Yesterday’s News Tomorrow

Check out this blog post by Brad A. Greenberg. Note how he’s already written the article that will appear in Thursday’s Jewish Journal but the Journal, in its infinite wisdom, won’t publish it until tomorrow. Why isn’t the Journal publishing its pieces as soon as they are edited and fit for publication? Because it is a lazy monopoly newspaper that still doesn’t get the web. I guess they fear cannibalizing their print readership if they give stuff away online in advance of the print run.

When I look out at Jewish Los Angeles, I see thousands of Jews who want their news when it happens.

By the waters of the Los Angeles River, there we sat down and wept when we remembered the news. On the willows there we hung up our lyres. For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. How shall we sing the LORD’s song in a strange land?

If I forget thee, O news, let my right hand wither, let my tongue cleave to my palate if I do not remember you, if I do not set you above my highest joy. Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem! Praise your God, O Zion!

Greenberg writes:

Karl Rove and the politics of religion

Last spring, Karl Rove was outed by atheist superstar Christopher Hitchens as a fellow nonbeliever.

"He doesn’t shout it from the rooftops, but when asked, he answers quite honestly. I think the way he puts it is, "I’m not fortunate enough to be a person of faith."

But last night Rove told me he is in fact a religious person, though he didn’t specify how his Christian roots manifest themselves in his life.

Rove was in Los Angeles to speak at the Gibson Ampitheatre, one of a number of distinguished voices in this year’s Public Lecture Series by American Jewish University. His invitation had caused a bit of consternation in the Jewish community, but he quickly won over many of his skeptics, which I wrote about in an article that will be online Thursday.

"I spent part of my childhood in Utah," Rove said at a VIP dinner before the lecture. "I went to a high school that is 95 percent Mormon, and only in Utah could a Presbyterian and a Jew both be gentiles."

Regardless of his own beliefs, Rove, who left his post as chief adviser to President Bush in August, was instrumental in helping Bush monopolize the support of evangelical voters and making religious rhetoric an essential part of presidential campaigns, something we are seeing plenty of this year.

About Luke Ford

I've written five books (see Amazon.com). My work has been covered in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and on 60 Minutes. I teach Alexander Technique in Beverly Hills (Alexander90210.com).
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