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Fishing for Life’s Big Lessons in the Book of Jonah
As Yom Kippur draws to a close, we read the deceptively simple book of Jonah. Three themes tie this all-too-relevant story together: the emptiness of self-absorption, the possibility that those who have disappointed us can change and the ultimate reality of interdependence. THE EMPTINESS OF SELF-ABSORPTION Why does Jonah flee when called to prophesy against…
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Labor’s Spiral Into Despair
In recent weeks, major American unions in heavy industry — like auto, steel, communications, etc. — have been behaving in a nontraditional fashion. Instead of demanding wage increases, they are accepting wage freezes. Instead of insisting that plant closings by mammoth corporations be a no-no, they have agreed to such closings although that has meant…
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In the Margins: Imagining a ‘Book of Lives’
I have always loved books. By the time I was 16 months old I had learned to name the letters of the alphabet from “Sesame Street.” By the time I was 3, my parents had instituted the Shabbat Book Program to satisfy my voracious appetite for books: Every Saturday morning I — and later my…
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Charity Lays Off Survey Architect
The chief architect of the controversial National Jewish Population Survey, Jim Schwartz, has been laid off by the survey’s sponsor, United Jewish Communities, according to sources close to UJC. The philanthropy announced last week in an internal communication that Schwartz’s position as director of the North American Jewish Data Bank was being eliminated as part…
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Candidates Turn to Clinton Advisers
Who are the top economic advisers of the leading Democratic presidential candidates? Well, naturally enough, many of the same experts who were the top economic advisers of the last Democratic president. The following is a list provided by the top five campaigns. Retired general Wesley Clark: Brookings Institution economist Henry Aaron, former Treasury secretary Robert…
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Double Bassist David Chevan Jazzes Up the Days of Awe
As a young boy growing up in Amherst, Mass., David Chevan was influenced by two towering figures in his life, both new immigrants from Eastern Europe with little in common except their Jewishness and the way in which they expressed it. “I had two grandfathers,” Chevan told the Forward. “One was a devoutly religious Orthodox…
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Russia Must Open Its Archives On Shoah Hero Raoul Wallenberg
Twenty-two years ago this Sunday, Raoul Wallenberg became an honorary citizen of the United States. The honor, though, was truly ours: This extraordinary man helped save tens of thousands of lives, including my wife’s and mine, while working under the direction of the American government. Yet, the full truth about Wallenberg’s own fate remains unknown….
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Dems Divided Over Details on Economy
Voters can be forgiven if they didn’t notice too many differences among the economic policies proposed by the top Democratic presidential candidates at their debate in New York last week. One guy who was once in the candidates’ shoes didn’t notice many differences, either. “I was in 39 debates in 1987-88,” former Massachusetts governor and…
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Still Nourished by a Childhood Feast
The year was 1919. The Russian civil war was raging and our town, Olevsk, was constantly under fire. Regimes changed almost daily between the Bolsheviks and the Ukrainian secessionists under Simon Petlura, whose troops spread terror and mass slaughter among the Jews of the Ukraine. We had to spend most of the time in a…
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Tourists Outnumber Residents In Storied Indian Community
“I feel like an endangered species, like a rhinoceros in a zoo,” Joseph Hallegua said with the faint helplessness of an old patriarchal figure slowly losing control over his domain. The 70-something Hallegua is one of the last Cochin Jews, trying to come to terms with the grim future of his community. On the island…
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CAMPAIGN CONFIDENTIAL
Debate Drama: The reports are in: At the CNBC/Wall Street Journal debate in New York City on September 25, the candidate who took the most punches was the frontrunner, former Vermont governor Howard Dean, and not the newcomer, retired general Wesley Clark. Noticeably missing from the pileup on Dean, however, was Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman,…
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