Everybody Wants to Be a Soprano

I didn't think $10,000 could buy that much these days, but I guess I was wrong.

Troopergate et al in Wasila, Blagojevich gets caught selling a Senate seat, Sanford is busted hypocritically lying about an affair, California goes bankrupt trying to please every special interest around, now it's New Jersey's turn for a black eye.

The surprising thing is not that several mayors and state officials were guilty of rampant corruption--I'm no babe in the suburbs here--and not even that they had the rare luck to get caught and indicted for it, but rather that we are talking about such paltry sums.

Ten grand? I know those piles start to add up (I hear), but still...bold. And stupid. Congratulations, assholes!


My two favorite parts of the story:

Levy-Izhak Rosenbaum of Brooklyn, was accused of enticing vulnerable people to give up a kidney for $10,000 and then selling the organ for $160,000.

Is 'ten grand' some kind of religious hocus pocus that gets people to do anything a rabbi wants him to? Who the hell would sell a kidney for $10,000? How often did this work? Why am I not in this line of work?

Also:

The timing of the investigation dovetails with the timing of bank fraud charges against Solomon Dwek, son of the founders of the Deal Yeshiva, a religious school that teaches children in the Sephardic Jewish tradition. Mr. Dwek passed a $25 million bad check at a PNC Bank branch in 2006, according to The Asbury Park Press.

What? Who the hell tries to pass off a bad check for TWENTY-FIVE MILLION dollars? How does one find the courage to attempt such a daring feat?

"No, don't worry about it--it's reverse psychology, man--it's SO much money that they will be LESS suspicious than if it's just for some little skidmark like $10,000. Cuz, like, who would ever have the balls for such a thing? Right? Trust me."
"Well, okay--but we should definitely have the rabbi take it in, just to be safe, so we can have religion on our side..."
"Oh, of course--I was thinking the same thing."

The next day, at a PNC Bank in the ghetto...

"Alright, I just need to call in to check on this and then we'll be all set."
"Oh, you don't need to call it in--it's real."
"We're talking about $25 million here--I need to check with the account holder."
"Come on, you can trust me--I'm a rabbi!"
"I don't trust anybody--I'm a banker. Excuse me."

Ha, ha, ha--what an idiot, right? It's good to laugh.


And it's okay, too, because--as the article notes three times--the Jews involved were not the average, everyday Jews you know and love, the kind that only go to temple for high holidays and often remind you of the Holocaust neither of you were around for, but never of the fact that their unnecessary (and not universally beloved) land theft to create Israel is one of the main reasons the United States/Nations is involved in an endless war on terrorism; the kind that it is NOT okay to have a laugh at, ever, in light of their eternal suffering, yadda yadda.

These were Syrian Jews, so, you know, they might as well be straight-up towelheads, right? Where is Syria on a map, right? No big surprise to John Q. Public that they are a corrupt and devious fringe branch of the Jewish faith--the shock is the absence of a sensational, Rove/Cheney/Murdoch-planted mention of a potential link to Al-Qaeda in the article.


In other news, a Catholic priest just confessed to raping 1000 little boys over the last 40 years and repeatedly lying about it in court. He was sentenced to ten Hail Marys and transferred to a different parish to end his days in peace and pleasure.

Thank God for confession, right? Heaven will be so sweet...

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A Matter of Schlock

A new screen gem for the international Sideways Set*: fat men struggle--hilariously--to become sumo wrestlers. In Israel. At the end they probably learn something about themselves and maybe even grow slightly.

Aside from the fact that this sounds really boring and familiar, it is also clear that somebody in charge of this fetid turd has no idea how athletic and disciplined sumo wrestlers are--there is quite a gap between them and lazy obese men.

Not only are they more flexible than just about everybody I know, but do you know how strong you have to be to pick up a tree-trunk-legged 400-pound man and carry him out of the ring?

Writer/Director Sharon Maymon, I submit the following for your consideration. Also, here is a pretty fascinating video.



* Sideways Set--the overjoyed target demographic for movies such as: Sideways, Little Miss Sunshine, The Full Monty, Calendar Girls, Juno, etc...

_

The Masters of Convenient Indecision

Of course the United States abstained from voting on the UN Security Council Resolution to halt the fighting in Gaza. Of course. What was their excuse?

"Well...we...have Jews here...that...are...powerful, I guess. And we're afraid to ever cross Israel, because we know our Jews will bring up the Holocaust again and say everybody hates them and that will put us in an awkward spot. We're not really sure why they need to have a homeland, since Judaism is a religion, and religion knows no national borders...and furthermore, we're not sure why they had to pick the place where a bunch of other people were living and already worshipping...but we support them anyway and give them money and weapons and have their back no matter how many other countries go against them for justified reasons, and no matter how many lives this alliance costs the United States."

I think the REAL reason, however, is that they have total props for the Israeli army's style.
It reminds them of some of their own best efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan, and...just about every country in South/Central America.

Here are some sample facts and figures:

- Women and children make up 40% of the 750 dead so far; 257 of them being children
- Over 1500 women and children are injured; 1080 of them being children
- The other day, 41 civilians were killed when a UN school was targeted
- Civilians are trapped and deprived of food and water for days
- Red Cross aid workers keep being accidentally killed by Israeli troops, so they are temporarily abandoning their efforts to help the 20,000 displaced Palestinians

Here is my favorite slice of the New York Times article on this:

“Look at the conditions in Gaza: more and more, it resembles a big concentration camp,” Cardinal Renato Martino, the head of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, said in an interview published Wednesday in Il Sussidiaro.

He defended his comments in the center-left Italian daily La Repubblica on Thursday. While noting that Hamas rockets into Israel were “certainly not sugared almonds,” he called the situation in Gaza “horrific.” Israel sharply condemned the cardinal’s use of World War II imagery. “We are astounded that a spiritual dignitary would have such words that are so far removed from truth and dignity,” said Yigal Palmor, a spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

The Vatican sought to play down the remarks, calling them inopportune.

Two thoughts:

1. "Inopportune?" That is a great response. You would have to be the Vatican to get away with that one. So...they're not saying it was not a good comparison, it was just delivered at the wrong time (when reporters were around?). That is their way of 'apologizing.' The Catholics vs. the Jews! It's on! Finally!

2. It might not be like a concentration camp, but it does seem comparable to a ghetto. So...the WWII imagery is not that far off. Palestinians were trapped behind military barricades, foreigners were allowed to leave, and then the Israeli troops started killing off the troublesome ones that fight back, as well as anybody else they feel like; aid workers cannot get in to help, people are starving to death in the streets, children are wasting away alongside their mother's corpses. The only thing that makes it not like WWII is that the persecuted are not Jews, gays, or gypsies. Does that mean it doesn't count?

Well, I think the soap box just caved in, so I'd better find something else to do with myself...