Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler on Monday called on Israel to respect Iran’s sovereignty and refrain from attacking Iranian soil, while appearing to step up criticism of Jerusalem, accusing it of genocide.
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman made the comments at a summit of Arab and Muslim leaders organized to press for the establishment of a Palestinian state, a year after the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation held a first conference on the subject.
A small minority of the frum world has long been asking why a large majority of the frum world is so fervently supportive of Donald Trump, a political figure whose character and value system are flagrantly and forcefully antithetical to everything we claim to believe is important. Sam Harris, a conservative, atheist, pro-Israel commentator, put it best: “Trump lacks every virtue we have a name for.”
Rav Schwab famously opined that it is incorrect to vote for some of poor moral character. How did we end up so far from that perspective? (To suggest that Kamala is also very immoral is a weak attempt at leveling the playing field; it is a good bet she is no tzaddekes, but there is really no comparison between the level of depravity of the two.)
I know people who voted for Trump either because the only issue they care about is Israel or because they acknowledged how dangerous he is, but felt the other camp is more so. I can respect these positions, even if I disagree with them. Turning a blind eye to the threat that Trump has explicitly put forward does not strike me as a reasonable position.
So why are so many people in that group?
Answer #1: Tribalism + black-and-white thinking
Frum people are rightly opposed to the aggressive agenda of the woke left. That puts us in the same camp as Trump on issues like Israel and identity politics. Admitting that he is as awful as he is means to many people that our own position is weakened.
Inflexible thinking means we have to rally around our own, even when they manifestly do not deserve our support. (Witness the repeated rallying of our community around frum people, especially those in positions of power, accused of sexual abuse; or the sickening justifications for Israelis who have done truly terrible things to innocent Palestinians.)
People feel they have to raise Trump up as much as possible while downplaying his (many) faults as much as possible in order to avoid having to acknowledge that one of “ours” could be flawed.
You see examples of this kind of behavior daily. Recently Qatar announced that it would be expelling Hamas from its country. Trump was of course credited with this (because they obviously are terrified that he will clobber them) even though the decision was actually made before the election. But hey, any opportunity to show how great Trump is.
Simultaneously, his fans will dismiss any criticism of him. Who can forget his immortal comment about grabbing women by their genitals, which his supporters don’t hesitate to wave away as no big deal.
But this is a lack of mature thinking. Black-and-white thinking – either we’re right or they’re right; either our candidate is great or he’s terrible – is a cognitive distortion that doesn’t reflect the complexity of life as it actually is. (It also leads to a lot of misery, as any practitioner of cognitive-behavioral therapy will tell you.)
The reality is that the woke left is indeed dangerous and objectionable. But so is Trump. Rationalizing away the serious problems with his personality and political aspirations may allow us to support his opposition to the left, but may also leave us with a host of equally worrisome problems – as I fear we will all soon see.
Answer #2: People actually like what Trump represents
Most people actually like the way Trump does things, whether or not they admit it (to themselves or others).
Winning feels good. Crushing the opposition feels great. Revenge is sweet. These are normal human feelings.
Even now, when you imagine arguing against someone in the opposite political camp (perhaps me), you imagine victory as delivering a crushing argument and forcing your opponent to concede or to slink away with their tail between their legs. You do not envision as the ideal outcome a handshake and a “let’s agree to disagree.”
The urge to be powerful is powerful. But of course, that is not what we are on this planet for. (Omnipotence is not one of G-d’s attributes that we are meant to emulate.) The Torah calls us to grow as people: to be humble, to be mevater, to seek shalom and peshara. But our animal nature pulls us in the opposite direction.
Trump lets all of that loose. And people love it. Somewhere deep down (or, for many people, not so deep down at all) they want to be just like that – to put down and mock their enemies, to crush anyone who gets in their way, to win at all costs, to demand loyalty and get it (without the obligation to offer it in return).
Trump personifies strength and domination, and that speaks to a very essential part of us. Everyone wishes, to some extent, that the world would conform itself to our personal desires. Some people try to enact that by exerting power over others to make others do what they want. That’s why there are so many fights in marriages, so many crimes committed every day, and so much war all over the world. Islam is the fastest growing religion because and not despite its mandate to convert the rest of the world by the sword or else subjugate it.
Me, I don’t want the world I live in to look like that. I want a world that looks more like what G-d has asked us to build. I want a world where people talk and people listen, where there is collaboration instead of control, consensus instead of authoritarianism, love instead of self-interest.
(I am not saying we should try to sing kumbaya with terrorists. We certainly must show strength when dealing with violent enemies. But that is something we should do because we have to, not because we like to.)
The more Trump mocks his opponents, gets his way, asserts power, and gets away with it all, the more people who want to live by strength will be drawn to him – and continue to rationalize in the most naked and unintelligible ways how really he’s not so bad after all.
Ramban (Bereishis 16:06) And Sarai dealt harshly with Hagar, and she fled from before Sarai’s face. Our mother did transgress by this affliction, and Abraham also by his permitting her to do so. And so, G-d heard Hagar’s affliction and gave her a son who would be a wild-ass of a man, to afflict the seed of Abraham and Sarah with all kinds of affliction.
The Kremlin has fiercely denied reports that Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin have already held a call on Ukraine in the days since Trump’s election victory. “This is completely untrue. This is pure fiction, it’s just false information,” Putin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Monday, according to Reuters.
In conclusion, The Coddling does an excellent job in starting an important and fascinating conversation about social dynamics, emotional health, and democracy. Anyone with an interest in social justice, politics, education, or general psychology would surely find much to appreciate throughout the book. While The Coddling may find a large general audience, it is perhaps crucial for university administrators (including Deans, Provosts, VPs, and Presidents) to read this book. Because at its heart, the book is about what’s happening on college campuses. So, to the people in charge of running those campuses: take heed. Consider signing on to the Chicago statement (a commitment to free expression). Draw large circles around your community members. Encourage productive debate and disagreement. There is a recipe for a wise university, with many helpful guidelines throughout this book.
https://www.commentary.org/articles/heather-wilhelm/bad-therapy-abigail-shrier/
“With unprecedented help from mental health experts, we have raised the loneliest, most anxious, depressed, pessimistic, helpless, and fearful generation on record,” Shrier writes. Moreover, “as treatments for anxiety and depression have become more sophisticated and more readily available, adolescent anxiety and depression have ballooned.”
The broader calamity, Bad Therapy argues, is that our supposedly kind, gentle, and obsessively empathic therapeutic culture boasts some disastrous unintended side effects—and at this point, they’re being “crop-dusted across the entire population.”
Dwelling on your problems, it turns out, can often magnify them. “Gentle parenting” often leads to lost and sullen teenagers—or, even worse, undisciplined monster preschoolers capable of terrorizing an entire airplane full of innocent passengers just trying to make it to spring break. Done poorly, excessive therapeutic techniques can induce negative feedback loops, fresh phobias, poor coping skills, self-absorption, unhealthy obsessions, and a laundry list of bonkers ideas.
רש"י בראשית פרק יח פסוק כב (פרשת וירא)
(כב) ויפנו משם - ממקום שאברהם ליוום שם:
ואברהם עודנו עומד לפני ה' - והלא לא הלך לעמוד לפניו אלא הקדוש ברוך הוא בא אצלו ואמר לו (פסוק כ) זעקת סדום ועמורה כי רבה, והיה לו לכתוב וה' עודנו עומד לפני אברהם, אלא תיקון סופריםד הוא זה (אשר הפכוהו ז"ל לכתוב כן):
Rashi (Bereishis 49:07)ABRAHAM STOOD YET BEFORE THE LORD — But surely it was not he (Abraham) who had gone to stand before Him, but it was the Holy One, blessed be He, Who had come to him and had said to him, “Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great” and it should therefore have written here, “And the Lord stood yet before Abraham”? But it is a variation such as writers make to avoid an apparently irreverent expression (Genesis Rabbah 49:7) (which our Rabbis, of blessed memory, altered, writing it thus).
Bereishis Rabbah (49:07) AND THE MEN TURNED (WAYYIFENU) FROOM THENCE (XVIII, 22). This proves that angels have no back.5 AND THEY WENT TOWARD SODOM; BUT ABRAHAM STOOD YET BEFORE THE LORD. R. Simon said: This is an emendation of the Soferim, for the Shechinah was actually waiting for Abraham.
Maharal(Bereishis 18:22)גור אריה בראשית פרק יח פסוק כב (פרשת וירא)
תיקון סופרים. אין הפירוש חס ושלום שהסופר כתב כך בתורה, חלילה לומר כך, אלא פירוש שהתורה כתבה דרך כבוד כלפי מעלה כמו שדרך הסופרים לכתוב דרך כבוד, וכמו שהתורה שהיא מדברת בלשון בני אדם (ברכות לא ע"ב) - כך כתבה לך גם כן כמו שדרך הסופרים לכתוב ולדבר, ולפיכך אמרו (ב"ר מט, ז) 'תיקון סופרים הוא', רוצה לומר ענין זה הוא תקון סופרים - כמו שדרך הסופרים לעשות - כתב בתורה:
Maharal (Bereishis 18:22) It is not to be understood that the scribe wrote in the Torah but the explanation is that the Torah wrote a way of honor as the way of the scribes to write a way of honor, and as the Torah that speaks in the language of men - so it also wrote to you as the way The scribes write and speak, and therefore they said 'Correcting scribes is', wanting to say that this matter is correcting scribes - as is the way of the scribes - He wrote in the Torah:
Tanchuma (Bereishis 04:06) R. Simon said: See what is written (in Gen. 18:22): AND THE MEN TURNED FROM THERE AND WENT TO SODOM, BUT ABRAHAM WAS STILL STANDING BEFORE THE LORD. Should it not rather have said, "And God was still standing"? < There is here >, however, a scribal emendation. Ergo {it says} (in Ps. 18:36 = II Sam. 22:36): AND YOUR HUMILITY HAS MAGNIFIED ME.
Tanchuma (Bereishis 16:02) Similarly it is written: For he who toucheth thee toucheth the apple of his eye (Zech. 2:12). “My eye” should be written here, for it refers, as it were, to the Heavenly One. However, the text was modified by the scribes of the Great Synagogue. The verse Ye say also: “Behold, what a weariness is it! And ye have snuffed at it” (Mal. 1:13) was likewise altered. The verse I will judge his house forever, for the iniquity, in that he knew that his sons did bring a curse on themselves, and he rebuked them not (I Sam. 3:13) was also modified. In the like manner, the verse Why hast thou set me as a mark for thee, so that I may burden to myself (Job 7:20) was changed. The verse Art not Thou from everlasting, O Lord, My God, my Holy One? We shall not die (Hab. 1:12) was modified also. Again the verse Hath a nation changed its gods which are yet no gods? But My people hath changed its glory for that which doth not profit (Jer. 2:11) was altered. Similarly, Thus they exchange their glory for the likeness of an ox that eateth grass (Ps. 106:2) was changed. The verse I will change their glory to shame (Hos. 4:7) was likewise modified. In the case of Also against his three friends was his wrath kindled, because they had found no answer, and yet had condemned Job (Job 32:3) they changed the text. Similarly, but Abraham stood yet before the Lord (Gen 18:22) is another illustration of this. Again, in the verse And if Thou deal thus with me, kill me, I pray Thee, out of hand, if I have found favor in Thy sight, and let me not look upon my wretchedness (Num. 11:15) they changed the text. Similarly in the passage Let her not, I pray, be as one head, of whom the flesh is half consumed when He cometh out of his mother’s womb (ibid. 12:12) they altered the verse. And likewise, the verse What portion have we in David? Neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse; to your tents, O Israel; now see to thine own house, David. So Israel departed unto their tents (I Kings. 12:16) was altered, for in the Second Book of Chronicles (10:16) it is written concerning this episode to his tent rather than unto their tents.
הכתב והקבלה בראשית פרק יח פסוק כב (פרשת וירא)
(כב) ואברהם עודנו עומד לפני ה'. ה"ל לכתוב וה' עודנו עומד לפני אברהם אלא תקון סופרים הוא זה (רש"י מרבותינו בראשית פ' מ"ט), אין הכוונה לומר ששינה שום אדם דבר מה בתורתינו הקדושה חלילה כי אין אדם בעולם שיזייף ספר ויאמר אני זייפתי ותקנתי כך וכך ואיך יאמרו תקון סופרים הוא זה אבל כונתם בזה (כמ"ש בעל העקרים מ"ג פכ"ב) שלפי ענין משך הפרשה היה ראוי להיות כן, ומה ששינה הכתוב לא היה אלא כסופר המתקן דבריו דרך כבוד כלפי מעלה.
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-admits-he-isnt-conservative-cnbc-squawk-box-1877949
Last month, Trump delivered a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) and called himself a "proud political dissident."
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/09/08/liz-cheney-donald-trump-conservative-00177879
“Donald Trump doesn’t stand for any of the things that Ronald Reagan did, and it’s another place that I would urge my Republican colleagues both in the Congress, but across the country to really look at Donald Trump’s policies, to really look at the danger that he presents, to look at, you know, what he was willing to do to stay in power,” Cheney said. “It’s a firm rejection not just of traditional Republican policies, but of the constitutional order on which this country depends.”
https://time.com/7173792/putin-plays-tough-in-his-opening-message-to-trump/
Vladimir Putin did not come running. He let his spokesman react on Wednesday to the outcome of the U.S. presidential race, proclaiming that the Kremlin has no plans to congratulate Donald Trump on his victory. If the U.S. wants the peace deal Trump promised during his campaign, the Russians signaled that he would need to earn it, and the price for Ukraine would be particularly high.
“The message is, if you want a deal, you’re going to crawl on your knees for it,” says Nina Khrushcheva, an authority on Russian politics and foreign affairs at the New School. “Putin feels he is starting out with Trump from a position of strength.”
Over the past number of years, MAGA ideology has seeped into our oilam hatorah and impacted our hashkafas hachaim. Much of the frum media has become a mouthpiece for this ideology. The standard reading material available to the chareidi consumer presents a one-sided approach to the day’s issues. Instead of articles addressing issues with chochmah and nuance, it becomes brash and divisive. Sadly, this trickles down and affects middos and how people deal with others of legitimate divergent opinions.
After Harris lost I have had a number of conversations with frum Trump supporters as to how they rationalize that Trump would be a good president
The most frequent explanation is that both Trump and Harris are bad people but since Trump is supporting Israel that makes him the lesser of two evils. Then I ask how is Harris equivalent to Trump
I get the same Moral Equivalence that is used to explain why Israel is the same as Arab terrorist and they are no different than Nazis. Just as America is a colonial power like Russia or the Spanish or Belgians
Clinton is the same as Trump since they both committed major security violations. Trump is also a sexual predator and adulterer but so is Clinton's husband
Trump was good friends with jeffery epsetin as well as a serial adulter and self confessed abuser but Harris is a prostitute and adulterer - even though there is no actual proof. the belief gives a sense of satisfaction to Trump supporters
Trump is often incoherent and lacks an actual program but Harris speaks in word salads
Trump lies constantly but Harris changed her message to fit the audience. That proves she is dumb while when Trump does it that shows he is intelligent
Biden had to drop out of the race because he is too old - but only biased people try to claim the same about Trump
Trump was corrupt and took bribes as well as his family, But Hunter Biden is corrupt.
Trump's family clearly benefitted from Nepotism - Hunter biden though never part of government received benefits
Trump stole classified documents and blocked access their return but so did Biden even though it was clearly unintentional and promptly returned them
Trump was impeached twice but Biden has been under constant investigation by Republicans
Arab terrorists kill innocent civilians while Israel kill innocent civilians
Nazis killed large numbers of Jews but Jews target Palestinians so if one is called genocide the other is also
Bottom line the rationalization is typically based on false equivalence which is viewed as fair but only if done by Republicans
Biden turned the legal system against Trump therefore Trump's promise to do the same is not only just but fair
Trump is partial to dictators - especially Russian but Harris is a communist and socialist according to Trump
It was alleged Biden called Trump supporters garbage - something he denied while Trump calls Democrats enemies garbage and more on a regular basis and this is understood as being perceptive
If Trump violates the law and is indicted it is only because of character assassination. If a Democrat commits a crime it is because they are all criminals
If Trump loses an election it can only be proof of fraud and he has no obligation to ever concede. While if Harris doesn't concede before the votes are fully counted that means she is a sore loser
If the news media says something favorable about Harris it is clearly biased and is fake news. While any positive descriptions of Trump are always proof of good journalism!
https://www.newsweek.com/what-will-donald-trumps-foreign-policy-opinion-1982406
But one would be a fool to pontificate too much about Trump's plans. In many ways, it's wasted energy. Trump isn't Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, or Joe Biden—he doesn't have a set ideology or a fixed view of how the world should function. His beliefs are situational, flexible, and at times contradictory. He says things on the campaign trail but either disregards them when he's in office or changes his opinion depending on who happens to be in the room with him. Sure, he may have one core position—the U.S. is constantly getting ripped off by everybody—but everything else is really open to interpretation. The guy is an enigma, and he likes it that way.
Look no further than Trump's first term. Trump wasn't fond of NATO, badgered the Europeans to beef up their defense budgets, and essentially described the entire continent as a spoiled child content with hiding underneath the U.S. security umbrella. But his policies didn't match with his rhetoric. Trump kept the U.S. in the transatlantic alliance, allowed that alliance to expand to two new members—Montenegro and North Macedonia—and threatened European governments with unspecified penalties if it locked U.S. defense manufacturers out of any European rearmament scheme. U.S. troop levels in Europe remained constant throughout, and when Trump ordered the withdrawal of almost 10,000 U.S. troops from Germany in 2020, most of them were scheduled to re-deploy to other countries in Europe.
Ramban (Bereishis 12:10) Know that Abraham our father unintentionally committed a great sin by bringing his righteous wife to a stumbling-block of sin on account of his fear for his life. He should have trusted that G-d would save him and his wife and all his belongings for G-d surely has the power to help and to save. His leaving the Land, concerning which he had been commanded from the beginning, on account of the famine, was also a sin he committed, for in famine G-d would redeem him from death. It was because of this deed that the exile in the land of Egypt at the hand of Pharaoh was decreed for his children. In the place of justice, there is wickedness and sin.
