Welcome to the New World
- Shameless EU
- Happy Knifings And CCTV
- Welcome to the New World
Yes, the Credit Crunch is coming home to roost. Make no mistake, the recent events in the world financial markets have changed the world as we know it and it will never be the same again. Everybody has been affected by the turmoil in the financial markets, directly or indirectly. Rich and poor alike, in fact the rich have been hit so severely you can’t imagine. This recession will be a great equaliser.
Free market philosophy has a lot going for it, but at times like this you have to question the underlying wisdom of this approach. Purists would argue that we should let the markets sort themselves out but with the current downward spiral the obvious concern is that the world will rapidly disappear up its own backside. The economy is rapidly coming to a standstill. Banks won’t lend money to each other, yet alone you or me. The housing market is dead and woe betide car manufacturers.
At the moment we are in a surreal phase where life is going on as normal. Christmas is coming and the economies of the western world are still chugging along under the inertia of consumer spending, but what happens when the credit card bills arrive on the doormat in January? 2009 will be an uphill struggle for most, people will pull in their haunches and look to reduce their debt burden. Consumer spending will slow rapidly and profit warnings from manufacturers and service providers will be plentiful. Stocks will crash even more and the downward cycle will continue.
This recession has the potential to be deeper and longer than no other the world has ever known. Yet I sense hope; there is so much talent out there, so many hard working , diligent, talented individuals bursting with enthusiasm and innovation that I cannot see how the downturn can last too long. In addition, when recovery comes it will come in a way that has never happened before. The standard of education, communication and technology will enable the realisation of smart business ideas in a way and with a pace that has never been seen before. This time it will be an a truly global basis with more and more Third World nations participating. I truly believe the world will be a better place with harmony and cooperation taking place like never before.
I see China and India as major players, no longer emerging markets but powerhouses of the new global economy. Africa will also participate as there is so much untapped potential there. Turning the Sahara green will be the way to save the world from threats of global warming/climate change. The deforestation in the Amazon will be offset by the greening of the Sahara. True carbon offsetting. There will be a surplus of food and this can be used to make carbon neutral fuel. A totally renewable source of carbon fuel which is effectively solar energy. The new plants will extract carbon from the atmosphere, in exactly the same way as other plant life, but we will be revitalising an area of land that is totally wasted right now. Sea water irrigation and salt resistant crops is the answer!
I see a brave new world where communication and cooperation are key. Talented individuals will run their own businesses from the comfort of their own home/office whilst collaborating with their personal networks around the globe. They will employ a few key workers and a few more service operators, plumbers, builders, gardeners, nannys and the like.
This is the new business model for the 21st century and you IT savvy, creative, problem solvers out there are at the heart of it, you can change the world with your innovative ideas and communication skills. How many of you reading this are out of work right now, spending your waking hours searching the internet, looking for the right role? With approximately 200 people applying for the same role as you, you would be right in thinking that the job market is extremely competitive right now. Don’t worry, in the new world you will be masters of the Universe. You just have to find your niche!
Written by Pete Wilder · Filed Under Economy
Roger: My political views inform my social views. I cannot separate the two.
If you think Israelis and Jews suffer from “victimhood mentality,” then you have no clue about them. You have a typical auslander view borne of ignorance. I have written elsewhere how unreasonable and illogical it is to persecute Jews and Israelis based on our collective record of achievement for just the last few hundred years alone.
It boils down to petty jealousy and resentment by the rest of the world. Can you understand why a jaundiced attitude toward them could exist? Jews have done all these great things for the world and this is how we are repaid?
I was always taught that if you are productive and hardworking you deserve all the riches that life could provide.
Jews are undeniably productive and hardworking, in addition to being among the most highly intelligent. That’s fact.
A “victimhood mentality” asks for undeserved compensation for hardship. A perfect example is many of the blacks living in New Orleans during the floods following Katrina. They did nothing to help themselves prior to the storm and claiming to be so “poor” when they had big screen TVs in their homes they were trying to save.
Roger, my advice to you is stop worrying about socially appropriate manners and views and whether or not they fit in with what others expect. Learn to just demand that others accept you at face value and on your own terms. If they don’t, forget them.
I don’t have any problem with Jewish accomplishments, intelligence, what have you. I’m part-Jewish myself. I just don’t believe in this group/collective mentality. But then again, I cannot judge here: it’s long-acquired behavior acquired as a result of years of discrimination and having no place of their own. And it’s functional even now as Israel is being besieged from all sides by its enemies. But personally, I wouldn’t take solace from all that by means of grouping or taking refuge in the collective. I’d fight own battles in solitude.
And no, David. I don’t look for approval or agreement. None of it is important or necessary for me when it comes to my own self-validation.
The problem is, Roger, is that you don’t have the courage to take sides. If you have Jewish blood in you then you should be unconditionally loyal to that blood. Jewish blood supercedes all others.
You’re playing that game of unbiased intellectual neutrality, I suppose, to make yourself more acceptable to a wider audience of people.
You give a damn about others. I don’t, except for my own flesh and blood and their interests.
It’s not my side, David, I’ve told you. It’s got nothing to do with courage. I just don’t identify with any group mentality.
As to courage, I take a stand as regards my own views everyday, without any need of support from anyone els. You’re also wrong about my need for acceptance. I do give a damn about others, yes, but it’s got nothing to do with that. It’s my human impulse, if you want to call it that. And yes, I am doing my best to cultivate it. But I always stand alone.
Nonsense, Roger, you identify with the overly humanistic and overly intellectual community of people who think and ponder just for the sake of it.
Not at all, David. I despise intellectual community, whatever and wherever it is. None have ever served as a model or a pattern And my thinking, always individualistic, is for my own sake – not for the sake of itself. Thought should always be pure to the extent possible – never have an object outside of itself in order to justify itself. It’s a means to the end – it is the end.
So in that sense, you may be right: thinking for it’s own sake is good enough for me. I can’t think of a better way to live a life. And I’m not going to apologize for that.
You may say all this about yourself, but reading your blog indicates something else entirely. Roger, you are not being honest with me. You ARE consumed with pursuing intellectual validity and recognition from a collective.
You wrote:
“With these remarks in mind, I welcome the invitation to contribute to Blogcritics Online Magazine – “a community of writers and readers from around the globe.” There’s a selfish reason of course, for my own writings and website stand to benefit from greater exposure therefore, but there is another issue at stake: it’s an opportunity, at the same time, to become a part of something larger.”
This pretty much compromises your credibility with me from this point forward. At least you could have the decency to be totally honest.
Of course I want exposure, David, because I know I can bring valid concerns and cogent discussion to the table – not to validate my own thoughts.
Having said that, I’ll be the first to say that none of that materialized. There is no community there, to speak of: only few brave souls. So how am I being anything less than honest.
Hi David,
I’m that fellow that Roger said he might bring on to the site to comment. I seem to remember your name from comments you made on Blogcritics Magazine a while ago – in what context – I do not remember.
Roger has me pegged wrong. I am not a Zionist. Zionism is a dead letter, having accomplished its goals of developing our country and bringing it into existence.
But I’ll not argue minor points right now. I see that tzah”al T-shirt in place of your photo and it reminds me of when I was a tourist here a number of years ago on a pilot trip to try to figure out if it was worth moving here or not. I bought such shirts for my little boys at Masada for a fantastically overpriced sum. When I say “worth moving here” I’m not talking about dollars and cents; I’m talking about a viable proposition for the family – including things like making a living. I’ll tell you truthfully, it has been hard. But I acted in full faith in G-d, and that has been all the difference in the world.
We know a couple who came here from Victoria State in Australia, a lot more “religious” than I ever was, or ever will be – but they are back in Australia now. Why? They had a house they could’ve sold in a Melbourne suburb, and it would have netted them a nice sum of money – enough to buy a nice house in Judea and Samaria, where I live, and keep them going for a bit while they got their bearings. They feared to sell that house. They did not have full faith in their enterprise. Always, in the back of their minds was “will I be able to go home?” With that kind of attitude, they could never regard Israel as home.
Do you understand what I’m telling you?
Now that my memory of you comes back more, I think you lived in this country for a time and returned to the States, for whatever reason.
Anyway, I’m not lecturing you here. I’m a socialist, not some piss-ant liberal – but when it comes to issues of Israel’s security, there is nobody more hawkish than I. If your remember them, I was a member of aHdút ‘avodá, a socialist party that was the most hawkish you could be on security. And they weren’t hawkish enough for me. But that is all over now, a figment of a youth of longings never fulfilled.
Anyway, I’ve gabbled on enough.
As for the actual topic at hand, I suggest you look up something called “global dimming”. This is the study of the amount of sunlight reaching the planet. It appears that over the last half century or so, the amount of sunlight reaching the planet has decreased due to the increased amounts of particulates in the air from things like jet fuel and the like. The basic result has been that all the catastrophic predictions of the global warming folks have been made a sham of because they never took the sun’s light (and heat) into account in their climate modeling. It’s kind of like working out a fancy mathematical predictive model – only to multiply 5×8 and come up with 35. The whole model is off!
Clear out the particulates from the atmosphere, and you do get the nasty effects predicted by the global warming folks! Of course, arguing their bullshit one way or another is now a cottage industry, so they are now in the business of making sure their rice-bowls don’t get tipped. The more “studies” that get funded that never really get out of the starting blocks, the more money they can suck in on grants. The global warming religion types thrive on controversy because every new controversy is a new pishke they can shake for grant money – without actually doing anything. Fersheist?
I remember that as David Ben-Gurion’s Labor party that was Zionist
“Zionism is a dead letter, having accomplished its goals of developing our country and bringing it into existence.”
With the re-emergence of Bibi as the Likud leader and Livni’s hawkish leadership, Zionist fervor still remains as the only ideological key to Israel’s continued survival.
Sorry, ruvy, given the challenges that threaten the survival of nations, economically and strategically, a little dirty air doesn’t seem like a real problem in comparison.
given the challenges that threaten the survival of nations, economically and strategically, a little dirty air doesn’t seem like a real problem in comparison.
Oh heck, let’s not bother over a little dirty air…. Let’s talk about a lot of dirty air. The knife that Israel should be holding to the Egyptians’ back is the destruction of the Aswan High Dam. Blow that to bits, and you have a lot of dirty air – along with the overflowing of Lake Nasser, and the destruction of Egypt – and very possibly the flooding of Gaza.
Couple that with a military campaign that kills all the terrorists in Israeli jails, kills all the members of el-FataH and Hamas in Judea and Samaria, cuts off Gaza altogether to make sure the Arabs there figure out who really is boss.
Victory in this part of the world is only predicated on being willing to kill continuously until the enemy comes crawling on his hands and knees begging for mercy – or until he dies….
What say you, David?
What say I? You’re meschuggenah.
“Victory in this part of the world is only predicated on being willing to kill continuously until the enemy comes crawling on his hands and knees begging for mercy – or until he dies….”
Many Israelis as well as I agree with that view. I’ve always believed in that thinking, even when I was a little kid hearing stories about the Holocaust and later on about atrocities in Israel against Jews. Then living there for a few years in the 70s solidified my thinking because I directly participated in the bloodshed inadvertently. You need to see the blood and smell the rotting flesh to truly understand what it means.
Nothing matters but survival and self-preservation.
Ruvy: I’m New York born and raised, and here we say “meschuggenah.”
You gave no indication that this view is yours:
“Victory in this part of the world is only predicated on being willing to kill continuously until the enemy comes crawling on his hands and knees begging for mercy – or until he dies….”
In fact, judging from your blog, your view seems to be that of one who likely is not pleased that Bibi is back in power, right? More of the cowardly appeaser type, Ruvy? That if Israel tries to make nice with Pally Arab terrorists they’ll stop firing rockets at Jews? I say to the Pally Arabs living on Israeli soil now: either get with Israeli law or get the hell out. Move to Lebanon or Syria.
Israel returned so much land to pre-1967 levels and she still is unjustly attacked. What does that mean? Hamas, Hezbollah, etc, will not rest until ALL Israel is DESTROYED.
Stop living in an idealistic fantasy land, Ruvy. Pally Arabs and their allies (like Iran) WILL NEVER ACCEPT ISRAEL’S EXISTENCE.
David,
You’ve read my blog and concluded that I want to cooperate with the “Palestinian Authority”?
You are meshuggeh!
Netanyahu is nothing but an easily intimidated wimp! He puts on a great act, growling the role of nationalist. But his first move, getting the nod from Peres (the murderer of Rabin – that Peres) was to call for a unity government with the maideleh who thnks she can negotiate with the damned Arab terrorists, and with the coward who ran away from the Arab terrorists in Lebanon, and who sent 23 Jewish kids to their deaths in an Arab ambush in Sultan Yukub in Lebanon in 1982.
Netanyahu is the putz who handed Hebron over to the Arabs. Netanyahu is the putz who caved over the caves near the Western Wall. Netanyahu is the putz who cheated a real nationalist, Moshe Feiglin, out of a seat in the Knesset. Netanyahu is a damned fake who has never been able to fill the shoes of his dead brother Yoni.
Netanyahu will growl and growl, but when push comes to shove, Clinton will shove, and Netanyahu will grovel. Her hubby pushed Netanyahu when he went to DC to try to get Pollard freed. And now Clinton – or some damned Obama flunky – will push and Netanyahu will cave and beg – just like any damned ghetto kike.
I believe in cooperating with the Arabs in the Land of Israel – AFTER THEIR TERRORIST LEADERS HAVE BEEN EXTERMINATED AND AFTER ALL THE TERRORISTS IN OUR JAILS HAVE BEEN EXECUTED! That way the Arabs figure out who is boss and once again have some fear when Israelis walk into the room. They no longer look forward to being sent to jail here – jail means the death sentence – and if the bastards can’t go out in a blaze of glory, they want to live – just like anyone else does.
I believe in scrapping the word “Palestinian” and calling the schmucks Arabs. They can display their flag anywhere they want – except within the Land of Israel. If they incite against Jews in this country, they go to jail – and then to their deaths. Rebellion and treason are punishable by hanging here – and I’m a hanging judge.
Got the picture?
Ruvy writeth:
Victory in this part of the world is only predicated on being willing to kill continuously until the enemy comes crawling on his hands and knees begging for mercy – or until he dies….
What say you, David?
David writeth:
What say I? You’re meschuggenah (meaning to say meshuggeh, Yiddish for crazy).
“Victory in this part of the world is only predicated on being willing to kill continuously until the enemy comes crawling on his hands and knees begging for mercy – or until he dies….”
Many Israelis as well as I agree with that view.
First you call me crazy – then you agree with me. Does this mean that you are also crazy, David? Is this some new mishigáss (craziness) invented by American Jews?
Usually, when people call me crazy, it’s because they disagree with me….
“If they incite against Jews in this country, they go to jail – and then to their deaths. Rebellion and treason are punishable by hanging here – and I’m a hanging judge.”
That’s great, but then you say this …
” I am not a Zionist. ”
Yet you sound exactly like one.
You have to pick a side. Playing both sides is cowardly.
You have to pick a side. Playing both sides is cowardly.
What was your name again? If you can go to my blog-site from here, you know an awful lot about me. Enough to find me and kill me. I wouldn’t call that cowardice.
When you learn the difference between a Jewish nationalist and a Zionist, perhaps you can talk. At this point, you need to learn the difference between the two – a difficult trick – that difference is still emerging.
So, just take me at my word. Zionism is a dead letter because its purpose – establishing a Jewish State – has been accomplished. It is long past time for the next development in the history of the Children of Israel. That requires Jewish nationalists like me, but it does not necessarily require loyalty to an ideology that has outlived its usefulness. For this reason, I am not a Zionist.
“When you learn the difference between a Jewish nationalist and a Zionist,”
In my day, there was no difference, but then, I am considerably older than you are and therefore, not given to useless parsings of labels regarding right wing Jews who despise Islam and non-Jewish Arabs.
from wikipedia:
“Zionism” was coined as a term for Jewish nationalism by Austrian Jewish publisher Nathan Birnbaum, founder of the first nationalist Jewish students’ movement Kadimah, in his journal Selbstemanzipation (Self Emancipation) in 1890. ”
That’s sufficient for me. Face it, Ruvy, you sound like those Jews who will no longer claim that Jews are a race.
When I was growing up, every Jew believed they were part of their own race. Then cowards afraid of nazi connotations started avoiding that definition. Then scientific definitions starting creeping into our beliefs and many people were swayed.
Well, I am no coward and I still say that we are our own race. Modern definitions do not impress me. Trying to define between a nationalist and a Zionist is you avoiding the term Zionist because you don’t like the label. The differences are in your head.
“When you learn the difference between a Jewish nationalist and a Zionist,”
In my day, there was no difference, but then, I am considerably older than you are and therefore, not given to useless parsings of labels regarding right wing Jews who despise Islam and non-Jewish Arabs.
from wikipedia:
“Zionism” was coined as a term for Jewish nationalism by Austrian Jewish publisher Nathan Birnbaum, founder of the first nationalist Jewish students’ movement Kadimah, in his journal Selbstemanzipation (Self Emancipation) in 1890. ”
That’s sufficient for me. Face it, Ruvy, you sound like those Jews who will no longer claim that Jews are a race.
When I was growing up, every Jew believed they were part of their own race. Then cowards afraid of nazi connotations started avoiding that definition. Then scientific definitions starting creeping into our beliefs and many people were swayed.
Well, I am no coward and I still say that we are our own race. Modern definitions do not impress me. Trying to define between a nationalist and a Zionist is you avoiding the term Zionist because you don’t like the label. The differences are in your head.
I do not find Wikipedia a persuasive source of information for very much. It’s convenient, cheaper than Britannica or the World Book, but far less authoritative.
Zionism, as a term, has its origins with English churchmen about 300 years ago who studied the works of the Hebrew prophets who saw the theme of return to Israel in those works. It was adopted by Jews in the late 1800’s. Earlier Jewish writers, Rabbi Alkalai and others, did not use this term at all. Let’s get this point clear in your heads. “Zionism” is not even a Jewish concept, but a Christian one, a distillation of Christians reading the Hebrew Bible and seeing the obvious themes in the works of the Prophets there.
In Jewish hands, it developed as a largely secular movement with strong leanings towards socialism and atheism, but with the distinctive idea of returning the Jewish people to the Land, and also thus erasing the difference between Jews, who did not inhabit their homeland, and Frenchmen, Germans and Englishmen, who did.
I, for one, do not give a damn whether “Jews” are a race or not, because for me the real question does not involve “Jews” per se, but rather the entire People that constitutes the Children of Israel.
But racialists like the Nazis and their Austrian intellectual predecessors of the late 1800’s make a big deal over “Jews” because they have had an agenda of purifying the world of die Gegenrasse (Jews) because they constituted a contaminant in the racialist weltanschauung.
Jews were the underclass of the Austrian half of Austria-Hungary, and these Austrian racialists felt threatened by Jews as they did by Slavs or Gypsies because in the Austrian Crown lands of Austria-Hungary, the Germans were a minority. In their eyes, Jews were the intellectual contaminant, Slavs were to be the slaves providing the breed-stock for the German übermenschen, and Gypsies were criminal elements – mutts, as it were – to be exterminated to keep the new Germanic world crime free.
Jews are part of a nation, the Children of Israel. Jewish Zionists cannot see this basic fact because all of their efforts are aimed at getting Jews acceptance by the non-Jewish world by providing them with a nation to settle in – like the English or the French, as cited above. As a result, the State of Israel, the creation of Zionism, in trying hard to negate the actions of the Nazis, have accepted the Nazi definition of “who is a Jew” rather than the one adopted in Jewish law.
As I said above, Zionism is a dead letter. It has accomplished its essential goals and has no fresh life in its ideas. Now it is merely the ideology of the establishment running the State of Israel, one desperate to protect its power by keeping the Jewish nation that has developed in the Land, the First Growth of our Redemption, from evolving beyond what is now. Judaism, a religion developed in exile, will change radically as it has to face questions of real change.
Jews comprise only about a third of the twelve tribes of Israel, and the other tribes are not lost at all. These realities do not seem to be on your radar at all, either of you. This is largely because neither of you lives here now. And your minds are occupied by the classifications of a dead series of ideologies.
Let’s look at the Children of Israel who are NOT Jews.
Part of the Tribe of Reuven, for example, had adherents who had maintained close contacts with Jews and who had kept the faith as did their brother Jews, living in central Asia. Most all of them now live in Israel, and are just regarded as Jews. A different part of the Tribe of Reuven aligned themselves with the people now known as Pashtun, converted to Islam and are now known as “Rabanizai” – Pashto for the Tribe of Reuven.
Most all the Tribe of Ephraim can be found in various permutations among the Pashtun, some known as “Yosefzai” – the tribe of Joseph, some as “Afridi”- Pashto for Ephraim. They call themselves “Bani Yisraíl” and regard us Jews as the people from the wrong side of the tracks, as it were. And yes, many of them now are in the Taliban calling for our slaughter.
G-d has a very sharp sense of humor, and you can literally die laughing from His jokes.
But first you need to comprehend them.
I always laughed at superstitious Jews who were afraid to spell “God” with the “o.”
I doubt that God, whatever it may be, can be funnier than Larry David or Woody Allen.
I could have gone downtown to the Jewish Theological Center and heard some overwrought academic say pretty much the same things as you have. That’s not how I think of it at all.
I grew up hearing Holocaust stories all the time from survivors and their families. I lived in Israel for a few years in the 70s and unfortunately witnessed innocent Israeli women and children slaughtered by medieval savages for no other reason but because they were Jews. I married a sabra and former IDF soldier who also witnessed unspeakable horrors while serving her country. Her parents were Holocaust survivors who settled in Israel after the war.
That common experience informs our views on what it is to be a Jew … joining in spirit a never ending war against violence against our people that will never be forgotten or forgiven.
You know, David. I’m really glad that – whether by virtue of circumstance or what not – I don’t share in this identity. And you know what – I don’t feel any more deprived for the fact or less inadequate. In fact, I’m much more happy that you’ll ever be. I don’t happen to have this stupid burden on my shoulders. And why should I have? Whose purposes would it serve?
Tell me!
I always laughed at superstitious Jews who were afraid to spell “God” with the “o.” I doubt that God, whatever it may be, can be funnier than Larry David or Woody Allen. I could have gone downtown to the Jewish Theological Center and heard some overwrought academic say pretty much the same things as you have. That’s not how I think of it at all.
I’m not superstitious that I fear to spell G-d with an “o”. G-d doesn’t need my respect or yours. He was around long before the Universe, His Creation, existed. But my fellow Jews need to know that I respect G-d. My fellow humans need to know that I respect G-d. Leaving the “o” out of His translated Name – a meaningless word in a language that has no authority – is a puerile sign of that respect for those not reading Hebrew to see. It’s needed because those not reading Hebrew need to know that the respect is necessary.
reshít Hokhmá yir’át hashém The beginning of Wisdom is Awe of G-d.
I used to be a lot like you – proud to be a Jew, but rejecting in its entirety the Faith or Knowledge that comes with being a Child of Israel.
When I began to have faith, then I began to learn, and understand that there was more to life than resenting the holocaust or living with the nightmares of fighting Arab savages or looking for the “OU” sign on tasteless, overpriced cheese. That is precisely where you are stuck. So you can see no future for the Children of Israel. If I had your outlook, I too would have Roger Nowosielsi’s distaste for your identity, and seek, as do so many Jews, to flee from it.
This country is the “first planting, the first growth, of our redemption”. And the regime that rules it, traitors like Netanyahu, Livni, Barak, Olmert, Peres, and the others, have a vested interest in seeing that this first growth does not evolve further – further evolution would cost them their power. Rule by the Priest and the Levite would end the need for these fools and their pathetic “Knesset”.
You side with these fools, David – or some of them, anyway, thinking they represent security. They represent the past, a time that is over. That is why Zionism is dead. The truth is that you are stuck in the nightmares and dreams of the past, and so long as you are stuck there, you will never see the dreams – or the nightmares – of the future.
And trust me, both dreams and nightmares are there, and while you may not “see” them or understand them, you’ll be caught in them as surely as a fly is caught in a Venus’ Fly-trap.
So open your eyes while there is still time.
Oh, please, Ruvy, stop with the sanctimonious UberJew schtick. Live by your own wits instead of by a book of ancient folk tales. You aren’t a rabbi and I am not a student. Lech tiezdayen!
David,
stop with the sanctimonious UberJew schtick
For someone who lectures someone else who is part Jewish on the importance of his Jewish blood, you seem to discount it yourself. Why am I not surprised?
You’ve forgotten even basic Hebrew, David.
But you are right, I am no rabbi – and will never claim to be; and you are assuredly no student.
My wits have shown me that the Torah and books of prophecy are coming true. In that case, they are not folk-tales. But don’t worry. You’ll find that out on your own at the appropriate time….
Have a great Sabbath!
Ruvy
Yes, and I guess you think all Jews must look and act like characters from “Fiddler on the Roof,” where funny beards, and say “oy vey” a lot. Sorry to disappoint, but I do not adhere to stereotypes.
It reminds me of a scene from “Curb Your Enthusiasm” where Larry David is accused of being “a self hating Jew” because he is overheard whistling an excerpt from an opera by Wagner while waiting in line for a film. Larry responds “I may be self-hating, but it has nothing to do with being Jewish.”
But please, continue with that fantasy trip of believing in great bearded legends and folk tales, if that’s what makes your life worth living.
I’m aware of the importance of it, Ruvy, but I’m doing it “my way.”
Have a great Sabbath, both of you.
Roger
This website of the Jewish Task Force likely best reflects my personal political values.
http://www.jtf.org/
Dave,
I don’t know why you keep ragging at me here. If you are an atheist, there is no real reason to give a damn whether you are Jewish or not, or to care about Jewish identity. Like I told you, I used to be a lot like you in my views. But the bottom line is that without some overriding source for Hebrew identity, being proud of being Jewish is just as petty as being proud of being French, Welsh, Scots, or Basque. Unless you have some real basis for this pride other than that Jews have provided lots of Nobel winners and seem smart compared to the run of the goyim, all you are is a petty nationalist.
Most of the things at this web-site, I agree with. for the most part, we are in agreement on more than you realize. But at this website, you have superstitious believers in dusty old tomes – like Meir Kahane, z”l hy”d featured. I used to hang with the JDL and owe quite a bit to the late Rav.
Here is where you and I differ. I am careful to note the real enemies, not just of western civilization, but of our own people as well – the Wahhabi. Everywhere you see “Muslim” at that site, you’d see me replace it with Wahhabi.
The second issue is how do we actually deal with resident Arabs in the Land of Israel. One solution, the one advocated by the late Rav Kahane was to find a way to remove all of them from the land, preferably buying them out. A second solution is to allow them to remain, either annexing the territory and bestowing Israeli citizenship on them, or forcing the Jordanian king to make them citizens and allowing them to express their “Palestinian” nationality through control of Jordan.
EITHER WAY, all the Arab terrorists have to be killed, and WE STAY IN ISRAEL – ALL OF IT. There can be no negotiation with terrorists – they must die.
EITHER WAY, THERE WILL BE NO PEACE WITH THE ARABS UNTIL THEY COME CRAWLING ON THEIR HANDS AND KNEES BEGGING FOR IT.
That is so it is thoroughly clear to you where I stand on security.
But.
I go beyond all this: all the above are yesterday’s issues, the undealt with aspects of an ideology that has succeeded in its basic goal – but which has not cleaned up its mess – Zionism.
My real interest is to get beyond all this mess to the issues I have referred to above. These issues deal with the future of the Children of Israel – all of us – and to the changes that must take place now that we have come home. These are things you do not see at the website you directed me to.
I’m presently (when I can) working on a book that deals with these issues.
shavua tov,
Ruvy
Any ” superiority religion” is plain evil and must be stamped out.
God favors no person who believes they are born superior. They will be punished instead and never have rest.
Pray there is no God if you belong to a religion that teaches otherwise.