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'Ive' Tag
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Part 3: Viral Videos Do Not Happen They Are Caused
February 19, 2011If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a thousand times: It’s not a flashmob if you hire people to do it, and it’s not viral if you hire a PR company to publicize it. Long story short, for some reason PR companies think I am interested in blogging about their “Fresh Thinking & Flawless [...]
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A Little Thought Experiment About the Middle East
January 28, 2011Hussein Ibish, of the American Task Force on Palestine, and I have an op-ed in the Times today, about ways to unfreeze the peace process. I’m not overly optimistic, of course, but I’ve decided to stop with the whole despair shtick.
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NPR on Asgari: Buying into Mossad Narrative
January 8, 2011After listening to Mike Shuster’s disappointing report on Ali Reza Asgari on NPR yesterday, I’ve come to realize that the very mystery of this case allows everyone connected to it, whether journalist, analyst, politician, intelligence agent, to project their own political agenda onto the blank slate that is Asgari’s disappearance. He’s a sort of Rorschach test. You [...]
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“He was a 40 yr old man..”
December 19, 2010Ever the curious one, I wonder if now that I’m 40, Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan’s book Inner Space will be easier for me to read and comprehend?
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Get Naked for America
November 5, 2010I’ve never received as much mail as I’ve received on the subject of the TSA, except for all the mail I get from Nazis. I’ll be posting some of the these letters in the coming days. Goldblog reader Bob Covington writes:I also have no plans to submit to the Get Naked For America security plan, [...]
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Innovations in Post-Progressive Kashrus
October 11, 2010Those following along at home know that dlevy and I like to cook. (What, you mean you’re not still dreaming of our Deep-fried Tofutti Cuties? Don’t tell me you forgot about our pancakes too?) Well, we’ve been at it again. And by “we’ve” I mean “I’ve.” With dlevy’s encouragement, of course. It all started on [...]
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Looking forward to Gathering the Waters
October 5, 2010For years I’ve been meaning to visit Mayyim Hayyim, the transdenominational mikvah in Newton. I’ve seen pictures and heard stories; everyone tells me that it’s beautiful, welcoming, and quite wonderful. Here’s how they describe themselves: Mayyim Hayyim is a 21st century creation, a mikveh rooted in ancient tradition, reinvented to serve the Jewish community of [...]
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Our national split personality
September 12, 2010I’ve been puzzling over what might be wrong with our national psyche, and I think I’ve figured it out. We are suffering from societal schizophrenia. On the one hand, we enjoy offering magnanimous, PC platitudes about how our culture is no better or worse than anyone else’s, how everything is relative and how we have [...]
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In Objecting to the Mosque, some Foolish Conservatives Drag out the Favorite Whipping Boy from the 90s, and Invert the Analogy
August 30, 2010Over the past two weeks, some conservative dimwits ‘
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Is Wayne Firestone the Jewish Steve Jobs?
August 19, 2010Last week, I attended the Hillel Institute in St. Louis , with many others. It was a nice time, including the first night’s well-run Pub Night that had followed the [non-plenary] plenary session of the Richard Joel Exemplars of Excellence awards (which, I’ve got to say, was the most smoothly run awards presentation I’ve ever [...]
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First Amendment protection
August 13, 2010I bet you haven’t heard about HR2765 entitled “Securing the Protection of our Enduring and Established Constitutional Heritage Act.” It’s the new law protecting First Amendment rights of American authors and publishers from foreign libel lawsuits. I’ve written about it before; it’s a vital piece of protection which passed both Houses of Congress unanimously (which [...]
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Stuck in Leadville on a Sunny Monday Morning
July 13, 2010Sorry about the light blogging; I’ve been busy having ideas at the Aspen Ideas Festival, and I’ve spent the last little while actually trying to escape from Aspen, not quite successfully. Unfortunately, I’ve misplaced the pilot to my private jet, so I had to rely on Frontier Airlines to get me out of Aspen, and [...]
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Supporting ALEPH
July 1, 2010If you’ve been reading this blog for any period of time, you know that I’ve wanted to become a rabbi for a long time, and I’ve been formally studying to become a rabbi since fall of 2005. I’ll be ordained, inshallah, in January of 2011. The ALEPH rabbinic program has been an amazing experience for [...]
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Hope you don’t mind me mentioning…
June 28, 2010Germany vs England: 4 – 1 The Jewlicious link you ask? When the players were leaving the pitch after the match, Matisyahu’s “One Day” was being played over the speakers at the stadium. Argentina, I’ve got my vuvuzela ready as well as my World Cup tee from 1990. And my 2006 World Cup cap. Just [...]
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Shabtai Rosenne and the Qibya Coverup
June 18, 2010Shabtai Rosenne is the 93 year-old Israeli appointee to the panel investigating the IDF’s attack on the Gaza flotilla last month. He has had a distinguished career as an scholar specializing in international law and in the diplomatic corps. I’ve written here about the ludicrousness of placing a nonagenarian in such a key position on [...]