Trump, showing presidential mettle, criticizes fire marshal whose dept. rescued him from stalled elevator

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Donald Trump Rescued From Stalled Elevator in Colorado Springs

Later blasts fire marshal for capping rally attendance

(Note: This twisted news did not require any additional twisting)

The Colorado Springs Fire Department reported that Donald J. Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, had to be rescued from an elevator that was stuck between the first and second floors of a resort.

In a statement released on Saturday, the department said that it was called at 1:30 p.m. on Friday to rescue about 10 people, including Mr. Trump, who were trapped inside the elevator at The Mining Exchange, a Wyndham Grand Hotel and Spa resort.

An elevator technician who subsequently inspected the elevator believes that a Trump staffer who was controlling the elevator incorrectly turned the key at the wrong moment, stopping the car between the first and second floors. A safety switch shuts down the elevator automatically when this occurs.

In a heartfelt demonstration of gratitude for the great work in rescuing him from the elevator, The Hill reported that Trump criticized the Colorado Springs fire marshal at his Colorado Springs event later that afternoon and suggested he was a Clinton supporter because he wouldn’t let more people into the venue. As The Hill reported:

“So I have to tell you this. This is why our country doesn’t work,” Trump started as soon as he got onto the stage. “We have plenty of space here. We have thousands of people outside trying to get in. And we have a fire marshal that said, ‘Oh we can’t allow more people.’” 

Trump explained that the venue had set up an overflow room for the extra supporters who were waiting outside and weren’t let into the main space. He said it was “unfair” to the people at the event not to let them into the main venue.

"And the reason they won’t let them in is because they don’t know what the hell they’re doing,” Trump continued. “Hey, maybe they’re a Hillary person. Could that be possible? Probably. I don’t think there are too many of them.” 

Trump compared the fire marshal’s decision to limit the event’s capacity to “the kind of thing we have in federal government.” 

“Then you wonder why we’re going to hell,” he said. “That’s why we’re going to hell.” 

“He’s probably a Democrat,” Trump said about the fire marshal again at the end of his speech. “He’s probably a guy that doesn’t get it.”

According to the The Gazette, a Colorado Springs newspaper, the fire marshal, Brett Lacey, was named Civilian of the Year in February for his efforts following the November shooting at the Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood clinic. 

In call-in to SF Jewish Film Festival, Trump announces matzo trade policy

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San Francisco Jewish Film Festival screens “Streit’s: Matzo and the American Dream”

Surprise guest at Q&A following film

(Note: This is a return to the normal “News with a Twist” so read it in that vein.)

A special treat at this years 36th annual San Francisco Jewish Film Festival is the film “Streit’s: Matzo and the American Dream” which documents the struggle of the almost 100-year old Streit’s matzo company whose family, descendants of founder Aron Streit, try to maintain production in their original bakery on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in the face of gentrification and cheaper, foreign competition.

The film is an entertaining and thought provoking combination of nostalgia and current events.

Nostalgic, particularly for someone who grew up in New York and whose family always bought Streit’s matzo rather than its historic competition – Manischewitz, Goodman’s, and Horowitz Margareten – but timely as well, as it depicted the effect globalization was having on the business.

Globalization? Who would have thought globalization would affect a business as simple and basic as matzo baking?

Well, someone has.

In the Q&A following one special screening of the film, Donald J. Trump, the Republican candidate for president of the United States, called in on a special Skype link.

Trump, aware that he was talking to an audience at a Jewish Film Festival, reverted,  for the first time in months, to his adopted second language, Yiddish.  (See here  http://tedblocksblog.blogspot.com/2015/12/trump-hillary-got-schlonged.html and here  http://tedblocksblog.blogspot.com/2015/12/around-block-news-with-twist.html for previous Around the Block posts regarding Trump and Yiddish)

“Oy gevalt, this is pure mishegas. I am verklmpt that a company like Streit’s is suffering the consequences of the mashugana Obama’s bad trade deals, deals that have sent millions of our jobs overseas. It is a shanda that cheap foreign matzo is flooding our shores made by pishers working for bupkes in factories owned by gonifs. One of my first acts as president will be to establish matzo tariffs so companies like Streit’s will no longer have to compete with fakakte Chinese matzo.”

When an audience member responded that in fact, the cheap foreign matzo was coming from Israel, not China, a man looking vaguely like casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, appeared to whisper something into Trump’s ear before the Skype feed went dead.

San Francisco Jewish Film Festival

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San Francisco Jewish Film Festival at the halfway point

36^th Festival could be one of the best

(Note: In a departure from satire, following is my take on the 36^th annual San Francisco Jewish Film Festival at about its half-way point this year.)

One of the highlights of the summer cultural season in the Bay Area is the annual San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. This year, its 36th, is no exception with a wide array of films, both documentary and narrative, which inspire and inform, sometimes with laughter, sometimes with tears, sometimes with controversy, but always with taste and purpose.

And, it’s not just for Jews, as this years trailer’s tag line states, “You don’t have to be Jewish to ride the J train,” referring to one of San Francisco Muni’s streetcar lines.

With that in mind, I encourage you to attend the festival if you’re in the Bay Area (it runs until August at various venues around the Bay). Here’s a link that highlights the films and the showings, so I won’t burden you with superfluous summaries (I will list my “favorites” below, however). http://sfjff36.jfi.org/festival-guide/view-all-films/. But I do want to point out one film in particular.

While it is short-handed as a filmed version of a one-man, 17 - character play, that description does not do Wrestling Jerusalem justice. It is possibly the most powerful, innovative and moving depiction of Israel, Judaism and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict I’ve ever seen. Last night’s showing was its world premiere and I encourage you to see it at the festival (Palo Alto – 7/28, Berkeley – 7/31, San Rafael – 8/7) or seek it out as it becomes available in other distribution channels.

Favorites

·       A German Life

·       A Grain of Truth

·       Baba Joon

·       Disturbing the Peace

·       Fever at Dawn

·       Germans and Jews

·       Joe’s Violin

·       Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You

·       Robert Klein Still Can’t Stop His Leg

·       Steit’s: Matzo and the American Dream

·       The Origin of Violence

·       The People vs. Fritz Bauer

New series "Lock Them Up" will feature Christie's mock prosecutions

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Chris Christie to star in new TV show, “Lock Them Up”

Teams with Roger Ailes for mock prosecution series

Coming off his stunning mock prosecution at the Republican National Convention of presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton for crimes against humanity , New Jersey governor and former federal prosecutor Chris Christie is rumored to be planning a new TV show with disgraced former Fox News Channel chairman Roger Ailes.

The show, to be called “Lock Them Up,” will feature Christie, a former federal prosecutor, bringing to trial people who have aggrieved Christie and/or Ailes, including any senior members of the Democratic Party and selected op-ed writers and editors at the New York Times and the Washington Post and anyone affiliated with MSNBC.

In a genre twist, the show will not allow the accused to defend themselves and will prosecute them, not before a judge and jury, but before a rabid mob selected on the basis of having already pre-determined that the accused should be ‘locked up.’

According to Christie, “As you know, I'm a former federal prosecutor and, at that time, was subject to the theory that there should be fair trials and no prosecutional overreach. On “Lock Them Up,” with no bothersome judge or defense attorney, we will have the ability to throw those rules out the window.”

Aides, who will be executive producer, added that “We are selecting the accused right now and hope to start with a lineup, no pun intended, that includes former president Bill Clinton, New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow and soon to be former president, Barak Obama. And, of course we intend to kick the show off with a replay of Chris’ prosecution of Hillary Clinton at the RNC.”

In another twist, the prosecutions will not be held in a court room but in famous mob-crazy venues including the Coliseum in Rome and the Nuremberg Parade Grounds.

And in a particularly exciting announcement, Ailes said that “Former New York City mayor, Rudolph Giuliani will appear on the show periodically as a guest prosecutor.” 

It is believed that Giuliani, also a former federal prosecutor, will only be identified as ‘former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani' because Christie’s contract stipulates that only Christie himself can be called a ‘former federal prosecutor.’ A Christie source indicated that not only has the governor trademarked the term, but has applied for a name change and will be identified going forward as Chris ‘Former Federal Prosecutor’ Christie.

It is rumored that Giuliani's first prosecution will be former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson who has recently sued Ailes for sexual harassment.