Always_Ask_Questions

> I voted for Biden and I am not going to debate it.

silence is an admission of a loss in our culture … very admirable way to do it.

I saw on another educated board, a TDS sufferer confronted with Trump’s quote forewarning Europeans about dangers of pro-Russian policies. Having nothing else to say, he went into a pretzel – he only said it because Bolton told him to say that. Human ability to stand on heir position is amazing. I am proud of jackk who has more integrity than that.

Practically speaking, I don’t see much changing from the time when Gemorah warned that Rashbi derech is risky: most of people I know whose Torah is interesting are either working as Rabbis or in professions. Don’t tell me I am hanging out in the right places, I can see a kollel from my window better than Sarah Palin can see Russia.

RebE > one who carries on himself the yoke of Torah is taken away the yoke of derech eretz
And Syag on a similar note:

Look, R Ilai (?) would have birds burned over him when he learned. If you solve the kashrus issues, you can just eat those birds. And if you don’t deserve (or prefer not to use) miracles, you can live modestly. In our times, if you are ready to live the same way most people lived in, say, middle ages, you can probably work one hour a week to achieve that. In fact, if someone is committed to this learning but does not have an hour a week, I’ll be happy to sign up as Zevulun, bli neder.

The problem is only when people want to have both zechus for learning full time and also keep up with Joneses at someone else’s expense without the sponsor approval.

CTL > The Democratic Party platform has never called for the abolition of private property, the hallmark of Communism.

I don’t want to over-label, and in general this country somehow avoided communism excesses that affected most of Europe 100+ years ago, but I think one can agree that D-s often suggest solutions that partially negate private property. In purist terms, any expropriation of private property that is not justified and unavoidable is a step towards abolition of private property. As D-s often look at taxation and re-distribution as a solution. Latest exhibit – wholesale student debt forgiveness directed mostly to their own voters.

One of the impact of “chochma” is ability to use logic and study facts. It does not have to be “goyishe” – you can skip Newtonian physics and go directly to Einstein.

Deleted for lack of kavod haTorah

As to Ch Ch, I already quoted a sefer that I bought in the zionist city of Benei Braq: there is an apartment in Petach Tikwa that was bought for Ch Ch and he refused at the end to come to EY, saying that if he visits Eida first, Mossad people will not read Mishna Berurah and vice versa, and he would like all of them to read it.

Avira, these are separate issues. That discussion and my observation apply to the food for melachim.

As to Mix INS, I wonder whether technology and supervision changed for the better from r Moshe’s times? Nets were changed to avoid mammals, and there is solid and chunk tuna that is full or big pieces of fish, rather than a formless mass. What would be the status of crabs in tuna’s stomach?!

By one midrash, both luchos had 10 commandments : these are simply two copies of a contract for both sides. So, whether the luchos were prepared in advance or written down later, shvues is the day the contract was agreed upon.

Crazy, to clarify the general immediately apologized for the retweet 6 years ago, saying that he meant to retweet the previous post. The one religion comment seem to actually happen indeed several months ago, at a religious rally and not when he was an advisor.

Not that I think that it is halachically permissible to use the first amendment to say untruths about any politicians, but we should be especially careful with people who served honorably, whatever their political views are.

age of the judge does not seem to be the problem in this case. Liberals were musing on the radio whether it is worth appealing the ruling because there is a real chance that the Supremes will uphold it. So, the ruling is not baseless. The issue seems to hedge on what “and other measures” mean in the law. I would say that CDC was justified using emergency powers in first several months but Congress should step up and define the Fed powers exactly.

Practically speaking:
– airlines and buses should be able to designate masked and non-masked sections, or at least let passengers exchange seats.
– please look out for elderly people in your neighborhood who took public transportation and now might not use it and would need a ride (with an open window)

Who said chasidim are the first shomrim!? Obviously, litvakim had the earliest organized militia to keep chasidim out!

John Mearsheimer was saying 5 years ago that Putin will not start a large war. He needs to eat his hat.

PS if not for
– FDA apparently directing Pfizer not to release vaccine test results before the election
– suppressing all stories about Hunter and his father’s businesses

> Doing your best is doing his best to compare this Corona

Increasing confusion and disbelief in facts accumulates and destroys fabric of the society. One interesting observation I saw is that Russians are using same channels and fake personas to propagate confusion about the war as they used to question masks and vaccines. In one funny moment in 2016, same facebook bot propagated info about a pro- and an anti-trump demonstration in NYC to ensure a proper confrontation.

I don’t see this coupling here though: seems like people who question the war do not overlap much with those who question masks. I guess it means that we get this propaganda virus through long chains: most of us are not subscribed to RT “news” “reports”, but we hear it from someone who heard it from someone, so we all sure that we are all using info coming from “frum” sources. More generally, discussion style here is along the lines everywhere else in the media – throwing slogans, disregarding truth, disrespect to opponents – even if slightly elevated sometimes. That is what mentioned about Amalek that cooled the water for later enemies: you get desensitized to goyishe attitudes by seeing it everywhere and I don’t even see that people coming from more isolated communities behaving better. That is, we are all infected…

mdd1, I think your overall skeptical approach to media is healthy and would work well in many historical situations. for example, debunking Nazi propaganda about Poland allegedly starting a war against them, or NYT describing great life of Ukrainian peasants in 1930s.

I wonder who would you believe with your approach when Nazis claimed to uncover “crimes” of Soviets allegedly killing tens of thousands of Polish officers in Katyn forest? Would you believe the side you happen to sympathize a priori, or would you stay open to both options?

So, if taking this situation to the extreme level of skepticism – should we use prior guilt and history into account? In this case, it is RUS that sent army to UKR. There are also numerous recent cases of RUS saying absolute lies, such as that there were no RUS forces in Crimea in 2014 – and later openly giving them medals. They now seem to be saying that UKR themselves shot their own rail station with precision weaponry and similar nonsense.

Reb Shlomo > Rav Chaim Zatzal when asked, paskened that it is a chiyuv and not a reshus to get vaccinated and it is on video for all to see.

is this information getting to the velt, or is it not propagated by people not enthusiastic about the the content? If it does, what do people who disagree say?

coffee > virus in order to be more virulent it becomes less deadly

this is a general rule of virus propagation that presumes that a deadlier host either quickly kills most hosts or, in human society, causes more preventive measures. So, it is a statistical, not a biological phenomenon. Given that the current pandemic went thru so many people all over the world with very varying behaviors, this is not perfectly followed: Delta turned out to be worse than Wuhan, but Omicron and BA.2 are indeed weaker.

How is this relevant to the fact that vaccines make it even milder, I am not sure. I don’t know though who is promoting vaccines – US has way lower rates, esp of boosters, than comparable countries and no vaccination is happening. People are literally dying because Trump is not the President – if he were, the press would be reminding us every day how bad things are and more people would vaccinate and wear masks.

Btw, anyone has experience with the new woonder drug – Paxlovid?

mdd> West and Ukraine should not have been provoking the Russian bear.

Whether it was wise or not for Ukraine do what they do does not excuse Russia’s crimes. For comparison, imperfect Jewish politics before hurbanos of batei mikdash does not make Babylonians or Romans tzadikim.

mdd > How do you know that the buses can not go in because of the Russians,

1) because reps from international humanitarian organizations say so.
2) Buses stand in UKR-controlled area and are trying to go into RUS-controlled. UKRs who are surrounded inside the city are further down, they do not have access to the highway with RUS checkpoints.

Again, this is all for the courts. I am not sure why people are focused on atrocities. Start of the war was a despicable act by itself and should have been firmly opposed. Whatever RUS reasons were, no other country resolved to violence in Europe after WW2, outside of Balkan skirmishes, and Russians could have pursued other avenues even if they had some legit claim, such as cutting gas and blockading the coast.

why don’t use guys move to America where people have their own cars?!
can you find someone to help you to pay to cross the bridge?

Doctors told Netziv that he needs a vacation and family members convince him to go to Lithuanian lakes. He ran away back in a couple of days. Of course, those were pre-internet days. Maybe if he could have taught in Volozhin over Zoom, maybe he would have stayed.

akuperman > If you say quinoa is kosher le-pesach, you are calling into question the halacha against kitniyos.

you are proposing a geder on the geder which is generally not done. We get so attached to our beloved minhagim that we “feel” that they are m’deuraita.

Syag > There are guidelines to determine if something falls under the halacha of being pikuach nefesh and there has been such a crazy misuse of this over the covid years.

I am relying on these psakim, for example:
R Meir Twersky suggesting that while in a regular medical case we should ask a doctor, in a case of new, uncertain, plague, we need to behave according to the most careful of multiple experts, and also more careful than politicians as we are always more careful about human lives than non-Jewish society in general.
R Heinemann: do not try to do anything that can be misconstrued as uncareful behavior so that Jewish community is not judged and then denied treatment by someone.

But you are right that estimation of the risk is somewhat subjective and some risky behaviors are accepted in society and Hashem protects simple folks who take small unnecessary risks. This, of course, does not apply to esteemed YWN posters who were exposed to facts (among other posts) and it does not mean that better behavior is not encouraged. Gemora warns us against drinking cups in pairs and walking between palm trees for a presumed danger. Surely, amoraim would not approve a clearly quantifiable danger.

mdd > The Russians stopping the convoys trying to take people out? And you know that how?

From international organizations trying daily to bring supplies to the cities and being stopped or attacked. From satellite images showing buses staged for days at the nearby cities. From seeing videos and interviews with people who left in cars, but no buses. From Ukrainians citizens who were taken to Russian territory who managed to leave Russia after that.

All these questions will be sorted out by the courts in several years. Ma nafka mina now? Significance seems to be that international community becomes outraged by the atrocities and increases sanctions and military assistance. While this is important in practice, I don’t think we here should care. Do we think that attacking another country the way Russia did is OK? killing thousand of people OK whether there is ICC jurisdiction or not?

> your sister is bombarding each of the dayanim

Why would people call dayanim all the time? Most likely, the talmid was repsectful to the dayan. I would rather ask friends and baalei batim and even the school cleaners (presuming they speak English) how the person interacts with them.

This is an issue not just for Jewish community. In US in general, women now outnumber men in college and do not want to have shiduchim with men without a degree. A shidduch crisis indeed. I would say the medical student should be able to find herself a real qualified learner and it will be a good match. She can verify it by asking a couple of questions related to shechita and Gemora’s medical remedies.