Summer Camp Tips
Dear Editor:
My son was a day camp junior counselor to 30 kids this year, most of whom were from the Queens area. He had a really enjoyable summer that ended last week on a somewhat sour note.
The kids in his bunk really liked him, and with a $20 tip recommended for a half summer and $40 tip for full summer, he thought he would earn around $1,200 for his efforts. He ended up with a little more than $600.
I understand that camp is already expensive, but all the people who stiffed him should consider who they’re hurting by withholding their tips: a 13-year-old kid who was looking to make some spending money by taking care of your kids. Yes, technically tipping is optional, but having more than half the kids stiff him (some kids tipped more than recommended amount) is just bad manners, bad chinuch, and in my opinion disgraceful.
Avi Goldberg
Dear Editor:
Having grown up in the Bronx in the 1950s (a tough place, a tough time), I was raised with the rule: “You don’t wear a yarmulke in the street.” I have raised my kids the same way. You can ask any of them; they’ll tell you. We live in a wonderful land, and we appreciate it. But we should never forget that we live in Galus. A Yankees or Mets cap is the way to go.
Leslie Bennett, MD
Automated Camera Enforcement Fines Now In Effect
Dear Editor:
Recently, the MTA began issuing violations to individuals blocking bus stops and double parking. Fines went into effect on August 19 and start at $50, scaling up to $250 for repeat violators.
In total, an astounding 623 buses on 14 routes now have automated camera enforcement installed. In Queens, cameras are active on the Q44-SBS, Q54, and Q58 routes. Other routes include the B44-SBS, B46-SBS, Bx12-SBS, Bx19, B62, Bx41-SBS, Bx36, M14-SBS, M15-SBS, M23-SBS, and M34-SBS routes.
Let’s not pay the city more than necessary and keep the streets clear at the same time.
Shabsie Saphirstein
Rational vs. Irrational Fear
Dear Editor:
In his latest unhinged letter, former VP of the Rosedale Jewish Center David Pecoraro would like to see fellow letter writer Avi Goldberg’s medical degree for stating the obvious: that the man occupying the Presidency (hard to call a guy who appears to be spending the rest of his term at the beach “The President”) has cognitive issues. I don’t want to sound snarky, but if after watching Biden the last few months one reaches the conclusion that he’s all there, perhaps it’s time to book a well-visit for yourself.
VP Pecoraro further asserts that Kamala Harris’ price fixing proposal is already on the books in numerous states. This is ridiculous. Although Komrade Kamala would like to impose communism on our country, as of now, our economy still operates within the confines of supply and demand and not government price fixing.
VP Pecoraro seems to have his feathers ruffled at my pointing out that Kamala Harris is a DEI candidate, insisting that it is a racial slur. I would remind VP Pecoraro that it was Joe Biden, not Doniel Behar who insisted that his Vice President needed to be a black female. If I were to pick someone for an important position, I would base my decision on their qualifications. The fact that you appear to support decision-making based on immutable and frankly absurd criteria such as skin color makes you, not me, the racist here.
Lastly, VP Pecoraro seems obsessed with Project 2025, a document I suspect that neither President Trump nor VP Pecoraro has actually read. VP Pecoraro appears to fear the rise of White Supremacy/Christian Nationalism in this country. In 2024, there are a lot of things to fear: the intentional devaluing of the dollar, a cyber-attack on the grid, another government-sponsored plan-demic, radical Muslim terrorism, out-of-control violent crime, and the rise of institutional anti-Semitism within the ranks of the Democratic Party, just to name a few. Any one of those fears is perfectly rational. A takeover of our government by White Supremacists in the near future seems pretty low on the list of things a rational person would fear. Why do I say this? Because White Supremacists control zero levers of power on the federal, state, or local level. That’s a lot of positions to have no control over! If you fear the direction of this country, perhaps it’s time to look at who’s been in charge and who controls virtually all of the institutions in our country: Democrats.
Doniel Behar
Kamala Harris’ Despicable Actions Toward Israel
Dear Editor:
We are all saddened by the news that numerous hostages, including Hersh Goldberg-Polin, were found murdered with gunshot wounds to the head in tunnels inside of Rafah this past week. I hate mixing politics within this horribly tragic story, but unfortunately the two are inextricably linked.
Israel’s military operation to rid Gaza of Hamas would have been over by now if not for the gross incompetence and outrageous interference of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. These two dimwits have done everything they can to prolong this operation, endangering both Palestinian civilians and Jewish hostages of Hamas. The bodies of the hostages were found in Rafah, a place Biden had been pressuring Netanyahu for months not to enter, and going so far as to withhold weaponry from Israel to ensure Hamas’ survival.
Given Biden’s obvious dementia, that may also be to blame for his ill-fated decisions on Afghanistan; perhaps he can get a pass. But Kamala Harris is on record opposing Israel’s mission into Rafah, explaining that “she studied the maps” and that entering Rafah would be a “huge mistake.” Harris was overly concerned with where Gazans would go, while showing zero interest in rescuing Jewish hostages being held captive and tortured by Hamas.
I’m sick and tired of readers such as David Pecoraro and others telling us that Trump is an anti-Semite and Kamala Harris is a friend of the Jewish people. I don’t even care anymore what the basis is for their nonsensical, fact-free, fantasyland political viewpoints.
Kamala Harris has Jewish blood on her hands; voting for her right now is incomprehensible, and anyone who truly cared about our people would be repulsed at the thought of pulling the lever for her.
Jonathan Goldgrab
Student OMNY Cards Replace Student MetroCards
Dear Editor:
With the start of school, I would like to inform the community that student OMNY cards will now replace Student MetroCards. Student OMNY cards are now valid 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and work all year. Eligible students will receive an additional trip, making for four free trips daily, up from three.
These changes will significantly expand flexibility for student travel. Note that students were previously limited to only three free rides each day from only 5:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. and the cards were only valid on days when the student’s school was open for class.
Have a great school year, and don’t forget to tap!
Shabsie Saphirstein
Dear Editor:
Behind the scenes, there are Democratic Party donors, political operatives, and lawyers working to place Constitution Party presidential candidate Operation Rescue anti-abortion candidate Randall Terry on the ballot in many of the handful of contested states. They hope that Terry will attract enough voters from Trump to ensure Democratic Party Presidential candidate Kamala Harris, with a tight margin, will carry these states, ensuring her victory in November.
Green Party candidate Jill Stein and independent candidate Cornell West, both running to the political left of Harris, could take votes away from her, resulting in Trump winning other contested states. In this case, Democrats are attempting to remove both Stein and West from the ballot. When it comes to practicing fair and honest elections, the Democratic Party practices “Do as I say, not as I do.”
Sincerely,
Larry Penner
Great Neck, New York
Dear Editor:
I have to give Moshe Hill credit. He’s criticized President Biden many times for the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan, and always seemed to be unaware of former President Trump’s role in the matter. But in his latest column, he finally acknowledges that Trump was at least somewhat involved! Sure, he still studiously avoids discussing any of the specifics of that involvement that would interfere with his narrative, but that’s still progress.
So, what was Trump’s role? He froze the Afghan government out to negotiate the withdrawal directly with the Taliban. The resulting agreement, the Doha Accords, basically gave the Taliban everything it wanted. Trump facilitated the release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners in exchange for 1,000 from the other side, pulled out most of the American troops (from around 13,000 at the time of the agreement to 2,500 when Trump left office), and set a final withdrawal date for soon after the end of his term. Now, if he was actually concerned with getting US citizens and the many Afghan allies who aided the US throughout the war out of the country before the final withdrawal, you would think he would prioritize doing so when we still had a strong presence and controlled territory throughout the country. But not only did he fail to do so, he actually slowed down the visa process for those seeking to leave.
As a result, Biden took over with a skeleton crew on the ground and a rapidly approaching withdrawal date. Could he have handled it better? You can certainly argue that, but the most obvious action he could have taken was to go against the Doha agreement by bringing in more troops to assist in the evacuation and pushing back the withdrawal date, or to even insist on renegotiating. But all of that would have risked renewed conflict with a strengthened Taliban that had stopped attacking US forces after signing the deal. There are those (many of whom criticized the deal in the first place) who argue that Biden still should have done so, but that just underlines the limitations of the agreement.
So, there was a frenzied period of trying to evacuate everyone, and 13 soldiers were killed by a suicide bomb detonated at a perimeter setup to receive evacuees. Mr. Hill places this squarely on Biden and says, “It’s not hyperbolic to claim that if Trump won in 2020, those soldiers would be alive today.” But what would have Trump done differently? Would he somehow have been able to conduct evacuations without setting up a perimeter? Would he have been able to keep insurgents away despite having a minimal number of troops to work with? And how could the situation in the Taliban-led post-withdrawal Afghanistan, which Mr. Hill attacks Biden for, have possibly been any different under Trump? Mr. Hill doesn’t concern himself with these questions. Rather, he simply explains that, unlike Biden, Trump was dealing from a position of strength. What is the evidence of this strength? Mr. Hill relays an anecdote from Republican Congressman Wesley Hunt that, in a meeting with the Taliban, Trump threatened to kill their leadership if they harmed any American, and to emphasize this he “reached into his pocket, pulled out a satellite photo of the leader of the Taliban’s home, and handed it to him, got up, and walked out of the room.”
There are multiple problems with this. First, there’s the brazen attempt to paint any part of what was essentially a complete surrender to the Taliban, after a long war with many US casualties, as a show of strength. There were good reasons to get out of the war, which Mr. Hill notably doesn’t seem to agree with, but let’s not paint it as something that it wasn’t. Second, despite my best efforts, I could not find any evidence of Trump meeting in person with the Taliban. There was an infamous plan of Trump’s to have the Taliban come to Camp David right before 9/11 in 2019, but that was scrapped. As for the above story, it does not appear to be a first-hand account, as Hunt was not in office during the Trump presidency and did not serve in his administration. But let’s assume that there were top secret negotiations involving Trump in person that the media never got wind of, that Trump never talked about, and whose details Hunt was privy to. The claim is that this threat to the Taliban would have saved the soldiers’ lives if Trump was still in office? The attack was carried out by ISIS-K, an enemy of the Taliban! In many ways it is a perfect encapsulation of the cult of Trump: praise for his bluster while ignoring his actual actions.
Mr. Hill concludes by arguing that the weakness of Biden, and by extension Vice President Harris, on Afghanistan, in contrast to “the strength that America displayed during the Trump years,” gave the green light for Putin to invade Ukraine, October 7, and actions by China and North Korea. So, Trump engineers a withdrawal that Mr. Hill seems to completely disagree with, carries most of it out, and then like the true leader he is, leaves the last and hardest part to his successor, and Mr. Hill sees that as a reason to praise Trump and blame Biden for all sorts of actions carried out by other parties. And to think that, after all that, Mr. Hill manages to criticize the media for their supposed anti-Trump bias without a hint of irony.
Regards,
Yaakov Ribner
Dear Editor,
The NYS Citizen Preparedness Corps. is set to host an important training program on Monday, September 16, 7:00 p.m. at PS173’s auditorium, 174-10 67th Avenue, Fresh Meadows.
With severe weather events becoming more frequent and extreme, it is more important than ever that New Yorkers are prepared for disasters. The workshop will teach residents to have the tools and resources to prepare for any type of disaster, respond accordingly, and recover as quickly as possible to pre-disaster conditions. This training course will provide an introduction to responding to a natural or man-made disaster. Participants will be advised on how to properly prepare for any disaster, including developing a family emergency plan and stocking up on emergency supplies. Each family that attends must register in advance at surveymonkey.com/r/PS17391724 to receive a preparedness “go bag” kit.
The event is a service of Governor Kathy Hochul and presented by Assemblymember Nily Rozic and State Senator John Liu.
Shabsie Saphirstein
Dear Editor:
Mr. Hecht, now that Hersh Goldberg-Polin Hy”d was found murdered, what are you going to do? Last week, you were all excited that his parents got a standing ovation at the DNC. Now, due to the continued catastrophic failures of this Biden-Harris administration, his parents have to bury their son and sit shiv’ah. Both Biden and Harris put out press releases. Shame on both of them for not facing live cameras and condemning the murders of six Jews. This just demonstrates their indifference towards Jews, and an American among them, who were murdered.
The DNC had vans outside the arena giving out free vasectomies and abortions all in the name of “reproductive rights.” They steal the nomenclature and try to trick the average American, as clearly these procedures are anti-reproductive. Death and murder are a Democrat Party favorite. Abortions up until the moment of birth, and criminals, including illegal immigrants, roaming free on our streets to terrorize law-abiding citizens. The Torah tells us in Leviticus 18:5, “va’chai bahem – to live by them,” and Deuteronomy 30:19, “u’vacharta ba’chayim – choose life. Life is precious. One cannot reconcile these p’sukim in our holy Torah and their love of G-d with their devotion to today’s Democratic Party.
Now it is time that we come out of Never-Never Land, with the fairies and pixie dust and come back into reality. It is the US Constitution – and only the US Constitution – that lists the qualifications for President. Not the Congress, Supreme Court, or David Pecoraro in Rosedale, Queens. So, whether you like it or not, Mr. Pecoraro, President Trump meets those qualifications and can run to be, G-d willing, our next President. None of the ludicrous reasons you listed in your letter last week – obese, old, or convicted in a political hit job in New York – are written in Article II of our Constitution.
Not one person was charged with insurrection or sedition in the aftermath of January 6, so, stop gaslighting. You know who was charged with sedition? The Democratic Party-loving FALN Puerto Rican domestic terror group that set off multiple bombings in New York City in the late 1970s. You know who pardoned/gave them clemency? Bill Clinton and Barak Hussein O. – Democrats. They let domestic terrorists out of prison charged with sedition.
Meanwhile, President Trump went to Arlington National Cemetery to pay his respects to the fallen 13 soldiers from the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. You know who didn’t bother to show up? Joe Biden and Kamala Harris? If they did, it would be an affirmation that they screwed up. But it appears that this is a common occurrence with these two. They can’t take the heat so they stay out of the kitchen. So, unless we need more dead Americans overseas, why should we vote for Kamala Harris?
Kamala Harris has no policy positions listed on her website. Why is that? What is she hiding? She’s vapid and weak. She does not command respect and she’s not a leader. She’s certainly not confident in any of her abilities. After all, she refuses to face the American press, and when she did a layup interview with Dana Bash of CNN, it was pathetic. Even when pressed on policy, which was minimal, she looked down at the table rather than at the camera to the American people or directly to Dana Bash. She doesn’t care that inflation is hurting us. She doesn’t care that energy and gas prices are high. She doesn’t care that food prices have gone up 20 percent since January 2021. She doesn’t care that 12 million illegals have crossed into this country, because she wants them to vote Democrat; which she will make happen by granting them amnesty if she wins. She doesn’t care that thousands of Israelis have been displaced in northern Israel because of rockets being shot by Hezbollah. She is a Marxist through and through. She will not do anything to benefit this country. She has no business running for President, as she is no commander in chief and certainly not a leader of the free world.
Shalom Markowitz
Roger Mudd 2.0
Dear Editor:
In 1979, Senator Ted Kennedy was the overwhelming favorite to seize the Democratic nomination for president when he sat down for an interview with CBS’ Roger Mudd. Mudd began with a softball question: “Why do you want to be President?” This is the type of question that seasoned politicians like Kennedy routinely knock out of the park, yet Kennedy stumbled badly, giving a long, winding answer that included talking about America’s superior natural resources, our technology, America’s ability to deal with energy issues and the importance of moving forward and not standing still. Kennedy’s flub on the easiest of questions effectively ended his candidacy for president. And rightfully so: A man who cannot articulate any coherent reason for his candidacy for the most powerful position in the world should not hold said position.
Kamala Harris effectively stole the nomination from the infirmed Joe Biden (If and when Biden ever comes back from the beach and finds out that he’s not running for re-election, I suspect he will be angry) and hid from the press for 40 days before agreeing to sit down for an interview/infomercial with CNN, the most friendly of networks for all Democrats. Because she is a coward, she would not do the interview alone but had to have her security blanket, Tim Walz, with her by her side the whole time.
Several angles must be explored here: First, are we to believe Harris is capable of sitting down and negotiating with some of the roughest customers around the world like Xi, Putin, or any Middle East leader, if she’s unable to sit down with a friendly CNN reporter and do a one-on-one? Second, Harris has been running on fem power and acting like a Queen Slayer, but what does it say about all her girl power, when she needed a man by her side to conduct a simple media interview?
Once the interview began, we were treated to a Roger Mudd/Ted Kennedy 2.0 moment. CNN reporter Dana Bash began with the easiest of questions: “What would you do on Day One in the White House?” Harris’ handlers apparently forgot to prep her for this, as her answer included a reference to strengthening the middle class, implementing “a new way forward...fueled by hope and optimism,” and ripping Donald Trumps’ character. The answer was so awkward, pathetic, and devoid of any substance that even the hyper-partisan Bash felt the need to re-ask the exact same question again. If the media were an honest broker, Kamala Harris’ campaign would have been over at that point. Instead, because the expectations for her are set so low, Harris not suffering a panic attack or getting knee-capped on stage like she was by Tulsi Gabbard in 2019 is considered a major success.
Harris is in the major leagues, yet barely possesses minor league talent. The one non-negotiable talent all politicians must possess is the ability to communicate and speak extemporaneously. Joe Biden’s corpse was thrown overboard because he could not communicate coherently. The irony of replacing him with Kamala Harris is that even though she is not a dementia patient like Biden, she, too, has no ability to speak when off her prompter. The Democratic Party has replaced a candidate they had to hide in 2020 to get elected, and continue to hide now, with another candidate who must be stowed away for long periods of time, lest she open her mouth and kill her chances of getting elected. The CNN interview in which Harris spoke in circles for a grand total of 16 minutes is likely the last time we will see her in an interview before the election. All brought to you by the party that’s purportedly defending our Democracy.
Jason Stark
Water
Dear Editor:
“Drink L’Chayim, to Life.” Tevye might not have had a medical degree, but he knew what he was talking about. Of course, I’m not advocating drinking schnaps. Instead, I’m begging all of you readers to start or continue drinking water. After all, Moshe wasn’t told to speak to the rock so that Coca-Cola would sprout out.
I am an avowed aqua lover now. August was very tough on my kidneys, and I wouldn’t wish the same on anyone. I grew up drinking orange juice, ginger ale, chocolate milk, and Coke. Water was never in the equation. When I was invited to a Shabbos meal, I couldn’t understand the hosts putting out a pitcher of iced water on the table. Didn’t I deserve Cherry Coke, Coke, or at the very least, Diet Coke?
Well, after five days at Booth (or whatever they call it now) and six hours screaming in the ER waiting hall, I’ve discovered what they mean by “Mayim Chayim,” and I learned that dehydration is the opposite of that. I also experienced what it meant for an Asian PA (no offense to PAs) to walk into your room at 7 a.m. when you are half asleep and inform you that you have a kidney tumor. Whoops! She meant kidney stone, and that I had a history of cancer. She obviously doesn’t watch Grey’s Anatomy, where at least three interns, two residents, and one surgeon enter a patient’s room together to give a diagnosis.
Anyway, go buy your water bottle and shlep it with you. You’ll be hydrated and happy you listened to my sage advice. Oh, by the way, you can drop the $20 co-pay into my mailbox.
Debbie Horowitz
