Next week, I'll start attending another Chabad-led series of weekly classes from the Jewish learning Institute. This one is called You Be The Judge. The topics that will be discussed are the enforceability (or not) of immoral contracts, what should happen when objects are abandoned and how do we distinguish creative opportunity from crass opportunism, among another things.

I made a decision earlier this year that Chabad won't be my synagogue of choice, but these educational opportunities to delve into Jewish texts just aren't offered in the Conservative movement and I'm happy to support them.

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I splurged on a bracelet for my wife's birthday tomorrow. I know she won't be happy about the money I spent because we're looking at some big expenses in the near future and my long-term job situation is a little shaky, but dammit she deserves something nice.

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That a Rabbi of a New York City synagogue can be this unaware of the Arab/Muslim position on Israel is frightening and goes a long way towards explaining why there is still a "peace camp" in the Jewish community.

Muslim-Jewish Dialogue Hits Unbreachable Wall

In soaring rhetoric, host Rabbi Marc Schneier of the New York Synagogue and Imam Omar Abu Namous of the Islamic Cultural Center urged that Jews and Muslims should put aside conflicts and reach out to each other.

But after Rabbi Schneier and moderator Joel Cohen pressed him on why more Muslims don’t speak out against Islamic extremism, Abu Namous, leader of New York’s largest mosque, unleashed a barrage of criticisms against Israel, at one point even questioning its legitimacy.

“It demonstrated how far apart we are and opened my eyes to the reality that we have a long way to go,” Rabbi Schneier said after the event.

This is the same imam who was fired as a chaplain to the NY Fire Department after he said that he tended to believe theories that the September 11 attacks were a conspiracy designed to further US interests. 

And here's the usual well-written piece by David Harris of the American Jewish Committee regarding Israel and the situation in Gaza.

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From the Jewish Press of all places, something for Democrats to do when they're watching the election returns next week.  It's Sudoku, just use the letters in the word DEMOCRATS instead of the numbers 1-9.

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I didn't know about this - I join the ADL in condemning a group of Jewish teens who were arrested for beating up a Pakistani man in Brooklyn the other day.  Assholes.  There's WABC video here, although I don't know how long it will be up.  I have to admit though that it seems odd to me that a huge group of Jewish kids would beat up an older, non-religious Pakistani guy in a mixed neighborhood just for the hell of it.

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I had no idea Red Auerbach was Jewish. Not that I thought of him as anything else, I just didn't know.

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Tomorrow I'll be seeing Rabbi Daniel Gordis speak.  he's the author of some really great reads such as "If A Place Can Make You Cry" at my girls' school tomorrow at lunchtime.  That and the fact that it's the wife's birthday mean I'm taking the day off.  Dinner tomorrow night at Maggiano's after services - can't wait to sample the pickings from their fall harvest menu.