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"Luke Ford reports all of the 'juicy' quotes, and has been doing it for years." (Marc B. Shapiro)
"This guy knows all the gossip, the ins and outs, the lashon hara of the Orthodox world. He’s an [expert] in... all the inner workings of the Orthodox world." (Rabbi Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff) LATEST POSTS:
- Dennis Prager v Cedars-Sinai Lawsuit
- Dennis Prager Through Randall Collins: Interaction Ritual Chains
- What is a ‘Received Idea’?
- Jordan Bardella: The Manufacture of Normality
- Everyone Became Television: Bourdieu’s Warning and the 2026 Iran War
- Marine Le Pen
- The Coalition-Proximity Rule
- Nigel Farage
- Bernard Haykel: A Life Between the Text and the Gun
- Walker Connor (1926-2017)
- Benedict Anderson and the Nation as Imagination
- Anthony D. Smith: The Student Who Kept the Question and Rejected the Answer
- Ernest Gellner
- Eric Kaufmann: The Man Who Made the Majority Visible
- Dominic Cummings: A Biography
- Steve Lopez: The Last City Columnist
- California Historian Kevin Starr
- Stephen Kotkin: A Life in Power
- William T. Vollmann: An American Life in Excess
- Rod Dreher: A Life in Exile
BEST POSTS:
- * The Enlightenment Wasn’t Enlightened (6-23-26)
* Mr. Burge Draws The Line (6-23-26)
* 'Improving on Democracy' (6-17-26)
* People Leak To People Who Are Fun (6-11-26)
* Why Does Australia Produce So Many Great Journalists? (6-11-26)
* Steve Wynn and the Press: Power, Litigation, and the Contest Over Las Vegas (6-3-26)
* Sheldon Adelson and the Journalists (6-3-26)
* The Vigilant Animal: Thinkers Who Reject the Myth of Human Gullibility (6-2-26)
* The Cost of Refusing the Misunderstanding Myth (6-2-26)
* Show Me How It Travels (6-2-26)
* The Norm Explainers (6-2-26)
* Centering Marginalized Voices (6-1-26)
* What would it look like if the Washington Post put its reader first? (6-1-26)
* What would it look like if the Financial Times put its reader first? (6-1-26)
* What It Would Mean for the Los Angeles Times to Put the Reader First? (6-1-26)
* What It Would Mean for The New York Times to Put the Reader First? (6-1-26)
* Why Wembanyama Lives on the Perimeter (5-31-26)
* The Emotional Palettes Of San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco & Sacramento (5-27-26)
* The Administrative Capital: Sacramento Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* San Diego - The Quiet Republic (5-27-26)
* The Quiet Bar: San Diego Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* SF v LA Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* Why Talent Travels Poorly Between San Francisco and Los Angeles (5-27-26)
* San Francisco and Los Angeles as Rival Models of Urban Access (5-27-26)
* Social Cliques in New York, 2026 (5-25-26)
* Social Cliques in San Francisco, 2026 (5-25-26)
* The Rival Courts of Washington (5-25-26)
* The City of Private Rooms (5-25-26)
Category Archives: Book Reviews
Review: ‘God is not One’
It’s easy to say that all religions are one. It’s easy to say that we all believe in the same God. It’s easy to say that we all want to be in Heaven. It’s also false, argues Boston University religion … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews, Christianity, Islam, Judaism
Tagged belief in one god, five pillars, noble eightfold path, seventh day adventism, stephen prothero, university religion professor
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Review: ‘Gaming The World’
In Gaming the World: How Sports Are Reshaping Global Politics And Culture, University of Michigan professors Andrei S. Markovits and Lars Rensmann examine the significance of athletics. “Sports matter,” they write in the book’s first sentence. “They hold a singular … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews, Personal
Tagged andrei s markovits, basketball baseball, leisure time activities, liverpool soccer club, major league baseball, overt racism
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Gaming The World
Here are the three books I’m reading and reviewing for Spectrum Magazine: * The Rebbe: The Life and Afterlife of Menachem Mendel Schneerson (Princeton University Press) * Gaming the World: How Sports Are Reshaping Global Politics and Culture * Eva’s … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews
Tagged global politics, life and afterlife, menachem mendel schneerson, princeton university press, spectrum magazine, stepsister
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Birth Control is Sinful in the Christian Marriages and also Robbing God of Priesthood Children!
Ned Muffin writes on Amazon.com: Despite being written entirely in BLOCK CAPITALS, this self-published work conveys its message elegantly. In fact, you don’t even need to read it to understand the main argument being put forward. True, by avoiding this … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews
Tagged abe lincoln, angel on earth, block capitals, british royal family, hairy eared dwarf lemur, sinister significance
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Dull Books For Yom Kippur
I afflicted my soul on Yom Kippur by reading a couple of very dull, poorly written academic books on Judaism. The first one had the exciting title: Between Redemption and Doom: The Strains of German-Jewish Modernism. I gave up on … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews, Germany, Judaism
Tagged academic books, conversion to judaism, dull books, gideon klein, hebrew prayers, jewish modernism, jewish neighbors, jim zorn, orthodox rabbi, public identity, rabbi robert, reform rabbi, washington redskins, yom kippur
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Fear, Not Hope: Edgar M. Bronfman Publishes Another Book
I read his first two. Big mistake. They were dull. His new book: "Hope, not fear: a path to Jewish renaissance" Why does anyone publish this man? He has nothing to say. Publishers Weekly says: Bronfman, a philanthropist, former World … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews
Tagged edgar m bronfman, gay jews, intermarried jews, jewish renaissance, open tent, world jewish congress
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I’m Not As Bad As Richard Yates
Over Shabbos, I finished Blake Bailey’s superb biography of novelist Richard Yates. I love reading biographies of great writers because I usually find that they share my flaws and yet have done great things. It gives me hope. Yates had … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews, Personal
Tagged biographies of great writers, blake bailey, mental breakdowns, oxygen mask, richard yates, young chick
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Lori Gottlieb Explores Kink
She writes in the Sunday New York Times Book Review: I once dated a man who seemed perfectly normal until the day he asked me to dress up for sex. By “dress up” I don’t mean in lingerie. He asked … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews, Lori Gottlieb, Sex
Tagged daniel bergner, fashion maven, foot fetish, Lori Gottlieb, rsquo, Woody Allen
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‘Against The Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob’
I’m reading this new book by Lee Siegel. It seems like a lot of twaddle. Here’s the incident that led to his book: In September 2006, Siegel was temporarily suspended from The New Republic, after an internal investigation determined he … Continue reading
Posted in Book Reviews
Tagged foundational premise, lee siegel, ralph nader, talk show host, tv talk show, tv talk show host
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