Category — Politics

Baruch Herzfeld is well-known in many circles. He has well over 1,000 friends on Facebook. I knew him back in the day, when he unsuccessfully ran for student president in YU on the platform that if elected, he would revoke the cherem d’Rabbeinu Gershon, the rabbinical decree restricting Ashkenazi Jewish men to monogamy. Hertzfeld explained (there was a recession then) that, “In today’s troubled economic times, a man needs more than one wife to support him while he sits and learns [Torah].”

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Eli Valley drew a comic mocking American-Zionist education. The Forward declined to publish it, which is their right.

So Gawker took it instead.

Voonga! Voonga! (That means, “mazel tov!”).

“Arab” Rejection?

I mean, I personally don’t care, but isn’t this suggesting that being Arab is synonymous with a certain mentality? And if so, how is that better than generalizing about Muslims? How is that different than generalizing about blacks?

I know the ADL would never have one standard for Zionist issues, and another for everyone else. So help me understand the difference, thanks.

Shabbos is coming, and for the Harediban, that can only mean one thing — it’s time to tantrum and get arrested!

Yeshiva World News reports,

As on past shabbasos, the Eida Chareidis this week called for a shabbos afternoon protest against the operation of Karta parking lot by Jerusalem City Hall on shabbos.

This week’s event will begin at 5:30pm at Kikar Shabbos, in the presence of Rabbanei HaEida Shlita. A number of rabbanim will address the tzibur as well.

As in past weeks, the event is for avreichim and adults only, not women and/or children.

Lakavod shabbos kodesh! [For the honor of the sabbath].

In other fahfrumpteh news, even the most right-wing Litvak leaders sometimes get sick of the frummer than thou nonsense.

A nominally Orthodox friend of mine once told me that a mildly retarded man was on his synagogue board. I was a little taken aback, and asked him why he had arranged for that.

“He votes how we tell him to,” he said.

Bloomberg is going to be getting a chunk of votes from those who vote as they are told to.

The NY Times reports,

For years, aides to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg routed hundreds of thousands of dollars in city money to at least two politically connected nonprofit groups in violation of government contracting rules, according to records and interviews.

The mayor’s office, from 2002 to 2006, gave $1.1 million to Agudath Israel of America Community Services and more than $400,000 to Ohel Children’s Home and Family Services, using a little-known pot of discretionary money that it controls.

Hat tip: Failed Messiah

Please vote for Reverend Billy. Reverend Billy is not beholden to the frum. He is a righteous gentile who will not sell out to the haredim.

The Jewish community has stabbed free speech and equality in the eyes of law in the back.

The Forward’s Nathan Guttman reports,

Twelve years of activism by Jewish groups is nearing an end as Congress prepares to approve legislation that would expand the definition of hate crimes to include actions based on a victim’s sexual orientation, gender or disability.

Jewish groups have been front and center in lobbying for the inclusion of these categories in the existing law, which already defines as hate crimes those that are committed on the basis of race, color, religion and national origin.

While the Forward and I might disagree on the Hate Crimes laws, the Forward is too honest not to note,

The Matthew Shepard Hate Crime Prevention Act is named after the gay student who was brutally murdered in Wyoming in 1998 because of his sexual orientation. Shepard’s murderers received life sentences, but the case was not prosecuted as a hate crime. – [Emphasis added]

In today’s dark times, the Jewish community needs to find new sources of revenue to support the continued growth of today’s Kiruv programs. We can’t rely just on the secular and Liberal Jewish communities. They don’t have the money they did just a couple of years ago, and frankly, they don’t know what’s good for them.

But believe it or not, there is an Orthodox Jew, Illinois state senator Ira Silverstein, who is actually willing to go out on a limb and find creative ways to spend taxpayer money that some might feel is not appropriate. Now before you start screaming, “I can’t believe an Orthodox Jew would bend traditional financial rules,” consider this: true, there is a long-standing prohibition between church and state. But that is NOT the same as shul and state.

The Chicago Tribune reports,

“NCSY,” for example, is getting $25,000 on Page 65 “for costs associated with a new facility.” You wouldn’t know without digging that the letters stand for National Conference of Synagogue Youth, an organization whose stated mission is “to connect, inspire and empower Jewish teens and encourage passionate Judaism through Torah and tradition.”

While it could reasonably be expected that the Democratic Borough President would not take lightly to nicknaming Obama, ““O-dumb-a,” Lee Landor, Scott Stringer’s deputy press secretary, went a bit more general.

The NY Times reports,
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The Forward reports,

When a predominantly gay synagogue in Manhattan learned that a group of ultra-Evangelical Christians were planning a protest outside their building, the congregation decided to turn the hate rally into a fundraising event.

Parishoners from the Westboro Baptist Church, a Kansas-based institution, gathered on Sunday outside Congregation Beth Simchat Torah with signs reading “God hates fags” and “Jews stole the land.”

The synagogue heard several days in advance of the church’s planned demonstration and decided to counter the protesters’ publicity drive with one of their own, rather than pursuing legal action.

The congregation encouraged its supporters to donate at least $1 for every six minutes that the demonstration lasted.

Following the 51-minute protest, the synagogue was able to raise more than $10,000 in donations.

And as I’m sure you know, Missouri State officials renamed a highway after Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel to undermine its Nazi sponsorship.

Why limit our freedoms or institute even more double standards? Just be smart and creative. So much better! For instance, I have a Black Hebrew two doors down who is filled with rage. But as long as he doesn’t spit on me, that’s his prerogative. I’m not going to take away his right to hate on the ice devil descendants of the nefarious imposter-angel Yaqub…I’m going to get rid of section eight housing!

I am rather wary of this Nicholas Stix guy for two reasons.

1) He is more right-wing than I am.
2) He appears to be wittier than I am.

I could possibly forgive him for the first reason, as the “no friends to the right” policy is an American rule only in force for Republicans, so I am probably exempt.

But the second reason is far less excusable.

Now, the incorrigible Stix has deemed discriminatory laws and policies against whites as “Jim Snow” laws. I will be using this term frequently, and wanted to give Stix credit where it’s due, despite my burning resentment at not having come up with it myself.

Anyway, nice going, Nick. For real.