BARBARA'S TCHATZKAHS

DISSECTING THE TERRORIST MENTALITY Old habits die hard. I used to be a working actor and part of my job, when doing a role, was to step inside the psyche of someone else. I still like to figure people out or at least their actions. TV like the CSI s and Law & Order s are 'appointment television' for me. I rarely miss them. So when I saw this article about Saraa Barhoum, the star of "Tomorrow's Pioneers" (the Hamas 'kiddie' show) I decided to dissect for myself the mentality of adults who poison the minds of other adults and children this way. And poison them from the womb all the way to the pieces of their bodies strewn all over Israel's landscape along with innocent Israelis. I have said it before and I will say it again, they have the classic abuser mentality. The closed system of logic, the indoctrination, the no rules but the abuser's, the reality is that the abuser wants you to have, etc. So read on while I do a little deconstructi...

WHAT'S NEXT? HALAL HAGGIS? How much bending the rules for the Islamic tide is society going to do? When I was growing up I got called a "bread-eater" and "idol worshipper." My ex Mother in Law called me a "Papist." My brother and I as well as many other Catholic kids, got a very hard time for going to CCD classes every week which took time away from school. We had to accomodate the Protestants around us and vice versa. But nooooo, the Muslims have to have it their way. Jews know that Sabbath and fasts can be broken for health and safety issues (in some cases). This was a SAFETY issue. What the HECK? Sorry but accomodating this veil business is like saying, "O.K. we are going to give you a pass to use a religious custom to break our laws." Either the custom needs to be modified or those who are adamant about adhering to it can go live somewhere that it isn't an issue instead of forcing Sharia Law down our throats. The Scottish peo...

Anti-Semitism on Daily Kos? -- An Open Letter to Harold Ford (reprinted here - because it needs to be) Dear Mr. Ford, It happened again. We should be used to it by now. The Republicans do it all the time. When we supported Ned Lamont in the primaries last year, Joe Lieberman did it, too. Your friend Bill O'Reilly -- Falafel Boy himself -- and his minions took their shot, even going so far as to call us Nazis and Klansmen. And now it's your turn, Mr. Ford. In your capacity as the chair of the Democratic Leadership Council, you said this morning on Meet the Press that we're a bunch of Jew haters here. My response? Are some individuals here anti-Semites? Sure. I defy you to find any diverse group of 130,000-plus individuals anywhere in the United States that doesn't have some anti-Semitic members. But calling us a blog of anti-Semites based on a handful of bad apples is like calling all Christians bloodthirsty psychopaths because of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, or calli...

ROVE RESIGNED? HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY! I tried so hard not to do the happy dance here. We still have Chimpy and Dead-Eye Dick to contend with, and Rove has left the Administration with a mess in Iraq and an economy that's tanking to contend with. They can credit him with his exploiting the Religious Right and engineering voting manipulation. Now let's see if he gets immunity from the investigations currently ongoing. But this kind of slime always pops up some place else. Some other political garbage scow is probably in his sights right now. He'll "put his feet up in September and think about that"? Wow, do I smell a big, stinkin'. remorseless Destructive Narcissist ? Why, yes I do. Someone follow him out with the Febreze, please. Still, allow me a few moments of happy dancing. While I dance, read on: Top White House aide Karl Rove to resign at end of month Top White House political adviser Karl Rove, who masterminded President George W. Bush's politica...

THE LESSON OF THE DONKEY I don't usually pass these on, but my neighbor emailed this and I found it applies to so much going on in the world today (both personally & globally) that it felt appropriate for me to give it some bandwith: One day a farmer's donkey fell down into a well. The animal cried piteously for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do. Finally, he decided the animal was old, and the well needed to be covered up anyway; it just wasn't worth it to retrieve the donkey. He invited all his neighbors to come over and help him. They all grabbed a shovel and began to shovel dirt into the well. At first, the donkey realized what was happening and cried horribly. Then, to everyone's amazement he quieted down. A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally looked down the well. He was astonished at what he saw. With each shovel of dirt that hit his back, the donkey was doing something amazing. He would shake it off and take a step up. As the farmer...

WHEN DAILY KOS MET THE DLC - THINK FOR YOURSELVES! A family member recently wrote the below for Daily Kos. It sparked a very lively "conversation" amongst bloggers & armchair pundits. Iddybud makes a great point on her site about political bloggers: A lot of our success, in blogging, has come from the simple fact that we are informed. We commit ourselves to being informed and that, alone, is a powerful tool because it allows us, individually and on a daily basis, to challenge the rhetoric that once slid past the ears of most people and left the discussion concerning the political realities to political junkies and concerned citizens on isolated barstools, street corners, and sitting rooms. Mr. Ford (DLC Chairman) again, went for the lowest common demoninator and continue the spin that so many have actually believed, that says "Daily Kos bloggers are anti-Jewish." Spare me. That's patently false and a smear campaign by the Neocons to keep the Jewish vo...

Haveil Havalim # 129 Is Up! Kudos to Jacks Shack over at Random Thoughts for the great job in sifting through 126 posts and giving us this great round up. ( and for my mentions as well !) CLICK HERE TO SEE THE ROUND-UP AND CHECK OUT SOME GREAT BLOGS! Submit your blog article to the next edition of Haveil Havalim using the carnival submission form (CLICK HERE FOR FORM). Past posts and future hosts can be found on the blog carnival index page (CLICK HERE FOR INDEX) . PLEASE CLICK HERE TO JBLOG ME

SAY GOODNIGHT, MERV After Shabbos, when I read that Merv Griffin was gravely ill, I thought "oh no, not a death watch!" The consummate performer, Griffin didn't linger too long. He took his last bow and left us. I grew up, like many people, watching Griffin and Mike Douglas after school. I got to know celebrities without rags like The Enquirer, I got to see them laugh and be real people, tell stories, secrets, jokes, show off their talents and interact. My Nana, of blessed memory, used to get a big kick out of Griffin and his interactions with Arthur Treacher. My Nana was usually a very quiet, refined lady. But she, like me, loved to see overblown egos punctured and truth revealed. Griffin did just that. About 12 years ago I was in Arizona, visiting my parents (both now deceased). He'd bought the failing Hilton Resort and restored it to its beauty as well as refurbishing a wonderfully located piece of Phoenix real estate. He also owned a lovely "dude ranc...

One and All ----------- The world was created with ten Divine utterances. What does this come to teach us? Certainly, it could have been created with a single utterance. However, this was in order to make the wicked accountable for destroying a world which was created with ten utterances and to reward the righteous for sustaining a world which was created with ten utterances. - Ethics of the Fathers, 5:1 * * * * In other words, G-d chose to "expend" ten utterances on our world to make our life's mission within it more significant and valuable. Yet this explanation seems somewhat unsatisfactory. If G-d could create a world with a single utterance, then this ought to be the true measure of its worth. Any additional "expenditure" on His part seems but an artificial inflation of its value. As the commentary Midrash Shemuel puts it: If A pays ten zuz for an object worth only a single zuz, and B steals it, would B's obligation be for more than the object's tr...

RITES OF PASSAGE I started this weekend. The "talks" about growing up. One of my children has signs of precocious puberty, which I had. I thought about this while we were away this past June. It was time. One of my kids has lost 3 teeth in 2 months and grown about 3 1/2 inches. Zoom... I do and don't feel anxiety about it really. It's normal and natural. But considering that I have PCOS (and my brother has signs of Syndrome X), I am worried that my children may have inherited this. However, I am not there yet. I am starting slow. We went to Barnes & Noble (one of our favorite places) and I picked up some new reading for them. They are such voracious readers its hard for me to keep up. I saw some reading on normal body changes that were age appropriate. I gave these books to them with a brief, now as you're reading, feel free to ask me about anything you don't understand. I have decided I am not going to do one big talk. They would zone out. ...