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July 31, 2009
Joy to These Loving Companions
A traditional Chuppah, Jewish wedding ceremony.
Karen and I are in New York.
This Shabbat we celebrate the Aufruf of our wonderful, soon-to-be, son-in-law. And then on Monday the chuppah where Offspring#3 will stand under the wedding canopy with her Bashert.
The first Sheva B'rachot will take place in New York, and then we all fly back to Los Angeles for the remainder.
Blogging will probably be rather light over the next few days.
I will be taking photos at the wedding and, as promised, I'll reveal Karen and Offspring #2's awesome wedding footwear.
Here is the text for the Sheva B'rachot. To hear the traditional chants, click here.
1. "Blessed are You, Lord, our G-d, King of the universe, who creates the fruit of the vine."
2."Blessed are You, Lord, our G-d, King of the universe, , who created everything for his glory.
3. "Blessed are You, Lord, our G-d, King of the universe, who creator of man.
4. “Blessed are You, Lord, our G-d, King of the universe, who creates man in your image, fashioning perpetuated life. Blessed are You, Lord, creator of man.”
5. “May Zion rejoice as her children are restored to her in joy. Blessed are You, Lord, who causes Zion to rejoice her children’s return.”
6. “Grant perfect joy to these loving companions, as you did your creations in the Garden of Eden. Blessed are You, Lord, who grants the joy of groom and bride.”
7. “Blessed are You, Lord, our G-d, King of the universe, who created joy and gladness, groom and bride, mirth, song, delight and rejoicing, love and harmony and peace and companionship. Lord our G-d, may there ever be heard in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem voices of joy and gladness, voices of groom and bride, the jubilant voices of those joined in marriage under the bridal canopy, the voices of young people feasting and singing. Blessed are You, Lord, who causes the groom to rejoice with his bride.”
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a lovely and miraculous Shabbat.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:49 PM | Comments (22)
July 30, 2009
Stars With Pluck
Hedy Lamarr’s perfectly arched eyebrows emphasize her symmetrical features. Considered the most beautiful woman in Hollywood, Lamarr was also incredibly bright, co-inventing, in 1941, a “frequency-hopping device that now serves as the basis for modern spread-spectrum communication technology.” That quote is grabbed from Wikipedia. I have absolutely no idea what it means, but darn, I’m impressed. Anyhoo. Married six times, Lamarr gained and lost several fortunes. After her career was over she was arrested on shoplifting charges.
Screening movies from Hollywood’s Golden Age, I’ve noticed an interesting trend—in eyebrows.
During the early days of silent films, female stars appeared pretty normal. Which is to say, eyebrows were lightly plucked, but retained a recognizably human configuration.
But the Flapper Age of the 1920’s, a time of huge social upheaval in America, ushered in severely plucked eyebrows, styles that were eventually refined into Baroque loops and harsh anorexic gashes.
To read my entire post, head on over to Big Hollywood.
Today is T'sha B'av, a fast day. Caffeine deprivation hit me like a truck at about seven in the morning.
Sigh.
Anyway, Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a meaningful fast.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:38 AM | Comments (1)
July 28, 2009
Anti-Obama Rally in Israel
You know what's weird—hugely ironic, even—about this whole Obama policy initiative where Obama decides where Jews can and cannot live in the Jewish homeland?
Obama is black, right?
So, you would think that there would be just a little sensitivity on the issue of ghettoizing a specific group of people based on ethnicity or religion?
I mean of 22 Arab Muslim countries, they are all basically Judenrein. Actually, make that 23, let's not forget Gaza.
Didn't President Obama learn anything about the poison of racism and prejudice from his good friend Henry "Skip" Gates, Jr., or Jeremiah Wright, Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dorn. Khalid Rashidi, and that model of racial tolerance, Louis Farrakhan.
What's really going on here is pretty simple and brutal. Obama seeks a rupture with Israel as a way of sucking up to the Arab Muslim world. It's that whole repair relations with the Muslim world fantasy that Obama has been pushing, AKA Kumbayah, the sophisticated edition because Obama is such a deep thinker—i.e. beat up on the Jooz—on international relations.
Yup, no less than four, count 'em four special envoys are descending on Israel to bully Netanyahu into dhimmitude.
Hope n' Change.
Glad that's working out for the 78% of American Jews who voted for Barack Hussein Obama, because it's not working out for anybody else except: the genocidal so-called Palestinians, the mad mullahs of Iran, the Communist dictators Hugo Chavez, Manuel Zelaya, the Castro Bros., and the Dear Leader—no not Obama, the other Dear Leader, North Korea's Kim Il Jong.
For the first time in years, the nationalist camp will hold a large scale rally against United States policies vis-à-vis Israel.
The protest will be held in downtown Jerusalem, on Agron St. on Monday evening, and is being organized by the Residents Committees of Binyamin and Samaria, as well as the nationalist umbrella organization Mateh Maamatz, the Yesha Council of Jewish Communities, and Komemiyut.
Knesset Members and others representing various parties, including the Likud, will speak.
“Not since the days of [U.S. Secretary of State Henry] Kissinger has there been such a protest against American policies,” said MK Yaakov Katz (Ketzaleh), chairman of the National Union party. “The pressure that Barack Hussein Obama is exerting against us to simply stop growing and stop living will not work.”
The Obama administration has made it clear that Israel must stop building of all types throughout Judea and Samaria (Yesha), as well as in parts of Israel’s capital city that were liberated during the Six Day War of 1967.
Full story at Arutz Sheva.
Hey, you know what else is weird? Remember Obama's spiritual mentor, Jeremiah Wright? Remember that Wright's church honored Louis Farrakhan?
Well, Farrakhan has the inside dope—bad pun, okay—on who killed Michael Jackson.
Let's take a look at the usual suspects:
1) Greedy physicians writing hundreds of prescriptions.
2) Michael Jackson killed Michael Jackson.
3) The Zionists, AKA The Jooz.
Answer here.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:20 AM | Comments (29)
July 27, 2009
How I Spent My Summer Vacation
Hamas summer campers reenact the
kidnapping of Cpl. Gilad Schalit.
I lived for the Summer.
That's because I hated school. I hated the cruel teachers and administrators , the boring classes, the schoolyard bullies, the long hours of home work. And I dreaded bringing home those grim report cards that invariably conveyed a single message to my poor parents:
Not living up to his/her potential.
I was assured that this was going into my Permanent Record.
Confession: When I first rolled into Hollywood I had this completely insane fear that my Permanent Record from good ol' Yeshiva Flatbush would somehow find its way to the studio chiefs and they'd realize that I was a dummy and a loser and send me packing back to Brooklyn.
I think we spend one half of our lives being tortured by our teachers and the second half recovering.
Or maybe that's just me.
Whatever.
When Summer rolled around my parents sent me to sleep-a-way camp, always an Orthodox camp in the the Catskills or somewhere in PA.
It was heaven.
We played softball and basketball. Twice a day we went swimming in the lake. I can still feel the goose bumps that sprouted on my skin as I dived into the ice cold water.
We put on plays, took hikes, and we roasted kosher frankfurters over roaring fires.
Catching fireflies in a jar was kind of magical—until they suffocated.
Anyway, the kids in Gaza also go to Summer Camp, but their experience is—what a shock—eerily reminiscent of Hitler Youth:
Children in Hamas summer camps reenacted the abduction of IDF soldier Gilad Schalit in the presence of top Hamas officials, according to pictures obtained by The Jerusalem Post.
According to Israeli defense officials, more than 120,000 Palestinian children are spending the summer in Hamas-run camps. In addition to religious studies, the children undergo semi-military training with toy guns.
At a recent summer camp graduation ceremony, the children put on a show reenacting the June 2006 abduction of Schalit. Present was Osama Mazini, a senior Hamas political leader, who is in charge of the Schalit negotiations with Israel on behalf of the terrorist group.
Full story here.
Now let's be clear, so-called Palestinian society is built on two complimentary notions: Jew-hatred, and the religious necessity of destroying the Jewish State.
The so-called Palesinians are not interested in founding a state, for that would entail the hard work of building a working infrastructure. The Islamists in Gaza, and throughout the Arab/Muslim world, yearn for a 7th Century Caliphite. That's why children are indoctrinated into the righteousness of jihad, and that's why even now Sharia Law is being imposed on Gaza.
Israel has no partner for peace, not in the barbaric Arab world and certainly not in the hostile Obama administration. We can only hope that the Netanyahu government will deal with the Iranian nuclear threat in a timely manner, and at the same time properly prepare and train for the next war with Gaza—which is coming sooner rather than later.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:29 AM | Comments (1)
July 26, 2009
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere #227
Jimmy Cagney—who was Irish Catholic, but fluent in Yiddish—insists that Mae Clarke read Haveil Havalim.
Haveil Havalim #227, presented for the first time by Jewschool.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 11:12 AM | Comments (1)
July 24, 2009
Friday Footwear Goes Extra Tiny Formal
Now that Ma'ayan Ariel is walking—at first a Charlie Chaplin shuffle, now a much smoother gait—the big question arises:
What footwear is Ma'ayan going to wear at Offspring #3's wedding?
Offspring #2 scours the N.J. malls for formal footwear.
Nothing. Nada. Zero. Apparently there isn't great demand for Extra Tiny formal footwear.
Offspring #2 skips through the internet and finds what she wants, but she can't order them online and can't find a local retail outlet and so Offspring #2 picks up the phone and puts in an emergency call to her mother because it looks like the shoes are available somewhere in Los Angeles.
Karen accepts the mission, hops into her car and zooms off into a sortie to West Hollywood.
Karen describes For Kids Only as: “Loehmann's for kids.”
Target acquired.
Karen pulls the trigger.
And ships the leather shoes back to Teaneck.
Karen goes: “They look a little small.”
I'm like: “Why didn't you get a bigger size?”
“They didn't have a bigger size.”
A few days later Offspring #2 conforms that the shoes arrived.
“Do they fit?”
“Yup.”
Sigh of relief.
I ask if it's okay to reveal the shoes before the wedding, or do we have to keep them top secret until after she wears them?
“Oh, Daddy.”
In fact, Ma'ayan is so in love with her new shoes that she wants to wear them all the time.
Karen and I wish all our friends a relatives a lovely and meaningful Shabbat.
Charles Krauthammer explains why Obamacare is sinking.
Israel Matzav reveals that a majority of Israelis—the hard Israeli left is, um, reliably delusional—have finally figured that Barack Hussein Obama cannot be trusted. To which we can only say: What did you expect from a man who described Jew-hater Jeremiah Wright as his “spiritual mentor.”
Let's review: President Obama made an apology tour to Europe and the Middle East, but apologizing to a dedicated and honorable Cambridge police officer is off the table. Gateway Pundit has a nice round-up.
From Front Page Magazine, Jew-hatred at a Jewish Film Festival.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:23 AM | Comments (5)
July 23, 2009
The Great Obama Traveling Patent Medicine Show
In the old days, Medicine Shows rattled along the back roads of rural America dispensing patent medicines that cured, well, everything. The Medicine Man, invariably called Professor, was a talented showman and raconteur. He lectured about his miraculous elixir, mixing grandiose claims with folksy anecdotes.
At some point during the show, one of the rubes in the audience would step forward—sometimes limp forward—and challenge the Professor's claims.
The Professor would dole out a precious teaspoon of his miraculous cure, usually rot-gut whiskey mixed with molasses.
The rube would gulp it down.
And poof.
The rube was was cured.
Of course, the afflicted rube was a plant, in on the con.
Everyone knew that the medicine man was a fraud, but people wanted to believe. They wanted to believe that this salesman was different, that this cure really worked.
Last night, watching President Barack Hussein Obama's press conference, I felt thrust back in time to the con men of the medicine shows. Obama is more polished than the quacks of old, but he's just another snake oil salesman.
And he's got his confederates in the audience: The Press.
Except for ABC's Jake Tapper, who might be the only only honest journalist in the Washington press corps.
Obama is selling a fantasy: He will cut costs and improve health care.
How?
He'll appoint an independent commission—translation: reliable political hacks—and cut waste.
Because that's what government does so well, cut waste.
So much for details.
The oily barker always ended his show with a dynamic flourish, something to put the audience in a buying mood, most often a Hoochie-Coochie girl “from the mysterious East” who swayed her hips while playing a ukulele.
Trust me, at the time this was considered unbelievably sexy.
Anyway, Obama also ended his show with a flourish. Lacking facts about the incident, Obama declared that the Cambridge police “acted stupidly,” thus falling back on the vulgar race hustling of his mentor Jeremiah Wright.
This not so subtle hint that America is still institutionally racist should, Obama and his cynical handlers believe, put the American public in a buying mood.
The question is: are the American people rubes?
Please take a moment to sign this petition.
Update: Joshua Pundit directs our attention to Obama's, um, truth disability.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:17 AM | Comments (12)
July 22, 2009
Obamacare: It's Your Patriotic Duty to Die
Democracies can only function properly when systems of fair arrangements are in place for the majority of its citizens.
Currently, 84% of Americans are covered by health care. Most are satisfied with their insurance.
Do we allow Obama and the Democrats to institute a system in the name of 16% of the population?
And by the way, only an additional 7% will be covered by Obamacare, many of whom are illegal immigrants and young people who have chosen not to pay for insurance at this time in their lives.
This makes no sense. In fact, it is criminal, especially when you consider that the underlying reason for Obamacare is to make more citizens dependent on the Federal government than ever before. This allows the nanny state to solidify the Democrat's hold on voters.
If Obamacare passes, approximately 20% of the American economy will be controlled by the Democrats.
This is not how a healthy democracy functions.
But it is the model of a grim, one size fits all Socialist state.
The first victims of Obamacare will be the elderly.
You prefer a different physician? Tough luck. You get who we deem appropriate.
Need a pacemaker?
Well, you're 82 years old. Too old. Take some medication. A pacemaker is not cost effective.
In short: It's your patriotic duty to die.
From Dick Morris & Eileen McGann.
In two weeks, Obama’s health care plan is likely to become law, ending medicine as we know it in the United States! Unless we can stop him, our own personal access to medical care will be attenuated (no matter if we can pay for it ourselves) and we will all be subject to bureaucratic rationing.
Seeing his popularity draining away rapidly, President Obama has cynically decided to ram through the complex health care legislation in two weeks, without debate or amendment. He is going to give up the attempt to win sixty votes in the Senate and will use the budget reconciliation procedure - which is only used for budget bills - to push it through with fifty votes.
His plan would:
• Force employers either to offer health insurance to their employees or pay a tax of 8% of their payrolls. This would apply to all with payrolls of $250,000 a year or more (basically every business).
• Reduce medical fees to the Medicare Schedule Plus 5%, driving doctors out of the profession and increasing the need for rationing.
• Raise taxes on all making more than $250,000 a year ($350,000 for a couple) with a surcharge. Rates will go as high as 45%.
• Set up a government owned health care plan to compete with private plans. Getting a subsidy, it will soon put the private plans out of business and we will have a single payer Canadian style system.
In Catastrophe, we enumerate the disaster of the Canadian health care system. A cancer death rate 16% higher than in the US. A colon cancer rate 25% higher due to waits for colonoscopies and a death rate once afflicted that is 41% as opposed to 32% in the US. An eight week wait for cancer radiation therapy.
“How can Obama care for fifty million new people without more doctors? By cutting access to care for the elderly. End Medicare as we know it. The government decides who gets hip, knee, or heart surgery. Eight month wait for colonoscopies. In Canada, an eight week wait for cancer radiation. Say no to Obama’s plan. Write Senator Evan Bayh today so you can still see your doctor tomorrow.”
Full article, here.
Martin Kozlowski
In the Wall Street Journal, Governor Bobby Jindal proposes sane, bi-partisan health care reform, and analyzes the lies Obama tells about a bill the Dear Leader has not even read.
Now, please take one minute to sign this petition.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:17 PM | Comments (22)
Rabbis To Obama: Hands Off Jerusalem
Praying at the Kotel, The Western Wall.
Photo: Copyright © Robert J. Avrech
Barack Hussein Obama is, by now, accustomed to a phalanx of obsequious court Jews, among them, David Axelrod, and Rahm Emanuel. And of course there are the compliant Jewish, ahem, leaders, hand picked by Axelrod and Emanuel, to meet the Dear Leader and listen to one of his interminable lectures about issues of which he is completely ignorant.
So, it will probably be something of a shock for the Dear Leader to run up against Orthodox Israeli Rabbis who have no qualms about telling Obama to take a hike.
On second thought, I'm pretty sure that Obama will shrug this off as further evidence of Jewish aggression.
Because ideologically, that's how The Supreme Leader rolls.
Heads of the Pikuach Nefesh rabbinical committee have begun collecting the signatures of rabbis in Israel on a letter to United States President Barack Obama. The letter demands that Obama cease talking about ending Jewish construction in Jerusalem and stop pressuring Israel in that direction.
In a reference to the upcoming “nine days” which culminate in Tisha B’Av, the rabbis tell Obama that “during these days, in which the Jewish people mourns the destruction of Jerusalem and marks the disgraceful memory of its destroyers, we are certain that you, Mr. Barack Obama, do not want to enter that disreputable list of those who raise their hand to strike Jerusalem and those who live in it.”
The rabbis note that during his visit to the Middle East, Obama showed “impressive erudition” in the Koran. “As one who is familiar with the Koran, you surely know that the city of Jerusalem is not even mentioned in it once,” they said.
...The rabbinical letter ends with a clear request: “If you, Mr. Obama. Wish to leave any chance at all for peace and quiet in the Middle East, take your hands off the Holy City of Jerusalem right now!”
Two hundred and fifty rabbis have signed the appeal, and efforts are being made to collect the signatures of almost every single rabbi in Israel before the letter is sent to Washington.
Full story, here.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:07 AM | Comments (4)
July 21, 2009
Hollywood: The Head Game
Lilyan Tashman, considered one of Hollywood's most stylish stars in the 20's, was born and raised in Brooklyn to an Orthodox Jewish family. Before breaking into the movies, Lilyan was a Ziegfeld girl with Marion Davies and Peggy Hopkins Joyce. Here, Lilyan appears properly elegant in a hat that looks like a yarmulke on steroids.
Step into an Orthodox synagogue on Shabbat, the Sabbath, and you’ll notice that married women cover their hair, donning hats, scarves, or sometimes just an elegant patch of lace. Hat variations are endless, and to yours truly, fascinating.
In Israel, you can usually pinpoint a woman’s religious and political ideology—Modern Orthodox, Right Wing Hasidic, Hippie Hasidic, Orthodox Feminist, Black Hat Orthodox, Gun Toting Settler (totally hot!)—by noting the head gear she favors.
Now, step back in time to Hollywood’s Golden Age and you will discover that an astonishing variety of hats are part of almost every wardrobe, and frequently used in studio generated publicity stills. Unlike today, classic Hollywood understood that elegant and creative millinery conveys multiple meanings that are a valuable part of a star’s glamorous arsenal.
To read my complete story, head on over to Big Hollywood.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:31 AM | Comments (4)
July 20, 2009
Rape the Virgins or They'll Go to Paradise
I'm no longer shocked by human cruelty.
History is a wheel that plays reruns of human depravity 24/7.
What does surprise me is the extent of denial in the West regarding Iran and the mullahs who rule that unhappy land.
When Barack Hussein Obama insists that dialog with these butchers is necessary, he is, in effect legitimizing the evil of that Islamic theocracy.
In fact, Obama's foreign policy initiatives have aligned America with some of the most repressive regimes on earth: Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Zelaya in Honduras. Obama has played kissy-face with North Korea, Syria, Cuba, Hamas, Fatah, and most recently the Russians made Obama look like an amateur in a game of high-stakes poker.
Well gee, I suppose if Obama could sit for over 20-years and contentedly listen to Jeremiah Wright curse America and Israel and honor a proud Jew-hater like Louis Farrakhan, the mullahs are—yawn—just more of the same.
As for the 78% of American Jews who voted for Obama, don't you think it's time for some serious self-reflection.
In a shocking and unprecedented interview, directly exposing the inhumanity of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's religious regime in Iran, a serving member of the paramilitary Basiji militia has told this reporter of his role in suppressing opposition street protests in recent weeks.
He said he had been a highly regarded member of the force, and had so "impressed my superiors" that, at 18, "I was given the 'honor' to temporarily marry young girls before they were sentenced to death."
In the Islamic Republic it is illegal to execute a young woman, regardless of her crime, if she is a virgin, he explained. Therefore a "wedding" ceremony is conducted the night before the execution: The young girl is forced to have sexual intercourse with a prison guard—essentially raped by her "husband."
"I regret that, even though the marriages were legal," he said.
Why the regret, if the marriages were "legal?"
"Because," he went on, "I could tell that the girls were more afraid of their 'wedding' night than of the execution that awaited them in the morning. And they would always fight back, so we would have to put sleeping pills in their food. By morning the girls would have an empty expression; it seemed like they were ready or wanted to die.
"I remember hearing them cry and scream after [the rape] was over," he said. "I will never forget how this one girl clawed at her own face and neck with her finger nails afterwards. She had deep scratches all over her."
Elder of Ziyon has the complete story.
Omri Ceren at Mere Rhetoric picks up the thread.
Soccer Dad reminds us that raping the virgins before execution has a literary and historical precedent.
And hey, why not allow the mullahs to acquire nuclear weapons?
Obviously, a regime that believes so deeply in the sanctity of marriage can be trusted to act rationally.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:08 AM | Comments (20)
July 19, 2009
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere #226
The Girl's Rifle Team, U. of Maryland, 1925 are big supporters of the 2nd Amendment and Haveil Havalim.
Jack is on deck. He takes a few practice swings, then steps up to the plate to present Haveil Havalim #226.
Home run.
In Communist dictatorships the past is constantly being erased and revised to suit the ideological needs of the ruling class.
Here's President Barack Hussein Obama working off the exact same playbook.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:26 AM | Comments (3)
July 17, 2009
Friday Flickers: Bombshell
Bombshell, (1933) starring Jean Harlow, Lee Tracy, Frank Morgan, Una Merkel and Franchot Tone.
Harlow plays Harlow. That's what this film is all about.
Jean Harlow, spitting world-weary wisecracks and fed-up with Hollywood's merry-go-round insanity, is Lola Burns, a Hollywood sexpot. Her father and brother are always looking for handouts, and the studio publicity flack cooks up outrageous publicity stunts to add heat to an overheated reputation as a smoldering blond bombshell.
Harlow, a hugely appealing and gifted comedienne, delivers the best, most energized performance of her short career. She died tragically of renal failure at age 26. And though her career was brief, she was, from 1931 to 1937, an enormous star. Depression era audiences sparked to her blond bombshell image, sensing a down to earth girl next door who just happened to be draped in clinging silk gowns—it was obvious she wasn't wearing underwear—ermine robes, and diamond necklaces.
In truth, like Lola, Harlow yearned for a normal life of domesticity: a comfortable home, a loving husband and happy children. Sadly, she was thwarted by wretched judgment in men, and a monstrously overbearing mother who controlled every aspect of her daughter's life and career.
The great director Victor Fleming with ace screenwriters John Lee Mahin and Jules Furthman cooked up this Hollywood tale as a thinly disguised look at Fleming's former lover, silent film star Clara Bow. Fleming observed that Bow's life was, on the surface, a glamorous Hollywood dream, but when Bow went home at night, her mansion was filled with dog droppings and her deeply unstable family soaked her for every penny she earned. Bombshell is a screwball comedy before Hollywood invented that most entertaining genre.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a miracle in Shabbat.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 06:40 AM | Comments (7)
July 16, 2009
Dems Make War on the War Against Islamic Terror
Four Dear Leaders: Barack Hussein Obama, Yasser Arafat, Abu Maazen, and
Khalid Meshal. Hope n' Change in Gaza.
The CIA actually had a top secret program to assassinate Al Qaeda leaders.
Shocking.
That a program existed to assassinate al Qaeda leaders should certainly come as no surprise to anyone. It has been well-publicized that the Clinton administration had launched military operations and attempted to use covert programs to strike the al Qaeda leadership in the wake of the 1998 East Africa embassy bombings. In fact, the Clinton administration has come under strong criticism for not doing more to decapitate al Qaeda prior to 2001. Furthermore, since 2002, the CIA has conducted scores of strikes against al Qaeda targets in Pakistan using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) like the MQ-1 Predator and the larger MQ-9 Reaper.
These strikes have dramatically increased over the past two years and the pace did not slacken when the Obama administration came to power in January. So far in 2009 there have been more than two dozen UAV strikes in Pakistan alone. In November 2002, the CIA also employed a UAV to kill Abu Ali al-Harithi, a senior al Qaeda leader suspected of planning the October 2000 attack against the USS Cole. The U.S. government has also attacked al Qaeda leaders at other times and in other places, such as the May 1, 2008, attack against al Qaeda-linked figures in Somalia using an AC-130 gunship.
Snip!
In light of these facts, it would appear that there was nothing particularly controversial about the covert assassination program itself, and the controversy that has arisen over it has more to do with the failure to report covert activities to Congress. The political uproar and the manner in which the program was canceled, however, will likely have a negative impact on CIA morale and U.S. counterterrorism efforts.
To read Stratfor's complete analysis, please click here.
So: the CIA didn't inform Congress about a secret program.
That's weird. Maybe—and I'm just throwing this out there—the CIA isn't all that anxious to see their alpha level security files compromised, leaked to the reliably irresponsible N.Y. Times.
Just saying.
By now it should be apparent—to the sane—that the Democrats cannot be trusted with national security.
Currently, we have a Democrat dominated Congress at war with the CIA, and a CIA Chief who seems more an Obama apparatchik than a man whose job it is to protect and defend the United States of America from foreign threats.
Now, CIA operatives and all members of our security branches will have to lawyer up every time they take a meeting or write a memo.
The big chill is underway.
INTERPOLATION
Hey, have you noticed that U.S. forces don't take prisoners anymore? We're just turning them into red mist with missiles fired from high altitude drones.
You know why?
Because we have no place to put them.
Obama, in his infinite wisdom, has validated every terrorist charge against Gitmo, by vowing to close the perfect facility in which to house these knuckleheads.
Once, our intelligence operatives reaped high-value intelligence from Islamist prisoners.
But those days are over. Now, we're just killing them, thereby relinquishing potentially vital intel that could be used in the war against transnational Islamic terror.
And besides, even if we do capture a few Islamo Nazis, who in his right mind is going to interrogate them?
Imagine the scene:
CIA Guy #1: “Saddle up, we got orders to interrogate Muhammed.”
CIA Guy #2: “Um, think I'll pass. I don't feel like getting investigated by Congress and the Justice Department.”
CIA Guy #1: “Dude, the order comes directly from President Obama, our Commander-in-Chief himself.”
CIA Guy #2: “Fine. Let him conduct the interrogation. Let him question the Haji and then get indicted for whatever. I'm gonna kick back and watch The Third Man. Awesome Anton Karas score. Most people think that it's a balalaika, but it's actually a zither.”
END INTERPOLATION
Anyhoo.
it's good new/bad news time.
Good news first:
Like Jimmy "Jihad" Carter, Obama will be a one-term president.
The bad news:
This country may not survive the one-term.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:01 AM | Comments (7)
July 15, 2009
Jewish Sex Gum Destroying Palestinian Youth
Beware Arab youth, the International Zionist Conspiracy will chew you up and spit you out.
Hey, I have a fab-u-lous idea, let's give these lunatics a state of their very own.
What could possibly go wrong?
Is Israel targeting the Palestinian population in Gaza by distributing libido-increasing chewing gum in the Strip? A Hamas police spokesman in the Gaza Strip Islam Shahwan claimed Monday that Israeli intelligence operatives are attempting to "destroy" the young generation by distributing such materials in the coastal enclave.
Shahwan said that the police got their hands on gum that increases sexual desire that, according to him, reaches merchants in the Strip by way of the border crossings. According to him, a Palestinian drug dealer admitted that he sold products that increase sex drive. The dealer said that he received the materials from Israeli sources by way of the Karni crossing.
A number of suspects have been arrested.
Full story here.
Quick, get Human Rights Watch to investigate this atrocity.
Whoops, not available, they are on a fund raising tour in that model of human rights: Saudi Arabia
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:54 AM | Comments (13)
July 14, 2009
Hollywood Unmasked: Latin Lover is Kosher Butcher's Son
Ricardo Cortez with Greta Garbo in The Torrent, 1926.
Ricardo Cortez (1899-1977) was a handsome and talented leading man whose image, in the silent era, was that of a hot-blooded Latin lover.
In truth, his name was Jacob Krantz, the son of a kosher butcher, born and raised in the mean streets of New York’s Lower East Side.
Cortez worked as a runner on Wall Street while training to be an actor at night. Soon his good looks afforded him an opportunity to break into the young but flourishing movie business. Paramount groomed the tall and handsome Cortez by giving him bit parts, and then moving him up to more substantial roles.
To read my entire profile of Ricardo Cortez, head on over to Big Hollywood.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:36 AM | Comments (1)
July 13, 2009
Apocalypse Now and Then
Nothing to worry about here. Just another culture expressing its timeless values.
When I was a kid growing up in Brooklyn, there was this guy who used to climb up on one of the benches on Ocean Parkway and Avenue N where he would rant and rave, warning us that the end of the world was near. He predicted that the seas would rise and swallow cities, great fires would turn entire countries into glowing embers, food would become scarce and people would turn into cannibals.
My buddies and I cracked up: “That's not kosher!”
At first we kids who played in the streets were a bit scared of this disheveled and odorous lunatic. But after a while we realized he was just a harmless nut job.
Well, now the nut jobs are in power.
If the Senate doesn't pass a bill to cut global warming, Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer says, there will be dire results: droughts, floods, fires, loss of species, damage to agriculture, worsening air pollution and more.
I don't think it's a coincidence that global warming hysteria—oh wait, they deleted the term global warming because, well, it's so obviously not.
Now, the correct terminology is climate change.
Y'know, out of the box phenomena like: rain, sunshine, snow, hail, wind.
The weather.
Pesky stuff.
It's not a coincidence that such fashionable hysteria has taken hold of the chattering classes at this point in history.
The Islamist world has declared war on Western civilization, but, liberals tells us, the real threat is the weather.
In this way, sophisticates avoid confronting militant Islam.
They take a pass on fighting evil.
It's the inevitable outcome of multicultural indoctrination and fanaticism.
And it fits quite nicely into the Marxist model, still alive and well among the, ahem, well educated.
Much more comfortable to make war on American corporations for having the chutzpah to create wealth and higher standards of living.
Anyway, my buddies and I once challenged Marty—we were on a first name basis with Brooklyn's Prophet of Doom:
“Hey, Marty, how do you know all this stuff?”
“Because, children, I am blessed!”
Which, in retrospect, seems like a much saner and more credible explanation than the junk science used by today's prophets of doom.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:28 AM | Comments (12)
July 12, 2009
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere #225
Karen's thinking: “I'd rather be reading Haveil Havalim.”
Haveil Havalim #225, is up and live. Maya, from How to Be Israeli, has done a wonderful job of organizing this round-up of the best of the Jewish Blogosphere.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 06:56 AM | Comments (4)
July 10, 2009
Friday Footwear: Born to Bop
Ma'ayan Ariel loved these shoes, but they don't come in her size.
It happens in the blink of an eye.
Karen and I were in Teaneck just a few weeks ago and Ma'ayan Ariel was cruising along, gripping couches, chairs, walls, using our legs as support.
Two days after arriving home, Karen and I are iChatting with Offspring #2 and at the edge of the computer screen Ma'ayan Ariel is bopping around like a pinball.
“She's walking,” Karen cries.
“Yeah,” says Offspring #3.
I go: “It's a miracle, like the Six Day War.”
A somewhat insane analogy, but whatever.
Ma'ayan Ariel's first walking shoes.
Offspring #3 went shopping for shoes at the local Nordstrom's.
“How'd you pick them? I need details for Friday Footwear.”
“There wasn't much choice, Daddy. These were the only shoes in her size.”
"What's the color, I can't tell, the screen resolution isn't so hot.”
“Pink. Pretty in pink.”
“Cute.”
“Watch out, Daddy,” Offspring #2 grins, “Maya's in training for much more expensive footwear.”
“DNA is a wonderful thing.”
“Soon she'll be talking,” I predict.
“Mow-er! Mow-er! Mow-er!” Cries Ma'ayan Ariel.
Ma'ayan Ariel is ready to walk down the aisle at Offspring #3's August wedding.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a miraculous Shabbat.
My friend Omri Ceren at Mere Rhetoric informs us that it's finally happened: Obama has united Jews and Arabs—in mocking The Dear Leader's moronic Iranian Policy.
Bookworm Room, who might be the only Republican in the Bay Area—hey, how about some stimulus money for that endangered species—observes that Marie Antoinette has taken up residence in the White House. Hmm, what happened to that whole oh-so-fashionable-but-budget-minded J. Crew thing?
Over in happy go lucky Somalia, Weasel Zippers reports that Sharia law is in full bloom as Islamists behead seven people accused of being “Christians” and “Spies”. We fully expect Barack Hussein Obama to apologize to the Muslim world for this latest colonial outrage against the religion of peace.
The always articulate and well informed Charles Krauthammer reminds us that Obama has just promised the Russians military concessions even Jimmy Carter didn't contemplate. Obama has handed a gift to the Russians—who are not our friends—that will most certainly damage America's national security. Obama is not merely naive and inexperienced, he's dangerous.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:59 AM | Comments (8)
July 09, 2009
Art as Prayer, Prayer as Art
Moshe Hammer, Z'L.
True genius is a rare commodity.
Five years ago, 26-year-old Moshe Hammer, z"l, a Lubavitch artist who frequently worked through the night, stepped outside for a walk in Los Angeles, to clear his head and recharge his creative batteries. As was his custom, Moshe rambled miles from his apartment in the Fairfax district.
Tragically, Moshe was struck by a truck and instantly killed.
For two days, Moshe's parents, Joan "Pessie" and Yosef Hammer, did not hear from their son. They were frantic, searching the neighborhood, calling friends, trying to locate Moshe.
Two days after Moshe's disappearance, July 15, 2004, there was a knock at the door; a local rabbi, rebbetzin and a police officer delivered the tragic news.
A few days later, Pessie Hammer went to clear out her son's apartment. In the bottom drawer of his desk she discovered over three hundred black and white ink drawings.
Mrs. Hammer knew that her son was a talented artist. As a child, Moshe drew comic books with hard-charging superheroes and sold them to his classmates. But Pessie and Yosef, a postal worker, had no idea that their son's body of work was so massive and of such quality.
Ma'ariv, the Evening prayer for Sabbath and Festivals.
Sorting through Moshe's work, Pessie discovered that Moshe had illustrated a Passover Haggadah, a Book of Esther, The Song of Songs, as well as the entire Siddur.
I met the Hammers when Pessie wrote to me after reading an article about our son Ariel Chaim, a"h, that I wrote for The Jewish Press. We lost Ariel a year earlier and understood exactly what the Hammer family was enduring.
Sitting in their comfortable Fairfax home, my wife Karen and I offered a measure of comfort to this fine family. The Hammers generously allowed us to examine Moshe's drawings.
Havdalah, Farewell Ceremony to the Sabbath.
I sorted through the single sheets one at a time. Nothing prepared me for the stunning images that overflowed with intricate details. I was dumbfounded by the inner coherence of each work. It was as if I had discovered a genizah of Jewish art in, of all places, Hollywood.
"What do you think?" Yosef asked me.
"Your son was a genius," I said with no hesitation whatsoever.
Moshe Hammer's art can best be understood as a cross between medieval illuminated manuscripts and the modernity of a sophisticated comic book. Hebrew letters dance like Chassidic Jews. The calligraphy and drawings reveal Moshe's intensive study of the traditional commentaries of the sacred texts.
To read my entire article, please head on over to The Jewish Press.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:55 AM | Comments (6)
July 08, 2009
Stimulus #1 Fails: It's All Sarah Palin's Fault
Quick Hollywood story regarding incompetence and the necessity of shouldering responsibility.
A few years ago I was Executive Producer of a TV pilot that I wrote. I had an efficient and creative director, a good cast, and, I thought, a fine DP, Director of Photography.
First day's rushes were murky. The lighting on our leading lady made her look about ten years older than she was. There was no kick in her eyes and no shading for her close-ups. It was shocking, totally amateur.
The network suits asked me what the heck was going on and I was like, I'll have a talk with our DP.
An exec said: “Fire him.”
I was not ready to do that. I saw myself as a nice guy.
I had a talk with the DP. He swore up and down to correct his work.
On set, the lighting looked the same. Which is to say: crap. I tried talking to the DP but he said he knew exactly what he was doing. He treated me with contempt because he was a professional and what did I, a writer, know about the complexities of lighting.
I was furious, sick to my stomach.
We only had a ten day shooting schedule.
Rushes that night were—you guessed it—horrible.
The network exec said: “I'm not gonna say I told you so.”
I fired our DP, hired a new crew, but the network would not allow me to go over-budget and reshoot my two lost days.
The production never recovered; the pilot was no good and the network passed on the series.
I screwed up.
Me.
I hired the wrong DP, and then rewarded his incompetence.
Lessons learned? When professionals fail to perform, replace them. Compassion is misplaced for it signals weakness.
Barack Hussein Obama was elected to do a job.
He has no idea what he's doing.
We can't fire him—yet—but we can and should put a stop to his reign of economic terror, or we will all drown in a crisis of debt. Soon, the dollar will be devalued and our savings will be worth much less than they should be.
U.S. leaders should be open to the possibility of a second stimulus package to jolt the economy out of a recession still causing job losses, House of Representatives Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said on Tuesday.
Full story, here.
Let's see, we're spending 100 million dollars a day—yup, no lie—on interest for the first sinkhole of a stimulus that has not, will not, cannot work.
But if you're a big government, big tax, big spending progressive/liberal/Democrat—what do they call themselves these days?—what could be more logical than to initiate another spending spree—financed by massive tax increases—because, really, the world as it is makes no impression at all. It's all about the world as they wish it to be.
Hey, guess what happened when Maryland decided to tax its millionaires.
State revenues declined because the millionaires got out of Dodge.
Here's what the Democrats will do to deny responsibility for their disastrous economic policies:
1. Blame George Bush.
2. Blame Sarah Palin.
3. Blame global warming, I mean, uh, climate change AKA The Weather.
4. Blame Israeli Settlements.
5. Blame Sarah Palin. Again.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:46 AM | Comments (14)
July 07, 2009
The Great Obama Moscow Giveaway
Hellooooo!
Anybody home, anybody paying attention?
The mullahs in Iran are clamping down on the growing chaos. There are mass hangings, arrests and torture of dissidents. But Barack Hussein Obama, by default, has sided with the tyrants by not meddling. Generations of freedom-loving Persians will curse the name of Barack Hussein Obama.
Honduras fought off a coup from Zelaya, a power-mad leftist—duh—and Obama has come out in lock-step with the Castro bros. and Hugo Chavez for the leftist tyrant wannabee.
North Korea is firing off missiles every ten minutes and in response Obama bounces over to Russia where he should be talking tough about Russian support of the Iranian nuclear program, Russian support for the North Korean nukes—y'know, stuff that actually matters to our national security.
Instead, Obama is in the process of selling out America's strategic interests and our allies: Poland, Ukraine, Georgia, the Czech Republic, and of course, Israel.
Hey, remember Obama's talk about, ahem, tough diplomacy?
Well, this is it, folks.
Except the tough diplomacy is directed at Israel.
Because we all know that Jooz are far more dangerous than Muslim terrorists, and Iranian or North Korean nukes.
We know because Jeremiah Wright said so. For over 20-years. To Obama.
Obama's foreign policy can best be summarized as: appeasement on steroids.
As one fine officer in our armed services wrote privately to Seraphic Secret: “For the first time in my career I am convinced that our Commander in Chief is not fit to be the town dog catcher.”
President Obama went to Moscow desperate for the appearance of a foreign-policy success. He got that illusion — at a substantial cost to America's security.
The series of signing ceremonies in a grand Kremlin hall and the litany of agreements, accords and frameworks implied that the United States benefited from all the fuss. We didn't.
We got nothing of real importance. But the government of puppet-master Vladimir Putin (nominally just prime minister) got virtually all it wanted. In Moscow, this was Christmas in July.
Snip.
President Obama's ideological bias against nuclear weapons dates back to his undergraduate years. Yet those weapons kept the peace between the world's great powers for 64 years. A few remarks about deterrence notwithstanding, Obama just doesn't get it.
He agreed to trim our nuclear-warhead arsenal by one-third and — even more dangerously — to cut the systems that deliver the nuclear payloads. In fact, the Russians don't care much about our warhead numbers (which will be chopped to a figure "between 1,500 and 1,675"). What they really wanted — and got — was a US cave-in regarding limits on our nuclear-capable bombers, submarines and missiles that could leave us with as few as 500 such systems, if the Russians continue to get their way as the final details are negotiated.
Moscow knows we aren't going to start a nuclear war with Russia. Putin (forget poor "President" Dmitry Medvedev) wants to gut our conventional capabilities to stage globe-spanning military operations. He wants to cut us down to Russia's size.
Our problem is that many nuclear-delivery systems — such as bombers or subs — are "dual-use": A B-2 bomber can launch nukes, but it's employed more frequently to deliver conventional ordnance.
Putin sought to cripple our ability to respond to international crises. Obama, meanwhile, was out for "deliverables" — deals that could be signed in front of the cameras. Each man got what he wanted.
Full story, by Ralph Peters, here.
And now, some words of wisdom from the Emperor Obama:
“The future does not belong to those who gather armies on a field of battle or bury missiles in the ground.”
—Barack Hussein Obama, July 7, 2009 Moscow, Russia
No doubt, the Islamist world, North Korea and totalitarians everywhere are doing hand stands. America has, at last, installed a true-believing radical in the White House.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:10 AM | Comments (12)
July 06, 2009
Good Thing Obama Didn't Meddle or Else Mullahs Might Hang 'Em High
Mass hangings of Iranian dissidents in Iran.
Let's review:
1) Barack Hussein Obama was reluctant to meddle in Iranian affairs because the Mullahs might accuse America of meddling in Iranian affairs.
2) The Mullahs immediately accuse America of meddling in Iranian affairs because they are a bunch of anti-American theocrats who checkmate Obama at every turn.
I'm gratified that the Republicans vocally and forcefully support the Iranian dissidents.
Meanwhile, over in happy go lucky Honduras, President Manuel Zelaya tried to strong-arm himself as El Presidente for Life and was deposed by his congress and the military and Obama immediately jumped in and, ahem, meddled—on the side of a leftist dictator.
Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright must be so proud.
Is it my imagination or does Obama pretty much always cozy up to totalitarians—the Arab Muslim world, Honduras, Cuba, Chavez, The Mullahs—and play hard ball with our allies: Poland, India, the Czech Republic, Taiwan, Israel, Japan, South Korea.
Furthermore, Obama has not a clue as to how to deal with North Korea.
So how is Obama going to deal with the murderous Mullahs?
Sanctions?
Nah, that might make them angry.
No wonder Israel and Saudi Arabia and Egypt have formed an alliance against Iran.
It's clear that every foreign policy initiative Obama has undertaken is a disaster. His current trip to Russia is just silly. What difference does it make if we have a few less nukes? While we downgrade our nuclear capabilities the bad guys, Iran and North Korea are building theirs. And of course, proliferation to Islamic non-state players is emerging as a very real scenario.
Barack Hussein Obama, a radical leftist left unchecked, will unleash the forces of oppression against world-wide democratic reform and heap dishonor on these United States.
Amid mounting reports of a series of executions carried out by the Iranian authorities in recent days following the disputed presidential elections last month, an Iranian lawyer has given this reporter an insight into the legal struggles he is facing in trying to defend some of those now in detention for participating in opposition protests.
The state-run Fars news agency reported that 20 people were hanged at the Karaj prison west of the capital on Saturday, and another 14 executions elsewhere in Iran have been reported by state media since Wednesday, including six hangings at Teheran's Evin Prison. Many of those executed have been described in state media as drug traffickers — a charge often leveled at dissidents.
Iranian police say that about 1,000 people have been detained for involvement in the public protests that erupted after June 12 presidential elections.
Full story, here.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:02 AM | Comments (10)
July 05, 2009
Reborn on the Fourth of July
L.B. Mayer, a man without a birth date.
Every Independence Day, L.B. Mayer (1884 - 1957) would shut down production at MGM and celebrate twin holidays: America’s birth, and the birthday of L.B. Mayer.
Flags and bunting graced every building and sound stage. There was band music and rows of picnic tables groaning under the weight of food.
Every MGM star was expected to attend and pay homage to America—and to L.B. Mayer. For in Mayer’s mind, the two were inseparable. All complied, except Greta Garbo, a woman far too narcissistic to lavish attention on any country or person other than her own mirrored island.
Though Yiddish was his first language, L.B. Mayer delivered a rousing Fourth of July speech. Mayer could be a forceful English speaker, mixing deeply personal anecdotes—usually about his beloved mother—and soaring rhetoric about his adopted home, America.
To date, every Mayer biographer and film writer with whom I’m familiar repeats the familiar anecdote in which Mayer “claimed to have lost his birth certificate” when crossing from Europe to America. The quotation marks tell us—with a condescending wink and nudge—that Mayer fibbed in order to adopt July Fourth as his birthday, thereby conflating his identity with America’s.
However, the truth of Mayer’s birth date can best be appreciated and understood within the context of the Eastern European Jewish culture from which the junk man turned film pioneer emerged.
L.B. Mayer, real name Lazar Meir, was born in Minsk, today the capital of Belarus, but at the time part of the Russian Empire known as The Pale of Settlement where Jews were forced to reside by the viciously anti-Semitic Tzar.
To read my entire July 4th post, head on over to Big Hollywood.
A Time of the Signs hosts Haveil Havalim #224, The Fourth of July Edition.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:04 AM | Comments (7)
July 02, 2009
Friday Flickers: Gun Crazy
By 1950, the Hollywood studio system was in steep decline. Television was flattening the landscape, and because stars were no longer under contract to the studios, the star system—invented by L.B. Mayer—was all but dead.
It was a bad time for American movies.
The last great film genre was also quickly fading.
Film noir, black or dark films, a post WWII phenomenon, was characterized by dark, urban landscapes where dangerous dames seduced cynical men into crime, betrayal, and death.
Gun Crazy, 1950, is one of the last, great noir movies.
But it doesn't fit neatly into the noir category because much of the story takes place in wide open rural spaces—which, to me, gives the film so much power. We don't expect noir in the mid-west.
John Dall plays Bart Tare, a young man who has always liked guns. He gets into a world of trouble when, as a kid, he breaks into a store to steal a six-shooter. Bart's friends explain to the judge that Bart likes gun, but he would never kill anything. He won't even kill an animal.
File away that last piece of information as the major set-up of the film.
For every movie set-up, you have to provide a payoff.
And the payoff in Gun Crazy is perfect.
No spoilers here, you must watch this film.
After getting out of the army, Bart attends a carnival where he meets sharpshooter, Annie Laurie Starr—“So beautiful, so dangerous...”— played by Welsh born Peggy Cummins—her voice is mesmerizing, like a finely-tuned musical instrument.
Annie and Bart engage in a sharp shooting contest. It's one of the most erotic sequences in movie history for the man and woman—gunslingers in heat—are doing a mating dance as they blast away.
Later, Bart sums up their relationship:
“We go together, Annie. I don't know why. Maybe like guns and ammunition go together.”
Annie and Bart end up on the road, broke, and Annie talks the reluctant Bart into committing a robbery:
"I told you I'm a bad girl, didn't ?"
Soon, Bart and Peggy are on a full throttle crime spree and the cops are closing in on the doomed couple.
The clip I've chosen is, to my mind, the greatest bank heist in movie history.
It's done in one take. Dall and Cummings, dressed in their carnival outfits, improvise dialog as they drive down the highway, enter a town—the scene was shot in Montrose, CA—and cruise to a stop outside the bank. Because the scene is shot in one take, in real time, the suspense is nearly unbearable.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a miraculous Shabbat.
Have a wonderful July 4th weekend and keep in mind that freedom is never free.
And hey, Jewish Democrats have been hit, en masse, with a deadly ailment: Cognitive Dissonance.
Meanwhile, Barack Hussein Obama, has finally chosen sides in Iran. Want to to take a guess where The Dear Leader stands?
Pop Quiz: What's the difference between The Washington Post and a prostitute?
Answer: Nothing.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 04:31 PM | Comments (9)
Full Body Shmatte and the Assault on Civilization
Recently, France banned the burqa—excellent move—and of course, Al Qaeda has promised revenge.
I'm sure the ACLU would argue that if you ban the burqa the next step is banning yarmulkes.
But honestly, those who wear yarmulkes—Orthodox Jews like yours truly—are not seeking to undermine the West and replace democratic, freedom loving societies with a barbaric 7th Century Islamic theocracy where Jews are eliminated, homosexuals are hanged, public beheadings are frequent, women are stoned to death, and all minority religions are oppressed.
Let's face it, the burqa is part and parcel of the Islamist war against western civilization.
Pop Quiz: To whom do you think the women wearing burqas are married?
The first rule of war is: know your enemy.
Predictably, Barack Hussein Obama chooses to turn this bit of obvious wisdom on its head. Like all leftists, Obama redefines enemies as friends and friends as enemies.
In leftist circles— a group deeply attracted to totalitarian impulses—this is called “nuanced thinking.”
Pat Condell makes you laugh out loud, but as with all great comedy, his observations have the unmistakable ring of truth.
New York has a law, dating from 1845, that allows loitering charges against someone who is "masked or in any manner disguised by unusual or unnatural attire or facial alteration."
Simply put, the masks are a security threat.
Naturally, the KKK claims that the law is unconstitutional.
I am not a lawyer and I have no idea if it's unconstitutional or not.
I'm just an average American citizen with some common sense, and I don't believe that the Constitution is a document that compels national suicide.
Further, it seems to me that masked people—we have no idea if they're male or female, because they're wearing full body shmattes—are an implicit threat to civilized society.
I mean, look, when a masked, uh, thing, walks into a bank, what's the natural reaction?
You shoot them.
It's called self-defense.
Phyllis Chesler explores the issue of banning the burqa in America. She's also taking a poll and I voted, duh, Yes.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 06:31 AM | Comments (16)
July 01, 2009
No No No, Which Really Means, No
I'm often told by those who usually know nothing about the Arab-Israeli conflict that: “It's complicated.”
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The Arabs have consistently rejected the notion of a Jewish homeland, denied the basic facts of Jewish history, and said, “No, No, No” to every overture for a peaceful settlement that envisions anything less than the destruction of Israel.
Let's be clear, the conflict is not geographical but ideological.
Islam violently rejects the notion of a Jewish State.
Here's a short video that traces Arab rejectionism, a polite term for incipient genocide.
But have no fear, Barack Hussein Obama is going to fix everything—by saying “No” to you know who.
But yes, yes, yes, to Muslim states.
Thus, the Netanyahu government will be saying no to Obama's July 4 picnics.
And to think, 78% of American Jews voted for Obama.
Not only is Mr. Hope and Change destroying the American economy with a push towards European type Socialism, but he's ideologically driven against the State of Israel and in the process of detonating relations between America and the Jewish State with the fervor of a true leftist believer.
Shocking, huh?
Who said Jews are smart?
And, hey, congratulations to Minnesota for electing this man to the Senate.
Just goes to show what you can achieve when you change the rules.
Well, as I said about Barack Hussein Obama: bad for America, good for blogging.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:05 AM | Comments (4)