BARBARA'S TCHATZKAHS

WE HAVE BECOME THEM Or reverted? (I'd probably fit right in with the elephants...) Political Animals ( Yes, Animals ) By NATALIE ANGIER As the candidates have shown us in the succulent telenovela that is the 2008 presidential race, there are many ways to parry for political power. You can go tough and steely in an orange hunter’s jacket, or touchy-feely with a Kleenex packet. You can ally yourself with an alpha male like Chuck Norris, befriend an alpha female like Oprah Winfrey or split the difference and campaign with your mother. You can seek the measured endorsement of the town elders or the restless energy of the young, showily handle strange infants or furtively slam your opponents. Just as there are myriad strategies open to the human political animal with White House ambitions, so there are a number of nonhuman animals that behave like textbook politicians. Researchers who study highly gregarious and relatively brainy species like rhesus monkeys, baboons, dolphins, sperm wha...

SHOOTING THE MESSENGERS Cross posted on behalf The Awareness Center : CALL TO ACTION: Marvin Schick, New York Jewish Week and Sexual Violence Please read the information below and send a note to Marvin Schick and the Jewish Week: Marvin Schick lacks the information and education needed to be making any sort of public statement regarding the issue of sexual violence in Jewish communities. Unfortunately, the Jewish Week gave permission for Schick to have a voice to promote inaccuracies to the Jewish world. It's time we demand that Jewish newspapers only publish information and articles on the topic of sexual violence from those who have the appropriate credentials of being experts in the field of sexual violence -- and not those who just who can afford to pay for full page ads, as in the case of Marvin Schick. In Schtick's article he attacks Rachel Yehuda, who is one of the foremost researchers in the trauma field. We all should be asking Marvin Schick to show us his resume so t...

Leaders Lift Spirit in Orthodox Women's Section By Abigail Klein Leichman Sara Hurwitz will never be an NFL linebacker. Elana Stein Hain cannot be the queen of England. Just as these are accepted as unattainable goals, so are certain leadership roles in an Orthodox Jewish synagogue. Judaism's Oral Law, which the Orthodox follow stringently, defines formal public prayer as incumbent upon men and optional for women. The reason isn't as clearly defined; it may be to free women for household and childrearing tasks, or it may be a nod to their innately deeper spirituality. Regardless, the law maintains that people who are not obligated in prayer may not lead those who are. But even if they can't earn the titles of "rabbi" or "cantor" as their Conservative and Reform peers do, modern Orthodox women such as Hurwitz and Hain are finding ways to put their professional experience and advanced religious education to work within the traditional synagogue framewo...