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May 24, 2012
Jeff Jacoby: The peace process battered Israel's reputation
Michael Muskal: 'Pro-choice' position hits record low, according to poll
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May 23, 2012
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Tina Susman: The wig wasn't enough: Man gets 13 years for posing as his dead mom
The Kosher Gourmet by Emma Christensen:A simple way to do fish right
May 22, 2012
Warren Richey: Can US group challenge overseas surveillance act? Supreme Court to decide
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The Kosher Gourmet by Megan Gordon: Enjoy a celebration of the most rich and layered flavors: Black bean, sweet potato and quinoa chili
May 21, 2012
Mark Clayton: Cybersecurity: How US utilities passed up chance to protect their networks
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Chris Farrell : Earn Dividends in Emerging Markets with This WisdomTree ETF
Stephen Whiteside, Ph.D. : Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: Social anxiety disorder --- or just shy?
Guy Jackson : Victim's father regrets death of Lockerbie bomber
The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: Famed chef's veal shoulder farsumagru: A festive meat course for late spring
May 18, 2012
Rabbi Berel Wein: Striving: The People of the Book's Book for (All of) the People
Steven Goldberg: 5 Great Stock Picks and the Exchange-Traded Fund that Owns Them
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The Kosher Gourmet by Carolyn Malcoun: DIY healthy lunchbox treats: HOMEMADE FRUIT BARS for kids and brown-bagging adults alike
May 17, 2012
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Josh Mitnick: Netanyahu's 'centrist' coalition is already proving it's anything but
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The Kosher Gourmet by Faith Duran : Cheesy Potato Breakfast Casserole with Cheddar and Sun-Dried Tomatoes
May 16, 2012
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The Kosher Gourmet by Joyce White : GOODNESS GRACIOUS: GREENS! 4 winning recipes that are no longer just for down-home folks (Includes expert tips & techniques)
May 15, 2012
Kristen Chick: Obama administration resumes arms sales to Bahrain despite serious unresolved human rights issues. Activists feel abandoned
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May 14, 2012
Lisa Gerstner: How to Protect Your Identity, Finances If You Lose Your Phone
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The Kosher Gourmet by Megan Gordon: MANGO COCONUT OAT MORNING MUFFINS are a bright but hearty delight
May 11, 2012
Jessica L. Anderson: Get the Best Deal on a Used Car
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The Kosher Gourmet by Chef Mario Batali: The famed chef's vegetable dish that tastes true to the season: FAVAS AND SUGAR SNAP PEAS WITH POTATOES AND TARRAGON
May 10, 2012
Sergei L. Loiko: Putin sends warning to U.S., NATO in Victory Day speech at Red Square
Mary Rourke: How being a 'mentch' got Vidal Sasoon his start and fighting in Israel's War of Independence provided him with confidence and a strong sense of his own identity
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The Kosher Gourmet by Betty Rosbottom: Gleaming with its golden, crimson, and snowy white hues, this silken smooth and creamy STRAWBERRY ORANGE TRIFLE looks impressive, but is easy to prepare
May 9, 2012
Sharon Palmer, R.D. How you can reduce your risk -- or delay -- chronic diseases associated with aging
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Jewish World Review
Jan. 22, 2007
/ 3 Shevat, 5767
But Is It Good for the Jews?
By
Suzanne Fields
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
When Sacha Baron Cohen, now famous everywhere as Borat, collected his Golden Globe last week as the best actor in a comedy, Jews everywhere asked each other a familiar question: "But is it good for the Jews?"
Jews who laugh with Borat, the wild and crazy journalist who satirized anti-Semitism in the movie "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan," think he's the Jewish counterpart of Archie Bunker, the lovable bigot in a sitcom of yesteryear. But other Jews think Borat fans the fires under the stew of prejudice and fanaticism always ready to boil on a back burner.
Columnist Charles Krauthammer, observing how easily Borat taught the lyrics of his "Throw the Jew Down the Well" to an astonished audience in an Arizona tavern, accuses him of looking for anti-Semitism in the wrong places: "Can a man that smart . . . really believe that indifference to anti-Semitism and the road to the Holocaust are to be found in a country and western bar in Tucson?"
But that may not be the point. Borat shows how easy it is to tap into prejudice, to lure a man to express bias openly when he thinks he's in friendly territory. On the day Cohen won the Golden Globe, The New York Times Sunday magazine profiled Abraham Foxman, the director of the Anti-Defamation League, who is often accused of looking for anti-Semites under every bed like those who imagined communists were lurking everywhere in the 1950s.
But that's not the point, either. A cursory examination of anti-Semitism over the centuries shows how swiftly bigotry can show itself once Jews or anyone who decries it let down their guard. Although Foxman frets that unsophisticated moviegoers will find Cohen's "comedic technique" encouragement for their bigotry, the ADL nevertheless defends his unmasking of the absurd and irrational side of anti-Semitism.
Foxman's own story, as he describes it in his book, "Never Again: The Threat of the New Anti-Semitism," is instructive. When his parents were forced into a ghetto in Vilna, Lithuania, during War World II, they put the infant Abraham in the care of an uneducated Christian nanny, a warm and devoted protector whom he came to love as a mother. But he also learned from her the secret prejudices that can be hidden in a "good person."
In his nanny's care, the little boy learned to spit at a Jew in the street, to mock him as a "dirty Jew." He remembers now the warmth at her hearth and bosom, but she unwittingly gave him the cold, critical eye he casts toward bigotry now.
Abraham Foxman's focus on anti-Semites in America, where Jews prosper and bask in unquestioned acceptance, seems obsessive to his critics many of them Jews but he's the needed reminder that the haters of Jews in Germany were once dismissed as merely unpleasant but harmless cranks.
Jimmy Carter, a former president, is not the typical anti-Semite, but in his recent book he likens Israel's dealing with Palestinian radicals to South Africa's apartheid, and condones violence against Israelis until the Jewish nation gets on with the "road map to peace." "President Carter's embrace of rhetoric frequently used in extremist circles has had the unintended consequence of encouraging anti-Semitic extremists to exploit and run with it," Foxman argues.
In the wake of this controversy, Neil Sher, a former Justice Department official and PoliticalMavens.com contributor, says the former president sought "special consideration" in 1987 for a onetime member of a German SS Death Squad who was proven to have murdered Jews in the Mauthausen death camp in Austria. Neil Sher says he went public with the information now because President Carter's book exposes "where his heart really lies."
Anti-Semitism is never funny, but Borat is funny in the way he makes us aware of what we had rather not acknowledge. Vaudeville, radio, the movies and early television were awash in Jewish comics, but they vanished from the public eye for a time after World War II. Jewish characters and Jewish jokes were dropped from scripts by Hollywood producers, many of them Jews. "When Hitler forced Americans to take anti-Semitism seriously," writes Henry Popkin in a widely circulated article in Commentary magazine in 1952, "the American answer . . . was the banishment of Jewish figures from the popular arts in the United States."
Borat's Golden Globe shows how far we've come since then. He's not only good for the Jews, he's good for others, too.
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Suzanne Fields Archives
© 2006, Creators Syndicate, Suzanne Fields
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