Imagine If Trump Were Jewish and Had to Seek Forgiveness for His Offenses

Come Sunday at sundown Jews the world over begin a 10 day period of inner reflection. Starting on Rosh Hashana, the Jewish new year, and culminating on Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, the time is known in Hebrew as “aseret yemai teshuvah,” the 10 days of repentance. 

Just imagine if Donald Trump were Jewish. And orthodox. I know it’s farfetched, but who would have thought Ivanka would convert and be orthodox. 

Anyway, I bring this up because with the onset of Rosh Hashana many Jews engage in a repentance practice called “mechilah.” 

As no one is immune from a fall from grace, particularly as it applies to our dealings with other human beings, mechilah provides a custom to seek and obtain forgiveness from those you might have offended, knowingly or unwittingly, over the previous 12 months. 

Prayers and acts of repentance for transgressions against god’s commandments may secure divine forgiveness. But wrongs committed against another person require two-step absolution. God alone does not grant forgiveness for interpersonal failures. Only the person one has offended can absolve the transgressor before god may intervene. 

So Jews go around asking for mechilah, for forgiveness. 

Return now to the opening premise. Just imagine how peripatetic Trump’s next two weeks would be if he had to seek forgiveness from all he had offended in the last year. 

Where to begin? John McCain? Too late. But there are plenty more on his list from whom to solicit forgiveness. 

Jeff Sessions would be at or near the top of the list, as would Omarosa. Michael Cohen, for sure. Long time favorite target Hillary Clinton would be joined by his new Twitter and campaign rally foil, Maxine Waters. 

A special corner of his list would be dedicated to law enforcement and the intelligence community. Robert Mueller. James Comey. Andrew McCabe. Peter Strzok. Lisa Page. John Brennan. James Clapper. Bruce Ohr. Rod Rosenstein.

Politicians, both domestic and international, engendered Trump outrages in the last year: Jeff Flake. Bob Corker. Chuck Schumer. Nancy Pelosi. Theresa May. Angela Merkel. Kim Jong-un. Justin Trudeau. Of course, a special  measure of forgiveness would be asked of the as yet unknown administration insider and member of the “resistance” who contributed an anonymous, scathing depiction of the Trump presidency to The New York Times. 

Then there are the journalists who have vexed Trump to public insult: Carl Bernstein. Don Lemon. Jim Acosta. Joe Scarborough. Mika Brzezinski. Bob Woodward. 

Since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Citizens United that corporations are people, Trump would also have to seek mechilah from Google and Twitter, from Amazon, The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN. 

Mechilah is generally expected to be a one-to-one forgiveness ritual. But in Trump’s case, perhaps a communal approach might be in order as he seeks mechilah from all Mexicans and from all the Latino families he traumatized by forcibly separating children from their parents when they sought asylum entry into the United States. His disparagement of the Muslim community, at home and abroad, also calls out for forgiveness.

But perhaps the most deserving recipient of Trump’s mechilah plea would be the American people, their values and their institutions which Trump has dishonored and abused time and again. 

We cannot expect our leaders to be perfect. But as was said of John McCain in a tearful eulogy by his close friend Lindsey Graham on the floor of the Senate, “He taught me that honor and imperfection are always in competition. I do not cry for a perfect man. I cry for a man who had honor and always was willing to admit to his imperfection.” 

McCain would be considered a “ba’al teshuva,” a master of repentance. You don’t have to be Jewish to earn that honorific. 

Venus, Jon Stewart and Red Light Districts

CBS Sunday Morning did a piece on Good Housekeeping’s Seal of Approval a few days ago. If a product carrying the coveted seal does not perform as promised, the magazine—not the manufacturer or the retailer—will refund the purchase price or replace the product. Which brings me to today’s mail and a copy of a magazine-sized glossy catalog of women’s apparel from Venus of Jacksonville, Fla. It’s 96 pages of soft porn images of fetching young maidens in bikinis and otherwise come-hither fashions. The back cover headline is “Sexy Sunrises are on your horizon.”

By the way, this hot catalog was not sent to Gilda. It was sent to me! I’m flattered Venus considers me, or Gilda, sexy. But I can’t help but thinking Venus and others of its ilk should adopt a Good Housekeeping-like creed—if their products don’t turn you into the personification of sexiness (at least to your partner’s satisfaction) in say, 60 days, you should get your money back. Or at the very least, they should remove you from their mailing list.

Jon Stewart of The Daily Show is no Sandy Koufax. You’ll remember the southpaw ace of the Los Angeles Dodgers forsook pitching the opening game of the 1965 World Series against the Minnesota Twins because it fell on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, Judaism’s holiest day. (For the record, Koufax pitched and won two other games in leading the Dodgers to the baseball title.) Stewart chooses to ignore, and even mock, Jewish holidays, working on Yom Kippur and other holidays including this week’s Passover celebration. Most Jews I know have a liberal sense of humor about our religion, so we laugh along with Stewart’s comedic send-ups. 

Monday night, however, one of The Daily Show’s best puns went unappreciated by what must have been an audience with few if any Jews, given that it was the night of the first seder of Passover. There wasn’t even a hint of laughter when Stewart’s reporting on the president’s trip to Israel was accompanied by the caption, “Barack Atah Adonai.” For the non-believers out there, and anyone else Hebraically challenged, Barack Atah Adonai is a play on “Baruch Atah Adonai” which begins every blessing and means “blessed are you, Lord our God.” In Stewart’s version, the Hebrew translates to “Barack (Obama), you are God.”  

Uh-oh: Retirement may cost me about 50 bucks. Since I don’t travel out of LaGuardia Airport too often these days I was unaware traffic lights were installed on an overhang above the departure ramp of the main terminal. As I drove Ellie and Donny to the United Airlines door, I was softly questioned by my son-in-law about gliding through a red light. 

I stopped at the next one and noticed a camera stationed to the right of the red sphere. Dread descended. No doubt my picture was taken at the prior light. No doubt I’ll get a notice in the mail in a few weeks demanding payment for going through a red light. No doubt my defense that no lights previously impeded my progress down the ramp will not absolve me from having to pay for the infraction. Ah well, it’s a small price to pay for an otherwise enjoyable retirement.

Slapping Down a Jester, a King, a Crowley

I’m a big fan of Jon Stewart, as anyone who reads this blog regularly knows. But someone needs to tell him that hosting The Daily Show on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, was unseemly. Though he’s not religiously observant, Stewart often refers to his Jewish heritage. Indeed, on his Thursday night show he bantered with Amar’e Stoudemire of the NY Knicks about fasting on Yom Kippur (Stoudemire has traced some Jewish roots). But to the casual viewer, seeing Stewart appear on his Tuesday and Wednesday night shows, both taped during the Day of Atonement observance period, was a discordant signal. Stewart should have emulated Sandy Koufax, and other professional athletes, who chose not to perform on Yom Kippur, even when it meant missing a World Series game. 

Perhaps Stewart’s guest list was limited Tuesday night because of the start of Yom Kippur, but I found it serendipitous to see King Abdullah II of Jordan sitting across his interview desk. Given Jordan’s strategic, or unfortunate, global position situated as it is on the borders of Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the West Bank and Israel, and just a missile’s lob from Iran, the Gaza Strip and Lebanon, King Abdullah could be expected to provide an insider’s perspective on the various conflicts in the region. He is considered a moderate among the Arab and Muslim community.

Yet, I was more than alarmed to hear him describe the root cause of Iran’s pursuit of a nuclear program as a response to the Israeli-Palestinian problem. “The reason why they have a nuclear program is what Israel is doing to the Palestinians and the future of Jerusalem,” he said. He asserted if the Israelis and the Arabs solve their problems “then there’s no raison d'être for Iran to have a nuclear weapon.” 

One problem with this reasoning is Iran is not an Arab state. Persians live there, Persians who have fought Arabs for some 3,000 years, including the recent 10-year war with Iraq. The Iranians have no love for Arabs. Now, the king might have couched Iran’s support for the Palestinians as one Muslim supporting another. But here again there is historical reason to question that argument: Iran is Shia; most Palestinians are Sunni. Those two sects don’t like each other. They keep blowing up each other, in their respective mosques, at funerals, in marketplaces. Anywhere. 

Furthermore, by King Abdullah’s reasoning, we would expect not just Iran but also other Muslim countries to want to nuke up their armaments to leverage a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem. Are we prepared for a nuclear Indonesia? Or Bangladesh? Or Albania? Or any of the other 45 majority Muslim countries of the world? 

Sorry, King Abdullah, but Iran’s nuclear ambitions have little if anything to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. By implying they do, King Abdullah is following the example of dictators throughout the Middle East who have used the conflict as a pretext to keep their own people suppressed, economically and politically. King Abdullah might be considered a moderate, his British-educated accent pleasant to the ear, but his type of reasoning is what has kept tensions in the Middle East at the simmering point ever since Jews started reclaiming the land of their heritage.

There’s a lot of hand-wringing these days about the state of education in the United States. Apparently our educational standards have a long history of laxity. To wit, here’s what one of our Ph.D.s, with a degree earned from Columbia University, no less, recently wrote the day after our consulate in Benghazi, Libya, was attacked and four American foreign service officers, including our ambassador, were killed: 

“The Middle East is aflame, much of which is a result of Obama’s policies of helping to dislodge allies like Hosni Mubarak and Moammar Qaddafi and replace them with the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists. He may use the orchestrated violence as a pretext to act in order to get Americans’ attention off the economy.  I don’t know.  But in any case, Obama must be defeated on November 6 if we’re to have any hope of surviving as a serious world power. Maybe surviving, period.”

Could be I was sleeping through these last 30 years or so, but when did Qaddafi become an ally of ours, much less a “key ally,” as Monica Crowley further elaborated on her written comments during a sit-down with Sean Hannity of Fox News September 12. During the Bush II years America championed the idea of democracy in the Middle East. Now that a democratically elected leader (not to her liking) is seated in Mubarak’s old chair, Crowley is all agog, yearning for those good old days of tyranny and torture, all for the good of the U.S. of A, mind you. Let’s not pretend to care what the Egyptians get out of this change of circumstance.

I also didn’t know America was in jeopardy of losing its status as a serious world power. Can you think of any other country people around the world are clamoring to enter, legally or not? Can you think of any other country even remotely as powerful as we are? Yes, our economy is still in the doldrums, but so is almost every other country’s. Even China is in flux. 

Every time a Democrat is president or running for the office conservatives raise the specter of our own annihilation. Yet they remained silent when the Neocons dragged us into two wars (and ran up the deficit by not funding them on the books). I am despondent to think the viewers of Fox News don’t recognize the absurdities they hear from that channel. Here’s another example: recently Fox News polled its audience to ascertain their election choices. Guess what? 90% favored Romney, 10% Obama. Duh!

Religion to the Nation's Rescue

There are lots of theories as to why Mitt Romney’s bid to unseat Barack Obama is slipping further and further away from fruition. No need to recount them here. Rather, I’d like to proffer my own—in a country increasingly religious, many voters are turning to their Bibles to find reasons to support the incumbent and question the sincerity of the challenger.

As I was sitting in temple Wednesday during Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) services, I listened as the following excerpt from the Book of Isaiah 58:3-7 was read (in Hebrew, but here’s the English translation from our prayer book): 

3 “Why, when we fasted, did You (God) not see? When we starved our bodies, did You pay no heed?” Because on your fast day you see to your business and oppress all your laborers! 4 Because you fast in strife and contention, and you strike with a wicked fist! Your fasting today is not such as to make your voice heard on high. 5 Is such the fast I desire, a day for people to starve their bodies? Is it bowing the head like a bulrush and lying in sackcloth and ashes? Do you call that a fast, a day when ADONAI (God) is favorable? 6 No, this is the fast I desire: to unlock fetters of wickedness, and untie the cords of the yoke to let the oppressed go free; to break off every yoke. 7 It is to share your bread with the hungry, and to take the wretched poor into your home; when you see the naked, to clothe them, and do not ignore your own flesh.

Surely, there are religious men in the Republican Party. Perhaps House Minority Whip Eric Cantor read these words while he was in his temple on Wednesday. He might well interpret them to mean individuals have the obligation to help the less fortunate. Charity is a noble endeavor. But it would hardly balance the inequities and inequalities we currently face as a nation. 

In my readings of Scripture, I’ve never come across any capitalist manifesto. Yet time after time the Bible, the Old and New Testament, exhorts us to care for the needy, to make them whole again. Catholic bishops have weighed in that the proposed Romney-Ryan budget cuts too many dollars from social services and even some total programs. Romney might believe a budget that supports social welfare initiatives comprises income redistribution on a national scale. He would be right. He could find justification for such an idea in the Bible. During each jubilee year God commanded land be redistributed to original owners. If that’s not income redistribution, what is? 

So my reading of the political winds these days is that after hearing, in his own words, what Romney stands for and his true, unfiltered lack of compassion for the “47%,” religious Americans are having second thoughts. They may not like Obama, but they believe his compassion is real, his values are ones they find in concert with their own. Over the next six weeks their conviction will be sorely tested by the withering assault Republican Super Pacs will unleash against the president. They’ll have to keep in mind verse 4 from Isiaiah 58. 

I’m apparently not the only one to believe religion will help swing this election. Pastor Rick Scarborough of Texas, a big supporter of Rick Perry’s aborted bid for the GOP presidential nomination, is launching a 40 Days to Save America crusade tomorrow. He’s asking for prayer, fasting and action to change the direction of the country. 

I don’t normally hear about the good pastor’s ideas, but Stephen Colbert’s Wednesday show enlightened me about the plans to sway undecided voters, including, according to Colbert, “the biggest undecided voter of all, God. He may be all knowing, but He’d still like to know a little more about Mitt’s tax returns.”

Colbert suggested Romney might have an edge is appealing for God’s vote. He does, after all, fit Romney’s “core demographic—old, male, vengeful and lives in a gated community.”

Sukkah Time, Almost

Today was a perfect day to erect the frame of our sukkah, the temporary hut-like structure that is central to the holiday of Sukkot. Technically, you’re supposed to wait until after Yom Kippur this Saturday, but I’ve never been a technically religious person. I’m more into the tradition and ethos of a holiday than the strict precepts that have evolved over the centuries.

So, the speed-rail frame went up, with hardly a miscue. I’ll wait until after Yom Kippur to drape the sides, drop on the lattice roof and decorate the inside with hanging plastic fruit, garlands of colored leaves and some white Christmas lights that give it a real holiday feeling.

For those who want to know more about sukkah building, here’s a link to an older blog: http://nosocksneededanymore.blogspot.com/2010/09/sukkadah-time.html


Handy Man. Not: My sukkah-building prowess notwithstanding, I am not by any stretch of the imagination a handy-man around the house. Oh, I manage to fix some things, but more often than not I am construction-challenged.

Gilda’s favorite story about my do-it-yourself skill set harks back to our first house, a Tudor-style three bedroom home built in 1932 that we bought 33 years ago. It had a large master bedroom with a walk-in shower in the master bathroom. The showerhead was one of those large round fixtures mounted in the middle of the ceiling tile, the kind that provides a soft rain spray. I prefer a more invigorating shower so I got my tools out to replace the showerhead with a WaterPik Shower Massage, back then the gold standard when it came to powerful replacement alternatives.

Try as I might with my wrench, I could not get the showerhead to budge. After 30 minutes I confessed my inability to Gilda. She calmly walked into the shower, climbed the ladder and turned the showerhead until it came off. Voila!

Had we not moved from that house several years later I would still be suffering daily embarrassment as water cascaded down over me. Not that Gilda lets me forget about this misadventure. It’s just that she’s kind enough not to bring it up except when I’m lauding my DIY skills to those who don’t know any better.

That first house produced some great memories, including the time I flooded out the basement bathroom trying to replace a valve in the tank. I wrote about it more than a year ago, so if you’re interested in reading more about my ineptitude, here’s the link: http://nosocksneededanymore.blogspot.com/2010/06/water-water-everywhere.html

Giving a Mulligan

Do you get a mulligan—a golf term for a do-over for a bad shot—for ill-advised comments if you’ve served in the military?

That’s what Tony Bennett is hoping after the 85-year-old singer and WWII veteran made some injudicious remarks on the Howard Stern radio show last week suggesting the 9/11 terrorists might have had reason to attack us.

“They flew the plane in, but we caused it. Because we were bombing them, and they told us to stop,” said Bennett, a native New Yorker. Subsequently, Bennett apologized if anyone misconstrued his words, adding, “I am sorry if my statements suggested anything other than an expression of my love for my country, my hope for humanity and my desire for peace throughout the world.”

I have no reason to doubt Bennett’s patriotism. He put his life on the line for all of us. He’s earned a mulligan, as this is the first instance I know of where he stumbled publicly. He’s different from other communications-challenged celebrities like Mel Gibson who is a multiple affronter.

What Bennett does provide, however, is a civics lesson on our expectations of public figures, especially politicians. As a nation we’ve arrived at a point where we demand perfection and strict adherence to dogma, even if it’s disseminated by a small, vocal minority.

It’s not a new story. In 1976, President Ford misspoke during a debate with Jimmy Carter when he said Poland, Rumania and Yugoslavia were not under Soviet domination. The gaffe cemented thinking Ford was not intellectually worthy of earning a full term as president.

Under the klieg lights and pressure to perform, candidates may stumble. As long as they don’t do it repeatedly, thus showing a lack of education and historical context, as Sarah Palin continually does, we should be tolerant of their mistakes. Give them a mulligan, when warranted. We’re too judgmental if we think they are not fallible. Choosing a president is not like voting for the best vocalist on American Idol. What we’re seeing today, from both sides of the presidential field, is a beauty contest of personality rather than ideas, a talent contest of sound bites versus careful exposition of principled positions, a my-way-or-the-highway evaluation of candidates.

I cringe at the prospect of a Rick Perry presidency. But I find myself sympathetic to his plight. He is not a good debater. Like most politicians, he takes credit for achievements that should be shared. Most of his policies would be repugnant to me. But I agree with Perry’s views on the need to integrate the children of illegal immigrants into our society so they can become contributing members and not burdens. I also believe his advocacy of a vaccination of young girls against the human papillomavirus was in the best interests of his state’s citizens.

Yet, because Tea Party Conservatives do not share those beliefs, and because they are so powerful in today’s Republican party, Perry has seen his candidacy suffer. The narrow base of the Republican party choosing the GOP standard bearer demands 100% adherence to its narrow-minded platform. It will accept no independent thinking.

Left wing Democrats express similar disdain for President Obama for deviating from the programs they espouse and which they thought he should implement. They do not accept Obama’s willingness to compromise, to govern from the center.

Given the state of our politics today, when neither side appears willing to work with the other, we seem to be at a tipping point. Will we choose our next leaders based on a clash of ideas or a clash of one-liners? A discussion of principles or a popularity contest? A thoughtful analysis of our national strengths and weaknesses or an emotional appeal to return to an era no longer relevant to our current and future global standing?


Wednesday night marks the beginning of the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, followed 10 days later by Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. It’s a period of reflection intended not just between humans and their concept of an Eternal Being but also, mainly, as a time when men and women must focus on and seek forgiveness for any wrongs they might have done to other people. It’s a Jewish version of an interpersonal mulligan. You’re supposed to request forgiveness in person, but this being the Internet age, let me ask your indulgence if during the past year this blog, or any personal contact we might have had, offended you in any way.

A happy and healthy New Year to all.

Sinat Chinam

Today, according to the Jewish calendar, is the 17th of Tammuz, historically significant because 1,941 years ago the Roman army breached the walls of Jerusalem, effectively presaging the end of the Jewish revolt and Jewish government in Israel for nearly 2,000 years. Three weeks later the siege of the city concluded with the destruction of the Second Temple, on the ninth of Ab, Tisha B’Av.

The 17th of Tammuz is considered a minor fast day by observant Jews. Minor meaning the fast lasts from sunrise to sunset, unlike the fast of a major day, such as the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) or Tisha B’Av, which lasts sunset to sunset. Most Jews, I’d confidently venture to say, don’t know much about the 17th of Tammuz, aren’t aware it is today, and, even if they did, wouldn’t pay it much heed. I, myself, only became cognizant of this year’s commemoration because of a reference to it by one of our rabbis this past Saturday (for those curious, no, I am not fasting).

I bring this bit of Jewish religious lore to your attention because of its applicability to modern times. You see, the fall of the Jewish revolt in 70 CE, according to our sages, was not so much a triumph of Roman military superiority but rather the result of infighting among Jewish sects, not to the level of a brutal civil war, but sufficient to command God’s attention and determination to punish his chosen people. The sages characterized the misbehavior endemic to the sects of first century Judea as a sin of “baseless hatred,” known in Hebrew as sinat chinam.

Increasingly, I find the actions of leaders in both Israel and the United States today rife with sinat chinam.

In Israel, coalition governments have given religious-right parties power beyond their numbers. In wielding their influence, these ultra-orthodox parties have or have tried to impose religious practices anathema to a majority of Jews living within Israel and the Diaspora. Their ideas include proposals to amend regulations governing conversions, marriages, and the definition of who is a Jew. Rather than instill universal support for Israel, these devilish designs have fractured Jewish solidarity.

Here in America, we are experiencing a profound period of intellectual intolerance. Nasty does not come close to describing the tenor of political discourse. The lack of respect both for the person and for the office held by the opposition is palpable.

We are, in short, wallowing in the sin of baseless hatred. You don’t have to be Jewish to acknowledge sinat chinam; Christians believe in it, as well: http://www.hebrew4christians.com/Holidays/Summer_Holidays/Tishah_B_Av/Sinat_Chinam/sinat_chinam.html.

There are too few democracies in the world. It would be tragic if sinat chinam led to their reduced ability to contribute to another Jewish concept, tikkun olam (repairing the world, often through social action, community service and social justice).

Ethnic Pride and Shame

Ethnic pride is a powerful cultural marker. What Italian didn’t feel his chest swell when Rocky Marciano won the heavyweight boxing title? Or when Luciano Pavarotti hit a high C note? When rap stars dominate the music business, when the NBA and most Division I college basketball teams feature Afro-Americans, when Barack Obama took the oath of office, how could people of color not be proud?

When I was growing up, my parents always pointed out prominent Jewish actors, playwrights, politicians, physicians, even sportsmen, especially when their names might not have given away their pedigree. Kirk Douglas. Tony Curtis. John Garfield. Arthur Miller. Jacob Javits. Jonas Salk. Sandy Koufax—how proud we were when he declined to play in a World Series game on Yom Kippur (how disappointed I was when Ike Davis of the Mets chose to play a meaningless game on this year’s Yom Kippur).

I wound up doing the same not so subtle identification process for my children.

But just as coins have two sides, ethnic pride is but the positive side of ethnic shame. Here are two prominent residents on my list of shame:

Bernard Madoff
Pamela Geller

Madoff is obvious. Beyond swindling money, helped along, let’s be honest, by the greed of many of his clients, was his total disregard for the impact his illegal activity would have on the numerous social and charitable organizations that blindly invested with him. Sad as it is that many individuals lost their savings, it is far worse that he bankrupted or weakened entities whose sole purpose was to help their fellow human.

If you are not already familiar with Pamela Geller, here’s a link to a profile from Sunday’s NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/nyregion/10geller.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=homepage.

To reject radical forms of Islam that have morphed into violence is not shameful. But Geller has transformed the perception of Islam from a major religion into an extremist movement. She incites hatred, intolerance, bigotry.

It is true. Some Muslims want to kill all “non-believers.” Nothing new here. Religions often are brutally intolerant—Israelites wanted to eradicate all inhabitants of Canaan; Christians killed non-believers during their conquests of the New World; Catholics and Protestants killed each other; New Believers and Old Believers fought for supremacy of the Russian Orthodox Church. Shiites and Sunnis kill each other in the name of Allah. It’s hard to find any religion without blood on its hands, as God always seems to be “on their side.”

But Geller, who went to Hebrew school, should have learned that Jews flourished in the early Middle Ages under Islam. Indeed, Spain was a model of religious tolerance when Muslims ruled there, allowing Jews to rise to the highest levels of government, commerce and the arts. Either through ignorance or intent, Geller turns her back on history to paint an entire religion as evil. Her depictions of Islam are as cruel as any anti-Semitic canard. She is a demagogue empowered by the Internet and cable TV. I shutter to think anyone might think she represents the Jewish community.


Texas Massacre: If you’re a liberal and a New York sports fan, this was a great weekend. First, the Texas Rangers lost two home playoff games to the Tampa Bay Rays. Both teams will travel to Florida for the deciding fifth game of their series to determine who will play the Yankees beginning Friday night for the American League pennant.

Second, the NY Football Giants beat up the Houston Texans, 34-10.

Third, the Dallas Cowboys lost to the Tennessee Titans, 34-27.

Few states bring out the nasty in me as does Texas. For the most part I enjoyed my visits there (I probably traveled to Texas close to 100 times). But I can’t separate the state’s regressive politics (and George W. Bush) from their sports teams. I was delighted the Rangers, Texans and Cowboys lost.

Oh, by the way, Target dodged a boycott bullet as the Yanks defeated the Minnesota Twins at Target Field (and Yankee Stadium).


Have a Seat: Perhaps you saw the Op-Ed piece last Thursday in the NY Times from John Edgar Wideman. He’s a a professor of Africana studies and literary arts at Brown University. At least twice a week he rides the Acela from New York City to Providence, RI, and back, discovering along the way that he rarely has to share a double seat with anybody. Why? He presumes because he is a man of color. (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/opinion/07Wideman.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=wideman&st=cse).

From more than 30 years commuting on Metro North, I can tell you he is 100% correct. As I never wanted to stand, I sat next to everyone and anyone, even if it meant taking the dreaded middle seat of a three-seat bench. My only bias was not to be wedged in between two portly passengers. If I sat at one end of a three-seater and a person of color sat at the other end, it was usually a given no one would take the middle seat, regardless of how crowded the train was.

Metro North is not like the subway where races mix, if not easily, at least commonly. Few Afro-Americans commute on Metro North. They are largely avoided. I am not alone in my convictions. Here’s how some other readers responded to Wideman in letters to the editor: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/09/opinion/l09seat.html?ref=amtrak.


??? For VP: Just as the baseball playoffs got under way, official, and unofficial, Washington entered its fall season with incessant speculation President Obama will shake up his team, switching the positions of Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. For the record, the White House denied any such move is contemplated.

As long ago as March 4, I opined Biden would conveniently and diplomatically be replaced on the 2012 ticket. I didn’t think it would be by Hillary. I picked former Indiana senator Evan Bayh, 55, a moderate young enough to give Democrats a good shot at holding the presidency in 2016 if Obama wins re-election.

Lebanon

Let me begin by acknowledging I’ve never been in the military. Never been in an active combat zone. Never fired a real gun. Never been shot at. Never shot at anybody. My exposure to war has been vicarious—through the media of print, television and film.

I grew up on war movies and westerns. Forget about the pyrotechnics of today’s shoot ‘em ups. The best of any genre are the ones that put you into the minds, the psyche, of the combatants to reveal their fears, their tension, their disgust with the dehumanizing character of war. All Quiet on the Western Front. A Walk in the Sun. The Hurt Locker. The Enemy Below. Das Boot. Platoon. The Red Badge of Courage. To this list of extraordinary studies of humans in and under conflict (and others too numerous to mention), add Lebanon, an Israeli film about a tank crew, and the dozen foot soldiers they are meant to protect, in the opening days of the war in Lebanon in 1982.

I saw Lebanon this week, part of the free-Tuesday movie series courtesy of Cablevision’s Optimum Rewards program. For 93 minutes I sat riveted as if in the claustrophobic confines of a dark, dank, dirty, noisy, clanking, reverberating, oily, sweaty, smoky, suffocating, greasy tank, looking out on the world only through the telescope of the gunner, a young soldier fresh from shooting barrels during basic training now ordered to fire into combat zones inhabited by civilians.

It would not be hard to view this film as anti-Israel. That would be wrong, for there are plenty of villains represented, including the PLO, the Phalangists and the Syrians.

No, Lebanon is first and foremost an anti-war movie, conveying in this singular story the horrors and fog of war, how it torments its participants, turning some into monsters, some into weeping children, others into selfish, delusional action figures. And how innocents become casualties of even the most well-meaning initiatives.

It is a hard movie to sit through, especially if you are pro-Israeli. But a strength of any country and people is the ability to look deep inside their actions to bring out the truth of their experiences. As I watched this film just days before Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, I was reminded of a sermon my rabbi gave Kol Nidre night, the commencement of Yom Kippur, in 1982, just days after the Israeli army stood by as Phalangists massacred hundreds of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps around Beirut. It remains the low point of Israeli involvement in any military action. As he recounted the tragedy, Rabbi Turetsky intoned words from the Yom Kippur confessional liturgy, over and over repeating Ashamnu, “we have sinned, we are culpable.”

The Sabra and Shatila massacres took place September 16-18, 1982.

Tonight, September 17, 2010, Kol Nidre services begin at 6:30.