Interesting poll:

A national poll of 1,000 adults conducted by Barna Research Group found 76 percent of Americans believe heaven exists and 64 percent believe they're headed for the Pearly Gates, reports the Los Angeles Times.
...
Among the believers, nearly half, or 46 percent, described heaven as a 'state of eternal existence in God's presence.' Almost a third, or 30 percent, said heaven was 'an actual place of rest and reward where souls go after death.' One in seven, or 14 percent, said heaven is just 'symbolic' and 5 percent said there was no afterlife, according to the Times.
Meanwhile, although 71 percent of respondents said they believe in hell, less than 1 percent actually expect to experience it.

I spent more than an hour getting on the wrong subway twice this morning (I suppose I could say my copy of amNewYork was just that distracting...but then I'd look more stupid), and so I'm just gonna let Ephraim Shapiro run the show with this week's senryu, Parshas Bereishis:

In the beginning
One Two Three Four Five Six days
Seventh, day to rest
(ES)

Do not Eat from this
Snake said not to touch it too
Now he says nothing
(ES)

Name all the creatures
Tough task for the only dude
Where'd he get Xerus?
(ES)

WorldNetDaily: Online chat rooms used to bring 'gays' to Jesus?:

A Florida assistant youth minister who claims he had graphic sexual conversations with homosexual teen-agers in 'gay' chat rooms so he could eventually 'talk to them about Jesus' has been arrested.
Deputies from the Broward Sheriff's Office picked up Hewart Lee Bennett, 46, near North Lauderdale, Fla., this week, saying he drove to Broward County looking for a 15-year-old boy he'd met online, reports the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

Lightning strikes 'Jesus' on film set:

As if there wasn't already enough electricity surrounding Mel Gibson's upcoming film on the death of Christ, the actor portraying Jesus was struck by lightning during filming – but miraculously escaped without injury.

"Treason and Deception are in Their Blood"

Courtesy of Memri via official Egyptian state press an article written by Sheikh Mansour Al-Rifa'i 'Ubeid, formerly Egypt's Under Secretary for Religious Affairs in charge of mosques and the Koran. Just two of the better paragraphs:

"The Jews lived their whole lives in a nest of corruption, propagating vile and fighting virtue. Therefore, Allah – through the Prophets - cursed them throughout time because they constantly propagated treason, be it their way of life and their way of dealing with people… They worship and venerate money, using it to breed depravity and to raze values. Because of this Allah, be He praised, said [Koran 5: 78-79]: 'The heretics among the Israelites were cursed by David and by Jesus the son of Mary because they rebelled and acted violently. They did not counsel each other from committing evil, but [indeed] did it and therefore their deeds are sinful.' Allah be He praised, did not curse all the Jews, since there is a group amongst them that has known Allah and believed in Him… Some of the Jews, though a minority, have decency and conscience.

"Indeed, trickery is in the nature of the Jews, and they will never [be able to] get rid of it, therefore we have to be wary of them when we deal with them in commerce or anything else. There is venom in the serpent's son [i.e. the Jew] and he spits it on friend and foe alike. No Jew knows a beautiful friendship, but only his own interest. That is why they abrogated agreements and covenants and did not honor a friend's right. They are what was said about them [Koran 9: 10] 'They do not honor a pledge or a covenant that they gave to a believer [Muslim].'"

The Independent and VOA have two very contradictory headlines to the same story… I wonder which unbiased perspective is more accurate.

US Confident of Donor Nations' Generosity for Iraq Reconstruction

Senior U.S. officials say they're confident donor nations gathered in Madrid will heed the call by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan for generous contributions for post-war Iraq reconstruction. But they're making no forecasts on what the pledge total will be when the two-day conference ends Friday.

Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general, appealed yesterday at the donor conference for Iraq for nations to give generously to tackle the disease, homelessness and malnutrition afflicting the country.

At the start of the fund-raising conference in Madrid its Spanish hosts lowered expectations by setting a $6bn (£3.5bn) target for the gathering, which is being held against the backdrop of divisions over the US-led occupation. Pledges are certain to fall short of the $30bn sought by Washington, with Europe expected to stump up about €700m (£487m) from EU and national coffers for 2004.

I know, I know, I've been AWOL for the past few weeks. But big tests coming up next week, I'm more or less living in the library. I'll be back in a week or so.

Just thought I'd post this spectacular example of disingenuous spin from today's Times, re: Palestinian execution of suspected informants for Israel...

Palestinians have killed 77 suspected collaborators since the current round of fighting began in September 2000, according to Bassem Eid, head of the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group.

"Unfortunately, we don't see any investigations in these cases by the Palestinians," said Mr. Eid. But he also said that Israel was responsible for ensuring the safety of Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, lands Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war.


OK, so when should we send the troops in to restore order, Mr. Eid?
Let me know.

My hometown makes it into the Jewish Week, although not in the exact fashion that I would have liked. If there was any silver lining to the Agudah fire, its that the entire community responded immediately and really well in terms of support and unity. Haqafot at the Young Israel Simchat Torah night were never more lively.

My Jewsweek Easterbrook story is up.
Also, Andrew Silow-Carroll sends in his take.
I might have more later.
BTW: When I saw the graphic to the story, I thought "Hey, that's cute." Scroll to the bottom of the piece, and you see it's made by Daniel Sieradski, aka Mobius.

Once again, its time to check out the Jewish Press Letters Section. First of all, kudos to all those who wrote long letters back to Yaakov Stern bashing his most recent screed which essentially blamed singles for being single. We can all look forward to his response - the early favorite for next week's Stupid Letter Of the Week. This week's S.L.O.W. is from Hayden Phillips of Tulsa, OK:

I am a non-Jewish reader of the online edition of The Jewish Press. I was introduced to your website about a year ago when I read an article from your newspaper that was posted on another
website. A hyperlink was provided, so I clicked over to JewishPress.com and was instantly hooked. To be perfectly honest, I’d always thought all Jews were liberal, secular agnostic types. I got that impression from seeing all the Jewish ACLU lawyers on TV fighting against any semblance of religion in the public sphere, and from reading about the leaders of all the radical, anti-family groups in the country — most of whom always seemed to have Jewish names. The fact that Jews tend to support the most left-wing candidates in elections, both local and national, was even more proof to me that today’s Jewish Americans had almost no connection to the biblical Nation of Israel and its G-d. You can imagine, therefore, how surprised and pleased I was when I discovered The Jewish Press and realized that not all Jews support the agendas forced on the rest of the country by shrill feminists and stomach-turning gay activists. I thank you and wish you much continued success in the year ahead.

I just handed in to Jewsweek the near-final edits on my nearly-3000 words on the Easterbrook situation. Not one bit of it mentions the ADL, and I'm not sure I'll add it in. The default assumption from so many seems to be that you can't just assume the ADL will be right, that it has a benefit from jumping into hysterics, and that it's been wrong in the past. That certainly seems to say something about the way it's been run.
BTW: I'm not seeing any Easterbrook mention in any of the J-weeklies -- has anybody seen some?

Suspected CIA Plot in Venezuela

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Lawmakers allied with President Hugo Chavez showed a videotape Wednesday which they claim was evidence the CIA was working with Venezuelan dissidents to overthrow the government. The U.S. Embassy denied the allegations.

The video, played at a news conference at Congress, showed three unidentified men speaking in Spanish about making contacts with an unspecified embassy. They discussed "blending in" and changing cars to avoid detection. The roughly six-minute tape appeared to have been edited.

Interpreting the video, ruling party lawmaker Nicolas Maduro said it showed U.S. secret agents training dissident military officers and municipal police in espionage and "terrorist" tactics. He said it was filmed in Venezuela in June.

The U.S. Embassy said in a statement that the video showed a private security company, not CIA agents. It also said the U.S. government did not participate in the event.

11,449 Die in 2003 China Work Accidents

BEIJING (AP) - Accidents in China's mines and factories killed 11,449 people in the first nine months of this year despite a nationwide safety crackdown, a jump of nearly 9 percent over the same period last year, officials said Thursday.

Fatalities were down slightly in accident-plagued Chinese coal mines, but the number of deaths in non-mining industries rose by 19 percent to 5,203, said Liu Jiakun, deputy director of the Work Safety Administration.

"Life in the Kickline: A Rockette's Story", my latest in the Forward, about a young woman who was living next-door to my parents on the LES, whom I met at Shabbos dinner.

The Orthodox Caucus publishes a set of reviews for post high school year in Israel programs. Thoughts?

WCBS 880: Several See Virgin Mary In Tree Stump:

Several people claim an image of the Virgin Mary has appeared in a tree stump after a cluster of trees were mysteriously cut down.
Crowds have flocked to the Passaic site in recent days since word of the image began spreading. The state Department of Transportation owns the land, but no work order was issued for the tiny tract and officials do not know who performed the work.
Some visitors say the clearing was an act of God.

War On Terror Goes Apocalyptic - That's the real headline, honest.

Besides implying that ADL National Director, Abe Foxman is a terrorism expert, the Jewish Week’s front-page story follows others in muddling Mahathir, Boykin and the war on terror into one great battle of religion. Reading much like a blog the article brings together some of the more widely circulated hits of the week into one place.

-----------------------------------------------

After a few days of reading and posting this stuff, I have to say that the relativism espoused by the leftists who are using the Boykin issue to hit Bush is simply gross. Bush should be slammed for Boykin and many other things, but the mixing of these issues is simply terrible. It detracts greatly from moral outrage that should be expressed over Mahathir’s comments.

Karzai: Terror still reigns in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - President Hamid Karzai acknowledged Wednesday that Afghans still "live in fear" nearly two years after the ouster of the Taliban regime, and alleged some forces within the government try to take advantage of the instability.

…Karzai said the country remains plagued by the "evil of terrorism" and factional infighting.

"People are not happy with the security situation," he told an audience that also included officers from the NATO-led peacekeeping force and the U.S.-led anti-terror coalition. "People still live in fear."

AmerAiken Idol Runner Debuts at Number One

Aiken's "Measure of a Man" debuted at No. 1, selling nearly 613,000 copies during its first week in stores, according to industry figures released Wednesday.

Ruben Studdard, this year's "American Idol" winner, plans to release his album, "Soulful," on Nov. 25.

Last season's winner, Kelly Clarkson, also debuted at No. 1 on the album chart with "Thankful," which sold more than 297,000 copies during its first week in stores in April.

Aiken's showing far surpassed that of his counterpart last season, runner-up Justin Guarini, whose self-titled debut sold only 54,000 copies during its first week in June.

The freshly scrubbed crooner ousted Ludacris from the No. 1 spot. The rapper's album "Chicken & Beer" dropped to No. 2, selling about 194,000 copies during its second week.

Meanwhile, Barbra Streisand's "Movie Album" debuted at No. 5, having sold about 162,000 copies.

Moses Maimonides, the First Reform Jew Via NT:

The Adult Education Committee of Congregation Kol Am is currently accepting enrollment in its Fall 2003 discussion series.

The first offering will be a four-week session focusing upon "Moses Maimonides, the First Reform Jew: His Philosophy (and ours)."

"The Guide for the Perplexed" suggested that the Bible was also a rational work of philosophy along the lines of Aristotle and Plato and for this he was excommunicated.

However, in hindsight, his writing was the first example of Reform Judaism, a rational approach to living as a Jew in the modern world, according to the press release.

The class, led by Rabbi Brooks Susman, will meet every Tuesday from Oct. 21 to Nov. 11. This course is offered to the general public at the cost of $15.

To enroll or for additional information, call (732) 792-8000 or visit the Internet Web site www.congregationkolam.org.

And now the Boston Globe is using the Mahathir incident to condemn Bush’s support of another ‘Racist’ Republican:

When Bush gets home, there is more wrong and divisive politicking he should stand squarely against: The good ol' boy antics of Haley Barbour… the former chairman of the Republican National Committee who is running for governor of Mississippi. In mid-September Bush spoke at a fund-raiser for Barbour in Jackson, Miss., that attracted 1,100 people and raised at least $1.2 million.

…it was reported that a photo of Barbour is on the home page of the Council of Conservative Citizens, the racist group that is an offshoot of the old segregationist white citizens councils that tried to hold back the civil rights movement… Barbour is pictured along with… CCC field director Bill Lord.

…Its website is full of direct links to blatant racism, anti-Semitism, and homophobia.

The home page features an article titled "In Defense of Racism." The article maintains that "certain racial groups show a marked proclivity for physical violence. Generally, those racial groups possess lower IQs. . . . "

Among the things that Mohamad said that White House spokesman Scott McClellan condemned as "hate-filled" was that "Jews rule the world by proxy. . . . they have now gained control of the most powerful countries."

You can find almost exactly the same notions in the "Defense of Racism." The article says, "Even the seemingly amenable Jew carries the DNA which will cause his progeny to want to control our offspring."

…Barbour has reportedly invited Bush to come back for another rally on Nov. 1, three days before the election… If Bush answers the phone to come to Mississippi, he has to first condemn Barbour's tacit support of the CCC's use of his photo. Otherwise he has hung up on millions of Americans. Once again, the compassionate conservative coddles hate.

PETA responds to critism of its Holocaust on a Plate campaign

What a shame that there is no let up in the denunciation of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals' "Holocaust on Your Plate" exhibit, which shows the victimization and suffering of animals used for meat as a modern day holocaust. Enough, already.

There is no getting around this uncomfortable fact: Those who can't face a hideous prejudice of our own time, which allows human beings to take all of those they believe to be "less" than ourselves, and use and abuse them, are suffering from the same mindset that allowed Nazis to treat Jews and others in similar ways. Meat eaters are endorsing a system in which people confine and slaughter animals in factory farms comparable to the most notorious concentration camps. Nothing can justify this cruelty. Nothing can justify tearing animals from their families, castrating them without painkillers, cutting off their beaks and horns and cramming them into a space so small that they can't move a wing or take a step. Nothing can justify the fear and misery of their transport in all weather only to arrive to a terrifying slaughter. I am reminded of the deeply moving scene in Schindler's List in which we follow a little girl, distinguished in a red coat, walking alone in a black and white crowd. The reason we were so overwhelmed by this scene was, at that moment, six million deaths were not an abstraction -- we felt that this particular girl, whom we sympathized with, was going to be killed six million times. Similarly, we must never forget that every single one of the 28 billion animals killed for meat each year is a unique individual who could feel pain, joy, love and fear. Nothing can justify pretending that this is not so.

It is, therefore, deeply saddening to see people fighting to hold the Holocaust as special only to those they relate to or sympathize with most, rather than letting it be used as a historical lesson that can help us open closed minds and eyes and lead us to improve our treatment of those we do not fully understand or care much about today. It is time to end the continued exploitation and bloodshed of others who are not "life unworthy of life" any more than any Jew ever was. Jews and non-Jews at PETA are daring to tell the truth. Those who wish to silence them and let the horrors continue are using the same arguments used by the Nazis to silence their critics and get on comfortably with their nasty business.

-- Ingrid E. Newkirk, president
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)

sacbee.com -- AP State Wire News -- Televangelist's ex sharing Hollywood mansion with porn legend:

Former televangelist wife Tammy Faye Messner and porn legend Ron Jeremy are Hollywood Hills mansion housemates for nearly two weeks in WB's 'Surreal Life 2' which began taping on Monday...
'We wanted to get worlds colliding, and I think that's what we've achieved,' WB alternative chief Keith Cox said, noting that assembling the cast was quite an effort. 'It's one of those tricky puzzles.

CNN.com - Gay bishop: Only God could stop me - Oct. 21, 2003:

The Rev. V. Gene Robinson, bishop-elect of the Diocese of New Hampshire, said in an interview with The Associated Press that he's been praying for years about becoming a bishop. He feels strongly that God wants him to go through with his consecration on November 2.
'God and I have been about this for quite a while now and I would be really surprised if God were to want me to stop now,' he said.

Kumah Weblog.

We just got a very weird hit. Someone got here by clicking on a link at JTA's site, but the page they supposedly used is password-protected. It's possible it could be password-protected draft story that references Protocols, but JTA is not known for inserting links into their stories. The information of the visitor is:
IP: 209.21.99.102
Hostname: xd1156366.ip.e-nt.net
Anybody want to clear this up?

A very good constellation to Friend (and roommate) Of The Elders Bryan Kinzbrunner on his engagement to Shira Frankel.

The Washington Post Editorial Page uses Bush’s ‘condemnation’ of Mahathir to condemn his own silence in the wake of General Boykin’s purportedly anti-Islamic statements.

Would that Mr. Bush's sense of outrage at religiously inflammatory remarks was so finely tuned when it comes to members of his own administration.

Gen. Boykin's comments have already become political fodder -- for those who push the belief that the United States is waging war on Islam, not on terrorism, and for those who would excuse other forms of religious intolerance. Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher, praising Mr. Mahathir's speech, said, "We hope that those who condemned Mahathir's speech lend more attention to the words of the American general . . . who demonstrated hostility toward Islam and Muslims."

But from the Bush administration, there has not been a syllable of criticism… The president ought to be forthright about comments that are wrong and divisive -- whether they're uttered by a foreign leader or by one of his own generals.

Anti-Semitism or Political Correctness?

Jefferson Morley of the Washington Post consolidates reports on reaction to Mahathir's speech and concludes that "Muslim and Western Media Focus on Different Parts of Mahathir Speech."

Malaysian PM Denies Bush Rebuked Him, Disputes U.S. Reports

BANGKOK (Reuters) - An unrepentant Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad repeated Tuesday his belief that Jews rule the world, denied President Bush had rebuked him for it…

Bush called the initial comments… "wrong and divisive," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.

"It stands squarely against what I believe," he quoted Bush as telling Mahathir…
But Mahathir said reports Bush had rebuked him were wrong.

"Certainly, he did not rebuke me," Mahathir told a news conference after the two-day summit ended. "All he said was that 'I regret today to have to use strong words against you'," Mahathir said.

"After that we were walking practically hand-in-hand."

Is Madonna converting Britney Spears to Kabbalah (via JewSchool)?

“Madonna seems to be the high priestess of proselytizing for the Bergs and the Kaballah Centre,” Rick Ross, an expert on cults and alternative religions who has been an outspoken critic of the Kabbalah Centre, tells The Scoop. “No doubt she’s pitched it to anyone with a brain in their head, and that might include Ms. Spears.”

Republican Senator: Bush Given too Much Leeway

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel is strongly criticizing Congress, saying it gave President Bush too much latitude in conducting foreign policy following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"The great reservoir of pro-American good will that has existed in the world since World War II . . . that reservoir is now down very low."

The Vietnam War veteran compared the United States' lack of international support in the Iraq war with what happened in Southeast Asia.

"The one great mistake that America made in those 58 years (since World War II) ... was we tried to do something alone. That was Vietnam," Hagel said.

Talk about your opposition research...

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) - For hours on end, "Dean Divers" camp out at the state archives... scouring public records, documents and correspondences in a search of crucial details about former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean...

"We've gotten requests for everything, every piece of paper," Vermont Secretary of State Deborah Markowitz said.

Some searchers have spent hours at Chittenden Community Television, watching… television tapes of Dean's news conferences…one woman from rival Dick Gephardt's campaign spent the better part of a summer day watching tapes of news conferences in the 1990s… The Gephardt campaign searched the database and came up with 230 tapes on Dean…

The archives are a little tougher to look through... the papers from Dean's governorship add up to 600,000 pages and fill 190 boxes... They are stored among papers on the state constitutions and scattered correspondences from 18th century and 19th century governors.

Had you heard anything about the Temple Mount Wall Collapse (BiblePlaces.com) Isn't that strange?

Christopher Hitchens weighs is on Mother Teresa:

What is so striking about the 'beatification' of the woman who styled herself 'Mother' Teresa is the abject surrender, on the part of the church, to the forces of showbiz, superstition, and populism.

ADL accepts the TNR apology and says, "we consider the matter closed." So what changed? I'm calling to find out.

U.S. Develops New Theory on Pearl Slaying

WASHINGTON (AP) - American authorities investigating the killing of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan now believe that he was slain by the hand of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Life is all about learning. Not too long after composing my last post I came across this in the blurb section of the JTA:

Swiss Jewish Group Charged

A Swiss Jewish group was charged with racial discrimination because of a letter saying Islam seeks to control the world. Frank Luebke, head of the independent Swiss anti-discrimination organization called David, will face the court on Dec. 12 in Zurich in what observers say may be the first application of that country’s anti-bias laws against a Jewish group. At issue is an open letter Luebke penned after the November 2002 bombing of a Kenyan hotel owned by Israelis and an attempted attack on an Israeli jet over the African country. Signed by 138 Jews and Christians, the letter — which referred to “Islamic terrorist madness” and termed the attacks an example of “Islamic-Arabic-Palestinian manic butchery against the Jewish-Israeli civil population” — was sent to the Swiss government and Parliament, as well as to private individuals. In late 2002, a Swiss Palestinian filed charges against Luebke. Swiss Jewish leaders had refused to sign the letter.

Haaretz reports that the Malaysian PM will visit Israel if the "Jewish leadership will go to the Muslim countries and explain why they call Muslims terrorists..."

Someone should explain to the Malaysian PM that few people have actually labeled all Muslims as terrorists. Condemnation has, for the most part been reserved for those who flew airplanes into the Twin Towers, tried to knock them down in '93, targeted Jewish neighborhoods , bombed the USS Cole, and killed hundreds of innocents by blowing up buses, cafes and schools all while maintaining the overwhelming support of the general populous.

No one has accused the King of Morocco of being a terrorist, despite his Muslim identity. I suspect this is because he does not blow things up and incite those who do.

A reconfirmation of what we already know:

Germany's Jewish population, already the fastest-growing in the world, is expected to soar by a third in the next two years, the head of the country's Jewish community said yesterday.

Forget about Rush and Easterbrook, you have got to love the script writer for Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. Apprently, the international condemnation of his speech in which he urged Muslims to rise up against the Jews, only proves his point that indeed Jews control the world. Yet he still maintains that his remarks were taken out of context... Explain that to me and you win a prize!

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad says his comments about Jews during a speech at an Islamic summit last week, which prompted harsh criticism in the West, had been taken out of context.

``In my speech I condemned all violence, even the suicide bombings, and I told the Muslims it's about time we stopped all these things and paused to think and do something that is much more productive. That was the whole tone of my speech, but they picked up one sentence where I said that the Jews control the world...''

Dr Mahathir added, however, that ``the reaction of the world shows that they [Jews] do control the world''.

Eric Umansky:

The off-lead in the NYT notices that President Bush took Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad aside and apparently told him that his recent anti-Semitic remarks were "wrong" and stand "squarely against what I believe in." Bush apparently detailed the meeting to aides who in turn recounted it to reporters. The Times notes that Bush had the "strange and choreographed encounter" after having remained silent for four days. "Clearly, we had to respond," said one unnamed White House official. "But the president wanted to do it in a quiet way, without further public embarrassment for Mahathir."
The less-than-full-throated nature of Bush's rebuke seems newsworthy. At least the NYT's writer, David Sanger thinks so, emphasizing it at the top of his article. But as TP has mentioned before, headline writers at U.S.-based papers tend to be wimps, frequently deferring to officialdom spin (ironically, for fear of appearing biased). Today's example, from the Times: "MALAYSIAN LEADER'S TALK ATTACKING JEWS DRAWS IRE FROM BUSH." Compare that to the headline of the same article in the Paris-based (but NYT-owned) International Herald Tribune: "BUSH'S CAUTIOUS REBUKE."
As it happens, that's not the only difference between the two articles. Check out their respective lead sentences, with the differences italicized. From the NYT: "President Bush told Malaysia's pugnacious prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad, on Monday that he was 'wrong and divisive' when he declared last week that Jews ran the world by proxy." And the IHT: "President George Bush ran into Malaysia's pugnacious prime minister, Mahathir bin Mohamad, at the opening of the Asian summit meeting on Monday afternoon, and told him confidentially, out of the earshot of the other 19 leaders, that Mahathir was 'wrong and divisive'. ..." Why did the NYT nix "out of earshot"? Did editors not think it was relevant? (Taking out "confidentially" is fair since details of the scolding were purposely passed along.)
Despite the failings of the NYT's coverage, it deserves credit for giving Bush's comments significant play—something none of the other papers do.
[...]
Back to the anti-Semite ... The NYT picks up on some follow-up comments the Malaysian prime minister made to a Thai paper. He insisted he's not anti-Semitic and that the wily Western press just gave him a raw deal. "In my speech I condemned all violence, even the suicide bombings," he said. "But those things were blacked out in the Western media." Then he said, referring to Jews, "The reaction of the world shows that they do control the world."

Yutopia's moved to http://yutopia.yucs.org/. Everyone update your bookmarks, pronto.

The Guardian tries to list the 100 greatest novels of all time but does a really bad job -- they missed Dracula, for crying out loud...

Interesting Sightings this week on the corrolation between a country's religiosity and its business ethics:

The CPI measures bribery, kickbacks, graft, and other corruption in the business world, including multi-national corporations in 102 nations (from least corrupt to most corrupt). Among the twelve 'least corrupt' -- eight of them European nations -- are several 'least religious' nations: the post-Lutheran five, Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, and Norway, the United Kingdom, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands.
Now consult Greeley's rankings on religious belief and practice: way down at 17, 18, 19, and 20 from the top are those northern 'least corrupt' nations (Iceland was not measured) listed in the CPI. Do we correlate 'least corrupt/least religious' and 'more corrupt/more religious? 'More corrupt' nations include Cyprus, once-Catholic Ireland, Poland, Northern Ireland, Portugal, Italy, Spain, and Austria. These were ranked in the top eight in belief and religious practices. Only 'most religious' Austria and Ireland show up in the top 24 'least corrupt.'

TNR's editors apologize for Easterbrook, and then James Taranto piles on in a most peculiar way, blaming liberalism and group identity for Easterbrook's remark. (Thanks, Josh)

Today's information tidbit from hasidicnews.com's homepage:

Hasidic Yeshiva boys are instructed not to look at any women. It is considered severely sinful to stare or even look at women outside the immediate family. It is not uncommon to see boys walking at the edge of the street with their, their [sic] heads facing away from pedestrian traffic so as to avoid being "stumbled" with a sin

Interesting passage in a otherwise boring article about evangelism and harassment?:

Our government does not exist to scrub every trace of religion from the public square. Nor does it exist to evangelize; its kingdom is of this world, not the next. In fact, when our government does get religious, its god is usually so generic as to be unworthy of worship.
'In God we trust?' Which God? Mine - or the deity worshiped by the millions of Americans who don't share my beliefs?

Tonight:

7:30 p.m. -- Diplomat and peace negotiator Dennis Ross speaks on ``The Middle East: A View from the Brink''; St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church, Park Avenue and 51st Street.

And now I am confused...

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Monday Israel was determined to "remove" Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, reaffirming a decision taken by his government a month ago.

I was thinking of going to Makor tonight to see a screening of The Holy Land and a discussion group with the director. Thing is, there's an engagement party for Sharon & Hayyim tonight. Does anyone want to go instead and cover it for Protocols? Contact me over AIM.

What ever happened to that Hadassah Magazine story that AKS was gonna do? Just a random thought that comes to me in my "After the Holidays" holiday. Of course, my mother would say that every day is a holiday for me...which is more or less true.

Last week's Boston Globe "Ideas" Section had an article on recent Nobel awardee J.M. Coetzee's animal-rights feelings, in which he just may be comparing the condition of animals to the Holocaust, but it's not so clear because he hides his opinions behind a fog of fiction-writing and rarely grants interviews.

I've been sending out e-mails requesting comment for the story on the Easterbrook situation I'll be doing for Jewsweek, and I've been specifying that it'll be "this week's issue" so that people will respond quickly. At first I was writing "the coming issue," but then thought that these people who haven't necessarily read the magazine might think it's a monthly publication...and just now I remembered that Jewsweek must necessarily mean "weekly"...the perils of working on little sleep.

Evan Coyne Maloney's video on the Rutgers Rally.

Tomorrow:

11:30 a.m. -- The Anti-Defamation League honors the 90th anniversary of the lynching of Leo Frank in Georgia, which led to the league's foundation; Mount Carmel Cemetery, 83-45 Cypress Hills Road, Ridgewood, Queens.

Here is an online petition in support of Gregg Easterbrook. The text reads:

To: All Media Companies
By adding our signatures below, we protest the firing of Gregg Easterbrook from his position with ESPN.
Further, we request that all current and potential employers not consider this post and the subsequent reaction to it to negatively affect Mr. Easterbrook.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

Gregg Easterbrook has been fired from ESPN. Instapundit has a rather thorough wrap-up of what's taken place over the past 48 hours. This is unbelievable. I'll have more later.