14,000 dead

According to these statistics, more than 14000 civilians have been killed in Iraq - since Janurary 2006. The number is staggering. I cannot wrap my mind around that. The CNN quotes a UN study:

"more than 5,800 deaths and more than 5,700 injuries reported in May and June alone."

Every time there's a massive suicide bomb in Iraq, I think to myself "how do they even have any more people." And the fact that this is all Muslim on Muslim makes you realize what they would do if they had free reign in Israel or America or Western Europe!

{2009 Update: Pic from here.}

My Profile Picture

I placed a picture on my personal profile page which is not of my face but, like Dr. Manhattan, a symbol of something I believe in: caffeine.

The Bomb Drawing Pictures

You may have seen these pictures of little Israeli girls writing happy bloodthirsty messages on bombs that, we all now, are used to kill little Lebanese children. Picture 1, picture 2, picture 3.

Here's research on the explanation. Summary: the kids were under fire from Hezbollah rockets and were writing messages - as a way to relieve frustration - against the terrorists who were trying to kill them every day.

1. Sandmonkey:

   kids were in bomb shelters for days. city is a ghost town. only poor people stayed. a new army unit arrived, kids were bored, went out with parents to look
   there were TWELVE photographers there and they egged the kids on. the kids are low class, not educated, have never met a Lebanese, just want to live their lives, don't understand why Lebanon attacked their home, etc. the photographers told them "hey, your cousins in america will see you!." mostly foreign photographers. so the kids, who were bored and restless and had been cooped up in bomb shelters for 5 days, took the felt markers and drew messages to nasrallah. there were no cries of hatred toward lebanese. and a big problem is that the israeli tv does not show dead lebanese. it shows destroyed buildings, but not dead bodies. so no one has a face of the dead in their minds. too aware of our own suffering, etc. make sense?

2. Yahoo Pictures (the originals, many on other websites were touched up). For an example of the propaganda, see here.

Tefilat HaDerech

On YouTube and IDF Tank Crew, about to go Lebanon, says Tefilat HaDerech.

Amen.

2009 Update: Embedded video -

Hezbullah preventing civilians from fleeing

This comes from Yedioth Achronot, not known for their rightwingyness, nor for being a mouthpiece of the government. The head of IDF intelligence says that:

The IDF has found that Hezbollah is preventing civilians from leaving villages in southern Lebanon. Roadblocks have been set up outside some of the villages to prevent residents from leaving, while in other villages Hezbollah is preventing UN representatives from entering, who are trying to help residents leave. In two villages, exchanges of fire between residents and Hezbollah have broken out. (Hanan Greenberg)

Response to Mearsheimer and Walt

Finally, an academic puts out a reasoned point-by-point critique of a recent anti-Semitic screed. Acquire here:

Zealous Realism: Comments on Mearsheimer and Walt by Marc Landy, Boston College.

Juan Cole Sees Some Light

Juan Cole, Professor of Middle East Stuff at the University of Michigan is a well respected member of the left-wing blogosphere and a commonly quoted expert on the Middle East. He also hates Israel. He may or may not hate Jews, I'm sure some of his best friends are Hebrews, but Juanito sure does hate him some Israel.

Just be warned, whenever you see the man quoted in a blog or Mainstream Media, you should know they are employing Edward Said's replacement.

On his website [called Informed Comment, meant to be as truthful as Fox's 'fair and balanced' no doubt] you can read some wonderfully twisted reportage and commentage about the nasty Israelites.

However, as an example of just how bad Hezbollah is, even Juan Cole thinks they have gone too far.

This is important to know because we pro-Israel people don't make a distinction between the PLO, Hamas, or Hezbollah. They are all terrorists; they all want to kill Jews, they will not stop until we're dead. I guess they *do* wear different uniforms and may even kill each other a few times just to keep in practice, but, c'mon, what's the difference?

Anyway, if Juan Cole thinks Hezbollah is off the chain, then I we need to figure out what exactly makes the Hezzies different from the PLO and, uh, explain that to people? Ah, forget it, they'll never follow simple arithmetic.

Anyway, this is what Cole has on his site:

[Ar.] Hasan Nasrallah, the leader of Hizbullah (Hezbollah), gave a televised speech on Sunday explaining his own strategy. He said in an eerily calm and calculating voice that he had aimed his rockets only at military targets, not at Israeli settlements 'in Occupied northern Palestine' (i.e. Israel). In contrast, he said, the Israeli military had from the beginning targeted civilians. (In fact, Nasrallah's katyushas are impossible to aim with any precision and in loosing them on Israel, he inevitably killed and wounded civilians; likewise in Haifa. His opening statement is a self-serving lie.)

He complained at length about Israeli airstrikes against civilian targets. He linked hitting the Israeli warship to Israel's airstrikes on Baalbak [where they hit a Husayniyah or Shiite mourning center].

He added, "We arose to strike at the city of Haifa, and we know the importance and grave significance of this city. Had we targeted with our missiles the chemical and petrochemical factories, an enormous catastrophe would have ensued for the inhabitants of that area. But we deliberately avoided those factories, which were in the sites of our missiles, since we were eager not to push things toward the unknown and were eager that this weapon be a weapon not of revenge but of defense . . . a weapon that would return the crazies in the Olmert government to a modicum of reason and save them from a grandiosity complex, or, I might say, the stupidity whereby they distinguish themselves . . . But because we set those targets aside this time does not mean that we we always adopt this position. At any point where we consider that we are involved in defending our nation and our people and our families, we will resort to all means we can in pursuit of that defense . . . " (-Cole translation)

He also denied that there were any Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon or that he had had Iranian help. He said people were always putting down the Arabs and saying they could not accomplish anything, but, he said, look at the Israeli warship in flames. That was an Arab accomplishment.

Uh, wouldn't an Arab accomplishment be more like, oh, inventing something or building up something nice? Destroying things and killing people is not an accomplishment.

I watched in horror as this maniacal speech unfolded in which Nasrallah actually threatened the Israelis with releasing chemical gas from local factories on civilians in Haifa. Despite fighting them for all those years, he clearly does not understand the Israelis' psyche or the trauma of the Holocaust. A threat like that. The Israelis don't like being caught in a quagmire any more than the next person, which is why Nasrallah could get them to leave southern Lebanon. But his victory appears to have given him megalomania, and he has now gone too far.

Hizbullah's attacks on Israeli civilians are war crimes. The killing of the civilians in Haifa at the train station was a war crime. And threatening to release chemicals from factories on civilian populations is probably a war crime in itself, much less the doing of it.

Obviously, I do not accept that Hizbullah's actions justify the wholesale indiscriminate destruction and slaughter in which the Israelis have been engaged against the Lebanese in general. But they do have every right to defend themselves against Nasrallah and his mad bombers.

If we can only get Cole to understand that Lebanon, ya know, supports Hezbollah... actually, that's too strong... howzibout: Lebanon effectively is Hezbollah... yeah ... maybe he'll see that 1+1 = 2?

Nah.

{2009 Update: pic from campus-watch.}

Jewish Agency Materials

The Jewish Agency (Sochnut) has some useful material for the current situation, inlcuding a translation of the special prayer for the 3 recent captives [verbatim below except in italics]:

May it be Your will, oh L-rd, our G-d and G-d of our Forefathers, That the verses of these Psalms which we have read before You today will find favor and will be accepted as if spoken by King David, Your servant and annointed one, of blessed memory.

May You do this for the sake of Your Holy Names that is written in them, alluded to and included within them. Accept mercifully and graciously our prayer and request.

May our supplication come before You that You shall take pity, forgive and have mercy upon Your servants, the son of Your handmaidens,

Gilad, son of Aviva Shalit
Ehud, son of Malka Goldwasser
Eldad, son of Tova Regev

And You shall save them in both physical salvation and compassion, together with all the hostages and prisoners of Israel, Your People.

"He who liberates prisoners in good health, may He redeem them from their captors. Bring them forth from captivity to freedom, from slavery to redemption, from darkness into light, Restore them to complete health, both in mind and body. Fortify their spirit and increase their strength, spreading happiness and joy, So that they may be strengthened and healed, and know eternal happiness.

May the proliferation of public prayer, protest and grief on his behalf, far and wide, act on their behalf to protect, shield and redeem them from the house of his imprisonment.

And He will cast asunder their evil sentence that has been decreed, their good deeds shall be enumerated before the Almighty blessed be He, including all that they have done and accomplished on behalf of our people and our inheritance.

So shall He cast asunder his evil sentence through the Holy Name that is alluded to in the initials of the words ""??? ??? ??? ????? ????? ????; accept the delight of Your People, exalt us and purify us exceedingly.

May He fulfill for them the Biblical declaration, as it is written: And those redeemed by the L-rd shall return and come to Zion in gladness, with eternal happiness on their heads; they shall know rejoicing and happiness; sorrow and grief shall fade. May this come to pass speedily in our days. Amen." (Isaiah 35:10)

The Morality of the Second Lebanon War

This was written to a Jewish email-group in response to someone who claimed "From so far away it looks to me like Israel has acted with a degree of disregard for civilian life in Lebanon that really upsets me."

Dear Ploni

Like you, I am very upset about the number of civilian casualties in Lebanon. Whenever a democratic country is in a war against a dictatorship, this moral question comes up because the tyrants use their civilians as shields and weapons. Often the people have no choice; the dictators purposefully destroy the line between solider and civilian.

Lebanon is a Terrorarchy - it's effectively controlled by Hezbollah. Note, according to Joe Klein, Iran is also controlled by the same terrorists. The Palestinians are also now a Terrorarchy; Hamas uses the same tactic as Hezbollah in Lebanon - they use innocents as weapons. We can even hold aside the fact that many Lebanese families knowingly and happily house the Hezbollah missiles - we are concerned about those who are as innocent a civilian as can be.

The particular terrorist groups the world faces now are often not in the freedom-fighting genre (which could possibly be applied to the Basques, the IRA, or even the PLO in an alternative universe). The terrorists we now have are the mindless genocidal slaughter variety. These terrorists are committed to the eradication of their enemies across borders and time. Hamas, Hezbollah, Al-Qaeda would gladly kill my two year old son in Connecticut tomorrow even if Israel were to disappear today.

These terrorist groups are the individual equivalent of psychotic serial killers - people who take joy in the killing, who will not stop even if you accede to their demands. They don't mind killing their "own" - as we see with suicide bombers. And they value death over life.

For example, in Israel right now, Hezbollah and Hamas hide behind innocent people to fire rockets at other innocent people. What can anyone do to defend themselves from a psychotic serial killer who uses innocent victims as weapons? On 9/11 al-Qaeda used American citizens to destroy the twin-towers... if al-Qaeda tried to use a plane-bomb again today, what should we do? Shoot down the plane, saving the lives on the ground, or let the plane continue its course?

The former is now assumed to be the policy, but the latter may be more morally palatable - at least we don't actively kill innocents. Or do we assume that any innocent being used as a weapon loses individual rights and is considered part of the terrorist threat?

All of the conclusions at this level become horrible. The terrorists transform almost everything they touch into a threat. And because they turn innocents into weapons, these terror groups are the greatest evil the world currently faces. They are a super-evil because they transform hostages, victims and innocents into more evil. Groups like that need to be destroyed quickly, utterly.

Moreover, by nature of this particular enemy, the moral conclusions need to take a long term view. Halakha understands this in a number of occasions.

Mishna 2:5 in Rosh Hashanah explains that Rabban Gamliel ruled that people who violate Shabbat to rush to save people from a collapsed building can violate Shabbat to return to their homes after the rescue is over. The counter-argument was that since the life- threat is over, there's no allowance to violate Shabbat any more. Rabban Gamliel felt that in the long term, in a future incident, people would not rush to save lives on Shabbat if they would not be able to get home afterwards. (This is why we allow Haztalah paramedics to return home after driving to a hospital on Shabbat).

Unfortunately, war is filled with these long-term goods that involve short-term evils. To look short term in war would mean you could never order a soldier to shoot a man or to take a hill, because the success of the individual act does not measure up to the cost of an individual human life. War must be fought in the aggregate. War is hell for many reasons, but for me, the biggest is because it requires so much faceless, individual evil.

Despite war's hell, we can demand that Israel take precautions to act as morally as possible. They do that, as far as I've read, by warning the Lebanese to evacuate specific places. Why this isn't the same as Hezbollah saying "Hey! We're gonna hit Haifa" is that the IDF is hitting an area only to neutralize terrorists/missiles and Hezbollah is purposefully targeting the innocent.

Another way Israel, and we, will act morally is to mourn the loss of all innocents. We do not champion the deaths of the Lebanese. In fact, Israel seems to care more for them than Hezbollah does. I know I care more about the innocent Lebanese than the terrorists do. That's the whole point.

Note, we don't even want to kill terrorists - we would prefer the terrorists to JUST STOP KILLING PEOPLE. If they would lay down their missiles and just, ya know, drink coffee, eat couscous, get a real job, whatever, I'd be perfectly happy.

The psychic pain we feel at the death of innocents is ironically not a reason to stop the warplanes - it's the reason we need to use them, if they will destroy Hezbollah and Hamas.

My bottom line is that I support Israel's effort to destroy both Hezbollah and Hamas. If my analysis is correct, that they are psychotic serial killers who will not stop killing and who purposefully use innocent people as part of their terrorism, then they need to be stopped immediately.

{2009 Update: pic from here.}

Don't Forget the Torture

Just in case a new reader wanders onto the blog and wonders why I think George W. Bush is ripe to be impeached, check out this story about the hitherto under-reported story of how Bush & Co. made it American policy to regularly torture prisoners of war.

The article, by Lawrence Wilkerson, is a set of questions reporters should be asking the administration about the routine practice of torture.

Lawrence Wilkerson "was Secretary of State Colin Powell's chief of Staff from 2002 to 2005, and served for 31 years in the U.S. Army.... including as Deputy Executive Officer to General Colin L. Powell when he was Commander, U.S. Army Forces Command (1989), Special Assistant to General Powell when he was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (1989-93), and as Director and Deputy Director of the U.S. Marine Corps War College at Quantico, Virginia (1993-97)."

What do we learn from this article?

1. That the Executive branch is horribly evil and needs to be kicked out of power

2. There were some men of integrity in the Exec Branch, but they were silenced (emphasizing point 1)

3. That the current press corps have ignored their responsibilities

4. Because the press corps is populated by no-nothing hacks (like this guy) who dare not upset the government

5. Since the press won't take on the government we need to have Congress do it, and they can't do that unless the Democrats win it in 2006, which won't happen as long as the Hard-Left Wing of the Democratic party (a.k.a. the Terminal Loser Wing, the Walter Mondale-Michael Dukakis-John Kerry Wing) keeps dominating the platform.

Why is the Press so Craven?

The answer is complicated. It's as complicated as the reasons behind the US Civil War and World War II; i.e. a lot of little causes surrounding one big one. But I will get to that anon.

Backpost finished 4/9/08. This is the first 'draft' item I've found in the blog. Boy that's a long time ago... computer years are like double-dog, so 2=28! Note, I don't see why I didn't post this at the time, since it seems fully formed. But I searched my archives, and it seems not to have been blogged.

Anyway, it's cute to see what I was thinking back before the '06 midterms. Those were wretched times. And considering the post I just wrote, this is old news to those who've been following the news with any diligence.

Lieberman Letter

I agree with you on the disaffection with Lieberman from Democrats. But Connecticut is a strange state. According to the Secretary of State, the voter registration in 2005 was, out of 1,952,648 total active registrations, 427,803 Republicans, 653,055 Democrats and 867,761 Independents. That shows that any Connecticut politician needs to court many types of voters (it also suggests that an independent run isn't the suicide-path the pundits have been claiming).

Two things about Lieberman that I think need to be emphasized: his backing of the Iraq war, like many of his actions, comes from a sincere belief not from cynical posturing. He is wrong to support the war (and I've written him often about that), but I think he's a remarkably honest politician and that's a rarity.

Which means, actually, that he's a really *bad* politician. As we've seen with his commericials and his public behavior, Lieberman is uncharismatic, clumsy and a nerd. He is not very good at the politics game. Ned Lamont is much better at commericals and he'd make a very good politician for the state (and I hope he continues to be active), but I hate to see Lieberman get punished for not being slick. Maybe it's the nerd in me...

[Ed. note: My views on the Iraq war will be in a later post]

Posted July 26, 2006. Sent to the Editor of the TPM on Friday, July 14th.

Onion is Better Than I

OK, besides being very funny, the Onion wrote this story (Bush: 'Our Long National Nightmare Of Peace And Prosperity Is Finally Over') in January 11, 2001 - I have never, ever been that prescient. Man.

A sample quote:

"My fellow Americans," Bush said, "at long last, we have reached the end of the dark period in American history that will come to be known as the Clinton Era, eight long years characterized by unprecedented economic expansion, a sharp decrease in crime, and sustained peace overseas. The time has come to put all of that behind us."

Eerie.

The Right Path

In this time of terror and war, when Israel is under siege from two fronts, [and considering the players (Iran, Syria, Hamas, Hezbollah) even more fronts can open up] who knows if Israel is acting and reacting correctly? Well, one sure way to know is to see how France reacts and, oh, looky here:

Chirac: Israel has gone too far.

Thank Goodness!

Donate to Northern Communities

The North of Israel is being pounded by hundreds of rockets. Haaretz reports that 220,000 Israelis spent last night in their bomb shelters.

According to the National Council of Young Israel:

Funds are needed to stock the shelters with food, mattresses, bedding, toys, etc. In general, the financial state for these families is not good, and the current violence adds to an already dire situation. Please make an emergency appeal this Shabbat. Funds can be sent to: Young Israel Charities, c/o National Council of Young Israel, New York, NY 10038.

I recommend giving to whatever charities you can.

Lieberman-Lamont

I could spend many a page on this Senate race (and I will). A quick article that frames the issues well is from the NY Observer.

Quote from Lieberman:

"I am a Democrat in the mold of Truman, Kennedy, Humphrey,” Mr. Lieberman told The Observer just after the event. “I continue to be socially progressive here at home, and I believe you have to put muscle behind your ideals in foreign policy."

This race is about the out-of-control left-wing of the Democratic party. These are the same people who destroyed Humphrey in 1968, nominated McGovern in 1972, Mondale in 1984, Dukakis in 1988, voted for Nader in 2000 and nominated Kerry in 2004.

The Democrats used to be and should be again, the party of blue-collar workers and all minorities (including Catholics and Jews). However the money and vocality comes from the hard-left - the suicide-bombers who are so out of touch they considered Kerry a moderate because he fought in Vietnam as a teenager.

Lieberman is the type of candidate Democrats need to support. If we hope to win in 2006 and 2008 we need the moderates, the cultural conservatives, the unashamed patriots - which is the majority of the country and the majority of national Democrats.

The fact that some buggy-eyed wacko like Lamont is getting money and support is a sign that the Democrats are ready to lose, yet again.

Red Buttons dies

Red Buttons, famed comedian and counterculture clothing accessory, died today. Frankly, I didn't know he was still alive. Good for him.

Fallen soldiers in Hezbollah border attack

The obituaries of the lost soldiers by Haaretz.

Shaalvim? Are You?

As many of you know in addition to my extensive Blog mastery, I also coordinate a Torah webpage. And, as many of you who have survived a sortie into my home-office know, I print out the contents of the Internet quite frequently. Some may ask 'why print the internet when it is snugly resting amongst the ones and zeroes of the World Wide Web?' I will answer that intriguing yet stupid question by using the example of Yeshivat Shaalvim.

Shaalvim, the "nice-guy" yeshiva (or at least that what we called it in college; Gush guys were arrogant, KBY guys burst into flames when they stepped foot in Princeton New Jersey, and the Shaalvim guys were 'nice.') Anyway, they have lots of good Torah online. Thought provoking, well-researched articles by Rabbi Aaron Weiss and Rabbi Joshua Blank, among others.

Oh, you'll have to take my word for it... because Shaalvim has removed most of the online Torah and replaced it with the WWW equivalent of Folger's crystals... or with nothing... I can't tell. A swift google search for "Aaron Weiss" reveals only my lone Torah website.

There are a number of top-notch Torah websites that swiped away all their Torah in the 8 years since I've run my website(yup, 8 years, holy macaroni).

And, lest you think it is a self-censoring salvo by extra frummie sites, the ones who've dropped off the Web are usually the most intellectual and academic: (1) The Soloveitchik archives from Mail Jewish, (2) Machon Lev, (3) The Chait High School in Seattle, (4) Keren-Kayemet L'Torah.

Shaalvim is in a different category - they have Torah up, but in the past 8 years they have changed their webpage 4+ times and they've swiped away their archives. But, in any case, its less Torah. Now the only source for this stuff seems to be my massive piles of printed paper.

P.S. the "are you" from the message title is a reference to the way my kid looks for lost objects, as in looking for his lost train totem of Thomas: "T'ommas?! Are You?!"

Judaica Press Tanach Online

I don't know how long this has been up but it is news to me. Chabad has put up the Judaica Press translation of Tanakh, with Rashi, online. Whoo and Hoo!

Movie Review: Solaris (2002)

The great team of Steven Soderbergh and George Clooney made a thoughtful, excellent remake of Solaris back in 2002. This is an underrated and misunderstood film. I can't even remember what specifically enthused me about it - it's been an uninterrupted 18 months since I've seen it - but I remember thinking that it was one of the finest examples of how to translate sci-fi into film.

In general, Soderbergh and Clooney make serious, good, films.

Backpost finished 4/10/08. I just had the link. I suspect I had just seen the movie and wanted to talk about it.

Old Blog?

My original blog (Life in the Styx: The Prequel) is still out there in bloggyland. Not sure what to do with the old posts. I'm thinking of a slow, methodical transfer of the archives and 'drafts.' As such, if older posts seem to pop up in this blog, you're forewarned, that when the Deja tolls, it tolls for Vu.

Am I Back?

I hope I'm back. Don't tell everyone, just in case this bursts early.

But I miss the writing.

The reason why this went on a year hiatus is 'cuz:

1. blogger.com was causing me much agita and
   
2. people were reading the Blog and nagging me in two ways:


1. asking why I had time to write a blog when I hadn't responded to their self-absorbed desires, or
   
2. how could I say such things when my public persona is a carefully produced shell that combines equal parts Chofetz Chaim and Abraham Lincoln - and neither of them would say such nasty things about nice people.

Anyway, if you out there get the urge to ask either of those questions, I request that, like the Chofetz Chaim, you reign in your yappers.

As it is, blogging for The Styx is the reverse of the most common model. People often blog to create a voice for their otherwise anonymity. As a public (type) figure, I have both a name and a literal pulpit, so I use blogging as an opportunity to be faceless and muted.

When you live in a fishbowl, there's an advantage to being able to shout into a void.

Italy Beats France

Not that I've been following the World Cup (because, I'm not yet that guy) as a masculine man of the male persuasion, I am indeed interested in whomever becomes the World's Finest in anything (whether it is soccer or the largest bee-beard). And who could predict a win in the battle between the two nations with the highest Surrender-to-Major War ratio?

Well, as the headline explains, it was a tie and then Italy wins World Cup on penalties. Metaphors, sweet metaphors.

And, to quote Scorpio, when asking Homer who he likes less, France or Italy, answers "heh heh, nobody ever picks Italy"

Balance of Power Scorecard

This is another attempt to see if the Blog works.

This is a remarkable website to keep track of the Critically Important 2006 Elections

CQPolitics.com: Senate Balance of Power Scorecard Details

Does this Work

Oh, I know its been a while, but I am hoping the fakaktiness of Blogger has been ironed out in my absence.

{2009 Update: Wow, a full year absence.}

Israel Lobby Resources

Some resources and links about the article by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy":

1. Their article in the London Review of Books
   
2. The original piece [Direct PDF] from the Harvard Kennedy School
   
3. Info about Walt
   
4. Info about Mearsheimer
   
5. Response by CAMERA
   
6. A response by Ruth Wisse (Professor at Harvard)
   
7. A brief response from Daniel Pipes
   
8. Article in the Crimson which includes an Alan Dershowitz response
   
9. KKK's David Duke's endorsement of the Walt-Mearsheimer thesis

Backpost finished 4/15/08

Munich Madness, part 1

This will need to be brief because I actually have too much to say. Back in 2005, Steven Spielberg, King of the Jews (with all that title entails) decided that his years in higher education (baccalaureate from film school, which, admittedly, is better than Clown College), gives him the authority, nay, the responsibility to comment on the Arab-Israeli conflict.

We know from the fact that he is (1) rich, (2) not-religious, and (3) married a bunch of non-Jewish women, we shouldn't expect that a movie about Israel will not be favorable to the Jewy Jewish State for Jews. And we'd be right.

Munich (2005) is based on a fictional account, written as non-fiction, of the aftermath to the massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. But because the book source wasn't false enough, Spielberg needed to fake it up with a whole bunch of stuff that insults the memories of the victims of the tragedy, insults Israel, and all in the service of making a simple grade-school morality point: there's no such thing as good violence.

Well, I didn't have the time to waste watching the film before talking about it from the pulpit. Rather, I adhered to the "Silence of the Jesus Lambs" Rules which state that you don't have to sit through a movie if more than 90% of eyewitnesses, including many you trust from other encounters but including ordinary neutral parties, all agree. People from all walks agreed that The Passion was a blood-orgy of anti-Semitic hate. And even though Mel Gibson was a known tee-totaling philo-Semitic philanthropist, the eyewitnesses spoke as one.

So too with Silence of the Munich. Many trustworthy sources said that it was mean, stupid, hokum. And so I based my sermons on their words, including this fine analysis by Rabbi Benjamin Blech.

The key point of Rabbi Blech is that Spielberg uniformly distorted events, and then just made stuff up, in order to broadcast a dishonest agenda:

Too bad the movie does not include perhaps the single most relevant dialogue in Jonas' book, Vengeance, that served as the primary source for Munich. In assigning the mission, the agents are given clear instructions: If you get all of the names on the list, your mission is an incredible success. Get six or five, we will feel the message has been sent that Jewish blood is not cheap, that we will not sit idly by as the world did during the Holocaust. Even if you get only one or two, it will not have been in vain. But if you will be faced with a choice between killing any one on the list together with an innocent bystander or aborting your mission, your instructions are to do nothing.

That piece of information is probably the most crucial difference between the Munich terrorists and the Israeli hit-squad, yet it wasn't included in the film.

Munich concludes with a final insult: The disillusioned leader of the mission, who cannot abide the ideology of a country that dares to declare that it will no longer idolize the glorification of the Jew as victim, renounces his country and settles in Brooklyn. And so ends the hope of the Jewish people.

It never happened. And it makes whatever message Spielberg sought to bring to the screen indefensible.

Part 2 of this topic will deal with my reaction to actually seeing the movie.

P.S. I do like the fact that after insulting the memories of the victims of the Olympic massacre, Spielberg becomes part of the Beijing Olympics committee. His moral compass was shattered, and who knows when. And, yeah, he pulled out of the committee a few months ago in protest over the Chinese complicity of the genocide in Darfur. Bra-effing-O Steve. You're a real hero.

Backpost finished 4/13/08, 9:11 PM. I had just the link to Blech's article.

Big Three Anchormen Leave

An AP Story (Big Three Anchormen Leave Sense of Loss) makes this low-key claim:

They were the men you could depend upon, the faces you'd see every night at dinnertime. In times of trouble, they were always there. Their words rang with authority. For a generation of television viewers, it was a role assumed by Peter Jennings, Tom Brokaw and Dan Rather. Not just anchormen, they were father figures, and their sudden absence as a regular presence after more than 20 years leaves an empty feeling.

All very true. Oh, I'm sorry, I meant NOT true. As not true as it is overblown brown-nosing.

Even if we could say that these "anchors" were actual journalists instead of glorified fashion-models, why on earth do we consider them "authorities"?

Is it because I have spent my life around college professors and Rosh Yeshivas that I place the bar too high? Is it wrong to assume that an "authority" should have above average intelligence, education and good judgment?

Rather, Brokaw and Jennings do not appear/talk/act particularly intelligent.

All three are either un- or under-educated (Jennings never graduated High School or college; Brokaw had a low C average at the University of South Dakota, and Rather has a BA from Sam Houston State Teachers College).

And they don't display good judgment - Rather is a clown, Jennings a racist, and Brokaw isn't much of anything.

Don't forget, all three came into power during an world era where any White Christian Male with all his hair and teeth could rise to the top of every profession with no competition.

The fact that the United States considers these unqualified crackers "authorities" explains why journalism has been a colossal failure since the brief Vietnam era heroism.

Pathetic.

Fun Site of the Day: Bunnyvision

The whole angry-alien website is awesome. This team of high-grade weirdos combines spot-on parody within a delicious standalone concept of a bunny-verse.

My favorites: Alien, The Shining, and Star Wars (where they establish their bona-fides by siding with me on the Greedo debate).

Minty-fresh new thirty second movies appear to be added all the time. Enjoy!

Another Religious Milestone (Backwards)

Oohhh, this can't be good: ArtScroll.com -- Women's Siddur