Jared Kushner: Smarmy Shark, Or Shithead With A Shiv? SPOILER IT IS BOTH

Just kidding -- everyone knows he's quite familiar with the taste of human flesh

Hot on the news that Jared Kushner is a filthy slumlord who is also being investigated by the FBI, Politico brings us a sort-of fascinating profile of The Kush, in which we learn he is actually not at all the nice guy of the Family Trump, in case anyone had been under that impression. Had they been? Politico thinks we thought so!

He was supposed to be the calm one, cool and unflappable under his Ray-Bans and beltless blue bespoke suits. If Steve Bannon was the Rumpelstiltskin of the administration, donning multiple half-tucked dress shirts at a time and always carrying a clutch of briefing papers and barreling through the administrative state, Jared Kushner, through pedigree and temperament, could reach out one of his long, elegant fingers and tap everyone in the West Wing on the shoulder and urge them to just cool out a bit.

And here we thought he was just the guy who stared at Donald waiting for signs of approval and ways to "help." Anyhow, what we actually learn from Politico's profile is that Jared Kushner is one tough cookie, a Goodfella of New York real estate, only without any risk of playing out the "Do I amuse you?" scene because no one will ever mistake him for a funny guy, ever. He is tough as nails and beneath the polished elegance, or what passes for it, is a man who's "unfailingly polite and urbane on the surface while searching for the soft underbelly to stick the knife in." So, sort of like a well-scrubbed version of his dad-in-law, but with a mute button.

We get a look at Kushner's management of the New York Observer , where he used the paper to go after competitors and his family's perceived enemies, in one case assigning several different reporters to dig up dirt on a another developer who refused to give Kushner a break on some debt. Unfortunately, the guy turned out to be fairly clean -- one aggressive reporter was only able to learn the rival was “kind of an asshole,” which seems to be a prerequisite for being in NYC real estate.

Then there's the story of disgruntled former employee Harleen Kahlon, who Kushner brought on in 2010 to expand the Observer's digital traffic. Kushner comes off as the perfect Pointy-Haired Boss here:

The two worked closely to redesign the website, with a weekly one-on-one meeting in her office in which Kushner would come in, put his feet up on her desk and check in on the progress of the site’s redesign, for which he hired one of New York’s top digital firms. “He would compensate his lack of knowledge by saying stuff like, ‘Let’s just blow up the whole concept of digital.’ It would sort of sound interesting for a second and then you would just forget about it and get on with the work.”

[wonkbar]<a href="https: //wonkette.substack.com/p/deadbeat-donald-trump-a-cheap-sociopath-who-doesnt-pay-his-bills-bet-you-didnt-see-that-coming"></a>[/wonkbar]Ah, but after a year of work, when she went to ask for her promised bonus, since the paper had met the metrics Kushner had wanted, he told Kahlon money was a little tight, so she'd have to “take one for the team.” ( Being a deadbeat runs in the family even for in-laws!) Kahlon, like a big silly who thought a contract was a contract, instead quit the team, because she's a loser, and now she calls Kushner “the guy that stole my money.” Is there more? Oh, inDEED:

Just before the election, Kahlon described her former boss on Facebook thusly: “We’re talking about a guy who isn’t particularly bright or hard-working, doesn’t actually know anything, has bought his way into everything ever (with money he got from his criminal father), who is deeply insecure and obsessed with fame (you don’t buy the NYO, marry Ivanka Trump, or constantly talk about the phone calls you get from celebrities if it’s in your nature to ‘shun the spotlight’), and who is basically a shithead.”

Gee, you'd never think it to look at him, would you? Unless you had some prior experience with shitheads, of course.

There is much more about Kushner the shark in a nice-guy suit, and you should read the whole piece! It's not as damning as the  New York Times investigation of Kushner's slumlording, but it's still a pretty solid portrait of a guy who wants to be a big player, but is only fairly good at it, sort of a dinner theater production of Citizen Kane. Jared Kushner might want people to tremble at his name, but instead he's more of a punchline.

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[ Politico / The Rude Pundit ]