Tuesday when questioned about Donald Trump’s penthouse atop Trump Tower. Weisselberg was on the stand as part of a $250 million lawsuit that the New York attorney general is waging against Trump and his associates, including Weisselberg, accusing them of lying about Trump’s net worth to financial institutions. To arrive at inflated figures, the Trump Organization used demonstrably incorrect facts, such as valuing Trump’s penthouse as if it contained 30,000 square feet, when it in fact consisted of 10,996. Under questioning, Weisselberg acknowledged that the 30,000-square-foot figure was wrong. He tried to suggest, however, that he had little to do with the bogus calculation, batting away a series of questions about the financial documents and discussions with Forbes, which has been valuing Trump’s fortune since 1982. “I never focused on the triplex, to be honest with you,” Weisselberg said. “It was almost de minimis relative to his net worth, so I really didn’t focus on it.” He repeated similar lines as his testimony continued. “I never focused on the apartment Mr. Trump owned,” he said at one point. At another: “I didn’t correlate the square footage of Donald’s apartment. I never focused on it. It was always in my mind a de minimis asset of the overall of Donald J. Trump’s statement of financial condition. That was never a concern of mine. I never even thought about the apartment. It was de minimis in my mind.” But that’s not true. A review of old emails and notes, some of which the attorney general’s office does not possess, show that Weisselberg absolutely thought about Trump’s apartment—and played a key role in trying to convince Forbes over the course of several years that it was worth more than it really was. Given the fact that these discussions continued for years, and that Weisselberg took a very detailed approach in reviewing Trump’s assets with Forbes, it defies all logic to think he truly believes what he is now saying in court. The saga started in 2009, on a relatively friendly note. Forbes had been valuing Trump’s fortune for decades at that point, though some of his smaller assets remained absent from the overall calculation. Weisselberg and Trump summoned a Forbes reporter to a meeting, according to the reporter’s notes. The reporter was hesitant to add Trump’s personal home to the valuation, something Trump and his underlings seemed to be okay with at the time. “They understand if we don’t want to include the penthouse at Trump Tower,” the reporter noted. Three years later, in 2012, a different reporter wrote, “Allen asked why we count large private estates for other billionaires and not Trump. He said we should be including his NY penthouse. He thinks it’s worth more [than] $88m.” Weisselberg had a point. The penthouse wasn’t worth $88 million, but it was worth something. The reporter added it to the calculation with an estimated $64 million valuation. Weisselberg kept pushing. The next year, a reporter explained, “Now Allen says it’s worth $200M, and there’s no debt.” Believing the penthouse was nearly 30,000 square feet, the figure that the Trump Organization would eventually claim on its internal documents, the reporter decided to bump up the estimate to $90 million. A year later, in 2014, Weisselberg once again weighed in on the value. “Now Allen says it’s $163m with 0 debt,” a reporter wrote in her notes. “He is sending us sales records for One57”—a luxury apartment building nearby, which Trump’s financial statements also referenced—“and then applying a per-square-foot rate, based on 30k sf.” The reporter opted to leave the valuation at $90 million in her calculation and sent a summary of her estimates to Weisselberg and his deputy, Jeff McConney. Weisselberg then set up a phone call, which was followed by an email exchange, titled “Mr. Trump’s penthouse.” “Hi Jeff, Allen— I just wanted to let you know that I was not able to bump up the value of Mr. Trump’s penthouse this time. While I understand your point that it may indeed sell for more than $90 million due to its large square footage, this is still an untested market. Since no apartment in New York is known to have sold for more than that sum to date, we’re not comfortable upping the number at this time.” Weisselberg replied at 5:02 p.m. on a September Friday, delving into the weeds on the penthouse. “Thank you for the response, but keep in mind that his apartment is a triplex which consists of 6 apartments.” In 2015, Trump hosted three Forbes journalists inside Trump Tower, with Weisselberg by his side. “This is the entire floor of Trump Tower, just so you know,” Trump said, showing off his penthouse. “Now, this wraps all around the building. All around the elevators. And I have three times three. So there’s like 11,000 feet on a floor. So I have three. So 33,000—and I have the roof.” The next year, Forbes uncovered property records that showed that the penthouse was only 10,996 square feet, not 30,000 square feet or 33,000 square feet. Reporters reached out to Weisselberg and others at the Trump Organization to ask about the discrepancy, emails that are now being used as evidence in the case. Even after receiving those messages, the Trump Organization apparently continued to value the penthouse on its documents as if it had 30,000 square feet. It wasn’t until after Forbes published a story in May 2017, exposing the lie publicly, that the Trump Organization seemed to change its internal documents, reducing the square footage to 10,996. Weisselberg was demoted from his role as CFO after he was criminally charged in a separate tax case in 2021. He remained with the Trump Organization until January, when he was sentenced to five months in jail as the result of the other case, which also implicated the Trump Organization. Weisselberg signed a separation agreement with the firm that month, which promises to pay him $2 million over two years, if he complies with his obligations under the agreement. An attorney for Weisselberg did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Weisselberg is expected to retake the stand in the attorney general’s case to continue his testimony in the coming days. Follow me on Twitter or LinkedIn. Check out some of my other work here. Send me a secure tip. Dan Alexander
  7. Just think: when trump was alone in a room, and pillow guy walked in, the average IQ in the room went up.
  8. What a fucking loon. That guy is rich and handsome. He could be getting all the pussy in the world.
  9. Walsh is unique in that you can tell it's Joe Walsh playing in just a few licks.
  10. @Brisketexan was it you that had a story about a drunk Mary Lou threatening to whip somebody's ass at a UT game?
  11. Our MLS was just updated. Property description options were changed, eliminating "master" and adding "primary".
  12. WTF, Rossi still exists? I've got a Rossi .38 revolver. I thought they were long gone.
  13. are lever 357's widely available? Who's making them because that sounds fucking awesome.
  14. Buckingham is a terrific player. Top 10 as a guitarist? It's not preposterous. Top 10 as an asshole? Without question.
  15. I use sidedooraccess.com to book musicians. Set up your profile, list your open dates and musicians contact you to book. I used backdooraccess.com and was contacted by south austin's mom
  16. Gil Bang

    Tokyo

    Wow. I can't help you. I think I spent 400 a night. Our room was small, but quite nice. We were in Shinjuku.
  17. Even if recruiting was steady, the roster was turbofucked. That's the first thing that Sark tried to correct. We had the wrong numbers of guys at the wrong positions.
  18. Oh indeed, I made the whole thing up.
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