Professor Obama

Like many yesterday, I took the time to watch inauguration ceremonies.

The location: From the seat of my Magazine Journalism class. For me, it seemed different not sitting @ home watching something like this, rather @ school. But I don't think it's that unusual nowadays that technology has allowed us access to pretty much whatever we want, wherever we are.

Nonetheless, our entire class was fixated towards the overhead screen at the front of the class and with several others were right outside our class watching off an even bigger screen in the main atrium of the HP Campus @ Centennial College. Having President Obama in a sense "give us lecture" with his inauguration speech was fun to watch.

Things that stood out from yesterday's proceedings:

1) Rick Warren reciting the Shema: Talk about catching me off guard... I was sitting @ my desk working on an in-class assignment meanwhile the CNN feed is being shown on the overhead because our Prof wanted to watch it. I wasn't constantly watching, but I heard everything loud and clear. All of sudden I hear the words "Hear O Israel..." and I'm thinking What? I turn to look and yes indeed, Rick Warren was reciting the Shema. For those who don't know, the Shema is the most important verse in Judaism. Written in the Torah, it's recitation represents a fulfilment of the paramount commandment of acceptance of G-d's absolute sovereignty (Artscroll Siddur). Good for Warren, who's also a pastor, for reciting the holy words. Jews all around the world watching must have felt special @ that moment...

2) Wow did Chief Justice John Roberts screw up reciting the words for Obama during the swearing in. He said way too much for him to repeat afterwards and spoke way to fast. To be honest, Obama did look a little nervous. And @ one point I actually thought he said one of the words wrong... And every time I watched a replay on the news, you didn't hear the mistakes, rather a quick snippet of Obama reciting a line or two. Wonder if anyone else noticed it?

3) My mom asked this one: "What if Obama has to go to the washroom?"
It's not like he can't go during the speeches, parades, balls, or whatever event that requires him to be on television. They probably snuck him out in between proceedings.

4) How much bloody coverage Michelle Obama's dresses get: Okay, I maybe conservative in this case but honestly, is it really that important to know every single detail about the clothes worn by the First Lady? Maybe it's because I'm a guy too... At one point when discussing the dress, I actually learned something interesting about the dress - it had to do with the tradition of these balls and the likeness of Michelle Obama towards Jackie Kennedy and what they both symbolize to the American public. Fine. But they still went overboard with the coverage...

5) The balls: 10 Balls? He had to go to 10? And dance @ them all? The same dance? Talk about patience... It's actually quite admirable to see someone who genuinely seems to enjoy and care about all the places and things he saw and heard. Must be gratitude. Michelle Obama on the other hand... you could tell her attention span was dwindling @ times...

6) CNN's Live Feed + Facebook Statuses: How cool was that? In addition to watching the inauguration, you could also check your friend's Facebook statuses too. In fact, most of them were probably watching the inauguration the same way you were too. I was very impressed.

So January 20th, will be a day history will never forget.
They better not forget it. I had my Bar Mitzvah on January 20th (2001).

December 16- This Day in History

Besides from the most important thing that happened on this day, a lot of other cool things happened on this day as well. People born, people died... famous events etc.
I already knew of a lot of these things but there were a few cool ones I hadn't seen before. So after doing some research, here's a brief list of cool things that happened on the day I share my birthday with:
Let's start with notable events:
1997- Clinton names his Labrador retriever, "Buddy"
1994- Céline Dion gets married to manager René Angélil

Wait a second, I said notable events... Let's try this again:

1998- Operation Desert Fox begins- The US and UK bomb Iraq because of an alleged failure to comply with UN Security Council resolutions. You can look as this day as a monumental day in how things began developing towards present day Iraq.
1991- Independence Day for The Republic of Kazahkstan. Very nice! I knew I was connected in more than one way to Kazahkstan asides from my infamous Borat costume.

One of my favourites:
1991- UN General Assembly Resolution 4686 is passed, which revokes UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 after Israel makes revocation of resolution 3379 a condition of its participation in the Madrid Peace Conference of 1991
Why is this a big deal? Pretty much the UN reversed a ruling that Zionism is considered racism. Like there was ever any question of that concept in the first place boggles me. The final vote was 111-25 (13 abstained). President Bush told the General Assembly:

"...to equate Zionism with the intolerable sin of racism is to twist history and forget the terrible plight of Jews in World War II and indeed throughout history."

Let this be a lesson for everyone...
I encourage everyone to look up information about this historic event.

1973-O.J. Simpson becomes the first NFLer to rush for 2,00o yards in a season. And now rots in prison.
1971- Independence Day of State of Bahrain AND Victory Day in Bangladesh- this day marks the surrender of the Pakistani army in the Bangladesh War of Independence and Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, paving the way for independence in Bangladesh.
ALSO
Miami Dolphins become first undefeated NFL team at 14-0-0. They actually lost the Super Bowl that year (a la New England Patriots in 2007/8) but repeated the undefeated season and won the big game - the only time that's been done.
1969- MP's in English Commons vote to abolish hanging. 2 days later the House of Lords voted in favour of abolishing the death penalty completely.
1966- Jimi Hendrix Experience releases its first single "Hey Joe," in the UK. And a legend is born.
1960- 1960 New York air disaster- While approaching New York's Idlewild Airport, a United Airlines Douglas DC-8 collides with a TWA Lockheed Super Constellation in a blinding snowstorm over Staten Island, killing 134.
1944- The Battle of the Bulge begins. This was the last major offensive by the Germans in WWII before eventually losing the war. Thank G-d for that.

1773- The Boston Tea Party. That's right, today was the day that members of the Sons of Liberty disguised as Natives and dumped several crates of tea into Boston harbour as a protest against the Tea Act.

1689- English Parliament adopts Bill of Rights after Glorious Revolution
1497- Vasco da Gama goes where no man has gone before- around the Cape of Good Hope, the point where Bartolomeu Dias had made it to, but turned back.

Birthdays:
1770- Ludwig von Beethoven, the musician: duh duh duh duh, duh duh duh duh!!
1775- Jane Austen, novelist, Pride and Prejudice
1883- Max Linder, French pioneer of silent film, it's said he created what was probably the first identifiable motion-picture character who appeared in successive situation comedies. Jewish too.
1913- George Ignatieff, He was a Russian-born Canadian diplomat, but today he's relevant because he's the father of Michael Ignatieff, the soon-to-be next leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.
1934- Elgin Baylor, NBA Hall-of-Famer
1938- Frank Deford, American Sportswriter
1941- Lesley Stahl, American journalist, 60 minutes

1946- Benny Andersson, singer and songwriter for ABBA - OR, the reason I almost my mind this summer while working because of having to listen to ABBA over and over again...

1949- Billy Gibbons, ZZ Top guitarist. A real musician, and what facial hair! >

1962- William "The Refrigerator" Perry, American football player, awesome nickname- at his peak weight he was 382 lbs! (See Below)

1963- Benjamin Bratt, American actor, Law & Order, Traffic
1966- Clifford Robinson, American basketball player
One of my favourites: 1967- Donovan Bailey, Canadian sprinter, 2-time Olympic gold medalist, held the world record for the 100 metre dash at 9.84 seconds. He's also from Oakville, Ontario, my previous hometown.
1975- Ben Kowalewicz, Canadian musician, Billy Talent. Solid band.
1977- Eric Belanger, Canadian hockey player, Minnesota Wild



Deaths:
1859- Wilhelm Grimm, One of the Brothers Grimm, fairy tale writer
1916 (old style calender, so for us its actually on December 29)- Rasputin, powerful Russian monk. legend has it that on this day he was poisoned by Romanov family members who believed his influence on the Tsaritsa became too dangerous. He didn't die right away but this event is known as the catalyst for his downfall.
1922- Eliezer Ben Yehuda, the man who revived the Hebrew language. Read his bio. What a fascinating story he has. He lived a tough life - after his wife died of tuberculosis and three of his five children died within a span of 10 days - but managed to revive a seemingly dead language. Many orthodox authorities rejected his teachings because of the sanctity of the Hebrew language, which is regarded as "Lashon HaKodesh" or holy language/tongue, and should only be used for the discussion of holy/torah matters, not everyday conversational use (they consider it a misuse of the language, thus explaining the prevalence of Yiddish as a conversational language.) Personally, I agree with the orthodox point of view, but what Ben-Yehuda did was extremely vital to the well-being of Jewish identity. One of the first things any Jew learns is the Aleph-Beis (the alphabet), and without it, it's extremely difficult to grasp much. Also, when defining a nation, better yet an organized group of similar people - language is usually one of those dominating characteristics. Thank G-d for bringing a man like Elizer Ben Yehuda into this world.
1922- Gabriel Narutowic, 1st President of Poland, assassinated a week after his election.
1976- George, a goose that lived to 49 years, 8 months. I read this and thought wow.
1980- Colonel Sanders, Mr. Kentucky Fried Chicken


Hope you enjoyed that!

The Obama Email

I'll admit that all I was only going to do was give my take on the candidates and what I though about the whole election hullabaloo. On Thursday however, an old friend of mine sent me a very eye catching email that appealed to me on many levels. It was written by Rabbi Lazer Brody, (profile).
Take a look:

"Those who don't come to Israel while they still can may be lucky to escape from the USA with a plastic bag and a pair of pajamas." Rabbi Shalom Arush made this devastating statement in his public lecture in Hebrew several hours ago. Rabbi Shalom is neither partisan nor does he care about politics, whether in Israel or overseas. Yet, he said, "The near eighty percent of America's Jews who voted for Obama will soon be called upon to suffer the consequence of their choice." What consequence? The American economy is so bad, and so much new money with no backing is being printed, that the gross national product soon won't be enough to pay for the mere interest that America owes its creditors. Suddenly, the young people of the USA will wake up from their slumber of fun and games to realize that the country has not only mortgaged their future, but the future of their great grand children and the unborn generations for years to come. With mounting unemployment and rioting in the streets, who'll take the blame? The Jews, of course! Don't be fooled by a few Uncle-Tom Jews in the Obama crew. The Judenrat - entrusted of filling the daily cattle-car quotas destined for the death camps - was also staffed by Jews.
I don't like messianic speculation, but more and more of this generation's spiritual leaders are saying that Moshiach is fast on the way. Don't miss the train. If you're smart, you'll start phasing out your assets in the USA and buying property in Israel. And if you're even smarter, you'll start thinking really seriously about coming home. Soon, the choice won't be yours. It's not too nice to escape as a refugee in the middle of the night with nothing more than your pajamas and a plastic bag.


First of all, I want to make it clear that I'm not in support of what's said in this passage. It's really hard for me to say that because even though I respect the opinion of the quoted Rabbis and the material has substance (I'll explain later in the post), a lot of it is speculation, so its really hard to attach any tangible evidence to believe what's being said. Than there's me trying to hone the mindset of a journalist: trying to say as neutral, objective, realistic as possible in the face all the point of views (no matter how attractive and appealing it is...).

Nonetheless, I wouldn't be posting this passage here unless I found it had value and opportunities existed to grow from it. I respect the people who took the time get this message out in the open.

My grandmother told me something very interesting a few weeks ago. She told me that back in Europe before the war, the first major sign that things were going wrong was the economy. I don't know exact circumstances, but I've done my research and its true.

She was however, actually talking about the Jews.

When the economy went bad in Europe, it was the first of many things the Jews began to get blamed for and you know the rest. She then told me to keep this mind with what's going on in the world right now. I don't know what to think of this kind of message that I posted above. It may just be speculation, who knows? I usually don't pay attention to something that appears like something speculation. But I thought twice after remembering what grandmother told me. Let's hope G-d willing, that the times ahead are prosperous and filled with opportunity. And if not, than its for the best.

Just something to think about.

Obama: Soon to be the most powerful man in the world

Its been a little week or so since Barack Obama won the election and although dust from the election coverage has settled, there's still much to to talk about.

Like most people, the US election was on my mind for the past "I can't even recall how long the coverage of the election has been going on for times" (that was supposed to be a substitute for an amount of time I couldn't put together). To be an honest even I have an interest in politics, because I'm an avid fan of Saturday Night Live, it was their spoofs that really turned me (and my family) on to the election.

But besides that, I began to notice a few things from my peers. One was that many of my religious friends (both American and Canadian) were heavily in favourite of McCain. No surprise there since George W. Bush has been one of those most supportive Presidents of Israel in history. To many people who are devoted to the Holy Land, foreign policy with Israel is without question the most important issue of any election campaign. You want proof? Take a look @ this past Canadian election: Prior to Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party taking office in 2006, most ridings with a significant Jewish population voted Liberal, such as my riding of Thornhill, which is home to one of the largest observant Jewish populations in Canada. Yet after Paul Martin's government broke down and Harper came into power, his party began to display a staunch supporting of Israel and the Jewish community certainly took notice. During this past election, Peter Kent of the Conservative Party convincingly defeated Liberal incumbent Susan Kadis - who is Jewish herself.

However... with the exception of support for Israel, Bush didn't do so well in anywhere else (that's an understatement).

Enter Obama: Personally I can't really find much not to like about him. He's definitely got great appeal (dancing on the Ellen DeGeneres show, playing 3-on-3 with Indiana high school students). Things like that are good for brownie points but running against the person succeeding George W. Bush, he'd be hard-pressed to lose.

So my question is, would it be hypocritical to say I'm Conservative in Canada, yet Liberal in America?

I'm not sure really. Guess I should brush up on my American politics.

And my appreciation of Obama, well let's just say I've had to ask myself a few questions after reading a very interesting email my friend sent me. (I was going to include it here, but Shabbat is coming so there's no time for that...). On Sunday, maybe Saturday night I'll post my thoughts on this email in relation to the election...

But for now, Have a good shabbos y'all (or as I like to say: Sabbatical Salutations and Benedictions!!)

Also!! Stay tuned for some announcement on some new features I'll be adding to the blog in the near future.