Stimulus Explained

This is an important subject for the entirety Klal Yisroel. The economy affects everyone. My friend Bonnie Slotnick sent the following to my wife, Annie. It is a must read primer on the what it is and what to do with it. - HM

This year, taxpayers will receive an Economic Stimulus Payment. This is a very exciting new program that I will explain using the Q and A format:

Q. What is an Economic Stimulus Payment?
A. It is money that the federal government will send to taxpayers.

Q. Where will the government get this money?
A. From taxpayers.

Q. So the government is giving me back my own money?
A. Only a smidgen.

Q. What is the purpose of this payment?
A. The plan is that you will use the money to purchase a high-definition TV Set, thus stimulating the economy.

Q. But isn't that stimulating the economy of China?
A. Shut up.

Below is some helpful advice on how best to help the US economy by spending your stimulus check wisely:

If you spend that money at Wal-Mart, all the money will go to China. If you spend it on gasoline it will go to the Arabs. If you purchase a computer it will go to India. If you purchase fruit and vegetables it will go to Mexico, Honduras, and Guatemala (unless you buy organic). If you buy a car it will go to Japan. If you purchase useless garbage it will go to Taiwan.

If you pay your credit cards off, it will go to bank management bonuses and they will hide if offshore. Same with stock investment.

Instead, you can keep the money in America by spending it at yard sales, going to a baseball game, or spending it on prostitutes, beer and wine (domestic ONLY), or tattoos, since those are the only American businesses still operating in the US.

With Friends Like These...

The blog, Circus Tent is run by the son of an old Chicago acquittance of mine. This fellow is a Lubavitcher although his parents are not. About a year ago when I was writing about some of the problems I saw with Lubavitch. He contacted me and we discussed the issues involved

In the course of those private discussions we became friends and he revealed his identity to me. But now I am beginning to wonder just what this friendship really means. In yesterday's guest post I was viciously attacked. And the comments that followed were even worse. Here is my comment back to him:

My, my my.

This is quite revealing. I didn't know there was so much 'love and understanding' by your friends about me. Except for one or two rather gallant defenders, almost every other comment was completely vile.

And you Mr. 'Tzig' (alias of the blog-owner) allowed this drivel?! You forget that I know who you are. And I could easily expose you. But don't worry, I won't do that.

I have never written one negative word about you nor would I even consider allowing others to do so. But you not only allowed it - you allowed unbelievably nasty comments to be made.

I have not written anything negative about Lubavitch in many months since there has been nothing to write about. But that doesn't stop Mr. Gurewicz from writing a most hateful essay.

I don't know where all his hate comes from. Maybe it's because I chided him a while back about sending his daughter to the Meshichist high school here in Chicago - I don't know. But I will be sure to mention this to him next time I see him in the Lubavitch Shul here - Bnei Reuven where I Daven twice a day as the Shaliach Tzibur.

25 Phrases Of Wisdom

From my Friend Steve Katz:

1. If you're too open minded, your brains will fall out.

2. Age is a very high price to pay for maturity.

3. Going to church doesn't make someone a Christian any more than going to a garage makes them a mechanic.

4. Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.

5. If you must choose between two evils, pick the one you've never tried before.

6. My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.

7. Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious.

8. It is easier to get forgiveness than permission.

9. For every action, there is an equal and opposite government program.

10. If you look like your passport picture, you probably need the trip.

11. Bills travel through the mail at twice the speed of checks.

12. A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.

13. Eat well, stay fit, die anyway.

14. Men are from earth. Women are from earth. Deal with it.

15. No husband has ever been shot while doing the dishes.

16. A balanced diet is a cookie in each hand.

17. Middle age is when broadness of the mind and narrowness of the waist change places.

18. Opportunities always look bigger going than coming.

19.. Junk is something you've kept for years and throw away three weeks before you need it.

20. There is always one more imbecile than you counted on.

21. Experience is a wonderful thing. It enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again.

22. By the time you can make ends meet, they move the ends.

23. Thou shalt not weigh more than thy refrigerator.

24. Someone who thinks logically provides a nice contrast to the real world.

25. Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves for they shall never cease to be amused.

Lion's Tail

The following is a post by Rabbi Shael Siegel. It appears currently on his blog, Rabbi Shael Speaks. I normally do not post verbatim essays from other blogs. But this one is right in my wheel house. It is a touchdown, a home run, a hole in one - to use some sports metaphors. Why do I use these sports terms? Read on. This post speaks for itself and needs no futher comment from me.

“No. You are a Jewish girl who got mixed up in the culture of the heathen-Greco-Roman-America of today. Look what they use you for: to sell their soft-porn smut through reaching out to the lowest aspect of humanity and to make airports a place where mothers have to cover children's eyes. How many lascivious thoughts has your image evoked? How many jealous thoughts? How much wasting of time? How much degradation of values?...…But you are not the only one to blame for this ignominious degradation.

All those Orthodox Jews who take pride in having kosher hotdogs and a Maariv Minyan in Madison Square Garden - they too are to blame. Oh, they would claim that their worship of professional sports has nothing to do with your public exhibitionism. But it does, because both come from the same root; that is, the Greek and Roman fascination with the body. Is it a coincidence that Sports Illustrated caters to both the pro sports and the soft-porn crowd? Of course not, because both pro sports and soft-porn are flip sides of the same coin. What can one expect from the secular Jews when Orthodox Jews act like Hellenists?…Orthodox Jews sitting in a stadium munching on kosher dogs while watching today's gladiators compete? This is not the stuff of a better world, nor the actions of a G-dly people…

…It is time for the Jewish people to end our addiction with animalism. It is time that we stop being the heads of foxes by helping the world plummet in its moral decline. Instead, it is time for us Jews to be the tails of lions, that is, to fulfill our role by being a "Light Unto The Nations" nation. The time has come to get up, shake off the dross of 2,000 years, and get to some real work. We have better images to put on the sides of airplanes and on magazine covers. We have a chance to make great things happen in this generation: to help breathe the breath of life back into a world that has chosen physicality over spirituality, and to remind mankind that we are all created in the image of G-d, and not vice-versa.”

This is an excerpt of an article by Yishai Fleisher which appeared on February 17, 2009 in Arutz Sheva. If you haven’t guessed, it was written in protest to Bar Rephaeli appearing on the cover of Sports Illustrated Magazine as well as having her image graced on the side of a Southwest airlines Boeing 737.

The author while protesting the lack of tznius, revealed a warped and unhealthy resentment towards western culture to the point that it has corrupted his own understanding and appreciation of Jewish culture as it has evolved through the ages. Under normal circumstances I would have read the piece, chuckled and moved on. However, what I find most troubling is that Fleisher’s point of view is finding wider currency among a growing number of right wing orthodox Jews.

He may be right about the lack of tznius but his condemnation of western values is not the answer and is therefore of great concern.This growing community of people seems to equate sports with pornography, spirituality with a rejection of physical beauty. In rejecting the display of flesh in public they are throwing out the baby with the bath water. If there is anything sensual or erotic about an object d’ art it must be rejected.

There is a display not only of intolerance but fanaticism that defies any logic, common sense and is indicative of a total lack of contextual understanding of our history and culture. His rant flies in the face of our tradition which offers ample examples of the balance and value we place on aesthetics. Parshat Terumah is a good example of that.

My intention here is not to use parshat Terumah to rationalize the behavior of any model or the display of oneself in an immodest manner. My intention is to contextualize our history and tradition and demonstrate how timely and beautiful it can be while appreciating physical beauty for what it is.

Parshat Terumah begins with a description of gifts to be accepted in the building of the Tabernacle and its vessels. “And these are the gifts that you shall accept from them: gold silver and copper; blue purple and crimson yarns fine linen, goats’ hair; tanned ram skin, dolphin skins, and acacia wood.” (Exodus 25:3-5)

From this description one can assume that color, texture and materials were very important to the building of the Tabernacle. It teaches us too that physical beauty was something which ought to be appreciated. We give gifts of things that are precious to us. Obviously these gifts were highly prized and appreciated. The text underscores and encourages our appreciation of beautiful things.

Indeed the aesthetics involved in the design of the structure was as important as the message emanating from it. Otherwise, why the detailed description in our text of the materials, colors and fabrics involved in the construction of the Tabernacle. Over the centuries and perhaps because of the long exile the Jewish religious aesthetics lost its unique signature and adopted many of the art forms from other neighboring or host culture. During those periods and perhaps because of our experience in exile we shunned art forms that were pagan or Christian in nature, perhaps as a way of maintaining our unique culture and resisting assimilating into the neighboring culture.

Our sages and rabbis however were wise and they were able to draw a qualitative line between enjoying art for the sake of its beauty and appreciating it for its religious value.There is a Mishna in Talmud Avoda Zara that tells an interesting anecdote about Rabban Gamliel, president of the Sanhedrin who frequently bathed in the Aphrodite bathhouse in Acre. One of the pagans bathing there at the time that Rabban Gamliel was there asked him how it was that he was bathing in a place where there was a statue of Aphrodite.

Rabban Gamliel answered him that one has to make the distinction between that which is important and that which is irrelevant as well as the intent of the statue. Had the statue been placed there for religious worship it wouldn’t have been permissible to bath there, but as it is there only for aesthetics it is permissible to bath there and to enjoy the aesthetics.

This is a fascinating Mishnah because it demonstrates the balance in Rabban Gamliel’s approach to Jewish living, halacha and appreciating the Greco – Roman world of culture.Rabbi Yosef Karo, editor of the Shulkan Aruch made a similar distinction when he said that statues in a small village aren’t to be viewed whereas those in larger cities are permissible.

The reasoning being that those placed in a small village were done so for religious purposes and therefore a Jew isn’t allowed to get any pleasure from it. However those placed in larger cities were placed there for the purpose of art and aesthetics, not for religious purposes and therefore can be viewed for artistic appreciation.

It would appear that the ability of our sages and rabbis to make these fine distinctions in order to appreciate art and architecture of the ages has been lost on many of our 21st century rabbis and scholars. There is a trend as demonstrated by Fleisher and others towards a fanaticism that has no genuine grounding within our tradition. The ability to balance Jewish living and the world we live in was a talent that our rabbis and sages valued and honed. Unfortunately it is fast disappearing.

Word Games

My wife just sent this to me:

Someone out there either has too much
spare time or is deadly at Scrabble.
(Wait till you see the last one)!
----------------------------------------
DORMITORY:
When you rearrange the letters:
DIRTY ROOM
----------------------------------------
PRESBYTERIAN:
When you rearrange the letters:
BEST IN PRAYER
----------------------------------------
ASTRONOMER:
When you rearrange the letters:
MOON STARER
----------------------------------------
DESPERATION:
When you rearrange the letters:
A ROPE ENDS IT
----------------------------------------
THE EYES:
When you rearrange the letters:
THEY SEE
----------------------------------------
GEORGE BUSH:
When you rearrange the letters:
HE BUGS GORE
----------------------------------------
THE MORSE CODE :
When you rearrange the letters:
HERE COME DOTS
----------------------------------------
SLOT MACHINES:
When you rearrange the letters:
CASH LOST IN ME
----------------------------------------
ANIMOSITY:
When you rearrange the letters:
IS NO AMITY
----------------------------------------
ELECTION RESULTS:
When you rearrange the letters:
LIES - LET'S RECOUNT
----------------------------------------
SNOOZE ALARMS:
When you rearrange the letters:
ALAS! NO MORE Z 'S
----------------------------------------
A DECIMAL POINT:
When you rearrange the letters:
IM A DOT IN PLACE
----------------------------------------
THE EARTHQUAKES:
When you rearrange the letters:
THAT QUEER SHAKE
----------------------------------------
ELEVEN PLUS TWO:
When you rearrange the letters:
TWELVE PLUS ONE
----------------------------------------
AND FOR THE GRAND FINALE:
MOTHER-IN-LAW:
When you rearrange the letters:
WOMAN HITLER
----------------------------------------
Yep! Someone with waaaaaaaaaaay
too much time on their hands! (Probably a son-in-law)

Social Kissing - Mutar or Assur?

Many people have the custom of social kissing as a form of greeting people of the opposite sex. Is this OK? What about Issurei Arayos... Halachos forbidding physical contact between the sexes.

Can we judge appropriate behavior by observing what people - including many Orthodox Rabbis - commonly do?

Someone suggested that they see the argument inheres in what the masses are doing, not in a she'eilah to the rav. But that said kissing and chibah (sexualy oriented contact) are not so separable. Sure, when it's your great aunt Sally. But what if it's her grandchild, your physically attractive second cousin?

Here is my response:

What the masses are doing is directly connected to the concept of Derch Chiba (sexually oriented behavior). In cultures where this is common practice, it is less likely that doing things like this are B'Derech Chiba.

Physical attraction is highly subjective. The concept of Derech Chiba is based on that. If someone is attracted to a member of the opposite sex then, IMHO it would be problematic to claim that a social kiss is not B'Derech chiba. I say problematic because even in such circumstances it might not be Derech Chiba if this is the standard practice in a given community.

But if one is not attracted and it is just a social norm, then it is highly unlikely that it is B'Derech Chiba at all. So in your example it doesn't matter how young or attractive she might be. It only matters how you perceive her.

I think this is what the Gemarah means by saying that it is Assur to derive pleasure by even looking at the little finger of a woman. It is about pleasure derived, not the actual looking at a little finger. It is about one's own subjective thought and/or purpose in looking at that finger and deriving some sort of sexual stimulus by looking at it. If the act of looking at a little finger alone were Assur, then certainly looking at a woman's face should be. And we know that is not Assur to look at a woman's face at all... unless we derive 'pleasure' from it - pleasure in the sexual sense.

This is how I understand the concept of Derech Chiba. It's all subjective and social norms play a big part in that.

Let it Be

I could never understand the Israeli government postion to bar the Beatles from performing in their coutry back in the sixties. Especially since David Ben Gurion’s expressed statement that Israel would not be a country unless it had brothels. The stated reason was that the Israeli government would corrupt the morals of the nation’s youth.

Are they kidding?

The immoral culture of sexual permissiveness that pervades Israeli armed services mandory of all citizens - towers over anything the Beatles sing about! I hardly think that John, Paul, George, and Ringo would have add anything more morally corrupting than that with their music.

I mean… really!

Well that wrong has been righted. Paul McCartney will be performing in Israel. Here is the story from JTA:

Ex-Beatle Paul McCartney will perform in Israel 43 years after government officials banned the Fab Four.

His Sept. 25 concert in Tel Aviv's HaYarkon Park is expected to be one of the largest in Israeli history.

The show is part of a world tour by McCartney comprised of more than 100 shows.
Earlier this year, Israeli Ambassador to Britain Ron Prosor invited McCartney and Ringo Starr to perform in Israel for the country's 60th birthday.

In 1965, Israeli government officials denied the Beatles a permit to perform out of fear their music would corrupt the morals of the nation's youth.