Year: 2018

Let’s Get Rid of Our Feminist Readers!

Is there any misogyny in Mishlei and its commentators?

Mishlei 23:22:

שמע לאביך זה ילדך ואל תבוז כי זקנה אמך

Rabbenu Yonah idem  – Women are not as intellectual as men:

אל תבוז אמך, אע”פ שאין החכמה מצויה בנשים. כי זקנה. ויש לה חכמת הנסיונות. על כן לא תבוז לה כי תעיד לך על אשר שמעו אזניה וראו עיניה. ויש לפרש, “אל תבוז כי זקנה אמך”. אל תבוז לדבריה אע”פ שזקנה והיא למשא על אחרים מפני שצריכה לזולתה ואין עזרתה בה.

(A certain rabbi once said in a lecture to men to never correct their wives. One of his homiletic proofs was stressing the word “לחכם” in the verse: הוכח לחכם ויאהבך)

Metzudos idem – Women tend to prattle senselessly:

כי זקנה, אף אם זקנה אמך לא תבוז אמריה לומר לא בסבי טעמא אף כי דרך נשים לה להרבות אמרים מבלי השכל.

And the simple meaning of Mishlei 11:22 is that it refers to an uncomplimentary female archetype, as pointed out already.

Is any of this misogyny? Not by my own definition. If racism consists of unjustified pride on the part of those doing the labeling, misogyny must be defined only as wrongly looking down upon the other sex. It’s not that different groups lack certain positives, but that we are all handicapped in different ways.

P.S., I forgot to mention “Eishes Chayil”: Competent women are rare.

על המקדש ועל המדינה

“אבל שונה היא תולדות ישראל מתולדות עמים רבים, גם בהיות עם ישראל יושב על אדמתו והנהיג ממשלה מדינית, גם אז יסוד קיומו היה רק דתו ותורתו, שבשעה שהיו ישראל מתהלכים בתמים את ד׳ ותורתו, עשו חיל והצליחו, ובסורם מדרך ד׳, אז בכל תקפם וגבורתם ירדו פלאים, – וכמו שמעתיק הח׳ ״הנ״ס״ ״בהצפירה״ גליון 49 שנת תרמ״ד דברי הח׳ העסקן הכללי גבריאל ריססער לאמר: ״היהודים סובלים חמת המציק בדומיה, כמו לא ירגישו, אך כאשר תגע יד צורר בקדשי מחמדיהם, אז ירגזו ממנוחתם ויתגברו כאריות, נקל להם אבדן חייהם ושפלות מצבם וירידתם במדרגת המעמד המדיני, אך חלול הורתם והגרשם מגן עדן הדת, בל יוכלו שאת במנוחה מבלי התעורר עד מאד, ובא האות על זה, כי הגדול והגבור בהאסונות אשר מצא אותם, אבדן חופשיותם וירידתם ממדרגת לאום מדיני בתגרת יד גייסות רומא, מכונה בפיהם על שם ״חורבן בית המקדש״, אותו ישימו להם לפרק ולציון בדברי ימיהם, ולפי החורבן הם מונים. המפלה המדינית, לא היתה למלה בפיהם, ולא הציבו לה יד בסגנון לשונם. ורק חורבן בית המקדש נשאר בזכרונם מכל המלחמה הנוראה שבה היתה תבוסתם שלמה״.

* זכרון יעקב – ר’ יעקב הלוי ליפשיץ ז”ל (קאוונא־סלאבאדקא, תרפ”ד), חלק א’ פרק א’

דפח”ח.

Ron Paul on the Looming American Entitlements Crisis

Spending Our Way to a Fiscal Crisis

By 

Ron Paul Institute

July 25, 2018

Another ominous sign is that this year both Social Security and Medicare will have to draw down on their reserve funds to be able to pay benefits. The Social Security and Medicare trust funds will both soon be bankrupt, putting additional strains on the federal budget and American taxpayers.

The excessive debt caused by excessive spending will inevitably cause a major economic crisis. Yet, with a few notable exceptions, there is little to no desire in Washington to cut spending. Instead, both parties are committed to increasing spending on warfare and welfare while ignoring the looming entitlements crisis.

Examples of fiscal irresponsibility on Capitol Hill are easy to find. For instance, even though the Untied Stares is currently spending more on its military than the combined budgets of the next seven highest spending countries, Congress recently increased military spending by 82 billion dollars. This brings the total the US spends on a futile effort to police and democratize the world to 716 billion dollars. The US House has also recently passed a farm bill that increases spending by more than 3 billion dollars over the next five years. This bill does not take a step toward ending subsidies to wealthy farmers and even continues providing farm subsidies to non-famers! Pressure on Congress to increase spending on farm subsidies is likely to increase as famers becomes collateral damage in President Trump’s trade war.

Many progressives are attacking the House farm bill because it makes some reforms to the “SNAP” (food stamp) program, even though the House version of bill increases the budget for food stamps by at least 1.7 billion dollars over the next five years!

When the economic crisis hits, there will be no choice but to cut spending and raise taxes. Of course, Congress is unlikely to raise taxes or cut benefits. Instead, it will rely on the Federal Reserve to do the dirty work via the inflation tax. The inflation tax is the worst type of tax because it is both hidden and regressive.

One of the worst features, if not the worst, of the tax reform plan is increasing the inflation tax by authorizing the use of “chained CPI.” Chained CPI hides inflation’s effects by claiming that rising prices do not harm Americans as long as they can still afford low-cost substitute goods to replace products they can no longer afford due to the Federal Reserve’s devaluation of the currency — as if people forced to buy hamburger instead of steak are not negatively impacted by inflation.

Increasing federal debt will also put pressure on the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates low to prevent federal interest payments on the debt from skyrocketing.  Eventually, the Fed’s monetization of the debt will lead to hyperinflation and a rejection of the dollar’s world reserve currency status. The question is when, not whether, the welfare-warfare state and the fiat currency system will end. Hopefully, those who know the truth will succeed in growing the liberty movement so we can convince Congress to gradually unwind the welfare-warfare state, restore a true free market in money, and stop trying to run the world, run the economy, and run our lives.

From Lewrockwell.com, here.

How You Tell Who the Israeli Deep State Are

See who comes first…

There is a fascinating demonstration of this in the bestselling “As Long As I Live: The Life Story of Aharon Margalit” (“Es’haleich” in Hebrew), chapter 30 and on (p. 315 in the English-language edition).

“Nobody Nothingstein” as far as the regime is concerned, or as we ourselves call him, “Aharon Margalit”, was scheduled for a critical operation to remove a malignant growth from his face. The rare operation was scheduled far in advance and required many different doctors to be present, etc. Then a VIP’s son fell off his bike, and a scan revealed a tumor on his leg. So the dauphin came first, of course. Socialism (and waiting on line) is for the Little People.

Significantly, the book, published in Israel, casually neglects to mention the identity of this VIP. (I may or may not know.)

Yes, it all turned out for the best in the end (you’ll have to read the book!). But that’s not the point…

Non-Interventionism Is Best for Marriage, Too

“The Surrendered Wife”?

Jun 30, 2001  |  by 

I cringed at the title, but the book, “The Surrendered Wife,” offers a surprising amount of wisdom

I don’t know who her PR agents were. I don’t know what her marketing strategy was. I just know that there couldn’t be a worse title for a truly valuable book than “The Surrendered Wife” by Laura Doyle. Even as I write it I cringe. But it got my attention. And maybe that was the goal…

Despite my reservations, I read the book in an effort to demonstrate how broadminded I am. “The Surrendered Wife” is a book about letting go. It is not a book about submissiveness. It is not anti-feminism. It is a book that demonstrates the destructiveness of trying to control another human being, particularly your spouse. So I read it. Cover to cover.

I saw myself, and many close friends (you know who you are) in Ms. Doyle’s stories. And while she takes her philosophy to an extreme of passivity that I find unpalatable – i.e. “don’t express your opinion, just say to your husband ‘whatever you think'” – there is a lot of wisdom in her insights. Perhaps my husband would enjoy if just once in a while I would keep my big mouth shut and turn to him adoringly and say, “Whatever you think.”

Maybe. Maybe not. But I know he would appreciate it if I didn’t always tell him he took the wrong turn and the slowest route. He might appreciate it if I didn’t tell him how to talk to the waiter, what to order, and the exact amount of the appropriate tip.

Our husbands want to know they have our respect, trust, and, as Laura Doyle suggests, every time we control, direct, or even worse, criticize them, they know they don’t.

And it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. As with children. If we don’t expect our husbands to succeed, they probably won’t (unless he’s got a very contrary personality and responds well to reverse psychology!)

The nitpicking, the correcting, the “I know a better way” attitude is destructive on many levels – to the husband personally and to the marriage. I know that I don’t enjoy spending time with people who are always telling me I’m wrong – either directly or by implication.

And this situation sure doesn’t augur well for one’s intimate life. It doesn’t encourage closeness and desire.

FOR HIS OWN GOOD

Of course, when we correct our husbands, we mean it for their good. We’re only doing it to help them. But most husbands don’t experience it like that. To them, it’s an attack. To them, it’s emasculating. To them, it’s depressing and destructive.

There’s nothing liberated or egalitarian about being critical. Our husbands are not our project, our work in progress, a piece of clay for us to mold. And our husbands are not children. (It always annoys me when women refer, half-jokingly, to their husbands as one of their biggest children. Do they think their husbands find that flattering or amusing?) It won’t create a new/modern marriage if we whip our husbands into shape. But it is a quick road to divorce.

“But I do know a faster way to drive there,” wives complain. Good. Keep it to yourself. (I would say, “Unless asked”; Ms. Doyle would say, “Even then.”) You’ll get there five minutes later with a stronger marriage.

“But he’s handling the situation all wrong.” Give him a chance to figure it out for himself and grow from it. Don’t rob him of his opportunities to stretch and change.

There is an important caveat in the book that none of this advice applies to an abusive situation. Similarly, if there is, God forbid, a serious crime at stake. If your husband is about to commit armed robbery, don’t say, “Whatever you think!”

We have to lift our husbands through caring and respect. As Rabbi Eisenblatt writes in Fulfillment in Marriage: “…to the extent that the marriage partners appreciate and respect each other they will create a nourishing atmosphere in which each can grow and develop into a still better partner.”

Worth taping to the fridge.

POSITIVE EXPRESSIONS

Positive expressions of pleasure after tasks well done accomplish much more than harsh words. And don’t qualify those compliments. Drop the “but” as in: “That was nice of you to make dinner but why didn’t you clean up the kitchen?” “I appreciate that you went grocery shopping but why did you buy ten bags of potato chips?” Practice saying two simple words: “Thank you.”

A woman’s belief in her husband’s abilities and potential will inspire him to greater heights. Nagging will drag him down.

It’s not about being submissive. And I don’t know if it’s about surrendering either. It is about letting go. We don’t have to run the world. (The Almighty’s on that job 24/7.) We don’t have to control our husbands. We don’t have to dominate our children.

And the most surprising thing of all is not only do things not fall apart without us at the helm, sometimes they actually get better.

Postscript: Whenever I address this topic to women, they invariably say, “What about the men? Don’t they need to hear this?” Of course, they do. There are many men who would benefit from the ideas in this book. Hopefully, their needs will be addressed. But asking, “What about the men?” can also be a way of avoiding personal responsibility. Don’t worry about the men for a minute. Look inward instead of outward. Do you see potential for growth and change? You go girl.

From Aish Hatorah, here.