Obama - who is he? II

LATimes - Peter Nicholas wrote:

[...] For the last year and a half I've covered the presidentialrace, focusing first on Hillary Clinton, then moving over to Obama.

AfterClinton's defeat in the Iowa caucuses, she decided she needed anemergency reinvention. She began mixing with reporters, sipping a glassof wine late at night in the aisle of her campaign plane andunburdening herself about the state of the race. As her prospectsdimmed, her accessibility grew. Sometimes she was off the record, butyou can't say she wasn't fun.

Not so with Obama. One of thestriking ironies is that a man who draws tens of thousands of people tohis rallies, whose charisma is likened to that of John F. Kennedy, canbe sort of a bore.

Discipline is essential for candidates whowant to drive home a consistent message, or avoid the self-sabotagethat comes with a careless answer. A steely perseverance helps explainwhy Obama at this point stands a better than even chance of becomingthe 44th president. But when you're exposed to the guy 18 hours a day,it's a bit maddening. You want him to loosen up.

I've watchedObama demonstrate a soccer kick to his daughter in Chicago; devour acheesesteak in Philly; navigate a roller rink in Indiana; drive abumper car; and catapult 125 feet in the air on an amusement-park ridecalled "Big Ben." He's done it all with dogged professionalism, butwith little show of spontaneity. After all this time with him, I stillcan't say with certainty who he is.

A couple of images from the long campaign stay with me.

Onewas watching Obama enter an apartment building near his Chicago homefor a morning workout. He wore dark sweats, a gray T-shirt and abaseball cap pulled low over his forehead. In those few seconds it tookhim to walk from the car to the building, with his head down, thin andsolitary, he looked nothing like the adored politician presiding overrallies. It was a reminder that behind the hype and the TV ads is thisone rather vulnerable-looking guy. And in that moment came thequestion: Is he really ready to take over the toughest job on theplanet?

The other was a hot summer afternoon in Iowa. Obamawas flipping burgers at a backyard barbecue, in what the campaign hopedwould be an exquisite photo opportunity. A fly began circling his head.Then more flies. Pretty soon flies were swarming him, the burgers --everything. It was awful to watch. But in rhythmic fashion he beganwaving them off with his hand. He scooped up the burgers and headedback to the picnic table, as if nothing had gone wrong. That smallepisode told me something about Obama's temperament. I would havewanted to fling the grill over the fence in frustration.

Both impressions came from a distance. A cordon of aides ensures nothing more intimate is available to the traveling press. [...]

First Clinton, then John McCain made the argument that Obama is someonewe don't really know. Obama's supporters counter that we have hisrecord in the U.S. and Illinois senates, two memoirs that reveal hisinner thinking and a vast trove of public speaking. Ironically, thoseof us who were sent out to take his measure in person can't offer muchhelp in answering who he is, or if he is ready. The barriers set inplace between us and him were just too great.

Obama - wealth redistribution bombshell

Michelle Malkin reports:

The blogosphere is buzzing about this video posted on YouTube Sunday night. It’s Barack Obama musing about how best to redistribute wealth in America in a Chicago Public Radio interview in 2001.

Not whether, but how: Through the courts or through legislation?

A caller asks The One to explain how he would do “reparative economic work.” Obama gives the legislative route two thumbs up as his preferred method of “breaking free of the constraints” placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution and then burbles about cobbling together the “actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change.”

Joe The Plumber, you barely scratched the surface:

Obama said the following:

If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court. I think where it succeeded was to invest formal rights in previously dispossessed people, so that now I would have the right to vote. I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and order as long as I could pay for it I’d be o.k. But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society. To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf, and that hasn’t shifted and one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused I think there was a tendancy to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that.

Israelis return - American dream shattered

YNet reported:

Global financial crisis prompts thousands of Israelis living abroad to return to Jewish state. Immigrant Absorption Ministry foresees 15,000 homecomings by end of 2009

The silver lining: The global financial crisis hitting world markets seems to have one favorable effect as far as is Israel concerned, as thousands of Israelis who have been living abroad for the past few years head back to their homeland.

According to the Immigrant Absorption Ministry, some 15,000 Israelis are expected to return to the Jewish state by the end of 2009.

The ministry launched a campaign encouraging Israelis living abroad to do just that in August of 2007, as part of the nation's 60th anniversary celebrations, offering a NIS 100 million (about $24 million) incentives package.

"The last few weeks have been crazy," Tali Naveh, who heads New York's Israel House, which tends to New York-based Israelis who wish to return, told Yedioth Ahronoth. "The phone has been ringing off the hook, and not just here, in all of out 10 centers on North America. People here have their American dream shattered."

Some 2,000 Israelis have returned home between August and mid October alone – a 50% rise from the same time last year.[...]

Child abuse - Valas case

YNet reported:

Knesset Member and Jerusalem mayoral hopeful Meir Porush testified Monday before the Jerusalem District Court, on behalf of Israel Valas, an ultra-Orthodox man convicted of killing his three-month-old son.

Porush, along with several other prominent figures in the ultra-Orthodox community, was a character witnessed for the defense, which is trying to convince the court to order a light sentence.

Valas, who was convicted of manslaughter in July, was arrested in April on 2006 on suspicion of abusing and subsequently killing his infant son. His arrest sparked

The defense denied any wrongdoing on Valas' part, but according to doctors' testimony, the baby presented with severe signs cerebral edema, which could only have been caused by someone forcibly shaking him.

"The defendant is a good man, I can't say a bad word about him," said Porush, adding that he was "marked for great things" within the ultra-Orthodox community.

Porush told the court that he has been acquainted with Valas and his family for six years, and that Valas was one of the "finest yeshiva boys" he had ever encountered. Another character witness for the defense was former MK and religious radio personality Israel Eichler. The latter testified he has been helping the family since the young patriarch's arrest, and warned that should he face prison time, it might "bring about the home's destruction and bring about a destruction of the Second Temple."

Other character witnesses included Menachem Porush, MK Porush's father who was a Knesset member for 35 years, and Rabbi Ben-Zion Gutfarb, who heads Valas' alma mater – the Matmidim Yeshiva.

Obama - who is he?

NYTimes reports:
[...]

But in the Oval Office, Mr. Obama would have a new set of deficits.Just 47 years old and only four years into a national political career,he has never run anything larger than his campaign. He began his run for president while he was still getting lost in Washington, a city he does not yet know well. His promises are as vast as his résumé is short, and some of his pledges are competing ones: progressive rule and centrist red-blue fusion; wholesale transformation and down-to-earth pragmatism.

Mr. Obama’s ambition and confidence have long confounded critics and annoyed rivals. In 2006, the still-new United States senator appeared before Washington’s elite at the spring dinner of the storied Gridiron Club, and as tradition dictated, roasted himself. He ticked off the evidence of his popularity: the Democratic convention speech that had won him national celebrity, the best-selling books, the magazine covers.

“Really, what else is there to do?” he said in mock innocence. “Well, I guess I could pass a law or something.”

He passed a few. By the end of the year, he was running for president.[...]

There is little Mr. Obama has controlled more tightly than his own story and message. Just as he was planning his entry into politics, he used “Dreams From My Father” to cast his peripatetic, confusing childhood into a lyrical journey. When he was elected to the United States Senatein 2004, Mr. Obama wrote his second book, “The Audacity of Hope,”laying out his political philosophy. It meant getting only three or four hours of sleep at night, his editor said, but he insisted on writing the entire thing himself’. (He not only read policy books to prepare, but also some of the articles cited in their footnotes.) For his presidential campaign speechwriter, he chose a 26-year-old who describes his job as channeling the thoughts of a boss who already knows what he wants to say.[...]

US attacks Syria - 8 dead

JPost reported:

Syria called the US attack within its borders on Sunday evening a heinous crime and a statement issued by Damascus said the country was reserving the right to respond as it would see fit. Damascus claimed that the four US helicopters that entered Syria attacked an "agricultural farm," Israel Radio reported.

Syrian ambassador to Britain Sami Al Khiyami said he was convinced the US was hunting for terrorists based on false intelligence.

At least eight people were killed when US military helicopters bombed targets in a Syrian border town near Iraq after global jihad operatives allegedly crossed the border into Syria.

The attack, which was not confirmed by the US military, was the first-ever reported American strike on Syria, which called it a"serious aggression."

Iran also condemned the raid, saying on Monday that theviolation of the territorial integrity of any sovereign state was unacceptable.

Israeli defense officials said the incident was not connectedto Israel and confirmed that the American troops had been chasing global jihad suspects in Iraq.

The helicopters then crossed into Syria in pursuit of the terrorists.[...]

A US official, in confirming the raid, said the attack targeted elements of a robust foreign fighter logistics network and that due to Syrian inaction the US was now "taking matters into our own hands."

The US military official said the special forces raid targeted elements of a network that sends fighters from North Africa and elsewhere in the Middle East to Syria, where elements of the Syrian military are in league with al-Qaida and other fighters. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the political sensitivity of cross-border raids.

Syria's Foreign Ministry said it summoned the charges d'affaires of the United States and Iraq to protest the strike.[...]

Obama - Close relationship to ex PLO member

L.A. Times sits on video of Obama toasting radical Jew-basher

By Michelle Malkin • October 25, 2008 11:14 PM

Jim Hoft has the story on the damning video of Barack Obama that the L.A. Times refuses to release.

Writes Jim: “It’s hard to imagine that the LA Times would hold on to a video of Sarah Palin praising an anti-Semitic radical and former PLOoperative…”

Exactly. Guess the reporter doesn’t want to open himself up to the Joe the Plumber treatment.

Akko Yeshiva burnt

YNet reports:

Mass prayer to be held in Akko yeshiva

The Akko police authorised a mass prayer to be held Sunday evening near the Hesder yeshiva that was set on fire over night.

 

Some 400 people are expected to take part in the prayer, and some additional 150 police officers will be patroling the city over the next 24 hours.

Child Abuse - Tzemach Tzedek/ Dr. Klafter comments

The Tzemach Tzedek - the third Lubavitcher Rebbe wrote one of the first teshuvos regarding child abuse. It was included in a list of citation sent to me by jewishwhistleblower from a footnote #33 - by Prof. Marc Shapiro. [New link] The translation is that of Prof. Shapiro. I asked the psychiatrist Dr. Nachum Klafter - who is very familiar with the issue of child abuse as well as the Torah sources - how he understood this teshuva. He has given me permission to post part of his response. He raises a very critical issue regarding child abuse - to what degree is it necessary for poskim to consult with experts in the field? I recently asked a posek why the issue of child abuse is being handled differently now than it was a few years ago. He replied that the poskim are now becoming more informed of the seriousness of the harm to the child.

R. Menachem Mendel Schneersohn (the third Lubavitcher Rebbe) in Tzemah Tzedek, Yoreh Deah, #237, was asked the following question:

A rabbi was playing with a young man on Purim and stuck his hands into the pants of the youth. The rabbi claimed that he did so because he was unable to perform sexually. He thought that this was due to his small testicles and he wanted to see if he was unusual in this regard. In other words, the rabbi was conducting a medical examination on the boy. The Tzemah Tzedek decided that the rabbi should not be removed from his position, as he provided a good explanation for his behavior.

The Chabad web site has the Hebrew original

צמח צדק (סימן רלז): לשו"ע סי' רמ"ו וסי' של"ד סמ"ב. ע"ד החשד שהיה על ההמ"צ דמחניכם ששחק עם נער א' בפורים והכניס ידו לתוך מכנסים של הנער אך נותן אמתלא ע"ז כי [הוא] חשוכי בנים מפני שאין לו ג"א מצד שהביצים שלו קטנים ביותר. ולכן רצה לידע אם כמ"כ הם אצל שארי אנשים:

הנה בירושלמי הביאו בב"י סס"י של"ד ובכ"מ פ"ז מהת"ת זקן שסרח אין מורידין אותו מגדולתו. לפ"ז מ"ש בש"ס שלנו במ"ק (די"ז) הכבד ושב בביתך. אין ר"ל להורידו מגדולתו כלל. והנה צ"ל דהפוסקים פסקו כר"ל דאמר ת"ח שסרח אין מנדין אותו כו'. ופסקו ג"כ כרב יהודה דשמתי' לההוא צורבא מרבנן דהוי סאני שומעני'. ושניהם במ"ק שם. והרי הם זה לעומת זה. הן אמת מדברי הרמב"ם נ' דהחילוק כך דפוסק כרב יהודה כמ"ש בפ"ו מהת"ת בסופו וז"ל חכם ששמועתו רעה ומ"ש רפ"ז מהת"ת אין מנדין היינו דוקא חכם זקן מופלג או אב"ד כו'. וכן מצאתי בב"י סי' של"ד שחילק בכה"ג בד"ה ומ"ש וכן כל ת"ח כו'. אך בטור שם משמע דמחלק בענין אחר והוא דרב יהודה מיירי בסני שומעני' דהיינו מתביישים משמועתו וזה גרע טפי מפני דה"ל חילול השם וכדאיתא ביומא דפ"ו. ומעתה בנד"ז י"ל דה"ל חילול השם. ויש להחמיר להרא"ש. אבל לפ"ד הרמב"ם כיון דהוא כמו אב"ד בעירו וראש העיר אין להעבירו כו'. ועיין בתשו' שער אפרים סי' ס"ד ס"ה. אך בנ"ד שנותן אמתלא טובה על הדבר י"ל דלכ"ע אין להעבירו כלל דאמתלא מהני בגמ' נגד כמה דברים

Dr. Klafter replied:

The Tzemach Tzedek, like all other human beings with no education about child sexual abuse or training in deviant sexuality, has a very limited capacity to imagine how a Rabbi would wish to do this to a boy. It is something which he himself, like all other normal human beings, would not find sexually gratifying or appealing. It is, to the contrary, instinctively horrifying and repugnant to him. Therefore, he is very ready to accept any rationalization or explanation, however implausible, which will allow him to deny the reality of homosexual pedophilia. This same psychological defensive style (which, again, is normal) is also what allows many misguided rabbonim to conclude that a Rebbe with a history of molesting bochurim has "done teshuva" and therefore will no longer be a risk to boys. To poskin that such a rabbi need not be removed from his position, the Tzemach Tzedek should have at least interviewed the victim to find out if he had complained of sexual dysfunction and if he was seeking the accused rabbi's assistance and guidance. If that was not done, it might be a further indication that there was an a priori wish to exonerate the Rabbi which is based on what appears to be a universal tendency to disbelieve, dismiss, and suppress from public awareness allegations of sexual abuse, rather than to take them seriously, investigate them. and implement.

Solutions are often placebos

NYTimes reported:

Half of all American doctors responding to a nationwide survey say they regularly prescribe placebos to patients. The results trouble medical ethicists, who say more research is needed to determine whether doctors must deceive patients in order for placebos to work.

The study involved 679 internists and rheumatologists chosen randomly from a national list of such doctors. In response to three questions included as part of the larger survey, about half reported recommending placebos regularly. Surveys in Denmark, Israel, Britain, Sweden and New Zealand have found similar results.

The most common placebos the American doctors reported using were headache pills and vitamins, but a significant number also reported prescribing antibiotics and sedatives. Although these drugs, contrary to the usual definition of placebos, are not inert, doctors reported using them for their effect on patients’ psyches, not their bodies.

In most cases, doctors who recommended placebos described them to patients as “a medicine not typically used for your condition but might benefit you,” the survey found. Only 5 percent described the treatment to patients as “a placebo.”

The study is being published in BMJ, formerly The British Medical Journal. One of the authors, Franklin G. Miller, was among the medical ethicists who said they were troubled by the results.

“This is the doctor-patient relationship, and our expectations about being truthful about what’s going on and about getting informed consent should give us pause about deception,” said Dr. Miller, director of the research ethics program in the department of bioethics at the National Institutes of Health.

Dr. William Schreiber, an internist in Louisville, Ky., at first said in an interview that he did not believe the survey’s results, because, he said, few doctors he knows routinely prescribe placebos.

But when asked how he treated fibromyalgia or other conditions that many doctors suspect are largely psychosomatic, Dr. Schreiber changed his mind. “The problem is that most of those people are very difficult patients, and it’s a whole lot easier to give them something like a big dose of Aleve,” he said. “Is that a placebo treatment? Depending on how you define it, I guess it is.”

But antibiotics and sedatives are not placebos, he said.

The American Medical Association discourages the use of placebos by doctors when represented as helpful.

“In the clinical setting, the use of a placebo without the patient’s knowledge may undermine trust, compromise the patient-physician relationship and result in medical harm to the patient,” the group’s policy states.

Controlled clinical trials have hinted that placebos may have powerful effects. Some 30 percent to 40 percent of depressed patients who are given placebos get better, a treatment effect that antidepressants barely top. Placebos have also proved effective against hypertension and pain.

But despite much attention given to the power of placebos, basic questions about them remain unanswered: Are they any better than no treatment at all? Must people be deceived into believing that a treatment is active for a placebo to work?

Some studies have hinted at answers, but experts say far more work is needed.

Dr. Howard Brody, director of the Institute for the Medical Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch, in Galveston, said the popularity of alternative medical treatments had led many doctors to embrace placebos as a potentially useful tool. But, Dr. Brody said, doctors should resist using placebos, because they reinforce the deleterious notion that “when something is the matter with you, you will not get better unless you swallow pills.”

Earlier this year, a Maryland mother announced that she would start selling dextrose tablets as a children’s placebo called Obecalp, for “placebo” spelled backward.

Dr. Ezekiel J. Emanuel, one of the study’s authors, said doctors should not prescribe antibiotics or sedatives as placebos, given those drugs’ risks. Use of less active placebos is understandable, he said, since risks are low.

“Everyone comes out happy: the doctor is happy, the patient is happy,” said Dr. Emanuel, chairman of the bioethics department at the health institutes. “But ethical challenges remain.”

Olmert's political comeback - again

YNet reported:

Kadima chairwoman's failure to form new government leaves prime minister four months to propel diplomatic, financial feats in form of progress in peace talks with Palestinians and Syria, stabilizing economy amid global crisis 

The beneficiary: Prime Minister Ehud Olmert seems to be one of the people who stand to benefit from Kadima Chairwoman Tzipi Livni's decision to call for general elections.

Livni decided to opt for calling for elections on Saturday, after her attempts to form a new government, and the intense coalition negotiation which accompanied them, appeared to be deadlocked. She is expected to notify President Shimon Peres of her decision later Sunday.

Olmert now stands to preside as the prime minister over a transitional government for the remaining 111 days left until the elections, and is most likely to try and use the time to propel political moves, as well as various financial ones, aimed at preventing the global financial crisis from harming Israel's economy.

Olmert will apparently use the four months he has left in office to push motions pertaining to the peace process with both the Palestinians and the Syrians. One of the options reportedly being discussed is calling a meeting with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, for later November, to mark a year since the Annapolis Summit.

A major breakthrough in the negotiations with Syria seems unlikely at this time, as Damascus awaits the results of the US presidential race, and now of the Israeli elections as well, to decided on its next move.[...]

Treasury bailout is a fraud!

NYTimes reported: [Associated Press also reported]

“Chase recently received $25 billion in federal funding. What effectwill that have on the business side and will it change our strategiclending policy?”

It was Oct. 17, just four days after JPMorgan Chase’s chief executive, Jamie Dimon,agreed to take a $25 billion capital injection courtesy of the UnitedStates government, when a JPMorgan employee asked that question. Itcame toward the end of an employee-only conference call that had beenlargely devoted to meshing certain divisions of JPMorgan with its newacquisition, Washington Mutual.

Which, of course, it also got thanks to the federal government. Christmas came early at JPMorgan Chase.

The JPMorgan executive who was moderating the employee conferencecall didn’t hesitate to answer a question that was pretty politicallysensitive given the events of the previous few weeks.

Given the way, that is, that Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. had decided to use the first installment of the $700 billion bailoutmoney to recapitalize banks instead of buying up their toxicsecurities, which he had then sold to Congress and the American peopleas the best and fastest way to get the banks to start making loansagain, and help prevent this recession from getting much, much worse.

In point of fact, the dirty little secret of the banking industry isthat it has no intention of using the money to make new loans. But thisexecutive was the first insider who’s been indiscreet enough to say itwithin earshot of a journalist.

(He didn’t mean to, of course, but I obtained the call-in number and listened to a recording.)

“Twenty-five billion dollars is obviously going to help the folkswho are struggling more than Chase,” he began. “What we do think itwill help us do is perhaps be a little bit more active on theacquisition side or opportunistic side for some banks who are stillstruggling. And I would not assume that we are done on the acquisitionside just because of the Washington Mutual and Bear Stearnsmergers. I think there are going to be some great opportunities for usto grow in this environment, and I think we have an opportunity to usethat $25 billion in that way and obviously depending on whetherrecession turns into depression or what happens in the future, youknow, we have that as a backstop.”

Read that answer as many times as you want — you are not going tofind a single word in there about making loans to help the Americaneconomy. On the contrary: at another point in the conference call, thesame executive (who I’m not naming because he didn’t know I would belistening in) explained that “loan dollars are down significantly.” Headded, “We would think that loan volume will continue to go down as wecontinue to tighten credit to fully reflect the high cost of pricing onthe loan side.” In other words JPMorgan has no intention of turning onthe lending spigot.

It is starting to appear as if one of Treasury’s key rationales forthe recapitalization program — namely, that it will cause banks tostart lending again — is a fig leaf, Treasury’s version of the weaponsof mass destruction.

In fact, Treasury wants banks to acquire each other and is using itspower to inject capital to force a new and wrenching round of bankconsolidation. As Mark Landler reported in The New York Times earlierthis week, “the government wants not only to stabilize the industry,but also to reshape it.” Now they tell us.

Indeed, Mr. Landler’s story noted that Treasury would even funnelsome of the bailout money to help banks buy other banks. And, in analmost unnoticed move, it recently put in place a new tax break, worthbillions to the banking industry, that has only one purpose: toencourage bank mergers. As a tax expert, Robert Willens, put it: “Itcouldn’t be clearer if they had taken out an ad.”[...]

Obama - Testing his mettle

Caroline Glick writes in JPost:

n a week and a half, American voters will elect the next US president. Their decision will impact the entire world.

Democratic nominee Senator Barack Obama now enjoys a significant lead in the polls against Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain. For McCain to win, a lot of Obama supporters will need to reassess their choice for president. This week, Obama's running-mate Senator Joseph Biden gave Obama supporters a good reason to change their minds.

In much-reported remarks to campaign donors in Seattle on Sunday, Biden warned that if Obama is elected to the White House, it will take America's adversaries no time at all to test him. In his words, "It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama…. The world is looking…. Watch, we're gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy. I can give you at least four or five scenarios from where it might originate."

Biden then continued, "And he's gonna need help….We're gonna need you to use your influence…within the community, to stand with him. Because it's not gonna be apparent initially, it's not gonna be apparent that we're right."

Many commentators have minimized the importance of Biden's remarks by claiming that all new leaders are tested. But this is not exactly correct. World leaders test their adversaries when they perceive them as weak. When Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected US president in 1952, the Soviet Union did not move quickly to test the man who had led Allied Forces in World War II. When Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980, the Iranian regime released the US hostages it had held for a year and a half.

In speaking as he did, Biden essentially acknowledged three things. First, he recognized that Obama projects an image of weakness and naiveté internationally that invite America's adversaries to challenge him.

Second, by stating that if Obama is tested a crisis will ensue, Biden made clear that Obama will fail the tests he is handed as a newly inaugurated president. After all, when an able leader is tested, he acts wisely and secures his nation's interests while averting a crisis.

Finally, Biden made clear that Obama's failure will be widely noted, and hence, "it's not gonna be apparent that we're right."

IN LIGHT of Biden's dire warning about his running-mate, the central question that Americans ought to be asking themselves is whether or not Biden is correct. Is it true that Obama projects a posture of weakness and incompetence internationally and is it likely that this posture reflects reality?

Unfortunately, it appears that Biden knows exactly what he is talking about.[...]

Conversion & Aliyah Seth Farber

JPost reports:

During the past year, conversion to Judaism has been the subject of much press and analysis. The crises surrounding the recognition of conversion and the annulment of conversion have rocked the Jewish world to its core. Ironically, in the past six months, it is Orthodox converts from overseas in particular that are being deliberately persecuted by the State of Israel. In the present environment, both the Interior Ministry and the rabbinate have engaged in a misinformation campaign, which has befuddled even the most acute analysts of Jewish life in Israel. This cannot be allowed to continue.

Two criteria related to conversion delegitimize even the most serious of Orthodox converts. The first - which is reasonable in its conception but not in its realization - prevents Orthodox converts from making aliya subsequent to their conversion. Since the State of Israel (as differentiated from the rabbinate) accepts conversions from all the denominations, and since conversion overseas entitles a convert to immigrate to Israel under the Law of Return, the Interior Ministry lives in constant fear that foreign workers (now numbering more than 100,000) will take advantage of "quickie conversions" or "pop-over conversions" overseas and then become citizens.

TO STEM this, the ministry has maintained a policy that insists that converts reside in their sponsoring community for a full year following their conversions. Individuals like Rachel Del Conte (The Jerusalem Report, March 18), who converted Orthodox but were encouraged by their rabbinical courts or communities to move to Israel are being rejected as Jews by the state - even in cases where the Chief Rabbinate accepts them as Jews. The organization I direct, ITIM, has petitioned the High Court against the Interior Ministry, and won a temporary injunction, with a full hearing scheduled on November 26. The rejection Rachel feels is felt by dozens if not hundreds of Orthodox converts each year, who are told that they are not Jewish enough to make aliya (even if, ironically, they are Jewish enough to be married in Israel).

But a second criterion is even more deleterious to the Jewish fabric of the state. In the past two years, the Chief Rabbinate has radically downsized the list of recognized Orthodox rabbis whose conversions will be confirmed for purposes of marriage. Now, while ITIM has serious reservations regarding the sensibility of this move, there is little question that it can act unilaterally. However, what is shocking is that the Interior Ministry has determined that the Chief Rabbinate is the sole source by which Orthodox conversions can be certified for purposes of aliya. In other words, if someone converted through their local Orthodox rabbi - either recently or in the past - then if the rabbinate does not accept this conversion, neither will the state. The rabbinate's list for North America at present includes approximately 15 rabbis. You do the math.

MEN LIKE Jose Portendo (The Jerusalem Post, October 5) could have made aliya six or seven years ago without a problem. They would have met all the criteria. But the state has begun to cower before rabbinical authorities whose agenda is unclear, whose understanding of the North American Orthodox culture is minimal and whose approach is fundamentalist. Ironically, if Jose had converted to Judaism in a Reform or Conservative ceremony, the state would have consulted with the organized American Jewish community structures and approved his aliya. Only the Orthodox need suffer.

This need not be the case. At present, there are no written guidelines for how conversions are recognized by the state, and thus converts' futures are subject to the whims of Interior Ministry clerks. Consider that a Jerusalem Post reporter was told that the list of "certified Orthodox rabbis" was held by the Conversion Authority of the state. Not only does the Conversion Authority not maintain such a list, but it also, by law, is not allowed to be involved in any conversions from overseas. The state is simply persecuting Orthodox converts.[...]