Caroline Kennedy: the Daring Swimmer

The Times profiled Caroline Kennedy on the occasion of her nomination as ambassador to Japan, "Caroline Kennedy, Catching the Torch".

In the article we read about a surprising facet of her life. She is an avid open water swimmer.

...A few years ago, Mr. Hughes made an offhand comment that he and his partner, Dr. Richard Friedman, a psychiatrist who directs the psychopharmacology clinic at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell hospital, made a ritual of competing in Swim for Life, a 1.25-mile event in Provincetown, Mass, that raises money for AIDS and women's health charities. "She said, 'Oh, I'd really like to do that,' " Mr. Hughes said.

And so, Ms. Kennedy did. "She just showed up and changed in a gas station and came out and did the race," Mr. Hughes said. "It was pretty choppy, and she did a terrific job. I'm happy to say I beat her. But just barely."

Last year, Mrs. Kennedy and her daughters Tatiana and Rose joined Mr. Hughes and Mr. Friedman in Turkey for another swim, this time a 3 1/2-mile race across the Hellespont, which takes entrants from Europe to Asia.  "Lord Byron went in with a disabled leg and came in with a much faster time than we did," Mr. Hughes said. "But it was extraordinary. It was one of the most terrifying things I've ever done."

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Trayvon and the Talmud

According to the Nation of Islam web site www.FinalCall.com you ought to blame the tragic killing of Trayvon Martin on the Jews and the Talmud. The NOI is the organization of the Hon. Elijah Muhammad, Hon. Minister Louis Farrakhan, Jabril Muhammad and Mother Tynnetta Muhammad, all known for their lifelong anti-Semitism and racism.

It is not a surprise that in the article "Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman, the American Legal System and The Jewish Talmud," the "NOI Research Group" published racist anti-Jewish and anti-Talmudic assertions of the NOI.  I cite specifically these offensive anti-Talmudic statements:

In Our Saviour Has Arrived, Mr. Muhammad further identified the society to which we all belong as “the Jew’s civilization,” using the possessive form—meaning that this civilization (its culture, science, industry, and government) belongs to the Jews. So if this is “the Jew’s civilization,” then we are, in fact, under Jewish Law—which comprises the codes and statutes found in the holy book of the Jewish religion, the Talmud...

And ONLY under the Jewish Law found in their Talmud does Trayvon’s murder and George Zimmerman’s acquittal start to make perfect sense....

But Black people should take the hardest look at this book, because the very origin of race hatred and race-based slavery entered the Western mindset by way of the Jewish Talmud...

The Talmudic mentality lives in Florida and in the hearts and minds of its people and their laws...

I sent this feedback to the NOI:

I am deeply sorry about the tragedy of the violent killing of a young boy. But the Talmud had nothing to do with Zimmerman or Trayvon. Your anti-Talmudic and anti-Semitic article offends me. I urge you for the benefit of your own souls to repudiate your baseless racism and to abandon your irrational hatred of the Jews.

You can tell the NOI that you disagree with their opinions by sending feedback to them.

To end hatred and bigotry, we must never practice and spread more hatred and bigotry. We must respond with compassion, with legislation and with justice.

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Politics Derailed the Film about Cyrus the Great

The Cyrus Cylinder is on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC, through August 4, 2013. This reminds us...

From my post of 1/29/2010: Cyrus was supposed to be the subject of a historical epic film. We wonder what ever happened to that film. Our best guess is that the film industry has closed ranks and decided that given the current political leadership in that country, there will be no film made that extols the culture of Persia, modern day Iran. Not surprising then, modern reality trumps ancient history.

Here is what we said in a blog post about Cyrus and the film - way back in March 2005...

Critics say that Russell Crowe and the movie Gladiator helped revive the Hollywood genre of the so-called sword and sandals historical epic. Warner Brothers released Troy, an adaptation of The Iliad, with Brad Pitt as Achilles. Universal made a film hurling the Spartans into battle against the Persians at the Battle of Thermopylae. Sony Pictures filmed a movie about Hannibal the Carthaginian general from the third century B.C.E.. Dino De Laurentiis produced a movie about Alexander the Great, co-financed by Universal and DreamWorks.

For the Jewish community this trend has been a mixed bag. In February 2004 Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, appeared. It is an epic retelling of twelve days of the life of Jesus. Because it implicates Jews in the death of Jesus, many feared that Gibson's film would be used by anti-Semites to trigger an onslaught of hatred and violence against Jews here in the US and around the world.

But there is reason for Jews and for all proponents of multiculturalism to be more sanguine about this revived sword and sandals fashion in film. In particular, a London-based company, co-owned by Marinah Embiricos, a relative of the Aga Khan and a member of the Greek shipping family that controls the Embiricos Group, has teamed with the Sultan of Brunei to finance a multi-million dollar film about Cyrus the Great.

These backers want to tell the story of Cyrus not just for the entertainment value. They believe that their film will inspire goodwill and world peace.

The title character, Cyrus the Great, lived from 580-529 BCE. Notably he founded the Achaemenian empire in Persia. Impressively, more than 2500 years ago, as emperor he freed the slaves in his empire.

Additionally, Cyrus has been admired by history as an enlightened liberator, not a heroic conqueror, because of his tolerance and respect for the customs and religions of every region of his great empire. Some might argue that Cyrus was the founder of multiculturalism.

From a global point of view, Cyrus was a trailblazer of epic proportions. A decree of Cyrus' social and political views inscribed on a clay cylinder, now in the British Museum, has been described as the first declaration of human rights. The pronouncement concerning his enlightened goals and policies has been recognized as a charter of the rights of nations. A replica of the cylinder is displayed at the United Nations. It declares,
History especially records that Cyrus was very good for the Jews. When he conquered Babylonia in 539 BCE he allowed the Jews to return to Judea. The Hebrew Bible records the Israelite perspective on his great magnanimity at the beginning of the book of Ezra,

. . .When my soldiers in great numbers peacefully entered Babylon... I did not allow anyone to terrorize the people... I kept in view the needs of people and all its sanctuaries to promote their well-being... Freed all the slaves... I put an end to their misfortune and slavery (referring to the Jews and other religious minorities). The Great God has delivered all the lands into my hand; the lands that I have made to dwell in a peaceful habitation...

The Persian Kurash Prism tells of this same multicultural generosity by Cyrus for many peoples and sanctuaries, and from the Persian perspective, Ms. Embiricos, the primary backer of the film, has said that she wants her production to promote harmony among all the world's religions. "We wanted to send out the message that people should be tolerant of each other's religion. It was a very spiritual time and we want to rekindle this. It is not that I want to make movies - I want to make this particular film."

In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also put it in writing: "Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and rebuild the house of the Lord, the God of Israel -- he is the God who is in Jerusalem; and let each survivor, in whatever place he sojourns, be assisted by the men of his place with silver and gold, with goods and with beasts, besides freewill offerings for the house of God which is in Jerusalem." Then rose up the heads of the fathers' houses of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and the Levites, every one whose spirit God had stirred to go up to rebuild the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem; and all who were about them aided them with vessels of silver, with gold, with goods, with beasts, and with costly wares, besides all that was freely offered.

I am Kurash [ "Cyrus" ], King of the World, Great King, Legitimate King, King of Babilani, When I entered Babilani as a friend and when I established the seat of the government in the palace of the ruler under jubilation and rejoicing, Marduk, the great Lord, induced the magnanimous inhabitants of Babilani to love me, and I was daily endeavoring to worship him.... As to the region from as far as Assura and Susa, Akkade, Eshnunna, the towns Zamban, Me-turnu, Der as well as the region of the Gutians, I returned to these sacred cities on the other side of the Tigris the sanctuaries of which have been ruins for a long time, the images which used to live therein and established for them permanent sanctuaries. I also gathered all their former inhabitants and returned them to their habitations. Furthermore, I resettled upon the command of Marduk, the great Lord, all the gods of Kiengir and Akkade whom Nabonidus had brought into Babilani to the anger of the Lord of the gods, unharmed, in their former temples, the places which make them happy.  

Evidently there is now some good news for the Jews from the world of film.

All who support tolerance and peace in our precarious world must herald with enthusiasm the coming epic about the reign of Cyrus the Great.
The First Declaration of Human Rights By Cyrus The Great (The Cyrus Cylinder at the British Museum)

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GulfNews.com: Is ‘World War Z’ a pro-Israel film? Movie-goers in the gulf region share Talmudic views

Paramount Pictures’ World War Z movie, starring Brad Pitt, imagined that the world was overrun by zombies and that Israel, one of the few countries that knew they were coming, built a wall around itself to prevent zombies from invading.

Gulf News has a fairly balanced report about a new zombie movie. Pro-Israel? Some say yes, some say no.

Dubai/Muscat: Movie goers from the region had mixed feelings regarding the zombie apocalypse film World War Z, which has sparked controversy for an alleged supposed pro-Israel bias.

The movie, starring Brad Pitt, imagined that the world was overrun by zombies and that Israel, being one of the few countries that knew they were coming, built a wall around itself to prevent zombies from invading.

People from all over the world took to social media to point out the resemblance between the barrier built in the movie and the separation wall built by Israel in the West Bank to separate it from the occupied Palestinian population, adding that the movie was promoting Israel’s policies.

“While I was watching the movie I did feel like I was supposed to feel good about the wall, the fear of the zombies made the wall look comforting rather than atrocious. I felt like they were attempting a mind shift. It was also interesting that only the [Israeli intelligence agency] Mossad was able to figure out the problem before everyone,” said Canadian national Mohammad Syed, works in the oil trade sector in Dubai.

Dubai resident Aleena Khan, from Pakistan, also said she believed that the movie was glorifying Israel, adding that the movie presented a misleading picture of the relationship between Palestinians and Israelis.

“I don’t think it was trying to justify Israel’s occupation, but it was glorifying the Israelis by emphasising on peace and harmony of the two nations, which is far from the truth. One has to face facts and admit that Israel is hostile towards Palestinians. It was a very rose-tinted version of what the relationship between the Israelis and Palestinians actually is,” she added.

Dr Abdul Khaleq Abdullah Professor of Political Science at UAE University on the other hand thought that the wall symbolised Israel’s insecurity.

“Plenty of Israeli propaganda came from the movie but the fact that they built a wall in my opinion shows how Israel feels insecure and so would go to any length to protect itself even if it meant coming up with over-the-top solutions like building the barrier or wall”

Palestinian national Saif Khalil, did not think much about the wall symbolism however thought that referring to Occupied Jerusalem as part of Israel was uncalled for.

Other movie-goers in the region said some people, especially Arabs and Muslims, were reading too much into the movie.

Palestinian national Maen Hadid, who works in a Dubai-based media company, said he did not feel the movie was trying to convey a pro-Israeli policy message.
“I think that the movie showed Israel as a country that normally exists just like any other country but their solution was to build a wall to protect those left inside, including the Palestinian Muslims,” said Hadid.

Bader Al Lawati, an Omani, said that after watching the movie, he read about the controversial views in the media and, “didn’t even think about it that way while watching the movie.”

British teenager Gwynfor Callaghan, who was born and brought up in Oman, said those viewing the wall scene as symbolising the situation of Palestinians were overreacting.

“It is a fiction made by Americans, so don’t think that the scene was intended against a group,” the British School Muscat student said...

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Summer Sale -- We Reduced Prices on Our Talmudic Books

Summer Sale. Wow. Our Talmudic Kindle Book Prices are Reduced!

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Kosher Talmud: Hullin $.99

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God's Favorite Prayers $2.99

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Define Judaism: Ten Seminars $2.99

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God Bless You: The Origins of Jewish Prayers and Blessings $2.99

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Eleazar: Rabbi, Priest, Patriarch $2.99

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Kosher Prayers: Talmud Yerushalmi Berakhot $2.99

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Rashi: The Greatest Exegete $.99

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Six People You Meet in Synagogue $.99

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Whence and Wherefore $2.99

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Was Marc Rich Jewish?

Yes, Jewish-American billionaire Marc Rich was a Jew. He will be buried in Israel.

JPost reports on Rich's controversial life:

LUCERNE, Switzerland - Jewish-American billionaire Marc Rich, who invented oil trading and was pardoned by then US president Bill Clinton over what had once been the biggest tax evasion case in US history and busting sanctions with Iran, died on Wednesday from a stroke in Switzerland at 78.

Rich fled the Holocaust with his parents for America to become the most successful and controversial trader of his time and a fugitive from US justice, enjoying decades of comfortable privacy at his sprawling Villa Rosa on Lake Lucerne.

Belgian-born Rich, whose trading group eventually became the global commodities powerhouse Glencore Xstrata, died in hospital from a stroke, spokesman Christian Koenig said.

At the villa, with views of the nearby mountains and grounds sloping down to the banks of the lake, security guards and other staff could be seen but there was no sign of family members.

"He will be brought to Israel for burial," Avner Azulay, managing director of the Marc Rich Foundation, said by telephone. Rich will be buried on Thursday at Kibbutz Einat cemetery near Tel Aviv.

Many of the biggest players in oil and metals trading trace their roots back to Rich, whose triumph in the 1960s and 70s was to create a spot market for crude oil, wresting business away from the world's big oil groups.

To his critics, he was a white-collar criminal, a serial sanctions breaker, who they accused of building a fortune trading with revolutionary Iran, Muammar Gaddafi's Libya, apartheid-era South Africa, Nicolae Ceausescu's Romania, Fidel Castro's Cuba and Augusto Pinochet's Chile.

In interviews with journalist Daniel Ammann for his biography, The King of Oil, the normally obsessively secretive Rich admitted to bribing officials in countries such as Nigeria and to assisting the Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad.

Clinton's regret

Rich became a fugitive in 1983, fleeing to Switzerland to escape charges of exploiting the US embargo against Iran to make huge profits on illicit Iranian oil sales. He was also indicted for wire fraud, racketeering and tax evasion.

He remained under threat of a life sentence in a US jail until Clinton pardoned him during the last chaotic days of his presidency, a move that provoked moral outrage and bewilderment amongst some politicians.

Clinton later said he regretted granting the pardon, calling it "terrible politics."

"It wasn't worth the damage to my reputation," he told Newsweek magazine in 2002.

Rich, who was born Marcell David Reich in Antwerp on December 18, 1934, began his career with one of the biggest trading houses of the time, Philipp Brothers, subsequently Phibro, aged 20. He left in 1974 with a fellow graduate of the Phibro mailroom, Pincus "Pinky" Green, and set up Marc Rich and Co AG in Switzerland, a firm that would eventually become Glencore Xstrata Plc.

"We are saddened to hear of the death of Marc," Glencore Xstrata Chief Executive Ivan Glasenberg said. "He was a friend and one of the great pioneers of the commodities trading industry, founding the company that became Glencore."

In later years, Rich's fortune dwindled after his property portfolio was hit by the Spanish housing crisis.

"I invested a lot of money there and because of the crisis also lost a lot, at least on paper," he said in a rare interview, with Swiss economic magazine Bilanz. Forbes put his wealth at $2.5 billion.

Rich once told Fortune magazine he was a normal person with an image problem.

"I've been portrayed in a horrible way," he said, "as a workaholic, a loner, a money machine. It's not a true picture."

Ken Hill, a US Marshall who hunted Rich around the world for more than a decade, once said Rich profited from greed.

"The smoking gun is greed," he said. "This is what Marc thrived on - the greed of those who had commodities and were in positions of influence and power."

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Is John Oliver Jewish?

John Oliver is filling in for Jon Stewart this summer, 2013. He is one funny dude.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Indecision Political Humor,The Daily Show on Facebook

On 2/6/2011 we wrote:

We laughed out loud at the latest video clip that the Jewish Humor Central Blog posted (hat tip) from the Daily Show's John Oliver.

And then we thought, he is so funny, yes, John Oliver is Jewish. (But he isn't.)

We base our conclusion in particular on his ability to invent a new Jewish holiday for the purposes of celebrating a political victory in Texas as you will see in the hilarious clip below.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Jewish Speaker of Texas State House
www.thedailyshow.com
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Is Edward Snowden Jewish?

Okay, fine. New Yorker bloggers debate whether Edward Snowden is a hero or a villain:

• Jeffrey Toobin: Edward Snowden Is No Hero
• John Cassidy: Why Edward Snowden Is a Hero

But what we want to know: is Edward Snowden Jewish?

We will go out on a limb here and, even lacking firm evidence, based on his bio, we will say, no, Edward Snowden is not a Jew. 

US News on NBC news reports: "Born June 21, 1983, he grew up in Wilmington, N.C., but later moved to Ellicott City, Md., he told The Guardian. His mother, Wendy, is the chief deputy clerk for administration and information technology at the federal court in Baltimore, a court official told NBC News. His father, Lonnie, is a former Coast Guard officer who lives in Pennsylvania, the Allentown Morning Call reported. A neighbor said he has an older sister who is an attorney."

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Are dirty tricks in negotiations kosher?

Day after day we see ill will and bad faith in the negotiations in our marketplace and workplace.

No, dirty tricks are not kosher.

But you ask, exactly what are dirty tricks and how can you deal with them?

Several years ago we took one course in Negotiations in the MBA program at Rutgers. Each year the brilliant professor who taught the course, Daniel Levin sends emails to his former students to remind them about how to respond in a negotiation to the prevalent issue of distributive tactics or what we normally call "dirty tricks."

According to Levin, the top ten dirty tricks in negotiations are:

1. Good Cop/Bad Cop
2. Emotional Intimidation
3. Lowball (or Highball) Offer
4. Opening with a Take It or Leave It Offer
5. Exploiting the Trappings of Power
6. Increasing an Offer's Appearance of Legitimacy
7. Pretending to Have Limited Authority
8. Playing a Game of Chicken
9. Lying about Priorities
10. Nibbling

Levin gives us his priceless suggestions for responses in his Talmudic analysis here. Study it and study it some more, because everything you need to know about dirty tricks is in that grid.

We've said many times that in all of the years of our education through college and rabbinical school and graduate school at Brown, Levin's negotiations course in the MBA program at Rutgers was the most valuable course that we ever took.

We use the skills that we learned there every day.

Thank you again Dan Levin.

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Is it kosher to bring a gun to the swim club?

Unless we are talking about a super-soaker toy, no, not in my backyard. It is not kosher to bring a gun into my swim club. I don't really care what the gold old boy yahoos in West Virginia do - see the story below. Just don't bring any gun to the Teaneck Swim Club or the JCC where my friends and relatives go to swim in safety.

And by the way even the toys are getting downright dangerous. Consider you can "ice" your friends with the NERF SUPER SOAKER ARCTIC SHOCK Water Blaster - about which we are told by Hasbro:

This powerful soaker lets you freeze your friends with icy blasts of water! The ARCTIC SHOCK soaker’s Ice Drum has a large 25-fluid-ounce capacity and you can fill it with ice for a super-chilled soak. Fill the drum and pump for a freezing blast of water at targets up to 30 feet away! The Ice Drum works with other Clip System SUPER SOAKER blasters (sold separately) and SUPER SOAKER Water Clips work with the ARCTIC SHOCK soaker. Fill additional Water Clips (sold separately) and use them to refill fast. Put the competition on ice with the ARCTIC SHOCK soaker!

From ProPublica, some dangerous summer news.

Now, You Can’t Ban Guns at the Public Pool
by Lois Beckett, ProPublica

If you feel unsafe at a public pool in Charleston, W.Va., you may soon have the right to lie there on a towel with a handgun at your side.

For 20 years, Charleston has been an island of modest gun restrictions in a very pro-gun rights state. But its gun laws — including a ban on guns in city parks, pools and recreation centers — are now likely to be rolled back, the latest victory in a long-standing push to deny cities the power to regulate guns.

Since the 1980s, the National Rifle Association and other groups have led a successful campaign to get state legislatures to limit local control over gun regulations. These "preemption" laws block cities from enacting their own gun policies, effectively requiring cities with higher rates of gun violence to have the same gun regulations as smaller towns.

Before 1981, when an Illinois town banned the possession of handguns, just a handful of states had preemption laws on the books. Today, 42 states block cities from making gun laws, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Even Illinois, which has long allowed its cities to pass gun control measures, is about to invalidate local restrictions on concealed handguns and ban any future local regulation of assault weapons.

Gun rights advocates argue that allowing cities to have their own gun laws creates an impossible situation for law-abiding gun owners, who cannot be expected to read ordinances for every town they might pass through.

The preemption campaign has racked up so many victories nationwide, it's now focusing on holdouts like Charleston, population 51,000.

Charleston's current gun restrictions include a three-day waiting period to buy a handgun, and a limit of one handgun purchase per month, as well as bans on guns on publicly owned property, such as parks and pools.

West Virginia Delegate Patrick Lane crafted an amendment to an unrelated state bill, now passed, that will likely force Charleston to erase those restrictions.

"Crime could happen anyplace. You obviously want to be able to defend yourself and your family if something happens," Lane said, when asked why anyone would want to bring a gun to a public pool.

The NRA did not respond to requests for comment, but its website calls Charleston's restrictions "misguided" and "unreasonable." Its site has closely tracked the progress of the repeal of the ordinances, which it states "would have no negative impact whatsoever on Charleston." The site has repeatedly criticized Charleston's Republican mayor for "speaking out publicly against this pro-gun reform."

It's not clear what effect the spread of preemption has had on public safety. "It's very hard to determine what causes crime to go up and down, because there are so many variables," said Laura Cutilletta, a senior attorney at the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence.

But in Charleston, Police Chief Brent Webster says he's worried about losing the city's current restrictions, in particular the law banning guns at city pools, concerts and sporting events.

"You will have some citizens say, 'I can do that now, so I'm going to do that,'" Webster said. "I am greatly concerned."

"When they're diving off the diving board, is that [gun] going to be in a book bag? Is that going to be lying under their towel and an eight-year-old kid is walking through the pool area and picks it up?"

Two of the city's former police chiefs also say they're worried about losing the ban on guns in public places that attract kids.

"That has nothing to do with the Second Amendment right. It has to do with public safety," former Chief Dallas Staples said.

Charleston's mayor, Danny Jones, who's fought to keep the gun restrictions, said the city now has no choice but to do what the state legislature wants and roll them back. The state legislature packaged the rollback requirement with a popular measure giving Charleston more leeway in how it raises taxes.

"I'm still reeling from all this, because it's going to affect us in a very negative way," Jonestold reporters after the law passed.

Keith Morgan, president of the West Virginia Citizen's Defense League, a gun rights group, said the group been pushing for an end to Charleston's ordinances for years, and that the change would protect law-abiding gun owners from a "minefield" of conflicting local laws.

Lane, the West Virginia delegate, also said that gun-owning commuters were put at risk as they traveled through different cities with different rules.

But neither Lane nor Morgan could cite an example of a gun owner being prosecuted for accidentally breaking the law during their commute, or by accidentally wandering into a city park. When Morgan himself once showed up at the Charleston Civic Center with a gun, he said, he was simply asked to leave, and he did. In lawsuits the West Virginia Citizen's Defense League filed against gun ordinances in Charleston and Martinsburg, the plaintiffs cited their fear of potential prosecution.

The main burden of Charleston's laws for gun owners has been the inconvenience of waiting three days to purchase a handgun, and only being able to buy one handgun at a time — something that can be particularly troublesome "if you're buying a present for your family and there happens to be a Christmas sale at the retailer," Lane said.

Former Charleston law enforcement officers say the handgun restrictions, passed in 1993, helped the city tamp down on the drugs-for-guns trade that was rampant at the time. But since then, gun stores have sprung up right at the city's borders, said Steve Walker, a former Charleston police officer and now president of the West Virginia branch of the Fraternal Order of Police.

"Honestly, I don't know whether with them repealing it, it is going to help them or hurt them," Walker said of the handgun restrictions.

State legislators said that city officials are overplaying their fears.

"I don't see everyone with a concealed carry permit deciding to go to a pool and carry a gun," said Democrat Mark Hunt, a state delegate, "So what if they do? They're law-abiding citizens."

Charleston’s mayor said he has a plan if somebody brings a gun poolside: “We're going to close down the pool."

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Michelle Bachmann Warns us that Minneapolis - St. Paul are the new Sodom - Gomorrah

The Daily Currant reported last week that Michelle Bachman has threatened to "Leave Minnesota Over Marriage Equality" because the new Twin Cities are now just like the old Twin Cities of the Bible. This is funny stuff (5/13/13):

Congresswoman Michele Bachmann threatened to leave Minnesota today if the state goes ahead with its plans to legalize gay marriage.

In an interview with a local television station, the conservative firebrand said she believes God will destroy Minneapolis once the legislation is enacted, and wants to be far away when the reckoning happens.

"The Bible is very clear on this issue," she told KSTP-TV this morning. "Homosexuality is a sin, and God will punish communities that support it.

"Sodom and Gomorrah thought they could defy the will of God, and we all know what happened to them. If the governor signs this legislation into law the Minneapolis-St. Paul region will be next.

"I have a friend from Eden Prairie who's already packed everything she owns into her car and is driving out to Montana as we speak. These are very scary times. I don't want my family to be the last ones out."

...Although none of the other states has suffered from Biblical-like destruction, Minnesota's most outspoken voice in Congress told anchor Bruce Nolan that it's only a matter of time.

"I don't know what it will be, Bruce," she said. "It could be an earthquake. It could be a volcano. It could be some sort of flesh eating virus. All I know is that God does not let homosexuality go unpunished, and Minneapolis is next in line for his wrath.

"It breaks my heart to think that the Democrats are willing to play politics with the lives of so many Minnesotans. And I hate to leave so many of my constituents behind, but I urge them - please, please - follow my example and get your loved ones to safety before it's too late."

In a subsequent interview with The Daily Currant, Bachmann says she's not sure where she'll go if she leaves, but is seriously considering Oregon as a possibility since its constitution bans same sex marriage.

"I've heard wonderful things about Eugene," she says, "and I think (Democratic) Congressman (Peter) DeFazio may be vulnerable to a challenge. They're the nicest people in the world out there. I'm sure we'd be welcomed with open arms."

Update: The governor signed the bill ("Minnesota Legalizes Gay Marriage: Gov. Mark Dayton Signs Bill Into Law") and, so far, no destruction.

Clarification: This story is a joke.

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Book of Ruth - Free for Shavuot

From our collaborator Reuven Brauner:

Hi Everyone,

Shavuos is coming up and that means Sefer Ruth.

In order to facilitate your learning of this important work, traditionally read on Chag Matan Torah, I have included the link to my Hadgashas Hane’emar version on halakhah.com which should make this book’s understanding easier, quicker and, maybe even, more fun.

Please feel free to copy it, print it out and pass it on to all your friends. Enjoy.

Happy Rosh Chodesh, have a Good Shabbos and Good Yom Tov

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2006: When Rabbi Aryeh Strikovsky ordained Aviva Ner-David

I wrote this seven years ago:

On one level, I was overjoyed to read in the Jerusalem Post report (May 4, 2006) that a Jerusalem Orthodox rabbi Aryeh Strikovsky has ordained his woman student Aviva Ner-David as a rabbi saying that her "knowledge and mastery of Jewish law are remarkable."

This was a breakthrough that I awaited, but frankly never expected to see in my lifetime. I thought, as I read the news, that this marks the end to the male monopoly on the Orthodox rabbinate. The Reform movement had torn down this wall in the 70s. The Conservative movement had started routinely ordaining women in the 80s. And now, the Orthodox will be ordaining women.

In theory, I want to see this is a good development in the history of Judaism. With women rabbis, more talent can be unleashed into the ranks of religious leadership. With double the talent there can be double the learning and twice as much new theological insight, imagination and energy.

In theory, since the Orthodox rabbi is not a sacerdotal position, a woman should be able to fill it regardless of the patriarchal roots of the system. A woman can become an expert in Jewish law and practice and act in all capacities as a rabbi just like men have been doing for centuries.

But we don't live in a theoretical world. A real reading of the nature of contemporary Orthodoxy will lead one to conclude that it is a system run by men whose political and social power in society at large is marginalized. And yet these men do see themselves as guardians of a particularly important male-dominated world order of their own.

How do those who live by the worldview of the Orthodox rabbinate react to the ordination of an Orthodox woman? These are ten of the most likely responses.

1. They see the growth of women's civil and familial rights as a threat to the historical male prerogatives.
2. They use male bonding as the basis of rabbinic public organization.
3. They see women's ordination as a feminization, a making womanly of the rabbinic estate.
4. They experience the end of the all-male public body of the rabbinate as an admission of the vulnerability and perhaps of the impotence of the collective organization.
5. But they extend the threat to more than just a challenge to the masculinity of the rabbi and flag bearer. They characterized it as a threat to the core beliefs of Judaism.
6. They feel this woman's ordination is a humiliation to the Orthodox rabbinic system.
7. They perceive the notion that a woman can be a rabbi as a foreign threat, imported first from Western feminist culture and most recently from heretical Conservative Judaism.
8. They argue that this weakness of boundaries must be healed - the rabbis cannot allow penetration from the outside or the permeability of the borders of rabbinic life.
9. They say that their religion must be purified of all feminization and alien contamination.
10. Logically it follows that they will act with a vehemence or even violence to attack and defeat the forces antagonistic to their way of life.

This leads me to predict that figurative "blood" will be shed as the Orthodox male leaders battle this startling challenge to their hegemony.
To the existing Orthodox establishment this daring ordination stands out as a symptom of the disordered sexuality of the evil modern world where women try to take the roles that belong to men. The rabbis will invoke this danger and then will likely associate this act of ordination with other disorderly sexual confusions such as gay marriage. They may feel free then to predict that if they allow women to serve as rabbis that will open the door to next allow gays to follow suit.
Yet after all is said and done, Rabbis who preach the perfection of Kosher sex roles and condemn the perversion of treif disorder are speaking sense only to those colleagues in their boys' club who live by their concepts of the world.
So let's expect the onslaught of attacks by the rabbis against the new Orthodox woman rabbi. They will say that she is bad. The rabbi that ordained her is bad. The idea is bad. How low have people sunk? And so on and so on. Lo and behold, Judaism has withstood another crisis of faith and onslaught of challenge.

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Is Jonathan Krohn Jewish?

No and yes. According to the Times, the young (former) conservative is being brought up as a Christian. So no, definitely Jonathan Krohn is not Jewish by religion.

Update: At 17, Krohn was doing teshuvah - repenting his conservatism - i.e., he adopted liberal ideas and went to study philosophy at NYU. MSNBC reported in the video clip below, wherein Lawrence O'Donnell lauded him for converting to the "bright side".

Update 2: The Times reported on Krohn: "The Growing Pains of Jonathan Krohn" (4/28/2013)

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

As to his religion, according to the Times, Jonathan Krohn's mother was Jewish before she converted to Christianity. According to Jewish law, Jonathan is a Jew. Appropriately, the Times is silent on the issue of whether his Baptist parents gave him a bris. It seems the young Christian conservative did not have a bar mitzvah but he did get a present,

He received a computer from his maternal grandfather for his 13th birthday. “In the Jewish culture in which my mom was raised, 13 is a big deal,” he said. “But since I’m a Jewish Christian, I don’t do a bar mitzvah.” (Decades ago, his mother became a Baptist.)

Even in parentheses, the fact that the boy has a Jewish mother, makes him a (latent) member of the tribe. In 2009 we said: We do envy this young man who has concluded at such an early age that the world is precisely the way it should be, that progress is not needed, that government ought to be curtailed and that Rush Limbaugh is NOT a big fat idiot. We wish we had learned all that by the time we were 14. Even now we are struggling to rid ourselves of the desire for progress and the esteem with which we hold those who dedicate their lives to public service in the quest for better government and leadership in our country. //reposted from 3/8/09 because this little feller is finally talking a bit of sense//

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Jewish Standard Op-Ed: A Bully in the Pulpit

In politics a "bully pulpit" is considered to be a good thing. In the synagogue, mosque or church a "bully in the pulpit" is not a good thing.

The term "bully pulpit" was coined by President Teddy Roosevelt to describe the White House as a superb platform from which to propound a political agenda. Roosevelt used the word bully to mean "wonderful" a common adjectival usage in his day.

Now we use bully mainly as a pejorative noun meaning a ruffian who harasses the weak. Bullying among children in schools is recognized today as a serious problem.

Based on what we have seen and read lately, bullying by clergy from the pulpit is a serious problem too. It is fairly likely that you or one of your neighbors goes to a synagogue, mosque or church where the spiritual leader is a bully.

The signs that your clergyman (or woman) is a bully are straightforward. He engages in name-calling, often subtle, via sarcastic or cynical stereotyping of those groups or individuals who oppose his view of the world. He makes you feel uncomfortable and insecure by characterizing classes, congregations or parties of people as dumb or incompetent, if not outright evil, by dint of their political or religious affiliation or preference. And hence you may feel that you could be next in line for his bullying if you say or do something that he decides is wrong.

Bullies gang with their cronies to insult and denigrate others. By staying silent or by cheering him on, you may be one of those who encourage the bully.

And to justify your support for the bully you may think, we need a "strong voice" in our community, a person who will stand up and protect us from outsiders who want to harm us. We need an "outspoken representative," a person who will impress the world with the justice of our faith or cause. We need an "inspirational leader," a person who will make us feel powerful, not defensive. After all, we are at risk of being bullied by the world. We need a bully of our own to fend that off.

But a bully in the pulpit is not a proper voice, not a valid representative and not a credible leader. His blustery transparent rhetoric lacks substance. He comes across as weak and insecure and he is easily ignored by the rest of world.

To combat a bully in the pulpit you can do some of the same things that people recommend for dealing with bullies in schools or at work. You can try to avoid the bully. Walk out of the chapel when he speaks. Change to another place of worship. In our town, we've seen people quietly withdraw from one synagogue whose rabbi is a bully and join another one, whose rabbi has a proper substantive demeanor that is not intimidating or threatening.

Or if you detect pulpit bullying, you can take action. You can speak up and try to end the bullying. You can raise consciousness in your town that bullying in the pulpit exists, that it is counterproductive to the strength and health of the community, and that it needs to be stopped.

Published in the Jewish Standard.

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What are the connections between religions and terrorism?

What are the connections between religions and terrorism? 

That's a big set of questions. We tried to answer, explain and understand them in the past.

Here is a selected list of our blog posts of study resources in the analysis of the connections between terrorism and religion (compiled when we taught a course on religion and terrorism at FDU a few years ago).

1. Questions about American Christian Terrorism
2. Religion and Jewish Terrorists (and see the JTA report)
3. What is a Religious Culture of Violence and Terror? 
4. Who were Shoko Asahara and the Buddhist Aum Shinrikyo Religious Terrorists? 
5. How did Religion Motivate Sikh Terrorists? 
6. What is the Logic of the Theater of Religious Terror? 
7. Why Do Religious Terrorist Martyrs say that they aim to kill the demons? 
8. What do Sexuality and Humiliation have to do with Terrorism? 
9. Will the War Against Religious Terrorism Ever End? 
10. From Kahane to Osama: How Do Men Make Religious Terrorism Into Cosmic War? 
11. How can we end religious terrorism and achieve the peace of God? 
12. Concluding Questions on Religion and Terrorism

We recommend:

God's Favorite Prayers

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Video: A Touching Memorial Service for Yom Hazikaron 2013

A Touching Memorial Service for Yom Hazikaron 2013

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Was Shulamith Firestone Jewish?

Yes, the pioneering feminist Shulamith Firestone was at the brackets of her life an Orthodox Jew. She was brought up as an Orthodox Jew as a child, and she was buried in an Orthodox Jewish rite.

During her life, the radical feminist activities that she engaged in and the critical books that she wrote were as far from the values of Orthodox Judaism as day is from night.

The inspiring and haunting New Yorker profile, "AMERICAN CHRONICLES: DEATH OF A REVOLUTIONARY," BY SUSAN FALUDI informs the reader that "Shulamith Firestone helped to create a new society. But she couldn’t live in it."

It informs us, "Best known for her writings, Firestone also launched the first major radical-feminist groups in the country, which made headlines in the late nineteen-sixties and early seventies with confrontational protests and street theatre."

The article begins, "When Shulamith Firestone’s body was found late last August, in her studio apartment on the fifth floor of a tenement walkup on East Tenth Street, she had been dead for some days. She was sixty-seven, and she had battled schizophrenia for decades, surviving on public assistance. There was no food in the apartment, and one theory is that Firestone starved, though no autopsy was conducted, by preference of her Orthodox Jewish family. Such a solitary demise would have been unimaginable to anyone who knew Firestone in the late nineteen-sixties, when she was at the epicenter of the radical-feminist movement, surrounded by some of the same women who, a month after her death, gathered in St. Mark’s Church In-the-Bowery, to pay their respects..."

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Free at Last from Friday through Sunday: Six People You Meet in Synagogue

For the Passover holidays, the Talmudic Blog and Talmudic Books is giving away a new book:  Six People You Meet in Synagogue.

In this book, the author, Tzvee Zahavy, presents six ideal personalities of Jewish prayer and their respective prayers.

This is a condensed version of the author's previous work, God's Favorite Prayers (Talmudic Books, 2011) where he first developed the notion of the six distinct prayer archetypes: the performer, the mystic, the scribe, the priest, the meditator and the celebrity.

Six People You Meet in Synagogue
For Kindle from Amazon: FREE for Passover -- from Friday through Sunday, March 29-31.

Check Out all the Talmudic Books
See the Kindle Edition Talmud in English
ALSO FREE for Passover -- Ponder the Questions of Whence and Wherefore -- FREE 

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Is Julius Genachowski Jewish?

Yes, Julius Genachowski is a Jew.

Barack Obama named Genachowski as Head of the Federal Communications Commission in 2009. He announced his intention to resign in March, 2013.

Several news reports confirmed that, "Mr. Genachowski, attended yeshiva through high school and studied in yeshiva in Israel before going to Columbia... His parents are immigrants who survived the Holocaust."

Calling him a "Talmud Ace," The Forward reported:

Julius Genachowski was born August 19, 1962, to Adele and Azriel Genachowski. He grew up in Great Neck, a Long Island suburb, in a family that attended the local Young Israel. He attended Orthodox day school at North Shore Hebrew Academy and summered at Camp Raleigh. His high school was the Marsha Stern Talmudical Academy, which is part of Yeshiva University. Though he says he cut classes to play basketball, he won the Talmud award.

Genachowski spent a year after high school studying in Jerusalem at Yeshivat HaKotel, where he and his peers practiced “learning, discussing, questioning each other, even the possibilities of different points of view,” he recalled. “One of the things that you take away from learning Talmud, learning Gemara, is that two or three brilliant people can look at the same passage and have different interpretations and views, each of which makes a lot of sense, but they’re not all consistent. So I enjoyed that.”

Today, Genachowski attends Sabbath services regularly at Adas Israel, Washington’s largest Conservative synagogue.

He is the cousin of Rabbi Menachem Genack (we assume shortened from Genachowski), rabbinic administrator and CEO of O.U. Kosher, an Orthodox rabbi with liberal political views.

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