https://www.thedailybeast.com/josh-hawley-needs-to-learn-a-thing-or-two-about-manhood
Real family values are about providing a healthy alternative to the toxic masculinity Hawley is offering. The disconnect between men and the economy or society isn’t happening because men are failing to achieve some weird idea of what it means to be a man. The core of this crisis is the fact that men without a college degree have seen their relative earnings fall by 30 percent since 1980.
My English index to Mishna Berura has been unavailable for a long time
I will be publishing it again through Amazon in a few days
Trump is by far the leading candidate for the Republican nomination. Any time he’s asked about Russia in a debate or other forum – or even if he’s not asked – he’ll say the investigation was utterly discredited by John Durham. For him and his supporters, that’s case closed.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/even-steve-bannon-blasts-clown-show-john-durhams-epic-failure
Former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon tore into Special Counsel John Durham on Tuesday over his failure to secure any major criminal convictions during his four-year probe of the FBI’s Russia investigation, describing Durham’s final report as an “epic failure.”
https://www.newsweek.com/world-leaders-trump-fool-bolton-1800730
During Wednesday's CNN town hall, Trump said that the war in Ukraine wouldn't have happened if he was president when it began in February 2022. Trump wouldn't say who he wanted to win the war before stating that he could end the conflict in 24 hours. When moderator Kaitlan Collins pressed him on how he would resolve the conflict so quickly, Trump said he would find a solution by meeting with Putin and Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelensky.
"I have been in those rooms with [Trump] when he met with those leaders, I believe they think he's a laughing fool," Bolton said on CNN This Morning. "And the idea that somehow his presence in office would have deterred Putin is flatly wrong."
Shulchan Arukh Orach Chaim 328:2 rules that one who delays in treating a dangerously ill patient on the Sabbath is virtually considered to be shedding blood. Mishnah Berurah, se'if katan 6, adds that – for this reason – a talmid chakham must proactively publicize the laws of piku'ach nefesh, so that the community will respond with alacrity on the Sabbath when a lifesaving opportunity arises. Accordingly, I will take this opportunity to argue in favour of medically treating brain dead patients on the Sabbath, and show how this question interfaces with Sotah, whose siyum is being celebrated today in the Daf Yomi.
The halakhic sources which include a brain dead patient within the ambit of safek piku'ach nefesh [such that his/her medical treatment necessarily overrides the Sabbath] are elucidated in my online essay at <https://www.scribd.com/
Apparently, one of the sources for the RCA's conclusion is R. Hershel Schachter, Be-Ikvei ha-Tzon, no. 36. [I hypothesize so because another page on the Ematai website acknowledges that Rabbi Schachter reviewed the text of that organization's policy. See endnote to <https://www.ematai.org/learn/
However, I can respond to Rabbi Schachter (be-mechilat Kevod Torato) by pointing to R. Eliezer Yehudah Waldenberg, Teshuvot Tzitz Eliezer 18:48, sec. 3, who raises three alternate possibilities how to interpret Sotah 46b: (1) perhaps the senior residents of Luz did not voluntarily leave the city, but were rather miraculously expelled [analogous to the residents of Kushta described in Sanhedrin 97a]; (2) perhaps Luz was not a real city but was rather a metaphysical concept; (3) perhaps the residents of Luz were not Jewish and were not following Halakhah. According to any of these three possibilities, there could still be a mitzvah of safek piku'ach nefesh to treat brain dead patients.
To the latter effect, it is important to appreciate the full context of Sotah 46b. The Gemara is reporting that the Angel of Death was denied entry into Luz in reward for the mitzvah of levayah [accompanying strangers on the road] that was fulfilled by the founder of that locale. And the reason this is being discussed in the context of eglah arufah [the subject of the final chapter of Sotah] is because the Mishnah on the previous page (Sotah 45b) declares that if the elders of a city [who are obligated to bring an eglah arufah] would have failed to provide levayah, then those elders would be virtually guilty of bloodshed. R. Shlomo Yosef Zevin, Ha-Mo'adim ba-Halakhah, chapter on Aseret ha-Dibberot, envisages this Mishnah as a source for the principle that even passive euthanasia constitutes murder. [While not mentioned by Rabbi Zevin, this would then serve as a support for the aforementioned Shulchan Arukh Orach Chaim 328:2, as well as a parallel codification in Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De‘ah 336:1.] Arguably, then, the Mishnah in Sotah 45b actually teaches that we may not practice passive euthanasia on any patient, brain dead or otherwise.
R. Moshe Feinstein, while never invoking Sotah 46b by explicit reference, writes as follows in Iggerot Mosheh, Choshen Mishpat 2:75, sec. 7:
"Regarding an exceedingly senior patient who becomes ill, for sure we are obligated to heal him as much as is possible, just as with a juvenile patient. And [this holds true] even if the senior patient does not want, saying he is disgusted with his life. And it is forbidden to even raise as a consideration these matters, even if its exponent is a great physician. And even with respect to triage priority, it is logical to assume that one should not calculate this."
Seemingly, Rabbi Feinstein [or whoever wrote this responsum on his behalf, given the outstanding debate that surrounds the provenance of that seventh volume of Iggerot Mosheh] – with his comment about "senior disgust for life" co-existing in harmony with the mitzvah obligation of piku'ach nefesh – interprets Sotah 46b like Tzitz Eliezer.
Thus, it is not surprising that R. J. David Bleich [Bioethical Dilemmas, Vol. 1, chs. 3-4; Be-Netivot ha-Halakhah, Vol. 3, pp. 161-178] does indeed demand medically treating a brain dead patient at all times, including on the Sabbath, in order to comply with Leviticus 19:16. To that effect, at a 2021 conference of Agudath Israel of America [in a rare speech by a lady], Mrs. Leah Horowitz (care navigator for the Chayim Aruchim affiliate of AIA) describes how – when a patient is pronounced brain dead and the attending medical staff wishes to terminate treatment – she will work urgently to find another hospital to which the brain dead patient can be transferred for medical care [on the Sabbath no less so than on weekdays]. The latter speech is available online at <https://agudah.org/watch-
Let us hope that this halakhic dialectic – which underscores the preciousness of human life [as per the Mishnah, Avot 3:14] – will be noticed by Russian President Putin [whom I have already addressed at <http://daattorah.blogspot.
Rabbi Spira works as the Editor of Manuscripts and Grants at the Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research [a Pavillion of the Jewish General Hospital] in Montreal, Canada.
What Durham did do was aid and abet the killing of a lot of trees by producing a 300-plus page report that reads like a plagiarized version of the 2019 report by the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General, in which Inspector General Michael Horowitz concluded that the FBI properly opened the Russia probe—code-named Crossfire Hurricane—and found no evidence of political bias by the FBI. The OIG’s report contained a meticulous analysis of the Russia probe and offered criticisms of the FBI’s then process for utilizing FISA, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, warrants that resulted in reforms undertaken by the FBI.
One of the most basic rules for deciding among disputants in a halakhic controversy is to rule in favor of the scholar who is gadol be-ĥokhma u-va-minyan (b. Avoda Zara 7a).4 As this rule is generally understood, there are two criteria for according one scholar greater authority than
https://www.torahmusings.com/2010/12/reacting-to-scandal/
Yet, Dr. Eidensohn’s book is what really makes me want to do something. It inspires the passion that is necessary to change our communal practices. It elicits the appropriate level of outrage. It is a J’accuse against the bumbling efforts of Jews unwilling to make hard choices to save our children, incapable of admitting mistake, and failing to learn from the collapse of the Catholic Church over precisely this issue.
Dr. Eidensohn’s second volume is a remarkable encyclopedia of Jewish sources related to issues of abuse. He collects and translates hundreds of post-talmudic texts, organized by subject or author. In particular, his chapter on wife abuse puts to lie the canard that Judaism allows such treatment. Overall, this book is an indispensable guide to the halakhic sources on abuse.
“What do you and [special counsel John] Durham, like, do you guys have tea parties every weekend? That talk about how you can destroy your reputation and your career … Durham tried this, remember? He chased conspiracy theories to try to prove that the FBI was corrupt and rigged the 2016 election, he made a fool of himself time and time and time again,” Scarborough said. “And now we have lost informants, in fact, the informant, that this entire charade was built on.”
