There is another, deeper, emotional/spiritual layer to this entire problem. I used to try to explain it but it falls on secular ears, and is largely ignored as insignificant. It is anything but, and anyone who cares about justice and dignity in the Middle East would do well to try to understand it better. Back in …
Category: America
Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2008/08/24/layers/
Aug 20 2008
If Americans only knew
What do we really cherish? America absolves itself the same way a smoker convinces himself he’ll never get cancer. In both cases, there is plenty of available information from which the truth of the matter can be gleaned, but that requires more introspection than most of us are willing to endure. Less than a minute …
Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2008/08/20/if-americans-only-knew/
Aug 19 2008
Rick Warren’s forum
I’ve been meaning to ask you if you watched the Saturday night Saddleback forum and, if so, what you thought of it. I’ll go ahead and give you my two-cents’ take… First, Rick Warren came across as a little too smug and a bit narcissistic — his subsequent fame on the bobble-head cable shows like CNN …
Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2008/08/19/rick-warrens-forum/
Jul 24 2008
A day in the life of George Orwell’s America
I watched Obama’s Berlin speech today on MSNBC. As soon as it was over, the bobble-head commentators (those erudite members of our once-vaunted Fourth Estate castrati) started trying to resuscitate the fading McCain in their desperation to keep the election an ad-selling horse race. There was endless speculation about whether Americans would be disgusted by Obama’s international popularity. …
Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2008/07/24/a-day-in-the-life-of-george-orwells-america/
Jul 10 2008
Rabbi Fox
Ms. Gassaway, I had hoped the rabbi’s recent rant would be disregarded by your readers as the specious partisan pandering it obviously is to anyone who understands even the smallest bits of Middle Eastern history and contemporary realities “over there.” However, given that more than a week has passed, and now today’s follow-on huzzahs by …
Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2008/07/10/rabbi-fox/
Jun 15 2008
The wolf we feed
“So it is that democracy without honest information creates the illusion of popular consent, while enhancing the power of the state and the privileged interests protected by it. Democracy without accountability creates the illusion of popular control, while offering ordinary Americans only cheap tickets to the balcony, too far away to see that the public stage has …
Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2008/06/15/the-wolf-we-feed/
May 18 2008
I beg to disagree
While Obama has shamelessly pandered (along with the rest of them) for the American Jewish vote, he has at the same time demonstrated a grasp of Middle Eastern realities that I have not heard from any other candidate. And while he has made some errors (in my opinion), he got it right on the big …
Permanent link to this article: https://levantium.com/2008/05/18/i-beg-to-disagree/