Letters posted here are associated with the following Salon Premium Member:

Derbig Mooser

Published Letters: 4402

Sunday, April 20, 2008 06:36 PM

@ bystander

Why, thanks for the compliment! But I won't have to convince them of anything.

Soon as Obama is elected Repubs will be growing their hair, wearing tie-dyed T-shirts and carrying "peace" signs.

"But, but" you will ask, "what of the threat of Al Qaeda?"

"Oh, them" the "military analysts" will reply, "we beat them completely by, oh, November of 2008. Obama is only trying to latch on to our success! Or worse, trying to get our boys involved in a quagmire!"

They will all be singing that old Freda Payne song.

The War On Iraq is to be used for the benefit of Repugs only! If a Dem touches it, he (or she, Hillary) they'll get burned.

Obama, I hope, knows this. If not, it will be brought home to him the first week after he wins, as I hope he does.

I hope like hell it isn't the Dems who will end up saying "Give war a chance"!

Sunday, April 20, 2008 07:37 PM

@Aycharach

Soldiers are humans first before they are soldiers and this is just the way humans operate.

Ah, I see. Enlisted men have to sacrifice their lives, without question. That's not the way humans operate. Their oath, and their obligation to their team members, cause them to act in a most un-human manner.

But when Officers betray their obligation to the truth and their country for money, well "this is just the way humans operate".

I never before realised just how superior superior Officers are. Those enlisted men, why they're hardly even human.

But Officers, well, they achieve their full human potential, along with its little foibles. After all, its human to err.

Monday, April 21, 2008 07:58 AM

So Nu, So Sioux

I know what my Aunt Helen would have told Kristol:

Az mir vill schlugen a hunt, gifintmin a schtecken!

Monday, April 21, 2008 08:03 AM

@Celery

You spent time at a Kibbutz? Perhaps you can comment on a particular pet peeve of mine, the "Palestinian Demographic Time Bomb".

I have always maintained that the fact that Israelis breed so slowly is a problem which can be laid at the feet of the closed thighs of Israeli women.

If those girls don't put out, Israel will have to give in!

Someone has got to inform Israelis that their salvation lies either in polygamy, or state sponsored wanton promiscuity.

Monday, April 21, 2008 12:43 PM

@electro robot

I've seen Rabbis have sermons that had zero to do with Days of Awe from everything having to do with their vacation to some concert they went to. This is why Rabbis are contractual employees of the shul, So you can fire them.

Electro Robot

And, BTW, a Rabbi is nothing like the Priests of the Old Testament. Not even close. For example, no Rabbi, from any Rabbinical College is rated to handle burnt offerings, not so much as a dove. If you threw a ram at these Rabbis, they'd be totally verklempt. They would totally not be back in a trice, ram all butchered and smoking on the alter, blowin' wild and crazy on their new shofar! Nope, amatuers, all of 'em.

It's always best to remind them of their contractual obligations, lest they get above themselves.

Monday, April 21, 2008 01:04 PM

@-- Armagednoutahere

You can read all about it in the Old Testament. God gave some land, the Land of Canaan as a matter of fact, to the Jews.

Hold on, not so fast. As I understand the story, by the time we got around to the Second Temple or after, He got so disgusted with us, that He cancelled the deal. In fact, I heard a terrible rumor which said He told everyone the Jews would just have to be a religion like everybody else, and not a state anymore, on account of we wouldn't stop adulterating and whoring after false gods an' stuff.

Monday, April 21, 2008 01:10 PM

@the 5thW

"tiny minority of cowardly nerds"

For extra versimilitude, of which you always want a surfeit, call them nebbishes or maybe nudniks.

You can also use those terms if you're dressing down the Rabbi for faulty ideology, or maybe call him a schmendrick.

Monday, April 21, 2008 01:19 PM

Burnt Offerings

We call that BBQ here--and it is a form of religion, come to think of it.

I myself have spent many hours praying and sacrificing to the great kettle god, who's name is - Weber.

Monday, April 21, 2008 01:25 PM

Oy Gevalt!

I almost forgot to recommend the best blog on Zionist issues "Jews Sans Frontieres" at:

http://jewssansfrontieres.blogspot.com/

Or click my name, if you can bring yourself to do that. C'mon, it won't bite you.

Monday, April 21, 2008 01:40 PM

@Electro Robot

Quick, my little Robotila, call the Anti-Defamation league of the B'nai Brith! Don't waste a moment. Remember: Az mir vill schlugen a hunt, gifintmin a schtecken! and you've got an entire tree here, macher.

Monday, April 21, 2008 02:15 PM

@pedinska

I'm by no means a mayven How's by you?

And it's a sin and a shame, really. I had a Mom who was pretty good at Yiddish, but also some relatives both fluent and literate in Yiddish,and involved in trying to keep the tongue alive. But did I, nudnik and hoodnik such as I was, steep myself in it? How I wish I had hung on to every word.

Funny part tho, we lived out in the burbs, and when my Mom was talking on the phone to friends or relatives, she would drop into Yiddish as a sort of liguistic "V-chip", so I wouldn't know from her talking about things from which I shouldn't know.

This prevented me from learning the facts of adult life in an apropriate way. And my Mom never could understand why! "But you must have heard me when I was on the phone to your Aunt---" she would say.

Monday, April 21, 2008 02:21 PM

@WT

I was out this lunch-time registering high-school kids.

Oh god that's nice to hear!

But dial back the charm a little. Young girls are so impressionable, and that way lies madness!

Monday, April 21, 2008 02:26 PM

"Israel's fundamental right to exist."

Watch that phrase, folks. It's oilier than a side of Novy, and if you examine it, you'll find it's not Kosher either.

Would you mind completeing that phrase, lestoil? Isn't it usually "right to exist as a Jewish State"?

I meant the phrase, the Novy is, of course glat.

Most Active Letters Threads

530

Do Obama officials know what his Afghanistan plan is?

What explains the completely contradictory statements from key aides on a central plank of the war strategy?
254

A new report questions "suicides" at Guantanamo

Why is the Obama DOJ attempting to block judicial review of three highly suspicious deaths?
222

I live in a van down by Duke University

How do I afford grad school without going into debt? A '94 Econoline, bulk food and creative civil disobedience
128

Is my kids making me not smart?

Stay-at-home fatherhood dulls my intellect to a nub. Excuse me while I ponder the subtext of "Hippos Go Berserk"
126

Trig, the anti-abortion straw baby

Sarah Palin's son is being used to demonize pro-choicers

View all »

Letters Help

Currently in Salon