BARBARA'S TCHATZKAHS

by Judith Orloff MD Growing up, my girlfriends couldn't wait to hit the shopping malls and go to parties, the bigger the better--but I didn't share their excitement. I always felt overwhelmed, exhausted around large groups of people, though I was clueless why. "What's the matter with you?" friends would say, shooting me the weirdest looks. All I knew was that crowded places and I just didn't mix. I'd go there feeling just fine but leave nervous, depressed, or with some horrible new ache or pain. Unsuspectingly, I was a gigantic sponge, absorbing the energy of people around me. Thank goodness, as my intuition matured, I had a life-changing revelation. From conversations with other healers and from working with patients I realized I was experiencing intuitive empathy: the ability to sense what's going on in others both emotionally and physically as if it were happening to me. Amazing at times, but also challenging. Let me explain the dynamics o...

Then we ALLOW these bastards to come here and wonder why they abuse women and kill innocent Americans? Drachonian doesn't even cover it! ~~~~~ A 13-year-old Saudi schoolgirl is to be given 90 lashes in front of her classmates after she was caught with a mobile camera phone. The girl, who has not been named, was also sentenced to two months in jail by a court in the eastern city of Jubail. She had assaulted her headmistress after being caught with the gadget which is banned in girl schools, said Al-Watan, a Saudi newspaper. The kingdom's use of such punishments has been widely condemned by human rights organisations. A criminal gets a public flogging by two officials in Saudi Arabia Brutal: public floggings, such as in this archive picture, are a common punishment handed down by religious courts in Saudi Arabia Three years ago 16 schoolchildren, aged between 12 and 18, were each sentenced to between 300 and 500 lashes for being aggressive to a teacher. Under Saudi's Sharia o...

If you have read my blog more than twice you know how I love fellow blogger, the late Kathy Krajco. Her writing at What Makes Narcissists Tick was stellar and consistently on point. I often refer abuse victims there who are trying desperately to make sense of the behavior of their abuser. They find answers and some semblance of closure when they have been cruelly abandoned and then blamed as being 'the one who ended things' or find that others have been told ' they are the abuser.' When they were little, my children had a couple picture books about a boy named David. David was always causing problems or being rude. Pictures included: David belching at the dinner table so loudly he blew out a candle; David looking innocent next to a freshly iced cake with his mouth covered with icing; David walking to school in just his underwear... you get the picture. At the bottom of a very funny picture would be the phrase "I didn't do it" or "I didn't m...

How Obama maintains his popularity. by Fred Barnes In football, it's called misdirection. When the ball is snapped, offensive linemen pull from the line of scrimmage and head to the right or left. A running back takes off in the same direction. But it's a deception. The play, a run or a pass, actually goes in the other direction. It's a clever tactic--pretending to head one way while going another--that also works in politics. President Obama is the master of misdirection. His skill in using this tactic is a key to his success as a candidate and to his popularity as president. He is a great salesman, marketing his product--the liberal agenda, plus a few add-ons--in a manner that disguises what he's really up to. Misdirection isn't the same as exaggeration. Everyone understands that politicians inflate their accomplishments. So their self-puffery is discounted. Misdirection is different. It is meant to deceive. When Obama intervened to prop up General Motors, he said...

I've had my ups and downs with Paul Krugman over at the NYTimes. But when he gets it right - he REALLY gets it right! He Wasn’t The One We’ve Been Waiting For by Paul Krugman Health care reform — which is crucial for millions of Americans — hangs in the balance. Progressives are desperately in need of leadership; more specifically, House Democrats need to be told to pass the Senate bill, which isn’t what they wanted but is vastly better than nothing. And what we get from the great progressive hope, the man who was offering hope and change, is this: I would advise that we try to move quickly to coalesce around those elements of the package that people agree on. We know that we need insurance reform, that the health insurance companies are taking advantage of people. We know that we have to have some form of cost containment because if we don’t, then our budgets are going to blow up and we know that small businesses are going to need help so that they can provide health insuranc...

AMEN! By: Not in This Lifetime The commonwealth of Massachusetts, Republicans, Independents and Democrats stood tall and voted for their chosen candidate, U.S. Senator Scott Brown. The good people of Massachusetts who are law abiding, hard working, who love their country and only wants what is in the best interest of this nation, made their choice as to who would best serve the people of Massachusetts and I commend and applaud their decision. This is a most historic and monumental election that has changed the landscape of the “stronghold” of the Democratic Party. There is not a doubt in my mind that this vote, had to be one of the most difficult decisions in decades for the voters of Massachusetts, to break with tradition and choose a Republican over a Democrat for the U.S. Senate seat that has long been held by a democrat. The corrupt “Audacity of Hope &; Change” should take full responsibility for the downfall of the unrecognizable Democratic Party, the “used to be, party of the...

WHY I MURDERED 13 AMERICAN SOLDIERS AT FORT HOOD: NIDAL HASSAN EXPLAINS IT ALL TO YOU by Barry Rubin How do we know that the attack at Fort Hood was an act of Islamist terrorism? Simple, Major Nidal Hassan told us so. You've seen reports of a long list of things he did and said along these lines. But what's most amazing of all is this: Hassan is the first terrorist in history to give an academic lecture[1] explaining why he was about to attack. Yet that still isn't enough for too many people — including the president of the United States — to understand that the murderous assault at Fort Hood was a Jihad attack. It was reported that the audience was shocked and frightened by his lecture. He was supposed to speak on some medical topic yet instead talked on the topic: "The Koranic World View as it Relates to Muslims in the U.S. Military." All you have to do is look at the 50 Power Point slides[1] and they tell you everything you need to know. It is quite a good talk...

The Mobosphere Unveiled Ever since Congress passed Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act giving immunity to interactive service providers for publishing the defamation of others, a wide range of characters has arisen and infiltrated the mainstream blogosphere. Instead of becoming a source for obtaining reliable information, the blogosphere, and user generated content, is at risk of becoming a less credible information source. Dozier Internet Law defamation lawyers are constantly battling these “black hat” forces and over the past several years we have acquired quite an insight into this underworld; an anonymous and covert society bent on terrorizing businesses. These are our internal thoughts on the matter, and not scientific analyses. We are not psychiatrists; just defamation lawyers and trial lawyers trained for almost fifty years to figure out the human nature of clients, witnesses, and juries. All too often blog attacks are simply protection rackets and extortion schemes i...

By Nick Allen Michael Winston Hicks, from New Jersey, was first singled out as a baby when his mother tried to get him on a flight in Florida. She was told by airline officials that her son’s name “was on the list”. As a two-year-old the boy, who is known as Mikey, was patted down by security officers at Newark Airport, which reduced him to tears. His name appears to be among 13,500 on the “selectee” list, which sets off a high level of security screening, after a man called Michael Hicks at some point triggered suspicion. It is not on the much smaller no-fly list which has about 2,500 names, mostly of non-US citizens. His mother, Najlah Feanny Hicks, a photojournalist, told the New York Times that Mikey was badly shaken returning from their recent holiday to the Bahamas when he was aggressively frisked re-entering the US. “A terrorist can blow his underwear up and they don’t catch him,” she told the newspaper. “But my eight-year-old can’t walk through security without being frisked. “...

by Andy Barr Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh and televangelist Pat Robertson are being scolded for their comments in the immediate aftermath of an earthquake in Haiti that has killed tens of thousands, according to early estimates. Critics from both the left and right are denouncing their remarks as insensitive to the disaster and attempts to score political points off human tragedy. Speaking on his radio show Wednesday, Limbaugh said the earthquake has played into Obama’s hands, allowing the president to look “compassionate” and “humanitarian” while at the same time bolstering his standing in both the “light-skinned and dark-skinned black community in this country.” He added: “We've already donated to Haiti. It’s called the U.S. income tax.” Limbaugh’s comments were, in part, a riff on Sen. Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) much publicized remark in a new book that Obama was able to win the election because he is “light-skinned” and lacks a “Negro dialect.” But regardless of the intende...

The Talmudic text we study here grapples with the meaning of the following three verses. The first verse appears in the Mishnah and the other two verses appear the Gemara. Before you start to read the Mishnah, take a look at these three verses and ponder what new idea each one gives you. Exodus 22:20 You shall not aggrieve a stranger or oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt Leviticus 25:14 When you sell property to your neighbor, or buy any from your neighbor, you shall not aggrieve one another Leviticus 25:17 Do not aggrieve one another, but fear your God; for I am the Lord your God Now witness how the Talmud through its close reading learns different things from each of these verses. Babylonian Talmud Bava Metziya 58b-59a Mishnah: Just as [it is illicit] to aggrieve someone in business, it is also [illicit to] aggrieve someone with words. One should not say, "How much does this item cost" if he does not mean to purchase it. If a person had once led a sinf...

Summer of 2003 saw myself and my children finally moving into a house and out of the personal and ultimately, spiritual entrapment I found us in. I moved away from a marriage that wasn't working and was, in fact, harming me no matter how hard I tried to repair it. I finally dealt with the facts that I had been working on the relationship alone far too long. I moved back towards a solitary sort of existence, with only my children to break my emotional numbness. I was half-alive and half-dead and making bad choices. Things were too broken. My ability to feel was cross-circuited, my trust was shattered, my peace of mind gone, my self-esteem had been shredded; all too far gone by the damage of a psychopath for me to simply repair. I couldn't start over but I had to salvage what I could and go forward. Not forgetting but rebuilding. The purchase was a brick row house built in 1933 that needed a lot of TLC. When the money allowed I embarked on making it over. And in the pro...

A proposed law in France would make psychological violence in marriages and among cohabitating couples a criminal offense . Supporters say that if the law passes, it would be the first of its kind in the world. The bill's aim is to protect women from the verbal threats and intimidation that often lead to physical violence. But skeptics say verbal abuse is next to impossible to prove, and that the law would clog the courts with "he said, she said" cases. The proposed law covers every kind of insult, including repeated rude remarks about a partner's appearance, false allegations of infidelity and threats of physical violence. The French parliament is expected to approve the legislation in February, and the government says the law will be in place within six months. If convicted, violators could face fines or jail time. Some media reports have poked fun at the legislation, jibing that screaming at your wife could now make you a felon in France. But parliamentarian Martin...