It’s the last new show of the year, so get it while it’s hot!

I did not include my poem after all. I’m grumpy enough this time of year; I don’t need hate mail on top of it all.

A Rutgers University senior got to talk to President Bush, who recognized her efforts to fix the vehemently anti-Israel (and sometimes anti-Semitic) atmosphere at Rutgers.

Because of her work at Rutgers, including establishing a dormitory where Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and Christian students live with and learn about one another, Josephs was invited to be one four students among 14 “Jewish leaders in higher education” meeting with Bush before the White House Hanukkah party.

[...] The Middle East Coexistence House, which opened this fall at Douglass College, is the culmination of Josephs’ impact on a New Brunswick campus that was experiencing bitter anti-Israeli and anti-Palestinian demonstrations before she arrived in 2003, said political scientist Gordon Schochet, her adviser.

“The situation was very tense. You had a strong anti-Israeli presence on the left, left-wing faculty members who were hostile to things Israel had done and hostile to pro-Israel activities by Hillel,” Schochet said.

He said Josephs joined Hillel, a campus Jewish organization, and on the way to becoming its president, she “lowered the tone of discussion remarkably” by reaching out to Muslim student groups to start a dialogue.

The effort is only in its infancy, but I salute Danielle for trying. And I got a kick out of this, where Danielle discovers that W. is not the moron the left makes him out to be:

Josephs is an affirmed Democrat, and even volunteers at Democratic Rep. Frank Pallone’s New Brunswick office, but she was diplomatic in describing the president after meeting him.

“You can agree or disagree with the president on issues, but you have to fundamentally respect that he has such a strong moral conviction,” she said.

“Especially living on the East Coast, I don’t think we give the president enough credit for what he does. It’s a tough job. In speaking with him, he was so intellectual and so articulate. A lot of people, especially where I live, don’t give him credit for that.”

Note that the author calls her “diplomatic” for not calling W. a moron. I would call her, well, honest.

They’re blaming the Bulgarians. Of course, there are no Jews in Libya, but that never stopped Jew-haters from blaming us before.

TRIPOLI, Libya Dec 19, 2006 (AP)— A court convicted six foreign health workers Tuesday on charges of deliberately infecting 400 children with the AIDS virus and sentenced them to death, setting off shouts of joy in Tripoli.

The verdict, which will be automatically referred to Libya’s Supreme Court, drew quick condemnation from European nations, which have charged that the five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor were being made scapegoats. A Western medical study, released too late for the trial, said the infections occurred before the medical workers came to Libya.

I can’t believe the trial was anything other than a kangaroo court, what with it being Libya and all.

The nurses and doctor have been in jail since 1999 on charges that they intentionally spread the AIDS virus to more than 400 children at a hospital in the city of Benghazi during a botched experiment to find a cure for the disease.

Western nations blame the infections on unsanitary conditions at Libyan hospitals and accuse Tripoli of using the six workers as scapegoats.

Gee. Ya think?

Sad. These poor people are going to be executed because Libya can’t face up to the fact that it’s a third-world craphole with a lunatic dictator making things worse.

When I read things like this, I thank God I was born in America. In fact, I should thank God every day of my life that I was born here, and that my ancestors were wise enough to emigrate from Europe. Thanks, Big Guy.

The palestinian civil war continues in dribs and drabs, teasing us just enough to believe that Gaza will become a battlefield at no risk to the IDF. (No, I don’t think it will, but one can always hope.)

Clashes between rival Palestinian factions in Gaza resumed early Tuesday after a relatively quiet night, with Palestinian sources saying a man was killed and at least 11 others were injured in exchanges of fire that erupted between Palestinian police loyal to Hamas and Fatah fighters.

Witnesses said the gun battle occurred at the entrance and inside the compound of the Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, but could not say how the fighting had broken out.

It was further reported that two Fatah security officers were killed and five other Palestinians were wounded during Hamas-Fatah gun battles in the city; at least total 20 people were wounded during the exchanges of fire in the Strip.

In the afternoon Palestinian sources said the lifeless bodies of two Fatah men who were kidnapped earlier in the day by Hamas gunmen were found in Gaza city. The two men belonged to the Palestinian Intelligence Forces.

In the meantime, check out these headlines and guess who they’re from:

Three Killed As Gaza Violence Resumes

Hamas Policeman Killed in Gaza Gunbattle

Israelis Kill Wanted Palestinian Gunmen

Which of these three is not like the others?

Notice how the terrorists are “killed” or even “dead” (”Three dead as Gaza gunbattles rage“) due to unnamed forces—unless the Israelis are the ones doing the killing.

And the media bias against Israel, and for the palestinian cause, continues unabated.

Make way for the latest disgusting Nazi comparison. But not in the Arab world. It’s in Bayonne, New Jersey (home to the woman I call “Cousin Shirley from Bayonne”).

A seventh- and fifth-grade child went to school wearing buttons depicting the Hitler Youth, as a protest against wearing the uniforms. I believe that’s an excellent example of what Patrick Moynihan called “defining deviancy down.” I believe it is also an excellent example of using your children to make a political point.

Apparently, being made to wear a school uniform is being compared to being forced into the Hitler Youth in Nazi Germany. Apparently, being made to wear a school uniform is going to turn your child into a mindless drone. Apparently, two women from Bayonne are unable to deal with rules.

Parents of two New Jersey students claim their school district was wrong when it threatened to suspend the boys for donning buttons featuring a picture of Hitler Youth to protest mandatory school uniforms.

The parents, in a federal suit filed Friday, say the Bayonne district and several of its officials have “stifled” the First Amendment rights of their children.

The buttons have the words “no school uniforms” with a slash through them superimposed on a photo of young boys wearing identical shirts and neckerchiefs.

The district instituted mandatory uniforms in September for Grades K-8, and one student wore the button for at least six weeks before objections were raised last month, said Karin R. White Morgen, a lawyer for the parents.

Those children didn’t think this up by themselves. Those children didn’t make up those buttons without help from their parents. This is the parents’ statement on school uniforms, and it is a pretty disgusting way to make a statement.

Morgen said the pupils’ parents don’t want to speak to reporters, but provided a statement from Michael’s mother, Laura DePinto.

“I’ve gotten overwhelming support from MANY people that tell me that they absolutely agree with what the image depicted, an ominously homogenous group of blindly cooperative children,” the statement said.

That statement is from the mother of the fifth grader whom, I presume, is not allowed to make any real decisions in his life, such as deciding to eat ice cream for dinner, or staying up until midnight on a school night. But that’s not the same, you see, as being forced to wear a uniform to school, thus turning him into a “blindly cooperative” (presumably mindless) drone. And gee, the fact that many people agree with the Hitler Youth image gives me such a feeling of comfort, you would not believe. (Thinking of my cousin Shirley, who is actually my mother’s cousin, makes me talk like that.)

Here’s a kicker for the parents: The Supreme Court has proven, time and time again, that students don’t have full First Amendment rights. School systems are allowed to dictate what clothes the children may wear to school. Police are allowed to search high school lockers without warrants. And student newspapers have been unable to publish things their advisors or principals try to quash. I may not agree with these things, but that is what has happened when parents bring school issues to court.

However, that’s beside the point. The point is, the parents could easily have made some other kind of reference—Orwell’s 1984 comes immediately to mind—than the Hitler Youth Group to make their point.

But trust them not to notice how offensive the buttons are. Because their point is far more important: How dare the school authorities tell them what to tell their precious babies what to do.

Gee. Society has rules. Who knew?

Sitting on 16 miles of shelving, they number 50 million pages covering 17.5 million victims, not only Jews but also millions of slave laborers, political prisoners, homosexuals and Roma.

I am not at all sure I need (or want) more proof. Some perfectionist historians, putting final touches on their manuscripts, will be happy to put their hands on this meticulous recording of the Nazi machinery in action. But most of the people do not require more proof.

As for Mahmoud the Mad and his clique of “scientists”: they are impervious to proof, because their activities are in a completely different plane. As one of the commenters to the linked article mentioned:

Facts will not change the minds of hard-core deniers like David Duke, David Irving and Ernst Zundel. No matter what facts are unearthed, what documents are released, what excavations reveal, they will never admit to the slightest adjustment in their views. One must never forget that the former head of the “National Socialist White Peoples’ Party,” Harold Covington, said it quite plainly: “The real reason for Holocaust revisionism is to make National Socialism an accepted political alternative again.” It’s disgusting, but true.

And this is the way it goes…

Cross-posted on SimplyJews