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July 2, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The hallmark of a person

Abe Novick: Up, up, and aliya

July 1, 2009

Rabbi Avi Shafran: The Road Taken

The Kosher Gourmet by Marialisa Calta: Get into the holiday spirit with these Star-Spangled desserts

June 30, 2009

Rabbi Binyomin Ginsberg: What makes a great parent?

Caroline B. Glick: Ideologue-in-Chief

June 29, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Beware of 'Caveat Emptor'

Steven Emerson: ACLU pushing for more money for Hamas

June 26, 2009

Rabbi Yoni Posnick: Learn the secret to a healthy marriage from a scriptural villain

Caroline B. Glick: Barack Obama vs. International Law

June 25, 2009

Rabbi Shimon Apisdorf: The Absurd Power of Truth

Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkle's strip: Everything's Relative

June 24, 2009

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Advancement of technology is a wake-up call for humanity

The Kosher Gourmet by Andrea Weigl: Summer on a stick: Making frozen treats can be easy, creative and fun

June 23, 2009

Martin M. Bodek: 'On Surnames': And so, We Begin

Caroline B. Glick: The Obama Effect

June 22, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Working for a corrupt firm

N. Richard Greenfield : Where are American Jews?

June 19, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: Emotion v. intellect

Caroline B. Glick: Israel's rare opportunity

June 18, 2009

Jonathan Rosenblum: Sometimes it is more essential to define the nature of evil than good

Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkle's strip: Everything's Relative

June 17, 2009

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The Language of Confusion

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: Nothing pleases Dad more than a thick, juicy onion-smothered steak. Add home-Baked Potato Chips and …

June 16, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Career v. Careersism

Caroline B. Glick: Obama's losing streak and Israel

Richard Z. Chesnoff: ‘Palestinians’: Never Missing an Opportunity …

June 15, 2009

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu: How Judea and Samaria can become 'Palestine'

Daniel Pipes: Where Netanyahu's speech failed

June 12, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: Some big thoughts about not acting so big

Caroline B. Glick: Obama's High Commissioner

June 11, 2009

Victor Davis Hanson: Our historically challenged President

Mitch Albom: Beware the True Believers

Lewis Grossberger: What we learn from the new Hitler photos

June 10, 2009

Mort Zuckerman: What Obama and his advisors won't -- or refuse to -- grasp about Israel and the Muslim world

The Kosher Gourmet by Steve Petusevsky Lotsa pasta: Tips, techniques and (amazing) taste

June 9, 2009

Anne Bayefsky: Obama's stunning offense to Israel and the Jewish people

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: America's first Muslim president?

June 8, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Merchant must take responsibility for careless shopper?

Mark Steyn: A superpower that feeds on mediocrity cannot survive for long on leftovers from the past

Richard Z. Chesnoff: How do you say 'kumbaya' in Arabic?

June 5, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: In quest of spirituality

Caroline B. Glick: Obama's Arabian dreams

Charles Krauthammer: The Settlements Myth

June 4, 2009

Paul Greenberg: The War Comes to Little Rock

The Kosher Gourmet by Judy Hevrdejs: Splash it on! Tap your inner jazz musician and improvise when stirring up a vinaigrette

June 3, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q. Should terrible teacher be exposed?

Jonathan Rosenblum: The Israel Lobby: Missing in Action

June 2, 2009

Dennis Prager: The Speech President Obama Won't Dare Give in Egypt

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Pressure on Israel raises war risk

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

Jewish World Review March 30, 2007 / 11 Nissan, 5767

Permission to celebrate Jamestown?

By Mona Charen


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | The Far East has its Mecca, Palestine its Jerusalem, France its Lourdes, and Italy its Loreto, but America's only shrines are her altars of patriotism — the first and most potent being Jamestown; the sire of Virginia, and Virginia the mother of this great Republic. — From a 1907 Virginia guidebook


The quadricentennial of the Jamestown settlement will be noted this spring. Whether it will be celebrated is a freighted question. Virginia has gone to some expense and effort remembering the founding settlers of 1607. Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is serving as honorary chair of what is being called "America's 400th Birthday." There will be musical performances, lectures and seminars. The Queen of England will visit on May 4 and 5.


But emblematic of our troubled understanding of our past and our present discomfort with our national identity, the powers that be in Virginia have decided not to refer to these and other observations as "celebrations." Instead, they will be called commemorations. "You can't celebrate an invasion," declared Mary Wade, a member of the Jamestown 2007 organizing committee. The native people were "pushed back off of their land, even killed. Whole tribes were annihilated. A lot of people carry that oral history with them, and that's why they use the word 'invasion' . . ."


Virginia is expecting many visitors to the reconstructed Jamestown settlement — and it is worth the trip. We've taken the children a couple of times. But the timid, apologetic tone of some of the exhibitions detracts from the experience. As Edward Rothstein reported in The New York Times, "The Indians, we read, were 'in harmony with the land that sustained them' and formed an 'advanced, complex society of families and tribes.'"


Rothstein continues: "English society — the society that gave us the King James Bible and Shakespeare . . . is described as offering 'limited opportunity' in which a 'small elite' were landowners." England, they tell us, suffered from social dislocation, unemployment, difficult working conditions, and so forth. The exhibit goes on to suggest that Virginia's history evolved out of the "interaction" of three different cultures: British, Native American and African.


This sort of hokum has become de rigueur at American museums. By all means, let's be honest about American history and admit that American Indians were often mistreated (broken treaties, displacement, murder). The Trail of Tears deserved its name. But the description of Powhatan culture as "advanced" is ridiculous. When the two cultures met, one was hundreds of years more advanced than the other. If the Powhatans had been further along, they would have prevailed. They certainly didn't lack the will.


One of the early setbacks (1622) for the British Jamestown settlers was a fierce Indian attack that killed 400 men, women and children. And though the exhibit does mention this elsewhere, it is worth remembering what should be too obvious to require restatement — that precolonial America was no idyll. Indian tribes were in more or less constant warfare with one another — just like humans in the rest of the world.


Some black leaders have objected to celebrating Jamestown's founding because it led to black slavery. It is perhaps worth recalling that Captain John Smith, a figure who gets less attention at the new Jamestown observance than Powhatan rulers Wahunsonacock and Opechancanough and African Queen Njinga, was once a slave himself. Fighting in Transylvania in 1602, he was captured by the Turks and enslaved. Through scheming and murder, Smith was able to escape back to England in 1605 and departed for Virginia soon after. His firm hand permitted the tiny outpost to survive. He memorably explained to the settlers that "He who does not work will not eat." And, as every schoolchild used to know, he believed that Pocahontas saved his life when her father captured him.


Black slavery was actually still several decades in the future when Jamestown was founded. And while neither Virginia's nor America's history can be unchained from the taint of slavery, can't we be mature about this? Keith Richburg, foreign correspondent for The Washington Post, was stationed in Africa in the early 1990s. What he saw there — rampant corruption, casual cruelty on the streets of Nairobi, civil war in Somalia and genocide in Rwanda — made him express gratitude that his ancestors had been dragged to the New World, the horrors of slavery notwithstanding.


There is every reason to celebrate the 400th birthday of America — for warts and all — there never has been a better country for all its citizens.

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