Benjamin Kerstein: House Jew, Field Jew (MUST READ)
Mr. Beinart will forgive us, I hope, for choosing not to suffer peacefully. Most of us, however ethically problematic he may find it, believe that the answer to his question is fairly simple: It is good for the Jews to have power; we are glad we have it; and our primary responsibility is to maintain it and, if necessary, expand it.
And there is a good reason many of us feel that way. Despite stereotypes to the contrary, many of us didn’t go to Ivy League schools; we didn’t have family connections to the worlds of academia or the arts; we didn’t have the money or time to enjoy unpaid internships at the New Republic; we must have been absent the day the Rhodes scholarships were given out. Some of us had to make our way on our own merits, and the support and strength given us by other Jews along the way was and is more important to us than belonging to a club that wouldn’t have us as a member without foregoing such support and strength. We have little trust in the kindness of gentiles because we have rarely enjoyed it. We are the field Jews whose ancestors decided, at long last, that a piece of the field was going to be theirs: a testimony to their labors and their sufferings.
It is possible, of course, that Mr. Beinart will choose to leave the house and come out into the fields, where life is less comfortable but also warmer and vastly superior in its fecundity. But if not, I feel the sorriest for him. Because sooner or later, the Arabs will commit yet another in their long line of heinous atrocities, too heinous to be either ignored or explained away, and Beinart and others like him will be given a choice: Are you a Jew, or are you one of us? In other words, collaborate or be purged. However that little scenario plays itself out, it won’t be pretty.
The rest of us, however, may not even notice. We will be too busy, I imagine, tilling the fields.
FP: Compare the knowledge and ability to reason of most critics of Beinart, with the ignorance and flawed logic of his screeds.
Jonathan Tobin: Failed Middle East Theories? Look in the Mirror, Tom Friedman
But in endorsing this [Hanson’s] sobering judgment, Friedman fails to note that he has served for the last 20 years as a faithful advocate for the sort of foreign policy “realism” that he criticizes. Nor does he have the guts to point out that his best-selling “flat earth” theories about how economic concerns will trump those of religion and nationalism in the 21st century have been shown to be as laughably out of touch with the reality of the Middle East as any other.
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Even worse, in summarizing our refusal to “tell the truth” to countries in the Middle East, he makes the following generalizations:
But we don’t tell Pakistan the truth because it has nukes. We don’t tell the Saudis the truth because we’re addicted to their oil. We don’t tell Bahrain the truth because we need its naval base. We don’t tell Egypt the truth because we’re afraid it will walk from Camp David. We don’t tell Israel the truth because it has votes. And we don’t tell Karzai the truth because Obama is afraid John McCain will call him a wimp.
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In adding Israel to that list, Friedman once again slips in offensive language that is redolent of the Walt-Mearsheimer conspiracy theories about The Israel Lobby. In December, Friedman earned the scorn of the Jewish world for falsely claiming that the Congressional ovations for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were “bought and paid for by the Israel lobby.” Here, he seems to be repeating that anti-Semitic slur by alleging that the votes of the pro-Israel community — a vast bi-partisan force that encompasses the overwhelming majority of all Americans — has prevented the U.S. from placing enough pressure on the Jewish state.
FP: Another Jewish useful idiot. Do you still believe his claim that he “just used the wrong term” in his previous anti-Semitic trope?
Do college professors work hard enough?
Not changed, however, are the accommodations designed to compensate for low pay in earlier times. Though faculty salaries now mirror those of most upper-middle-class Americans working 40 hours for 50 weeks, they continue to pay for teaching time of nine to 15 hours per week for 30 weeks, making possible a month-long winter break, a week off in the spring and a summer vacation from mid-May until September.
Such a schedule may be appropriate in research universities where standards for faculty employment are exceptionally high -- and are based on the premise that critically important work, along with research-driven teaching, can best be performed outside the classroom. The faculties of research universities are at the center of America's progress in intellectual, technological and scientific pursuits, and there should be no quarrel with their financial rewards or schedules. In fact, they often work hours well beyond those of average non-academic professionals.
Unfortunately, the salaries and the workloads applied to the highest echelons of faculty have been grafted onto colleges whose primary mission is teaching, not research. These include many state colleges, virtually all community colleges and hundreds of private institutions. For example, Maryland's Montgomery College (an excellent two-year community college) reports its average full professor's salary as $88,000, based on a workload of 15 hours of teaching for 30 weeks. Faculty members are also expected to keep office hours for three hours a week. The faculty handbook states: "Teaching and closely related activities are the primary responsibilities of instructional faculty." While the handbook suggests other responsibilities such as curriculum development, service on committees and community outreach, notably absent from this list are research and scholarship.
FP: A vast majority of Western colleges and universities are crap. They have substituted education—the intellectual development via knowledge and ability to reason critically and independently—with vocational employment training and ideological indoctrination, mostly leftism. A huge number of academics are neither willing nor capable of anything else, a major factor in Western decline.
Obama squeezes N. Korea to change, China to help
Warning North Korea from its doorstep, President Barack Obama said Pyongyang risks deepening its isolation in the international community if it proceeds with a planned long-range rocket launch.
"North Korea will achieve nothing by threats or provocations," Obama said during a news conference Sunday in Seoul, South Korea, where he was to attend a nuclear security summit.
FP: Squeezes??? Begs pathetically. Another example of the upside down media, covering up for Obama’s incompetence and failures.
Fears of Anti-Semitism - More and More French Jews Emigrating to Israel
More and more French Jews are buying homes in Israel amid fears of rising anti-Semitism in France. Many complain of being harrassed in public and feel the country is no longer a safe place to raise their children. In the wake of the Toulouse attacks, the wave of emigration is only likely to increase.
Many must have been reminded of the treatment of Jews under the Third Reich. Shortly after the attack on a Jewish school in the southern French city of Toulouse on Monday, school principals in the city walked into classrooms and asked the Jewish pupils to come forward. "We ask you to leave the class and join the other Jewish children, who are in a locked and safe location."
It was intended as a precaution in response to a request from the Jewish community. But it also highlights the degree to which many Jews in France feel that they are a threatened and increasingly excluded minority. Every year, these feelings prompt thousands to take a dramatic decision, namely, to pack their belongings and move to a crisis zone: Israel. They feel safer there.
FP: I rest my case. Note to Beinart: Pay attention and don’t delude yourself that anti-Zionism will save your “good Jews” ass.
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