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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 Sept. 25, 2007 / 13 Tishrei 5768

The MoveOn moment passes

By Jonathan Gurwitz


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Never again should any Democrat, especially Hillary Clinton, be permitted to use the term "politics of personal destruction" with impunity. That snicker that rolls out of liberal quarters when President Bush talks about the promotion of democracy — save it for the senator from New York and her partisan colleagues.


Let's be clear: Everyone has the right to question reports of progress from Baghdad and the wisdom of maintaining a vast military commitment to Iraq. If you're a U.S. senator who voted "with conviction" to go to war in Iraq, it might even be said that you have an obligation to do so.


What no one has the right to do is impugn the loyalty of a decorated military commander, especially a U.S. senator who praised his leadership and expertise at his confirmation hearing nine months ago. You can challenge his numbers, dispute his methodology and debate his recommendations in the toughest terms. What common decency suggests you cannot do is attack his integrity.


Democrats in Congress have gotten quite adept at deflecting any criticism, no matter how pertinent and fact-based, as an attack on their patriotism. Point out the inconsistencies of their Iraq war stances or their voting records on national security legislation, and you'll get tarnished with the faux protestation that you're somehow questioning their patriotism.


In the case of Gen. David Petraeus, the attack on his patriotism is very real. Here is the U.S. military oath for commissioned officers:


"I ... do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservations or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me G-d."


If, as MoveOn.org suggests, Petraeus is betraying the American people about Iraq, he's not supporting and defending the Constitution. If his Senate testimony, as Clinton told him, "requires the willing suspension of disbelief," then he is not bearing true faith and allegiance. Cooking the books is a treacherous — that is, treasonous — act.


Challenged by the Giuliani campaign to repudiate the MoveOn.org ad and apologize for the insult to Petraeus, Clinton said ... nothing. A campaign spokesman instead attacked Giuliani for distorting Clinton's record. Naturally. Among the Democratic presidential hopefuls, only Sen. Joe Biden was able to mete out a mild rebuke.


A group calling itself Veterans for Trust sent a letter to Rep. Ciro Rodriguez, D-San Antonio, last week asking him to return $163,000 in campaign donations he received from MoveOn.org. Next to Ned Lamont, who was unsuccessful in his bid to unseat Sen. Joseph Lieberman in Connecticut, Rodriguez was the largest beneficiary of MoveOn.org's support during the 2006 election cycle.


Rodriguez's response? Nothing.


Back in 1992, presidential candidate Bill Clinton had the wisdom to distance himself from some of the extremists in his party. Hip-hop artist Sister Souljah had commented about the Los Angeles riots, "If black people kill black people every day, why not have a week and kill white people?"


Clinton repudiated the statement — to the Rainbow Coalition, no less — and a new term entered the political lexicon: the Sister Souljah moment.


The Sister Souljah moment helped define Bill Clinton as the leader of a new, centrist, even reformist Democratic Party that had finally gotten past the hangover of its post-Vietnam-era, left-wing binge. A major part of that bender from the '70s was hostility to men and women in uniform, the higher the rank, the more virulent the hostility.


The absence of a Move- On.org moment defines Hillary Clinton and her colleagues as leaders of an old, marginal, especially opportunistic Democratic Party in thrall of extremists who have repackaged their contemptuous attitude toward the military in the digital era. The politics of personal destruction evidently isn't such a bad thing when it's your opponents in uniform who are being destroyed.

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.

Comment by clicking here.

JWR contributor Jonathan Gurwitz, a columnist for the San Antonio Express-News, is a co-founder and twice served as Director General of the Future Leaders of the Alliance program at NATO Headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. In 1986 he was placed on the Foreign Service Register of the U.S. State Department.

Jonathan Gurwitz Archives


© 2007, Jonathan Gurwitz

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