Washington — Misha Lerner speaks softly but carries a big stick.
At 10 years old, the sandy-haired, fair-skinned boy, his broken arm in a cast, seemed cherubic and unthreatening sitting among some 40 students who were listening to former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice at the Jewish Primary Day School of the Nation’s Capital on May 3.
Rice had come to speak at the school as part of JPDS’s annual Yitzhak Rabin Memorial Lecture.
Lerner, whose mother, Inna, left Moscow for the United States in 1996, and whose father, Mark, works as a lawyer for the Department of Labor, had been taught not to pull any punches.
So, amid questions for Rice about figure skating, Led Zeppelin and even growing up under Jim Crow, Lerner’s stood out. “How do you feel about the things the Obama administration has said about the ways you got information from prisoners?” he asked her.
The hard-hitting question won the fourth grader from Bethesda, Md., immediate fame. But reports that the school had asked him not to use the word “torture” drew suggestions that Lerner had been censored. The original question, “If you would work for the Obama administration, would you push for torture?” seemed much tougher.
David Zimand, the school’s director of general studies, who helped Lerner and other students formulate their questions, called the charge “mind-boggling.”
“We let him ask the question,” he said. “Misha’s not this crusading political person. He’s a quiet, shy, sweet, thoughtful little boy. And nobody put him up to this, either.”
Although the question was modified at the behest of Zimand and Naomi Reem, the school’s principal, Zimand said the decision to do so was not political —“There was no chance that Rice was going to work for Obama,” — and that Lerner was happy to rephrase it.
“I told him, ‘I really want you to have an opportunity to ask this question, but I want to make sure we ask it in a way that will give her a chance to answer and to feel respected, even if we’re pressing her,’” Zimand said. He confessed that he and his colleagues “didn’t put a ton of thought into this,” because “we didn’t even remotely think that he was going to be talking to [National Public Radio’s] Robert Siegel and on the third page of The Washington Post.
“We reframed the question together,” he related. “I said: ‘Are you comfortable with this? Is this a question you want to ask? Is it your question?’ And he said yes.”
Lerner himself appeared to confirm this, saying that the removal of the word “torture” from his query “didn’t really matter.”
Asked how he initially came up with the question, Lerner said, “Mr. Zimand came to our classroom and talked about Condoleezza Rice’s background and history, and he also mentioned that there was some controversial stuff about her, and he talked a little bit about torture.” Lerner said he also had “heard about it in the news… So I decided to do my question based on that.”
Inna Lerner, a stay-at-home mom, was surprised when her son popped the question to Rice. “He likes history and politics, and he’s very good at art. He likes physics now; I don’t know where that came from. He likes to write, and he likes to swim. He’s constantly doing research and learning — between playing computer games — and he seems to enjoy that. But I haven’t discussed torture with him,” she said. “I was surprised by the subject.”
Rice, who has come under fire recently for telling Stanford University students that waterboarding was legal because “it was authorized by the president,” didn’t seem surprised at all by Misha’s question. “One of the hardest things about being in government,” she told the students, is criticism from “people outside of government who really don’t have to deal with the daily struggles that you do and aren’t trying to solve really difficult problems. They’re just sitting out there, commenting and criticizing. I don’t think that’s really fair.
“We were all terrified of another attack on this country, but even under those most difficult circumstances, the president was not prepared to do something illegal, and I hope people understand that we were trying to protect the country.”
Lerner isn’t sure that he understands. The Bush administration used torture, he says, which “is basically like robbing someone. Like you put a gun to someone’s head and say, ‘Gimme the money,’ but you’re doing it with torture and information, not a gun and money,” the boy said. For him, Rice’s answer just wasn’t good enough. His mother agrees. “I didn’t expect anything else,” she said.
Contact Jeremy Gillick at feedback@forward.com
The Forward welcomes reader comments in order to promote thoughtful discussion on issues of importance to the Jewish community. In the interest of maintaining a civil forum, the Forward requires that all commenters be appropriately respectful toward our writers, other commenters and the subjects of the articles. Vigorous debate and reasoned critique are welcome; name-calling and personal invective are not. While we generally do not seek to edit or actively moderate comments, the Forward reserves the right to remove comments for any reason.
To post a comment, click to login:
Copyright © 2012, Forward Association, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Misha Lerner, the fourth-grader who asked Condoleezza Rice a tough question about torture (though his school had pushed him to avoid using that word), showed a great deal more wisdom and sense of Jewish values than the leaders of the school who "honored" Ms. Rice by having her give their annual Rabin Memorial Lecture. Ms. Rice took part in, helped plan, enabled, advised, and publicly supported a war that violated every level of Jewish, American, and human values. It violated international and American law, was profoundly implicated in the elevation of torture to become an instrument of public policy. weakened the security position of Israel by greatly strengthening that of Iran, drove four million Iraqis from their homes, killed 4,000 Americans and somewhere between 100,000 and 400,000 Iraqis, and maimed the bodies, minds, and souls of many thousands more. These deeds were all based on a set of lies that Ms. Rice facilitated and never resisted. Nor has she done any sort of tshuvah whatsoever for this massive mangling of lives, justice, truth.
On the torture question, though the New York Times has reported that she raised some questions within the Bush Administration, once she was told that the President had authorized the policy she concluded that "by definition" that meant it was legal and did not violate the Convention Against Torture.
This argument is not worthy of being honored by a Jewish school or any other Jewish institution. Torah not only forbids torture, but in a people that has suffered Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, Rome, the Inquisition, Hitler, and Stalin, this argument for allowing torture is an abomination. There is a reason that our Yom Kippur service includes a graphic description of the torturing to death of ten great rabbis by the Roman Empire .
Misha Lerner's wisdom and courage shine a spotlight on, but do not redeem, the school's lack of wisdom or courage in this matter. May the school speedily and in our day return to upholding the three pillars that according to Pirkei Avot uphold the world: truth, justice, and peace.
Rabbi Arthur Waskow The Shalom Center www.shalomctr.org
G-d bless George Bush for the torture he unleashed on the scum who would destroy America, which kept us safe for the past 7 and 1/2 years. I am sure Arthur Waskow has a piece of paper somewhere that proclaims him a rabbi, but of him my own rebbes at Yeshiva and Mesifta Rabbi Chaim Berlin would have proclaimed, Nu, look who's also a rabbi. Feh.
Bernard Braginsky is sadly mistaken and needs to study the lessons of the Holocaust. Look at the process of torture, the need to inflict it, the consequences of it, and the process that Israel applied to the Eichman trial--making sure Eichman was given a fair trial which clearly showed the world his criminality and the humanity and moral superiority of the Jewish state.
I'll take the saving of innocent people over the torture of a terrorist any time or day.
Ms. Gold: Eichmann did not get a fair trial. His trial at best was a show trial and any idiot could have predicted his fate. For a fair trial, a third country would have been a better venue, then either Israel or Germany. For everyone else: The issue of torture works simply because it puts a fear into the recipient. You place someone's head under water a few times, he/she will tell you anything to stay alive. Of the anything they state, usually 60% or more will be the truth. The rest, garbage. There is no bottom line here when dealing with terrorists.If people are rational and they think like rational human beings, then the need for torture would be mute, but we are not dealing with rational human beings. For the most part, we are dealing with Untermenschen,(sub-human beings) who delight in killing anyone and anything that gets in their way. Be that the Mumbai massacre, or the 9-11 tragedy. The bottom line equates to the same thing. If you need information, you get it from all available sources.
Liberals are like naive children when it comes to the difficult decisions of the day. When it comes to harsh interigation techniques or waterboarding, of course we would all be for it, if it involved our own child or loved one who was being held captive and was about to be killed, and we had in custody one of the kiddnappers who new the child's location. Please read Charles Krauthammer's recent article on the subject.
Torture? No. Except …
By Charles Krauthammer
Torture is an impermissible evil. Except under two circumstances. The first is the ticking time bomb. An innocent's life is at stake. The bad guy you have captured possesses information that could save this life. He refuses to divulge. In such a case, the choice is easy. Even John McCain, the most admirable and estimable torture opponent, says openly that in such circumstances, "You do what you have to do." And then take the responsibility.
Some people, however, believe you never torture. Ever. They are akin to conscientious objectors who will never fight in any war under any circumstances, and for whom we correctly show respect by exempting them from war duty. But we would never make one of them Centcom commander. Private principles are fine, but you don't entrust such a person with the military decisions upon which hinges the safety of the nation. It is similarly imprudent to have a person who would abjure torture in all circumstances making national security decisions upon which depends the protection of 300 million countrymen.
The second exception to the no-torture rule is the extraction of information from a high-value enemy in possession of high-value information likely to save lives. This case lacks the black-and-white clarity of the ticking time bomb scenario. We know less about the length of the fuse or the nature of the next attack. But we do know the danger is great. (One of the "torture memos" noted that the CIA had warned that terrorist "chatter" had reached pre-9/11 levels.) We know we must act but have no idea where or how — and we can't know that until we have information. Catch-22.
Under those circumstances, you do what you have to do. And that includes waterboarding. (To call some of the other "enhanced interrogation" techniques — face slap, sleep interruption, a caterpillar in a small space — torture is to empty the word of any meaning.)
Did it work? The current evidence is fairly compelling. George Tenet said that the "enhanced interrogation" program alone yielded more information than everything gotten from "the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency put together."
Michael Hayden, CIA director after waterboarding had been discontinued, writes (with former attorney general Michael Mukasey) that "as late as 2006 … fully half of the government's knowledge about the structure and activities of al-Qaeda came from those interrogations." Even Dennis Blair, Obama's director of national intelligence, concurs that these interrogations yielded "high value information." So much for the lazy, mindless assertion that torture never works.
Could we not, as the president repeatedly asserted in his Wednesday news conference, have obtained the information by less morally poisonous means? Perhaps if we'd spoken softly and sincerely to Khalid Sheik Mohammed, we could equally have obtained "high-value information."
There are two problems with the "good cop" technique. KSM, the mastermind of 9/11 who knew more about more plots than anyone else, did not seem very inclined to respond to polite inquiries about future plans. The man who boasted of personally beheading Daniel Pearl with a butcher knife answered questions about plots with "soon you will know" — meaning, when you count the bodies in the morgue and find horribly disfigured burn victims in hospitals, you will know then what we are planning now.
The other problem is one of timing. The good cop routine can take weeks or months or years. We didn't have that luxury in the aftermath of 9/11 when waterboarding, for example, was in use. We'd been caught totally blind. We knew there were more plots out there, and we knew almost nothing about them. We needed to find out fast. We found out a lot.
"We have people walking around in this country that are alive today because this process happened," asserts Blair's predecessor, Mike McConnell. Of course, the morality of torture hinges on whether at the time the information was important enough, the danger great enough and our blindness about the enemy's plans severe enough to justify an exception to the moral injunction against torture.
Judging by Nancy Pelosi and other members of Congress who were informed at the time, the answer seems to be yes. In December 2007, after a report in The Post that she had knowledge of these procedures and did not object, she admitted that she'd been "briefed on interrogation techniques the administration was considering using in the future."
Today Pelosi protests "we were not — I repeat — were not told that waterboarding or any other of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used." She imagines that this distinction between past and present, Clintonian in its parsing, is exonerating.
On the contrary. It is self-indicting. If you are told about torture that has already occurred, you might justify silence on the grounds that what's done is done and you are simply being used in a post-facto exercise to cover the CIA's rear end. The time to protest torture, if you really are as outraged as you now pretend to be, is when the CIA tells you what it is planning to do "in the future."
But Pelosi did nothing. No protest. No move to cut off funding. No letter to the president or the CIA chief or anyone else saying "Don't do it."
On the contrary, notes Porter Goss, then chairman of the House intelligence committee: The members briefed on these techniques did not just refrain from objecting, "on a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda."
More support, mind you. Which makes the current spectacle of self-righteous condemnation not just cowardly but hollow. It is one thing to have disagreed at the time and said so. It is utterly contemptible, however, to have been silent then and to rise now "on a bright, sunny, safe day in April 2009" (the words are Blair's) to excoriate those who kept us safe these harrowing last eight years.
Liberals are like naive children when it comes to the difficult decisions of the day. When it comes to harsh interigation techniques or waterboarding, of course we would all be for it, if it involved our own child or loved one who was being held captive and was about to be killed, and we had in custody one of the kiddnappers who new the child's location. Please read Charles Krauthammer's recent article on the subject.
Torture? No. Except …
By Charles Krauthammer
Torture is an impermissible evil. Except under two circumstances. The first is the ticking time bomb. An innocent's life is at stake. The bad guy you have captured possesses information that could save this life. He refuses to divulge. In such a case, the choice is easy. Even John McCain, the most admirable and estimable torture opponent, says openly that in such circumstances, "You do what you have to do." And then take the responsibility.
Some people, however, believe you never torture. Ever. They are akin to conscientious objectors who will never fight in any war under any circumstances, and for whom we correctly show respect by exempting them from war duty. But we would never make one of them Centcom commander. Private principles are fine, but you don't entrust such a person with the military decisions upon which hinges the safety of the nation. It is similarly imprudent to have a person who would abjure torture in all circumstances making national security decisions upon which depends the protection of 300 million countrymen.
The second exception to the no-torture rule is the extraction of information from a high-value enemy in possession of high-value information likely to save lives. This case lacks the black-and-white clarity of the ticking time bomb scenario. We know less about the length of the fuse or the nature of the next attack. But we do know the danger is great. (One of the "torture memos" noted that the CIA had warned that terrorist "chatter" had reached pre-9/11 levels.) We know we must act but have no idea where or how — and we can't know that until we have information. Catch-22.
Under those circumstances, you do what you have to do. And that includes waterboarding. (To call some of the other "enhanced interrogation" techniques — face slap, sleep interruption, a caterpillar in a small space — torture is to empty the word of any meaning.)
Did it work? The current evidence is fairly compelling. George Tenet said that the "enhanced interrogation" program alone yielded more information than everything gotten from "the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency put together."
Michael Hayden, CIA director after waterboarding had been discontinued, writes (with former attorney general Michael Mukasey) that "as late as 2006 … fully half of the government's knowledge about the structure and activities of al-Qaeda came from those interrogations." Even Dennis Blair, Obama's director of national intelligence, concurs that these interrogations yielded "high value information." So much for the lazy, mindless assertion that torture never works.
Could we not, as the president repeatedly asserted in his Wednesday news conference, have obtained the information by less morally poisonous means? Perhaps if we'd spoken softly and sincerely to Khalid Sheik Mohammed, we could equally have obtained "high-value information."
There are two problems with the "good cop" technique. KSM, the mastermind of 9/11 who knew more about more plots than anyone else, did not seem very inclined to respond to polite inquiries about future plans. The man who boasted of personally beheading Daniel Pearl with a butcher knife answered questions about plots with "soon you will know" — meaning, when you count the bodies in the morgue and find horribly disfigured burn victims in hospitals, you will know then what we are planning now.
The other problem is one of timing. The good cop routine can take weeks or months or years. We didn't have that luxury in the aftermath of 9/11 when waterboarding, for example, was in use. We'd been caught totally blind. We knew there were more plots out there, and we knew almost nothing about them. We needed to find out fast. We found out a lot.
"We have people walking around in this country that are alive today because this process happened," asserts Blair's predecessor, Mike McConnell. Of course, the morality of torture hinges on whether at the time the information was important enough, the danger great enough and our blindness about the enemy's plans severe enough to justify an exception to the moral injunction against torture.
Judging by Nancy Pelosi and other members of Congress who were informed at the time, the answer seems to be yes. In December 2007, after a report in The Post that she had knowledge of these procedures and did not object, she admitted that she'd been "briefed on interrogation techniques the administration was considering using in the future."
Today Pelosi protests "we were not — I repeat — were not told that waterboarding or any other of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used." She imagines that this distinction between past and present, Clintonian in its parsing, is exonerating.
On the contrary. It is self-indicting. If you are told about torture that has already occurred, you might justify silence on the grounds that what's done is done and you are simply being used in a post-facto exercise to cover the CIA's rear end. The time to protest torture, if you really are as outraged as you now pretend to be, is when the CIA tells you what it is planning to do "in the future."
But Pelosi did nothing. No protest. No move to cut off funding. No letter to the president or the CIA chief or anyone else saying "Don't do it."
On the contrary, notes Porter Goss, then chairman of the House intelligence committee: The members briefed on these techniques did not just refrain from objecting, "on a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda."
More support, mind you. Which makes the current spectacle of self-righteous condemnation not just cowardly but hollow. It is one thing to have disagreed at the time and said so. It is utterly contemptible, however, to have been silent then and to rise now "on a bright, sunny, safe day in April 2009" (the words are Blair's) to excoriate those who kept us safe these harrowing last eight years.
To Renee Gold -- how many Americans are you willing to see die in order to retain your "moral superiority"? Gold needs to cease her insipid babbling and join the rest of us common mortals in the real world. If Gold were ever to catch wind of a terrorist plot against her own family, she would not waste a second in pleading with the CIA to please, oh please torture anybody they wanted to in order to save her mother, child, etc. And if Gold had bothered to do some elementary research before wasting our time with her delusions, she would have known that in a recent article, Dennis Blair, Obama's own director of national security, has written sympathetically of Bush's interrogation program. It was revealed in that same article that it was waterboarding that forced a jihadist swine to disclose an incipient plot against Los Angeles, in time for Bush to head it off. Unfortunately there were no jihadists for us to torture to reveal 9/11 beforehand, so there was no chance to prevent the death of my cousin, Alexander Braginsky. The only reason my grandchildren are not orphans today is because their mother, my daughter, missed her regular ferry that morning to her job at the World Financial Center. Mishugoyim like Gold will bury us all yet.
"Rabbi" Waskow, You're a Disgrace. Period. You are exactly what is wrong with the Rabbi profession these days. Far from being the spiritual head of a congregation, Mr. Waskow would rather spew his "social activism" which of course includes blaming a good, honorable President (quite unlike the current occupant of the White House, whom I'm sure Waskow in his infinite wisdom - read: arrogance - voted for) for waging a just war against an enemy, not only of America but of Israel too.
Since Mr. Waskow wants to talk casualties and wars, I would like to ask him where he was when Bill Clinton chose to wage an aggressive war against the people of Yugoslavia, a people who suffered as much as we did during World War II, a people who unlike Saddam Hussein or the Al Qaeda Clinton failed to protect us from, were friendly to America. 2000 innocent Serbian men, women and children were murdered by American bombs dropped indiscriminently from B-52s and other aircraft, while those of "Jewish" origin, i.e., Madeleine Albright, William Cohen, Sandy Burger, and Wesley Clark cheered on. If we had divered just 10 percent of the resources used in this ILLEGAL, unjust war over Kosovo against Al Qaeda back then, there would not have been a 9/11 or a Gitmo for clowns like Mr. Waskow and all of the screamers out there who pity those who'd torture, behead and murder us than truly behave just and righteous.
And to end, I fully concur with the gentleman who posted the last remarks. I would gladly torture anyone who was willing to murder 100, 1000, 10,000, 100,000 Americans or Israelis if that were the only means to prevent such a genocidal bombing. If Waskow and his friends don't like that, then kindly move to Tehran or Gaza and preach your benevolence there. Of course you could start here and try to preach to Jeremiah Wright first.
Misha's question was a legitimate one for a child, and the answer should have been one appropriate for a child that age: "Misha, there are some very bad people in this world, terrorists, and sometimes the people who are responsible for keeping us safe need to do things we would prefer not to have to do, but it is more important to save people's lives."
(As an aside, I am no fan of Condoleesa Rice, and President Bush's policies toward Israel appear to have been schizophrenic, some helpful, others harmful, but they were absolutely saintly compared to Obama's antagonistic policies.)
As for the extremist leftist "Rabbis" (whose sophomoric hyperventilating rant about Iraq is laughable), who presume to lecture other Jews about "abominations", it is their conduct which is an abomination. They consort with the sworn enemies of the Jewish people, the un-indicted terrorist co-conspirators at CAIR, urge recognition of and "peace" with Hamas, organize far-left anti-Israel political groups, and agitate against a military strike against Iran which is essential to save the lives of millions of Jews and the Jewish State of Israel. American Jews are plagued by many similar lefty "Rabbis", whose "hearts go out" to the sworn enemies of the Jewish people, and who act a fifth column in America through anti-Israel groups like J-Street.
As to "torture": Putting aside the fine points of what legally qualifies as "torture", it is obviously an "abomination" when torture is used to cause a person to convert to another religion. The rabbis who died of torture rather than convert were Jewish martyrs.
On the other hand, it is an entirely different matter when an enemy must be killed (or much less, inflicted pain) in order to save your own life or the lives of innocents. It is an obligation, not a choice, to kill a wrongdoer in order to save an innocent life. I do not pretend to possess expertise on this matter, but I found the following:
"MAIMONIDIES, LAWS OF A MURDERER,CHAPTER 1, LAWS 6-7, 9: Every Jew is commanded to save a person being pursued for his life, even if it means killing the pursuer, and [even if] the pursuer is a minor. Thus, if warning is issued and he continues to pursue, the pursuer can be killed even without his acknowledging the warning. But if the pursuer can be stopped by disabling part of his body, by striking him with an arrow, a stone, or a sword . . . then that should be done. And this is a negative commandment, i.e., not to have mercy on the life of a pursuer."
It is clear that one is required to do that which is necessary to save one's life, even up to killing or maiming that person. To me, it seems elementary that it is proper and necessary to torture the pursuer of murder, the "ticking bomb", who has information which can save hundreds or thousands of innocent souls. And it works! As one example, reportedly Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a mastermind of 9/11, gave up useful information which saved many American lives. (Charles Krauthammer is brilliant on the subject.)
But, what is Jewish law on the subject? Tried to do a bit of research, and found a scholarly article by a Rabbi with real Rabbinical credentials, Rabbi Michael J. Broyde, an Orthodox Rabbi ordained by Yeshiva University, and a member of the Beit Din of America (and professor). A copy of a purported excerpt of his article follows:
...
[T]orture is permissible and consistent with halacha [Jewish law] in all situations where there is a proper, thoughtful military chain of command (the higher up a decision goes, the more thought tends to be put in) and no other reasonable alternative is available... [T]he wholesale suspension of the sanctity of life that occurs in wartime also entails the suspension of such secondary human rights issues as the notion of human dignity, the fear of the ethical decline of our soldiers, or even the historical fear of our ongoing victimhood.
Furthermore, the protection of our own soldiers and civilians undoubtedly trumps the claims of human dignity by those who seek to do us evil. International law, which Jewish law generally expects its adherents to obey, is limited in its scope to those who pledge themselves to its obedience. Neither Hezbollah nor Hamas nor al Qaeda are signatories to the Geneva Convention and do not conduct themselves in accordance with its provisions. They certainly do not treat prisoners they capture in accordance with its requirements (as shown by the recent murder of two captured American soldiers in Iraq). Thus we are not required as a matter of international law to treat their prisoners in accordance with the convention on the treatment of prisoners.
In sum, according to Jewish law and ethics, torture in the context of war is no more problematic than death itself, and is permitted by the general license to wage war. There is no logical reason that halacha would categorically prohibit duly authorized wartime torture as a method for acquiring information otherwise not available, in order to save lives in the future. Of course, not all conduct permitted as a matter of Jewish law is wise or prudent; the consideration of which policies work in what settings is fundamentally not a question of Jewish law or ethics, but one for military and political leadership."
...
Reading up more on the subject, I find that there is a goodly amount of controversy concerning the proper interpretation of Halakhaic law, but that there are eminent elder Orthodox Rabbis, including Rabbi J. David Bleich, who have written on torture's justification in cases of "ticking bombs" (there is an Article in Tradition magazine (Winter 2006) which apparently needs to be purchased to be read), but is described by other commentators).
The bottom line is that serious people recognize the necessity and morality of torture under limited circumstances. We need serious, mature, reasonable and moral Jewish perspectives, not the invectives of far-left vitriolic ideologues with parochial political agendas.
Frank,
Enjoying your comments. I couldn't have said it any better.
Like you, I too am no friend of Condi's. She was a pretty good National Security Adviser, kind of like Albright when she was UN Ambassador but before she became Secretary of State and "found out" she was a Jewess. When she got to Foggy Bottom she changed drastically, but I think she'll be looked at as a saint compared to her namesake, Susan Rice, who's just one despicable victicrat who is wrong on practically everything except perhaps Darfur.
But then again, the entire Obama Foreign Policy team - and his White House Staff of Court Jews are all hostile - not one friendly voice - towards Israel.
Misha Lerner should have asked Condi about Islamic policies; why the U.S. has always moddycuddled Islamic regimes even when they practice torture themselves, when they behead children in Indonesia for being Christian; when they enslave, starve and slaughter Blacks in the Sudan - both Christian and Muslim! When they intimidate Palestinian Christians in Bethlehem, or deliberately seek out an innocent Chabad Rabbi and his family in Mumbai for slaughter? But he's just a typical Liberal little Jewish boy. I was just as idealistic at his age, but perhaps a bit better read.
And we have the Waskows - smug, arrogant, self-righteous like Emanuel, willing to sell us out or betray our people, yet constantly beat the drums for those who call Israelis "Nazis". Interesting that Emanuel goes to an "modern"-Orthodox Shul. He should have been physically pitched out into the street by his fellow congregants when he told Israel no help on Iran unless you surrender to Hamas. But nowadays we allow scum to permeate our people. We scream about Medoff and his crooked wrongdoings, but not one word about Soros the Nazi collaborator, or that pervert Barney Frank, both of whom are worse goniffs.
No wonder why our people are going downhill fast. We have Misha crying about the torture of roaches, and on the other hand we have Jonathan Krohn, his same age, the brilliant darling of Conservative radio who was born Jewish but his parents chose to convert out.
I just wonder how all this will play out. Will Netanyahu be pressured to do nothing, and 6 months to 2 years from now Tel-Aviv evaporates under a radioactive mushroom cloud, or will Israel go it alone, risk condemnation, even from a country that was its closest friend, until the American people, in a period of madness, voted in a hypervenilating coward and reverse racist? They said it could never happen here - but it is, courtesy in great part to the 78 percent who chose to goosestep with those who hate us.
More important than Misha asking the question, I find it courageous that he did not take Rice at her word. He continues to question against the submissive current generated from those around him, and in this way upholds his Jewish faith.
To say that he is "crying about the torture of roaches," to quote Alan, is to forget the essence of what makes us Jewish; if we do not push our leaders to honesty, then they will surely continue to circumvent the truth. Kids like Misha are the darlings of American Judaism, regardless of their political leanings; Jonathan Krohn may be the wunderkind for the Republican Party — or rather traditional Conservatism, as he himself makes the distinction — but he has yet to come out and say anything that might challenge anyone other than a liberal. And liberals, as we have learned, are the White-hating pervert-Nazis that make up 8 out of 10 people in this country. To say that there is not "not one friendly voice" for Israel in the Obama Administration — not even Rahm Emanuel, whose father fought for the Isreal in Palestine — is simply incorrect. What is being confused here is that, instead of using brute force and violence to gain peace in Israel, Obama is advocating an agreement base on mutual respect.
To be the first of the two parties to give this respect and acknowledgment of the others' humanity would prove that Israel has the supremacy of strength. As long as we treat our enemies as sub-human, they have a reason to spout anti-semitism and hatred for America; the militant Islamic groups that are beheading Christians are no different in viewpoint to those who see their enemies as roaches. It is a terrible cycle in which we find ourselves, and someone must put an end to it before nuclear warfare becomes a reality, as Alan has stated. Instead of questioning the tactics of the other side, we must first question our own tactics. Misha did just that, and in doing so he upheld what it means to be Jewish in the world's greatest nation. And that is far from goose-stepping with the rest.
To Nathan Goldstone: Please spare us the cant and sanctimony. If your family were threatened with a terrorist attack, would you torture a terrorist to get the information to prevent it? Or would your "essence of what makes us Jewish" stop you from doing so?
Mr. Braginsky —
Your question is a valid one, and none of us must forget what terrorists have done to our own relatives, friends and neighbors. I did have family in New York City in 2001, and the threat was very close to home, and remains so with an uncle and cousin in the armed forces making repeated deployments overseas. I have not been able to serve my country; until a few months ago, I was not old enough. Knowledge of my age makes all previous comments seem undoubtedly naive and unlearned, of top of sanctimonious and cant, but thank you for nonetheless for the peer-to-peer criticism. It means a great deal, Mr. Braginsky.
I am not sure of all the things I could do were I under the pressure of terrorists threatening my family directly — to answer your question straight — but the fear of terrible things happening is ever-present. That does not change the fact, however, that international terrorists are held to a different standard than domestic terrorists. I am sorry, but nobody would have considered subjecting someone like Timothy McVeigh to the mechanisms used in Guantánamo Bay; there are two standards, and one of them believes itself above the Constitution it is to uphold.
Now, some believe torture is not cruel and unusual; indeed, my own hero Elie Wiesel, who I thought was too wise to seek revenge, spoke of his desire to flash images of Bernie Madoff's victims in the old man's prison cell. But to punish non-citizens illegally isn't right, and to do it on the grounds that they are committing some perverse crusade is, to use your words, cant and sanctimonious. I urge you to read Jeff Sharlet's "Jesus Killed Mohammed" in this month's Harper's, an exposé on how many high-ranking officials in the U.S. Army only support Israel ostensibly; they believe that the Holy Land will return to Christians on Judgment Day. And what of the Israeli soldiers in Gaza hoping to return the land to the Jews? These are crusades that are not unlike those of extremist Muslims; each ends up taking innocent lives in the name of a supreme faith and a god that, between the three religions, is the same.
International terrorists have done great evils, but so too have domestic ones. Our court systems are meant to be used and are designed to carry out sentences that our society has deemed is just, right, and lawful. Until we treat all of those who do evil to Americans in an equal manner, those against use will have fuel for their fires.
My Jewish faith does indeed guide me to seek a better and more verdant world, and a greater life for my future children, so yes, Mr. Braginsky, what makes me Jewish does influence my stance against torture. That you and others take this essence flippantly, as some empty turn of phrase, is what motivates me to ask questions of those around me. I may have lost a hero in Mr. Wiesel, but I have gained one in little Misha for this reason.
It’s sad – but at the same time, a bit funny – to watch as the fringe of authoritarian rightwing fanatics becomes increasingly unhinged from reality day after day, ever more shrill, sputtering with rage and indignation about the traitors and cowards all around them, while only these ultra-mega-macho super warriors have the resolute moral fortitude to stand up to the swelling tide of appeasement that threatens to consume all of Western civilization at a moment’s notice.
Bernard and Rick and Alan and Frank – not to mention, of course, such sadistic, brutish animals as Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Charles “Dr. Strangelove” Krauthammer, whom they worship with cult-like adoration (and who was thrown out of synagogue on Yom Kippur for screaming at the rabbi in the middle of his sermon) – are all representative of a very specific type known as The Neocon. Let’s face it: there are few phenomena in life more disgusting than the endless whining and bottomless self-pity of the Neocon, and America has had way more than enough of them.
Frank Lee is undoubtedly the biggest creep of the bunch, demonstrating that he is incapable of retaining a single piece of information that doesn’t come directly from the lifeline that connects his lips to Rush Limbaugh’s ass. Let’s look at a couple of his choice nuggets offered up in response to Gillick’s article.
“American Jews are plagued by many similar lefty "Rabbis", whose "hearts go out" to the sworn enemies of the Jewish people, and who act a fifth column in America through anti-Israel groups like J-Street.”
“The bottom line is that serious people recognize the necessity and morality of torture under limited circumstances. We need serious, mature, reasonable and moral Jewish perspectives, not the invectives of far-left vitriolic ideologues with parochial political agendas.”
“To me, it seems elementary that it is proper and necessary to torture the pursuer of murder, the "ticking bomb", who has information which can save hundreds or thousands of innocent souls. And it works!”
So Frank actually expects someone to believe that the vast majority of American Jews who voted for Obama are secret anti-Semites, and their rabbis traitors? That J-Street wants to see Israel destroyed? Frank is also one of those clowns who learned from daddy Rush that a thesaurus is an excellent substitute for coherence, logic, plausibility or empirical evidence. Thus, those who believe in torture are “serious, mature, reasonable and moral,” while those opposed to torture are “far-left vitriolic ideologues with parochial political agendas.” As to the “ticking time bomb” idiocy, the simple fact is that there isn’t, nor has there ever been, any such thing. There is never any way to confirm the accuracy of information obtained under torture, and it is universally recognized that victims being tortured will say anything they believe the torturer wants to hear in order to make it stop. We all know the simple truth of the matter: Neocons like Frank want to torture people because they goddamn like it. They’re authoritarian, sadistic thugs with a boundless sense of entitlement who want to teach Arabs a lesson. Is it any wonder at all that the Neocons are among the most widely, intensely, and justifiably loathed group of human beings anywhere on the planet Earth? Or that that election day in the United States has become a largely ceremonial occasion when the country gets together to collectively repudiate their most cherished beliefs, and every one of their repellent paranoid conspiracy theories?
Then we have Rick, who says,
“When it comes to harsh interrogation techniques or waterboarding, of course we would all be for it, if it involved our own child or loved one who was being held captive and was about to be killed . . . .”
First of all, you have to just love the Neocon’s adorable penchant for political correctness when it suits him. The word is “torture,” and the Neocon isn’t going to change that fact no matter how many times he tries to alter reality by calling it “naughty interrogation techniques.” Second, the notion that U.S. policy should be determined by the fact that “we’d all be for it” if our own kid were kidnapped is just too egregiously stupid to have to refute. That’s precisely why we have institutions such as the police and courts and prisons; indeed, the very purpose of a criminal justice system – of civilization itself – is the imposition of a consistent standard of justice in place arbitrary acts of private vengeance. Guess what? If my sister were raped, I’d want the perpetrator tortured, and if my mother were defrauded of her life’s savings, I’d want to beat the guy within an inch of his life. But only the Neocon thinks it’s a good idea to make his whims the basis of U.S. policy.
Rick’s hero The Kraut and the rest of his Neocon buddies also claim that torture is fine because of their standard “9/11-changed-everything” dog crap. Nonsense. If it’s not garbage, then let them answer one fantastically easy question: how come we not only didn’t torture the Nazis or the Japanese in WW II, but hanged them for war crimes for doing exactly the same thing Rick and his buddies are salivating about? Are they seriously trying to claim that the 9/11 attackers are qualitatively worse than those who operated extermination camps and bombed Pearl Harbor. I mean, is there anything on Earth more dishonest or hypocritical than a damn Neocon?
Lastly – and most comically – we have Bernard, who says,
“G-d bless George Bush for the torture he unleashed on the scum who would destroy America, which kept us safe for the past 7 and 1/2 years.”
You know what else your hero George Bush managed to do Bernard? He kept every major American city from being destroyed and thousands of their residents from being drowned for the last three years of his presidency, right after Hurricane Katrina. Isn’t that just great? Boy, you must really be proud, huh Bernard? You know what would have been even better though Bernard? If Georgie had managed to keep America safe FOR THE LAST GODDAMN EIGHT YEARS, not 7-1/2! You know, like it was his job to do. Try to get it through your head: your cousin’s dead because the George Bush and the Republican Party were too arrogant and stupid and incompetent to do their damn jobs, and torture didn’t have a thing to do with it.
And, sorry Bernard, but we’re not legalizing torture in this country so you and your Neocon buddies can have your sick revenge, and so you don’t have to confront the fact that you voted for the incompetent dolts who allowed 9/11 to happen in the first place. In fact, you better get used to the fact that not only has torture been banned by an American president respected within his own country and around the world, but the investigations and trials for the human filth that allowed it to happen are just getting started. Jay Bybee is going to be impeached, disbarred, and will never work as a lawyer again. John Yoo is going to disbarred and thrown off the faculty at U.C. Berkeley, with students throwing dog crap at his car as he’s run out of town. And soon it’s going to be time for the Neocon trash in the White House. In short, though I’m you’re probably used to the fact by now of having the American electorate spitting in your face every election day, you better get used to having it happen with a bit more frequency for a while.
Nathan,
When they come for you, the ACORN, ANSWER, MOVEON.ORG types - and they will, even going after their so-called "Jewish" organizers, i.e., the ones you claim "keep us honest" (as if Eli Pariser could keep anything honest in his miserable, pro-Fascist life), then kindly board the trains and cattle cars without a fuss. After all, Soros will be there grinning as usual, and ready to loot your home, and also it is only fair.
Your "stinking thinking" claims that Qaedist, Hamas, Hezbollah members are NOT "sub-human". Sorry, but I see no difference, moral or otherwise, between the SS murderer aiming his rifle at a doomed Jewish woman and child, and the piece of crap known as Mohammed Atta ready to take innocent women, children, and babies to their doom. I also see no difference between the Ustasha murdering a village filled with Serbs with the Muslims in Indonesia beheading and burning Christians, including children. To me, they are roaches, period, and you don't play with them - you torture them if that means saving innocent lives.
Another case in point. The Olmert government knew, knew damn well Goldwasser and Regev were dead. Yet they took back the tortured, multilated corpses of the dead in exchange for a live babykiller Kuntar, and declared it a "moral" victory. After the Holocaust, any dead Jew murdered by scum is NOT a victory - we need to adapt Patton's maxim that preventing the enemy from killing you is to kill them, whether the pacifists like Nate like that or not.
And to call Rahm Emanuel pro-Israel because his father might have had more brains than he has, is laughable. Obama has NOT said one friendly word or reached out to Israel since taking office. Quite the contrary. An average American should be outraged that 900 mil of our taxpayer dollars is going to Hamas, courtesy of Obama, Biden, Hillary and the Democratic Party at a time we need that money at home, not in the hands of terrorists. To equate support of Israel over Iran with progress over a Paly state, is not the act of a friendly pro-Israel President but someone who has a perverse agenda. The someone who sat in a pew either applauding or sitting stupid while hate was poured down on him and others.
When you wake up to reality, Nate, call us.
For Smitty the Fascist...
What comes around, goes around.
If Bybee and Yoo are disbarred or even imprisoned, the next Republican President, and grant me, it may happen quite sooner than later, should be a meat eater unlike G.W. Bush who honestly was too nice and decent, even to neo-Fascists like you, (an irony that the current head of DHS is using that same "Patriot Act" that she and others screamed about to threaten the lives of good, decent Americans rather than the ANSWER, ACORN, MOVEON.ORG slime)and will indict child kidnappers and crook releasers like Holder and others for treason.
Just wait until the next 9/
For D. Smith,
Spoken like a true Nazi...look at yourself in the mirror, chum.
As for this guy being "respected" throughout the whole world, just tell that to a North Korea that just launched missiles or an Iran who told him to go to hell and plan to build those nukes while gutless wonder that he is, says the military option is off the table.
Your accusation about Bush has been refuted so many times I am not going to regurgitate to an typical neo-fascist ideologue (btw - I'd rather be a Neo-Con who helped elect Ronald Reagan than a Neo-Fascist who elected a coward who sat in a pew) except to say you've got the blood on your hands of 2000 innocent Serbian men, women, and children murdered by B-52s in our ILLEGAL war in Kosovo, a war that was waged against a people that were no threat to America, yet we bombed them for 30 days and nights.
If Clinton had done his job and sent those bombers further eastward to the hills of Pakistan and Afghanistan, we would have avoided 9/11, period, and Bernard's cousin would have been alive. He chose to murder Serbs instead of Al Qaeda.
Any more of a response to a typical Fascist jerk like you would be worthless. Just be a good little boy and go over to your Jeremiah Wright meets David Duke party.
The unrealistic, illogical, simplistic and muddled arguments made by some left-wing Jews impels me to speculate on the reason for their self-destructive behavior, and I am tempted to play psychologist.
There seems to be a strange ailment, an extreme-leftist ("progressive" or "liberal") self-delusion, requiring very fuzzy and wishful thinking and/or wilful denial of reality, which causes one to choose to believe that the world is simply comprised of only misunderstood people. In that make-believe world, an evil enemy must have somehow been aggrieved, and simply in need of "mutual respect" and understanding. In that dream-world, even a member of an evil cult, raised from infancy with hatred for others and in a culture deeply based on magical beliefs and outrageous lies will, with "mutual respect", enter in good-faith into a negotiated "peace". In that world there are no evil people, ideologies, or cultures. Of course, in the real world, these are sick and dangerous delusions.
An alternative or comorbid possibility is that there is something more malignant involved, perhaps a deep discomfort or even resentment of being a Jew.
For the self-deluded, it is my impression that they have so much invested in their delusion, and reality is so painful, that they resist any glimmer of truth. They must therefore torture reality to fit their delusions. So the leftists' answer is that the victims must somehow be to blame. If only the victims would change their ways! And so they invent lies about the victims:
It is a vicious anti-Semitic lie by extreme-leftists ("progressive" or "liberals") to suggest that Israel is in any manner the moral equivalent of the arabs.
It is a vicious anti-Semitic lefty lie to claim that Israel has treated its arab oppressors as "sub-human".
It is a vicious anti-Semitic lefty lie to pretend that there is a "cycle" of violence, and to equate Israel with the evil "culture" which seeks the destruction of the Jewish state and the murder of its Jewish citizens.
It is an obvious dangerous lefty lie to claim that in pressuring Israel to give up its physical security in order to purchase an illusory "peace", and preventing Israel from protecting herself from nuclear annihilation, that Obama is creating an agreement "based on mutual respect".
"Peace" has always been readily available to any enemy who chose it. Israel has repeatedly gone out on a limb to achieve it. Israel has never, I repeat never, been the aggressor nor refused any "peace" which preserved its physical security. There is no more moral country on the face of the earth. And America, with some exceptions (an example being Carter) has generally been a staunch ally, at least until now.
We are now confronted, at the worse possible time, with an American administration clearly hostile to Israel.
Finally, as to the "tactics" used by civilized peace-loving people to defend themselves against the unrestrained utterly evil barbarians, they are the minimum which must be used to defend ourselves against being terrorized and slaughtered.
All the Mishas have to be protected, in spite of the leftist adults for whom reality is too frightening to accept, and who instead choose to live in a world of self-delusion.
Memo to Nate Goldstone -- a lack of life experience melded to a firm position based airily on theory creates a luftmensch. If you don't know the term, you could look it up, as Casey Stengel used to say. Memo to D.Smith -- I'm pleased to see that therapy is enabling you to write complete sentences. However, if you should experience another overflow of bile, take two kashe varnishkes and call me in the morning.
My previous comments were addressed to Jewish readers, including even those whom I believe to be self-deluded or harbor deep discomfort of being a Jew. (Please forgive my unintentional double-post.) I did not address the malevolent far-left fringe who are true hate-mongers.
We know that we have among us Jews who are extreme-leftist equivalents of Hamas, far-left fascist true-believers whose stock-in-trade is hatred and lies. I will not address them directly, because I believe they are beyond the pale and beyond redemption.
For them I see no purpose in playing psychologist. (Although it could be amusing to speculate on various severe personality disorders which could play a role in their malevolence - perhaps psychopathic or sociopathic tendencies, or a far-lefty form of Tourette's syndrome.)
If you read their rantings rationally, it is evident that they thrive on the "Big Lie", a series of outrageously false statements. Unfortunately, there are a number of notorious "Jewish" antisemites who are actively, and to some extent effectively, libeling Israel and threatening the Jewish people. Take away their Big Lies, and nothing remains but anger and unbridled hatred.
The utter perversity of their hatred is that it relies upon demonizing the victim. Just as Hitler did so effectively, their Big Lies cast the Jew (with a new leftist code-word "Neocon") as the criminal, the one who sucks the blood of arab children, the "oppressor", the "occupier", who is "sadistic", who "enjoys torturing people".
They may seem patently absurd and laughable, but we should not ignore these voices as harmless crack-pots. They are the home-grown vanguard of the far-left antisemitism which is surging in Europe, which has begun to spread in America. These voices feed, and in a perverse way, normalize the anti-Israel vitriol and all the Big Lies which are fast becoming part of the left-wing political propaganda. The "mainstream" media publishes these lies as an alternative point of view which in the past they would have ignored, or reported as aberrant and hateful. These voices tend to validate the virulent antisemitism which infests the muslim world and Europe, and the far-left "Jews" who act as a fifth column in America through anti-Israel groups like J-Street.
Because the hate-mongers are real, just as the other enemies of Israel and America are real, we must acknowledge and identify them for what they are, hate-filled enemies of the Jewish people.
To Frank and Bernard,
I feel I've made two new great friends! BRAVO...you couldn't have said it any better than me in those last few remarks.
My previous comments were addressed to Jewish readers, including even those whom I believe to be self-deluded or harbor deep discomfort of being a Jew. (Please forgive my unintentional double-post.) I did not address the malevolent far-left fringe who are true hate-mongers.
We know that we have among us Jews who are extreme-leftist equivalents of Hamas, far-left fascist true-believers whose stock-in-trade is hatred and lies. I will not address them directly, because I believe they are beyond the pale and beyond redemption.
For them I see no purpose in playing psychologist. (Although it could be amusing to speculate on various severe personality disorders which could play a role in their malevolence - perhaps psychopathic or sociopathic tendencies, or a far-lefty form of Tourette's syndrome.)
If you read their rantings rationally, it is evident that they thrive on the "Big Lie", a series of outrageously false statements. Unfortunately, there are a number of notorious "Jewish" antisemites who are actively, and to some extent effectively, libeling Israel and threatening the Jewish people. Take away their Big Lies, and nothing remains but anger and unbridled hatred.
The utter perversity of their hatred is that it relies upon demonizing the victim. Just as Hitler did so effectively, their Big Lies cast the Jew (with a new leftist code-word "Neocon") as the criminal, the one who sucks the blood of arab children, the "oppressor", the "occupier", who is "sadistic", who "enjoys torturing people".
They may seem patently absurd and laughable, but we should not ignore these voices as harmless crack-pots. They are the home-grown vanguard of the far-left antisemitism which is surging in Europe, which has begun to spread in America. These voices feed, and in a perverse way, normalize the anti-Israel vitriol and all the Big Lies which are fast becoming part of the left-wing political propaganda. The "mainstream" media publishes these lies as an alternative point of view which in the past they would have ignored, or reported as aberrant and hateful. These voices tend to validate the virulent antisemitism which infests the muslim world and Europe, and the far-left "Jews" who act as a fifth column in America through anti-Israel groups like J-Street.
Because the hate-mongers are real, just as the other enemies of Israel and America are real, we must acknowledge and identify them for what they are, hate-filled enemies of the Jewish people.
As far as I'm concerned, anyone who uses the word "neo-con" to disparagingly cast Jews can be considered to be a Neo-Fascist, or better yet, Neo-Nazi, period, and yes, that DOES apply to any so-called JINO, ala Soros, Chomsky, Zinn, Normie Finkelstein who would goosestep with the enemies of both America and Israel but either smear or allow and applaud the smearing of fellow Jews.
Remember 78 percent, many, if not most of you can count yourselves in that number too. After all, you deliberately ignored the virulent anti-semitism and Israel-baiting, both closely related, of Obama and his friends.
TO: Alan,Frank,and Nate: Thank you, Alan. I value your camaraderie. If you and Frank should ever want to reach me beyond this exchange, my email address is foxfeature@juno.com. I would appreciate your sharing your email addresses, if you wish. Nate, you are also invited to stay in touch. Your opinions are misguided, but I feel there is goodwill behind them. Possible points of interest: l. Check out the Rasmussen Poll of registered voters of,I believe, this past Friday and Saturday. The poll indicates that if Israel attacks Iran, 49& of Americans say the US should help Israel. This breaks down as follows: 64% of Republicans and 50% of independents say the US should help Israel. The largest group of Democrats, a 44% plurality, say the US should not help Israel. 2. It is useful to remember a comment of Ben Hecht's. Hecht was the most famous screenwriter of his time,authoring Gone With the Wind, Gunga Din, Scarface, Guys and Dolls, Kiss of Death, and some 150 other screenplays. He was also the American co-chairman of Menachem Begin's Irgun Z'vai Leumi, which was fighting the British and the Arabs in 1946-47 to establish a Jewish homeland in Palestine. After the Irgun had hung several British officers in retaliation for the British executing Irgun prisoners, a great many American Jews were upset that the Jews were abandoning their "moral superiority" and in danger of becoming a "bloodthirsty people." Hecht's rejoinder: "The term 'bloodthirsty' as applied to Jews is itself a novelty. Until now, the world was accustomed to thinking of Jews exclusively as blood-covered and blood-emptied." Best, Bernie
Bernie's mindset reminds of those to leap to defend the rebbe who rapes his talmidim. Stop these reckless and irresponsible rationalizations of halacha and hashkafa. It's really beginning to bankrupt orthodoxy on many fronts!
Very nice site!