Submitted Comments RSS Feed Comments by Truthiness Macabbee
Posted in: No joke: Mother-in-law sues
Considering I've never heard of any of these people before, I think this is a brilliant publicity stunt! Kudos all around.
Posted in: Florida governor cites Kotel prayer in absence of hurricanes
This of course means that the next time a major storm hits Florida, it's the Jews' fault.
Posted in: PLP closing down
Even though "Mussa Aliwat" is being facetious, as is his or her wont, that comment actually stumbles upon a basic flaw in the whole model currently being followed by the cabal of funders behind ROI, CLI, ReBoot, the former PLP, et al., which is: who gets to decide who's in and who's out? It seems like there is tremendous overlap among the participants in all those programs. Some might even call it a clique. Cliquishness is one of the biggest turn-offs about the Jewish community for those on the outside who these same funders are in theory trying to attract and retain.
Posted in: Unhip Commentary
Wow, what a beautifully written and insightful rebuttal. The only unfortunate thing is that by JTA calling attention to *anything* Commentary does, you basically quadruple their readership.
Posted in: The Zionist reality: A euphoric, frustrating day at NYC's Tel Aviv beach party (UPDATED WITH VIDEO)
Yeah, I was there too. Why can't we American Jews just admit it aloud: Israelis are our loud pushy cousins that we see once a year, just to remind ourselves why we can't stand them. We so desperately want to forgive them for being overly-aggressive to the point of vulgar -- after all, they're on the "front line," we tell ourselves -- but I'm tired of giving them a pass. When I'm in Israel, I learn how to drive like a *****; now that they're in the U.S., they should learn a little manners. (Yes, I'm stereotyping, so please apply this smear only to the 85% of Israelis to which it applies, thank you.)
Posted in: Tony Judt takes aim at settlements
You're right, Uriel; Israel has not "annexed" the West Bank, so I guess it's just "quibbling" to point out how much land the settlers have taken. Are they simply "borrowing" it? It's obvious that for the settler movement, this is HOW they're going to get the West Bank, through "facts on the ground" rather than through official annexation. But I suppose as long as Israel hasn't "officially" annexed the land, nothing they do with it should be considered "illegal" in the eyes of the world, right? RE: counting Jews in East Jerusalem, Judt counts them because he is going by international law, not by what is convenient for Israel or her U.S. supporters. Pointing out picky issues like how many Jews live in Tel Aviv proper versus the municipality, or how right-wing he describes Bar-Ilan, is a way for you to avoid the substance of Judt's arguments, which I don't see you addressing in this blog entry. The various abstractions that the Palestinians have or have not yet accepted (the supposed "historically important" parts of Netanyahu's speech) are diversionary tactics to avoid acknowledging that (a) Israel controls the land, (b) Israel has taken over and settled large swaths of it, and (c) Israel has total decision-making power over whether or not to give the Palestinians their own state. Yes, keep "quibbling" over whether or not the Palestinians have had their "profound ideological conversion" yet as Israel continue to crush them under the Army's boots. How long can this go on? How profound a conversion can an occupied people have?
Posted in: OU raps Obama on settlements
I hope Obama will ignore the letter the way 85%-90% of American Jews ignore the OU. Has the OU ever once made a statement suggesting that the Palestinians deserve the same right to self-determination as Israeli? And Will, were you upset every time your tax dollars paid for George W.'s trips to Crawford Texas? Or do you kid yourself into believing he was paying for those out-of-pocket? All Presidents have the same set allowance for travel and entertainment, and all of them use it.
Posted in: More on Lamm and Kaddish
Ben, that SimpleToRemember.com study is a total canard and I can't believe you fell for. It's not done by sociologists or demographers, and I challenge you to find a single such social scientist to back up the methodology. Among many flaws, the study does not in any way account for denominational switching, which -- if you look at any REAL study of American Jewry -- is SUBSTANTIAL and particularly affects the number of Orthodox. The 2001 NJPS found that of all Jews who said their denomination at birth was Orthodox, only 40% said they are now Orthodox. That was by far the highest out-migration of any denomination. Remember that fundraising-letter controversy of a month ago where JTA claimed the mantle of journalism over the blogosphere? Do a little fact-checking about that "study" you link to as fact. (Maybe call it "infamous" rather than "well known.") Otherwise, don't bother trying to differentiate JTA from the rest of the blogging screeds.
Posted in: Guest Post: Simon says federations, denominations and J. orgs can evolve through new social media
And yet..."old wine" is often the best, most sought-after and expensive; they just call it "vintage." I am not convinced that any of those initiatives are reaching "hard-to-reach Jews" and would like to see some proof. Aren't PresenTense's offices in Jerusalem? Are the young Jews already living in Israel that hard to reach?! I want a definition of "hard-to-reach Jews." If you reach ANY Jews ages 15-35, does that mean you're automatically reaching "hard-to-reach Jews" because those are the traditional drop-out years from organized Jewish life? Or do these folks actually have to be at risk of losing their Judaism. If it's the latter definition, I bet there are very few Jews participating in ROI that the Jewish community was ever at risk of losing. They may not have been doing a thing about being Jewish before joining ROI, and that may be "proof" enough for the funders (who of course are entitled to do whatever they want with their money). But where are the pre- and post-evaluations? Do many of those participants answer "no" to the question "Do you feel it is important that your future children be raised Jewish?" And now that they're participating in PresenTense they answer "yes"? There has been so much talk about how this is different than business-as-usual but so few concrete examples. Can you provide some?
RSS Feed Breaking News
Updated 02/09/12 @ 05:54PM EST
- A poll showed that nearly half of likely voters believed the United States should use military force to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
- Rabbi Gunther Plaut, a major figure in Reform Judaism, died in Toronto.
- The application for a proposed Hebrew-language charter school was accepted by the District of Columbia Public Charter School board.
- A truck driving calves from Eilat to the Golan Heights was hijacked into the West Bank.
- U.S. Rep. Howard Berman introduced legislation that would allow eligible Israeli nationals to receive non-immigrant investor visas in the United States.
- Poll: Half of U.S. voters back strike on nuclear Iran
- Reform leader Rabbi Gunther Plaut dies
- D.C. Hebrew-language charter school accepted for review
- Op-Ed: Kick the reaction addiction on campus
- Berman moves to grant investor visas to Israelis
- Holy cow! Calves hijacked into Palestinian territory
- Report: Israeli journalist also works for prime minister
- Larry Greenfield tapped to lead JINSA
Posted in: Roger Cohen: Sanctions won't work
09/29/09 05:00 PM
Roger Cohen must feel that if he keeps talking about Iran, eventually he'll get something right. Germany and France had both become peace-loving democracies before they started talking about European Union. It's a boneheaded analogy.