The Jewish morning prayer service ends with the Psalm of the day. Psalm 82 concludes the service on Tuesdays, which is also Election Day in this Country. I find it an interesting coincidence that the Psalm, written more than two millennia ago and admonishes hypocritical leaders who favor the powerful over the poor, is read on Election Day. When I read it, I always imagine a biblical era prophet chastising contemporary Republicans.

The Birnbaum Siddur or Prayerbook reads right to left with the odd pages written in Hebrew while the even pages contain translations of the Hebrew text in archaic King James style English. I choose to pray with Birnbaum when it's an available option, over books with easier to understand English, because I'm used to its liturgical translation. Although I know how to read Hebrew and recite some prayers in that ancient tongue, I understand little of the language and pray mostly in English. Using other English translations throws me off.

Containing just 8 sentences, Psalm 82 is among the Bible's shortest chapters. Below is the Birnbaum version of the Psalm.

I grocery store bills are ridoncuously high due to the assorted allergies we have to manage. My oldest has something in the order of 15 allergy markers; while the little, their father and me have abut 5 allergy markers each. Eggs, nuts and sesame seeds can lead to life threatening reactions.

No wonder I spend most of my week at supermarkets. A loaf of spelt or gluten-free bread is anything between 4 to 7 dollars. Same with cereals and other sundries. So I spend my days shopping online or checking local supermarkets for sales on anything that is wheat free.

Guess what I saw at the supermarket on Avenue A and 4th Street?

So came across Cesare Bonizzi on BBC's website. Fra Bonizzi is a monk of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, an offshoot of the Franciscan order dating back to the 16th century. Fra Bonizzi is also lead singer of a Heavy Metal band that regularly shows up at the Gods of Metal festival in Italy:

UPDATE: Found a better video (still in Italian, though) to add in:

In 2005 there was much sound a fury about a series of Danish Cartoons portraying the prophet Mohammed. The bottom line was that several Danish cartoonists drew cartoons including the prophet as part of a newspaper's publicity stunt. Two of the cartoons were making fun of the newspaper's publicity stunt itself. Two were, arguably, based on racial stereotypes. At least one specifically addressed Western stereotypes of Muslims. In other words, the cartoons were a mixed bag of attitudes towards Islam and the West's attitudes towards Islam.

The overwhelming reaction in the Muslim world was of outrage, often with no real knowledge of the actual cartoons.

This controversy has come back. One of the cartoonists, Kurt Westergaard, was targeted for death by Muslim terrorists. This plot was stopped by the Danish police. In response to the terrorist threat 11 Danish newspapers reprinted Kurt Westergaard's original cartoon...further pissing off Muslim nations.

Again...much sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Back in 2004 I published this piece at culturekitchen as an elections post-mortem and a response to pieces written by Steve and Chris Bowers.

I have had people research my work for either papers or dissertations and so ... if there ever was an "it" blog post for my online political activism, this has to be the post. This post informs all my political activity and the issue that keep me up at night.

And I have to say that neither Steve nor I could have written had we were not only black but from socio-economically blended families with some rich, some in the middle, others working and some just poor. This is what makes us unique in the political blogosphere.

So without further ado, Secular Blue America.

November 11, 2004
Secular Blue America
by Liza Sabater

I got to Steve Gilliard's News Blog : They voted for this mess via another awesome post, written by Chris Bowers, at MyDD :: Yes, These Are Conservatives.

Gilliard's is one long-winded rant that starts out hitting liberals good but ends up really tearing appart the post-election appeasement façade of the extremists ruling the Republican party. I wish he had spent more time flogging the "Liberals". Here's why :

“… but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”
– U.S. Constitution, Article VI

Poll after poll suggests that Mitt Romney is up against a huge challenge – about one-third of all Americans say they won’t vote for a Mormon. Some people compare this to the trouble overcome in 1960 by John Kennedy, when people weren’t about to vote for a Catholic. Indeed, it seems that we’ve merely redrawn the line, rather than truly begun to erase religious bigotry, or any other brand of hate, from our society.

But there is another facet to the current polls that is not receiving widespread attention. Since Romney is only running for the Republican nomination, most people are focusing on whether Republicans will vote for him. But all the polls show there is very little difference between Republicans and Democrats when it comes to voting for Mormons.

Fellow Culture Kitchen writer, Leo Igwe, from Nigeria, recently wrote about a murder in Nigeria where a mob tore a teacher apart because she was perceived as "defaming the Koran." He uses this incident to discuss the hypocrisy of religious fundamentalism where pieces of paper are considered sacred, but human life expendable.

Today Salon.com has another story of Fanatics Gone Wild, this time in Iraq. It seems that the traditional practice of honor killings is alive and well in post-Saddam Iraq.

April 20th is Hitler’s Birthday. In 1943, Heinrich Himmler wanted to give Hitler a particularly nice birthday present. He decided that in honor of Hitler’s birthday he would eliminate the entire Jewish Ghetto of Warsaw, which had been causing trouble in the early months of 1943.

Instead, the Jews of Warsaw gave Hitler a present that he certainly didn’t want: months of armed rebellion that DEFEATED the German army repeatedly and wasn’t completely crushed until October 1943, though major combat operations, to borrow a phrase, were completed around May. Including the periods of more sporadic fighting, this resistance lasted far longer than the German take over of Poland as a whole, which took scarcely one month. It is pointed out in Melvin Konner’s book Unsettled that the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, largely fought by Jews but with some Polish uprisings occurring at the same time and inspired by the Jewish uprising, also lasted longer than the time it took Germany to defeat France, though again you have to include the period of more sporadic fighting as well as the main combat.

The uprising was partly inspired by the Socialist Zionist organization Hashomer Hatzair (coincidentally, my mother briefly belonged to this organization in her youth). Insurgency started in January, 1943. By the end of January the Ghetto was actually controlled by two armed Jewish organizations, one led by Mordechai Anielewicz, of Hashomer Hatzair, and Zivia Lubetkin (who survived the uprising) and the other led by Dawid Mordechaj Apfelbaum, a former officer in the Polish army. As Passover began on April 19th, Himmler’s birthday present to Hitler also began, with thousands of German, Polish and Ukrainian forces attacking the Ghetto. They moved in at 4 a.m. They moved throughout the Ghetto and believed they had occupied it within 4 hours. Then, at the intersection of Mila and Zamenhofa Streets, the insurgents struck with a single captured machine gun, ample small arms fire, and many Molotov cocktails. The Germans were completely routed by the Jewish insurgents by 2 P.M., providing Hitler with a major embarrassment for his birthday.

In honor of the suppression of an art exhibition right here in New York where a crucified Jesus made of chocolate was found to be offensive, I present the lyrics to Tom Waits' song, Chocolate Jesus:

Dont go to church on sunday
Dont get on my knees to pray
Dont memorize the books of the bible
I got my own special way
Bit I know jesus loves me
Maybe just a little bit more

I fall on my knees every sunday
At zerelda lees candy store

Well its got to be a chocolate jesus
Make me feel good inside
Got to be a chocolate jesus
Keep me satisfied

Well I dont want no anna zabba
Dont want no almond joy

There has really been a recent dovetailing of Israel related issues. From a Bulgarian friend quizing me on Israel to a discussion among NYC bloggers (offline and private, so none of your business) about Israel/Palestine, to some rather disturbingly anti-Israel diaries on Daily Kos with some outright anti-Semitic overtones. (Note: This statement in NO WAY implies an anti-Semitic bias of dKos in general. The opinions were those of particular individuals, not the community as a whole). And, of course, my recent writing about Jewish issues, including what seemed to be a not so well received piece on the depth and persistence of anti-Semitism historically.

In the context of all of this, I find an editorial that gets to the crux of one key issue in Israeli politics: the balancing of equality for Israeli Arabs with security of Israel as a whole. In an ideal world these two things would not need balancing. But the Middle East is not and never has been an ideal world even if you look back thousands of years.

This is from Abraham Foxman and Ken Jacobson, both of the Anti-Defamation League, and originally appeared in The Jerusalem Post on March 5, 2007: