BOLD like a Leopard

To look at the cover of JFREJ's "Racial Justice Haggadah" one would think that the story of the deliverance from Egypt takes place between 1960 and 2015, and that no Jews were involved. In the previous installment I sought to discuss how Bernie Sanders' personal philosophy places him at such a conflict traditional Jewish thought that calling him a representative of the Jewish people would be a distortion of that concept. Sanders has in many ways sought to reduce his Jewish heritage as an element of both his personality and his ideas. Like Kamala Harris among many black voters, he is able to act and behave like one of the them, yet his record in office, policies, and public statements show that his priorities lay elsewhere. This is a free personal choice, but it has not deterred fans of his from using him as the standard bearer of all of us. Here are some examples: Like with every candidate there was a Jews for Bernie forum created during his 2016 run and ...

It's pretty well-known that in conservative circles the topic of identity politics today is considered to be a distraction and an element of grievance culture. Discussing a political issue within the prism of a specific ethnic, religious, racial, or sexual minority is taken to be a position of weakness. But the fact is that people do want to talk about race, religion, gender, and sex and it's an easy marsh to wade into in the current climate of culture wars. Conservatives like to believe they don't care about identity politics, because they see it as beneath their level of debate. So with that let's take a quick dip in the stink pit that Bernie Sanders and his progressive movement use as their natural habitat - identity politics and victimhood as a virtue. Let me first say that even though I'm Jewish my votes do not go to candidates based on their being Jewish or not, nor for that matter regarding their attitudes towards Jews. The last few candidates that I...

The year was 2008 and for many Americans an economic meltdown, the War in Iraq, and the waning failing days of the Bush Administration had spawned a feeling that change was needed. But for me, at the time a struggling engineering student at the Technion’s pre-academic program, the idea that voting would change that wasn’t even in my mind. I’d moved to Israel four years before, served in the army, and didn’t vote in my first eligible American election.  Leaving the USA I’d pretty much come to the conclusion that the American political system was dominated by two hogs wrestling over corn cob.   But the truth was that by 2008-09 I had also become fatigued and culturally alienated despite being from an extended family largely made up of Israelis. I was living in the Hadar neighbourhood of Haifa, a warren of dilapidated early 20th century Bauhaus homes populated by a population of the city’s poorest, heroin addicts and alcoholics, elderly Russian immigrants, and Filipino ...

The Three Musketeer s   as Reinterpreted by Tara Subtle Tingler We join our brave D’Artagnan in the midst of his meeting with the Duke of Buckingham (Ch. 21). All of the previous chapters are victim-shaming colonialist apologies. D’Artagnan blushed up to the whites of his eyes. He saw that the duke was searching for a means of making him accept something and the idea that the blood of his friends and himself was about to be paid for with English gold was strangely repugnant to him. “Let us understand each other, my Lord,” replied d’Artagnan, “and let us make things clear beforehand in order that there may be no mistake. I am in the service of the King and Queen of France, and form part of the company of Monsieur Dessessart, who, as well as his brother-in-law, Monsieur de Treville, is particularly attached to their Majesties. What I have done, then, has been for the queen, and not at all for your Grace. And still further, it is very probable I should not have don...