The Washington Jewish community has been rocked by allegations against leading Rabbi Barry Freundel of the Kesher Israel Congregation in Georgetown. Freundel is accused of using a secret camera to film Jewish woman engaged in the ritual bath known as a Mikva.
Category: Society
Having just been in Chicago, one of the most prevalent subject of conversation (despite the football season of course) is the ever-rising number of tickets being given to drivers. The Daley administration first made Chicago the most expensive parking city in the country with a corrupt deal that bordered on the criminal. The city was also accused of corrupt dealings with the company handling red-light ticking. However, none of this has curtailed the city contractors and officials clipping motorists for revenue in the form of endless ticketing. The latest outrage was the city reducing the time of yellow lights — a small tweak of a second that resulted in nearly $8 million in new tickets. Drivers are being treated as sources for revenue and hit with the equivalent of speed traps and short lights to generate more and more tickets.
US health experts and scientists are pushing for any interesting change in packaging information — the extent of exercise needed to burn off the calories of a product. If you buy a bottle of coke, for example, the table would show that the soft drink would require a 4.2 mile run or a 42 minute walk to break even. Research shows that teenagers better understand that measurement than just a calorie count
We previously discussed how the White House opened admitted that it was delayed the increasingly unpopular immigration plan until after the election. Now it appears that another radioactive issue is being slow marched until after the election. The Army has completed its investigation into Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl’s disappearance from his base in Afghanistan five years ago. However, Pentagon sources have said that any release will have to come after the election and there is no guarantee that the findings will be made public.
Continue reading “Bergdahl Report Delayed Until After The Election”
We have often discussed tax policy on this blog. I am in the minority here on tax policies, particularly the high rate imposed in various countries for top earners. I am admittedly more inclined to a Chicago-school view of such high tax rates than many on this blog. This story caught my eye for obvious reasons. The French government is reporting a 20 percent increase in one year of high earners in leaving the country. We have previously discussed how such taxes produce emigration by rational actors from markets. French President Francois Hollande ran on a pledge to soak the rich in tax increases, a popular political platform but a disastrous economic plan. The result has been predictable. The French economy is in terrible condition and thousands of French families are leaving the country for England, the United States, and other countries. Now, Hollande’s government has announced that it will rescind the tax increase. Hollande and his socialist allies refused to accept the obvious impact of such a tax and now, a few years later, it will remove the tax after losing a huge amount of high earner tax dollars.
By Mark Esposito, Weekend Blogger
Can religious beliefs actually retard our intuitions for justice and fairness? Research seems to suggest it might well. The Christian religion has imbued Western thought with the fundamental belief that God presides over a just world – one where sin is punished and rightly-held beliefs and actions are rewarded. We see this attitude in every aspect of human interaction. Today, in some sparkling sports stadium an earnest athlete is bound to thank his deity of choice for the good fortunes that befell his team or his game changing performance. By extension, the loser ( a value loaded word if ever there was one) will decry his lack of luck. From the Book of Job to Pinocchio and Cinderella, this belief in what some psychologists call “immanent justice” or “The Just Word Hypothesis” seeks to explain our plight and our success. It also hardens our attitudes about the poor, victims of crimes and those folks either buoyed or sunk by pure chance.
The Book of Job gets us into the mindset. A saintly man if ever there was one as the Bible itself acknowledges, God allows Satan to test Job with all manner of suffering to determine his worthiness. Stripped of his wealth, prestige and power, Job then loses his children and ultimately his health and vigor. Still, Job endures and never ever curses his fate – or his God. He does consult his friends for some inkling as to the cause of his travails. Their answer, which comes like a thunderclap is: “Behold,” one of them declares, “God will not cast away an innocent man, neither will he uphold evildoers” (Job 8:20). Classic “Blame the Victim” mentality from this coterie of advisers.
Puzzled but resolute, Job however concludes that despite his worldly righteousness, he can never know divine justice and according to the story prostrates himself silent before his Master’s “Just World.’ For that, he is rewarded with the resumption of his wealth and status. He even replaces his children with seven new ones. The clear message to the world however is the same: God handles the world’s justice and we are powerless to exact our own except on only the most superficial level.
Jesus himself gets in on the act in the New Testament. Addressing the multitude in the Sermon on the Mount, he has two distinct things to say about justice and our expectations of it: Blessed are…..those who hunger and thirst for righteousness: for they will be filled. (Matt. 5:6) and Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (Matt. 5:10). In modern speak, “Don’t worry God will handle it in his own way and, if you let him do so, you’ll get the whole enchilada. The pearly gates, the mansions, those singing and harp-playing cherubim … you, my faithful believer, get it all.”
Continue reading “Religion, Justice and The Just World Hypothesis”
Italians know how to do babies. Cute plump cherubs abound in this city. Of course, some are more improvised than others like this clown who performed in the Piazza Navona.
Continue reading “Day 4: Babies From The Demented To The Divine (Rome)”
The Washington Post is reporting it as one of the most painful 40 seconds of this election cycle. Alison Lundergan Grimes (D) was asked a simple question: did you vote for President Obama. What followed in the clip below was one of the most revealing 40 seconds of how bad this election is becoming for Democrats and how radioactive the President has become. Grimes refuses to answer. She is trying to unseat Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R) and these mid-term elections tend to reflect the view of the incumbent president as some voters try to either add support or resistance to a president in Congress. Obama’s popularity stands at a dismal 30 percent in Kentucky. The clip is particularly interesting given the recent public statements of the President that this election is about his policies. It was an effort to rally Democrats but candidates who have been increasingly fleeing associations with the unpopular president cringed across the country. Given Obama’s national polling, an election based his policies and Administration would magnify the already great expected losses in November, including the possible loss of both houses. Even long-time ally and former campaign manager David Axelrod said that the President’s framing of the election as a vote on his policies was a huge mistake. The deer in the headlights look of Grimes reflects that point vividly.
I am happily ensconced this morning at that beautiful Villa Pinciana not far from the Roman steps in Roma, Italy. Besides the beauty of this location and this hotel, one other thing is likely to stand out for American travelers not just at this but virtually all hotels in this country: free wifi. As many of you know, I have long complained about the practice of high-end hotels charging ridiculous fees for wifi while cheaper hotels (and countless coffee shops, restaurants, and other establishments) offer it for free.(Here and here and here) It is an open gouging of business travelers but these hotels which are charging hundreds of a night only to demand that guests pay them for something free on the street. Now there is a small victory against the corporate greed of high-end hotels. Marriott has agreed to pay a $600,000 fine after the Federal Communications Commission found the company blocked consumer Wi-Fi networks last year during an event at a hotel and conference center in Nashville. Of course, nothing changes in Marriott ripping off guests for wifi generally, but they stand to do the electronic version of poisoning wells to force travelers to drink at their well.
Today, Leslie and I leave for a 10-day trip to Italy and Sicily. I will be attempting to post daily travel blogs, but there will be fewer postings during this trip. We will start with three days in Rome followed by six days in Sicily and then one final day in Rome. I will be visiting the village of both of my grandparents Josephine and Dominick Piazza (I am half Irish and half Sicilian). The village of Cianciana is located about two hours from Palermo. We will also be staying at Syracuse and Catania in Sicily. Not since the likes of Hannibal and Garibaldi has a force in the field attempted such an ambitious campaign.
Continue reading “All Roads Lead To Rome: The Turleys Invade The Italian Peninsula”
There has been some predicable and understandable objections to the selection of Mumia Abu-Jamal, the convicted killer of Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner in 1981, as this year’s commencement speaker for Goddard College in Vermont. Faulkner’s widow and others have decried his recorded appearance from Mahanoy state prison in Frackville, Pennsylvania. However, as is all too often the case, politicians have responded to such good-faith objections with a highly questionable, poorly crafted law that allows victims to seek injunctions in future such cases.
Germany has long shown far greater foresight than the United States in the investment into science, infrastructure, and alternative energy — investments that are now giving the country huge returns as a leading economic system. With a decision of Lower Saxony, the German have now shown precisely how serious they are about keeping the country as one of the most educated in the world: they have eliminated all college and university tuition. The Germans view education as not just a right, but an essential component for continued growth.
Continue reading “Germany Abolishes Tuition For University Students”
I have often praised Germany for its forward-leaning laws on the environment and other areas. However, Germany is following France in a move that I consider perfectly absurd: a ban on after-hours work emails. I will confess to attaining some Chicago school economic bias against certain forms of tax and regulatory policy. However, this is one area where the market should be left to its devices, literally.
Continue reading “Nein Nachrichten: Germany Reportedly Considering Ban On Work Emails After 6 pm”
Given the game last week, the long-standing rivalry in football between the Bears and the Packers has only become more intense. As the Bears growl and the Packers . . . well do whatever angry cheese does, there would seem little hope for a dénouement between the great powers. However, this weekend, hope emerged in the most unlikely of places. In Illinois, my niece, Jessica Turley, a die-hard Bears fan, and Matt Patterson, a die-hard Packers fan, got married. That’s right, before a large crowd divided 50-50 between Bears and Packers families, Jessica and Matt tied the knot in a beautiful wedding to the joy of both families. The whole Turley family from Virginia joined the rest of the Turley clan (despite having our flight cancelled the day before) for the event, which was a huge amount of fun in Oak Brook. Madie was the flower girl. Sure, there are some who do not believe that either family should “intermarry” but these two brought not just two teams but two families together. So Middle East negotiators, Russian-Ukraine diplomats, farmers and ranchers, Carnivores and Vegans, take note. Peace is possible.
Continue reading “MEET THE PATTERSONS: BEARS-PACKERS RIVALRY YIELDS A BECKERS WEDDING”
Submitted by Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
Deutsche Welle reports a frightening and disturbing practice within Pakistan where newborn children are murdered due to the stigma of illegitimacy.
Warning: This article contains explicit information.
Adultery is often punished by vigilantism where family exact revenge against couples, often murderously. The children and mothers more often are targeted.
Nurse Razia Zulfikar of a maternity hospital in Gujranwala, Pakistan states that hundreds of children are killed simply by reason of the status of having unwed parents; a social taboo of society. The law provides a potential capital criminal offense stemming from pre-marital intercourse.
Continue reading “Hundreds Of Cases Reported In Pakistan Of Infanticide Due To Illegitimacy”