Letty Cottin Pogrebin's Newsy Newsletter Returns

LETTY COTTIN POGREBIN  //  NEWSLETTER #64  //  JAN 21, 2020

A newsletter on politics, culture, activism, Israel/Palestine, Jews, women, and issues worth knowing about

This Newsletter has been hiatus while I was writing my twelfth book: SHANDA: A Memoir of Shame and Secrecy. Happily, Fig Tree Books has bought the book and it's slated for publication in 2021. Meanwhile, I've curated some stuff I think you should see, hear, or know about. Have a great winter! - Letty
 

P.S. If you couldn't care less about what I care about most, you can unsubscribe at the bottom.

  PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS

* Pro-Trump want ad: Snopes hasn't confirmed whether this is real or fake, but I wouldn't put it past Republicans to pay actors to puff up the President's crowd numbers and noise, to integrate the all-white optics – "Minorities welcome and needed!" – and to make the "protest activity" look real. For the Phoenix rally, they were "looking to fill about 500 spots" and paying $15 an hour.  On election day, how much will they pay voters to mark their ballot for Trump? 

*  My daughter Abigail opts for Bloomberg. I'm still in the "anyone but Trump" camp, i.e. not yet settled on a candidate, but I'm proud that Mike Bloomberg hired my daughter Abigail Pogrebin, to serve as Director of Jewish Outreach for his presidential campaign. Abby is the author of  MY JEWISH YEAR: 18 Holidays, One Wondering Jew, and STARS OF DAVID: Prominent Jews Talk About Being Jewish. Thanks to her devoted readership and decades of addressing Jewish audiences across the country, she's widely respected and well-versed in the concerns of our community and is a great asset to Bloomberg and his team.

* Talk about all politics is local:  You gotta love this headline about Trump and the lede sentence in the Queens (N.Y.) Daily Eagle. 
 

ISRAEL/PALESTINE

* If you self-identify as Jewish and you're interested in sending a progressive slate of delegates to the World Zionist Congress' Plenary Assembly in Jerusalem next October, please vote NOW (or before March 11th) for the Hatikvah list.  M.J. Rosenberg, a liberal policy expert with 20 years experience on the Hill, at AIPAC, Israel Policy Forum, and Media Matters, explained on Facebook why this Plenary Assembly matters:

"I voted for the Hatikvah, progressive anti-occupation, equality- for-all slate, led by Hadar Susskind, Daniel Sokatch Jeremy Ben-Ami, Jonathan Jacoby, Kenneth Bob, Letty Cottin Pogrebin, Paul Scham, Peter Beinart, and numerous other great Jewish progressives. No, I don't consider myself much of a Zionist these days but I'm not voting for today's Zionism but for the Zionism of Buber, Magnes, Szold, and others who fought NOT for Jewish supremacy but for full equality in one state or two states or whatever it would take for Israelis & Palestinians BOTH to feel secure and EQUAL in the land that belongs to them both. This slate aspires to that and so do I.

* Two tour guides - Israeli and Palestinian -- show visitors Jerusalem from both perspectives. A refreshing change from the propoganda of the usual organizational tours.

* Can Jews have unity without women?  This story about women singers excluded from an Israeli charity event reminds me of the sign in an Orthodox community that said "Talmud for Everyone. Men Only."

GREAT VIDEOS

* Military dads. The men in this NBC video are extraordinary – but shouldn't be. They should be ordinary, normal, par for the course.  Until that happens, let's salute them.

* Call it New Age, pat, feel good, corny, whatever. Gorgeous nature photography and beautifully diverse faces make Louie Schwartzberg's 6-minute video a welcome antidote to the nightmares of now.

* Topical song. I feel queasy about sending up something as serious as impeachment but Randy Rainbow nailed it with "He's just a girl who'll quid pro quo."
 

BEST POLITICAL CARTOON 

HEROES & SHEROES

* Creating young readers one head at a time. Local barber, Courtney Holmes, from Dubuque, Iowa, gives free haircuts to kids who read to him in the barber chair. Fantastic!

* Amazingly articulate 8-year-old girl, Noya Dahan (above) wounded in the terror attack on her San Diego synagogue, describes the woman who died protecting her rabbi. "Instead of the rabbi dying, she did." 

* Nicholas Winton, the remarkable Englishman who saved 669 Jewish children during the Holocaust shown with some of the kids then (above) and now (below) at an emotional surprise reunion on TV.  This isn't a new story but if it's new to you, I'm sure you'll be deeply touched. I bawled.

WOMEN

* Belgium's first female prime minister, Sophie Wilmes  is also its first Jewish prime minister. Read about her here. She happens to be a mother of four. Which reminds me of the Congressman who, in the 1970s, asked Colorado Rep. Pat Schroeder how she could possibly be a mother and a Congresswoman at the same time? Pat replied, "Because I have a brain and a uterus and I use both."

* Uncredentialed no more. Marilyn Webb finally gets her PhD.  Academic justice delayed but finally delivered. (photo credit: Ray Miller)

* NASA Milestone: The first all female spacewalk! Christina Koch (standing in photo above) and Jessica Meir (aloft) seen in the capsule after their spacewalk. Scheduled for last March, it was postponed to October. Why? Well, it turns out NASA didn't have two female-sized spacesuits.

* Pro-football player rewards girl quarterback. When he heard Dejah Rondeau had been bullied for playing football on her 7th grade team, Boston Patriots' wide receiver Julian Edelman gave her Superbowl tickets.
 

BOOKS

* A book for anyone who's been raped, knows someone who's been raped (or a man who raped someone), wants to be supportive of rape survivors, or "never called it rape" because sexual assault was either invisible or normalized in American life and culture.
 

HARPERCOLLINS.COM

I Never Called It Rape - Updated Edition - Robin Warshaw - Paperback

Featuring a new preface by feminist icon Gloria Steinem, and a new foreword by Salamishah Tillet, PhD, Rutgers University Professor of African American Studi...

CULTURE

* Judy Collins sings a gorgeous a cappella rendition of her haunting new song, "Dreamers," inspired by the sorrows of an immigrant mother separated from her daughter.  "This land was made by dreamers, and children of those dreamers..." 

* You can catch me on Harper Spero's podcast "Made Visible" discussing my book HOW TO BE  A FRIEND TO A FRIEND WHO'S SICK. Listen to it here. And check out the show notes.  

THEATER

* Harvey Fierstein's Off-Broadway production of Bella Bella has closed but is not forgotten by anyone who saw it. (I did talk backs after two performances.) Here's an engaging PBS interview with Harvey. And this short video will tell you how Bella's daughter Liz is advancing her mother's legacy. 
 

ACTION

* Rather than list all the resistance activities going on around the country, I suggest that you get your marching orders from Blue Action Matters and put yourself on the email listserv of Sunny Goldberg, who periodically sends out a fantastic action bulletin. Contact Sunny at sunnyg45@aol.com.