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6/6/03 09/03 10/17/03 11/25/02 9/5/02 5/20/02 12/19/01 10/23/01 7/20/01 4/30/01 4/2/01 2/20/01 12/4/00 10/20/00 9/7/00 8/18/00 6/2/00 4/27/00 3/13/00 3/00 Nov. 2, 2007 Dec. 30, 2005 Sept. 9, 2004 My New Writing On Dennis Prager Dec 19, 2001 Prager discussed the behavior of Cleveland fans Sunday who threw plastic beer bottles after the referees made a call they didn't like. DP notes that in sports stadiums today, you can't smoke but you can swear. Whereas 40 years ago, you could smoke but not swear. Because today people seem to care more about their physical health than their souls. A trainer injured by a snowball six years ago wondered how the Cleveland fans who threw bottles would like it if someone came to their office and when they made a mistake at work, threw bottles? Prager rejoiced at the number of religious Jews leading the charge for Christians to celebrate Christmas. And many Christians are in the forefront of the sensetivity crowd who want "happy holidays." DP says the sharing of values is a far better indicator of a person's stands than the sharing of a religious faith or ethnicity. Values, more than religion or ethnicity, bond people. Prager spoke to the directors of Hillel (Jewish college campus outreach) this week in New Jersey. Prager asked, who do you think I have more in common with? Bill Bennett or Alan Dershowitz? Orthodox Jew Michael Medved wrote in the USA TODAY: It's that magical, enchanted time of the year when busy bureaucrats across the country can find nothing better to do with their time than make war on Christmas. The Supreme Court has issued a confusing series of decisions that draw, at best, a squiggly dividing line between church and state -- most recently letting stand a lower-court ruling that permitted organized prayer at a public high school graduation. The high court has never suggested, however, that public buildings can't recognize Christmas, which remains, after all, a legal as well as religious holiday. No reasonable observer of contemporary jurisprudence could find the slightest hint that red poinsettias in a courthouse, or paper angels in a public housing project, represented any sort of constitutional violation. The officials who issued the current anti-Christmas edicts did so not because they feared negative legal consequences, but out of concern that someone might feel offended. They worried more about wounding feelings than about breaking the law. Especially during the Christmas season, bureaucrats seem to promote a new human right: the right to avoid all feelings of discomfort at a public observance of the holiday. Suzanne Fields writes in the Washington Times: It's the most serious of seasons. It's the most unserious of seasons. For all of our political correctness, we're still looking for a grand era of kindness, tolerance and brotherhood. (Uh, better make that siblinghood.) Officials in Ramsey County, Minn., banned "red poinsettias" from display at the capitol in St. Paul because they're symbolic of something, presumably religious. Exactly what the symbolism is is not quite clear, since the plant was named for James R. Poinsett, an early U.S. minister to Mexico, who discovered it there in 1828. As Freud might have said, sometimes a red poinsettia is just a red poinsettia. Dec 18, In his second hour, Prager interviewed Bernard Goldberg author of the new book BIAS, now number one on Amazon.com. Goldberg served 28 years at CBS news and alleges that the network news is biased in a liberal direction. Prager and Goldberg loved each other and agreed to do dinner soon. In his third hour, Prager said it is a bad idea to inculcate in a child to always clean his plate (finish all the food on his plate). Wasting the food by throwing it away is less bad than developing the habit of over-eating. Dec 17, In his third hour, Prager discussed the cover story in today's USA TODAY: NEW YORK — The epiphany on West 4th Street occurred shortly after the second World Trade Center tower vanished into an apocalyptic cloud of ash. That moment turned one quintessentially high-voltage New Yorker — a stockbroker's assistant and aspiring model whose workaholic habits were exceeded only by her limo-and-champagne party tastes — into a woman who now longs for a family and may leave her cherished Big Apple to get it. The story of Nichelle Welsh, 32, really is the story of anyone who sees life differently after an event best known as a date: Sept. 11. While thousands of friends and relatives continue to mourn the loss of those killed in New York, Washington, D.C., and Shanksville, Pa., countless more Americans are dealing with the fact that, in ways large and small, things will never be quite the same again. To survey how our lives have changed since Sept. 11, USA TODAY found six individuals with different demographic and geographic backgrounds and asked them to share their stories with our readers — today, and in the months ahead in periodic updates. In addition to Welsh, you will meet: • Ed O'Sheehan of Hollywood, Fla. Both O'Sheehan and his wife are in the National Guard. After Sept. 11, Heidi was called away on assignment, and he now juggles his law career with getting three kids in and out of bed each day. • Russell Parker of Fort Worth. Parker put in 10 years servicing aircraft at American Eagle. Upon adopting two children earlier this year, he transferred to American Airlines for higher pay. When Sept. 11 decimated the airline industry, Parker lost his job and a well-earned sense of security. • Myra Luna of Albuquerque. Luna saw herself headed for the world of corporate public relations upon graduating from the University of New Mexico. After spearheading a campus campaign to write letters to New York rescue workers, she can't imagine doing a job that isn't socially rewarding. DP says: I've always been preoccupied with good and evil. I've had more of these thoughts than most people. There's nothing like an awareness of evil and death to make life more precious. Dec 13, 2001 Jewish Offense League From the LA Times article: "The volatile chairman of the militant Jewish Defense League and another of the group's top officials faced federal charges Wednesday of plotting to blow up a Los Angeles area mosque and an office of Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista). Irv Rubin, 56, the group's chairman, and Earl Krugel, 59, its West Coast coordinator, were arrested late Tuesday after explosive powder was delivered to Krugel's home in Reseda, authorities said." The LA Times profiles Irv Rubin here: "Irv Rubin says he has never forgotten that day in 1971 when he was a student at Cal State Northridge and Rabbi Meir Kahane, who had founded the militant Jewish Defense League three years before, stopped by to speak. "He told us, 'If you see a Nazi, don't try to convince him you're a nice guy,' " Rubin recalled a few years later. "He told us to smash him." "Rubin has done a fair amount of smashing in the years since then--he has been arrested, by his own estimate, more than 40 times. So he said it came as no surprise that when Kahane announced that he was stepping down in 1985, the rabbi named Rubin as the new chief of the JDL." On his nationally syndicated radio show, Dennis Prager said Ruben's alleged bombing plan was evil and stupid. Stupid because if carried out, it would only hurt Jews and Israel. DP noted that the difference between the JDL and Muslim terrorists is that the JDL is isolated and hated in Jewish life and it is not allowed to present its case in synagogues. DP discussed his debate with the late Rabbi Meir Kahane, the founder of the JDL, on ABC radio in 1985. DP found the debate uncomfortable because Kahane called him so many names. The rabbi was upset that Prager would confront him publicly. Many traditional Jew believe that a Jew should never criticize a fellow Jew in public. Perhaps such Jews have never heard of the prophet Isaiah? Most of the letters Prager published in his journal Ultimate Issues about his debate with Rabbi Kahane supported Kahane. Prager later noted that almost all of Kahane's proposed laws for Israel (making it a crime for a Jew to sleep with a non-Jew, to swim in the ocean with a non-Jew) come from Torah Law. Khunrum writes: "A crime to swim in the same ocean? I mean, what if Yasser was taking a dip in the Pacific and Rabbi M. was swimming in the Atlantic? Would Jewish law force Yasser to get out and instead finish his laps in the Hilton pool?" Rabbi Kahane wanted to kick all non-Jews, particularly Arabs, out of Israel and the occupied territories Judea and Samaria. Many, perhaps most traditional Jews that I know, support this. I sometimes flirt with the idea as well. Daniel phoned in to note that Kahane's political party Kach in Israel is outlawed. It's regarded as a terrorist organization. Daniel said that when he came to the US, he was surprised how accepted Ruben and the JDL were, particularly by the news media. DP notes that the media embrace extremists because they make for more dramatic stories. DP says the JDL has no support within the Jewish community. Luke says: I have acquaintances who are in, or were in, the JDL. I believe that the JDL is far more popular in Jewish life, particularly within Orthodox Judaism, than Prager says. A few weeks ago, I had a Sabbath lunch with a Hasidic couple. The host asked me which Jewish thinkers most influenced me. I named Prager as number one. My host said Rabbi Kahane changed his life. I see Rabbi Kahane's book on numerous bookshelves as I go to homes in my religious community. Within the Orthodox Jewish community I know, Rabbi Kahane is a far more popular than unpopular figure. And those who oppose Rabbi Kahane and the JDL usually seem reluctant to say so publicly. I've found that the more a Jew is involved in Jewish life, particularly Orthodox Jewish life, and the more nationalistic the Jew, the more likely he is to support the JDL. And the more secular the Jew, the more likely he is to oppose the JDL. CNN.com reports: " The Jewish Defense League is a militant Los Angeles-based group that advocates the return of all Jews to Israel and the use of "all necessary means -- even strength, force and violence" -- to defend the interests of Jews, according to its Web site. Its logo contains a silhouette of a clenched fist over the Star of David. Rabbi Meir Kahane founded the organization to mount armed response to anti- Semitic acts in New York. The group gained notoriety when its members were linked to bombings, most of them aimed at Soviet targets in retaliation for the treatment of Jews in Russia. Kahane left the group and moved to Israel. He was assassinated in New York in 1990. El Sayyid Nosair, 36, an Egyptian-born Muslim, was convicted in connection with the shooting." I wonder if anyone's been kicked out of their shul for belonging to the JDL? I remember Irv Rubin phoning in to Prager's radio show to make his case for the JDL. Susan Cohen writes on soc.culture.jewish.moderated: "Whenever I have remarked on the total whackos in the JDL, I have been shouted down and told I am defaming Jews. All I remember from them is, years ago, hearing about their internecine wrangling and pipe bombs under each others cars. Now this. I have the sinking feeling that I was not wrong." Joe Rosenberg writes: "The JDL took a wrong turn, some decades ago which is why, at age 17, I quit, some thirty-odd years ago. To this day, though, I think that that JDL in general and Meir Kahane in particular -- despite saying many stupid, wrong things -- did directly address some issues that others long ignored, and that lack of the addressing of those issues has led to some dreadful things happening - the Crown Heights riot and the establishment of the PA spring instantly to mind. Whatever bad can fairly be said about the JDL -- and much can be -- it's also fair to note that they've been consistent, when nobody else has, about the futility and danger of negotiating with terrorists, for example. Dec 12, 2001 "What do we tell our children is true?" Dennis said there was no reason to tell your kids that Santa Claus is not real. No more than you should tell your kids there is no Barney the Dinosaur. Or, when you're reading your kids a story, there's no reason to keep saying this story is not real. These are only fictitious characters. Do you have an obligation to warn your kids about the reality of all fictitious characters? No. You give age appropriate truthful answers. You don't have to discuss the details of intercourse with a five year old. In his third hour, Prager took on the gay activist groups like PGlag.com that lead boycotts against the Boy Scouts and the Salvation Army for their discrimination against gays, and the transgendered. DP wonders why don't these leftist activist groups, instead of destroying, build up their own versions of the Boy Scouts and the Salvation Army. Dec 11, Dennis says he applied to work for the CIA when he was doing graduate work at Columbia. He ended up going in a different direction. DP read from the New York Times contrast of traitor John Walker and dead CIA agent John Spann: Mr. Spann grew up foursquare in a four-stoplight Alabama town. Life in Winfield revolved around family, church, duty and high school football, and Mike Spann embraced them all. He took apples to his teacher, played soldier at recess and prayed on Sunday with his family at the Church of Christ. A favorite boyhood picture shows him sitting on the barrel of a tank. At 16, he knew what he wanted. He would be a marine, he told friends, then serve in the F.B.I. or C.I.A. Mr. Walker came of age across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco in affluent Marin County, frequently caricatured as a haven for politically correct Californians who drive Porsches and who raise children made muddle-headed by too much freedom. Like Mr. Spann, Mr. Walker figured out what he wanted to do with his life at 16. Encouraged by his divorcing parents to seek his own spiritual path, he found himself by rejecting teenage culture in the name of Islam. He sold off his hip- hop records, immersed himself in the Koran and started wearing a long white robe. DENNIS PRAGER notes that since Timothy McVeigh was executed, nobody talks about him. Because he's dead. That's one of the benefits of capital punishment. DP hopes the British capture Bin Laden so Americans can learn about Europeans lousy values. The Europeans, including Britain, refuse to turn over to the US suspected criminals who might be eligible for capital punishment. Luke says: I felt like I wasted the last two-and-a-half hours of Prager's show as it lapsed into platitudes. Prager is frequently a boring talkshow host, who relapses into repeating himself. Dec 10, 2001 Prager spoke out in favor of Christmas lights. He says the only reason to not hang them up is poverty or laziness. Prager rejoiced over the My Turn column in the December 17th issue of Newsweek by Yale student Alison Hornstein: On the morning of September 11, my entire college campus huddled around television sets, our eyes riveted in horror to images of the burning, then falling, Twin Towers. By evening there were candlelight vigils where people sought to comfort and be comforted. BUT BY SEPT. 12, as our shock began to fade, so did our sense of being wronged. Student reactions expressed in the daily newspaper and in class pointed to the differences between our life circumstances and those of the perpetrators, suggesting that these differences had caused the previous day’s events. Noticeably absent was a general outcry of indignation at what had been the most successful terrorist attack of our lifetimes. These reactions and similar ones on other campuses have made it apparent that my generation is uncomfortable assessing, or even asking, whether a moral wrong has taken place. I spent 14 years at a public school in Manhattan with students who came from a variety of ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds. I benefited immensely from the open-minded curriculum. In second grade we learned about the Inuit (who don’t like to be called Eskimos, our teacher taught us), and how, though they sometimes ate caribou hoofs and other foods that we generally did not find on our own dinner tables, they were essentially like us. When my third-grade class read a story about one boy kicking another at a school-bus stop, our teacher talked about why the boy might have done what he did—maybe he was having a bad day or had had a fight with his mother that morning. The teacher stressed that the little boy had feelings that sometimes led him to do mean things. That these feelings did not necessarily justify his actions got lost in the discussion. We gained an important degree of emotional and psychological sophistication from looking at these issues. But being taught to think within a framework of moral and cultural relativity without learning its boundaries has seemingly created a deficiency in my generation’s ability to make moral judgments. DENNIS PRAGER then conducted an awkward interview with Alison. DP fell into his unfortunate habit of spending much of the interviewing lecturing Alison and telling her about his positions. In his third hour, Dennis discussed the proposal by Alaska's governor to allow people to pay more taxes if they want to. Liberals hate the idea. DP points out that liberals want women to have the choice to have an abortion, but people in general should not have a choice about how much tax they should pay. A caller said that abortion was solely a personal issue but DP pointed out that was only if he viewed abortion is solely personal. To those who are anti-abortion, keeping all those who are alive from conception helps all of society. Dec 4, Dennis spent 90 minutes on butt cleavage. He says the less well men and women communicate, the more need women will feel to flaunt their bodies. Needless to say, DP is opposed to butt cleavage in public. From FoxNews.com article: "Butt cleavage is definitely in," said Alex Douglass, associate fashion editor at Cosmopolitan magazine. "To have a little of your body falling out is extremely sexy." Celebrities like Pamela Anderson, Rosanna Arquette and Sarah Michelle Geller are all fans of the "dangerously low" Frankie B. jeans. Then there's Jennifer Lopez, whose much-publicized backside has been partially credited with her rapid rise to fame. "It's all over Hollywood," said Frankie B. representative Mya Walters. And now it's out on the road. One of Britney Spears' backup singers, Annette Stamatelatos, has been "butting" out — on and off-stage — throughout their current tour. "We're all flying out of our pants — Britney, me, the dancers," Stamatelatos said. But she added that visible crack is a bane, not a boon, of the low-rise jeans trend. "It's sexy at the pre-point before the pop-out," Stamatelatos said. "Beyond that you get a little self-conscious." Dec 3, 2001 DP decried the sympathetic coverage given to the American who joined the Taliban. Yes the man is a lost soul and pathetic, but he has aligned himself with a regime that perpetuates terrible cruelty. Second. This story shows how religion and spirituality can make people worse. This boy got worse when he he converted to Islam. DP also offered examples from Reform Judaism (most liberal, modern and generally left-wing of the three major Jewish denominations) and the World Council of Churches (represents mainstream Protestantism) of religion making people worse. Just like there is good psycho-therapy and bad psycho-therapy. Some people get worse, psychologically and morally, after therapy. If you looked to religion for leadership after September 11, with few exceptions, you would not find moral guidance. Nov 29, 2001 DP says he has no interest in interviewing murderers. But he's fascinated by folks who commit some white collar crimes or drive rudely. What were you thinking? How do you justify this? How do you use the September 11 attacks to try to collect life insurance? How could you have your 14 year old daughter sign an affidavit that mommy is missing? Rabbi Allan Nadler writes in a review of Dr. David Berger's new book: "One of the most dangerous consequences of the messianic carnival that has overtaken Lubavitch society during the past two decades has been its exploitation by fundamentalist Christian missionaries. Reporting on a California highway billboard with the phone number of a Christian mission to the Jews, a picture of Schneerson and the words "Right Idea: Wrong Person," Rabbi Berger concludes with sadness that "the profound theological differences between Judaism and Christianity have been reduced to a matter of mistaken identity." This perverse development has also led Dennis Prager - the national radio show host whom this reviewer has long considered a dangerous Jewish version of Jerry Falwell - to propose in earnest that the Jewish community embrace Jews for Jesus so long as they repudiate the idea of Jesus's divinity and stop proselytizing to the mainstream Jewish community. This proposal is, as Rabbi Berger accurately reports, based on Mr. Prager's analogy between Jews for Jesus and "some wonderful chabad Jews who believe the last Lubavitcher Rebbe was the messiah."" From New Times LA 9/27/01 Staunch support [for Bill Maher of Politically Incorrect] is also coming from conservative author and KRLA syndicated radio talk-show host Dennis Prager. Prager told me, "I disagree with almost everything Bill says, but if he loses sponsors for those comments, then those of us with unusual views will all be burned, the left, the middle and the right. He said nothing to deserve losing sponsorship." In a recent issue of Moment magazine, Prager writes about the cowardice of the Reform movement of Judaism: The decision of the Reform movement to cancel its summer youth programs in Israel because of Islamic terrorism could stain the movement's name for a generation. Over the past decades, Reform has become more socially and theologically radical. Nevertheless, none of its recent breaks from Jewish norms'such as redefining Jewish identity (patrilineal descent) or redefining marriage (to include same sex couples) had prepared the Jewish people for this decision. At the very moment that the beleaguered Jewish State most needed the support of American Jews, our community's largest religious movement declared to the world that it is abandoning a major commitment to fellow Jews in Israel. ..... How then does one explain Reform's decision? The answer, I believe, is the comparative lack of religious faith and commitment that characterizes much of Reform. While many individual Reform Jews affirm the three components of Judaism'God, Torah, and Israel'as a movement, Reform's passions and beliefs lie elsewhere. They lie in "social justice," meaning liberal, often radical, political and social action. If you want to know what the Reform movement believes, do not read the Torah, read the position papers of the American Civil Liberties Union, the platform of the Democratic Party, or the New York Times editorial page. These criticisms do not come from an outsider. I have been active in Reform for the last decade, attending a Reform synagogue every Shabbat, and teaching Torah there on most Shabbatot for the past five years. To its credit, my temple, one of the largest Reform synagogues in America, allows me to speak at its services regularly. But when was the last time your Reform synagogue invited a non-liberal to speak to its members' And yes, the Orthodox, Chabad excepted, do the same. They only invite Orthodox speakers to speak in Orthodox synagogues. For the most part, Jewish life, left and right, avoids intellectual challenge. ................. From Matt and Trey Parker on their South Park TV show: August 24, 2001 What the hell is that thing in Barbrady's ear? Matt: Officer Barbrady wears a hearing aid. That's why he always talks so fucking loud all the time. His voice was based on our impression of radio talk- show host Dennis Prager, who we actually worked with years ago. Both Trey and I actually think pretty highly of Dennis Prager, but he does have a HUGE voice and in person its almost overwhelming. I don't think Dennis Prager has a hearing aid, but it would explain why he talks so big. Nov 28, 2001 Dennis Prager saw the Harry Potter film with his wife and nine-year old boy. DP says he shares many values with many of the religious critics of the film, but he does not believe there's anything in the film to worry about. And when you call wolf too many times, and there's no wolf, you lose credibility. And DP doesn't want Christians to lose credibility. In his second hour, DP explained why he donates his money to the Salvation Army rather than the Red Cross. DP read from full-page ads in the USA Today where the Red Cross repeatedly referred to the September 11 terrorist attacks as "tragic events." DP decried the demoralizing of September 11. DP says the Red Cross is politically correct, with a broken moral compass, dishonest in how it allocates its money, and arrogant in its dealings with the public. Prager critiqued this Thomas Friedman column in today's New York Times as 75% correct. DP focused in on one particular word used by Friedman: "negated." DP says it doesn't matter that members of a religion believe they have exclusive divine truth and negate other religions. After all, most fundamentalist Christians and Jews believe this, yet they don't act like Bin Laden. What's key is that people don't use violence against those who don't share their faith. Friedman seems to lump all exclusivists as Bin Ladens. TF writes: If 9/11 was indeed the onset of World War III, we have to understand what this war is about. We're not fighting to eradicate "terrorism." Terrorism is just a tool. We're fighting to defeat an ideology: religious totalitarianism. World War II and the cold war were fought to defeat secular totalitarianism — Nazism and Communism — and World War III is a battle against religious totalitarianism, a view of the world that my faith must reign supreme and can be affirmed and held passionately only if all others are negated. That's bin Ladenism. But unlike Nazism, religious totalitarianism can't be fought by armies alone. It has to be fought in schools, mosques, churches and synagogues, and can be defeated only with the help of imams, rabbis and priests. The generals we need to fight this war are people like Rabbi David Hartman, from the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. He answered: "All faiths that come out of the biblical tradition — Judaism, Christianity and Islam — have the tendency to believe that they have the exclusive truth. When the Taliban wiped out the Buddhist statues, that's what they were saying. But others have said it too. The opposite of religious totalitarianism is an ideology of pluralism — an ideology that embraces religious diversity and the idea that my faith can be nurtured without claiming exclusive truth. America is the Mecca of that ideology, and that is what bin Laden hates and that is why America had to be destroyed." Luke says: I've talked to David Hartman. He's about as representative of Orthodox Judaism as I am - meaning not at all. He's on a fringe. In 1994, I asked Rabbi Hartman why Jews should be Jewish and he thought it an interesting but not consequential question. Hartman's open handed approach won't inspire many Jews to lead intensely Jewish lives. Nov 27, In his last two hours, DP interviewed former KFI talkshow host Tammy Bruce, a lesbian feminist who's published the book "The New Thought Police: Inside the Left's Assault on Free Speech and Free Minds." Roger Pipe writes on Amazon.com: As someone who used to listen to Tammy Bruce every weekend when she had her show on KFI in Los Angeles, (I actually emailed her regularly and often got nice responses.) I was happy to hear she had written a book. It was the way I heard about it that surprised me. While flipping the dials, I heard Dr. Laura talking about this great new book. I can't say that I ever would have figured that Tammy's most vocal supporter would be Dr. Laura. This support may explain why the book was sold out at eight stores I visited the week it was released. (Thank goodness I had Amazon.) There have been plenty of books written about Political Correctness and those who would control our speech. What makes Bruce's' book different is that she is not a right wing thundercloud shouting down the opposition. As a lifelong feminist and President of LA N.O.W for nearly a decade, she has a long history as a champion for 'liberal' causes and has been an outspoken advocate for traditionally 'left leaning' issues. In spite this lengthy pedigree, or perhaps because she actually believes in her causes, Bruce is appalled by the tactics of the left and the new "thought police" who carry out the marching orders. "The New Thought Police" is an easy read. I finished it in less than a day without much effort. The reason for Dr. Laura's strong support is quite clear early on when Bruce devotes an entire chapter to the criticism and threats faced by Dr. Laura after her comments angered the 'gay establishment.' A lesbian herself, Bruce may disagree with Dr. Laura, but is quick to point out that the propaganda used against her national TV show was filled with lies. As Bruce points out here and throughout the book, the left has adopted the policies that used to be used against them. (In this case, passing out hateful fliers in Dr. Laura's neighborhood as anti-abortion foes have done with doctors for years.) I loved the candor of this book. Tammy pulls no punches and lands most of strong left and right crosses she throws. Her description of the evolution, or de-evolution of the women's movement is particularly eye opening. Likewise, her attacks on the "Misery Merchants" who use racial tension to line their own pockets is hard hitting. It's one thing to hear Rush Limbaugh attack Patricia Ireland or even to hear Larry Elder call out Jesse Jackson, but when Bruce does it, it packs more of a wallop. Missing from the book is an explanation of what happened to Bruce when she left KFI. The last any of us heard, she had been fired for some comments she made about Camille Cosby after the wife of the famous comedian wrote a letter blaming American racism for the death of her son. Mrs. Cosby was never called to task for her racist letter, but when Bruce refused to apologize, she was fired. At least that's the story we all heard. A better explanation of that chapter would have been wonderful. The book does lose some steam near the end when Bruce teeters precariously on a razor thin line between activism and thought control. After calling into question the efforts to shut down Dr. Laura, she relates with great pride how she led a charge against Brett Eaton Ellis' novel "American Psycho." Her descriptions of direct sponsor action back up her point, but the fact that she laughs at giving out the private number of Ellis' publicist and encouraging hateful phone calls just smacks of self justification. I also didn't care for a crack she made about people who would watch pornography. (Something about these being the kind of people we wouldn't want to have over for dinner.) Nov 26, 2001 Dennis notes there are idiot savants. People who are idiotic in most things but brilliant in one or two areas. Then there are moral idiots. Folks who are fine in most parts of life, but on moral questions, are idiotic. Columnist and TV commentator Robert Novak is a moral idiot. He's a purported conservative but he's out of touch with conservatives on Israel. Prager researched Novak this weekend and dug up this column he published September 13: An attack on Afghanistan for sheltering Osama's terrorists will put the United States in danger of being perceived, however incorrectly, as launching a holy war against Islam. There is strong sentiment in Congress for hitting somebody, somewhere who has unsavory terrorist credentials even if not connected with Tuesday's attack. Perhaps the biggest difference with Pearl Harbor is the cause of the conflict. Bush's eloquent call for unity talked of the need to "defend freedom." Unlike Nazi Germany's and Imperial Japan's drive for a new world order, however, the hatred toward the U.S. by the terrorists is an extension of its hatred of Israel rather than world dominion. Secretary of State Colin Powell's laudable efforts at being an even-handed peacemaker makes no difference to terrorists. Stratfor.com, the private intelligence company, reported Tuesday: "The big winner today, intentionally or not, is the state of Israel." Whatever distance Bush wanted between U.S. and Israeli policy, it was eliminated by terror. The spectacle on television of Palestinian youths and mothers dancing in the streets of East Jerusalem over the slaughter of Americans will not soon be forgotten. The United States and Israel are brought ever closer in a way that cannot improve long-term U.S. policy objectives. Here's an excerpt of the CNN transcript of the show Capital Gang from Saturday, November 24, 2001: NOVAK: Can you imagine the audacity' Secretary Powell makes a very balanced speech, says they both have to do things, recognize each other's existence. Prime Minister Sharon says, yes, that's fine. Immediately the next day they have this attack on Hamas targeting, as they've been targeting ever since he came in as prime minister, people to be killed. Now, the question all over the Middle East is: Is the United States going to take this conduct by Israel lying down, or are they going to say this is unacceptable behavior' And the one thing that was very disappointing about the secretary's speech was he didn't criticize the Sharon line that you have to have seven days without violence before he'll sit down to even talk with the Palestinians. You can't have seven days without violence if the Israelis are going to start the provocation. SHIELDS: Al Hunt, since September 11, 90 percent of all the deaths in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have been on the Palestinian side. HUNT: Well Mark, look, I think every administration come into office saying they're going to stay out of that Middle Eastern briar patch; and it's understandable why they want to, and none can. Margaret's right: This administration only now is fully appreciating that; same thing with the Clinton administration eight years ago. I thought George Mitchell has laid out exactly what has to be done there. And I think it really is quite even-handed, as I think the Secretary's speech was. I think it was a good speech. And then we saw what happened. And Bob, it wasn't just the Israelis, it was also the Palestinians. And it seems to me that the great danger is that, look, neither Sharon nor Arafat is a day at the beach. But what's behind them, in both instances, may be worse. I mean, Arafat has these terrorist who bring pressure on him. And if anything should happen to him, I think any success (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and Sharon's been the poster child of the Israeli right the last 20 years, hear's footsteps from Netanyahu on his right. That's what's so scary about this whole situation. O'BEIRNE: Mark, this week Colin Powell called on the Palestinians to remove any doubt that they don't support the right of Israel to exist. It's not a question about which there's any doubt. The PLO explicitly does not accept Israel's right to exist. Barak, Sharon's predecessor, called Arafat's bluff. He was willing to give more than Arafat ever dreamed he would get -- share governing of Jerusalem. And Arafat either couldn't our wouldn't deliver. So why he remains the head of the PLO -- he apparently can't deliver, and he can't keep down violence or -- as I said, he plays a role in -- or doesn't want to. Powell also talked to the intifada which, we should remember, Arafat launched last year. He said it's self-defeating violence. Well, we've got to make darn clear that it's self-defeating. All of a sudden this administration's talking about supporting a Palestinian state. They flirt with the notion that terrorism, used as a negotiating tool, does work. And after September 11, it seems to me, it should be harder and harder for us to urge Israelis to have this incredible restraint when civilians are routinely attacked. Every Israeli family has a gas mask in their home. And they've now slipped into Israel and killed a Cabinet secretary. NOVAK: I think -- well, of course, the Israelis have been killing all kinds of leaders in the Palestinian movement. But I think... O'BEIRNE: It was self-defense. NOVAK: Oh, self-defense' It's an attack. I can't imagine, Al, anybody worse than Sharon. I mean, the idea that he's a good guy is just part of the propaganda. But I am just amazed -- I am always amazed how American conservatives can get involved in this absolutely mindless support of the transigent (ph) Israeli policy. And there's one other thing... O'BEIRNE: They just don't have a right to exist. NOVAK: The thing that General Powell said, which I think is exactly correct, is that the Israelis have to accept a Palestinian state. And they -- and Sharon won't do that, and either will his friends in this country. And that is the main thing that's holding up the whole process. CARLSON: The Palestinians throw bombs into pizza parlors and cafes and discos. They killed a civilian yesterday. The Israelis killed a senior official of Hamas. He is, himself, a terrorist. NOVAK: Well, why do you call him a terrorist' I mean, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. CARLSON: No... NOVAK: They're trying to get their own land in the... (CROSSTALK) CARLSON: Bob, you're the only people (sic) -- you're the only person who would call Hamas freedom fighters. NOVAK: Oh, no; people all over the world do. HUNT: I don't disagree with what you said about Sharon; but are the Palestinians willing to accept, as Powell said they must, a Jewish state' NOVAK: Will Arafat' Yes. I think Arafat will. Will all his followers' No. But you have to start negotiating; Sharon won't even negotiate. You surely don't defend that, do you' (CROSSTALK) O'BEIRNE: ... negotiated, it got him no where and Arafat wouldn't... (CROSSTALK) NOVAK: See, that's the attitude -- that's a bad attitude... NOVAK: Let me tell you, yes, there's a lot worse than Arafat. let me tell you right now: As long as you have general Sharon as prime minister of Israel, you'll never make any progress. (CROSSTALK) CARLSON: And as long as Arafat is there -- Arafat, who would not accept peace in his hands, there will never be peace. NOVAK: Well, that isn't true; but we can't get into that. DP: Are we killing "leaders" in Afghanistan' Does Novak make a distinction between American killing Taliban "leaders" in Afghanistan and Israel killing terrorists' As for Mark Shield's comment about the ratio of casualties. In WWII, the Allies killed almost four million German civilians but America lost zero civilians. In the battle with Japan, Japan lost about 300,000 civilians and America lost zero. So' Since when does the ratio of casualties matter' But liberals like to think in terms of underdog and oppressed rather in than in terms of right and wrong. Prager quoted an Al Gore advisor who referred to Bob Novak's CNN program as the "Bash Israel" show. DP says he supported the peace process. DP cried when Arafat and Rabin shook hands on the White House lawn. DP says he was wrong on the peace process because he thought the Palestinians had made peace with the existence of the Jewish state. Prager received several anti-Jewish calls and DP hung up on them and didn't respond to their points. A caller points out that Novak says he is not a Republican nor a conservative. He's an independent libertarian. DP answered a caller who asked him what he'd do if he were a Palestinian: I'd say that most of our problems are internal. We should cooperate economically with Israel so that we could have a thriving life rather than a wretched hate-filled one. Arab dictators, like Arafat, feed their people hatred of the Jewish state instead of giving them freedom. It's an old trick of dictators - Hitler and Stalin did it. DP praised George Will's column on Secretary of State Colin Powell's major speech on the Palestinian - Israeli conflict. DP remembers only one time when he disagreed with Will (on term limits). If he were to disagree with Will, DP would ask himself why he was wrong. Before the speech, Powell said he would appeal for Yasser Arafat to use his "moral authority" to stop the terrorists who operate in the territory controlled by Arafat's Palestinian Authority. Perhaps Powell meant that Arafat's status as the world's senior terrorist might make Arafat willing and able to stop terrorism. Perhaps. Powell did helpfully say that Palestinians must recognize Israel's right to exist as a "Jewish state." This U.S. policy opposes Arafat's demand for an unlimited "right of return" for all Palestinians who claim to be connected in some way with those who in 1948 fled Israel, confident that Arab armies would extinguish the new nation. How important is the "right of return" demand -- which would mean the effective dissolution of Israel -- to Arafat' Prime Minister Ehud Barak's rejection of that demand caused Arafat to scupper the July 2000 Camp David meeting at which Barak, going far beyond any previous Israeli offer and far beyond what he could persuade his country to accept, offered 98 percent of the West Bank and partial Palestinian control of a divided Jerusalem. Perhaps Powell meant only that settlements complicate the "peace process." But, then, what did Powell mean when he said Israel must "end its occupation"' If Powell believes the entire West Bank is occupied Palestinian territory, what is to be negotiated' And what becomes of the "land for peace" approach if there is this prejudgment about the land at issue' In Louisville, Powell endorsed the creation of a "viable" Palestinian state. Well. Leave aside the fact that Switzerland would not be viable if governed by the thugocracy that is Arafat's Palestinian Authority. But does Powell believe that the territory currently controlled by the Palestinian Authority is inherently unviable as a state' If so, what territorial adjustments would be necessary for viability' And how might those be squared with his call for "taking full account of Israel's security needs"' Does Powell believe that Israel's 1967 borders, within which Israel was at one place just 11 miles wide, were defensible' And what does he think an Israeli withdrawal to those borders would accomplish, given that in 1967 Arafat rejected Israel's right to exist, and today he says that an Israel with the 1967 borders would be illegitimate' Powell's emissaries follow CIA Director George Tenet's mission, which followed former senator George Mitchell's mission, which produced the idea that the problem between Israel, which intends to exist, and her enemies, who say she should not, is a lack of "confidence." Hence the centerpiece of the Mitchell plan -- "confidence-building measures." DENNIS PRAGER read 90% of Will's column. DP says: Regarding Jewish settlements on the West Bank, if a quarter of Israel can be Arab, why can't 1% of a Palestinian territory be Jewish' Nov 22, I've heard Prager say 100 times that he broadcasts on national holidays like Thanksgiving so that he can inject more meaning into the holiday for his listeners. DP never mentions another major reason he broadcasts on holidays (the same reason that many religious Jews work on goyisha holidays) - because he has to take off so many days as Jewish holidays, that he needs to make up these days when he can, by working on days when the goyim are holidaying. It's typical for Jewish doctors to work on Christmas Day and Easter and Thanksgiving in exchange for their Gentile counterparts working for them on Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, etc. I've generally found DP's holiday shows the least interesting. He leans on repeating traditional themes instead of breaking new ground - my major criticism of his show. I will frequently put in two or three hours listening to his show and not hear him say anything new. I will then feel that I have wasted my time. He's violated the good faith I have in him that he will make it worth my time to listen to him. Nov 15, Just as we imposed democracy and freedom on Germany and Japan after WWII, so too the US needs to do the same to Afghanistan. If we don't install a decent government there, it could come back to hurt us. DP recommends: * That we pay Afghani women a dollar a day to not wear veils over their
faces, Kids Gym Schoolhouse owner Laura Johnson knew a positive evaluation of her preschool’s program was necessary to earn a distinguished four-star rating from the state. But she didn’t expect one evaluator to deduct points based on the presence of “violent” toys. So what did the observer determine to be violent? A toy ax? A toy gun? Child-size toy hand grenades? None of the above. The offending toys in this case: nine green plastic Army men. To a really imaginative child, the Army men could have been part of a plastic peacekeeping force. But to an observer rating the program under the Early Childhood Environmental Rating System, the little figures represented something else. “If stereotyping or violence is shown with regard to any group, then credit cannot be given,” wrote evaluator Katie Haselden. “It was observed that nine ‘army men’ were present in the block play area. These figures reflect stereotyping and violence, therefore credit cannot be given.” Nov 14, Dennis Prager celebrated America's success in Afghanistan. The Northern Alliance now control the country's capitol Kabul. So women there no longer need wear a veil and the radio can play music. DP celebrated the vast amount of good that's accompanied the US/Alliance triumphs. In his third hour, Dennis celebrated this column in the Los Angeles Times: By FLORENCE WAMBUGU, Florence Wambugu is a plant pathologist and regional director for International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications. In January, she will become executive director of A Harvest Bi NAIROBI, Kenya -- They can buy their food in supermarkets. They can eat fast food, home-cooked food, restaurant food. They can choose the more expensive organic foods, or even imported foods. They can eat fresh, frozen or canned produce. Then, from their world of plenty, they tell us what we can and cannot feed our children. The "they" I refer to are a variety of anti-biotechnology protesters who would deny developing countries like my home, Kenya, the resources to develop a technology that can help alleviate hunger, malnutrition and poverty. Genetic engineering of plants has sparked a revolution in agriculture, one that can play an important role in feeding the world's hungry. As an African, I know that biotech is not a panacea. It cannot solve problems of inept or corrupt governments, underfunded research, unsound agricultural policy or a lack of capital. But as a scientist, I also know that biotech is a powerful new tool that can help address some of the agricultural problems that plague Africa. The protesters have fanned the flames of mistrust of genetically modified foods through a campaign of misinformation. These people and organizations have become adept at playing on the media's appetite for controversy to draw attention to their cause. But the real victim in this controversy is the truth, and African farmers and consumers are not far behind. I know of what I speak, because I grew up barefoot and hungry in Nyeri, Kenya, searching for solutions that would rid our crops of the pests that ravaged them year after year. We tried to smother the bugs by using ashes from burned wood and crafted various concoctions to spray the plants with. Most of the time our attempts failed, and so I learned early in life that to grow enough food we must somehow find a way to control the plant pests and viruses that routinely destroyed our crops and shrank our harvests. I'm not alone in my belief that biotechnology offers a solution to agricultural and food problems. In Western Europe, birthplace of the biotech protest movement, after an analysis of the scientific evidence from 81 research projects, the European Commission concluded that, "The use of more precise technology and the greater regulatory scrutiny probably make [biotech crops] even safer than conventional plants and foods." Nov 13, Dennis Prager repeated that he does not believe in conspiracy theories. He does not believe the government is lying to us about the plane crash yesterday. DP notes that the National Transportation and Safety Board (NTSB) has an excellent record for integrity. DP devoted his show to the failure of organized religion in America to provide moral leadership. DP condemned Reform Judaism for opposing legislation to make phone tapping of terrorists legal, abandoning the Boy Scouts and not sending their youth on a trip to Israel this past summer because of violence there. Mainly, Prager condemned much of the Christian and Muslim leadership for its weakness in condemning Islamic terrorism. The AP reports: ...Bishops are reviewing their position on the war on terrorism, acknowledging in a draft document a moral right to a military defense but warning that force alone is not the answer. The authors of the proposed statement took pains to say that nothing justifies terrorism. Still, they argued that poverty, violence and human rights abuses, if not addressed, generate resentment that terrorists can exploit. The proclamation urges U.S. leaders to redefine foreign policy to make alleviating global suffering a priority, and recommends lifting economic sanctions against Iraq and helping to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It also asks national leaders to develop criteria for when the airstrikes on Afghanistan should end. Nov 12, A plane crashed in Queens with 260 people aboard. Dennis noted from the outset, less than three hours after the plane crashed, that we have no evidence that indicates terrorism. DP says it is important that Americans not freak out about terrorism. DP related his conversations with people in New York who all immediately suspected terrorism. Nov 8, 2001 Dennis Prager filled with fury at President Clinton for his remarks yesterday at Georgetown University. Prager read from the Washington Times report: Bill Clinton, the former president, said yesterday that terror has existed in America for hundreds of years and the nation is "paying a price today" for its past of slavery and for looking "the other way when a significant number of native Americans were dispossessed and killed." "Here in the United States, we were founded as a nation that practiced slavery, and slaves quite frequently were killed even though they were innocent," said Mr. Clinton in a speech to nearly 1,000 students at Georgetown University's ornate Gaston Hall. "This country once looked the other way when a significant number of native Americans were dispossessed and killed to get their land or their mineral rights or because they were thought of as less than fully human. "And we are still paying a price today," said Mr. Clinton, who was invited to address the students by the university's School of Foreign Service. Mr. Clinton, wearing a gray suit and orange tie, arrived 45 minutes late for the event. DENNIS PRAGER: For moral clarity on what Clinton did, imagine that these comments were made after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor' How come few media aside from the Washington Times reported on this Clinton speech' The CNN report does not mention these remarks above by Clinton, probably because the CNN reporter saw nothing shocking about them. How come NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw, who wrote The Greatest Generation, is not reporting on this' Wasn't the Greatest Generation the greatest because they had moral clarity on the evil of the enemy they fought' The United States fought a civil war to end slavery. Did Arabs attack the WTC because the US had slavery' It was Arabs who sold slaves to the Anglos. Prager says Clinton is a liability to the US. Clinton said: "We of European lineage are not blameless [for the crusades, slavery]." Yes we are. We alive today had nothing to do with the crusades and slavery. Nov 5, Dennis read from today's New York Times column by Thomas Friedman: If you want to know why the U.S. is hated in the Arab street, read the recent editorial in the semi-official Egyptian daily, Al Ahram, written by its editor, Ibrahim Nafie. After saying that the U.S. was deliberately making humanitarian food drops in areas of Afghanistan full of land mines, Mr. Nafie added: "Similarly, there were several reports that the [U.S.] humanitarian materials have been genetically treated, with the aim of affecting the health of the Afghan people. If this is true, the U.S. is committing a crime against humanity by giving the Afghan people hazardous humanitarian products." This was an editorial written by Egypt's leading editor, personally appointed by President Hosni Mubarak. It basically accuses the U.S. of dropping poison food on Afghans — according to unspecified "reports." So is it any wonder that people on the Egyptian street hate us' While Arab leaders have refused to acknowledge any Palestinian responsibility for the stalemate with Israel, a few weeks ago the Jerusalem-based Palestinian leader Sari Nusseibeh had the guts to criticize Palestinian strategy: "We're telling the Israelis we want to kick you out: it's not that we want liberation, freedom and independence in the West Bank and Gaza, we want to kick you out of your home. And in order to make sure that the Israelis get the message, people go out to a disco or restaurant and blow themselves up. The whole thing is just crazy, ugly, totally counterproductive. The secret is to get Israelis to side with you. We lost our allies." The Bush team should tell our Arab partners: Look, we don't need your bases or armies. We just need you to open your societies so the voices of those who want a different Arab future can really be heard. We'll take care of bin Laden — but you have to take care of bin Ladenism. DENNIS PRAGER noted that many of today's most radical voices are in religion. Not just Osama Bin Laden in Islam, but in the National and World Council of Churches of mainstream Protestantism and in the Quakers, who call for pacifism. In his second hour, Prager interviewed pilot William Langewiesche who writes in the November issue of The Atlantic, one of the five most important periodicals today says DP, that Egypt Air Flight 990 was pushed into the water by its suicidal Egyptian co-pilot, killing all aboard. In his third hour, Prager read from Dan Kennedy's article: The most easily mocked cliché to arise out of the post–September 11 world is the one that goes like this: If we do (or don't do) such-and-such, then the terrorists win. Surely, though, it's neither a cliché nor an overstatement to observe that if presumably well-meaning Americans turn against Israel, then, yes, the terrorists win. Sadly, last week there was strong evidence — in the streets of Boston, no less — that US support for Israel rests on shaky ground. According to reports by Boston Globe religion writer Michael Paulson, three leading Episcopal bishops — Roy Cederholm, Barbara Harris, and Thomas Shaw — staged a protest outside the Israeli consulate to register their displeasure over Israel's military incursions into the West Bank, especially Bethlehem. Leaders of other denominations expressed at least qualified support. All made it clear that one of their principal objectives was the creation of a Palestinian state. Now, reasonable people can differ over the admittedly heavy-handed tactics of Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon. But Israel, like the United States, is trying to survive a desperate struggle against terrorism. For the bishops to criticize Israel without mentioning the numerous Israeli civilians who have been killed by Palestinian terrorists was ahistorical at best, morally obtuse at worst. Currently, Israel is trying to respond to the assassination of a Cabinet member, tourism minister Rehavam Ze'evi, at the hands of a terrorist. And every few days, Israeli civilians die at the hands of Palestinian terrorists — including, most recently, Sunday, when a gunman opened fire on a bus in Jerusalem, killing two and injuring more than 40. As for a Palestinian state, the bishops appear to forget that Sharon's predecessor, Ehud Barak, offered exactly that to PLO leader Yasir Arafat in July 2000, and that Arafat — rather than negotiating for still more concessions, which certainly would have been his right — rejected it out of hand and launched a new wave of terrorist assaults. What is especially frightening about our own war against terrorism, both abroad and at home, is that it is now clear that it is being fueled by a vicious brand of anti-Semitism — something both Andrew Sullivan, in the New Republic, and Jonathan Rosen, in the New York Times Magazine, have discussed recently with considerable insight and horrifying details, from the fantasy that the Mossad was behind the September 11 attacks to the libelous myth that Jews knead the blood of Arab children into their Passover matzoh. Not for a moment do I think the Episcopal bishops harbor any anti-Semitic thoughts or feelings. Nevertheless, their one-sided protest played into the hands of anti-Semites who seek the destruction of Israel — especially since the bishops chose to stage their protest just weeks after September 11, thus lending credence to the idea that US support for Israel will weaken now that we ourselves are under attack. Nov 4 Dennis Prager read approvingly from this FOXNews.com article: "I think all women oughta carry a cell phone and a three-fifty-seven. Loaded." So declares a woman interviewed by The New Republic's Michelle Cottle. That statement seems to sum up the post-Sept. 11 attitude toward gun control. Things were already tough for the gun-control movement. Convinced that Al Gore's strong anti-gun stance had cost the Democratic Party the 2000 election, the Democratic Leadership Council had already called for a softer line on gun control. Bill Clinton and former White House spokesman Joe Lockhart had pronounced Gore's stance a mistake. Meanwhile, product-liability suits brought against gun manufacturers were failing miserably in courts from New York to California. These, however, were all tactical defeats. The gun-control movement could still boast the loyalty of most of the media; favorable treatment from the courts on Second Amendment cases; the strong support of women; and a new book by a celebrated historian that claimed guns weren't important to the framers of the U.S. Constitution. Most important of all, the movement resonated with the Rosie O' Donnell culture of "niceness" that assumed that the best way to avoid harm was to be harmless. But now all of this has changed. Though gun-control groups have tried to capitalize on the Sept. 11 attacks, those attempts have misfired. Tom Diaz of the Violence Policy Center tried to claim that Barrett Firearms had sold .50 caliber sniper rifles to Usama bin Laden. Not many in the media bought this, which was a good thing since it turned out that those rifles had actually been sold to the United States Government. DENNIS PRAGER also read from George Will's latest column: With the latest warnings from Washington that the public should be wary and vigilant because other terror attacks may be imminent, the federal government has, in effect, deputized the American people. Such vague warnings may seem unhelpful, but they do, in effect, call 280 million sets of eyes and ears to heightened sensitivity, which has to change the environment, and risks, for terrorists. Yet some say this is a logical time to multiply the legal hurdles for Americans seeking to defend themselves with firearms. What this idea ignores is the connection between civic health and the public's responsibility for participating in the provision of public safety. So this is an appropriate time to revisit the most fundamental -- the philosophic -- reason why both the right and the fact of widespread gun ownership reflect a healthy dimension of America's democratic culture. This subject is doubly timely because of what a federal appeals court said 35 days after Sept. 11. Nov 1, 2001 Yesterday, Prager quoted talkshow host Mike Gallagher, who said that Rosie O'Donnell and her child stayed sitting during the standing ovation for President Bush at the World Series game in New York. If true, that behavior is contemptible said DP. Today Rosie phoned the show to say she did stand up for the President. From the DrudgeReport.com: Talkshow host and ardent Democratic activist Rosie O'Donnell stunned Los Angeles radio listeners Thursday morning by declaring she's changed her opinion of President Bush. "I love him now!" O'Donnell told KRLA-AM's Dennis Prager. O'Donnell said she even got to Yankee Stadium an hour early for a World Series game so that she could videotape Bush! "I brought a videocamera and my six year old son and no security so that my son could see the president," said O'Donnell. "We left at 6 o'clock in order to do that. And since September 11, I have had nothing but accolades for the job he has done for this nation... I am in full support of the President." O'Donnell added: "Honey, I love him now! He is our President. We are at war." Steve Ross from UnitedJustice.com writes: After hearing the Dennis Prager interview with Rosie (and his apologies) I thought, who is this Mike Gallagher who would pass along lies about 'poor' Rosie. Rosie later came on Prager's show and said she absolutely did stand with her young son while the President threw the first ball. (www.spotgarage.com/spots/rosie.mp3) Dennis apologized to her, and that would have been That, had it not been for FOX Sport's excellent video coverage. FOX Sports Video of President Bush at World Series... http://www.foxsports.com/search/search.adp'contentTypeCode=3&searchString=president+first+pitch ROSIE THE LIAR! Unless Rosie is only 3 FEET TALL (she's short, but not that short), She and her son are the only ones sitting with their heads just above the 3 foot fence, while everybody elses heads are cut off due to their standing for the President. (Hit pause, just after Bush pitches: Rosie is sitting just to the left behind backstop with her son). Oct 31, Dennis praised President Bush's dignified appearance at Yankee Stadium in New York last night for the third game of the World Series. DP noted the huge ovation the president received. DP described various types of evil: * Sadism - where people enjoy inflicting pain on innocents. DP says America pays for Saudi Arabian oil with American blood. We need to wean ourselves off Saudi oil. Saudi Arabia, even though we rescued them from Iraq in 1990, is our enemy. For the first half hour of his second hour, Prager talked with FOX's Bill O'Reilly about the Red Cross and other charities who raised hundreds of millions of dollars for the families affected by September 11, and yet are not giving the money to the families but to their own causes, such as preaching tolerance towards Arab-Muslim Americans. Reilly said that TV news, since it was taken over by corporations in the 1990s, has become tame. They don't want to do stories that will have subjects angry towards them, and calling their corporate sponsors of the TV news. DP asked Bill why TV news didn't cover the million dead Africans in the Sudan. Bill said that Americans don't care about Africa, and that the continent's problems are not solveable because of the tribalism there. Prager read this piece in the October 30th Washington Post by former Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger. DP says how a group treats jews is an excellent moral litmus test of that group. Dr. Bernadine Healy's resignation as president of the American Red Cross is a tragedy. This remarkable woman has, in less than two years, forced major reforms on a reluctant governing body and shown superb crisis management skills in the aftermath of the terrible events of Sept. 11. But this is not all she should be remembered for. Healy, shortly after she took office, discovered that the American Red Cross had acquiesced for decades in the policy of the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent to oppose accepting Magen David Adom as a legitimate emblem of the Israeli equivalent of the Red Cross. She rightly saw this as, at best, turning a blind eye on a moral wrong; in an act of great moral courage, she set about to put things right. She spoke against the federation's anti-Israeli stance in Geneva, the home of the federation, and stirred up a hornet's nest of denials of wrongdoing, complaints against her lack of diplomatic finesse and charges that her methods just "weren't done" in Geneva. When it became obvious that the federation (and most of its member states) were not going to change their ways, Healy settled in for a long and sometimes nasty battle. She made it clear to the federation and her own board that the American Red Cross was no longer prepared to accept in silence a policy that was inimical to our deepest held values and that put the lie to the federation's claims of universality. As a part of Healy's preparations for a strategic approach to the fight to force the federation to forswear its discriminatory policy against Israel, she asked me to accept appointment as ambassador at large (a high sounding but unpaid and powerless position), and to advise her when she felt the need for advice. I accepted, went several times to Geneva on her behalf and saw at firsthand the conspiracy of silence and obfuscation deployed against the American Red Cross's efforts to at least get the issue thoroughly aired before members of the federation and the public. I suggested to Healy that withholding dues to the federation was a useful way to force the federation to take the American Red Cross's demands seriously; Healy agreed, and the funds were withheld, with the approval of the board. At the time, I warned Healy that support for this aggressive policy would begin to diminish over time as the weak of heart, and those who really did not care much if the discrimination against Israel continued, listened to the blandishments of the federation's bureaucrats and politicians, who would argue that a hard-line American approach would never accomplish its objective, while compromise and goodwill could eventually accomplish much. I recently sent Healy a memorandum that laid out the issues as I saw them: "The refusal of the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent to reverse its long-standing opposition to accepting Magen David Adom as a legitimate emblem of the Israeli Red Cross equivalent is, and has been from the inception of this exclusionary policy, immoral. As such it has no place in an organization which purports to be philanthropic in its purposes, and caring for the least of us in its practices. "That the exclusion of Magen David Adom has continued for decades without strong objection from the American Red Cross has raised legitimate questions about our commitment to the fundamentals of the Red Cross movement, and to the principles that guide American foreign policy. It is for those reasons that I recommended that the American Red Cross withhold its dues from the Federation. We have no business supporting an immoral policy that looks and smells too much like the infamous policies of the 1930's and 1940's. . . . "As certain as night follows day we can expect that bureaucrats from the Federation will do all they can to persuade leading Americans to force President Healy . . . to return to discredited policies. "They must not succeed! At a time when the United States and the civilized world are at war with extremism, it would be an inexcusable mistake for a leading humanitarian organization like the American Red Cross to succumb to political pressure and drop its principled opposition to policies of exclusion and intolerance." But "they" have succeeded. Last week Healy was forced out of office by a behind-closed-doors vote of the American Red Cross's Board of Governors -- not because of anything relating to the Sept. 11 tragedy but because she dared to try to right a wrong -- the wrong of denying a sovereign nation equality because of its ethnicity. The weak and easily persuaded had indeed succumbed to the blandishments of the sophisticated federation apologists who are so adept at making a wolf look like a sheep. Before long the American Red Cross, under its new and surely more "moderate" leadership, will return to paying its dues and "cooling it" on the issue of granting Magen David Adom the equality justice demands. Those of us who, like Healy, believe that the American Red Cross must represent the best of our nation have lost not just a battle but a war. Oct 30, 2001 DP: If we civilians are on the front line of this new war with terrorism, then shouldn't we be armed' Yes, the terrorists don't fear death, but if we're armed, we can better protect ourselves. If those Christians in Pakhistan who were slaughtered a few days ago had arms, they would've better been able to protect themselves. The Islamic terrorists who opened up fire on an Israeli street a few days ago, they were stopped and shot by armed Israelis. Prager wondered if parents would allow their kids to trick and treat given the latest warnings by the Attorney General of another terror attack. DP said parents should allow. DP says he and his wife Fran agree on almost everything - one of the keys to their good marriage. DP wondered about the passivity of Christians in the face of Christian persecution around the world, including the shooting in Pakhistan. Christians had it worse in the Soviet Gulag than did Jews, yet every synagogue in the US and many other countries had signs up "Save Soviet Jews." Part of the reason that Jews were more active is that Jews are used to being persecuted. Suffering is so remote from the lives of Christians in the West that they don't react to the suffering of their coreligionists. Why Arab/Muslim anti-Semites are worse than the Nazis Dennis Prager writes for Jewish World Review: The most cursory acquaintance with the Arab press and fundamentalist mosque discourse around the world makes it clear that millions of Arabs and Muslims loathe Jews and many want Jews dead. Not to mention the hundreds of millions of Muslims and Arabs who want the one tiny country Jews have ever called their own eliminated from the map. Protests that the Arab/Muslim hostility is directed only at Israeli occupation of that even tinier area known as the West Bank have no basis in reality. The Arab/Muslim world sought Israel's destruction before Israel occupied an inch of the West Bank. We Jews have reasons to worry because the last time a civilization declared such hatred against Jews, what ensued was the most organized and monumental evil in history, the Holocaust. We hoped that Nazi-type hatred would never reappear. But it has. In fact, in two ways, Arab/Muslim anti-Semitism is more frightening. Oct 25, 2001 Dennis Prager took off yesterday from his radio show to lecture in Chicago. It was his first time flying since September 11. He found LAX eerily quiet. At an airport restaurant in Chicago, Prager was denied a knife. No knives anymore in the airport. Martin Luther King's family wants a licensing fee before a statue of him can be erected. The family has done this before with his speeches. The family has done many dishonorable things and besmirches his memory. Windows XP is now available. For $199 you can get ads for all sorts of programs that made deals with Microsoft. According to the LA Times: "There are some annoying aspects to the operating system. Balloons pop up from time to time inviting you to sign up for a Microsoft.net passport account or to sign on to the Windows Messenger service. There are instances--such as making it very "easy" to order prints of digital photos--in which Microsoft tries to direct users to its or its partners' services." Singlemom writes on the Prager List: Why has the pre-eminent brilliance of this and all centuries, the Pragester, posted NOTHING on His website about our national tragedy of September 11 - NOTHING. He continues to sell his crap - books, tapes, Arctic cruise, etc. Gotta ask, just gotta; if Prager has the secret to fixing our broken national moral compass, why doesn't he offer it FOR FREE to the nation now when we need it' What is more important - Prager's income or fixing our broken moral compass' His demand that we pay for his wisdom seems to indicate that he cares more for his bank balance than our country. Would a patriot deny the fix to a country with a broken moral compass' What kind of patriot would ask to be paid for the solution to our nation's moral troubles' |
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