Written Comps Tomorrow

After months of frantic reading, I am primed for my comprehensive exams tomorrow in Jewish Studies. I have never read so many books so thoroughly in so short a time before. I may have book poisoning. Sure, I read constantly, but in the past when I found that a text was idiotic, I would stop reading it. I don't have that choice with comps!

For your use and mine, here's my reading list:

Biblical Medicine (6)

1. Avalos, Hector, Sarah J. Melcher, and Jeremy Schipper. 2007. This Abled Body: Rethinking Disabilities in Biblical Studies. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature.

2. Avalos, Hector. 1995. Illness and health care in the ancient Near East : the role of the temple in Greece, Mesopotamia, and Israel. Atlanta, Ga.: Scholars Press.

3. Brettler, Marc Zvi. 2005. How to read the Bible. Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society.

4. Droge, Arthur J., and James D. Tabor. 1992. A noble death : suicide and martyrdom among Christians and Jews in antiquity. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco.

5. Levenson, Jon Douglas. 1993. The death and resurrection of the beloved son : the transformation of child sacrifice in Judaism and Christianity. New Haven: Yale University Press.

6. Milgrom, Jacob. 1991. Leviticus 1-16 : a new translation with introduction and commentary. New York: Doubleday. Pp. 742-1008 (chapters 12-15)

Medicine, Science & Judaism (6)

1. Bleich, J. David. 1998. Bioethical dilemmas : a Jewish perspective. Hoboken, N.J.: Ktav Pub. House.

2. Dorff, Elliot N. 1998. Matters of life and death : a Jewish approach to modern medical ethics. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society.

3. Heynick, Frank. 2002. Jews and medicine : an epic saga. Hoboken, NJ: KTAV Pub. House.

4. Rosner, Fred. 2001. Biomedical ethics and Jewish law. Hoboken, NJ: KTAV Pub. House.

5. Rubin, Nissan. 2008. Time and life cycle in Talmud and Midrash : socio-anthropological perspectives. Boston: Academic Studies Press.

6. Zohar, Noam J. 1997. Alternatives in Jewish bioethics. Albany: State University of New York Press.

History & Sociology of Halakhah (10)

1. Berger, Michael S. 1998. Rabbinic Authority. New York: Oxford University Press.

2. Berkovits, Eliezer. 1983. Not in heaven : the nature and function of Halakha. New York: Ktav Pub. House.

3. Boyarin, Daniel. 1993. Carnal Israel: reading sex in Talmudic culture. Berkeley: University of California Press.

4. Cohen, Shaye J.D. 1999. The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

5. Halbertal, Moshe. 1997. People of the Book: Canon, Meaning, and Authority. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

6. Halivni, David. 1986. Midrash, Mishnah, and Gemara : the Jewish predilection for justified law. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

7. Katz, Jacob. 1961. Tradition and crisis; Jewish society at the end of the Middle Ages. New York: Free Press of Glencoe.

8. Katz, Jacob. 1989. The "Shabbes goy" : a study in halakhic flexibility. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society.

9. Roth, Joel. 1986. The halakhic process : a systemic analysis. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America.

10. Sokol, Moshe. 1992. Rabbinic authority and personal autonomy. Northvale (N.J.): Jason Aronson.

American Jews (8)

1. Cohen, Steven M. and Arnold Eisen. 1998. The Jew Within. Boston: Wilstein Institute of Jewish Policy Studies.

2. Davidman, Lynn. 1991. Tradition In a Rootless World: Women Turn to Orthodox Judaism. Berkeley: University of California Press.

3. Elazar, Daniel Judah. 1995. Community and polity the organizational dynamics of American Jewry. Jewish Publication Society .

4. Fishman, Sylvia Barack. 2000. Jewish life and American culture. Albany: State University of New York.

5. Heilman, Samuel C. 2006. Sliding To The Right: The Contest For The Future Of American Jewish Orthodoxy. Berkeley Univ of California Press.

6. Heilman, Samuel C., and Steven M. Cohen. 1989. Cosmopolitans & parochials: modern Orthodox Jews in America: University of Chicago Press.

7. Sarna, Jonathan D. 2004. American Judaism : A History. New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press.

8. Smith, Tom W. 2005. Jewish Distinctiveness in America: A Statistical Portrait. New York: American Jewish Committee.

The Atlantic and Israel

I read the Atlantic every day, mainly for Goldblog and the unparalleled Ta-Nehisi Coates (who's so good he'll probably be asked to be a regular op-ed for the Times, which I hope he won't take, because that op-ed page has become dumber than a bag of rocks). At one point, I read Andrew Sullivan but stopped when he became a vicious anti-Zionist (which, as has been proven in every case in every way is the same as an anti-Semite). Sullivan left to spew his bile elsewhere, but in the past few months the Atlantic has added a number of new anti-Israel bloggers.

This morning, I saw an even newer post by another dude, Marc Lynch: Why the Arab Uprisings Will Force the U.S. to Rethink Israel-Palestine. You don't need to read it because you already know what it says: Israel is bad, Palestinians good.

This was the comment I was going to leave on the site:

Does the Atlantic really need another anti-Israel guy? Steve Clemons and Robert Wright are already on that popular bandwagon. Add something new - maybe there's another small ally of the US you can throw ire on. How about Taiwan? They continually resist China, and China is actually better with human rights than Israel's enemies.

Trayvon Martin Case: Comments

The Trayvon Martin case is very important for exposing some rotten aspects of American society (which, like all diseases, has gotten virulent soon after the cures have been located). Specifcally, our addiction to guns and a deep-rooted racism.

I've mentioned in previous posts on gun control, that the biggest fallacy the gun-nuts push is the idiotic idea that a person can tell the difference between a good guy and a bad guy. That's why this case demonstrates the anti-Black racism of America better than any I remember. Because here the victim was an unarmed and innocent black teenager who lived near where he was murdered and his assailant was basically a crazy violent loner with a gun. A crazy Hispanic loner. In every other scenario, were Zimmerman the victim and the shooter were White, the case would be the same. But in the US, blacks are hated more than Latins... need proof, here's your proof.

The key point is this: only if you hate and fear blacks could Zimmerman's actions be OK. And while I hate to credit an anti-Zionist slimeball with anything, Robert Wright of Atlantic makes my points so well, I need to cite him: "(1) A man with a gun pursued an unarmed teenager who had done nothing wrong. (2) The man with the gun initiated a confrontation with the teenager. (3) As a result of the confrontation, the man with the gun shot the teenager to death. "

As Wright points out, these facts aren't in dispute - they are part of Zimmerman's defense! But when seen without race, this is a clear case of an armed assailant attacking and killing an innocent teen. However, since many Americans are viscerally racist, the "innocent teen" is automatically worthy of being shot because of his race. That's why the Police are releasing Trayvon's misdemeanor record - to depict him as a walking criminal. However, and I feel this is so obvious that it's overlooked, Trayvon wasn't doing anything wrong when he was stalked and murdered.

This reminds me of the Toulouse Massacre (which I need to say more about) because in both cases, some disturbed individual with a gun decided that the object of his hate could be killed. Yet, while in France it is seen as a crime to kill children in cold blood, sadly in the US - or in the crazy province of Florida (home of voter suppression and hanging chads) - you can.

Megan McArdle on Health Care

Megan McArdle is an infuriating blogger at the Atlantic. The Balloon-Juice lexicon for "McMegan" is accurate:

Nickname for fact-free Atlantic blogger Megan McArdle, who predictably makes arguments that have less to do with reality and more to do with wild-ass assertions meant to lend credibility to her libertarian bona fides. A self-proclaimed “economic libertarian” whose first blog was called I Am Jane Galt. See also, “Technically true, but collectively nonsense” and “It wasn’t a statistic-it was a hypothetical.”

She's one of these people who uses all possible effort to be wrong about everything. It's stunning. In her latest column, though, I found that she was basically correct. Entitled "What Cutting Health Care Costs Looks Like" she describes how her mother was kicked out of the hospital before she had a chance to recover fully from a burst appendix.

McMegan still tries to spin the story into some libertarian squawk, but ultimately it shows a sympathy for how cruel cost-cutting can be. This naturally proves a point I made decades ago (on the State of the State, I believe) which is that while the joke goes that a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged, I add that a liberal is a conservative who lost his job. In this case, it's a similar indignity.

BTW, I do think the early-hospital-ejection is a major social problem in America and I think we can solve it. The first question to ask is, naturally, why hospital stays cost so much, but I am a practical man and I realize that there's no way to rebottle that efreet. I suggest a facility called a Recovery Clinic (RC) which would be like a 'nursing home' in the sense that it is a residence with 24/7 nursing care, but would allow the full recovery that the hospitals have overcharged out of their purview.

Steelers to release Hines Ward

This is sad - I've been dreading it since then end of the season, but my favorite Steeler, Hines Ward #86, is being released. I feel they could have done something to keep him on the team, but I guess not.

The Zero Hour of Rick Santorum

It's beyond scary that Rick "Unprintable Other Definition" Santorum is actually surviving this long in the primaries. The man is the worst type of Republican. If you hear him talk about religion, he is the exact type of Christian that Jews should be afraid of, and most definitely the type of Catholic that the Protestant majority of this country hates.

For example, this case (formatted quote from WashPo):

“To say that people of faith have no role in the public square? You bet that makes you throw up. What kind of country do we live that says only people of non-faith can come into the public square and make their case? That makes me throw up.”

-Rick Santorum on “This Week,” February 26, 2012, in defense of remarks made in October against President Kennedy’s famous speech on Catholic identity and public policy.

A few points from this charming quote:

1. "That makes me throw up"? Really Rick? It's bad enough that you look like a teenager, you have to speak like one? You were a Senator! Get serious enough to act like you should be given executive powerhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif.
   
2. Rick probably does not understand why JFK made those comments, and why Rick's repudiation is so dangerous. JFK ran for president before Vatican II. V2, in short, made Catholicism more acceptable to liberal Western democracies; making Catholicism feel a lot like Protestantism (for a correlation, see "Reform Judaism"). JFK had to explain to America how he did not intend to take marching orders from the Pope etc. Well, Rick Santorum may not listen to the pope - he strikes me as the type of sanctimonious prig who listens to nobody - but he clearly allows his religion to attack every aspect of modern civil society (see below for more). So when he says: "we look at the shape of mainline Protestantism in this country and it is in shambles, it is gone from the world of Christianity as I see it." combined with his rejection of JFK, then he's stepped off the safe path.

There's so much crazy in Santorum that it's hard to catch up.

However, his attack on public schools did spark a thought in me. Rick, like me, is a religious family man who declines sending kids to public school out of a religious obligation. Now, I don't attack public schools - quite the opposite, really. As a grandchild of immigrants, I realize how free public schools have been the bedrock of the American Dream (no joke). Good free schools means everything for a good, safe republic.

What I find weird (in this case) about Santorum is that he chose to home-school and not send his kids to the generally well-regarded Catholic school system? As an orthodox Jew, I look at the CAtholics as the other major religion who shares my need for parochial schools. This is a case that makes me feel that Sanctimonious Rick is possibly more Catholic than the Pope (or in this case, the arch-diocese).

Another point bounces off this reaction to Santorum by the remarkably still alive Dick Cavett::

And what is the argument for it? For some, is it to protect their innocent ones from hearing words like, oh, “sex” and “contraception”? From forced association with those less desirable ethnically? Maybe it’s to keep them safe from radical notions like the idea that fossils and carbon-dating aren’t put there by the Devil to fool the scientists, but prove the world has billions, not thousands, of years on it.

Cavett notices that for Rick to not send his kids to *any* school (even Catholic school, as I add) smacks of something creepy. I agree.

There's the internal illogic about home schooling; i.e. that a parent is incapable of tweaking their child's education. I do this all the time with my kids, and they go to Maimonides. You can always educate your child at home, when they return from school, about what you should believe. If the Santorii are willing to spend the hours to home-school, they can't spare the few minutes a day to correct the wackiness that EVERY school teaches?

Ah well, we'll see what happens with the GOP. In some sense, maybe I'm glad the religious wacko is Santorum and not Huckabee. Huckabee is charming, rational sounding, and has actual moments of sane compassion. Yet also a Bible thumper who could erode the wall of church and state. Santorum is so obnoxious and horrible that I imagine he wouldn't get as far as Huckabee would.

Magnum Force

I purchased recently (for cheap!) "Magnum Force" [Wiki, IMDB, TCM] and I want to add it to the list of sequels that are better than their originals.

It's not only much more watchable (it has the awesome plane hijack scene) but the politics are better than the original. Most people didn't get Dirty Harry - most notably Pauline Kael, who I've learned since my youth to completely distrust - she was not only wrong most of the time, but disastrously so - I actually think I've lost friends because I recommended movies on her suggestion, I've definitely lost some sanity following her advice on such stinkers like "The Warriors," "Deliverance" and "The Killer Elite" - she had a tin ear for action films, and I suffered.

Kael labeled the film "fascist" but she did not understand the deconstruction of Harry in the film itself. He's meant to be an unlikable character, he's called "Dirty" because he'll do the things others are too ashamed to do. Kael's criticism could be against those who didn't understand that Harry was to be questioned not lauded, but alas she was in the benighted category herself.

In any case, the writer of Magnum Force - the cro-magnon John Milius - says explicitly that he wrote the sequel as a response to the critics. He wanted to explain what real fascism would look like. And as a result the full character of Harry comes out - instead of being a fascist response to the Miranda ruling of the early 70s, Harry was just another cowboy. Which interpretation would be more interesting? Well, the full fascist would be the Stallone characters of the 80s - really stupid expressions of a man being above the law. In Harry, as seen in Magnum Force, we have a person who believes in the Constitution, just not how it was being interpreted at that time. Fascism believes that liberty should be sacrificed for unity of the people, while the American cowboy ethic is libertarian - have as much liberty as possible. Both seem to agree that when a person violates the code, they should be killed. But libertarians believe the only things which violate the code are extreme crimes, while fascists reduce all action against the Polity as crimes.

Also, it had the best main theme - although nothing beats Lalo Schifrin's music for Dirty Harry's school bus scene.

P.S. The latter Dirty Harry films don't get put into the mix; while "Sudden Impact" was decent (it was a rehash of Magnum Force's anti-vigilantism) the "Enforcer" was absolutely ridiculous. And I can't even muster enough memory to recall "The Dead Pool."

Israel: Iran is Bluffing

So, evidently Israel is claiming that Iran's threats for heavy retaliation are a "bluff" (NYTimes or Yahoo News). This is the best indication I've seen that Israel is ready to strike Iran. If I were a shul rabbi right now, I would be making a deal with my local police to have extra protection. Because Israel at war means that the local US crazies start attacking Jews.

Must Read: Bill Clinton Esquire Interview 2012

Drop everything and read this: Bill Clinton Esquire Interview 2012. Clinton is just so smart and creative... I do wish he could be president again.

The Post-Season

I used to play Quake 3 back when I owned a Macintosh and my favorite move was to use the gauntlet - the worst, most difficult to score with - weapon on opponents. Why? Because you get a special award by doing so - the "Humiliation" patch. When you 'frag' a rival with the gauntlet you get the award and the deep announcer voice proclaims "Humiliation!" (See first clip)

This is how I feel about last night's Steelers' loss to the Broncos. (See second clip)


To be beaten by Tim "More Christ Loving than George W Bush" Tebow? Not as bad as the 4 second overtime emasculation.

I've been following my beloved Steelers quite closely this year in an attempt to finally have a sport to be a fanatic about (it makes sense in the long term scheme of things). And I knew that we were not going to the Superbowl. We were too injured to make it - especially Big Ben, who was crippled by the Cleveland Browns. I knew we'd lose badly in the end because every game since the crippling was depressing. The irony of course is that we lost to Denver because of our defense, not Big Ben. It helped that we lost about 1/3 of our starters to injuries.

Now what can I do in these playoffs? Can I root for the AFC to win? My feeling, now, is that I'd prefer to see a Ravens-Saints superbowl. Mainly because both teams have not gone to the show very often and that keeps the Steelers' SB record safe. And, it goes without saying that I cannot hope for the Texans to make it. The cowboys are bad enough but to have The Texas Texans, owned by Tex "Tex" McTexas, have any success? It'd be Gore v. Bush all over again.

If absolutely necessary, I'd accept the 49ers in the Superbowl just as long as they lose. That way they'd mess up their perfect record.

In any case, I can't read any stories about last night's game yet. Way way way too painful.

How Obama Can Cement a Win in '12

Drop Biden from the ticket and take on Hillary as his VP.

Gay Marriage and Judaism

The issue of Orthodox Judaism and gay marriage was brought up recently when the only openly gay YU musmakh married two men the other day (see: here for the reaction from the Orthodox establishments.)

After spending a few years now studying American Jewish history, I can say that there are times when the non-Orthodox denominations are on the side of history and times when they are not. I can say that it's hard to defend a full anti-feminism in halakhah; this is one of those topics where halakhah has really seemed to mimic the cultural mores of the surrounding society.

What about gay marriage? Is this the future of American society? Maybe. But for while there are some moves by the Jewish reformers that were prescient move - e.g. introducing vernacular into the service - and some that are accepted by American society - e.g. jettisoning Sabbath observance and Kashrut - there are others that show a too slavish attachment to trends.

The best example is the attempt to move the Jewish sabbath to Sundays. Another was the virulent anti-Zionism of the 19th and early 20th Century Reform movement. The latter is actually coming back into vogue - and for the same reasons as a century ago: the rejection of Jewish choseness and nationality, coupled with a dire attachment to a Diaspora identity.

The Sunday thing? Maybe that will come back as well.

Presidential Candidates Explained Through Dungeons and Dragons Character Sheets

You got to be my type of person, I guess, to find this as awesome as it truly is. But this is so good:Presidential Candidates Explained Through Dungeons and Dragons Character Sheets from Funny Or Die and Nick Wiger

h.t. TNC

Cain's Race Card

Herman Cain as a good presidential name going for him. Single syllable names are great, see Gore v Bush, and Biblical last names even better, no matter the images evoked of a powerful man killing his weaker brother - which is a perfect description for the Republican Party in 2011, and for Cain's attitudes towards American Blacks as well.

However, he plays the race card like he was in Vegas. Most recently, he has needed to double-down (note my gambling metaphors!*) because he has been accused of sexually harrassing a bunch of employees. People have referenced Clarence Thomas. The implicit point of Cain is that black men will be accused of this if they are Right Wing. I don't assume he harassed the women because he was black. I assume he did it because (a) he's a rich businessman born between 1940-1960, (b) he's a patriarchal fool who treats everyone as an object. These are blanket assumptions for anyone of his ilk.

Anyway, Cain and his cronies are trying to portray him as the victim, which I just love in a gallows humor way. In this interview

you can see that he blames the liberal establishment for leading the charge against him. Basically, punishing him and his Black Republican Brethren for their maverickyness.

Aside from the fact that there's no proof for his assertion, and that it's a classic Strawman Defense for someone guilty as Cain, I'd like to use my trusty tools of (1) logic, and (2) precedent to understand the situation.

This is currently a Republican primary. Unlike 2000 and 2008, there's an incumbent and therefore only one primary. And as history will show that primaries are when the real knock-down attacks occur. Scandals are brought up by their own party-mates - and this is logical because once a person gets the nomination, then the process of election changes.

Biden's plagarism, Hart and Clinton's philandering**, McCain's black*** babies, Obama and Rev. Wright - all examples of devestating attacks that occured by their own party during the primaries.

There is no incentive, truly none, for the other party to being opposition research during the primaries. Why should the Democrats attack Cain 14 months before election day? It's illogical and has no precedent. The only people who care about Cain right now, and have the money to do oppo research, are Perry and Romney. I'd bet Romney did this.

Footnotes:
*Gambling metaphors are steeped in US politics. The "New Deal" itself is a poker reference. So is "The Buck Stops Here" (Truman).
** Not with each other.
*** Black to a Republican means something totally different than what you think.

Low-Cost Bus Fatalities High

So, guess what, according to the Transportation Safety Board, the Low Cost Buses (e.g. Fung Wah, or as I call it, Fung Ow My Femur) are really dangerous. My reaction:



If you pay $15 for something that ordinarily costs 10 times as much, you should wonder where the money is saved. Evidently your life is worth about 80 bucks in savings.

Prominent Jewish Athletes

This is a very nice photo spread of a number of famous, and not so famous (to me) Prominent Jewish Athletes by Sports Illustrated in honor of Rosh Hashanah.

Shalit Free

We're very emotional about this in the Styx house. It's a hard price to pay, releasing vicious scum to save one Israeli, but it does send an important Torah message: that it's very easy to kill a terrorist, but very hard to save a life. And Israel, and Jews, value life over death. Unlike our enemies... and those Americans and Jews who support our enemies.

Still No Power

We live in Newton Center and we've been without power since 11am on Sunday, May 28th. Let me know if you hear somebody say that the pre-Irene warnings were all "hype" - I will track them down and throw them into the prison that is my house. Not only have we lost a certain amount of food, feeding a family of 5 is tough in this semi-kosher accessed place. I'm writing this in a "Panera" and I'm surrounded by other families without power, but they can bring their kids here to eat, we can't.

We're naturally out of hot water as well, and since I have a Motorola Droid phone - known by cognoscenti as a hunk of crap in a plastic case - my phone batteries have been burnt out. This was already after the phone became impossible to directly recharge because the silly little prongs in the recharge port became slightly bent. When that happens, a few cents of breakage, renders the hundreds of dollars phone useless.

Our power-company, NStar, is ignoring their customers, as far as I can tell. We're not even told when we will be scheduled to be visited by a friendly crew. I'd switch companies, but as far as I know they have a government mandated monopoly of my neighborhood.

My kids are doing a decent job in handling this stuff, but there's just so much three kids under 7 can understand.

The only silver lining in this lovely episode is that I can use the experience to convince my family, or anyone I know, to never ever go camping. Because everything I'm suffering through right now is what 'camping' people endure on purpose.

Life on Mars (US TV Series) - Wow

I just saw the whole run of Life on Mars - an absolutely awesome, yet doomed, sci-fi TV series. They canceled it after 17 episodes, but with enough time to allow a real finale. So, unlike it's kindred brother "Firefly," the story actually ends.

It's probable that you, no matter who you are, won't be affected in the same way that I am by the awesomeness of this TV show. You need to be equally obsessed with (a) 70s music, (b) 1973, (c) New York City, (d) red-headed boys who look like me (and my sons), (e) and time-travel stories that are also 70s cop shows.

The premise is that our hero is a cop in 2008 who after an accident wakes up as the same person in 1973. He meets his father and mother and other mentors when they are the same age as he was in '08. While the show depicts the drama of his home life, and his attempts to help out his mother and young self, the main greatness of the show comes from the depiction of policing, and NYC, in the early 70s - when cops were sexist, racist, and brutal. And so was the city.

The reason why cop shows were much better in the 70s is because the crime in NYC was insanely high. When Law & Order has a murder a week, they are inflating the crime statistics by like 800% - not so in 1973. Also, the music was so much better. When you see a leather jacketed, mustachioed, long haired cop striding around with a long rifle and snub-nosed pistol, there MUST be a funky bassline with a wa-wa pedal. See here for the visuals.

There's also the struggle the hero has in dealing with communications from the future, and what is possibly an attempt to remove him from life-support and other mysteries. Which makes the drama multi-leveled.

It's written very well and has an amazing cast of some of the best in Hollywood: Gretchen Mol, Michael Imperioli and the incomparable Harvey Keitel.

Naturally, it was canceled. Maybe it's for the best - the quality stayed great for the entire, short, run. Wow.

GOP Nominee Predictions

According to the Times Pawlenty Drops Out of Republican Race. With Pawlenty gone, that means there's only one sane candidate in the race: Huntsman. However, the GOP is currently more insane than I've ever seen them. This is the crazy of Hoover + Nixon + McCarthy all rolled into one. Which means that the nominee is going to be Perry, Governor of Texas.

If you see the list of nominees, there's only 3 who had any chance: Romney, Perry and Huntsman. Bachmann is nuttier than peanut-brittle and while she's much smarter, and more articulate, than her alter-ego in dangerous psychosis - Sarah Palin - Bachmann is also a member of the House of Representatives. It's almost as laughable as being a mayor. And let's just forget Ron Paul for the rest of history, please? At best, he'll be another Perot (Texas breeds funny looking, creepy third party cranks).

So, this leaves the three governors, 2 of whom are Mormons - and both of those are tainted by rationality and good politics. Which leaves the mouth-breathing Perry. Here's a good primer about the presumptive nominee.

The Good, the Bad and the Greedo

I stumbled across this amazing art site, Arethemost.com, here's a fun example:

Upside Down House

What follows is a long, personal, shaggy dog story:

We've been having a few days of craziness in the house. It started two weeks ago when I smelled an acrid burning smell around midnight; I left my office and found that the smell was through the house; when I came upstairs I saw that there was smoke in the house. After evacuating my wife and three kids, all under 7, we entertained the fire department for an hour (my family went to stay in our minivan and watch DVDs until 1am when the all-clear was established). The FD was stumped as to the cause except that they found (using a cool heat/temp gun) that some ceiling lights were running very hot - nearly double the temp they were supposed to.

We were told to shut off the circuit-breaker for that part of the house, which in turn shut of my wife's office, our basement lights, downstairs bathroom, and electric stove. Since this was Thurs night, I couldn't get an electrician to come to the house until Monday. He arrived and said that he could see nothing amiss with our electricals. Which meant that we would need to follow the advice of the FD and tear the ceiling down to see why there was "heat buildup in the strapping."

Meanwhile, we noticed the smell persisted even with the electricity out. Moreover, we were told by our condo association that our drier's exhaust had been declared unsafe. So we simultaneously needed to get a contractor to demolish part of our ceiling, and get a dude to fix the drier hose. We were also due for a furnace checkup - and I suspected that the smell was from there anyway - so we needed all three done at once.

The furnace people claimed they couldn't come to see us for over a week. We did get the drier hose fixed but it didn't chance the problem of the smell that triggered this whole episode. We did tear the ceiling down - which rendered most of the first floor of the house inaccessible - and the electrician didn't find any reason for the smell-smoke-heat. I asked him to change all the wires and fixtures anyway - once we have the ceiling open - and he recommended we keep those new lights burning for a few days to see if there's any recurrence of the problem.

Meanwhile the furnace guy came and said - guess what - the furnace was busted. That's why we smelled the burning plastic and wires and - this is the best - why we saw the smoke! Because these punks didn't come to our house for 10 days after our calling them, we needed to pursue the electrician/contractor/ceiling route because until it was fixed we couldn't use our oven or basement.

Naturally the furnace guy said it would take most of the week to fix the furnace - he came Tuesday and the furnace is still not fixed... which is bad because Boston is freakin' cold in May.

In the midst of all this our drier - remember it, the one with the new hoses - broke. Just busted. And we managed to convince the contractor that he needed to put our ceiling up before the weekened (which I managed to do, and he did too, except it needs to be painted, so we still have no use of half of the first floor). But we do have electricity... and the drier and heat are to be fixed today...

All this happened at once. I do thank Hashem that we didn't lose all of the electricity, nor the hot-water heater (which, by dint of the pattern, should have gone belly-up).

And my daughter's second birthday is on Lag B'Omer and I'm leaving that day for a conference. Shabbas!

Obama's Speech

There's much to be said about Obama's speech (transcript) and I've been using Jeffrey Goldberg's blog as a center for my reading. While he and I disagree about the means of the Peace Process and about our ideas of Zionism, I respect his knowledge and his commitment to Israel (he served in IDF, I did not).

Some key points:

1. The concept of using the '67 lines is not new at all. That it's considered a pro-Palestinain action by Obama is part of the media spin. In fact, according to some analysis, it was started by a distorted AP piece and then picked up by the anti-Obama forces (e.g. Fox News). See this Little Green Footballs piece to follow the trail: LGF: Instantaneous Outrageous Outrage: 'Obama Sides with Palestinians!' What I learn from the AP bias is that the media WANTS Obama to side with the Palestinians. So does the GOP. And many Jewish racists who hate Obama more than they love Israel.
   
2. Obama did not call for a return to the '67 borders. He said (bold mine): "We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states." What did people expect, that Obama would call for Greater Israel from the Nile to the Euphrates? Or the fanatasy, that I shared before Oslo, that maybe we could keep until the River Jordan? He said there's be land swaps. Cool.
   
3. No mention of: the Golan Heights (especially in the same week that we put sanctions on Assad/Syria).
   
4. He also tabled the issues of Jerusalem and the Palestinian false claim of a 'right of return': "I am aware that these steps alone will not resolve the conflict, because two wrenching and emotional issues will remain: the future of Jerusalem and the fate of Palestinian refugees."
   
5. Most importantly, Obama smashed down two dangerous threats to Israel: the Hamas-Fatah coalition: "In particular, the recent announcement of an agreement between Fatah and Hamas raises profound and legitimate questions for Israel: How can one negotiate with a party that has shown itself unwilling to recognize your right to exist?"
   
6. and the looming credible threat of a unilateral declaration of Hamas statehood: "For the Palestinians, efforts to delegitimize Israel will end in failure. Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won't create an independent state. Palestinian leaders will not achieve peace or prosperity if Hamas insists on a path of terror and rejection. And Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist."

People need to get over their hatred of Obama - or the GOP's twisted path to destroy the Democrats by destroying America and Israel.

Bin Laden is Dead

I have strong emotions about the news, which I read last night and woke up my wife to tell her. Three quick thoughts:

1. This is a real victory. He was shot to death, identified by experts, and buried at sea. He was being protected by Pakistan, and killed not on a battlefield but in his Wisteria Lane hidey-house. It's crucial to remember that for megalomaniac murderers, the most important goal is to be alive and in power. When Saddam and Bin-Laden are captured and killed it sends the message to other freak-show killers that their chosen path has a definite and predictable end. Moreover, as I learned in my studies of the Holocaust, the loss of a single charismatic leader is devastating. He was a symbol to terrorists that you can beat the Americans, he was a symbol to America that we could be beaten. No more. We caught him like a mad dog and put him down.

2. For that reason, I am hoping that this will have a long-term effect in raising American morale about our perceived feelings of decline. Bin-Laden's continued existence showed that we were weak. It also kept the 9/11 siege mentality alive; it was an unclosed grave. Now we've killed him - it can feel, and feelings are important here, that we can move on. And we really need to move on.

3. Lastly, I hope this will change the perception of Obama and of Democrats. The Press has been a disgusting promulgator of nonsense and dissent in our country. Obama released the long form of his birth certificate (the POTUS equivalent of a poll-tax) not because of Trump but because of the media's fascination with this complete nonsense. Because the Press is fickle and stupid, they can now have flashy evidence of what has been happening since January 21, 2009 - that Obama has been systematically and effectively cleaning up Bush's messes.

This is why it took 10 years to get bin Laden - because 8 of those years were under the complete schmucktard Bush.

That the killing of Bin-Laden happened 8 years to the day after Bush landed on the aircraft carrier, dressed up in a costume and acting like a blowhard punk, is icing on the cake.

Obama's ability to clean up for Bush helps with #2 above. As a social scientist, I can tell you that perception is very important for how a society will advance or decline. Killing bin Laden, I am hoping, will show America and the World that we have also cleaned up from Bush. Just last week, Obama's reaction to the tornadoes of Alabama was praised for it's swiftness and effectiveness. So he cleaned up Katrina and 9/11 in one week.

We'll see if the Press takes this ball and runs it in the right direction. We could be now getting out of our decade long malaise. Obama could announce we're drawing down in Afganistan, that we can wear shoes on airplanes, that we can be sane again!

Grading Papers vs. Pulpit Rabbinate

I'm in the midst of grading papers as a TA (teaching assistant) and I remarked to my wife that I'm feeling the same tension that I had answering shylas while a pulpit rabbi. Often, knowing the standard halakha wasn't an issue: the tension came in when congregants would present a terrible scenario, where the clear result was forbidden, and I was tasked with finding out how there could be a possible leniency.

Note, this was a different process in NY than New Haven. While in NY, it was often a demand to find a loophole or wiggle room in the law, and I took up the challenge because (a) I was the assistant rabbi and that's my job, and (b) because I found it important to interpret Jewish law with kindness for people who could just run down the block and become Conservative and follow even less halakha. Most of the time I endeavored to explain the wisdom behind prohibitions, but the power-differential made this a loss-leader

In New Haven it was often the opposite - I had people who wanted to have prohibitions and I would seek legitamate leniencies because people were poor and it was my job as posek to help them halakhically and meta-halakhically.

In both cases, I couldn't just unload my halakha guns and say what the clear answer was. Truth, if it could be called that, was tempered with bent-backwards 'shalom.'

This is what I face while grading student papers. I'm an assistant again, so I can't exert my own will (which, for my personality, is a MAJOR struggle)... and I'm spending hours and hours on papers that the students will only react to for 30 seconds (a peek at the grade)... and I need to find some possible way not to give every one of these people a much more lenient result than the clear halakha would allow.

Steven Fry on Language Pedants

I agree with Steve Fry here, quite a bit. Ah, if I were able to simulate a British accent!

h.t. TNC

Farfel

There's just been one normal day this whole chag (i.e. that wasn't Shabbas/Yuntif or erev thereof) so we're going ga-ga. As such, I'd just like to say how much I like the word Farfel. Farfel farfel farfel.

The Pre-Pesach Matzah Ban

According to custom, we're not allowed to eat Matzah 30 days before Seder night. The stated rationale for the minhag is that we're to abstain from Matzah so we can eat it at the Seder with gusto. I used to think that this was Rabbinically enjoined cognitive dissonance - i.e. everyone knows that Matzah is terrible, so by telling us we can't 'spoil our appetite' we're to think that Matzah is actually decent food.

Then I got to thinking about what makes transitioning to a Hametz-Free house ("making Pesach" as I now call it) so hard. And, at least for me, it's the delicate balance of eating Hametz while the whole house has to be cleaned for Pesach - and that it would be so much easier to prepare for Pesach if I could just eat Matzah for the few days beforehand...

Then I realized with a bolt outa the blue why my Rabbinic brothers invented this minhag! If we were allowed to eat Matzah before Pesach then my wife, and doubtless every homemaker since Eishet Rashi, would have converted the whole house to Pesadik a week ago! Why not? It's almost logical in a humra sense - two weeks of Pesach instead of one.

This minhag allows me to eat my pop-tarts today. Thank you unnamed rabbis!

Pic from here.

Scalia and Thomas: The Pure GOP

Whenever I want to describe the true face of the Republican party, and what voting for them will bring, just remember this case: Connick v. Thompson: Clarence Thomas writes one of the cruelest Supreme Court decisions ever. - By Dahlia Lithwick - Slate Magazine, and specifically this line: "Both parties to this case have long agreed that an injustice had been done. Connick himself conceded that there had been a Brady violation, yet Scalia finds none. Everyone else concedes that egregious mistakes were made. Scalia struggles to rehabilitate them all."

A vote for a Republican, any Federal office but especially the presidency, will yield more evil like this case.