“Enough is enough.” US District Judge T.S. Ellis III, the judge in Paul Manafort’s highly publicized criminal trial, has been expressing frustration regarding the angle prosecutors have taken with their case. Federal prosecutors have chosen to stress to the jurors Manafort’s wildly lavish lifestyle, fixating on his extravagant purchases. These range from silk rugs to…
Throughout the Tanach, God models extraordinary behavior and spotlights key virtues for the benefit of humankind, simultaneously sparing us pain and setting an example worth following. In fact, from the very first interaction with man, God establishes a precedent for acting and reacting with patience and compassion, and emphasizes the importance of living a life…
A version of this article originally appeared in the Texas Jewish Post. I think we can all relate to the challenge of overcoming the lure of instant gratification. Whether it’s the magnetic pull of the glazed doughnut, the couch or a forbidden act, exercising self-control is one of the greatest challenges of life. And generally,…
What message of Tisha B’Av is relevant for life in a sovereign state like Israel? Does the American recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel make the day of mourning for “the city that is in mourning, laid waste, despised and desolate” an anachronism? Generations of rabbis and scholars have endeavored to understand the…
Since President Trump was elected, I’ve taken to the streets of Washington, D.C. more times than I can count to protest the administration’s policies and the people stripping women, immigrants and marginalized communities of the rights that progressives spent decades fighting for. Each protest has been marked by a different call to action — but,…
In the early hours of the fourth of July, “Harry Potter” scribe JK Rowling took to Twitter to denounce the Trump administration’s family separation policies and resulting decisions to force toddlers as young as three years old to represent themselves in court. It’s so awful we could laugh. Or drink. But Rowling, who 4,224 pages…
It is both shocking and predictable that in such a turbulent week, one of the most depressing, cynical, Holocaust-referencing articles of the week was written by a rabbi about the state of progressive Judaism. In his article “Paying the Price for Abandoning Jewish Peoplehood,” Rabbi Clifford Librach gleefully skewers Reform Judaism with one hand while…
Speaking at a conference in Tel Aviv on Wednesday, the president’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani aired his thoughts on porn stars and other sex workers. “Someone who sells his or her body for money has no good name,” the former New York City mayor told the conference. Any woman who “sell[s] her body for sexual…
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