Odds & Ends

June 12, 2010, 6:01 AM As Israel went offline for the Jewish sabbath, YouTube removed most versions of Latma's hit parody song We Con the World. If you try to access the song on YouTube you receive the notification: This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Warner/ Chappell Music, Inc. . Copyright experts we advised with before posting the song told us in no uncertain terms that we were within our rights to use the song because we did so in accordance with the Fair Use Doctrine. The Fair Use Doctrine, copied and pasted below from the US Copyright Office stipulates that it is legal and permissible to use copyrighted material under the fair use doctrine for purposes of parody. Copyright attorneys also warned us that given our clearly lawful use of the song We are the World, if anyone wished to silence our voices,…

The USCJ is struggling to deliver on last year's promises. <a href="images/TBS/bulletins/10junbul.pdf" mce_href="images/TBS/bulletins/10junbul.pdf"> This is the June 2010 Strategic Planning Update from Rabbi Wernick This is the report of the consultant, Ukeles Associates, Inc A Summary Profile: the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism This is the current USCJ Vision and Mission Statements This the new Draft Vision and Mission Statementand finally below is an analysis of the above by Ira Fink of Beth Sholom B'nai Israel Manchester, CT, as posted to the Google Bonim group.USCJ has finally come out with the draft of the new Mission and Vision Statement, and the Profile that has taken months to create.  I have attached copies of both, in case you have not received them from USCJ yet.There is absolutely nothing new here.  The mission and vision statement is just gobbledygook-a rehash of the old mission statement with no real meaning or direction.  It…

YouTube removed the original video after more than 3,000,000 views. The copies below are from three different sources. If one gets censored, try another.The lyrics are below the last video. Click triangle to start. There comes a time When we need to make a show For the world, the Web and CNN There's no people dying, so the best that we can do Is create the greatest bluff of all We must go on pretending day by day That in Gaza, there's crisis, hunger and plague Coz the billion bucks in aid won't buy their basic needs Like some cheese and missiles for the kids We'll make the world Abandon reason We'll make them all believe that the Hamas Is Momma Theresa We are peaceful travelers With guns and our own knives The truth will never find its way to your TV Ooooh, we'll stab them at heart They are…

JTS Chancellor Charting New Course For Outreach Eisen aims beyond Conservative movement to ‘religious center.’ Call it chutzpah or commitment — or a combination of both. Even as the Conservative movement is losing members left (to the Reform) and right (to the Orthodox), literally, the chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary is setting his sights not just on survival, but on expanding the school’s focus, “carefully but boldly,” throughout North America. Arnold Eisen, completing his third year in his post as head of the educational and spiritual center of the movement, is launching a campaign to roll out “a new JTS mission that defines our purpose and sets our future direction,” with an emphasis on “learning, leadership and vision.” Considered too low-key until now by some critics, he plans to enlarge his duties as a spokesman for “what Judaism has been and can be,” and take on the mantle of…

For Joel (Yoel) Chasnoff, “a skinny Jewish kid from Chicago (as he is described in his book’s subtitle), joining the Israeli Army for one year might seem counterintuitive: He was 24 years old, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, where he acted in the all-male Mask and Wig Club dressed in drag. He was a left-leaning, lactose-intolerant peacenik who passed out when he saw blood. Still, there was his strong sense of Jewishness, nourished in a Conservative home and day school--where he met his first Israeli, a teacher whose love of the country infected him--and family and youth group trips to Israel. Finally, there was Dorit, a Yemenite-Persian Israeli and Israel programs director at the Brooklyn College Hillel, where Chasnoff was hired to perform stand-up comedy. When Chasnoff realized he might one day want to spend his life with Dorit in Israel, he knew he first had to serve…

click triangle to start video... And here, for your pleasure, is a translation of the Hebrew lyrics, sung movingly by a group of 10 singers: When I ask myself who I am, I am a bit Sephardi, a bit Ashkenazi, A bit Israeli, a droplet Exilic Perhaps I’m religious, perhaps secular, But between me and myself, I am a Jew, That is my uniqueness, Not better than the Other, not worse Simply Jewish. Sometimes a soldier, sometimes a student, I have a huge past, and I also see the future Sometimes a mitnaged [the opposite of Hasid], sometimes a Hasid, Perhaps materialistic, perhaps spiritual, But always, always, I am a Jew and that is my uniqueness. Not worse, nor better, a different drop, simply Jewish. Suddenly I returned from afar, So that we can be here together, that I can be more secure, That I can return to laughter, that…

April 17, 2010by Rabbi Mitchell WohlbergMy sermon received a standing ovation in shul last Shabbat. Here’s what I said:I must begin by telling you that I was uncomfortable writing this sermon. I wonderedwhether it was too harsh or not harsh enough. I asked myself if I should be delivering it or if Ishould have delivered it two years ago. So I’ll leave it to you to decide.This week Israel celebrates the 62nd anniversary of its rebirth … the greatest event inmodern Jewish history. You know by now how much Israel means to me. From my perspective,an Israel comes along once every 2000 years so it is to be cherished, protected and loved. In twoweeks I will make my annual visit to that beautiful country, taking along my entire family, whichmeans that for my oldest granddaughter – who is 7 years old – this will be her fourth visit but formy…

Israel's Population Up 1.8% The population of Israel on the eve of its 62nd Independence Day is 7.577 million – 9.4 times higher than it was when independence was proclaimed, 62 years ago. The United States' population, by comparison, stands at 309 million, or only 2.1 times higher than it was in 1948. Just over a fifth of the population is Arab, and just over three-quarters – 5.726 million – are Jewish. Israel’s population grew by 1.8% over the past year – about double the rate of the United States. Over the past year, 159,000 babies were born in Israel, and 37,000 people died – 4.3 births per death. (By contrast, the U.S. Bureau of the Census estimates that three babies are born for every two deaths – meaning nearly three times more births per death in Israel than in the U.S. Various explanations have been put forward.) Some 16,000 people…

click triangle to start video... ReWalk™ is a wearable, motorized quasi robotic suit. Partially concealable under clothing, ReWalk provides user-initiated mobility - leveraging advanced motion sensors, sophisticated robotic control algorithms, on-board computers, real-time software, actuation motors, tailored rechargeable batteries and composite materials. ReWalk™ works with users – not just for them. Users walk with the assistance of crutches, controlling suit movement through subtle changes in center of gravity and upper-body movements. In addition to simplifying suit control, this user participation in mobility brings tangible health and emotional benefits. ReWalk™ is not just a vertical wheelchair – ReWalk™ restores the element of control over mobility so lacking for wheelchair users. As any sedentary wheelchair user can attest, life in a wheelchair carries a hefty healthcare price tag. Serious problems with the urinary, respiratory, cardiovascular and digestive systems are common, as well as osteoporosis, pressure sores and other afflictions. By maintaining users…

Is there a difference between hand-made and machine-made matza? The process of making matza has undergone major changes over the past 200 years, amid great controversy. In many ways, today’s matza market reflects uniquely diverse ways of producing this ancient food. The Torah (Deuteronomy 16:3) conjoins the prohibition of consuming hametz (leavened bread) on Pessah with the commandment to consume matza, the unleavened bread whose meagerness and “incompleteness” recalls the impoverished slavery of the Israelites and their hasty exodus from Egypt. The sages derived from this conjoining that matza and hametz share similar physical qualities. Matza became defined as grain flour which, when combined with water, could become hametz, but was made in a manner that prevents it from fermenting. As such, the flour in matza may only come from rye, oats, barley, spelt and wheat (Pessahim 35a). While wheat was historically given preference (OC 453:1), companies have recently produced…