Carly is Correct

While I was away for the first day of Passover, eating unleavened BREAD, that is flour and water baked into BREAD without yeast or other agents to HUFF and PUFF it up, there seems to have arisen a half-baked confusion stemming from seasonal remarks of Carly Fiorina.

“Passover is a time of remembrance and thanks. This festival provides us all – Jewish, Christian and all faiths – with an opportunity to reflect on the challenges we have faced and the triumphs we have achieved together. It is also a reminder of the resilient spirit that has carried people through trials of every kind through every generation. This week as we break bread and spend time with our families and friends, I hope we also take a moment to say a word of thanks for our freedom and for those who have give their lives in freedom's name.”

To the delight of rabbinic legal experts like Huff-Po, Ms Fiorina's comments are grounds for exile, or at least excoriation.

Except that she's not wrong. Matzah IS bread. Moreover, the Seder begins with both the actual and symbollic breaking of bread and the recitation of the following statement of fellowship and welcome in Aramaic, not Hebrew:

This is the bread of affliction our ancestors ate in the land of Egypt. Whoever is hungry--let them come and eat! Whoever is needy--let them come and celebrate Passover! Now, we are here; next year may we be in the Land of Israel! Now we are slaves; next year may we be free people.

Note that this invitation is for anyone and everyone to partake of the meal and rituals of the Seder. Matzah is the name for a kind of bread. The fact is that it is bread, although wafer like without leavening, and not something else. In fact, before Matzah is eaten, everyone at the Seder makes the blessing for BREAD before making the blessing for the requirement of eating ONLY Matzah.

Blessed are You, O Lord our God, King of the universe, Who brings forth BREAD from the earth.

During the seven days that follow the Passover, when Jews are required to eat only unleavened BREAD, it is only the blessing for Bread that is said before eating Matzah. Moreover, during the Seder and at all other times during the Festival of Unleavened BREAD, the prayers of thanksgiving after eating a meal are the ones for eating BREAD. There are no separate prayers of thanksgiving for eating Matzah.

The rituals associated with eating Matzah and "breaking BREAD" together at this season has deeper significance as well. The ritual of BREAD and fellowship lies at the core of BOTH Christian and Jewish practices at this season. Depending on whether one holds that the Last Supper was the first night of Passover or the night before the Passover, the rituals of Easter are associated with breaking BREAD, leavened or unleavened, which in those days looked and probably tasted a lot like modern Matzah.

Think of it as a Venn diagram--all Matzah is BREAD, although not all BREAD is Matzah. On all other nights, we eat all kinds of BREAD--leavened or unleavened BREAD. On Passover (all seven days of it), we ONLY eat unleavened BREAD. One of my Rebbes in seminary was fond of reminding me whenever I would offer a sociological explanation for the Feast of Unleavened BREAD:

My dear Mr. Jackson. The Passover is not about Matzah or BREAD. It's about God's commandment to engage in a certain form of action at this time. If God had ordered us to eat puffed pastry at this time, we would eat flakey dough crescent rolls. That is why we say the second blessing on the Matzah; it comes to tell us that Commandment to eat unleavened BREAD comes from God; not from Marvin Harris.

That would be a Puffington Host indeed.

There is in fact an unintended truth behind Ms Fiorina's words. The preparations for the Passover involve the disposition of a lot of leavening. Jewish Law commands that Chametz, leavening, and products made with Chametz or grain derivatives must either be sold or given to non-Jews. A lot of bread and food stuffs get given away or sold during this time. Food banks over flow (or, they should overflow). This year, I gave away a bottle of Johnnie Walker and made the non-Jewish barkeep in Tel Aviv to whome I gave it VERY happy.

At the end of the seven day period, Jews have traditionally turned to their neighbors for fresh baked bread on the evening after the Festival is over. Jews from Middle Eastern cultures usually turn to their Christian or Muslim neighbors for fresh hot Pitot (another form of BREAD). It is a traditional act of friendship and solidarity between individuals and households rather than rulers, ideologues, and factions.

Judging by the noise generated over this comment, it would appear that those who fault the candidate for her sincerity are in need of some basic education about the practices and rituals of the Passover. After this, I do not think there will be any doubt that Carly has been afflicted over bread.

Next Year in Jerusalem.

Was Judas Iscariot actually Christ's accomplice?

Or was Judas truly a traitor to Jesus?

One of the most deeply-rooted traditions in Christian faith is that one of Jesus' disciples, Judas Iscariot, cruelly betrayed Jesus in Jerusalem, guiding Temple soldiers to Jesus and identifying Jesus to them. Jesus was immediately seized and taken away. He was shortly condemned by both the Jewish Sanhedrin and the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate.

The Gospels record that to identify Jesus to the police, Judas kissed him, leading Jesus to ask, "Judas, do you betray me with a kiss?"

Not long ago a documentary on the Discovery Channel examined the last week of Jesus' life. One scholar posed the idea that Judas did not betray Jesus, but was Jesus' accomplice in carrying out a course of action that went bad in ways Judas did not foresee, but Jesus did.

I don't recall the scholar's name, but his position was based almost exclusively on word studies of the Greek texts of the Gospel's accounts of the events, especially the word translated "betray," which is translated elsewhere as hand over or deliver up - about which more in a moment.

The idea that Judas was traitor has very ample evidence, not least of which is the testimony of the Gospels themselves. Luke identifies Judas as a traitor early:

Luke 6:16: Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor. [There were two disciples named Judas. The infamous Judas was termed "Iscariot." This term refers to his hometown of Kerioth, in southern Judah. Hence, Judas was the only one of the Twelve who was not a Galilean.]

John's Gospel also identifies Judas as a traitor:

John 18:5: "Jesus of Nazareth," they replied. "I am he," Jesus said. (And Judas the traitor was standing there with them.)

There are other such specific attestations as well. (The Greek used for "traitor" is prodotes, which has no other connotation.)

"Traitor" is not the only pejorative term used about Judas in the Gospels. He is also called a "thief" in John 12:6; as the "keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it."

So an attempt to paint Judas in more favorable terms has very strong scriptural obstacles to overcome, to say the least. There are, however, some questions that intrigue:

How did Jesus know that Judas would betray him? None of the other disciples knew. Like the other Gospels, John 13 relates that Jesus gathered his disciples for a meal on his last evening as a free man. After an instructional discourse to them, Jesus informed them, "I tell you the truth, one of you is going to betray me" (v. 21). Jesus identified the traitor as one who with whom he would share bread, then handed bread to Judas.

As soon as Judas took the bread, Satan entered into him. "What you are about to do, do quickly," Jesus told him, but no one at the meal understood why Jesus said this to him.

Since Judas had charge of the money, some thought Jesus was telling him to buy what was needed for the Feast, or to give something to the poor [v.27-29].

How did Jesus know he would be betrayed in the first place, and that Judas would be the traitor? The Gospels give no clue.

The Greek word used for betrayal, paradidomi, does not mean only a traitorous action. It can also be translated, according to Strong's Greek Dictionary (a standard reference) as "to surrender, yield up, entrust or transmit," without necessarily implying underhandedness. My Liddell and Scott Greek-English Lexicon indicates the word is multivalent (as are so many Greek words) and betrayal is one of several meanings the word implies. Context is everything.

The King James version translates paradidomi as "deliver up" in other parts of the Gospels. The modern NIV translates it in other uses as "hand over." In Mark 10:33, Jesus foretells that the Jewish authorities will "hand him over" to the Romans, and the word used there is paradidomi, the same word translated as "betrayal" when referring to Judas' deeds.

The ambiguity of the word at least leaves open the possibility that Judas' actions were not actually traitorous. In fact, the NIV translates paradidomi as "hand over" in Matt 26:15-16. Judas went to the chief priests and asked, "What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?" So they counted out for him thirty silver coins. From then on Judas watched for an opportunity to hand him over."

(According to some historians, the money Judas was paid was standard bounty money paid to good citizens who identified wrong-doers.)

After Judas left the Upper Room, Jesus completed the Last Supper. Then he and his disciples went to the Mount of Olives, outside the city. Matthew and Mark say they went to there and then to "a place called Gethsemane," where he was arrested. Luke says he was arrested at the Mount of Olives and does not mention Gethsemane. John merely says they went to an olive grove across the Kidron Valley from the city. (The Gospels never refer to a place called the Garden of Gethsemane.) John confirms, though, that the place was known to Judas "because Jesus had often met there with his disciples" (John 18:2).

After a period of prayer and speaking to his disciples, Judas arrived with soldiers from the Temple, sometimes called Temple police because they were more a constabulary than a fighting force. (The synoptic Gospels say it was "a crowd" armed with clubs and such. John is probably more accurate.) Judas identified Jesus to them, and they apprehended him.

Events then proceeded apace. After a tempestuous confrontation with the Jewish High Priest, Caiaphas, and the high Jewish council (the Sanhredrin), Jesus was convicted of the religious crime of blasphemy for claiming messianic identity. This crime was one for which the Jewish law required death, but the Sanhedrin did not have authority from the Romans to adjudge a capital the sentence. And they knew that Pilate didn't much care about what religious offenses Jews committed. So they persuaded Pilate that Jesus was actually attempting insurrection against Rome. For that, Pilate sentenced Jesus to be crucified, a standard punishment for insurrection against Roman rule. The sentence was carried out.

Judas attempted to return the silver coins to the chief priests, then hanged himself. (Acts says, though, that he bought a field with the coins, fell headlong into it and was disemboweled.)

There are the bare facts of what Judas and Jesus had to do with each other the last week of both their lives.

So - did Judas actually turn traitor against Jesus, or did Judas do what he did at Jesus' bidding?

The claim that Judas was a traitor has the substantial weight of text behind it, as I have explained. But it does not answer four key questions:

1. How did Jesus know he would be betrayed, and betrayed by Judas, and why were the other disciples clueless about it?

2. How did Judas know exactly where to lead the Temple police to arrest Jesus?

3. Why didn't Jesus escape away from Jerusalem when he had the chance? The Mount of Olives was the near edge of safety for him, from there he could have easily gotten away across Jordan River, which land John 11 identifies as safe haven for Jesus.

4. Why did Judas try to return the money and why did he commit suicide? Judas was no fool, he surely knew his betrayal would risk Jesus' life and could not have been surprised when Jesus was condemned.

Postulating that Judas has gotten a bad rap and that Judas was actually doing what Jesus wanted answers these questions. So consider some pluses and minuses of the "Judas as accomplice" theory:

A. As the only Judean, Judas was the only choice to be Jesus' messenger or intermediary with the high priests. The people of Jerusalem considered Galileans to be hicks from the sticks - John 7:41 records the incredulity of Judeans that Jesus was a Galilean: "How can the Christ come from Galilee?"
Advantage: accomplice.

B. Passover week in Jerusalem was always a tempestuous time. Tempers against the Roman occupiers ran high then, so high in fact that Pilate left the resort city of Caesarea and moved to Jerusalem for the duration, where he could control his forces on scene. Jesus was loved by many of the ordinary people. That would explain why the high priest didn't want to arrest Jesus during the daytime when the crowds could see.

But it does not explain why Jesus would arrange to meet with Caiaphas at night, nor for that matter why he didn't arrange to meet Caiaphas himself, without using Judas. If Jesus wanted to meet Caiaphas all he had to do was walk into the Temple and say hello.
Advantage: betrayal.

C. If Judas was Jesus accomplice, why did Jesus tell the disciples, including Judas, that one of them would betray him? They all understood what he meant. For Jesus to call Judas a betrayer while actually being in collusion with him makes Jesus deceptive.

Not only that, Jesus threatened that it would be better for Judas had he never been born (Mark 14:21).
Advantage: betrayal (a major advantage at that).

D. But Jesus knew what Judas was going to do.
Advantage: accomplice.

E. Jesus went to exactly the place where Judas led the Temple police and did not attempt to evade them.
Advantage: accomplice.

F. If he was working at Jesus' initiative, Judas had no reason to believe that the Jewish high council harbored lethal intent toward Jesus. Thus, when Jesus was condemned, Judas was overcome with grief and remorse at having had a part in delivering up Jesus to that fate. So he killed himself.
Advantage: accomplice.

G. Judas took the silver coins from the high priests because he was avaricious and wanted to be paid for betraying Jesus,
or
the 30 pieces of silver were "market rate" and a routine matter for the high priests to pay for cooperating with them.
Advantage: neutral.

Outside the Gospels, Judas is mentioned a couple of times in Acts, written by the author of Luke, but that is all. The rest of the New Testament is silent about him. But the Gospels' record is uniformly negative. Clearly, there was an apostolic and early church understanding that Judas was a traitor.
Advantage: betrayal.

The idea that Judas was an accomplice of Jesus rather that his betrayer rests on too thin evidence to be accepted. The verdict of the early witnesses is upheld.

Update: I see I neglected to explain what the reason would be for Jesus to send Judas on a secret mission to have him delivered into the hands of High Priest. According to the ruminations of a couple of scholars on the Discovery Channel, Jesus wanted to force the issue of who he was with the High Priest and the Sanhedrin. Judas, being the sole Judean among them, could most easily act as intermediary with the Temple.

By this idea, the notion to see Caiaphas by subterfuge would have to be a very late idea in Jesus' mind. We could say the Jesus had tried to force the issue of confronting the Sanhedrin by his violent cleansing of the moneychangers from the Temple earlier in the week. And according to Matthew 23, Jesus launched into verbal broadside against the Temple class that we bloggers might say was the mother of all fisking of their religious practice and indeed, their very identity. He actually called them sons of Hell, not a move calculated to win their affection.

But these events did not cause the religious authorities to apprehend Jesus, forcing Jesus to arrange his "betrayal" to them by Judas. Judas thus would have been faithful to the end; he committed suicide from shock that his faithfulness had led to Jesus' death.

What this theory fails to explain is why Jesus was so desirous to stand before the High Priest. It could not have been merely to respond affirmatively to Caiaphas' question that he was indeed the "Son of the Most High." Jesus had been declaring his Messianic identity openly for some time; in fact, driving out the moneychangers was a Messianic act. He had personally forgiven sins in front of scribes and Pharisees for a couple of years or so, angering them because they knew that only God can forgive sins.

Nor does it hold up that Jesus expected the High Priest to confirm his Messiahship, for the Gospels are full of Jesus saying that judgment would fall upon "this generation" (meaning his own contemporaries) for not recognizing him.

There is one reason, though, that Jesus could have sent Judas to do what Judas did: Jesus intended to force his own execution. His death, then, was not the result merely of a good disciple gone bad, but the actual objective Jesus had in mind all along. And in fact, the Church has usually been quite comfortable with the idea that Jesus’ death was a cosmic necessity. But with Judas a true traitor, Jesus' death can seem practically accidental - it might not have taken place if Judas had reconsidered and heeded Jesus' warning, for example. And a near-accident is a mighty thin lifeline upon which to hang the redemption of humanity! So this part of the Jesus story is a buttress of the notion that Judas was Jesus' agent rather than his betrayer.

But there is an even stronger argument against the theory: Jesus kicked Judas out of the Upper Room before he instituted the Eucharist. Jesus and the disciples gathered there for a meal (not necessarily the Passover Seder; John says it was not, the other three Gospels say it was). It was only after the meal was done that Jesus took the bread, gave thanks for it, blessed the bread and gave it to his disciples. Likewise, it was after the supper that Jesus took the cup of wine and proclaimed it was the cup of the new covenant.

There is no question that Jesus saw the Eucharist as a defining ritual for his followers. He told them to practice it often and that he would share it with them again at the eschaton. That Jesus dismissed Judas from the room before the sharing of the bread and cup must be considered, I think, as proof that Judas was free-lancing, not secretly abetting Jesus' plans. To use a later religious term, Jesus excommunicated Judas from discipleship, and discipleship identity in Christian faith is practically defined by partaking of the Eucharist.

So, in my mind, the idea that Judas was actually Jesus' ally rather than his betrayer is refuted.

More plausible was the show's examination of just who was most responsible for plotting for Jesus to be executed, about which another post to follow.

Constitutional amendments - take your pick

Shall federalism be killed and buried or shall it be restored?

There has been a lot of buzz across the 'sphere about amending the US Constitution, including a post by Randy Barnett on The Volokh Conspiracy, whose founder Eugene Volokh is a respected professor of Constitutional law at UCLA. It's called, "Help Draft the Federalism Restoration Amendment."

Federalism is, of course, the Constitutional principle that sovereign authority of the country is divided between the federal government and the states. It is encapsulated by the 10th Amendment, one of the amendments of the Bill of Rights, which states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

That is a major reason that the federal government is said to possess only "delegated powers," since the Founders' conception was that sovereignty and rights originally reside in the people, not the state apparatus. They had claimed in the Declaration of Independence, "That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."

The powers of the Congress are enumerated in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution. These are the powers delegated by the people. These days, however, the Congress has decided that there is no limit to its powers, whether specifically delegated or not. Congress's majority party believes that the preamble (the preamble!) to the Constitution confers upon them virtually unlimited powers. This development makes the people subjects, not citizens.

Hence the calls in some quarters for amending the Constitution to restore the founding principle of federalism in the national polity. Well, I can make a list of amendments as well as anybody, so here are mine.

There are two sets of amendments. First is for those who think that federalism is rightfully dead and should be buried. It concretizes the consolidation of power in Washington. The second set reverses the trend.

Set One - Amendments to Enhance the Power of the Federal Government at the Expense of the People and the States

Amendment 28 - The Power of Congress Unlimited

The Tenth Amendment to this Constitution is repealed.

The Congress shall have the power to enact laws as it shall determine necessary. The powers enumerated in Article I, Section 8 of this Constitution shall not be construed or interpreted by any federal court as limiting the authority of the Congress.

Amendment 29 - Sovereignty of the Federal Government Confirmed

The words, "and those in which a State shall be Party," of Article III, Section 2 of this Constitution, are deleted.

The sovereign authority of the United States originates in the national government of the United States. Rights of the people and of the states are, without regard to articles of this Constitution or other amendments thereto, subject to definition and regulation by the Congress.

No challenge to or suit contesting, as to compliance with this Constitution, an enactment by the Congress or executive order of the president may be heard in any federal court after the enactment has become law or the order is issued.

Set Two - The Preservation of the Rights and Powers of the People and of the States


Amendment 28 - The 17th Amendment Repealed

The 17th Amendment to this Constitution is repealed. Article I, Section 3 of this Constitution is restored to the original text as ratified by original states of the United States.

This amendment would repeal direct election of US senators and return them to being chosen by the legislatures of the states. My explanatory notes on this are here.

Amendment 29 - Direct Federal Taxation of Incomes Prohibited

The 16th Amendment to this Constitution is repealed.

The powers of the Congress shall not extend to levying taxes of any kind directly upon incomes of individual persons.

After being ratified, this article shall become effective on the first day of January of the first even-numbered year following the general election of the members of the United States House of Representatives.

Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

My explanatory notes on this are here. My attempt in the rather inartfully-worded phrasing of the second paragraph is the ensure the amendment becomes effective one year after the seating of a new Congress, meaning that the same Congress that enacts legislation to fund the government by means other than income tax will have ample time to figure out how - and will have to face the voters 11 months after the amendment takes effect.

Amendment 30 - Regulatory Powers of the Congress Defined

The powers of the Congress to regulate commerce among the several states shall not extend to making any law that requires any commerce to take place. No commerce taking place wholly within a state may be regulated by the Congress.

If the Congress can require Americans to buy health insurance, there is no principle that inhibits the government from requiring us to buy anything it wants us to buy. As US Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) points out, there is no reason now that the government could not compel auto buyers to purchase a General Motors product rather than another brand's.

Think this is far-fetched? The federal government already tax penalizes auto makers or importers who sell certain vehicles getting lower than 22.5 mpg on the EPA's combined table. It's called the gas-guzzler tax. Of course, the tax is simply considered as a cost by the companies and, like all costs, it is passed along to the consumers. But even before the passage of the health-care law, there was no reason the Congress could not also mandate that buyers of such vehicles pay the tax at the point of sale.

If the government can require us to buy health insurance or pay extra tax to the IRS, then there is no reason we can't be mandated the same choice when buying a car. Buy GM or not, but if not, pay extra to the IRS next April.

Amendment 31 - Right to Keep and Bear Arms Clarified

The right of the people to keep and bear arms is a right of individual persons of the United States without relationship to the purpose of Militias of the states or to the armed forces of the United States.

Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Amendment 31 - Executive Orders Limited

Orders by the president, except those directly regulating the operation of the executive branch of the government, shall expire two years after they are issued unless sooner enacted into law by the Congress; however, such enactment shall not be made less than one year after the order is issued.

Amendment 32 - Judicial Review of the Courts Not Absolute

In the event that a law of the United States is, in whole or in part, held by a court of the federal judiciary to be not in compliance with this Constitution, the Congress shall have the power to overrule the judiciary by concurrence of two-thirds of the members of each chamber; however, no such action by the Congress shall take place until an election of Representatives shall have intervened, nor shall the concurrence of the president be required.

Amendment 33 - Citizenship by Right of Birth Clarified

1. A person shall be a citizen of the United States by right of birth provided that the person is:

a. born in the United States to parents of whom at least one is, at the time of the birth, both a citizen of the United States and a de jure parent of the newborn, or,

b. born in the United States to parents who, though not citizens of the United States, are legally in the United States at the time of the birth, and who are de jure parents of the newborn, or,

c. born outside the United States to a de jure parent who is citizen of the United States at the time of the birth, provided that the birth occurs outside the United States because of United States diplomatic mission or military orders of a parent, or,

d. born outside the United States to a de jure parent who is citizen of the United States at the time of the birth, provided that the birth and identifying information of the newborn are registered within six months from the date of the birth with a United States diplomatic mission to the jurisdiction wherein the birth occurred.

2. Persons born in the United States and who do not meet a criterion citizenship by right of birth shall not be deprived of due process of law; nor shall any such persons within the jurisdiction of the United States be denied the equal protection of the laws by the United States nor by any State.

3. Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Amendment 34 - Supremacy of the Constitution as the Law of the Land

This Constitution is the supreme law of the United States and shall not be subordinated to international treaties, agreements or concordances. The rights of the people of the United States shall not be diminished or denied by terms of treaties or any other agreement with a foreign government or organization.

Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Comments on.

Unleavened Bread

Well, the minutes are counting down to Pesach and over here in Efrat everything is slowly shutting down--event the birds are settling down. Perhaps even more than Yom Kippur, Passover is THE celebration that virtually all self-identifying Jews make, in one form or the other. Good food, drama, four obligatory 3.5 oz glasses of wine, lots of stories, and the entire family gathered together under one roof--what's not to like (don't start)?

The drama of the Passover story is already being discussed with its obvious political overtones to current events. There are several wonderful examples of this modernized narrative on the net, well within the traditional boundaries of the day, or evening, so I won't belabor the obvious. I am concerned, however, that with all of the political applications, especially directed at Barak, something fundamental about the meaning of Passover is neglected.

The Passover is more than the party, the celebration, and reading from a small book. Passover is a process; a time for learning and a time for preparation. It is a time of renewal to "Hear, O Israel, The LORD is God; the LORD is One."

It starts thirty days before the festival with a fevered pace, mostly centered on the changing of dishes, something that looks like spring cleaning, and lots of activity on the subject of leavening, or Chametz. While most people start this cleaning process after Purim, many, like our family wait until the week before the deadline.

The dietary restriction on eating leavened products extends beyond “bread” per se, and attaches to the active ingredient, the leavening agent referred to as Chametz. Often defined as a souring or fermenting ingredient in food, Chametz is permitted throughout the year in everything. From noon on the day before Passover begins, continuing for the next seven days, Chametz becomes forbidden.

Moreover, the prohibition of Chametz is not just with respect to food items but with anything with which Chametz has come in contact. Pots, pans, utensils, shelves, storage bins, computer keyboards, clothing, and any location where family members are likely to take food made with leavening requires thorough cleaning.

From a spiritual perspective, this period of time before the Holy Festival of Passover, a time of preparation, is itself sacred . Holy times demand some sort of spiritual separation from everyday work and play. To demarcate the approach of sacred space and time, it is necessary to prepare our households as well as our selves.

Perhaps this is the reason that Chametz is invested with so much meaning and interpretation. More than simply a thing, Chametz is a process. At the surface level, Chametz is the process of fermentation when moisture comes in contact with grain and grain products. It is a souring agent that has many wonderful properties: one causes bread to rise and another improves the flavor of that combination of flour, water, oil, and salt.

Yet, Chametz is also associated with craving and excess. During sacred time and space, the goal is to pull back from personal desires and drives and focus on the spiritual side of existence. While fermentation creates wine, too much produces vinegar—in Hebrew, the lengthening of the vowel “a” transforms Chametz to Chometz—vinegar.

My wife’s view is that adding Chametz to bread causes it to swell symbolic of pride, an ingredient in daily life that a little goes a long way. In small doses, pride manifests as self esteem; too much pride becomes arrogance—a souring agent in any social setting. During Passover, however, through eating the Bread of Affliction, we learn from the poor, who are without pride, in order to acquire a taste for humility.

Underlying all of the explanations for the Passover process there remains one central question: Why do we celebrate the Passover? Rabbi Yeshayahu Horowitz, the author of the book The Two Tablets of the Covenant, my mother's illustrious ancestor, directs our attention to Exodus 34: 17-18.

You shall make for yourself no molten gods. The Feast of Unleavened Bread shall you keep. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, in the time of the month Aviv; for in the month Aviv you came out from Egypt.

That pretty much covers it. Keep the Feast of Unleavened bread for seven days in the spring to remember the Exodus because I, God, told you to do so. Clear? But, why is the prohibition of molten idols included with the observance of Passover? What is the association between idol worship and Chametz?


At the core of Jewish life is the centrality of God. It is the first of the Ten Sayings.

I am the Lord your God, who have brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of servitude. You shall have no other gods before me. [Exodus 20: 2-3]

Anything that stands between God and each of us represents a barrier to our relationship with God. The very act of creating or molding things, actions, ideas, even our emotions into focal points that absorb our attention away from the Divine Presence is idol worship pure and simple. Among the reasons for the Exodus was, and still remains, our separation from idols and false gods.

When the quest for the material things in life, such as position, tenure, or fame, absorbs us so completely that we no longer see our way to God’s gift of life, then we have created an idol as vile as the Golden Calf. It is that taste, not of the forbidden, but of excess, that is the message of this season. Just as we can make things holy, like Shabbat, we make things horrific. The choice is ours. Turn away or return to God’s way. How do we do this? Well, we can start by casting out Chametz and watching with what we seek to fill our mouths.

Ground Zero

Shabbat HaGadol, the Sabbath that precedes The Passover, is a time of expectation and reflection. It is an opportunity to reflect on existential peril and God's Deliverance. To remember how darkness precedes light, arrogance comes before a fall.

Next Year In Jerusalem!

We are now subjects, not citizens

Having been perforce offline for the past few days, I have still been attentive to the events that transpired therein. The stunning destruction of Constitutional process by the Democrats on Sunday night was sickening to behold - and that without the "deem and pass" tyranny that almost came to be.

The question has been asked repeatedly since Sunday where in the Constitution is the Congress granted the authority to mandate that individuals buy health insurance. The answer is, of course, nowhere, not even in the Constitution's "good and welfare" clause that House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., claimed justified the act. But of course, there is no such clause.

The Constitution does begin by saying that it's purpose is (among others) to "promote the general welfare." The signs have been evident for literally decades, but now it is blindingly clear that Democrat party believes that the preamble - which delegates no powers, that comes later in the document - gives them unlimited authority "to control the people," in the words this week of Rep. John Dingell.

The entire Founders' insight that government has no rights, only powers delegated to it by the people, has been tossed on the ash heap of history. With Sunday night's vote and the self-triumphant signing of bill by President Obama, "we the people of the United States" has been struck through. The operating slogan now is, "You the subjects of the Sovereign Congress."

I wrote in 2003 that this was where we are headed. I never imagined it would come this quickly.

High speed, low level

Gerard Vanderleun embedded this Youtube clip, "Top 10 Low Pass Flybys of All Time."



To which I would add this stunt flying, below, done for the movie, "The Battle of Britain," 1969. The Bf-109s in the clip are real. They were bought from Spain, which had retired them from active service some years before. The Hawker Hurricanes being shot to pieces on the ground are not real. The 109s' pilots were all Spanish air force pilots. Since the movie was made long before the days of CGI, all the flying here is actual. Elsewhere in the movie, some sequences were shot using very high-quality flying models, but it is so well done it's not obvious.

This sequence takes place at the beginning of the movie. Set in France, a Hurricane squadron is abandoning its base due to German advances. Unflyable Hurricanes are about to be torched when the 109s appear. The clip will begin playing at the moment.

Deemocrats approve Slaughter Solution

Two hundred twenty-two Democrat Deemocrat House members voted today to use the Slaughter Solution to trample on Constitutional requirements of passing legislation. For back ground, see Con Law Has a Whole New Meaning and its redux.

The Slaughter Solution, named after Rep. Louise Slaughter, chair of the House Rules Committee, will enable Speaker Pelosi to "deem" the Senate health-care bill passed without an actual vote on it by enabling Slaughter to rule that the House's amendments to the Senate bill amount to passing it. Hence shall they be evermore known as Deemocrats. Michelle Malkin has more.

The American people are now being ruled by edict.

Lame duck redux and the hidden costs of defeat

I said last July that unless President Obama can get the health-care bill passed he will be the most ineffectual of all office holders, a lame duck.

I think that Obama and his inner circle realize that if they can't get this [health care] package, or something very close to it, passed then they will be faced with the fact that Obama, barely more than a half-year into his first term, will basically be a lame duck.

Of course, that's when everyone knew that the bill would make it through both houses before the August recess. Didn't happen, and the bill limped, well, lamely, through the House and Senate before the end of the year, though the House bill and the Senate bill are not the same, which is causing all sorts of problems for the Democrats today.

Anyway, we have now reached the day when powerful people in Washington are now saying on the record that lame duckness looms if the HC bill doesn't make it. Says Politico:

One [Congressional Hispanic] caucus member told POLITICO that Obama won him over by “essentially [saying] that the fate of his presidency” hinged on this week’s health reform vote in the House. The member, who requested anonymity, likened Obama’s remarks to an earlier meeting with progressives when the president said a victory was necessary to keep him “strong” for the next three years of his term.

Another caucus member, Rep. Jose Serrano (D-N.Y.), said, “We went in there already knowing his presidency would be weakened if this thing went down, but the president clearly reinforced the impression the presidency would be damaged by a loss.” ...

Moreover, there’s an unmistakable sense that the health care debate is fast moving past a discussion of the bill’s merits, beyond the all-consuming anxieties of incumbents and into an existential battle to preserve Obama’s presidency.

“The White House is raising the stakes so high, they are basically telling [House Democrats] that failure is not an option unless you want to sink the president,” said health industry lobbyist Steve Elmendorf, a onetime adviser to Rep. Dick Gephardt, a former Democratic leader.

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), one of Obama’s closest allies in the health reform push, was more than willing to lay out a post-health-care doomsday scenario for Democrats and Obama should they fail.

“The first risk [of a health care defeat] is that he loses the reelect,” she said. “I think the risk to Congress is that his approval rating goes so low, he does not have enough heft to lift other important things we want to work on." ...

“There are serious implications of losing on President Obama’s ability to be effective for the rest of his three years in office,” [Democrat Rep. Henry] Waxman told POLITICO.

Well, you get the idea. The real danger of the president being a lame duck is not that he won't be able to get most of the rest of his domestic agenda enacted (for which we should all be thankful!) but that there are some very nasty and potentially very violent national leaders out in the world who will see that Obama's stature is so small at home that they won't even perceive him as a paper tiger.

Is that a good reason to enact the disastrous heath-care bill? No. But it may well be that the cost of its defeat will be paid in other coin.

Update: Men named Don must think alike (that is, brilliantly!). Don Surber writes in the Charleston Daily Mail, "The world watches our president fail."

Obama's presidency is collapsing.

As a conservative, this brings no joy. I am worried.

The whole world is watching. And I really do not like what the world is seeing.

Allies are less confident in us. Adversaries are emboldened.

Don is right: the defeat of the HC bill is necessary, but should bring no joy.

Con Law has a whole new meaning redux

I explained Tuesday why the "Slaughter solution" to "deem" the Senate's HCR bill as passed in the House, rather than actually vote on it, would be unconstitutional, according to Constitutional law (Con law) scholars. But,

Nancy Pelosi gives a whole new meaning to "Con Law," the slang for Constitutional Law. Her version is all con, no law. As the WSJ says, "We have entered a political wonderland, where the rules are whatever Democrats say they are."

I ended by observing that Candidate Barack Obama touted himself as a professor of Constitutional law and claimed, "I actually respect the Constitution." "Well, Mr. President," I asked, "let's see whether you live up to that promise if the Slaughtered bill lands on your desk."

And now we know the answer from Obama's appearance last night on FoxNews:

"I don't spend a lot of time worrying about what the procedural rules are in the House or Senate," Obama said. "What I can tell you is that the vote that's taken in the House will be a vote for health care reform. And if people vote yes, whatever form that takes, that is going to be a vote for health care reform. And I don't think we should pretend otherwise. And if they don't, if they vote against it, then they're going to be voting against health care reform and they're going to be voting in favor of the status quo.

So this president has said that he will not worry whether a bill presented for his signature was brought forth according to the Constitution. The means don't matter as long as the end is gained. So why bother with even the pretense of Constitutionality at all, for any issue?

Here are the videos. The above quote is found at the front of the first video.

First part:



Second part:



Update: Tom bevan at RCP says that Obama made a big mistake appearing on Fox - not because it was Fox, but because,

Obama came across as both dismissive and non-responsive to Brett Baier's insistent questioning about the process. He implicitly approved using parliamentary gymnastics to pass the Senate bill, and he didn't provide very specific or convincing answers about which "special deals" will be included in the final legislation. In the end, he repeated familiar bromides about the benefits and centrist nature of his plan, all of which the public has heard ad nauseam for months and few of which they appear to believe. President Obama offered nothing new, either in substance or tone, that would grab someone whose mind is still open on the issue of health care (and there aren't many left after a full year of debating the issue) and convince them to support his legislation.

Seems about right to me.

Climate scientist explains how the IPCC is political

Part of an interview in Discover with Judith Curry, head of Georgia Tech's School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences (link):

Are you saying that the scientific community, through the IPCC, is asking the world to restructure its entire mode of producing and consuming energy and yet hasn’t done a scientific uncertainty analysis?

Yes. The IPCC itself doesn’t recommend policies or whatever; they just do an assessment of the science. But it’s sort of framed in the context of the UNFCCC [the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change]. That’s who they work for, basically. The UNFCCC has a particular policy agenda—Kyoto, Copenhagen, cap-and-trade, and all that—so the questions that they pose at the IPCC have been framed in terms of the UNFCCC agenda. That’s caused a narrowing of the kind of things the IPCC focuses on. It’s not a policy-free assessment of the science. That actually torques the science in certain directions, because a lot of people are doing research specifically targeted at issues of relevance to the IPCC. Scientists want to see their papers quoted in the IPCC report.

Did you catch that? The IPCC's work is done to conform to the expectation of the the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which has a policy (read: political) agenda and which frames its questions of the IPCC in terms that support the political agenda.

I have been saying all along that the IPCC is a political body, not a scientific one. Climate science is "Advocacy science."

Climate science may well be the only scientific study that has no utilitarian value. All other scientific disciplines enable some kind of improvement in the human condition. Physics enables space exploration and medical equipment such as MRIs, for example. Meteorology predicts weather which has all sorts of beneficial applications. Chemistry provides us with new materials and biology with health insights and improved crop productions. All of these things plus countless others.

Yet climate science has no "product." The outcomes of climate modeling cannot be used to do anything except what is being done with them - promote statist control of ever-expanding slices of national economies to conform to a transnationalist ideology.

If climate science could be used to do anything else, it would already be happening. But have you ever heard of any report of climate science's findings not in connection with expanding the power of the state or trans-state organs?

The prima facie evidence is that climate science's purpose to use science to exercise political power. More about that here.

Bailing from Blackberry

I have a Blackberry Tour and I am right there with this: "39% of BlackBerry owners say they'd switch to an iPhone."

A study released this week from Crowd Science found that 39 percent of BlackBerry owning respondents said they "definitely or probably would" switch to an iPhone if they had to buy a new handset "tomorrow." Another 29 percent said they were unsure, while 31 percent are unlikely to buy Apple's handset.

The survey carried even more good news for Apple, as 92 percent of iPhone users said they are satisfied with their purchase and would likely make their next smartphone another iPhone.

Android-system users also reported a very high satisfaction rate. I have had my Tour, my first BBerry device, since last July, on Verizon. I would gladly trade it for almost any other smartphone except a Windows OS phone. My discontent with the Tour only intensified after my wife gave me an iPod Touch last Christmas. The Touch is an iPhone without the phone part or a camera. But in form factor and applications it is the same. (The only other difference is that my Touch has 32 GB of capacity rather than the iPhone's eight, and you can buy a Touch with 64 gigs.) Because it has no phone, you can go online only through wi-fi, but since getting it I have been impressed with how ubiquitous wi-fi is in public places.

The iPhone/Touch's Safari browser is infinitely superior to the Tour's, which is trapped inside a screen so small as to be mostly unusable for browsing, especially paired with the decidedly inferior Blackberry native browser. There are downloadable browsers for the device, such as Opera, but again, the screen is so small it does not help much.

The Touch has far more available apps, too, and more of them are free. Navigation with the Touch's touchscreen is silky smooth and precise compared to the clunky, jerky trackball on the Tour.

Complaints about ATT's network remain, though. However, just comparing device to device, the iPhone is clearly superior by far. As for the Google Droid, also available on Verizon, it's clunky and awkward compared with the iPhone, at least those were my impressions after an extended time of operating a working phone at a Verizon store. The on-screen keyboard is dead compared to the iPhone's, offering absolutely no tactile feedback. The Droid is not as comfortable in the hand and, of course, lacks the app selection, although I would think that by now (or soon) the most useful apps are available.

Interesting, though, that in my laxst conversation with a Verizon rep, she said the company no longer says it will not get the iPhone. "We'll see," is the new (and not very informative) company spin.

Update: I had the chance this morning to talk to a Verizon rep who said that while Verizon will never sell the iPhone, its network will be iPhone compatible "before the end of the year." Verizon is implementing a 4G-LTE network that will be compatible with GSM-based phones, which is what an iPhone is. So Verizon users can buy an iPhone on their own and activate it on the Verizon network when the time comes.

Rumors remain, however, that there actually will be a Verizon-branded iPhone. I hope so. We'll see.

Jokes for St Patrick's Day

Paddy was driving down the street in a sweat because he had an important meeting and couldn't find a parking place.. Looking up to heaven he said, 'Lord take pity on me. If you find me a parking place I will go to Mass every Sunday for the rest of me life and give up me Irish Whiskey!'

Miraculously, a parking place appeared.

Paddy looked up again and said, 'Never mind, I found one.'
_____________________________

Paddy was in New York. He was patiently waiting and watching the traffic cop on a busy street crossing. The cop stopped the flow of traffic and shouted, 'Okay, pedestrians.' Then he'd allow the traffic to pass.
He'd done this several times, and Paddy still stood on the sidewalk..

After the cop had shouted, 'Pedestrians!' for the tenth time, Paddy went over to him and said, 'Is it not about time ye let the Catholics across?'
_____________________________

Gallagher opened the morning newspaper and was dumbfounded to read in the obituary column that he had died. He quickly phoned his best friend, Finney.

'Did you see the paper?' asked Gallagher. 'They say I died!!'

'Yes, I saw it!' replied Finney. 'Where are ye callin' from?'
_____________________________

An Irish priest is driving down to New York and gets stopped for speeding in Connecticut . The state trooper smells alcohol on the priest's breath and then sees an empty wine bottle on the floor of the car.

He says, 'Sir, have you been drinking?'

'Just water,' says the priest.

The trooper says, 'Then why do I smell wine?'

The priest looks at the bottle and says, 'Good Lord! He's done it again!'
_____________________________

Walking into the bar, Mike said to Charlie the bartender, 'Pour me a stiff one - just had another fight with the little woman.'

'Oh yeah?' said Charlie, 'And how did this one end?'

'When it was over,' Mike replied, 'She came to me on her hands and knees.'

'Really,' said Charles, 'Now that's a switch! What did she say?'

She said, 'Come out from under the bed, you little chicken.'

Con Law has a whole new meaning

By now almost every blog reader knows that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is determined to get a health care reform bill to President Obama's desk no matter the cost, monetary or political. And with her latest trick, she's quite willing to shred the Constitution to do it. Her latest power play is the "Slaughter Solution."

The WSJ reports that Pelosi has leaned on US Rep. Louise Slaughter, Democrat of New York, who chairs the House Rules Committee, to,

... insert what's known as a "self-executing rule," also known as a "hereby rule." Under this amazing procedural ruse, the House would then vote only once on the reconciliation corrections, but not on the underlying Senate bill. If those reconciliation corrections pass, the self-executing rule would say that the Senate bill is presumptively approved by the House—even without a formal up-or-down vote on the actual words of the Senate bill.

Democrats would thus send the Senate bill to President Obama for his signature even as they claimed to oppose the same Senate bill. They would be declaring themselves to be for and against the Senate bill in the same vote. Even John Kerry never went that far with his Iraq war machinations. As we went to press, the precise mechanics that Democrats will use remained unclear, though yesterday Mrs. Pelosi endorsed this "deem and pass" strategy in a meeting with left-wing bloggers.

Rep. Louise "Rules by Edict" Slaughter --->

Nancy Pelosi gives a whole new meaning to "Con Law," the slang for Constitutional Law. Her version is all con, no law. As the WSJ says, "We have entered a political wonderland, where the rules are whatever Democrats say they are."

This is so blatantly unconstitutional that it almost beggars belief that even Nancy Pelosi would try it -- but we've learned since her ascendancy to the Speaker's throne chair that there is no line she won't cross to get her way.

Jonathan Adler at The Volokh Conspiracy (a law-oriented blog run by UCLA Constitutional law Prof. Eugene Volokh) cites Former federal judge Michael McConnell, of Stanford University on why Pelosi's ploy is unconstitutional.

To become law—hence eligible for amendment via reconciliation—the Senate health-care bill must actually be signed into law. The Constitution speaks directly to how that is done. According to Article I, Section 7, in order for a “Bill” to “become a Law,” it “shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate” and be “presented to the President of the United States” for signature or veto. Unless a bill actually has “passed” both Houses, it cannot be presented to the president and cannot become a law. ...

The Slaughter solution attempts to allow the House to pass the Senate bill, plus a bill amending it, with a single vote. The senators would then vote only on the amendatory bill. But this means that no single bill will have passed both houses in the same form. As the Supreme Court wrote in Clinton v. City of New York (1998), a bill containing the “exact text” must be approved by one house; the other house must approve “precisely the same text.”

These constitutional rules set forth in Article I are not mere exercises in formalism. They ensure the democratic accountability of our representatives.

Here is a key question: Will Obama go to Slaughter? Some Democrat House members are balking.

Opponents of Obamacare have recently been talking about how outrageous the Slaughter strategy is. I agree with them. But there's another point that's worth making more than Republicans have: It's not going to buy the Democrats much political cover, and might make their situation marginally worse.

Candidate Barack Obama touted himself as a professor of Constitutional law.

Sen. Obama, who has taught courses in constitutional law at the University of Chicago, has regularly referred to himself as "a constitutional law professor," most famously at a March 30, 2007, fundraiser when he said, "I was a constitutional law professor, which means unlike the current president I actually respect the Constitution."

Well, Mr. President, let's see whether you live up to that promise if the Slaughtered bill lands on your desk.

I'm guessing he'll sign it so fast the nub of his pen will set the paper afire.

Comments on 


Update: Pelosi and Slaughter were against the self-executing rule before they were for it. You see, it's not hypocrisy when the Democrats do it.

"Run away!" - You read it here first

I wrote last July in, "Health care bill is defining the future" that health-care reform would lead to the day when

Dems in Congress ... will enjoy the freedom of running away from the White House, even to the point that in some tossup seats next year, we'll see some Dems running against Obama as much as their Republican opponents.

Jennifer Rubin at Commentary indicates that the day has arrived: "Run away!"

Obama keeps telling his fellow Democrats that ObamaCare will cure what ails them. But the facts — polls and the behavior of candidates – tell us otherwise. As this reports explains (h/t Mark Hemingway): “Representative John Boccieri, Democrat of Ohio, whose vote on major health care legislation could be crucial to the outcome, will not be attending President Obama’s health care rally on Monday in Strongsville, Ohio, not far from Mr. Boccieri’s own district, a spokeswoman said.” We’ve seen this before, as Democrats in swing states steer clear of Obama. And given the polling data in Ohio, it isn’t surprising that a Democrat would want to evade the president.

The HCR vote is being taken now and some Dem Congressmen are voting with their feet. And any excuse to run the Holy Grail clip that Jennifer refers to is good enough.

Go green and live worse

Decisions have consequences. And here they are.

Shamelessly ripped from American Digest.

Thank goodness for global warming

If it was not for global warming, humankind might still be huddled in caves around roaring fires, just trying to stay warm.



Hat tip: Red Planet cartoons

Some previous posts:

What if global warming is a good thing?

Global warming myths

Why Greenland welcomes warming

Advocacy science: Climate science has no "product"

And everything here.

Upping the Ante

The Obama administration is playing a dangerous game in the Middle East and the only beneficiary will be Iran regardless of the outcome. Debka explains that the current strong arm tactics with Israel started before Tuesday's announcement of the 1600 housing units.

The peremptory note was first noted when Biden called on president Shimon Peres, his first meeting with an Israel leader. He then explicitly warned Israel against venturing to attack Iran without prior American permission.

Even the oft-repeated American commitment to Israel's security was delivered with a notable reservation: I can promise the people of Israel that we will confront every security challenge that we will face, said Biden. This statement ruled out unilateral Israel operations in its defense. Forget unilateral, he was saying: From now "we" make the decisions about the levels of "security challenge" facing Israel and how to "confront it." And there was no false modestly about who the senior decision-maker was to be in this "alliance."

Jerusalem was also taken aback by the US vice president's assertion that Iran was isolated as never before. A distorting prism appeared to be held up by the Obama administration to justify its backtracking on painful sanctions for Iran. These sanctions were explicitly promised by the White House to Netanyahu and defense minister Ehud Barak in return for Israel's consent to hold back from striking Iran's nuclear facilities.

The Biden visit to Israel, therefore, far from meeting its avowed goal of smoothing over the differences between the Obama administration and Israel, has left Jerusalem more distrustful than ever.

This growing lack of trust with the administration's Iran repproachment is not limited, moreover, to the Israelis. The Saudis are very concerned with the alarming way chess pieces are behaving. Debka explains.

US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates arrived in Riyadh Wednesday, March 10, flying in unexpectedly from Kabul in Afghanistan, after the Saudis demanded urgent clarifications of the Obama administration's Iran policy. DEBKAfile's military sources report that the demand followed the failure of US Vice President Joe Biden's talks with Israeli leaders to resolve their differences on Iran.

As a result, two senior US officials are visiting to Middle East capitals at the same [time] under pressure to deal with the Iranian nuclear question.

Gates was closeted with Saudi rulers although it was as recently as Feb. 15 that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Riyadh and explained Washington's strategy on Iran to King Abdullah and several senior Saudi princes. But she failed to allay her hosts' intense concerns that the US was doing enough to abort Iran's nuclear weapons program.

Then on Sunday, March 7, US Centcom Commander Gen. David Petraeus, asked by a CNN interviewer, whether countries in the Persian Gulf wish to see a US military attack on Iran, said: “…there are countries that would like to see a strike, us or perhaps Israel, even...”

In Israel, where the media are obsessed with the slightest Arab or Palestinian utterance, none cited the US general's comments.

DEBKAfile's military sources report that Petraeus' comments referred mainly to the two main Persian Gulf state, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. In fact, the UAE foreign minister, referring to the assassination of Hamas member al-Mabhouh, noted this week that his country and Israel see eye to eye on the Iranian issue.
Reports of the Biden conversations in Jerusalem Tuesday have reached Riyadh. They reveal that not only is the Obama administration leaning hard on Israel to abstain from attacking Iran, but is even retreating from harsh sanctions. Such penalties have no been put on hold for five months.

The Saudis are as deeply alarmed by the latest American stance on Iran is as the Israelis.

US sources reported that no sooner did the US defense secretary land in Riyadh from Kabul when he was summoned to dinner with King Abdullah and the Saudi defense minister, Crown Prince Sultan. They admitted that he would be required "to present an update to Saudi officials who are intensely concerned about Iran's nuclear program and the fate of the American-led effort to impose new sanctions on Tehran."

This morning, reports are that the Obama adminnistration is considering holding up agreed arms shipments to Israel to further rachet the pressure on Jerusalem. This was hinted at by Clinton during a dressing down phone call to Netanyahu last night.

Meanwhile, back in the land of democracy, Netanyahu's own Likud party is asking the question that Israelis (and perhaps the Saudis) are asking--what's to apologize for?

"How can it be that we need permission from the Americans every time we want to build a neighborhood or a house in Jerusalem?” [MK Yariv] Levin said. The American condemnation of Israeli plans to build in Jerusalem exposed the real problem, the problem of Israel's willingness to accept foreign meddling in domestic affairs, he stated.

"The time has come for us to stand up for ourselves. I have no doubt that if we do so, the world will see us differently,” he said.

America's attempt to interfere in Jewish housing projects in Jerusalem is the result of the building freeze in Judea and Samaria, said Levin. “We warned [Netanyahu] that it was a slippery slope, and that the building freeze would lead to interference in construction in Jerusalem, and that's what happened,” he said.

What is not being discussed is the growing violence in the West Bank. Undoubtedly, the Palestinian tough guys will use this an excuse to scuttle the "next round of talks". Stay tuned.

Pining for the Fjords

Nicole Brackman and Asaf Romirowsky over at Pyjamas Media have a great article on Palestinian education reform. Actually, it's really more about the lack thereof.

Now their discussion got me thinking about the same topic but in a slightly different angle. Actually, Palestinian education, reform or otherwise, is essentially virtual. Like all forms of virtual realities, believing determines what is seen.

A case in point is the Frush Beit Dajan school project somewhere out in the Jordan Valley. I say "somewhere" because my son showed me the sign announcing the USAID grant to expand the school, but no where to be found is the school.

According to the UNISPAL website, the school's expansion was inaugurated in 2005 to expand the current school.

FRUSH BEIT DAJAN, West Bank – American and Palestinian officials inaugurated a new wing to the local primary school Thursday, expanding the facility's capacity by three grades and allowing older students to study in their own neighborhood.

The new wing of the Frush Beit Dajan Co-Ed School includes four classrooms and a teachers' room. The school used to accommodate students only up to the sixth grade – forcing older children to travel 17 kilometers to schools in Jiftlek or Nassarieh.
The new classrooms will enable the students to continue their education close to home until the ninth grade.
Teachers say they also expect the new classrooms to sharply reduce the drop-out rate among the school's 200 students.
The American people contributed $88,000 to the project through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The Frush Beit Dajan Village Council chipped in another $7,000 in the form of designs and site supervision.

My son told me it is something of a joke out in the area around Ma'ale Ephraim where his pre-military training program is. Like the child's game of peek-a-boo, here's the sign, where's the school?

Now maybe the sign migrated from its original site. Maybe it is a model modern school that utilizes virtual technology, just like all those virtual educational reforms Brackman and Romirowsky are writing about. Maybe the school never was built and this is just the local version of Chicago style political construction projects.

It could even be that the school, like the students and the staff, goes home for the night.

Or, maybe it goes off to some remote hilltop to pine for the fjords.

Hot Air and Sandstorms From the West

The weather this week in Israel has been frightful. Incredibly hot air and fine sand blown in from the west, accompanied by very high barometric pressure made it just plain yucky to walk about let alone have a civil conversation.


Perfect timing for Joe Biden's visit to Israel to scold the Israelis. The latest in a recent gaggle of tongue waggers and nay sayers, Biden was here to get things going, otherwise known as lean on Bibi. Acting very Bill Clinton, the Vice President probably was using the former president's play book when Netanyahu folded and, if it were not for Arafat, would have given away the farm.

It was a good idea. But the mood in Israel is just not the same as it was back in those days. In fact, Biden was "brought up short with a round turn", as maritime folk like to say.

There are two significant differences between now and then, and these two things will influence how Israel will deal with neighbors, friends, and foes.

First, Israel is faced with an existential threat in the form of Iran. This is not the sort of thing even Big Bill can minimize with that old arm-about-the-shoulder-come-let's-walk-in-the-garden ploy he uses so well. Iran is a real threat and everyone in this part of the woods, especially the Saudis, believe that Iran will get its bomb and use it.

Second, the democratic will of the Israeli electorate put together a ruling coalition made up with different politcal interests that guarantees that Bibi will NOT do what he did when last given keys to the family car. While Israelis may not have the savvy of a Chicago style politician, they do understand Byzantine plots and chess strategy. Many of Bibi's most loyal followers voted for Lieberman JUST to keep their favorite son in line.

Over the last several months, Bibi has tried different tactics to get out of this or that coalition partner in a vain attempt to return to the slightly left side of center. Nothing has worked. In fact, the new political style has far more of a Russian flavor that American or European. Lieberman's tough talk has earned Israel third and fourth looks from Moscow as seen by Russia's hesitation to ship Iran missiles promised BEFORE Lieberman was foreign minister. Lieberman's number two, Danny Ayalon, followed suit with tough talk and aggressive action dressing down Turkey's envoy for the outrageous blood libel program on state run Turkish television.

While this may be very politically uncorrect for US State Department standards, it is both regionally understood (and respected) and unavoidable for Bibi's tenure as Prime Minister. Netanyahu's coalition is propped up by Lieberman's party and the Russian immigrant Israelis he represents.

Now, when Admiral Moon Mullins was here a few weeks ago, he made it very clear that his boss was prepared to let Iran have the bomb and would be very unhappy if Israel should do something rash like get a 1967 jump start on the up coming war. Israelis were both understanding and disappointed. They understand, however, that everything has a price. Just exactly what is this administration willing to pay to purchase Israel's taking another round for the Obamasama?

It is not surprising, therefore, take the events of this week as the opening round of bargaining with the US and holding Netanyahu's feet to the fire. Just as Bibi and Joe were having their tete-a-tete, the Minister of Housing, Reb Yishai, announced construction permits for 1600 units in Jerusalem, Israel's capital city. Yishai is the top MK for the SHAS party, Israelis ultra right religious party--the other volatile arm of Netanyahu's ruling party.

It should be borne in mind that SHAS is the king-maker party in recent Israeli political history. While Lieberman presents the strong Russian flavor, brusk and straight to the point, Yishai presents the refined logic of the Babylonian Talmud and Yeshiva culture, no small part of Israel's melting pot culture. When questioned about the timing of the announcement, Yishai responded in a powerful but non-Lieberman style.

Yishai stressed that during "sensitive" visits, he would like to be informed of the deliberations taking place in the committee.

No official is to blame," Yishai said, referring to Interior Ministry staff. "It was technical authorization only. The committee session was scheduled two weeks in advance, and no one in the committee knew that the vice president of the U.S. was coming."

From which quarter would Yishai, the King Maker, like the information of deliberations to come do you suppose? Underlings and functionaries? In the Byzantine labyrinths is Israeli government offices--I don't think so! Like Lieberman, Yishai is shaking Bibi's cage. Like Ayalon, Yishai is setting Biden straight about how Israel, a democratic country, feels about Jerusalem--it is not for sale. Period.

"Those who may have known know that in Jerusalem there is no freeze on construction, so there was nothing unusual," Yishai added. "There was a mishap and no special importance should be attributed to it."

While Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu worked hard to publicly explain what was seen as an effort to spoil Biden's visit, Yishai was quick to stress that "In Jerusalem there is no construction freeze and therefore building will continue. Jerusalem, according to a cabinet decision, is not part of the freeze."

The Shas leader also expressed confidence that the matter will not have a detrimental effect on his relations with the prime minister or on coalition stability. "The integrity of the coalition is important to Shas, and I certainly have no intention of making the prime minister's life difficult or undermine the diplomatic process [with the Palestinians]. The prime minister has a genuine desire to push the process forward, and he is capable of bringing peace. I believe him and I suggest that instead of attacking him, help him. The demand should be made to the other side. It is up to the Palestinians, and I do not know whether they are capable of making decisions."

Now, isn't Israeli politics so much more interesting since Lieberman entered politics?

The fact is that if the US wants to give Iran the Bomb, it will cost them plenty and 1600 housing units is simply part of the overall package. Also, as everyone in Israel knows, and American should know, that the money to build these units will go into the pockets of the Palestinian and Arab Israeli contractors who in turn will pay their Palestinian and Arab Israeli construction workers to do the job. That means plenty of work, take home pay, and shopping in Malls for consumer goods. And THAT is part of Bibi's plan.

Government's new motto: It's good to be king!

As every king knows!



And how are the monarchs doing today? Well, pretty well: "Gov't workers feel no economic pain."

The recession and the ongoing jobless recovery devastated much of the private-sector work force last year, sending unemployment soaring, but government workers emerged essentially unscathed, according to data released Wednesday by the Labor Department.

Meanwhile, the compensation for state and local government employees continued to easily outdistance the wages and benefits for workers in private business, a separate Labor Department report showed.

Private-industry employers spent an average of $27.42 per hour worked for total employee compensation in December, while total compensation costs for state and local government workers averaged $39.60 per hour.

The average government wage and salary per hour of $26.11 was 35 percent higher than the average wage and salary of $19.41 per hour in the private sector. But the percentage difference in benefits was much higher. Benefits for state and local workers averaged $13.49 per hour, nearly 70 percent higher than the $8 per hour in benefits paid by private businesses.

USA Today reports,

Federal employees earn higher average salaries than private-sector workers in more than eight out of 10 occupations, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data finds.
Accountants, nurses, chemists, surveyors, cooks, clerks and janitors are among the wide range of jobs that get paid more on average in the federal government than in the private sector.

Overall, federal workers earned an average salary of $67,691 in 2008 for occupations that exist both in government and the private sector, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The average pay for the same mix of jobs in the private sector was $60,046 in 2008, the most recent data available.

A chart of comparative pay rates between the federal and private sectors is here. Some of the differences are very large, for example, a federal public relations manager makes $132,410 working for the feds, but only $88,241 in the private sector, a difference of $44,169.

Why is this important? Two reasons.

First, government at almost all levels is growing like unchecked cancer, and spending along with it. Last month's deficit of $221 billion was 37 percent larger than the entire year's deficit of 2007 of $161 billion. But government does not produce wealth. Government is funded only by reducing the wealth of the country. Government must be funded, of course, but every dollar exacted from the people is a dollar lost to economic activity. Government does buy things, of course, but except for the military there is no economic activity the government does that is not or could not be done in the private sector. Quite simply, the government has no money of its own.


Already, there are far more people employed by government in America than are working in manufacturing. And from December 2007 until near the end of last year, private-sector employment dropped dramatically (as we all know) while government employment, excluding education, rose sharply, outpaced by several multiples by employment in education and health services taken together - and governments at all level are major employers of those disciplines (see here, chart next below).

The growth of government has been impelled by two main factors. One is the now-entrenched political philosophy of both parties that America is a problem to be fixed, and Americans are a people to be managed, which I identified as George W. Bush's principal shortcoming back in 2003. Since the instrumentalities of government management (well, control) are the bureaucratic structures of government, it's no wonder that government's size has exploded in both the number of employees and the appetite for money. The only way this growth can be sustained is first to milk and then to control the economic activity of the country. Increasing mandates, regulations and taxes are how that is done.

The other factor is the rise of the entitlement mentality of American to match the growth of entitlement-disbursing governments. Quite simply, Americans have allowed welfare payments of various kinds, both individual and corporate welfare, to control a far greater share of the total economic activity of the country than is healthy for growth or freedom. I belabored this point many times before, and this post is long enough, so I'll provide a few links:

"The end of entitlements"

"American reliance on government at all-time high."

"California is a greater risk than Greece, warns JP Morgan chief"

"The entitlement mentality knows no boundaries"

"How democracies perish"

The second reason the growth of government employees should cause alarm is that increasingly, government employees are unionized, therefore politicized. In fact, the Service Employees International Union, SEIU, is is heavily political. With 2.2 million members it is about 50 percent larger than the Teamsters and more than five times the size of the UAW. The consequence?

At the apex of union density in the 1940s, only about 9.8% of public employees were represented by unions, while 33.9% of private, non-agricultural workers had such representation. In this decade, those proportions have essentially reversed, with 36% of public workers being represented by unions while private sector union density had plummeted to around 7%.

The result is that government employees are setting government policy in a virtual mode: they do what unions do, collective bargaining, to force job security and benefits. I have not been able to find the proportion of federal expenditures that are personnel costs of all kinds, but they are huge as a share of the budget. Does anyone have a link?

To preserve the sovereignty of the people, government must shrink, especially the federal government. But the relative security, higher incomes and political power of government workers and their unions almost guarantees this cannot be done easily, if it can be done at all.

The senseless Census?

An email from a longtime friend and reader:

Can anyone tell me why on earth the US Dept of Commerce sent out a letter to every residence in the United States this week to tell me, that in a week I will be getting the 2010 census form?

I would imagine you also have received your letter too.

Is this not a complete waste of tax payer dollars? Or is this Obonomics at it finest, creating jobs for who know how many people to put out this piece of paper. Plus the special letter head and special envelopes to put out a letter telling me I am getting a Census Form in a WEEK! Plus there are 5 other languages at the bottom of the page, of which I can identify one as Spanish, maybe one a Chinese and or Japanese.

Maybe this is an attempt to help out the Postal Service. Since they can’t bail them out, why not just create a useless mailing of say 75 million households times a bulk mail rate of $.28 so $21 million dollars, give or take a few million.

I guess the government thinks I have been living in a cave these last few months with all the television ads telling me to fill out the census form and how important it is to make sure to include MY PHONE NUMBER! How does that help count how many people there are living in my state, county, etc.? Plus fill out my address completely. Isn’t that already on the form? How did the form get to me? Did they have people just throwing envelopes at houses as they drove by?

Am I missing the mark on this? Any thoughts are always appreciated.

Listen, I can explain to you how women think, how high is the sky and most other mysteries of the universe. But I cannot explain the inexplicable ways of government.

But boy, is this one easy to understand the reason---->

Every decade the census form gets more and more intrusive. Any guesses as to why the gummint wants to know these details about our health insurance? Oh, really, just guess.

But's that's not all. Mark Krikorian at NRO observes:

Fully one-quarter of the space on this year's form is taken up with questions of race and ethnicity, which are clearly illegitimate and none of the government's business (despite the New York Times' assurances to the contrary on today's editorial page). So until we succeed in building the needed wall of separation between race and state, I have a proposal. Question 9 on the census form asks "What is Person 1's race?" (and so on, for other members of the household). My initial impulse was simply to misidentify my race so as to throw a monkey wrench into the statistics; I had fun doing this on the personal-information form my college required every semester, where I was a Puerto Rican Muslim one semester, and a Samoan Buddhist the next. But lying in this constitutionally mandated process is wrong. Really — don't do it.

No, do not lie to the government. I have not yet received my census form. But I guarantee, based on the form of 10 years ago, that I am not going to answer a lot of the questions. Didn't a decade ago, either, and never even got a phone call from the bureau. We'll see this year, won't we?

Update: Michael Silence at Knoxnews.com says he got three postcards. Does that mean he'll be triple counted?