"The misuse of language induces evil in the soul." - Socrates

I've been meaning to do this for some time now (mostly since some awesome discussions with spider88 and qatar), but keep on forgetting. It was qatar's last question [link removed], that "forced my hand".

The damn-fool interview meme keeps on coming around every 6 to 8 months or so, and I generally ignore it, because I really hate the lame "What's your favorite color?" ^[1] variety of questions. But as Chapters of the Fathers 2:6 tells us "It is not the shy-bashful person who learns.", and because people have been very good about asking serious questions, I am putting this entry perpetually at the top of my journal. Feel free to ask ANY question here, personal, inter-personal, about Jewish Thought, Israeli Politics, or about the weather on Mars (no idea there). The worst that can happen is that I'll respond with "That Information is Classified!" (although I have yet to encounter that type of question yet).

So go ahead and ( Get Smart Now, Ask Me How! )

1. BLOOD-Red or Burgundy if you must know.

Wishing my family, friends and y'all out there, a blessed new year. May you all be inscribed in the Book of Life, for a year of growth, health and happiness.
I'll try and be more 'present' in this new year.

 
 
 


Having taken a sudden turn for the worse this past week-end, my grandmother passed away on wednesday. The funeral will be held sometime thursday in Seattle, WA (basically as soon as my mother and aunt arrive from Israel).

In a most fitting fashion, today is Tisha b'Av, the Jewish national day of mourning, and a day of fasting. My grandmother, having survived seven concentration camps in that latest calamity to befall us (also mourned today), spent half of her life, talking to anybody in any forum that would listen, about what had happened in the Holocaust.

It is also most fitting, that having then very nearly starved to death, she was constantly feeding everyone (she cooked the entire wedding meal for four hundred, for my mother's wedding), and now that she's gone, no-one can eat. 15 years later, I still shudder every time I see a chocolate glazed donut. You see, last time I was in her house, as I was about to leave, after finishing a more-than-you-can-ever-eat breakfast, she gave me desert - Entemann's Rich Frosted Donuts, NOT one of them mind you, but a whole box of eight.

The above photo taken from the website of renown photographer Joan Roth, who did a series of photos, for Seattle Stories for the Jewish Women’s Archive, my grandmother, being one of them. This piece, written three years ago, Cecillia Etkin, is a beautifully amazing statement as to who she was, and will have to serve as a eulogy for now (she raised five kids, not four). (Also: Jewish women tell their stories for history - Seattle Times 15/2/2003).

Like the Jewish people itself, you were small in size, but had an unbeatable iron will. You were literally unstoppable. Look what a hard time you gave the very Angel of Death, who'd never heard of an 87 year-old with severe diabetes. Rest in peace, bubbie, having done a job, amazing beyond words, you certainly deserve it. If only we should be as worthy, living up to your flag.

So last week, Malachi set about demonstrating what a Tough [Little] Guy he was. He was playing nicely outside, within eyesight of Anat, when he climbed some steps to nearby garden terrace, stepped out onto the terrace wall, and... jumped! The wall being about 150 cm! (~5'), he proceeded to land on his head. [ We don't actually know exactly what happened, because no-one saw him. He may have actually tripped, hit the low wall with his back (minor scrape) and fallen over. ]

He was rather dazed for about twenty minutes, whimpering and breathing roughly for twenty minutes, before falling asleep. Anat DID take him to the closest thing to a doctor, an expert of Chinese Medicine, that we have locally (our doctor is 20 min away (by choice)), and Anat DID wake him up. BUT I was NOT taking any chances with no head injuries! So as soon as I dropped everything I was doing (shopping) and got home, I took him to the ER. After some X-Rays and blood-tests, it appeared that Nothing Was Wrong. Thank G-d! While Malachi was Not Very Happy about it, they kept us overnight just to be sure.

[ As an aside, regarding health-care systems, Anat had called our health-care provider, because the local doctor (who wasn't in) is from another HMO, and she needed a form faxed that they'd cover the visit. Miss HMO called back later to say that IF Malachi was hospitalized, we needn't worry, even about the paper-work, because they automatically covered the ER visit and stay. ]

Malachi, I am VERY proud of you, all of the time. Really. I'll be more than glad if someday you join the Paratroopers. But please do so when you're 19 years old, NOT 19 months. And while we may have red-neck ancestors, please don't do no jumping without a 'chute!

ladyqkat posted the following clip which MUST be shared: Extreme Shepherding (AKA Highlanders can be Geeks too).

So all you American folks, how do you think Obama is measuring up as far as internal policy goes? Is he really going to revamp health-care? Is he going to save the dead-man-walking American Industry, or has he bought you all a whole herd of white elephants? I'm really curious to know what you view-from-inside is, because many of the issues are too convoluted for a dang foreigner like myself to follow.

The reason I ask, is because from my dang foreigner POV, his foreign policy is so Full of Fail, as to be pathetic. Is he truly that naive, ignorant or just malicious? I'd go so far as blame the situation in Iran on Obama. No he had no part in rigging the elections (which take lots of advance planning), nor did he order the shooting of protesters. But Obama's complete buffoonery in face of the escalating situation regarding Iran and North Korea, made it clear to Despot Ahaminejad, that he CAN do whatever he damn pleases, and the world will ignore him. Exhibit A.

As to his general "policy" of appeasement towards the Muslim World, he's just bat-shit crazy (or stoned out of his head). To think that some of these recent statements actually got past a team of professional speech-writers and PR Drones makes me shiver. The only possible explanation is that the image being cultivated from the White House, is motivated by nothing less than antisemitism (and I'm not one to make that statement lightly). If one is to believe Obama, then the main reason (if not the only one) that the state of Israel was "created" the UN, was due to guilt over the Holocaust. Never mind that the actual vote results put this to the lie, and never mind 3000 years of Jewish history. This claim is most often heard coming from the Arabs themselves, who in the same breath claim to have lived peacefully with their Jews for centuries, which is blatantly false. Exhibit B.

Barry Rubin, a blogger I'm reading a lot of recently (thanks to Aharon Sheer) says it a lot better than I could: 1) Good Intentions Plus Misunderstanding Equals Failure and 2) The Novelist, The Violent Censors, and The President. Also of interest: 48 Hours of Reality Overthrows Obama Middle East Policy See Mr. President? All it takes is two days to demonstrate how silly you are. So much for democracy in the Near-East, eh? Ahaminejad is shooting (as in Dead) his OWN citizens. You think he's going to give a shit about anybody and anything else?

So is Obama being a clown abroad in order to distract from the fiasco at home, or what?

Is there anybody that still reads this that is NOT on my friends list for whatever reason? Speak up and I'll add you.

"Shabbat Shalom, motherfuckers".

For the first time in five years, my family got together at my sister's house, for the traditional Seder meal. This included my two sisters, mother and "step-father" and our combined 16 kids (aged 15 years to 18 months). While I find such gatherings extremely triggering, (LOTS of noise in a family context) I also enjoy them very much. It was a blast! Obviously, the average age at these gathering goes up every single time, and this year it passed some critical mass, the older kids were highly participant and at a much higher level. The whole point of the Seder, is to engage the children, as start-to-finish it is designed to be an educational experience. So it was extremely gratifying to have my three eldest daughters and my older nephews and nieces take an active part.

But of course, with my mother present, nothing ever goes over without "incident". ( "Slowly, but surely, they drew their plans..." )

The Latest Gizmo as reported by ( Onion-TV - Tech News. )

Probably NSFW due to swearing. Don't miss the "coming soon" slide at the end!

My grandmother is in the hospital in rather severe condition. She had emergency surgery on Shabbat, and despite the operation being a success, it's not looking good. As this has been an ongoing situation for some weeks now, my mother is there with her, with my uncle, my brother and his wife. She just had a leg removed (without anesthetic!) and remains unresponsive. My grandmother is 87 (and my only living grandparent for twenty years now). As a Holocaust survivor she's looked death in the face often enough, including Doc. Death, Josef Mengele himself. Iron Woman that she is, she just might be able to stare DEATH itself in the face, and simply refuse let go. She's just so determined to Survive!

The following is a quote from an email my mother sent me:

[Uncle] and I really did think this was the end... and I said to mom "are you ready to go to the next world"? she opened her eyes and said "I am not going anywhere".

When I read that, I was literally laughing out loud, because I can't think of any two sentences, that would be more typical of my mother, her mother, and that would better encapsulate their entire relationship. My grandmother is five feet made of steel, and my mother only an inch or two taller. I can hear my mother's matter-of-fact (hiding hysteria) "ready to go, mom?" and my grandmother's gruff response. The two of them are both extremely alike and opposites. My mother is ever the jumping at shadows pessimist and my grandmother is a born optimist (after all, she's seen it the worst it can get).

Having survived hell, she's since had a long full life, but it breaks my heart to loose her. If I had a spare 1000 dollars, I'd be on the next plane out, if only to say good bye. But I don't, nor can I even think of taking a week's leave. It's funny, I've always made sure my passports were in order for this very situation. Well here it is, and here I stay.

In the first entry on Gaza I wrote:

There will NEVER be peace in the Middle-East, until the Arabs BEG us to stop killing them.

In response to which, most delightful jane_etrix asked:

This sounds similar to the position of Hamas and other Islamic radical groups. "If we just kill enough Jews, they'll go away." Do you think that's going to work for them? If not, why do you think it will work for you?

So I thought I'd take the time to try and explain precisely what I meant, as this is the very root of evil The Problem.

As the title of this entry says, "It Takes Two To Tango". Sadly nowhere in the Arab-World does Israel have a true partner to dance with (unless you prefer the Ben Dover Bugalloo?). See footnote [1] for brief history of Israeli - pan-Arabic peace efforts. But let's for the sake of argument buy into the Arab rhetoric that the "Palestinian Problem" is both a completely separate issue AND the root and source of the entire Arab-Israeli Conflict.

For the past twenty years, we have actively actively and repeatedly engaged these most local Arabs (AKA "Palestinians') in numerous Peace Efforts/Processes. Guess what we got? Half of All Israeli Terror Victims Died in Six Years of Oslo War (an outdated news-item from April 2007). The "Half" and "All" being referred to here, are the total number of victims since the massacre of 1929! [2] The harder we try making peace with these Arabs, the more they increase their efforts to kill us. Hmmm, somebody seems to have a fatal flaw in understanding this whole "Peace" concept. I'm not referring to those Opposition Factions that object to peace, but to the very same groups/organizations that not an hour ago, signed the actual documents. So after so many years, is it them or US who fail to understand what we're dealing with? The Arabs are pretty damn consistent: Sign a document, ask for money, violently attack us, suggest a new document to stop the attacks. Sign a document... [ rinse and repeat ]. Knowing how strongly the International Media and damned World Opinion[Tm] sides with the "poor oppressed underdog", they consistently reassure their own followers that they have no intention of fulfilling the treaties they sign. On the odd chance that some Media here comments on this, our very own stoned-out-of-their-minds Peace Pipe Tokers (such as Peres, Bailin and others) then go through the ritual of reassuring us that these statements are merely "for purposes of internal posturing" and such. So who's insane party here? Us Israelis who expect different results from repeating the same actions [3], the world who is doing ever less to hide the rampant antisemitism behind it's "objections to Israel's policies", or the ever consistent Arabs, who insist on death and destruction for themselves, regardless of the cost to themselves?

Bottom Line: In sixty years, not a single Arab country has initiated a peace process with us. In not a single such country is there even a ghost of a Peace Movement. The last Palestinian to seriously advocate actually making peace [and quiet] with Israel was Hanan Ashrawi, nearly paid for her opinions with her life, and has mostly disappeared from the public scene some years ago.

So not until the Arabs actively change their mind [and culture] about killing Jews, and beg us for sit down and talk peace, will the killing stop. Forty years ago, Golda Meir said

"We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We can not forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us."

Benjamin Netanyahu once said:

"If the Arabs put down their weapons today, there would be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons today, there would be no more Israel"

These statements are just as true today, as they were when originally said. It's not that we want to kill Arabs, it's that at present we simply must, in order to survive.

jane_etrix also said:

Ultimately, if you were correct about Arabs (or Muslims in general) being just nihilistic and destructive, they'd be waging total war, regardless of the consequences. But they aren't.

I don't know Jane, how can you say that they are NOT waging world-wide war? Any place in the world that has medium to large concentrations of Muslims, also has outright Islamic Terrorism, or has experienced their religious destruction. Denmark, Paris, London, Somalia, Indonesia and, of course, the "usual" places (like Lebanon or Gaza, in both of which the constant inter-Arab fighting is more damaging and deadly than Israel is, oh but wait the world always ignores/under-reports that). Yes, the vast majority of Muslims quietly stay at home, but that is always the case with ANY conflict. The silent masses always remain silent, giving passive support, or being too cowed [mooo] to protest what is done in their name. But publish a single cartoon, and the whole world goes BOOM! Back in the 12th century, the number of actual "weapon" carrying Crusaders was nil. It still took the world 400 years to settle down again. And that is before we even consider the poisonous effects this Muslim mindset is having on the Free World culture. The fast growing Muslim population of Europe, have their respective host governments so thoroughly shaking with fear of them. The UK has removed Holocaust education from the general curriculum for fear of offending Arabs. Denmark is prosecuting a Parliament Member for "hate crimes" because of a documentary film he made about Islam. There are plenty more such examples. Many of these Western countries, now like Iran and Saudi-Arabia and most recently Gaza, have Sharia court-systems. That is, they rule according to the most strict forms of Islamic law...

So no, Terrorism, FGM, Honor-Killings of women [only] or children martyrs are hardly native or endemic to Islam. At least no more a part than Crusades, Pogroms or Blood-Libels are endemic to Christianity. But regretfully they seem just as inseparable in a historic perspective. The only real reason we see less of these in the Christian world today, is mostly because [most] people are just much less "Christian". In the Muslim world, we generally see the opposite trend. Muslims most anywhere, are becoming ever more radical.

[1] For over sixty some years, even before the foundation of the Zionist Entity State of Israel, all we ever sought was peace with our neighbors. It even says so in our Declaration of Independence [4]. Within hours this declaration was met with gun and bayonet. In 1947 we agreed to the UN's ridiculously untenable "Partition Plan", that left Israel as three non-continuous areas. Time after time, we were attacked and then pressured into returning the areas we conquered in defense (we gave back the Sinai peninsula three bloody times). In 1979 we did finally sign a "Peace Agreement" with Egypt, giving them everything they wanted, and guess what? Thirty years later, Egyptian government schools still teach that Israel is the Great Enemy. That's a whole freaking generation born and raised on the good old' Hate after the agreement was signed! Egypt is still the greatest military threat to Israel. They have a huge US funded army, with no real enemies except us... The only reason Egypt is not more openly aggressive is because Dictator President Mubarak is between a rock and a hard place. He knows that Israel is no threat to him, and any aggression he shows will only play into the hands of Islamic fundies, the Brothers of Islam, who ARE a serious threat to him. But he still causes us as much damage as he indirectly can. The whole situation with Gaza is precisely because of this non-peace with Egypt, which makes no effort to stop the massive smuggling from Egypt into Gaza. Mr. Mubarak figures that any terrorism he exports is a net gain for himself. We DO have peace of sorts with Jordan, but then they have always been the weakest of our enemies. After we thoroughly whopped them in 1967, and King Hussein dealt with his own "Palestinian problem" in the Black September of 1969, he practically became an ally (he even tried to warn us of the impeding '73 war).

[2] List and stories of the 1357 people killed by terrorism in Israel since September 2000, the beginning of the Second Intifada AKA The Oslo War. See also breakdown by decades - 1920-1999.

[3] In this regard. Albert Einstein once said "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results".

[4] From the translated text of the Israeli Declaration of Independence:

WE APPEAL - in the very midst of the onslaught launched against us now for months - to the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve peace and participate in the upbuilding of the State on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its provisional and permanent institutions.

WE EXTEND our hand to all neighbouring states and their peoples in an offer of peace and good neighbourliness, and appeal to them to establish bonds of cooperation and mutual help with the sovereign Jewish people settled in its own land. The State of Israel is prepared to do its share in a common effort for the advancement of the entire Middle East.

"That's like saying fat people are healthy because they might exercise!"

Nobody does it like Robin Williams.

( ...cut cut CUT cut CUT... )

---

Maybe later, I'll post some actual serious stuff. I still need to address a comment by dearest jane_etrix, who's hotness must not be ignored.

None of these will get an Oscar, nor likely to even be mentioned in Hollywood, but they are more real than anything you'll see anywhere else: ( the view from Israel )

Total viewing time about 16 minutes. Worth every second of it.

Anyone interested in Israel, might enjoy the Dry Bones blog of long-time Israeli cartoonist Yaakov Kirschen, who's been drawing an editorial cartoon by that name for the past 36 years. The blog is mostly the stories behind the cartoons. He has a very biting way with things. As an immigrant from the USA, he also often had an outsider's view. He's also just as funny in real-life. He once had lunch in my Succah, back in the day when I worked for a start-up called 2AM. Every single fax he sent to the office, was a Dry-Bones doodle.

Twice a week he also posts relevant "Golden Oldies" - cartoons that he did many years ago. It's sad how relevant so many of them still are. Take for instance, the entry titled Savoy Hotel (1975) written in response to the Savoy Hotel attack. As he says, thirty four years later, and the answer is still the same.

The last time I got totally involved in an online debate justifying Israel's actions was back in the wild days of the alt.callahans news-groups. I literally spent hours everyday, for a week, researching and debating a single thread. I wish I could find it on Google! I don't have that type of energy any more. So odanu, I'll maybe pull off one final response, tomorrow morning, to your questions (y'all can go read it here, if you promise to play politely). Despite my respect for odanu, I think I've moved past the stage of trying to actually explain these issues to ANY-body on the net, at least during the fighting. It's just too draining and annoying, and with extremely few exceptions, I've never gotten the pig to sing.

Just two final points:
1) Watch this very short film aptly titled 15 Seconds:



Requires Flash. A direct link, if the embedded one doesn't work: 15 Seconds.

This has been going on almost daily, for the past seven years. Where the fuck was the "international community" then? I have a cousin, Noam Bedin, who lives in this town of Sderot. His job is to try and mitigate media bias, and make sure the cry of Sderot is heard. I have another much younger cousin, who is receiving treatment for being "shell-shocked". Don't tell me these are improvised home-made weapons. These are government massed-produced death. The only real explanation why despite thousands of such rocket attacks, so few Israelis have died, is because G-d watches over his chosen. But that's not an argument that will get you many "points" in a debate...

2) A simple visual reminder of what the term Genocide actually means:



This is the family tree of the immediate family of my great-grandparents Moshe and Gittle Pollak of Sighet, Romania. I could just as easily expanded this tree in both directions by adding their siblings, but that would be very incomplete, because even the information itself is mostly lost. Of the twenty-two people represented here, being the parents, eleven siblings, their wives and children, FOUR survived (my grandmother, Cecillia Etkin, who lived through Auschwitz and three sisters, hidden as non-Jews). That is Genocide. When we have a hundred thousand dead in Gaza, then you could think of using that word. The term "cultural genocide" is utter bullshit. The only way to "kill" a culture, is to kill it's members. Just ask the English, they tried destroying the Irish culture. Just ask the Egyptians, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans and Communists. They ALL tried it with those ever so "problematic" Jews. Fat lot of good it did them.

But frankly, and I'm sure this will annoy a hell of a lot of you open-minded liberals, the so-called Religion Of Peace, was NEVER anything of the sort (except perhaps very briefly under the influence of the Spanish Moors, back in the 12th century). Even more so than the blood-thirsty European Christians. This is a "culture" in which it is normative for a father/brother to gladly slaughter his daughter/sister if he disapproves of how she dresses, all in the name of "family honor". This is a "culture" in which mothers pray that their adolescent son be worthy of them and blow himself up before breakfast, just as long as he kills some infidels too. Need I say more?

So yes indeed I DO believe that as a group/culture the Arabs are incapable of being reasoned with, or even know how to act in their own interest. You show me another culture that so thoroughly overruns the most basic biological imperatives... Even the best of negotiators would have a impossible task in dealing with damn Nihilists, who's only wish is to sow Death and Destruction, regardless of who they kill, including their own people. This is a "culture" the world is best without, yes. And yes, NOT all Muslims are raving lunatics, frothing at the mouth, but then neither are all Christians equally "devout".

There will NEVER be peace in the Middle-East, until the Arabs BEG us to stop killing them. Sadly, Israel yet lacks the fibre/desperation to actually retaliate properly, so that won't happen either. Certainly not in THIS round of fighting. Now, of course, we are all waiting to see how soon our northern friendly neighbor Nassralla will follow through on his since retracted promise to attack Israel in response to Gaza. My step-brother has been emergency reserve-activated to watch the Lebanese border, and my brother in-law is very likely to go into Gaza. Personally, the only change for me, is that my college is closed for the duration, being within the area targeted by the missiles.

* Exhaustion *

To make following me around on the dang Web-2.0 I present you with my "web-presence":

• Facebook.


• LinkedIn.


• Geni.com.


• Last.fm (thanks to batshua for reminding me).


• LiveJournal (redundant of course).

I'm pretty sure that that's it.

Today I was supposed to have been in school, but college was closed due to being within Missile range of Gaza. Home is nowhere near that.

"Shmuelisms" were what my parents (mostly father) called pretty much ANY opinion of mine that he couldn't comprehend or just didn't agree with. I was an extremely attentive and well-read child/teen, so I'd often come out with very outlandish synergistic ideas, combining many unlikely sources.

So while I STILL often have highly outlandish synergistic ideas, I'm reclaiming this term as well. It's more individually "me" than any present word-play on Kam could ever be.

Goodbye kahnman, you've served me well.

If programming languages were religions...

For my techie friends. Of course they got Judaism all wrong, especially as you CAN join us, rather the opposite - Once in, you can't really leave (although conversions can in theory be annulled).

( Just my kind of Madness )

Yet another sign of the coming Apocalypse - The German Government is SO disorganized, that they lost files so secret that their contents are unknown! So they are so disorganized that 1) they lost them and worse 2) they don't even know what they lost. Well "at least" they know the files exist, err, existed. Oops. Oh, and gh4acws no need to defend them. ;-)

Also thanks to siliconshaman (and wcg) for: No Limit Texas Dreidl! in which the Chanuka game of Driedl intermarries with Texas Hold' Em.

The Holy Bible of Group-Therapy is The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy, by Irvin D. Yalom. On discussing the importance of interpersonal relationships, Yalom quotes an earlier source, Harry S. Sullivan, Conceptions of Modern Psychiatry (1940), page 207:


That quote just SO blew me away, because it was so in sync with my experience and gut feelings. Regardless of internal trauma and turmoil, the only operative way to observe this turmoil and to deal with it, is indeed through interpersonal relationships. No matter what the pathology, eventually it will make itself known, through those very same interactions.

How on earth did Sullivan's "interpersonal theory of psychiatry", based on actual observation, ever get displaced by that shit-for-brains Freud? Oh that's right, people wanted to feel good about [dreaming of] fucking their mother (is the MILF meme just an extension of that??). Damn damn damn. Almost makes me want to go and read the most-likely somewhat dated Conceptions, or at least this review of Sullivan's work, so I added it to my wish-list. Looking at some other quotes by Sullivan, makes me want to "know" him all the more. His most famous quote being:

"When the satisfaction or the security of another person becomes as significant to one as one's own satisfaction or security, then the state of love exists. Under no other circumstances is a state of love present, regardless of the popular usage of the term."

So much for RAH having an original idea.

I am reading Yalom, for school, and I'm enjoying it very much. It is mind-blowing good, IMNSHO, and spot-on so far. Of course the book is also completely freaking me out, making me feel way too messed-up to ever be ready for this type of work. I'm reading it in Hebrew, to be familiar with the professional terminology (but found the quote using Amazon's book search).

Has anybody else here read it? (ginamariewade, odanu, jezebel_0 or kyra_ojosverdes? anybody?) Comments? Other reading suggestions?