In his recent essay “The Failure of the American Jewish Establishment,” Peter Beinart laments the disconnect young liberal American Jews feel from Israel and the American organizations that support it (i.e. AIPAC). He argues that Zionist organizations have moved rightward with the Israeli government and have largely shut out liberal dissent: “…by defending virtually anything any Israeli government does, they [...]
Raul Carrillo has a column in today’s Crimson arguing that Democrats need to become better at the “politics of spirituality.” Such exhortations often contain an ambiguity, and Carillo’s is no exception. Is he criticizing liberals on substantive grounds, i.e. for their support for separation of church and state and their “neutral stance on issues of faith”? Or is he just [...]
Shocking new evidence that Obama is secretly a Muslim: he’s hosting a Passover seder at the White House! Seriously though, this Times article about the Obama Seder warms my young Jewish heart. Like most holiday celebrations done well, theirs has nothing to with politics and little to do with religion; it’s just extremely sweet: Then came what is now remembered [...]
Vice-President Joe Biden’s recent visit to Israel to jump-start peace talks seemed like good news, until he was met with an announcement from Israel’s Interior Ministry that it had authorized the construction of another 1,600 homes in occupied East Jerusalem. In my opinion, this highlights an incredible paradox of American foreign policy: how America’s unquestioning support for the state of [...]
I’m not always wild about The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, but I think he has a very perceptive post about Israel’s relationship with the United States. He points out that the ultra-conservative governments that have been in power lately have been doing their best to alienate their potential American supporters, particularly young American Jews. Namely, that actions like Gaza or their [...]
Check out Jon Yip’s post, “The Asian Ceiling” for a review of a Kara Miller’s Boston Globe editorial about Asian discrimination in the college admission process. Asians are the new Jews, Miller explains: In a country built on individual liberty and promise, that feels deeply unfair. If a teenager spends much time studying, excels at an instrument or sport, and [...]
Today's colleges welcome Asians with open arms—they just don't want too many of us
For an allegedly “grotesque” (but, thankfully, “innocuous”) confusion, Sam Barr’s equation of liberty and equally is pretty well-founded empirically. Think about the history of America. Think about the struggle to integrate non-land-owners, Catholics, Jews, women, blacks and now gays. Surely, as Sam notes, all this expanded both liberty and equality at once. One way to understand the relationship between liberty [...]
