Discriminating against veterans

Posted on 02/10/2012 by Meryl Yourish

Nichole Olson explains why American companies aren’t hiring veterans, and the American education system refuses to honor military education when vets go to college to get a degree (that will make them more employable) and try to transfer credits from the education they’ve had in the military.

In each of my interviews, my military experience obviously came up and it was evident that it was an issue. Not that my experience meant little but the fear of my being called up again and my availability came into question several times. I found this odd but even more so, discouraging. After the last interview, I really started thinking as to why I would not be considered for one of the open positions. I was told that I had the qualifications, experience, and that they were sure I could handle the job but my availability was in question due to my commitment to the Navy Reserves. They weren’t sure they wanted to hire me because I may have to leave unexpectedly. From a business standpoint, I understand their concern; who wants to hire someone who may have to leave due to a national crisis? They do have a business to run after all. However, the more I thought about it, the angrier I became. I am but 1 reservist in a sea of thousands of others who, especially since 9/11, have found themselves in this exact situation at least once in the last 11 years. My experience cannot be that uncommon to that of my fellow reserve/guardsmen and of those who have recently separated from active duty; I can’t be the only one who has experienced this opaque form of discrimination.

[...] In speaking with a fellow Veteran recently, maybe the onus isn’t on the 1 percent but the other 99 percent. Why is it that military members receive extensive training in the fields of electronics, medicine, mechanics, aviation, and administration yet we can barely get a nationally accredited university to grant us little more than three credit hours towards physical education (because we were smart enough to complete boot camp). While we are able to apply for and received certifications in some career fields, they are either not enough, or are not recognized, by many employers. We can continue to write resumes and attempt to translate our skills into civilian terms yet without education that is nationally recognized, we’re back at square one. The GI Bill is an outstanding benefit and most service members take advantage of it in some capacity but many Veterans should be at least 50 percent completed with their degrees simply by the amount of education and experience they’ve received through the military. At the very least, they should be allowed to test their competency without having to re-take formal classes. How can we not grant the required qualifications necessary to obtain employment in the civilian sector to deserving Veterans? How do we tell a military police officer that while he is qualified to carry a weapon and serve in a combat zone that he is not qualified for employment with his hometown police force because he has not gone through their training academy? How is he good enough to go to war but not good enough to respond to 911 calls?

That’s interesting, because my nephew is currently learning communications in the Marines. From my understanding, he’ll learn about the most modern networking systems, 3G, 4G, etc., and will be setting up communications at FOBs in Afghanistan if necessary. To know now that his education will be meaningless if he chooses to go to college is unbelievable.

Read it all.

Posted in American Scene | 1 Comment

One more penalty on thriftiness

Posted on 02/09/2012 by Meryl Yourish

Let’s review: I refused to get a mortgage I couldn’t afford. I didn’t get a balloon mortgage. I didn’t buy my condo until I was sure of two things: That my contracting job would be a full-time staff position, and that my debt was paid down considerably before I bought it.

There is also the fact that when I set foot into a Ryan Homes office on July 3, 2007, I was given the hard-sale pitch, told I could effectively buy a condo with little or no money down, and that my debt wouldn’t be a problem, because a quick credit check showed that I could afford one up to, oh, $400,000. And if I acted now, they’d throw in several thousand dollars off the price. But I’d have to act soon, because the townhouses were going fast!

I walked out of that office without signing through sheer strength of will, knowing that I was being sold a load of goods and that I didn’t have to sign anything without thinking it over at length. I waited a year before buying my condo, paying down significant chunks of my debt in the meantime. When I finally did get a mortgage, I took advantage of the $7,500 home buying loan, which is a loan that I am paying back to the government each year on my 1040. A few months after I bought my condo, that loan became a credit.

Now the government is trying to work the housing market by making banks give money to people whose houses are underwater and who can’t make the mortgage payments. The article does not say whether it covers people who bought houses they could not afford with ARMs that they hoped would never take effect because they were trying to flip the house for a profit. It doesn’t say whether it covers people who didn’t care that they were buying a house they couldn’t afford, because they were betting on being able to get a better job, or something. All it says is that the big five banks are going to help homeowners who are about to be foreclosed on for whatever reason.

And you and I will ultimately be footing the bill for this.

My condo is currently underwater. It’s lost around 15% of its value, I think. I’m a little afraid to compare the current assessment with the original assessment. But I refinanced my mortgage last year and always had one that I could afford. I’ll never be a moocher. I’m just a stupid working stiff who thinks part of being a grownup is being responsible for your own actions, and waiting until you can afford the house that you bought. Go figure.

Posted in American Scene, Life | 3 Comments

More Superbowl commercial fun

Posted on 02/08/2012 by Meryl Yourish

First, watch this one:

Then go here and see the behind the scenes videos.

Hilarious.

Posted in American Scene, Pop Culture | Comments Off

You lost me at “wants to be remembered”

Posted on 02/08/2012 by Meryl Yourish

This is what is wrong with journalists today. In one of NPR’s top five articles on their website, they discuss whether or not Israel will attack Iran. The number one reason why Israel may bomb Iran is as follows:

1. Jewish history. Given the legacy of the Holocaust, no Israeli leader wants to be remembered as the one who let Iran build a bomb and did nothing to stop it. Netanyahu has said repeatedly that he will not let Iran become a nuclear-armed state on his watch. Some Israelis say it would be better to carry out an attack, even if it’s not successful, than to not take action against a state that has called for Israel’s destruction.

Note how the writer turned the most important decision a political leader can ever make–whether to attack anothe country–into an issue of personal pride for Bibi. It isn’t the fact that hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Israelis will die in a nuclear attack by Iran. It isn’t the fact that the Jewish people will have a significant portion of their number wiped out–again–in less than a century. It’s the fact that Netanyahu is thinking of his legacy. Right. Because when he reads the analysis from the Mossad and discusses an Iranian attack with his ministers, the first thing on Netanyahu’s mind is, “How will I look as the leader of Israel if I do this?”

I think the writer is confusing Netanyahu’s leadership with Obama’s.

Snark aside, this is an utterly despicable statement. The primary focus of the leader of Israel is on the survival of the State of Israel. Iran threatens that survival. It has nothing to do with how Bibi wants to be remembered. Backing it up with “Netanyahu has said repeatedly that he will not let Iran become a nuclear-armed state on his watch” gives it the imprimatur of being fact-based. That is such an important statement because it is an existential statement, not because you can use it to back up your contention that Bibi is thinking of his legacy.

This is what I’ve been writing about for nearly a decade: The subtle ways Israel is delegitimized by the media. Even their fear of a nuclear holocaust is put down to personalities, instead of a realistic approach to an enemy that threatens their destruction.

Your objective media, at work.

Posted in Iran, Israel, Media Bias | 2 Comments

Wednesday briefs

Posted on 02/08/2012 by Meryl Yourish

If you’ve lost Joe Klein, you’ve lost Middle Europe: When even Time magazine correspondents are commenting on how crappy the deal between Fatah and Hamas is, you know that it stinks really, really, really badly.

Check the skies for flying porkers: The AP profiles Israeli peace moves toward Iran. Of course, being the AP, they tell you this:

Before the revolution, Israel and Iran were close allies. Some 100,000 Jews of Iranian descent live in Israel today, many with fond memories and still strong ties to friends and relatives in their homeland. An estimated 25,000 Jews still live in Iran.

But they don’t tell you this:

On the eve of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, 80,000 Jews lived in Iran. In the wake of the upheaval, tens of thousands of Jews, especially the wealthy, left the country, leaving behind vast amounts of property.

That second paragraph, of course, is why there is such a large population of Iranian Jews in Israel.

You just can’t stop the haters from making hateful asses of themselves: A columnist in the Las Vegas Review wrote about the special post-Shabbat caucuses in Nevada on Saturday night. She called out the Jew-hate code words (“New York Lawyers”, for one) and accused some of Ron Paul’s followers of being anti-Semitic. In the comments to the article, they prove her right.

AHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!! Pull the other one: How can you tell Hassan Nasrallah is lying? His lips are moving.

Iran will not ask Lebanon’s Hezbollah to retaliate if Israel attacks Iran’s nuclear facilities, the leader of the militant group said Tuesday.

Sheik Hassan Nasrallah told thousands of supporters by video link that in case of such an Israeli attack on Iran, his leadership would make a decision about a response. Hezbollah is funded by Iran.

The One Is Not Happy: Shmuel Rosner, no fan of Benjamin Netanyahu’s, points out that Bibi is going to be around for a while yet, perhaps longer than the Obama Administration, which has tried so hard to get him kicked out of office. Cue world’s smallest violin.

And just for kicks and giggles: Ha’aretz is publishing the hacked emails of the Syrian administration. Georgie-Porgie Galloway is seen slobbering over the dictator’s murderous feet in the hopes of keeping his money coming in.

Posted in Anti-Semitism, Gaza, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, palestinian politics, Syria | 2 Comments

Time warp blogging fatigue

Posted on 02/07/2012 by Meryl Yourish

One of the reasons I get so tired of posting these days is because I post essentially the same things, different days. Pick a month from 2008 and go read over the archives. I found a post on Hamas smuggling bigger and better rockets through the Gaza border from Egypt. Moral equivalence of the media on reporting terrorist attacks and Israeli retaliation. Kassams raining down on Israel. The media minimizing Israeli casualties while maximizing Palestinian ones. The end of the two-state solution (because Israel won’t give the Palestinians everything they want). The wire services not reporting threats to destroy Israel. The EU issuing resolutions solely blaming Israel. Iran threatening to destroy Israel, while the UN ignores the threats but issues resolutions on Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.

And that is from just one week in February, 2008.

It’s why I can’t stand posting some days, and so, I don’t.

I think it may be time to do a 180 and go back to making this a personal blog that occasionally discusses current events. I can only take so much bad news before I need a dandelion break.

Posted in Hamas, Israel, Media Bias, Site news | 1 Comment

I have a new obsession

Posted on 02/06/2012 by Meryl Yourish

And it’s only minutes old.

Smash.

The new NBC series about putting on a Broadway play.

Yeah, it’s well-titled.

Smash is a smash.

I am STILL humming the tunes. Now THAT’s Broadway. (I’m sure it will be, after the TV series.)

Posted in Pop Culture | Comments Off

Tehran: HOT under the collar

Posted on 02/06/2012 by SnoopyTheGoon

I confess that the first time I’ve seen this ad, it made me laugh.

Since the clip is not translated, here is its synopsis from Israelity:

That’s the case anyway with the current TV ad campaign by cable provider HOT, which is promoting its ‘on-demand’ episodes of the popular spy-comedy show ‘Asfur’ by offering a free Samsung Galaxy tablet as enticement for prospective customers to sign up for the on-demand package.

In the ad, a bored Mossad agent stationed in Iran, apparently to monitor Iran’s nuclear development, meets up with three characters from the show who are also clandestinely in the country dressed as women. Sitting in a café, the agent shows off the Samsung Galaxy, explaining that he used his downtime to use the on-demand option to watch episodes of ‘Asfur’.

At the end of the clip, one of the three Asfur accidentally pushes an application on the tablet over the frantic efforts of the agent, and a nuclear reactor is detonated in the background.

Well, as David from Israelity says, “Typical Israeli sophomoric, whistling in the dark, hilarious humor.”

However, some moron (or several morons) in the Iranian Majlis (parliament) decided not only to take offense, but to (mis)direct his displeasure at Samsung, whose tablet is used as enticement in that ad.

The sheer stupidity of that Iranian act of indignation is mirrored by Tehran’s overseas branch Press TV article:

Meanwhile, Samsung’s Dubai office has issued a statement condemning the production of the teaser by the company’s Israel office.

Of course, poor Samsung and its Israeli office have nothing to do with that ad, the fact that escapes understanding of Tehran lawmakers and Press TV, although Samsung has stressed that point – if you care to read the next paragraph in the linked piece:

Samsung’s public relations official in Tehran, Elaheh Taheri, told reporters on Thursday the clip had nothing to do with the South Korean company and that it had been produced by an Israeli cable TV station, Hot.

However, the iron will of Ayatollahs will not be distracted by minor details, and Samsung was chosen to bear the wrath. Perhaps as a lesson to others:

Fat’hipour said Samsung’s apology to the Iranian nation, though necessary, would not be enough and that the company must be held accountable for producing the teaser.

Of course, I understand that by boycotting the Israeli cable provider HOT Majlis is not going to achieve much in the way of retaliation, but choosing Samsung?

I have almost made my mind to compensate Samsung for the unpleasant incident in my own small way, fixing to purchase one of their new products. You should too.

Next: President of the Islamic Republic of Iran Mahmoud (the Mad) Ahmadinejad decides to boycott the Swiss shoes manufacturer Bally, since a person unknown pissed in his shoes while he was praying in his favorite mosque.

Update: thanks to Sabba Hillel, here is a link to a version of the same clip with English subtitles and some preliminary info. With one mistake, however: the bug that is swatted at the end of the clip is called “khumeni” in Hebrew slang, however the name stems from its color (“khum” means brown) and not from a similarly sounding name of Ayatollah Khomeini.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews

Posted in Iran, Israel, Israel Derangement Syndrome | 2 Comments

The best Superbowl commercial

Posted on 02/05/2012 by Meryl Yourish

I like this one the best, so far.

There are a bunch here.

Posted in Pop Culture, Television | 2 Comments

Well, I did write today…

Posted on 02/05/2012 by Meryl Yourish

But it was for me. I’m close to the halfway point with my novel, and put about another 2000 words on it this weekend. You know, if it’s a choice between the blog and my novel, the blog is always going to lose.

I’m on target to be finished by the end of May, so we’ll see what happens this summer.

Posted in Life | Comments Off

Burying the lede, AP style

Posted on 02/04/2012 by Meryl Yourish

Well, that’s that for the AP. The fact that Iran’s Supreme Leader called Israel “a cancerous tumor” that “needs to be removed” is now buried on the second page of the story that warns the rest of the world that helping Israel will result in Iran attacking them. Yes, that’s now the angle–Iran will attack America if Israel attacks Iran. The fact that the leader of a terror-supporting nation that has already murdered thousands of Americans and others throughout the world calls for the destruction of Israel in the plainest terms ever? Not important.

Here is the full quote:

“The Zionist regime is really the cancerous tumor of this region and it needs to be removed and will be removed,” Khamenei said to a cheering crowd.

Here’s the AP quote from the story yesterday:

“The Zionist regime is a true cancer tumor on this region that should be cut off,” the supreme leader said. “And it definitely will be cut off.”

And here’s the quote in the final AP update of the story:

Khamenei called Israel a “cancerous tumor that should be cut and will be cut” — a remark he has made previously.

This is what they always do: Minimize the threat to Israel and bury the information far down in the latest updates. They can argue that they’re simply putting the more newsworthy parts first, updating the story to bring more information, but the fact that Khameini threatens any nation that helps Israel cannot be put into context without first including the threats Iran makes against Israel. This is the angle and lead they’re going with now:

Iran’s supreme leader has pledged to aid any nation or group that challenges Israel and said any military strikes over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program would damage U.S. interests in the Middle East “10 times over.”

The quote about destroying Israel comes 17 paragraphs in, after detailing how Khameini is threatening the U.S., how Israel may strike Iran, and how Iran has already struck at Israel via its proxies in Lebanon and Gaza.

If Israel does strike Iran–and I hope to God it doesn’t come to that–count on the media to downplay the existential threats Iran has made repeatedly over the last few years.

Posted in Iran, Israel, Media Bias | 2 Comments

The war of the words

Posted on 02/03/2012 by Meryl Yourish

Israel’s annual Herzliya conference, which draws leaders from around the world to discuss the region’s security issues, is always a cause for the news media to get a case of the vapors. Its major topic this year, of course, is Iran. Israelis intelligence chief said that Iran has enough material for four nuclear bombs. And that Israel has other problems:

Kochavi said that Israel was currently threatened by 200,000 rockets and missiles in the hands of Israel’s enemies. The missiles, he said, currently covered the entire State of Israel and were growing in their ranges and the size of their warheads.

Ehud Barak says that Iran is nearing the point where their underground bunkers will be too heavily fortified to be bombed. Moshe Ya’alon said that the missile base that exploded in Iran last year was building ICBMs capable of reaching the U.S. And now Leon Panetta says that there is a “strong likelihood” that Israel will attack this spring.

Iran has responded by threatening to destroy Israel, using the same language of the Nazis:

The supreme leader of Iran issued a blunt warning Friday that war would be detrimental to the United States — and that Iran is ready to help anyone who confronts “cancerous” Israel.

[...]“Well, these kinds of threats are detrimental to the U.S.,” he said. “The war itself will be 10 times as detrimental to the U.S.”

He said Iran will support any nation or group that fights against Israel.

“The Zionist regime is really the cancerous tumor of this region and it needs to be removed and will be removed,” Khamenei said to a cheering crowd.

The AP chose not to write a headline including the threats to remove the “cancerous tumor.” Instead, the focus was on Iran openly declaring to harm any nation that helps Israel–a declaration that is not really new.

Khamenei: Iran will back ‘any nations, any groups’ fighting Israel
Iran will help any nation or group that confronts the “cancer” Israel, the Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Friday.

The London Telegraph got it right:

Iran: We will help ‘cut out the cancer of Israel’
Iran will help anyone willing to “cut out the cancer” of Israel, its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said today.

The Telegraph is using the AP story. They rewrote it to emphasize the points the AP thought were worth burying. Remember that next time some AP editor puts in the weasel words that Hamas “denies” getting support from Iran, or some idiot pundit tries to ell you that Hamas is not working under Iranian orders.

And now that we’ve gotten the war of the words out of the way, here’s Barry Rubin on why neither Israel nor the U.S. are going to bomb Iran.

If Israel attacks Iran now, does that mean Iran would never get nuclear weapons? No, it would merely postpone that outcome for at most a year or two more than it would take otherwise. And then it would ensure an all-out, endless bloody war thereafter.

If Israel attacks Iranian nuclear installations, would that ensure future peace between the two countries? Would it make it less likely that the Tehran regime uses such weapons to strike at Israel in the future? No. On the contrary, it would have the exact opposite effect. Again, it would ensure direct warfare between the two countries and make Iran’s use of nuclear weapons against Israel 100 percent probable.

I’ll put my faith in Barry Rubin. He’s one of the best Israel analysts on the planet.

Posted in Hamas, Iran, Israel, Media Bias | Comments Off

25 years online

Posted on 02/02/2012 by Meryl Yourish

Twenty-five years ago today, I opened my BBS to the public. It had one telephone line, so when one person was on it, everyone else got a busy signal. It was 2400 baud. Woo! So fast! I think I used to get about 30 hits a day, and I knew nearly everyone who called, especially after we started having our BBS get-togethers every month or so. The site was all message threads, with various topics, ranging from politics to storyboards (I cannot tell you how much fun it was to write Cap’n Claws, the pirate who had an adamantium hook and hated the French) and beyond. I stayed online with Through the Looking Glass for seven years, then went into the GEnie network and other online services until blogging came to my attention in 2000. And of course, in the spring of 2001, I started Yourish.com.

Twenty-five years online. (Twenty-six, when you count in the year I spent BBSing myself before I started the BBS.) I believe that’s longer than the millennials have been alive.

Posted in Life | 3 Comments

The double standard on political influence

Posted on 02/02/2012 by Meryl Yourish

Wow, the media keep piling on Sheldon Adelson. Let’s remember his big crime is donating millions of dollars to Newt Gingrich’s campaign. And as we all know, there’s nothing the media like to do more than profile people who use their money to influence politics. For instance, there’s this headline yesterday on CBS News.

The big GOP prize: Shelly Adelson’s war chest

It’s a reprint from The New Republic. The message spreads.

Then there’s this, in the WaPo:

Casino mogul Sheldon Adelson’s family is bankrolling Gingrich super PAC

No! Not his family, too. Really? Because that’s so unheard of from Obama donors. Oh. Wait.

So why do they keep pounding Adelson?

Because it’s working.

Adelson tried to bring to Nevada Republicans’ attention the fact that Saturday caucuses, by their nature, exclude religious Jews from participating. It was interpreted as trying to mess with the caucuses. End result:

Sands Corp. Chairman Sheldon Adelson distanced himself Monday from a Clark County Republican decision to hold a special presidential caucus after sundown Saturday for observant Jews, saying through a spokesman he and his wife “had no involvement” in the arrangement.

The statement seemed designed to counter concerns by several presidential campaigns that the GOP was giving special consideration to Adelson, who backs presidential candidate Newt Gingrich. Adelson and his wife, Miriam, have donated $10 million to a pro-Gingrich Political Action Committee.

They’re forcing him to back off from supporting the candidate of his choice because they’ve made him the story.

The casino magnate also has become concerned that he is overshadowing Mr. Gingrich’s campaign, according to people close to Mr. Adelson.

“He [Mr. Adelson] realizes that when you make a contribution it does become an issue and he wants the focus to remain on Newt,” said Andy Abboud, vice president of government relations at Las Vegas Sands Corp., an Adelson company. The two men will maintain a distance in Nevada this week, he said, but their paths might cross at some point. Mr. Gingrich is staying at Mr. Adelson’s Venetian casino, said Dan Burdish, who is working for Mr. Gingrich in Nevada.

(Okay, come on, let’s not pretend their paths aren’t going to cross. Really?) But still, the fact that the media have forced Adelson to back off of Newt is pretty pathetic. They did no such thing when Haim Saban was telling Harry Reid what to do.

“Let me give you an example of this access, and why it’s completely O.K.,” Saban responded. “I hosted the Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, in my home. I was informed that he refused to sign a letter to Obama, which was signed by most of the senators, supporting Israel, before the speech in Cairo. . . . I got the message on Saturday and he was at my house on Sunday. I asked him, ‘Why didn’t you sign?’

“So he said, ‘Because I don’t sign other people’s initiatives,’ as the leader, as head of the Democratic Party.

“I said, ‘So send a letter of your own.’ ” And, Saban added, smiling, and with hesitation, as though he did not like to boast, “He did.”

And he bragged about it. Do you remember that New Yorker profile? Yeah, me neither. It’s from May, 2010. But although Saban’s views on Israel are pretty close to Adelson’s, we don’t hear about his “Israel-firster” attitude–because he donates to Democrats.

Double standards? But of course. That’s the way the left works. And the “objective” media.

Posted in American Scene, Israel, Media Bias, Politics | Comments Off

Conservative Jews: We’re wrong, but we’re still Jewish. No, really.

Posted on 02/02/2012 by Meryl Yourish

This is probably one of the most condescending opinion pieces I’ve ever read in my life. It starts out bashing the Forward’s current Jewish Bogeyman of the Month, Sheldon Adelson:

Jewish conservatives continue to spend significant amounts of effort and money to swing American and Israeli politics to the far right. Most visible is gambling billionaire Sheldon Adelson, whose funding of Israeli media affected the 2009 Israeli election and who is now spending a fortune to equate American “support for Israel” with support for Israel’s far-right wing.

Similarly, William Kristol’s “Emergency Committee for Israel” plays on Jewish fears to garner Republican votes. And Eric Cantor, House minority whip, is one of the most vocal proponents of Tea Party ideology — the same social Darwinism dressed up as American populism that brought us the 2008 financial crisis.

Note that he starts with a false charge, that Adelson is trying to equate American support for Israel with supporting only the Israeli far right. Now that Jay Michaelson has set the false tone, he then goes on to say that those progressive Jews who are saying that conservative Jews are not following “Jewish values” are wrong. Conservatives can be Jewish, too. I know, I know, you’re shocked. And as a Jewish centrist who has shocked her very liberal Jewish friends by voting for George W. Bush and John McCain, it’s nice to know that I’m just as Jewish as the Obama Fan Club in every synagogue. Why, just look at this philosopher’s reasoning process as to what progressives think of people like me:

The second response has been to argue that Jewish conservatives just don’t get it. They’re misreading Jewish history and tradition. They’re traumatized, bigoted or confused. Whatever the reason, it may be that Jewish conservatives are just plain wrong in their interpretation of Jewish tradition.

Relatively few progressives come out and say this directly, because to do so violates a cardinal progressive principle, that of pluralism and toleration. (Of course, conservatives don’t hesitate to make these claims, painting critics of Israel as self-hating Jews, or social progressives as rebels against the Torah.) So, some make a softer claim: that conservatives get it, but get the wrong it. Yes, there are reactionary elements within Judaism, but these are just barnacles stuck onto the side of the Jewish ship. Yes, the Cantors and Kristols of the world can find some nasty Jewish traditions to draw from, but they miss the real point, which is Judaism’s progressive social agenda, or love of peace, or whatever.

Shorter Michaelson: Oh, conservatives. You are so mean. But we, the Noble Progressives, rise above the meanness and give you our kindness, our tolerance, and our condescension.

Except, of course, they don’t. Note the way he started the article. “Some” Jews think this. “Some” Jews think that. He goes on to bash Jews who don’t think like him, and then he brings in the big gun for his backup: Michael Lerner. Yeah, now that’s an authority that all of Judaism considers to be a top Talmudic scholar able to make decisions about who is a Jew. And finally after being informed a dozen times that conservative Jews are wrong, wrong, wrong, we are told this:

I have my approach to Jewish values that allows me to say that Eric Cantor, Sheldon Adelson and William Kristol are wrong — pluralism is not the same as relativism, after all — but what I won’t say is that they are somehow un-Jewish.

Here’s the thing about this expert on Who’s A Jew: He’s a Buddhist.

I think I’ll stop here. ‘Nuff said.

Posted in Jews, Politics, Religion | 5 Comments

Hiding the truth about Newt Gingrich and Israel

Posted on 02/01/2012 by Meryl Yourish

So the liberal Jewish press is harping on Sheldon Adelson because he has the nerve to want to spend his money on electing the candidate he likes the best. Gee, how un-American of him (*cough* *cough* Oprah) (*cough* *cough* Haim Saban). It’s almost like nobody else ever contributes any large sums of money to American politicans (*cough* *cough* Jon Corzine bundling $500,000 for Obama).

So, is Adelson’s money buying Newt’s support of Israel?

Not hardly. One of my readers did a little research and sent me a few helpful links. (Thanks!)

Look at this article from 1998 in the San Francisco Jewish Weekly, titled Resignation of Newt Gingrich means Israel is losing a friend. For those of you readers who can’t do difficult math, that article was written more than 13 years ago, which means Sheldon Adelson’s money played no part in Newt’s opinion on Israel. So far, the best the Forward can come up with is Adelson’s money contributed to Gingrich’s group in 2006. Whoops. That’s eight whole years after we read this:

A Jewish Democratic politico said of Gingrich’s pro-Israel credentials, “I don’t think Newt is acting. I’d like to say he’s full of it, but he isn’t. Yes, he was trying to out right-wing the right-wing Jews, but he’s a true believer. Livingston may say what AIPAC wants to hear, but it’s not in his kishkes. He’s not a true believer.”

Really? A Democrat called Gingrich a right-wing Israel supporter in 1998?

But wait. There’s more! In 1998, Gingrich also called Jerusalem “the united and eternal capital of Israel”

Oh, pshaw. There must be some way Adelson’s money influenced Gingrich’s opinion. Maybe he’s so rich, he has a secret time machine and he went back in time to convince Newt to support Israel?

Or maybe Newt’s been a supporter of Israel for decades. (Also, Newt is pretty damned close to getting the Yourish.com cherished Master of Juvenile Scorn™ designation.)

Speaker Newt Gingrich said today that the White House was trying to blackmail Israel by pushing it toward the negotiating table, but President Clinton said he was only trying to bring about fruitful talks on Mideast peace.

”It’s become the Clinton Administration and Arafat against Israel,” Mr. Gingrich said at a news conference. ”The Clinton Administration says: ‘Happy birthday. Let us blackmail you on behalf of Arafat.’ ”

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

The Forward itself discussed Gingrich’s ties to Israel in the 1990s (buried, of course, in page two of an article using the Gloom-and-Doom Machine profiling his ties to Adelson). On the first page, they date the Adelson-Gingrich relationship back to 2007. This, kiddies, is how you get away with saying that your article is objective because it mentioned the recent and more distant relationships. It is also what is known as “slanting.” But the most important takeaway here is just what I wrote the other day: The only reason the liberal media is jumping all over the Gingrich-Adelson relationship is because Adelson is a Jew who is supporting a conservative Republican, rather than the liberal media-slash-Jewish establishment’s approved causes–which would be liberal Democrats.

Haim Saban influencing Bill Clinton? Not a problem. Sheldon Adelson is contributing to Newt Gingrich’s campaign? OMG, he’s a conservative, somebody stop him!1!!

Your objective media, exposed.

Posted in Israel, Media Bias, Politics | Comments Off

Just a test

Posted on 01/31/2012 by Meryl Yourish

An open letter to Richard Schiff:

Don’t ever speak in a faux British accent again.

Really.

Boy, did you suck in this week’s episode of Once Upon A Time.

That is all.

(P.S.: Stick to cranky characters like Toby in the West Wing, and please make sure to speak in your natural accent.)

Posted in Television | Comments Off

The AP: Scary, scary, hardline Israeli is going to lose, but we’ll profile him anyway

Posted on 01/30/2012 by Meryl Yourish

The AP never misses an opportunity to bash Benjamin Netanyahu. This time, they use my personal winner of Most Annoying Israeli Spam to Meryl Award, Moshe Feiglin, as the bogeyman who is even more extreme than Bibi. Here’s the lead:

A hard-line Jewish settler who wants to pay Palestinians to leave the West Bank and Gaza is running against Israel’s prime minister in Tuesday’s ruling party primary election.

Moshe Feiglin has little chance of defeating Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but he could deliver an embarrassing blow to the country’s leader in his fourth try for leadership of the Likud, none of which have had a realistic shot at success.

Experts say Feiglin could get a third of the vote in the closed party primary, reflecting the view of hard-liners that Netanyahu, despite his uncompromising worldview, is not hawkish enough.

Got it? This guy hasn’t got a snowball’s chance in hell of winning, but note the slam at Netanyahu bolded above.

Now look what else the AP says about him.

Israeli nationalists believe the West Bank must remain under Israeli control for religious and security reasons. Though Netanyahu backed that view for years, his movement has edged toward compromise in recent years, and Netanyahu himself has accepted the concept of creating a Palestinian state.

Really? So, you mean–Netanyahu has compromised on his former views? In the exact opposite of what you report two whole paragraphs ago?

They say that analysts are “divided” over how Feiglin’s challenge will affect Netanyahu’s actions. That’s because they interviewed two “analysts” and one said it would have no effect, and the other said it would.

And there you have it, folks. Another day in Scary Israel-Land reporting in the AP, and still not a single word about Palestinian TV praising the murders of the Fogel family (including a three-month old infant) as “heroes.”

Posted in Israel Derangement Syndrome, Media Bias | 2 Comments

Scary pro-Israel backers only count if they’re Republicans

Posted on 01/30/2012 by Meryl Yourish

The Forward takes the biggest anti-Semitic trope–that Jews have too much influence over American politics and are loyal to Israel over America–and publishes a piece that gives the David Dukes, Pat Buchanans, and John Mearsheimers of the world even more grist for their mill of lies.

What Sheldon’s Money Buys
Adelson Millions Ensure Gingrich Steers to Far Right on Israel

This is what Ha’aretz chose to use as the headline for the Forward jump:

Just how far can Adelson influence Gingrich’s campaign?

And yet, there have not been any such articles about how much influence someone like George Soros (funder of super-liberal attack dog Media Matters, among others) has on the Democrats. In fact, I’m betting you don’t even know who Haim Saban is. That’s because he is a Democrat, and a contributor to Democratic causes. Sheldon Adelson makes the cardinal sin of contributing to Republicans., sorry, Rethuglicans. George Soros, who has committed Lord knows how many millions to Democratic and progressive causes, hates Israel, but there are no hard-hitting exposes of how much power liberal Jews like him over the American political process.

The New Yorker wrote a 12-page profile of Haim Saban, the entertainment billionaire who contributes millions to Democratic causes and apparently has President Clinton in his pocket. The article pretty much leads with his influence over the Clintons, and talks about how he wants to protect Israel by strengthening U.S.-Israel ties. But the tone of the article is quite different, and the gist of the article never made its way into the wire services. I don’t recall seeing any scary warnings about how Haim Saban influenced the Clintons and was one of the major figures behind Hillary Clinton’s run for the presidency.

The contrast is stark. This story is told fondly:

“Haim said, ‘Let me make a phone call—maybe I can get something done here,’ ” Chernin told me. “He was extremely helpful in getting Clinton to help. Clinton called the President of Brazil.” Matt Krane recalled how Saban described to him what had happened: “Saban had called the Fox Family attorney in Brazil and asked, ‘How long will it take?’ It was months. He said he asked the lawyer, ‘Who is your finance minister?’ The attorney understood, and he said, ‘There is no political pull available in this process.’ Saban called Bill Clinton and asked, ‘Can you help me?’ ” Soon afterward, the approval came through.

What a great guy! He used his influence with the former president (this was in 2001) close a deal that enabled him to walk away with $1.5 billion. (He paid no taxes on that–then. The IRS is after the firm he used to avoid paying those taxes and was in the process of collecting back taxes from him.)

As Krane began to explore the tax-shelter world, he learned that major accounting and investment-banking firms—including K.P.M.G., Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and many others—were involved in creating tax-shelter products. He selected one that was developed by the Quellos Group, a financial boutique based in Seattle; he integrated this shelter with a tax plan of his own, and, with the combination, made it possible for Saban to pay no taxes on his $1.5-billion gain.

And while the profile mentions Saban’s strong Zionism, it mentions it favorably, with glowing anecdotes like this:

As Saban has said, “I’m a one-issue guy, and my issue is Israel.” When Bill Clinton was President and Ehud Barak was Israel’s Prime Minister, Saban, who was close to both men, says that occasionally he provided a back channel for communications. In July of 2000, shortly before the start of the Camp David negotiations, Israel’s planned two-hundred-and-fifty-million-dollar sale of an airborne radar system to China—furiously opposed by many at the Pentagon and in Congress—threatened to derail congressional support for a peace deal. Saban said, “I just called Ehud and told him, ‘In the middle of this peace thing, it’s impossible for Israel to do things that are perceived in the U.S. as against the interests of the U.S. I understand the financial aspect, I understand that it may not be really a security concern for the U.S.—it doesn’t matter. There’s a much bigger picture here, and you really should seriously consider.’ ” Barak suspended the sale. “How much impact my call had, I have no idea,” Saban added. During Camp David, he continued, “I was involved, but only on the periphery. If Barak could not say some things to Clinton to his face, he would ask me to convey a message, and vice versa.” At one point during the negotiations, Clinton, accompanied by his national-security adviser, Sandy Berger, had to go to Japan. “When they came back, I spoke to Sandy Berger, and gave him my two cents about dealing with issues. ‘Is that really super-important?’ ‘Well, why can’t Arafat give up on that?’ ” He laughed. “The usual!”

Compare and contrast.

It is safe to say that without multi-billionaire Sheldon Adelson’s help the chances of Newt Gingrich becoming the Republican nominee for president would be zero — and consequently the race itself, going into Florida at the moment, would not be the competitive, drag-out fight it has become. Adelson, the hotel and casino magnate, has kept Gingrich alive, first through an infusion of $5 million into a super PAC, which allowed the former speaker to defend himself against attacks by Mitt Romney and led to Gingrich’s thumping victory in South Carolina. And now we know that Adelson’s wife, Miriam, has committed another $5 million to the cause of Newt.

One of Adelson’s passions — and a reason for his desire to play such a big role in American politics — is undoubtedly Israel. And his positions are unambiguously right-wing and hawkish to the extreme.

Cue scary music. OMG! The Jews are controlling the Republican candidate for president!

Yep. Your love for Israel is only a menace if you’re a Republican or, worse–a conservative.

Way to go, Forward. Keep on spreading those tropes about powerful Jews controlling American politics. The denizens of Stormfront thank you for it.

Posted in Media Bias, Politics | 1 Comment

A challenge to the Associated Press

Posted on 01/29/2012 by Meryl Yourish

How about reporting on items like these instead of whitewashing Palestinian accountability for encouraging terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians?

Palestinian television aired an interview with the relatives of the Fogel family murderers earlier this month, praising the two cousins convicted with the brutal attack as “heroes.”

The broadcast was aired as part of a weekly show on the Palestinian state-run station called “For You,” which focuses on Palestinian prisoners incarcerated in Israel.

Ha’aretz managed to print it. It’s your turn, AP. And here’s even more of the Ha’aretz story to show you how the Palestinians lie when they say they want to live side by side, in peace, with Israel.

Hakim Awad’s mother sent her regards to her son, proudly describing him as the perpetrator of the Itamar attack and that he was sentenced to 5 consecutive life sentences.

Awad’s aunt then proceeded to describe her nephew as a “hero and a legend.”

This “hero” and “legend” murdered a three-month-old infant. What courage that must have taken! A baby, asleep in its bed–what a fierce Zionist soldier, and how heroic that her nephew was a part of the attack that subdued the mighty infant!

You can also add this to your news files, which shows that the Mufti of Jerusalem is lying when he said his words were taken out of context and that he didn’t call to kill the Jews in relation to the current conflict. Palestine Media Watch should be required reading for all Middle East reporters. They merely record and translate what the Palestinians are broadcasting.

Posted in Israel, Media Bias, Terrorism | 2 Comments