Al Aqsa Trump Tower. Cartoons. Do it for Doug. Chocolate for breakfast. Peter Martins. Al Franken. The Band's Visit. Quotes. Books. Should Olympic doctor get 90 years less than Madoff?
LETTY COTTIN POGREBIN NEWSLETTER #61 DEC 10, 2017
I've never posted on a Sunday before but I'm hoping to reach you in time for your contributions, however small, to reach Doug Jones and make a difference. Jones can win the Alabama Senate seat if his campaign workers have the wherewithal to advertise. make calls, and travel all over the state to pull out the vote. My friend Laura Sillerman fired me up: "Committed citizens CAN create change," she wrote. "Send a dollar or five or more to Doug Jones today. It will make a difference if enough of us do it. Send this to 20 people. We could get to a million dollars in a matter of hours. We could be amazed by a seismic victory in Alabama on election day, this Tuesday, 12/12." Donate here. Don't let accused pedophile Roy Moore run away with this election because a few thousand of us couldn't afford to pitch in $5 or $10 right now.
MORE POLITICS
"Outraged and Inspired, Women Join the Political Fray" is a wonderfully uplifting report on the enormous number of women, some with but many without political experience (sound familiar), who are running for elected office thanks to their rage at Trump and his ilk. Since the 2016 election, more than 22,000 women contacted Emily's List for advice on how to run or get involved. Action: Join She Should Run.
* Trump gives away our precious patrimony; horrifies his predessesers; slashes two gorgeous national monuments in Utah. Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase–Escalante National Monument are too beautiful to be turned into Trump condos or oil fields. We gotta stop him. Join the Sierra Club.
(Kudos to the cartoonists -- such as Barry Blitt who draws so many great New Yorker covers (above) -- who help me lighten up this Newsletter all year long. With few pen strokes and minimal or no text, these artists deftly encapsulate the truth of our times in unforgettable Ah-hah! images.)
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
* Calling it "wrongheaded, dangerous, or deeply-flawed, " nine former U.S. Ambassadors to Israel bash Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital & move our Embassy from Tel Aviv to J'lem,
* Notice that POTUS never mentioned the Israeli occupation, the wall that separates Palestinians from their jobs, schools, and families, the poor conditions under which they live in East Jerusalem, nor the Palestinians' historic and emotional claims to the city.
He also ignored all prior agreements endorsed by previous U.S. Presidents, signed documents that specified the status of Jerusalem would be negotiated by the parties involved. Trump's unilateral action was both a violation of international law and the erasure of the rights of an entire people. Imagine how we Jews would feel if Israel were the target of a U.S. president's denial and disrespect. American Jews should not be celebrating Trump's statement; we should be alarmed, apologetic and ashamed.
* APN's indefatigable CEO, Debra DeLee (above), is quoted in the Times' illuminating story "Praise and Alarm from American Jews Over Trump's Jerusalem Move,"
* Read my end of year letter about APN here. (Full disclosure: the photo of me that pops up on their website when my letter rolls into view is more than ten years years old. I'm too vain to update it.) Given Trump's latest ass-kiss to Bibi Netanyahu, Sheldon Adelson, Mort Klein, and the Evangelical right, you'll want to stay on top of the news about Israel-Palestine and U.S. policy-related issues by reading APN's excellent resources, maps, articles, and fact sheets. Please consider a donation to support the organization's invaluable work in the U.S. and the Middle East!
* A friendly reminder from the European Union to Israeli P. M. Netanyahu.
Hope you can read the fine print in the document above.
GOOD NEWS for a change
* Eat dessert first! Really! Researchers prove eating chocolate for breakfast is good for your brain, body, & energy level. Moreover, A.M chocoholics lose more weight than those who don't indulge! Pass the cake!
RADIO
* Tuning in to WNYC this morning, I was thrilled to hear DJ Paul Cavalconte hosting Jonathan Schwartz' Sunday jazz and pop show which i've been listening to every Sunday for years. Sadly, Schwartz is alleged to be one of the station's serial sex harassers. Happily, Cavalconte's style, sensibility and musical taste makes him the perfect permanent replacement..
THEATER
* Hock the family jewels and buy a ticket for The Band's Visit, the Broadway smash-- about a police band from Egypt arriving by mistake in a remote Israeli desert town -- that's even better than its rave reviews suggest. David Yazbek's score fills the heart and achingly embodies emptiness, love, and longing. Itamar Moses' book proves that ending up in the wrong place can be a good thing for everyone involved. Katrina Lenk & Tony Shalhoub (above) are magnificent. The lovable band members in their baby blue uniforms produce great music whether an Arab ballad or a Chet Baker standard. Buy seats here before they're gone.
HUMOR
* Palestinians recognize Texas as part of Mexico. At last! We've been waiting for so long to hear those words. Great satire by Alex Huntley in The Beaverton, a terrific comedy site from Canada. Sample: "Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas says that this is a new approach to Mexican-US relations, and hopes it will help ease the tension between the two countries over security and immigration."
* Satirist Andy Borowitz had me worried when I (mis)read his headline: "Broad Majority of Americans Support Moving Trump to Jerusalem." Then I read the piece and roared.
DEPT. OF SEXUAL ABUSE
Men of both parties accused of sexual harassment have resigned or been suspended: Not just Democrats Sen. Al Franken and Rep. John Conyers, but Arizona Republican Rep. Trent Franks, who pressured women on his staff to be surrogate wombs. You can't make this stuff up.
The marketplace has never protected women -- especially waitresses, hotel maids, factory workers, secretaries, nightclub employees -- whose work life is one long slalom race to avoid male customers, colleagues, and superiors who touch, rub, leer, sneer, proposition, intimidate, threaten, or physically overpower them. I don't know a single woman -- white collar or pink collar -- who doesn't have a #MeToo story. As Gloria Steinem famously said, "We didn't used to have a name for sexual harassment; it was just called 'life.' Not anymore.
* Gail Collins' definitive NY Times column on "The Great Al Franken Moment" explains why #MeToo is on target and must not be derailed by a backlash. "It was inevitable that sooner or later, we’d need to go through a huge social trauma that would firmly establish the new rules. And here we are."
* High culture takes another hit. Peter Martins takes a leave of absence from the New York City Ballet. Besides his alleged sex harassment, "Two dancers said he had a bad temper and could be physically rough on occasion, pulling dancers around by the neck during rehearsals."
The physician who took sexual advantage of all those little girl Oympic gymnasts was sentenced to 60 years in prison, less than half the time slapped on Bernie Madoff for security fraud. Madoff's victims lost a lot of money but the doctor's victims lost their childhoods, their trust in adults, their bodily integrity, their innocence. The doctor deserves another 90 years for all that.
Time magazine Honors The Silence Speakers
*These women weren't silent; they just weren't heard. Read about the woman whose arm is shown in the right bottom corner of the Time cover but who declined to identify herself. (Still scared after all these years.)
* Tarana Burke (above) founded the #metoo movement. Some of us feel Tarana should have been Time's cover girl. She would have been the first woman of color to be named "Person of the Year."
QUOTES FROM OTHER PEOPLE'S WALLS
Thanks to those who readers responded to my favorite wall quotes with contributions of their own.
* From Dr. Monica Starkman
“No one but a fool trips on what’s behind him.” Yiddish proverb
“Yesterday is a cancelled check. Tomorrow is a promissory note. Today is cash. “
* From Esther-Ann Asch SINCE I RETIRED FROM LIFE'S COMPETITION I BUSY MYSELF WITH LIFE'S REPETIITION I GET UP EACH MORNIING AND DUST OFF MY WITS PICK UP THE TIMES AND READ THE OBITS IF MY NAME IS MISSING I KNOW I'M NOT DEAD SO I EAT A GOOD BREAKFAST AND GO BACK TO BED
From Rosalie Fox
"Dwell in Possibility." -- Emily Dickinson
"Do one thing every day that scares you." -- Eleanor Roosevelt
"It is never too late to be what you might have been." --George Eliot
"Be the change you wish to see in the world." -- M. Gandhi
"When one door of happiness closes, another one opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us." -- Helen Keller
"Out of clutter find simplicity. From discord find harmony. In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity." -- Albert Einstein
HANUKKAH
* *Cartoons you may not get unless you're Jewish
* Video: "My Menorah," produced 14 years ago, still gets top points for clever.
HAPPY HOLIDAYS!