Archive for category Politics
What bad calls in baseball teach us about global terrorism, climate change, and the leadership to face the real problems that threaten civilized society
Baseball aficionados will not soon forget the game played on June 2, 2010, at Comerica Park between the Detroit Tigers and the Cleveland Indians. Detroit pitcher Armando Galarraga should have become the 21st pitcher in Major League history to throw a perfect game. Instead, the first base umpire called Indians batter Jason Donald safe at first base, handing Mr. Galarraga the lesser distinction as winning pitcher of baseball’s most “Imperfect Game.”
The question on everyone’s mind was, justifiably: How could this happen?
In an interview with NPR’s Shankar Vedantam, Etan Green of Stanford Business School offered this thesis based on her research team’s observation and analysis of over a million pitches:
“If you’re an umpire and you’re unsure about what the correct call is and you’re given a choice between one call that’s particularly consequential and one call that’s relatively inconsequential, they will more or less preserve the status quo.”
This says a lot about the process of calling plays, which is much more of an art than a science. It also suggests applications that extend far beyond the field of athletics.
I offer here a remarkably savvy insight into progressive thinking and priorities from Jim Geraghty of the National Review, cited by Eytan Kobre in Mishpacha Magazine:
A list of progressives’ fears would offer a mix of the insignificant, the theoretical, the farfetched, and the mundane… climate change a century from now, the Koch Brothers, insufficient cultural sensitivity in video games… New York mayor Bill DeBlasio is on a crusade to save his city from charter schools and horse-drawn carriages…
You notice progressives don’t spend a lot of time and energy fearing flights of people from countries with Ebola, and unsecured border, ISIS, al-Qaeda, Vladimir Putin’s aggression, the declining number of two-parent families…
This may be a bit of psychological transference. When the Leftists notice things like ISIS, Putin’s aggression, or the collapse of the family, on some level — perhaps subconsciously — they realize their prefered options are unlikely to be effective. Confronting that fact would force them to reevaluate how they see the world — and sometimes, after a sufficiently dramatic or frightening event such as 9/11, some people actually do change their worldview.
But a lot of people can’t or won’t overhaul their entire philosophy and understanding of how the world works. So they deny the idea that any of these are real problems or worthy of much attention or discussion — they reflect GOP scaremongering, others’ paranoia, etc.
But all that fear and anxiety and anger has to go somewhere… and thus it gets expressed at much more convenient and much more philosophically aligned targets — i.e., climate change a century from now, the Koch Brothers, insufficient cultural sensitivity in video games, and so on.
In other words, if the big problems of the world are likely to remain insoluble unless I change my approach to political, economic, and social dynamics, then I’m likely to shift my focus to more abstract issues that don’t force me to question my own ideological predisposition.
This reminds me of a meeting I once had with my editor at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. In the course of the conversation I mentioned columnist Charles Krauthammer. Without missing a beat, my editor said, “I hate him.”
“Really?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. “He’s so articulate that I find myself agreeing with him… and I don’t!”
Had I been less protective of my position at the time, I would have suggested that she reexamine some of her positions. Oh, well. I guess I can suggest it now.
Adapted from an essay in Mishpacha Magazine for the Times of Israel.
Question: When is a new shul considered successful?
Answer: When it’s big enough to spawn its first breakaway minyan.
This past August, observers went to great lengths to show, correctly, the silver lining of achdus within the dark clouds of terrorism. The three martyred yeshiva students, the barrage of rocket fire, the mass retreats into bomb shelters, the cost of the Gaza operation in precious Jewish lives – all of these brought Jews in Israel and around the world together and, for at least a moment, put an end to the divisiveness that too often characterizes our community. Now, the brutal terrorist attack in Har Nof promises a similar response. This is a genuine consolation, and should not be discounted.
What compounds these tragedies, however, is the cycle of missed opportunity that has repeated itself again and again and again.
Read the whole article here: Revisiting the Cause of Terror | Yonason Goldson | The Blogs | The Times of Israel http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/revisiting-the-cause-of-terror/#ixzz3JdkIQb4p
Follow us: @timesofisrael on Twitter | timesofisrael on Facebook
Published on Hubpages.com
A child’s brain is like a sponge, absorbing everything with which it comes in contact. As the brain gets older it learns to process, to analyze, to interpret. And eventually it begins to slow, begins to forget, begins to lose function.
Few prospects are as forbidding as mental decline, the specter of which haunts us as we advance toward old age. And so the experts tell us to keep our minds active, that using the brain is the surest way to stave off mental deterioration.
Crossword puzzles. Sudoku. Word games. Logic problems. These are common recipes from the diet books for the mind. Go traveling. Take up knitting or gardening. Learn Italian. Drive a different way to work. Get an advanced degree. Anything and everything that piques cognitive activity belongs in our catalogue of mental health activities.
“That’s all good,” says Barbara Strauch, author of The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain: The Surprising Talents of the Middle-Aged Mind andNew York Times health and medical science editor. But the most intriguing advice Ms. Strauch has heard is this: “Deliberately challenge your view of the world. Talk to people you totally disagree with.”
Published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
After Charles Krauthammer wrote so articulately about the moral clarity in Gaza (July 18), it is astonishing that there remains such profound moral confusion.
Exactly why are Arielle Klagsbrun, Hedy Epstein and Maya Harris (“The American Jewish community must value all life,” July 22) so eager to misrepresent the history of Israel, and to condemn their fellow Jews for the unspeakable crimes of self-defense and survival? They denounce the “illegal occupation” of captured territories. Why are they not equally concerned about the Jewish-owned land appropriated by Arab governments — all 38,625 square miles of it (compared to Israel’s total area of 7,992 square miles)? Why do they condemn Israel as oppressors when it was the Palestinian Authority that rejected Ehud Barak’s offer — after the Camp David Accords of 2000 — to return an equivalent amount of territory to that captured in the defensive 1967 war?
Have they forgotten that Israel withdrew unilaterally from Gaza and handed it over to the Palestinians, who promptly destroyed much of the infrastructure the Israelis left behind and embarked on a campaign of terrorism against Israel?
Most important, by what twisted logic do they suggest that Israel is guilty of murdering the Palestinian civilians used by Hamas as human shields to protect the rockets targeting Israeli civilians in an unprovoked rain of terror? It should be obvious that there would be peace tomorrow if the Palestinian leadership would stop seeking Israel’s destruction today.
Even the Washington Post editorial staff has reached the inevitable conclusion that the leaders of Hamas have no motive other than to sacrifice their own people on the altar of public opinion in hope of inciting world condemnation against Israel for defending itself. If they read the letter written by Ms. Klagsbrun, Ms. Epstein and Ms. Harris, the Hamas terrorists will rejoice, as their people die, knowing that their stratagem has not been completely in vain.
Although the recent UC Davis divestment resolution against Israel ended in a deadlock, I suppose there is still some silver lining: at least half the people casting votes can be considered clear-headed. But as for the others, please tell me — what exactly were you thinking?
Did you buy into former President Jimmy Carter’s accusation condemning Israel as an apartheid state? If so, how do you explain Israeli Arabs having a higher standard of living than Arabs in Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, or Iraq? or a higher literacy rate? or higher life expectancy? Does it mean nothing to you that Israel is the only democracy in the Mideast? that only in Israel women have equal rights and equal education? that Palestinians who work for Israeli companies like Sodastream oppose the boycott you advocate to save them from oppression?
If you are outraged by the unequal treatment of Israeli Arabs, how do you explain that Israel has Arab members of Parliament proportional to its Arab citizenry? How is it symptomatic of apartheid that Israel has or has had an Arab deputy Prime Minister, an Arab Supreme Court justice, an Arab national soccer team captain, and an Arab Miss Israel?
Where is your outrage toward apartheid in Arab countries that oppress their Jewish minorities? Or are there too few Jews for you to apply the term apartheid in Arab countries that are essentially Judenrein? In case the flight of oppressed Jews from Arab countries is news to you, look at the decline in Jewish populations from 1948 until today:
Algeria: 140,000 to <100
Egypt: 80,000 to <100
Iraq: 150,000 to 40
Lebanon: 30,000 to 30
Libya: 30,000 to 0
Morocco: 500,000 to 700
Syria: 30,000 to <100
Yemen: 55,000 to <200
You denounce the “illegal occupation” of captured territories. Why are you not equally concerned about the Jewish-owned land appropriated by Arab governments — all 38,625 square miles of it (compared to Israel’s total area of 7,992 square miles)? Why do you continue to condemn Israel as intransigent when it was the Palestinian Authority that rejected Ehud Barak’s offer — after the Camp David Accords of 2000 — to return an equivalent amount of territory to that captured in the defensive 1967 war? And by what twisted rationalization do you fault Israel for not sitting down to negotiate with Arab leaders who continue to call for Israel’s destruction and deny its right to exist?
As for those of you who abstained: were you lacking clarity or courage?
Why are you not railing against the far more egregious human rights violations in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, and myriad other nations all over the globe? Even if political correctness is the explanation, please explain why quantifiable Arab oppression is accepted while fabricated Israeli “oppression” is not.
But if the real reason, as seems likely, is old-fashioned anti-Semitism, then let’s trade in that antiseptic euphemism and call your worldview what it really is: Jew-hatred, plain and simple.
UC Davis was once an institution to be proud of. For the first time in thirty years, I am ashamed of my alma mater.
Rabbi Yonason (Jonathan) Goldson
Class of 1983
At first glance, the soggy, green downs of Ulster bear little resemblance to the parched and craggy hills of Israel. But a gentle tugging at the cultural fabric of either place unravels an unmistakable common thread: two peoples, impossibly close geographically, impossibly distant ideologically, with more than enough fuel for hatred between them to burn until the coming of the Messiah. Tromping over hills and through city streets, however, first in one place and then in the other, I discovered a more compelling similarity: the bitter struggle of humanity in exile.
“Which are the bad parts of town, the ones I should avoid?” I asked the owner of the bed-and-breakfast where I passed my first night in Belfast.
She dutifully pointed out the Shankhill neighborhood on my map, cautioning me to steer clear of it. I thanked her and, with sophomoric self-confidence, proceeded there directly.
It was the summer of 1984, and central Belfast exuded all the charm of a city under martial law. Policemen on patrol wore flack jackets. An armored personnel carrier idled at a major intersection waiting for the signal to change. Blown out shells of buildings sprouted weeds, and street signs warned, DO NOT LEAVE CAR UNATTENDED. But as I worked my way up Shankhill, I discovered even more disconcerting landmarks: elementary school yards swathed in barbed-wire and churches pocked with scars from automatic-rifle fire.
I stopped in at a corner pub and took a seat at the bar beside two locals. Each was nursing a pint of Guinness. Another glass, two-thirds full with boiled snails, rested between them. The men took turns using a bent eight-penny nail to dig each snail out of its shell before popping the meat into their mouths.