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July 3, 2008

Rabbi Dr. Abraham J. Twerski: A spiritual budget (TOUCHING!)

Jeff Jacoby: Israel still paying for its defeat

JWisdom:: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part IV by Rabbi David Aaron

July 2, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: Appeasers Make Poor Patriots

The Kosher Gourmet By Kathleen Purvis: Slaw, y'all: For BBQs or Sabbath dinner, these southern recipes are something else!

JWisdom:: Rabbi Mordechai Becher: Jewish Rx for A Simpler Life

July 1, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q. I think it's important to leave a legacy to my children. How much should I save towards this end?

Paul Greenberg:A President who is history deficient?

JWisdom:: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Poland's Unique Antisemitism

June 30, 2008

Jonathan Rosenblum: Remembering the architect of Torah Judaism for the modern world

Abe Novick: Hulk: Still a Jew?

JWisdom: : Putting the Spirit Back into Spirituality, Part 2: The Abandoned Child

June 26, 2008

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: Quantum leap to evil

Caroline B. Glick: Victimized families must not be allowed to dictate policy

June 25, 2008

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Today in Biblical History: King Jeroboam of Israel prevents pilgrimage to Jerusalem

Jonathan Tobin: Real Friends and Real Enemies

JWisdom: Raping of reason By Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

June 25, 2008

Steven Emerson: Kristof: Never Mind the Terrorists

Stratfor Intelligence Briefing: Mediterranean Flyover: Telegraphing an Israeli Punch?

JWisdom: Rabbi David Aaron: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part III

June 24, 2008

Caroline B. Glick: What were they thinking!?

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Guilty knowledge

JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Warping Innocence

June 23, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Diploma dilemma

Jeff Jacoby: A world without children

JWisdom: Rabbi Dovid Gross: Putting the Spirit Back into Spirituality --- Introduction

June 20, 2008

Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: Man: The Crowning Glory of Creation

Caroline B. Glick: Israel's darkest week

JWisdom: We aren't worthy? by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

June 19, 2008

Rabbi Elazar Meisels: The saints who don't come marchin' in

Chris Christoff: Muslim woman demands an apology from Obama after camera snub

June 18, 2008

Jonathan Tobin: Still Dancing Around Jerusalem

The Kosher Gourmet by Steve Petusevsky: Chilled fruit and vegetable soups

JWisdom: Souls Need A Check Up? by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

June 17, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: Baby Einstein

Caroline B. Glick: Bush's rhetoric, Bush's policies

JWisdom: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part II by Rabbi David Aaron

June 16, 2008

Varda Branfman: Bob Dylan, won't you please come home?

Diana West: Academic dares to question the 'religion of peace'

JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Positive Backfire

June 13, 2008

Rabbi Berel Wein: Trading manna for whine

Caroline B. Glick: Peace with friends

JWisdom: From the mouths of … by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

June 12, 2008

Michael Feldberg: Meet Paul Revere's pal, the Orthodox Jew who played a key role in laying Boston's cultural and business infrastructure

The Kosher Gourmet by Kathy Manweiler: No need to be tempted by Wendy's mandarin chicken salad

JWisdom: Re-Jew-venating prayer, Part I by Rabbi David Aaron

June 11, 2008

Rabbi Avi Shafran: What would Hillel say?

Jonathan Tobin: UNRWA and NGOs: The Real U.N. 'Insult'

JWisdom: Sara Yoheved Rigler: Greatness Made Simple: How a momentary decision shifted life's course and destination

June 6, 2008

Rabbi Pinchas Stolper: Revelation: The basis of faith

Binyamin L. Jolkovsky: Mere hours after becoming Israel's new 'best friend' Obama backtracks on status of Jerusalem

Caroline B. Glick: UN choosing to protect rogue nuclear programs

JWisdom: Sameness in difference by Rabbi Sroy Levitansky

June 5, 2008

David Lightman: Now Obama wants to be Israel's newest 'best friend'

Obama's remarks to AIPAC policy conference

The Kosher Gourmet By Ethel G. Hofman: Shavous cuisine: Ruby Fruit Soup, Lokshen Kugel with Cheese, Key Lime Curd, Calsone Casserole Frittata with Wild Mushrooms, Sun-dried tomatoes and Olives, Baked Tilapia with Pepper Cheese Cream and Brown Sugar Shortbread

JWisdom: Why a Jewish Jerusalem makes so many nervous by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

June 4, 2008

Jonathan Rosenblum: A different sort of 'religious broadcaster'

Jonathan Tobin: Misgivings on the Road to Damascus

JWisdom: 44 Years Without An Argument? by Sara Yoheved Rigler

June 3, 2008

Daniel Pipes: Obama vs. McCain on the Middle East

Everything's Relative: There is a crisis growing in Orthodox synagogues worldwide, reveals Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkel

JWisdom: White Facades; Black Secrets by Rabbi Mordechai Becher

June 2, 2008

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q: Lie to outsmart discriminator?

He writes the songs that make our souls sing:Gavriel Aryeh Sanders interviews Jewish music legend Ben Zion Shenker; includes stirring, uplifting song

JWisdom: Holocaust in the Perspective of Faith by Rabbi Nosson Scherman: Of laws and lives

March 22, 2007

J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !)

Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review January 3, 2008 / 25 Teves 5768

The old warhorse

By Victor Davis Hanson


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., early on was thought to be the frontrunner for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination. But by summer 2007, he had been written off as a has-been. His poorly funded, lackadaisical campaign nearly ensured that he was put out to pasture before the primary races even began.


While he faded, the media went gaga first over Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill, then former Sen. Fred Thompson, R-Tenn., and most recently former Gov. Mike Huckabee, R-Ark. Yet now the nearly forgotten McCain is surging back.


Compared to the flashy Obama or mannequin-like former Sen. John Edwards, D.-N.C., McCain still looks tired and pale on the trail — except when he nearly loses his explosive temper and turns beet-red.


McCain has survived malignant melanoma and at times his face still appears craggy and swollen. His shoulders seem frozen, the result of years of torture as a prisoner of war held by North Vietnamese communists. If he wins in November, McCain, at 72, would be the oldest to enter the presidency — and, unlike Ronald Reagan, he will look it.


Liberals once flirted with McCain as a maverick when he ran in the primaries against the more conservative George W. Bush in 2000 — but then they also assumed that Vice President Al Gore would naturally succeed Bill Clinton in the general election.


Now, though, they have little good to say about him. McCain never gave up on the unpopular Iraq war, loudly calling for both the appointment of Gen. David Petraeus and a surge of additional troops. His promises to cut spending rather than to raise taxes aren't exactly endearing to Democrats.


Conservatives can't even count all the ways they have soured on him. Libertarians were furious that the McCain-Feingold campaign-financing law impinged on unfettered political expression. McCain never supported Bush's massive tax cuts that spurred the economy. But he did team with Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., to craft a comprehensive immigration bill that included de facto amnesty to illegal aliens.


The Christian Right opposed his support for human-embryo stem-cell research. On issues like global warming and shutting down the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, McCain has sounded like Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., or Kennedy.


Why, then, has this old warhorse trotted back into the Republican race?


There are a number of good reasons that transcend ideology, and they loom larger every month of this topsy-turvy campaign.


First, in a campaign year of crass political reinventions, McCain does not flip-flop. Instead, he seems to enjoy telling people what they don't want to hear. Apparently, at his age, and after what he went through in Vietnam, there is no reason to begin trimming the truth now.


To those more liberal, McCain insists that the surge is working and we will secure Iraq — only to explain to conservatives why we can't, either practically or morally, deport all 11 million illegal aliens. He seems more opposed to pork barrel and deficit spending than doctrinaire conservatives.


Second, McCain has the most diverse experience of any of the candidates in either party. Sens. Obama and Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., may bicker over whether being first lady or growing up in Indonesia constitutes the better foreign-policy background. But no one would question McCain's far greater breadth of service: carrier aviator, combat pilot, wounded veteran, tortured while a prisoner of war for five and a half years, U.S. congressman and senator for a combined quarter-century, 2000 presidential candidate. And the list only goes on.


Third, we are still in a war on several fronts — as we were reminded recently by the assassination, likely by al-Qaida, of pro-American Pakistani Benazir Bhutto. Many of the other inexperienced candidates fumbled in their initial reactions to Bhutto's murder.


Obama ludicrously associated her death with the Iraq war. Huckabee, in Jimmy Carter fashion, apologized to Pakistan for the assassination — although he did not explain why. Former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson demanded that Gen. Musharraf step down — as if we can snap our fingers and choose nuclear Pakistan's leaders.


McCain in contrast kept his cool. He candidly admitted that the tragic loss of Bhutto was a setback to American democratic objectives, while reminding us that a nuclear Islamist Pakistan is unstable and doesn't present America with any good choices. In this war, having a veteran fighter and savvy old statesman as commander-in-chief makes a lot of sense.


I don't know whether plain-speaking John McCain will win the presidency. But so far he's proved the most experienced of the candidates, and he's run the most principled and honest of the campaigns. Other candidates may be younger, better financed and more charismatic; none has more earned America's trust.

Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.

Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and military historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. Comment by clicking here.


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