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November 30, 2009
The Jewish Prisoner: Past, Present and Future
Headstones of Rabbi Meir of Rothenburg and Alexander ben
Shlomo Wimpfen in the Jewish cemetery in Worms, Germany.
Rabbi Meir of Rothenberg (1215 – 2 May 1293) was one of the greatest Jewish scholars of the Medieval age.
In Paris, Rabbi Meir witnessed the public burning of twenty-four cart loads of the Talmud by Louis IX on Friday, June 17, 1244.
In Germany, he was the Rabbi for several large Jewish communities. Rabbi Meir founded and financed an important yeshiva in Rothenberg where many of his students went on to become some of the best known and most important Halachic, Jewish law, authorities.
Rabbi Meir was acknowledged as the leading Ashkenazi authority on Talmud and Jewish law. The Jewish communities in France, Italy, and Germany frequently turned to Rabbi Meir for guidance. So great was his scholarship and wisdom that he was known as The Light of the Exile.
Among his disciples were the towering Rabenu Asher ben Jehiel and Rabbi Mordecai ben Hillel Ashkenazi.
In 1286 King Rudolph I declared the Jews of his lands servi camerae—serfs of the treasury—which destroyed Jewish political freedoms, in effect encouraging official persecution of the Jews. Rabbi Meir, his family, and scores of other Jews tried to flee the German lands, but Rabbi Meir was captured in Lombardy and imprisoned in a fortress near Ensisheim in Alsace.
Knowing that Rabbi Meir was beloved by the Jewish community, Rudolph demanded a huge ransom.
The Jewish community complied, and 23,000 marks silver was raised.
But Rabbi Meir refused to be ransomed.
To his students—crouched by the window of his prison cell—he explained that the ransom would only encourage further kidnappings, thereby placing other Rabbis in danger.
Rabbi Meir was that rare man who placed the future and safety of the Jewish community before his own well being.
Rabbi Meir died in prison after seven years.
Fourteen years after his death his body was ransomed by Alexander ben Shlomo Wimpfen.
Gilad Shalit has been in cruel captivity for over three years, kidnapped by the terrorist gang Hamas.
Israel will, eventually, release hundreds of terrorists in order to secure Shalit's freedom.
The politicians are in favor of this deal because precedent has already been set by previous unwise Israeli administrations. And Shalit's captivity is an open wound in Israeli society, a loud, squabbling extended family.
The IDF is in favor of this trade—this deal with the devil—because the IDF lives by a doctrine that no soldier is ever left behind.
The security services are unhappy for obvious reasons, but they have to go along. And, they reason, at least they know on whom to keep an eye. And let's not forget that a number of Arab prisoners have already been flipped so they will supply valuable intel to the Israelis.
But let us be clear: you and I and every Jew in the world is, with each of these lopsided trades, placed in harm's way because the Arab Muslim terrorists understand that Israel and Judaism are built on a foundation of empathy and decency.
And for the Arab Muslim terrorist and their western enablers this virtue is nothing less than a fatal weakness to be exploited again and again and again.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:08 AM | Comments (11)
November 29, 2009
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere
Rabbi Abraham Avrech strongly urges you to read Haveil Havalim.
Torat Yisrael hosts this week's Haveil Havalim #245. As always, there is much to read, much to ponder.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:21 AM | Comments (3)
November 27, 2009
Friday Flickers: Raise the Red Lantern
Until meeting Gong Li in China, I never posed for a photo with any of the stars with whom I worked. She is, quite simply, the greatest movie actress of our time.
Raise the Red Lantern (1991), places all of Gong Li's considerable talents on display in this powerful tale set in 1920's China.
Gong Li plays Songlian, a nineteen-year old girl whose family has fallen on hard times. She agrees to an arranged marriage with a rich, older man. Thus, the innocent Songlian enters a household as #4 Concubine.
The opulent castle into which she moves is a petri dish of bitter jealousies and Machiavellian rivalries as the wives maneuver for the attention and affection of their husband and master.
The narrative feels almost biblical as the wives align for position and power with and against one another. The alliances are liquid as enemies become friends and friends become enemies. In the end, the all-powerful husband matters far less than the desperate relationships forged by the women.
The film is gorgeous, every composition carefully framed. The colors are chilly and crisp, jelly bean hues set against the muted grays of the massive castle. Director Zhang Yimou is a master of scale. Like the best of silent directors, he understands how to convey worlds of emotion by placing his characters against vast spaces and overpowering architecture.
Too many modern film writers and directors rely on exposition when silence and geography are far more eloquent.
Gong Li's performance is unerring in portraying the stages through which Songlian moves: from reluctant and baffled young bride, to a devious plotter in the dysfunctional household.
Some critics view the film as a metaphor for the ravages of Communist rule, but the great director Zhang Yimou has denied this. The film was banned in China for quite a while so obviously the authorities teased meanings from the movie that displeased them. Allegory or not—and I'm not so sure about this—Raise the Red Lantern is a fine film that affords a view of a foreign culture that feels strangely close to home.
In this brief clip, Gong Li as Songlian watches Third Mistress, played by He Caifei, a former opera singer, vent her feelings through song, thereby allowing Songlian a glimpse into her own isolation.
If you decide to purchase the DVD, make sure to get the 2007 MGM remastered version. Previous releases are of such poor quality that the images look like mud.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a lovely and peaceful Shabbat.
Seraphic Secret has always maintained that the global warming/climate movement is a form of mass hysteria, an academic delusion—we rely on common sense—invented in order to minimize the true danger of transnational Islamist terrorism. Climategate should prove the undoing of this fanatic secular religion.
H/T Son-in-Law #1.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:46 AM | Comments (4)
November 26, 2009
Thanksgiving: Hope Fulfilled
As far as I know there are only two countries in the world that were founded on the idea of hope.
America and Israel.
And what was the hope?
The hope of achieving religious freedom, and freedom from government tyranny.
The Children of Israel, fleeing Egyptian slavery and religious persecution, settled the land of Israel 3,000 years ago, thereby fulfilling G-d's covenant with the Jewish people.
The Pilgrims saw themselves as the children of the children of Israel, escaping a British Pharaoh and crossing a liquid desert.
In fact, so complete was the Pilgrim identification with the Jewish narrative that they seriously considered making Hebrew the national language.
Israel and America are religious and national twins.
America without Judeo Christianity at its core would be a meaningless husk.
And Israel without Judaism would be, well, hopeless.
At Casa Avrech, when we gathered for our Thanksgiving meal, we would go round the table and each of us would explain why we were thankful.
The kids laughed because I always said the same thing:
“I'm grateful that Karen married me.”
Well, I'm still grateful that Karen married me. I'm grateful that our daughters are lovely, bright and generous young women. I'm grateful that my son-in-laws are kind and loving husbands. I'm grateful that the memories of our twenty-two years with our late son Ariel ZT'L are filled with joy and pride in his piety, modesty and goodness.
I'm grateful that America makes this wonderful life possible.
George Washington released this Thanksgiving Proclamation on October 3, 1789. Read it, savor the language, the love of G-d and country. Imagine if the ACLU were around in those days.
Karen and I wish all our friends a Happy Thanksgiving.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:14 AM | Comments (7)
November 25, 2009
Navy Heroes Face Court Martial
March 31, 2004: Barbarians chant “Allahu Akhbar” God is great, as the
charred and mutilated bodies of American contractors hang from a bridge
over the Euphrates River in Fallujah, Iraq.
In 2004 Four American civilian contractors who provided security for food convoys were ambushed, tortured, and burned alive. Their bodies were hoisted on a bridge while the fanatic crowd chanted: “Long live Islam!” and “God is great!”
A few days ago, four Navy SEALS captured the terrorist ringleader of the Fallujah atrocity.
You would think that they would be hailed as heroes.
But you would be wrong.
Navy SEALs have secretly captured one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq — the alleged mastermind of the murder and mutilation of four Blackwater USA security guards in Fallujah in 2004. And three of the SEALs who captured him are now facing criminal charges, sources told FoxNews.com.
The three, all members of the Navy's elite commando unit, have refused non-judicial punishment — called an admiral's mast — and have requested a trial by court-martial.
Ahmed Hashim Abed, whom the military code-named "Objective Amber," told investigators he was punched by his captors — and he had the bloody lip to prove it.
Now, instead of being lauded for bringing to justice a high-value target, three of the SEAL commandos, all enlisted, face assault charges and have retained lawyers.
Full story here.
A few observations:
1. Keep in mind that in all Arab Muslim terrorist training manuals are detailed instructions on how to work and subvert the American system. Terrorists are ordered to charge their captors with unprovoked assault and, naturally, torture. The terrorists understand the propaganda value of such charges, especially under Obama, a man who seems more concerned with garnering international adoration than with national security.
2. I'm pretty sure the SEALS are pressing for a court martial in order to embarrass the nit-wits who brought the charges against them.
3. The greatest enemy facing our military is the political correctness that is trickling down from our, ahem, commander-in-chief and his gang of craven internationalists. We have already seen scores of our troops gunned down by a Muslim terrorist embedded in the U.S. army. Nidal Malik Hasan's Islamist beliefs were well known to the FBI and to the Army, but political correctness stayed the many hands that should have placed this terrorist in custody.
4. Let's say one of the SEALS did punch the Fallujah terrorist in the mouth. So what? We're at war with a bunch of dirt bags who are convinced that they represent a superior civilization—the Islamic Umma—yet their world is a swamp of ignorance and barbarism. They refuse to take responsibility for their own backwardness and blame others—Jews, Americans, Christians, etc,—for their situation. Punching is too good for such creatures.
5. Speaking of creatures, let us not forget that this atrocity prompted Markos Moulitsas of the Daily Kos to spit, “I feel nothing over the death of mercenaries.They aren't in Iraq because of orders, or because they are there trying to help the people make Iraq a better place. They are there to make war for profit. Screw them.”
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:42 AM | Comments (9)
November 24, 2009
9/11 Trial: Coming Attractions
Rise at 3AM with a thunderous migraine.
Head downstairs and guzzle a few cups of very strong coffee. Ease into my favorite chair, wrap myself in a heavy quilted blanket—I'm shivering with pain—and try:
Not.
To.
Think.
But reality is, um reality and a news segment on Fox haunts me because one of the lawyers for the Islamist barbarians gives a clear preview of what we're in for:
The lesson our Islamist enemies take away from this Holder/Obama travesty?
If you commit a terrorist act of mass murder on American soil you will be handed all the constitutional rights of an American citizen, and as an extra bonus the opportunity to spread terrorist propaganda to a world audience.
No matter what happens with this trial, America loses, and the transnational Islamist terrorists reap huge benefits.
No wonder my head hurts.
At the same time, the defense for the Fort Hood terrorist have indicated that they will plead not guilty by reason of insanity. This, no doubt, will warm the hearts of liberals who maintain that Islam had nothing to do with Hasan's outspoken Islamist agenda.
My friend Shrink Wrapped, a practicing psychiatrist, cautions about the danger of using a trial to establish a new and delusional psychiatric diagnosis.
...there is no such thing as PTSD by osmosis or by proxy or via time inversion (where one develops Pre-Traumatic Stress Disorder.) The single most salient feature of Major Hasan's case is that he took whatever psychopathology he had (and I believe he had a fair amount, none of it dispositive) and subsumed it into subservience (submission) to Allah whereupon he took it upon himself to perform his religious duty and murder infidels who he believed were part of an army attacking his people. Everything else is BS.
Read his entire post here.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:16 AM | Comments (13)
November 23, 2009
Good to Know, “A Stranger Among Us” is Essential
Eric Thal and Melanie Griffith in the “essential” A Stranger Among Us.
Over at Bang it Out, a Jewish website, film critic Jordan Hiller has, for the past few weeks, been compiling a list of The 25 Essential Jewish Movies. His selections are limited to films that are easily available for rental or purchase. Thus, he focuses exclusively on modern and contemporary movies. Naturally, the silent classic, The Golem 1920, does not appear on the list, nor does the amazing and obscure Ricardo Cortez, Irene Dunne vehicle Symphony of Six Million 1932, one of my very favorite Jewish movies.
Anyhoo.
It's an interesting list, with Hiller's fascinating and knowledgeable commentary. My 1992 film A Stranger Among Us, with Melanie Griffith and Eric Thal, directed by the great Sidney Lumet, comes in at #5.
Hiller writes a generous review of the movie—he's got keen insights into what I was trying to accomplish—and there's an interview with yours truly in which I discuss the how-to's of selling such a difficult project in Hollywood.
Robert (Body Double) Avrech infuses his wonderfully original and daring script with one startlingly insightful moment after another. What could easily have been another irritatingly earnest, clueless depiction of orthodox Jewish stereotypes, unfolds as an involving, challenging, and (most importantly) respectful treatment of our oft misrepresented religion.
Over and above this unique achievement, Mr. Avrech allows for a film to be established which expresses an affection and profound understanding of Judaism while never becoming cloying, overbearing, or false hearted.
The film subtly enlightens its audience regarding not only very intricate Jewish practices and customs (hafrashat challah, payos, kabbalah, shidduchim), but issues ranging from theology to history to tradition. And it does so with a natural flow of dialogue and emotion between truly human, unconventional characters who struggle with every day dilemmas as well as their religious awareness (or obliviousness).
To read the entire article, please go to Bang it Out.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:33 AM | Comments (12)
November 22, 2009
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere #244
Esther Ralston commands you to read Haveil Havalim.
Up and live Haveil Havalim#244, edited this week by A Mother in Israel. Lots and lots of good stuff to read.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 03:07 PM | Comments (0)
November 20, 2009
My Beautiful Neighborhood
Yup, that's me, age 7, with my very first Kodak Brownie, just outside Brooklyn's Prospect Park. Always rumpled, shirts untucked, my chronic shlumpiness drove the parents crazy. The bow tie they insisted I wear drove me crazy. Photo, 1957.
Okay, kids, it's time for a quick tour of Los Angeles through the lens of my trusty camera.
On Robertson Boulevard, not far from Casa Avrech, there's an ordinary gas station. I often pull in and pump gas here. But this location is not so ordinary. The underground storage tanks are crowned with elegant, color kissed steel caps. Gassing up is, for yours truly, like a trip to a museum of contemporary art.
I was on my way to a meeting with my agent at a restaurant on La Cienega Boulevard when I spotted an outdoor stairway. It was high noon. The sun blazing straight down. Maybe the worst time to take a photo—the light is harsh, unforgiving—but the shadow of the handrail imprinted a hypnotic zig-zag pattern on the steps. I like the desaturated color and the brutal texture of the concrete.
Strolling along Pico Boulevard, I walked by a store I've passed like a zillion times. But this time I stopped because my eye fastened on the contrasting textures and shapes—I really like the half moon over the knob—of the security gate. Looking through the lens I managed to catch the reflection of a synagogue across the street.
Not too long ago I had to order a new Rx for my glasses. Without them I am close to blind. Parking behind the optometrist's office on Santa Monica Boulevard, I noticed a blur of blue off in the distance. I donned my new glasses, and whoa, that slab of blue—the side of a building—looked even crisper and more striking.
Welcome to Casa Avrech. Our Spanish style home was built in 1929. The Arts and Crafts inspired skylight—evidence of a more gracious period in Los Angeles home construction—is original to the house. We recently had it cleaned after years of neglect—it's a real pain to access—and now the light pouring through is positively celestial.
Okay, we just knew this was coming from the man who spent over 20-years in Jeremiah Wright's proudly Jew-hating church.
H/T Son-in-law #1
And look who's been banished from the U.N. It's time to dissolve that disgraceful institution. Oh wait, Obama's pledged to donate even more money to that rat hole.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a lovely and uplifting Shabbat.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:11 AM | Comments (18)
November 19, 2009
Hollywood's Great Latin Lover vs. Hollywood's Great Jewish Mother
Rudolph Valentino, Hollywood's legendary lover.
The great pioneering director D.W. Griffith hired Rabbi Isadore Myers as the Jewish technical consultant on his great epic, Intolerance, 1916. Griffith was so happy with Rabbi Myer's expert advice and attention to detail that he said to the good Rabbi:
“How can I ever repay you?”
Replied Rabbi Myers:
“I have a daughter who would like to get into pictures.”
True to his word, Griffith extended a helping hand to Carmel, Rabbi Myer's striking and talented daughter.
Carmel Myers (1899 - 1980) appears fleetingly as a dancing girl in Intolerance, and after production wrapped, signed as a contract Griffith player.
A few months later the future star Colleen Moore arrived in Hollywood, also signed by Griffith. Myers and Moore became close friends.
In her excellent memoir Silent Star, Colleen Moore remembers that a club for young actresses—Our Club—was organized as a means of mutual support. The young actresses would lunch on Sunday, discuss movies, books, “boys” and generously feed one another tips on what roles were available at which studios.
Myers was an active member. A typical meeting included: Anita Stewart, Patsy Ruth Miller, Helen Ferguson, Billie Dove, Virginia Zanuck, Gertrud Olmsted, Julanne Johnston, Clara Horton, Ruby Keeler, Loretta Young, Aline MacMahon, Ruth Roland, Carmelita Geraghty, Pauline Garan and Ann Harding. Mary Pickford was Godmother to this extraordinary gathering of up and coming stars.
Carmel's biggest break came when she was chosen to play the wicked Iras in the huge MGM production of Ben Hur, 1925.
The rabbi's beautiful daughter was frequently cast as the sexy vamp in silent films. She starred and worked with some of the best known stars of the time: John Barrymore, Mary Astor, Rudolph Valentino, Norma Shearer, Adolph Menjou, Eleanor Boardman, Lon Chaney, and Joan Crawford.
Carmel made the transition to sound quite nicely, and as she grew older eased gracefully into character parts. But when the roles got too small she shifted into real estate—always a smart bet in Los Angeles—and launched her own perfume company. In 1951 Carmel had a TV show for one season.
But let's rewind to 1918, when Myers was an emerging Hollywood star.
In the comprehensive Valentino biography, Dark Lover, Emily W. Leider reports that the young, incredibly handsome dancer and aspiring actor Rudolph Valentino—real name, Rodolfo Alfonso Raffaello Piero Filiberto Guglielmi di Valentina d'Antonguolla—was struggling for a foothold in Hollywood. Back in Italy, Valentino's beloved mother had just died and Valentino was mired in a black depression. He sat in his small apartment and wept. His financial situation was precarious. Never smart about money, Valentino's Mercer car had been repossessed because the future star could not afford the monthly payments. Rudy was forced to walk and take streetcars to the endless rounds of casting sessions.
Valentino (1895 – 1926) who, in The Shiek, 1921 was transformed into the world's greatest lover, was lonely, isolated and yearning for love.
Carmel Myers, the rabbi's beautiful daughter.
Leider narrates Valentino's brave but naive attempt to court the Jewish beauty:
Carmel Myers, a teenaged star who picked him to play her boyfriend in two romantic comedies, says he tried to date her but was stymied by her overprotective mother, a rabbi's wife. When informed by her mother that Carmel was too young to go out with men, “he said, 'Madame Myers, when I want something I never let anyone stand in my way.' And Mama asked him, 'Even if the person standing in your way weighs two-hundred and fifty pounds?'
Deadpans Carmel, “I never did have dinner with him.”
Of course, the rebbetzin (Yiddish: Rabbi's wife) did not block Rudy's path because of Carmel's tender age. Carmel was 19-years old in 1918, an appropriate age for dating. The truth is that Mama Myers would not allow her daughter to date a non-Jew. American Jews were assimilating at a frightening rate, especially in Hollywood, and Mama was determined that her daughter choose a Jewish husband and raise a Jewish family.
Mama got her wish.
Carmel Myers was married three times—all Jewish men.
In 1919 Rudy impulsively married actress Jean Acker—a lesbian—who, on their wedding night, locked him out of her bedroom. The marriage was never consummated. They divorced in 1921. Next, Valentino married Natacha Rambova, the flamboyant costume designer. Rambova was domineering, controlling and seriously damaged Valentino's career. They divorced in 1925.
A year later, in August, while in New York, Valentino, the most popular male star in the world, was hospitalized with appendicitis and gastric ulcers. Peritonitis set in and the 31-year old star star died.
Over 100,000 people lined the streets of New York for Rudolph Valentino's funeral. Agatha Hearn, a New York woman and mother, shot herself while clutching a batch of Valentino photos. In London, a young actress named Peggy Scott, surrounded by photos of Valentino, ingested poison and left a note saying: “With his death my last bit of courage has flown.”
A second funeral was held in Los Angeles. Among the numerous mourners weeping at Valentino's grave was Carmel Myers.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:28 AM | Comments (10)
November 18, 2009
The Inspiring Sarah Palin and, Um, Heidi Montag
Heidi Montag, whose dinner prayer was deeply inspiring.
For the past week I've been doing research for a new script that was recently proposed to me by a producer. I have to decide if I'm going to accept the assignment or not. In one sense it's a dream project, but like all scripts it presents a unique set of narrative problems—problems that are daunting.
I have a tendency to torture myself when it comes to movie projects. Do I truly understand the material, is the main character someone with whom I empathize, what's the film really about—I must be able to voice the theme, not the plot, in three sentences—am I prepared to devote over a year of my life to the script, and finally, will I do a good job?
During this process, I tend to go to sleep fairly early and then wake up at three or four in the morning thinking about character, story velocity, and narrative structure.
I worry.
A lot.
I fret, I pace, I step outside, sit next to the pool and watch the the moon's reflection quivering in the water. Pondering the architecture of my life—from Yeshiva to Hollywood—I wonder if there is a moral coherence to my personal narrative.
It's exhausting.
Karen and I usually set aside a bit of time in the evening to zone out on the couch and watch some television together. It's our decompression chamber.
Last night we had a great time, thanks to Sarah and Heidi.
Sarah Palin, well, you know who she is and you have your opinion.
Heidi Montag, if you're not schooled in popular culture, is an actress on The Hills, a series that follows the lives of a bunch of Beverly Hills brats. They gossip, sleep around, gossip about sleeping around, shop—the women wear to die for outfits—and go to an endless series of trendy restaurants where you have to scream to, um, gossip.
Heidi, a feather brained “personality and singer,” is married to the evil Spencer.
They have a bizarre marriage.
You can tell because Heidi wants children and Spencer wants a vasectomy.
Last night, Heidi was putting her master plan into action. Cooking dinner for hubbie, lighting candles, wearing a skin tight little red dress, all designed to seduce the clueless Spencer. You see, she's secretly off the pill. So now she'll get pregnant and then Heidi explains, “He'll realize that he really does want children.”
Perfect logic.
So, here's the thing:
Heidi says grace—she's suddenly all devout—before they dig in. It goes something like this: “Lord, thank you for the food we are about to eat, thank you for my wonderful husband, and thank you for my outfit.”
My outfit.
Karen and I cracked up.
“Oh my gosh,” I cried, “that is the most brilliant dialogue ever!”
Laughing so hard, Karen started wheezing. I was ready to fetch the inhaler.
Video capture of Governor Sarah Palin in her office. Notice the
Israeli flag by the window.
After The Hills, we caught a preview of the Barbara Walters interview with Sarah Palin. Here's what the former Governor of Alaska said about Israel:
"I disagree with the Obama administration on that. I believe that the Jewish settlements should be allowed to be expanded upon, because that population of Israel is, is going to grow. More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And I don't think that the Obama administration has any right to tell Israel that the Jewish settlements cannot expand."
The love of my life looked at me and nodded.
Good dialogue.
When I woke up at four in the morning I went downstairs, read more source material, pondered Sarah and Heidi.
I shook my head and smiled. Abruptly, I felt really good about the script. I can do it. In fact, I know exactly how to do it.
You just never know how or from where inspiration is going to hit.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:06 AM | Comments (14)
November 17, 2009
Reloading Sarah Palin
So Karen and I sat down and watched Sarah Palin on Oprah yesterday. The first thing that struck me about Sarah is how authentic and normal she is. She's sort of like Donna Reed, a pretty mom, but definitely not glamorous or overtly sexy.
Karen and I looked at each other, baffled, what's to hate?
She's imbued with classic American values: religious, patriotic, hard working, self-reliant, and brimming with common sense. Sarah's got a wonderful marriage—she and Todd are high school sweethearts—a lovely and lively family, five kids, the youngest with Down Syndrome, and she's been spectacularly successful in her political career.
I repeat: what's to hate?
Well, she's not liberal. Prominent women are supposed to be Democrats. The liberal establishment can't abide the image of a feminist Conservative.
As I said, she's got five kids. Most liberals do not have five children.
She's pro-life.
Thus she's a traitor to the pro-abortion sisterhood.
Sarah did not go to an Ivy League university. She bopped around various colleges and ended up at the University of Idaho. That's a major sin. She's not like the well educated sophisticates in the Obama administration who adore mass murderer Mao and espouse Socialism.
Unlike liberal role models Nancy Pelosi and Dianne Feinstein, who made money the old fashioned way—marrying wealthy men—Sarah's husband is a blue collar worker.
No chip on Sarah's shoulders. That's a big negative for liberal feminists who have enshrined anger and victimhood as a virtue.
What else? Oh, yeah, guns, hunting. Big problems for the chattering classes who confine their hunting to Hermes, Gucci and Louis Vuitton.
Sarah choked in the Katie Couric interview, proof that she's an idiot, ill suited to the office of VP, evidence that she doesn't have the necessary gravitas.
As opposed to the Obama gravitas which roughly translates as acute narcissism.
Liberal Jews were especially vicious towards Sarah.
No big shock, I mean Sarah has an Israeli flag in her office. How many liberal Jews have an Israeli flag in their home or offices?
Not many.
They fly the J Street banner, the notorious—beloved by Obama—anti-Israel lobbying group.
Why did Sarah resign as Governor of Alaska?
She avoided full disclosure on this, but I think it's fairly obvious. The Obama black ops team hit her with so many law suits, alleging ethical violations, that her legal expenses have climbed into the stratosphere. Sarah has to earn some real money, fast, or stay mired in debt for the rest of her life.
It's a sign of Sarah Palin's potency as a political figure that the liberal media are positively obsessed with the former Governor. They can't stop attacking her. She's like the high school girl who earns the contempt of the geeks because she's pretty and popular and doesn't give a crap what others say. The geeks are sick with jealousy—caused by inadequacy—and that jealousy transmutes into a derangement syndrome that should be classified as a genuine mental illness.
George Orwell, in his novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four , describes the Two Minutes of Hate instituted by Big Brother.
Sarah Palin has been targeted for far more than two minutes.
But as her father commented about her resignation, “Sarah is not retreating, she's reloading.”
Update #1: I was unhappy with the Newsweek cover of Sarah Palin in running shorts. Why would she pose like this I wondered? Well, I just heard Dennis Prager explain that the picture was shot for Runners World Magazine—perfectly appropriate—but Newsweek grabbed it for their cover in order to demean Sarah.
Have these people no shame?
Update #2: Have not read The Persecution of Sarah Palin: How the Elite Media Tried to Bring Down a Rising Star, but I plan to.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:15 AM | Comments (18)
November 16, 2009
KSM Trial Intel Gift to al Qaeda
The decision to afford KSM and his Islamist gang all the civil rights of American citizens and alien residents is a nakedly political maneuver designed to accomplish three goals that are at the ideological heart of the Obama administration:
1. Declare that there is no war against transnational terrorism, thus treating terror attacks as a criminal matter.
2. Put the Bush administration on trial.
3. Abolish the notion of American citizenship in favor of an amorphous international citizenship.
Military tribunals are a time honored and effective method of dealing with foreign combatants. The U.S. has made use of military tribunals since The Revolutionary War.
The use of civilian courts prove to the jihadists that America is not only weak but stupid. The Islamic terrorists have told us, again and again, that they are at war with us, that they wish to annihilate the west, and yet the left refuses to connect the dots.
But there as even more pernicious danger to the use of civilian courts for Islamist war crimes, the spilling of valuable intelligence.
'This is a prosecutorial decision as well as a national security decision," President Barack Obama said last week about the attorney general's announcement that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other al Qaeda operatives will be put on trial in New York City federal court.
No, it is not. It is a presidential decision—one about the hard, ever-present trade-off between civil liberties and national security.
Trying KSM in civilian court will be an intelligence bonanza for al Qaeda and the hostile nations that will view the U.S. intelligence methods and sources that such a trial will reveal. The proceedings will tie up judges for years on issues best left to the president and Congress.
Whether a jury ultimately convicts KSM and his fellows, or sentences them to death, is beside the point. The treatment of the 9/11 attacks as a criminal matter rather than as an act of war will cripple American efforts to fight terrorism. It is in effect a declaration that this nation is no longer at war.
Full article by John Yoo at The Wall Street Journal.
Andrew McCarthy weighs in with an ever darker analysis:
The decision to bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other top al-Qaeda terrorists to New York City for a civilian trial is one of the most irresponsible ever made by a presidential administration. That it is motivated by politics could not be more obvious. That it spells unprecedented danger for our security will soon become obvious.
The five 9/11 plotters were originally charged in a military commission. Military commissions have been approved by Congress and the courts. Eleven months ago, the jihadists were prepared to end the military case by pleading guilty and proceeding to execution. Plus, the Obama administration is continuing the commission system for other enemy combatants accused of war crimes. If we are going to have military commissions for any war criminals, it is senseless not to have them for the worst war criminals. In sum, there is no good legal or policy rationale for transferring these barbarians to the civilian justice system. Doing so will prompt a hugely costly three-ring circus of a trial, provide a soapbox for al-Qaeda’s anti-American bile, and create a public-safety nightmare for New York City.
There is, however, a patent political rationale behind Obama’s decision.
Full article here.
Rudy Giuliani nails it:
Part I
Part II
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:48 AM | Comments (4)
November 12, 2009
Lost Joan Crawford Not So Lost
Robert Montgomery and Joan Crawford in the long unseen MGM film “Letty Lynton,” 1932. The white cotton organdy gown with deliriously ruffled shoulders by Adrian, real name Adrian Adolph Greenberg, is one of his most famous and influential designs. A copy of the dress was mass produced to help promote the film and over half-a-million were sold at Macy's. I can just imagine a depression era housewife assuring her husband that the dress is an investment, or just perfect for a quick run to the grocery store. Photos via: The Best of Everything: The Joan Crawford Encyclopedia.
Quick, while it's still up, you can screen the famously unavailable 1932, Pre-Code Joan Crawford vehicle Letty Lynton, directed by the great Clarence Brown.
The entire film is posted in nine segments, but because of a tangled legal history I'm not embedding the video.
It's easy to find on You Tube.
But move fast before it's removed.
Letty Lynton allows us to view Joan Crawford in all her glory. Never has she looked more beautiful or elegant. Her character suffers, oh how she suffers: desire, guilt, betrayal, fear, passion, hatred, and oh yes, did I mention desire.
Built around an unusual narrative structure Lette Lynton pounds away at a single story line with unblinking focus. Most movies juggle three narratives, the A story, from which the central plot emerges, and then two more narratives that branch out from the A story. All are resolved, ideally in an organic manner, in the third and final act.
But Letty Lynton hangs its sole narrative line on a packet of love letters—intimate, racy—that threaten Letty's love for Boston blue blood Robert Montgomery, letters so scandalous that, if made public, will forever mark her as a fallen woman.
It's hard for post-modern audiences to relate to such a high moral tone. We live in an age where raw sex tapes catapult people—and I'm using that term loosely—to instant celebrity, frequently rewarded with their own reality shows.
Nevertheless, Letty Lynton possesses a singular power that hypnotized this viewer, yes, even as a nine-part You Tube experience.
Screenwriters John Meehan and Wanda Tuchock's dialogue is spare and powerful. Joan spits her lines, poisoned darts designed to wound, yet words that reek with subtext and feel more like self-inflicted blows. It's a fine script aided by director Clarence Brown's signature precision camera placement—the murder scene is a nail biter, I'll bet anything Hitchcock studied it carefully. And Brown's ability to step back for the extended medium shot is a model of a master director allowing his stars the space in which to work their magic.
Crawford's wardrobe—she plays one of Hollywood's beloved and ubiquitous “socialites”—is jaw dropping. There's the white organza gown, and a fur coat with a massive collar that winds around Joan's body like a cuddly python—it will cause PETA'S collective heads to explode. There's also a silver lame gown that makes Joan look like a silver bullet.
This is classic Hollywood, the Golden Age that can never be replicated.
Via: Self Styled Siren, via Lou Lumenick.
Nils Asther, Joan Crawford, and the Adrian designed fur coat in Letty Lynton, 1932.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a lovely and spiritually meaningful Shabbat.
Not to be missed, Charles Krauthammer explains Explaining Away Mass Murder.
And my good friend Shrink Wrapped, a practicing psychiatrist, demolishes the argument that Hasan is psychotic.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 03:35 PM | Comments (10)
Patsy Ruth Miller and F. Scott Fitzgerald: Politically Incorrect in Hollywood
Actress and author Patsy Ruth Miller.
In 1924 while shooting a film in New York, actress Patsy Ruth Miller (1904-1995) developed a close friendship with author F. Scott Fitzgerald and his wife Zelda. Frequently, Fitzgerald and Patsy Ruth would go out for dinner while Zelda remained home pleading fatigue. Patsy Ruth eventually realized that Zelda's fatigue was acute alcoholism.
Observes Patsy Ruth:
It didn't seem to me that Scott drank more than most of the men I knew. He seemed intoxicated on words, and sometimes we would sit, our after-dinner coffee growing cold, while Scott tried to make me see some fine point of writing, or understand why an emotion had been ill or well portrayed. But often I had the feeling that he was unsure of himself as a writer, that he was afraid of that one day he'd have nothing left to say, and I also had the impression that Zelda did little to build his confidence, even sometimes, in a perverse way, seemed to enjoy his battle with self-doubt.
Fitzgerald's agonies of self-doubt are common among writers. The fear of having nothing left to say will, inevitably, be paralyzing. And a non-supportive spouse can act as a fatal poison to a vulnerable writer. Perhaps Fitzgerald was not yet a full blown alcoholic, but he certainly turned into a drunk over the next few years.
A future O'Henry Award winning writer, Patsy Ruth Miller, in her juicy memoir, My Hollywood: When Both of Us Were Young, narrates a fascinating anecdote that took place a few years later when a shaky Fitzgerald was under contract at MGM.
At the time, Patsy Ruth Miller was married to the great screenwriter John Lee Mahin, director Victor Fleming's frequent collaborator.
John [Lee Mahin] often saw Scott at MGM, where they were both working, and told me that Scott seemed very despondent. I said that was only natural, with Zelda in a sanatorium, but John said, No, that wasn't it. He was writing a screenplay based on someone else's story and hated his assignment. Then why does he do it? I asked. Money, I suppose, said John, but it's a damn shame.
In truth, Fitzgerald never mastered the craft of the screenwriting, and in the tense, sink or swim factory atmosphere in which studio screenwriters labored, the master novelist's confidence level was further undermined. Most authors idealize themselves as artists. But the best, most productive screenwriters, then as now, understand that they are craftsmen working in collaboration with scores of highly talented people. Sadly, Fitzgerald never came to grips with the rigid studio system.
Remarks Patsy Ruth on Fitzgerald's bleak state of mind:
I finally ran into Scott one day at the studio where I had gone to pick up John. It was true, he did seem to have less sparkle, less animation, than he had in New York. I remember John saying to him, “Come on, kid. It's all grist to your mill. Some day you're going to write something about Hollywood as good as The Great Gatsby.”
Scott reacted as though he'd been accused of raping his twin sister. He said that he had never written anything worthwhile, that Gatsby was already dead and best forgotten, that nothing he had ever done would live, and not to give him any of that crap about great literature.
Bit by bit, F. Scott Fitzgerald unravels in Hollywood. Certainly, Fitzgerald's unhappiness with his Hollywood career is a prime factor, and with Zelda quite mad and locked away an all consuming anger and bitterness envelopes the great novelist.
Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald>
But John Lee Mahin has a different take on Fitzgerald's broken spirit:
On the way home John said this was all because of the people Scott was surrounded by, all the writers who had suddenly become politically oriented, social consciousness was the cry, and anyone who merely wrote about people and their everyday problems and emotions, was at least a Facist or maybe worse. Poor Scott had been tossed into this whirlpool of Liberalism, and without a political credo to cling to, was drowning in it. He had never espoused causes, nor been very interested in politics; as a writer, Humanity had meant little to him, the Individual everything...
Of course, Patsy Ruth is describing the emerging cells of Hollywood Reds. The love of humanity at the expense of the individual is at the core of Communist ideology. Too often Communist purges, where thousands if not millions are murdered, are justified by this charming dictum: “You have to break a few eggs in order to make an omelette.”
Patsy Ruth observes:
His work was condemned, they said, and he believed them. He denounced himself even more harshly than his judges, accusing his work of being trivial and superficial.
“He actually told me he's ashamed of The Great Gatsby,” John fairly snarled. “Those cursed Do-gooders... they've got him believing his work isn't worth a tinkers damn just because he wasn't waving a banner or marching in a picket line. They've destroyed him, as sure as God made little apples.”
That shouldn't keep him from writing,” I protested.
The Hell it doesn't,” John said. “Who can write when you've been told, when you've been convinced that anything you have to say is a bunch of crap. He can write rings around every one of those bastards who've done this to him, but he doesn't believe it any more, and if you don't believe it, you can't do it.”
Is Mahin's theory correct? Did Fitzgerald fail in Hollywood because he felt diminished by a wave of politically correct thought?
I doubt that this was the prime reason for Fitzgerald's Hollywood decline. Common sense argues that the break-up of his marriage, alcoholism, chronic money problems and a loss of confidence were the prime motivators in F. Scott's downfall. But let's not forget that Fitzgerald did write The Last Tycoon, unfinished yes, but still a masterful portrait of Hollywood with Irving Thalberg as Monroe Stahr, the central character.
Nevertheless, Mahin's denunciations of Fitzgerald as the victim of a politically correct Hollywood ring true as contributing to Fitzgerald's melancholy state of mind. And drawing from personal observation, I can attest to the wounds that can be inflicted by an almost monolithic political Hollywood sensibility.
Turner Classic Movie Alert
My friend Self Styled Siren, one of the best movie bloggers in the known universe—I think Ms. Siren has read even more Hollywood memoirs than yours truly—is, with the The New York Post's Lou Lumenick, programming a series of films, in January, for Turner Classic Movies titled: Shadows of Russia
The festival will air Wednesdays in primetime throughout January.
From the TCM press release:
The selections focusing on the many views of Russia and communism to be found in American movies. Some films are masterpieces that the Siren and her readers know almost by heart (Ninotchka, The Manchurian Candidate, The Scarlet Empress), others the Siren loved on viewing but needs to get re-acquainted with (Reds, The Way We Were), still others are oddities deserving of a more focused look (Rasputin and the Empress, Red Danube, Conspirator, Comrade X). And there are some rare films being shown, including Leo McCarey's film maudit My Son John, with poor doomed Robert Walker in the lead; The North Star, of which I am told TCM has located a good print that should show off James Wong Howe's cinematography; and I Was a Communist for the FBI.
I will be watching and writing about the series for Big Hollywood. It should prove enlightening and fascinating.
Congratulations to Siren. Her exemplary work, along with many others in the lively and informative movie blogosphere, demonstrates that the internet is exerting a profound influence on the world of films.
Memo to TCM: If you'd like to program a series exploring the image of Jews in American movies, give me a call.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:55 AM | Comments (8)
November 11, 2009
Veterans Day '09
Rabbi Abraham Avrech, my father and my favorite veteran. An Army Chaplain in the 42nd Division, my father served this great nation through World War II, The Korean War and Vietnam. Retired as a full Colonel, my father often speaks of his Chaplaincy as the most important and fulfilling of his long and distinguished Rabbinic career. This photo of my father conducting services was taken during the Korean War.
Today we honor all our veterans—the living and the dead.
Take a moment to ponder the enormous sacrifices made by our nation’s heroes, and their families.
We are forever be in their debt.
Keep in mind that the U.S.military has freed more people on this earth from tyranny and evil than any other force. If the U.S. military disappeared today, cruelty, genocide and unlimited wars would engulf the planet. On the global stage, the U.S. military is the only effective force for good.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:01 AM | Comments (8)
November 10, 2009
How to Kill a Terrorist
Meet Larry, my buddy from Bensonhurst. Okay, so it’s not Larry.
For reasons of security his identity cannot be compromised. But take
my word for it, Larry looks exactly like William Powell in The Thin Man.
Or not.
My wife Karen and I are visiting Karen’s brother David, his wife Elana, and their four children, residents of Efrat.
Attending Shabbat services in an Efrat synagogue, out of the corner of my eye, I spot “Larry.”
Security requires that I do not use his real name.
We’re both from Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, a tough neighborhood even by Brooklyn standards. Together, we attended high school, Brooklyn Talmudic Academy, a tough Yeshiva even by San Quentin standards.
We have been friends forever.
Larry’s parents are Holocaust survivors and as Larry often tells me, his father is obsessed over the fact that so many Jews were unprepared, mentally and physically, to fight the Nazis.
“He’s written thousands of pages about this,” Larry confides.
Thus, it is only fitting and somewhat ironic that several years ago, in an Efrat supermarket, Larry bravely confronted an Arab Muslim homicide bomber and deleted the terrorist.
Larry and I discuss the killing which probably saved dozens of innocent lives, men, women, children and infants.
“How’d you know he was a terrorist?”
To read my complete article, please head on over to my home away from home, Big Hollywood.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:23 AM | Comments (13)
November 09, 2009
Political Correctness Kills
There were plenty of explicit warnings that Hasan was an Islamist terrorist living comfortably in the bosom of the American military.
Major Nidal Malik Hasan, the gunman who killed 13 at America's Fort Hood military base, once gave a lecture to other doctors in which he said non-believers should be beheaded and have boiling oil poured down their throats.
He also told colleagues at America's top military hospital that non-Muslims were infidels condemned to hell who should be set on fire. The outburst came during an hour-long talk Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, gave on the Koran in front of dozens of other doctors at Walter Reed Army Medical Centre in Washington DC, where he worked for six years before arriving at Fort Hood in July.
Colleagues had expected a discussion on a medical issue but were instead given an extremist interpretation of the Koran, which Hasan appeared to believe.
But why weren't there any whistle blowers?
A few paragraphs down we are hit with the explanation:
One Army doctor who knew him said a fear of appearing discriminatory against a Muslim soldier had stopped fellow officers from filing formal complaints.
Read the full story here.
...fear of appearing discriminatory...
The virus of political correctness has infected even our military.
Democracies always balance freedom and security. That's a given. But when fighting a multi-front war against a fanatic enemy, one must use common sense and err on the side of safety.
But for this cancer of radical liberal thought, thirteen young men and women would be alive today.
Meanwhile, we should view the Fort Hood terrorist massacre in the context of a popular internet call for decentralized Arab Muslim terrorism.
Counterterrorism blog notes that radical Yemeni-American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki's sermon "Constants on the Path of Jihad" has become a bible, er Koran, for lone wolf Muslim terrorists:
“Jihad does not end with the disappearance of a person. Jihad must continue regardless because it does not depend on any particular leader or individual… Jihad does not depend on any particular land. It is global. When the Muslim is in his land, he performs jihad… No borders or barriers stop it. The message cannot be conveyed without jihad. If a particular people or nation is classified as… ‘the people of war’ in the Shariah, that classification applies to them all over the earth. Islam cannot be customized to suit the conditions where you are, for instance Europe.”
Full analysis at Counterterrorism blog.
We should also be aware that the Arab-Muslim war against Israel is not a regional conflict concerning borders or so-called refugees—that's just a convenient justification. It is, in fact—and far too many Israelis don't comprehend this—part of a transnational Arab-Muslim war against “Jews, Crusaders and other infidels.”
The enemy is not at the gates.
The enemy has already breached the gates.
And the leftist media, at every turn, protect and enable the Islamists who are determined to destroy western civilization. How many times have we heard the chattering classes say: “It's not clear if religion is a motivating factor in the Ft. Hood attack...”
These people are not stupid. They are, however, supplicants at the idol of multiculturalism, a religion which posits that all people are the same, all religions are equal, and all we need to do is understand one other.
In truth, the Islamists understand us just perfectly.
But many of us don't understand the Islamists.
And this can be fatal for a civilization.
To get a clear-eyed view of the Isamist war against us I urge you to screen The Third Jihad, Radical islam's View of America.
In 72 minutes, the film reveals that radical Islamists driven by a religiously motivated rejection of western values cultures and religion are engaging in a multifaceted strategy to overcome the western world. In contrast to the use of “violent jihad” and terror to instill fear in “non-believers,” The Third Jihad introduces the concept of “cultural jihad” as a means to infiltrate and undermine our society from within.
This is a superb film that is politically incorrect.
Which means that it does not deny facts.
Have you noticed that President Barack Hussein Obama has never publicly uttered the phrase Islamic terrorist, or Islamic radical.
If ever anyone deserved the death penalty, Hasan is the poster boy for capital punishment. But I have little doubt that he will get jail time and then, probably, an early release for good behavior.
Update #1: Hasan frequented a strip club near Fort Hood. Not a big shock. There is a well documented history and pattern of devout Muslim terrorists getting their jollies before committing their murderous acts.
Update #2: The story is rapidly devolving into incompetence and insanity.
U.S. intelligence agencies were aware months ago that Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan was attempting to make contact with people associated with al Qaeda, two American officials briefed on classified material in the case told ABC News.
Full story here.
Update #3: And hey, look at all the moderate Muslims out in the streets protesting this heinous act.
Not really.
Silence = acceptance.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:07 AM | Comments (12)
November 08, 2009
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere
Ann-Margret and Elvis dance to the Jewish Blogosphere.
Better late than never, Haveil Havalim #242, presented this week by our fearless leader, Jack.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:06 PM | Comments (1)
November 05, 2009
Swing Time
Astaire and Rogers, poetry in motion.
Swing Time, 1936 might be the best of the nine RKO Astaire-Rogers musicals. The plot is paper thin—Astaire plays a gambler and dancer who must earn $25,000 in order to win a bride—but the dance numbers, choreographed by Astaire and Hermes Pan, are luminous.
“Waltz in Swing Time” is an incredibly complicated routine a “syncopated waltz with tap overlays.” So difficult is this dance that director George Stevens—in order to get it in one shot as Astaire insisted—had to shoot numerous takes in order to get it right.
By the end of the day Ginger Rogers shoes were filled with blood.
The reliable Counter Terrorism blog concludes that the Fort Hood massacre is the largest terror act since 9-11.
And hey, let's stop digging into the life of the Ft. Hood terrorist. He's evil. A jihadist. It's not complicated. Worthy of our attention and gratitude is the woman who stopped the mass murderer, Sgt. Kimberly Munley.
Karen and I wish all our grieving friends in the military, a peaceful and spiritual Shabbat.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 05:28 PM | Comments (5)
Massacre at Fort Hood
Once again, we must point out that the terrorist attack at Fort Hood—12 dead, 31 wounded—the murderer is wounded and in custody—is not a tragedy but an atrocity.
The name of the terrorist has been released: Malik Nadal Hasan, a Major in the U.S. Army.
Hot Air is providing regular updates.
Look for claims that Hasan was the victim of harassment.
The media keep talking about the search for a motive.
This is politically correct babble.
The motive is religious: Islam's ideological love affair with jihad.
Counter Terrorism Blog writes that the Ft. Hood massacre is the largest terror act since 9/11.
As long as the West dodges this simple truth we will continue to lose ground to the Caliphate Muslims who seek transnational dominance under the banner of Sharia.
Waiting for President George Bush to catch the blame for this latest act of terrorism.
Or Israel, yeah, always safe blaming the Jews.
Seraphic Secret extends our most sincere condolences to the families and loved ones of the innocent victims.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 02:54 PM | Comments (25)
Israel: Leader in Business Innovation
Dan Senor, co-author of Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel's Economic Miracle, discusses with CNBC how Israel has managed to become a global leader in business innovation.
The most salient point underscoring Israel's business innovation is the Jewish state's ability to harness and integrate their citizen soldiers—men serve for three years, women for two—into the dynamic economy, something we in the U.S. should study and duplicate.
Israel's powerful economy—a state with no oil and surrounded by genocidal enemies—should make the dysfunctional Arab Muslim world and their Western leftist lapdogs hate Israel with even greater fervor.
H/T Seraphic son-in-law #1.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 06:30 AM | Comments (3)
November 03, 2009
Esther Ralston: Why Do All My Husbands Want To Kill Me? Part III
Hollywood star Esther Ralston at the height of her fame, 1920's.
To read Part I of this series, please click here.
To read Part II, please click here.
Broke, with her second marriage in shambles and blacklisted by studio boss L.B. Mayer—Esther wouldn't trade amorous favors for movie roles—Esther Ralston flees to New York in 1939 to find work and rebuild her shattered career.
Esther, in her slim but resonant 1985 memoir, Some Day We’ll Laugh, tells us that she was forced to leave her daughter Mary behind in California with her mother.
Working in Summer Stock and radio, Esther meets a young entertainment columnist named Ted Lloyd. Everywhere she plays, Ted is in the audience. With characteristic understatement Esther notes that Lloyd “seemed to follow me.”
Clearly, Esther has an admirer. Not surprising in that Esther Ralston, dubbed The American Venus, was a famous Hollywood beauty. One would hope that coming on the heels of two ex-husbands who were not only unreliable, but also somewhat homicidal, Esther would steer clear of another hasty romantic entanglement, but —
To read the concluding post in my three-part series, please head on over to Big Hollywood.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 03:32 PM | Comments (5)
Less Government, Not More
Thomas Jefferson
This video on health care, produced by the Center for Freedom and Prosperity, features Eline van den Broek, founder of the European Independent Institute. She does a nice job of explaining, in simple terms, why the United States should not copy Europe's mistakes, and why the key to true health care reform is less government, not more.
I'm particularly fond of Ms. van den Broek's Tuesday Weld-like wink at the conclusion of the video. Nothing like a camera-ready policy wonk.
But all kidding aside, Obamacare, as defined in the humongous 2,000 page bill that no one has read, that is written in impenetrable legalese, that is a minefield of unintended consequences, and sections of which are probably unconstitutional—the government will fine you if you do not buy health insurance—is, as The Wall Street Journal writes, The Worst Bill Ever.
H/T Powerline.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:13 AM | Comments (1)
November 02, 2009
Jews of Yemen: The End
The father of Moshe Nahari, who was murdered in December, with his daughters outside a court in Yemen following a hearing in the murder case. AFP/Getty Images
A few observations about the slow fade to black of Yemenite Jews:
The Arab Muslim world is only comfortable as a self-contained organism.
The presence of non-Muslims is perceived as an insult, an open sore that must be corrected. Jews are seen as a particularly grievous minority. Thus the oppression of Jews is a religious mandate and creating a Judenrein Ummah—a unified worldwide Muslim Community—is considered a Muslim duty.
Remember, after the Algerian revolution, the 140,000 Jews of Algiers, en masse, were expelled by the Muslim government.
In 1922 there were 80,000 Jews in Egypt. Pogroms, confiscation of bank accounts, property and expulsions from 1942 onward has left the Jewish population at less than one-hundred.
It's the same story for Jews from Iraq, Tunisia, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, and Lebanon.
Jews are officially barred from stepping on Saudi Arabian soil. Henry Kissinger was given special permission by the House of Saud to enter the Jew-hating kingdom.
Currently, Morocco is home to the largest Jewish Arab population, about 4,000. But growing hostility will most certainly force these remaining Jewish Arabs to emigrate.
Yemen is now Judenrein.
Naturally, the world community could not care less about the Jew hatred that infests the dysfunctional Arab Muslim world. The playbook is simple: make it politically acceptable to dictate where Jews can and cannot live. That is why it is vital that Judea and Samaria—known as The West Bank—never be ceded. For if Judea and Samaria is rendered Judenrein then Brooklyn, London, Paris and Melbourne will be the next targets.
Here's the Wall Street Journal story:
In his new suburban American home, Shaker Yakub, a Yemeni Jew, folded a large scarf in half, wrapped it around his head and tucked in his spiraling side curls. "This is how I passed for a Muslim," said the 59-year-old father of seven, improvising a turban that hid his black skullcap.
The ploy enabled Mr. Yakub and half a dozen members of his family to slip undetected out of their native town of Raida, Yemen, and travel to the capital 50 miles to the south. There, they met U.S. State Department officials conducting a clandestine operation to bring some of Yemen's last remaining Jews to America to escape rising anti-Semitic violence in his country.
In all, about 60 Yemeni Jews have resettled in the U.S. since July; officials say another 100 could still come. There were an estimated 350 in Yemen before the operation began. Some of the remainder may go to Israel and some will stay behind, most in a government enclave.
The secret evacuation of the Yemeni Jews — considered by historians to be one of the oldest of the Jewish diaspora communities — is a sign of America's growing concern about this Arabian Peninsula land of 23 million.
The operation followed a year of mounting harassment, and was plotted with Jewish relief groups while Washington was signaling alarm about Yemen. In July, Gen. David Petraeus was dispatched to Yemen to encourage President Ali Abdullah Saleh to be more aggressive against al-Qaeda terrorists in the country. Last month, President Barack Obama wrote in a letter to President Saleh that Yemen's security is vital to the region and the U.S.
Full story here.
And do check out the Wall Street Journal's slide show on the Jews of Yemen.
The Jewish Writing Project has just reprinted one of my posts about Ariel ZT'L: Remembrance of a Shabbos Past.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:36 AM | Comments (9)
November 01, 2009
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere
The Yiddish reads: “Jimmy Cagney in Taxi.”
Haveil Havalim #241 is up and live, presented this week by Simply Jews. Enjoy.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:11 AM | Comments (3)