ujm

The survey is voluntary, self-selected and web-based, so it is highly doubtful it is scientific or representative of anything.

I fast since I’m a b’chor.

We need R’ Yair Hoffman to address this question.

places: The reference was to frum Ashkenazim who isolate themselves as much as possible away from the secular world. Those people have a nil intermarriage rate, a close to nil assimilation rate and a very high staying very frum rate.

Mrs Plony: Because these so-called frum stores actually sell non-tznius clothing to so-called frum people who buy them.

Welcome to eating in restaurants!

This happens in almost every restaurant.

The only difference is that the vast majority of the time you don’t see the finger in the food or the sneeze in the kitchen or the roach crawling behind the stove.

mitzvah to be drunk is to get to the point of not knowing the dif between cursed is haman and blessed is mordechai.

You are supposed to get drunk to the point of not knowing the difference between cursed is haman and blessed is mordechai (according to many poskim, including my own) Therefore, it takes quite a bit of drunkedness to reach this halachic state.

Please don’t interfere with my religious obligations. Even U.S. law allows MINORS to drink alchol when it is for religious obligations.

asdfghjkl, plead what? what wrong was done?

gaw, confused. You are patur until you are a tzadik gamur? Sounds like a cop-out. No one is perfect. If you push off observance of something until you reach perfection on everything else, you are essentially saying you don’t wish to observe it – as you’ll never be perfect in everything else.

PM, did you read Reb Moshe’s letter clarifying b’shaas hadchak, copied in Hilchos Kashrus?

Jothar,

If you were running this place, what would you do about this situation?

We miss syriansephardi.

Jothar: Why did they stop doing that? Should we do the same today?

I think there are so many good guys and so few good girls.

That’s why some people believe that the guys have a list of 100 girls, while the girls are begging to get just one name.

berlin:

Did you bother reading the Gedolim quotes on the first page of this thread? Did you bother reading what Rabbi Hutner ztl and Rabbi Miller ztl and others have said about the zionists war-time treachery and murder?

Did you bother to read what Judge Halevi and Rudolf Vrba said about the zionist Kasztner?

These are a few, out of an ocean, of examples.

SJS:

I think you still missed Rabbi Avigdor Miller’s point. You said that Kastner was a collaborator and despicable but you question whether other zionist leaders are. The answer is an unequivocal yes. Kastner was, as pointed out, just an example of the atrocities committed by the zionists prior to statehood. There are so many others. Did you also read Rabbi Hutner’s description (in addition to Rabbi Miller’s) earlier in the thread of their activities during that time frame?

What you are asking, to put it in other terms, is if the Nazi’s (yms) are really all bad, since there were some exceptions where individual Nazi’s actually saved Jews. The answer there too is an unequivocal yes, you can clearly state that the Nazi’s were bad. Same with the zionists.

cantoresq:

Trying to shut up discussion by calling all who you disagree with you fanatics is comical. Effectively YOU are engaged in ideological fanaticism. The truth is a very powerful thing, and it hurts those opposed to it. The ostrich buries its head in the sand. You can close your ears and heart to it, but the truth it remains.

Jothar:

Good joke!

BTW Its good you stressed that reminder after someone tried to portray your views as something other than what you stated.

Oy, where would we be without the Gedolim?

tentwenty30, re: mekor for needing hats, etc.

Hilchos Tefiloh, siman 91, (megulah)

sk 4, mb 12

the mishne berureh is in s’u orach chaim 91 seuf katen 12

S’O Orach Chaim Hilchos Tefiloh, siman 91, sk 12 (megulah) [sk 4, mb 12 ?]

Mishnah Berurah 8:4, citing the Ba”ch, requires two head coverings. (Shulchan Aruch O”Ch 282:2)

squeak,

It is too dangerous for our children’s neshamas to wait to we find out if the internet spiritually killed them. We must act now, not when the issue is “fully ironed out.”

Recently, at the United Nations General Assembly a representative from Israel began: “Before beginning my talk I want to tell you something about Moses. When he struck the rock and it brought forth water, he thought, ‘What a good opportunity to have a bath!’

He removed his clothes, put them aside on the rock and entered the water.

When he got out and wanted to dress, his clothes had vanished. A

Palestinian had stolen them.”

The Palestinian representative jumped up furiously and shouted, “What

are you talking about? The Palestinians weren’t there then.”

The Israeli representative smiled and said –

“And now that we have made that clear, I will begin my speech.”

The three Goldberg brothers, Norman, Hiram, and Max, invented and developed the first automobile air conditioner.

On July 17, 1946, the temperature in Detroit was 97 degrees. The three brothers walked into old man Henry Ford’s office and sweet-talked his secretary into telling him that three gentlemen were there with the most exciting innovation in the auto industry since the electric starter.

Henry was curious and invited them into his office. They refused and instead asked that he come out to the parking lot to their car.

They persuaded him to get into the car, in which it was about 130 degrees. They then turned on the air conditioner and cooled the car off immediately. The old man got very excited and invited them back to his office, where he offered them $3 million for the patent.

The brothers refused, saying they would settle for $2 million, but they wanted the recognition by having a label, “The Goldberg Air-Conditioner,” on the dashboard of each car that it was installed in.

Now, old man Ford was more than just a little anti-Semitic, and there was no way he was going to put the Goldbergs’ name on two million Fords.

They haggled back and forth for about two hours and finally agreed on $4 million, and that just their first names would be shown.

And so to this day, all Ford air conditioners show Norm, Hi, and Max on the dashboard.

josh, i’m not sure where you’re trying to go with that, but that is as nonsensical as going to your nearest mo leader and telling him you want to form a committee to attack all women who don’t utilize mixed swimming pools. that scenerio and the one you described are as equally unlikely either to be suggested or to be practiced. actually you’re scenario is far more unlikely. what you describe at best sounds like the type of story peddled by anti-semitic rags of the nature of haaretz and ynet when they are seeking an avenue to attack chareidim. it can’t even be described as an exaggeration, as it doesn’t happen anywhere but in their hate-filled minds.

jphone: I don’t think anyone can fake the kind of evilness displayed in yossiea’s comments.

And besides, the mods are rather vigilant in disallowing socks puppets.

can’t figure whats the joke either.

Unleash Israel and Win Peace

Dec. 6, 2001

WSJ Op-Ed by Rush Limbaugh

The only way some form of quiet will ever exist in the Middle East is if Israel is given the latitude to totally defeat its declared enemies. Only then will the terrorist attacks on Israel’s civilians come to an end. Perpetual negotiations, diplomatic half measures, or land for peace deals will not bring peace to the Middle East. For those who believe this is an irresponsible notion, I use history as my guide.

Today marks the 60th anniversary of Imperial Japan’s unprovoked attack on Pearl Harbor, in which 2,500 Americans were killed. There are lessons to be learned from our victory in that war. In his April 16, 1945 address before a Joint Session of Congress, President Harry Truman stated: “So there can be no possible misunderstanding, both Germany and Japan can be certain, beyond any shadow of doubt, that America will continue the fight for freedom until no vestige of resistance remains. We are deeply conscious of the fact that much hard fighting is still ahead of us. Having to pay such a heavy price to make complete victory certain, America will never become a party to any plan for partial victory. To settle for merely another temporary respite would surely jeopardize the future security of the world. Our demand has been, and it remains, unconditional surrender.”

On August 6, 1945, just 16-hours after the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, Truman issued a statement which said, in part: “The Japanese began the war from the air at Pearl Harbor. They have been repaid many fold… We are now prepared to obliterate more rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the Japanese have above ground in any city. We shall destroy their docks, their factories, and their communications. Let there be no mistake: we shall completely destroy Japan’s power to make war.”

Truman understood that there could be no peace without total victory. This lesson has not been lost on President George Bush. On September 20, 2001, Bush also addressed a Joint Session of Congress and announced America’s policy — “the Bush Doctrine” — in responding to the atrocities of September 11. He stated: “…Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.”

Bush stated further: “…We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place, until there is no refuge or no rest. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.”

Since September 11, Bush has refused all offers by the Taliban regime to negotiate any settlement of the war — including the status of Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants in the al Qaeda terrorist network — short of outright surrender. As Bush once eloquently put it: bin Laden is “wanted, dead or alive.” And for over two months, the U.S. has been systematically bombing the Taliban and al Qaeda day and night. Already, the Bush administration is planning the next phase of the war, which may involve U.S. military action in Iraq, Somalia and elsewhere.

So, in the two most recent examples of the U.S. being attacked on its own territory, America’s predicate for peace has been the total annihilation of its enemies. And there is every reason to expect Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to have learned the same lesson.

Since 1948, Israel has been forced to fight 4 wars with the hostile nations surrounding her. Despite defeating her enemies on the battlefield, the international community has never permitted Israel to completely destroy any of these regimes — none of which are democracies. They’ve always been left largely in tact, free to start or support another war, including the current terrorist war now being waged against Israel’s citizens. And between wars, Israel’s enemies have convinced the world, including the U.S., that her borders and security are not only legitimate subjects of constant negotiations, but that Israel’s refusal to accept most, if not all, of her enemies’ demands is an obstacle to peace.

This week Hamas and other terrorist groups — which, like certain of the countries that surround Israel, seek the destruction of Israel, not co-existence or even the establishment of a Palestinian state — intensified their war against the Jewish state by unleashing 5 fanatic suicide bombers against innocent civilians, mostly children. The result: hundreds of casualties, including 26 dead. In the past 14 months, more than 230 Israelis have been killed — the proportional equivalent to the U.S. losing some 11,000 people.

In addition to Hamas, which receives support from Palestinian expatriates, wealthy Saudi Arabians, and Iran, Israel is under attack from, among others, Hizballah, which is supported by Syria and Iran, and Islamic Jihad, which is backed by Iran, Sudan and militant Islamic groups.

On December 4, in an address to his nation, Sharon stated: “…A war has been forced upon us. A war of terror. A war that claims innocent victims daily. A war of terror being conducted systematically, in an organized fashion, and with methodical direction… We will pursue those responsible, the perpetrators of terrorism and the supporters. We will pursue them until we catch them, and they will pay a price.”

Ironically, the major obstacle to Sharon implementing the Bush Doctrine has been U.S. Middle East policy. When attacked by terrorists, Israel has been urged to show “restraint,” to make more negotiated concessions and even accept the creation of a hostile Palestinian state on its border. This week’s carnage appears to have caused some positive change in America’s rhetoric and position. The president has now pointed the finger of responsibility directly at Yassar Arafat for ending the terrorism committed by his people. But accomplishing peace requires more — much more.

Truman was right to insist that peace would only be realized after the “obliteration” of the Japanese war machine, just as Bush is right about “defeating” the Taliban, al Qaeda and other terrorist networks. It is, therefore, necessary that in the pursuit of real and lasting peace, Israel also be free to destroy its enemies — meaning the terrorists and, yes, their sponsors, who are at war with her, and that she do so before they obtain devastating weapons of mass destruction.

(an op-ed by Rush Limbaugh, originally published on Dec. 6, 2001)