Dear Editor:
I am writing to express what a kiddush Hashem has happened to our k’hilah. For some time there have been tensions between the various factions in the k’hilah. When the son’ei Yisrael came out, everyone worked together as a k’hilah to defeat the son’ei Yisrael and help our friend Jim Gennaro. Having a sonei Yisrael “representing us on the Council” would have been disastrous. Ashkenazim, Sefardim, long-time residents, Bukharians, yeshivish, Black Hat, Modern – everyone got together on the same page. Everyone worked as a k’hilah to get out the vote and defeat the rasha – badly.
Other communities have watched what has happened and saw what a real community is and how a community can get together. I hope other communities can learn what great things can be done if we act like a k’hilah instead of always disputing among ourselves.
I was at Queens College the last Sunday before the election and I saw everyone who came out. It was a beautiful thing. Hopefully, in the future, we can do many good things as a k’hilah together. We should learn from this that we are stronger as a team, rather than as individuals.
Howard Schoenfeld
Dear Editor:
Imagine my surprise when I read the name “Rabbi Barishansky,” a name last heard when I was a child. It was a name often mentioned by my grandmother who left Gomel with a new husband, Yechiel Michel Kerbel, in 1905 and settled in New York, where my mother was born shortly after their arrival. My grandfather, a businessman, was active in the Homeler Society and I have a picture commemorating the 25th anniversary celebrating the founding of the organization, taken some time during the 1930s.
My grandparents, uncle, and great-aunt are buried in the Homeler section of Old Mt. Carmel Cemetery. My mother often spoke of her cousins, descendants of family members who came to the United States early in the 20th century. Most of them settled in the Philadelphia area, and some migrated to Atlantic City and Wilmington, Delaware, and consequently, we were unable to visit frequently during my childhood. We reestablished contact in the 1960s; and though most are scattered throughout the United States, there are now several living in Queens, including two rabbis. Probably, the most well-known descendant of Gomel that I know of, though not a relative, is Jeffrey Gurock, a professor of History at Yeshiva University who has written extensively about the American Jewish Community.
I would be curious to know if your family, who lived in Gomel in the interwar period, had a memory of those who stayed behind. My maternal great-grandparents still lived in Gomel during the 1920s.
Sifrah Hollander
Dear Editor:
How should we deal with fare evasion, vandalism, and crime on NYC Transit subways and buses? Perhaps it is time to return to the good old days when a transit police officer was assigned to ride and patrol most stations and trains. This, along with installation of security cameras on trains and at stations might serve as a deterrent against crime, fare evasion, and vandalism. There also may be the need to increase fines and penalties as a deterrent for those who don’t pay their fare, commit crime, or vandalize.
Larry Penner
(Larry Penner is a transportation advocate, historian and writer who previously worked for the Federal Transit Administration Region 2 New York Office. This included the development, review, approval, and oversight for billions in capital projects and programs for the MTA, NYC Transit, Long Island and Metro North Rail Roads, MTA Bus, NYC Department of Transportation, along with 30 other transit agencies in NY & NJ.)
Dear Editor:
Those directing curses at Joe Biden must have forgotten who is patiently waiting in the wings if some harm were to befall the President.
Perhaps the plan is to curse Kamala Harris, as well? That would give us a President Nancy Pelosi. Avada Kedavra within minutes of her swearing in we can be assured.
Next up, President Pro Tempore of the Senate Patrick Leahy introduced a bill to restore humanitarian aid to Palestinians. Rasha.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken – a Jew. But alas, he criticized Trump’s pullout from the Iran deal. He’ll have to go.
Here’s a thought: Instead of serially cursing half of the country, try davening that Hashem should bless our leaders with foresight and ideals that will help us and all Americans live better lives. Wouldn’t that be a better outcome anyway?
Elana Mandelbaum
Dear Editor:
Economist Paul Krugman suggests workers use only their right hand to boost employment (Satire)
UNITED STATES—In today’s edition of The New York Times – a former newspaper – Nobel Prize-winning-economist Paul Krugman wrote an op-ed in which he suggested that American workers should start using only their right hand to perform any type of work or job, in order to boost the economy’s lagging job numbers.
The editorial’s headline was, “The case for a right-handed-only economy.” Krugman summed up his rather lengthy article in a series of tweets, stating in part, “The economy has been lagging for a long time as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which started almost a year ago. Job numbers have been declining and unemployment is at a record high. The most efficient way at this point, in my opinion, in order to increase employment is if the government mandates that all workers use only their right hand on the job. This means that every type of job out there will now require twice the number of workers than before to perform the same task, boosting employment by 50 percent. It’s an excellent solution that will help reignite the economy.”
Reactions to Krugman’s proposal were mixed. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (Socialist-NY) thought that Krugman’s proposal didn’t go far enough. On her Facebook page, she suggested that within the framework of a right-handed economy workers should only use half their fingers instead of all ten, because according to Krugman’s logic that’ll increase jobs by another 50 percent, as half the number of fingers means double the number of jobs.
Others, like economist Dr. Thomas Sowell, disapproved of Krugman’s proposal. In a recent article, he explained that “the aim of economics is wealth consumption, not jobs. It’s nonsensical to create any scheme that creates tons of jobs if those jobs fail to produce real wealth to society.”
After reading Krugman’s op-ed, Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) sent Krugman a copy of Critical Thinking Skills for Dummies.
Rafi Metz
Dear Editor:
Apparently, Mr. Hecht thinks his Trumpian readers haven’t submitted enough letters complaining about Biden. After all, the Left does prefer constant complaints, preferably about foreign collusion. In honor of Mr. Hecht’s opening paragraphs last week, I will go through a partial list of the things I don’t like about the Biden administration.
China Collusion – Did I mention the China Collusion? And also the China Collusion? What, I made a mistake? I was supposed to say “Russian” collusion? Oh, and we’re supposed to impeach people for things like that? Wait, I’m not allowed to talk about Hunter Biden? I’ll get suspended from Twitter? Newspapers can’t pri––
The Unity Hypocrisy – Despite calling for unity, unity, and also unity, the Biden administration has deliberately trampled and undone many of Trump’s most popular acts. Where is your unity, Mr. Biden, when you cancel untold numbers of Keystone pipeline jobs, put us back into the disastrous Paris climate deal, and allow your party to unconstitutionally impeach a former President for legally ridiculous reasons? Oh, and also, despite Mr. Biden claiming in the past that executive orders are only for dictators, Mr. Biden signed record numbers of executive orders in his first days in office. Biden also broke his own COVID rules. Rules for thee and not for me, you can really feel the unity in the air!
Now Nobody Will Stand Against Censorship and Cancel Culture – Stories break every day now, if you know where to read them, of people getting de-platformed, fired for their views, books canceled, accounts locked, harassed by strangers, organizations getting blacklisted by payment processor, etc. Respected scientists get thrown off social media. The goalposts are always shifting, the definition of what’s “problematic” gets broader each day. Freedom of the Press and Freedom of Speech mean practically nothing anymore.
Foreign Policy – Trump somehow managed to place exactly enough pressure on countries like Iran, China, and North Korea. Not too little, not too much, and with a personal touch that was both highly controversial and highly effective. Biden lacks the emotional strength to manage that balance, and we may well be at war within a year.
I could say more, but I’ll leave it at that.
Ephrayim Fox
Always A Deplorable!
Dear Editor:
I would like to respond to many false representations that have been made in this paper and elsewhere regarding the 2020 presidential election.
Lie #1: “The 2020 election was legal and transparent. Trump has spread vicious lies about the fairest and transparent election in history.”
Here are the facts:
- Donald Trump received ten million more votes in 2020 than 2016 and still he lost.
- Trump won four “bellwether” states – Florida, Ohio, Iowa, and North Carolina – and still he lost.
- The Republicans gained a net 13 House Seats. It is very strange for the Republicans to lose the presidential election and pick up seats in the House.
- Many key battleground states changed election laws without the consent of the legislators to favor the Democrats and reduce safeguards to prevent election fraud. Some of these safeguards were signature-checking. These new laws allowed for mail-in ballots to be sent out to millions of people who never requested them. In addition, these battleground states did not remove dead people and ineligible voters from their register rolls. This had the result of many phony ballots being sent out.
- Many witnesses have submitted sworn affidavits that there was massive ballot tampering on election night. Republicans were not permitted to observe the counting of the mail-in ballots.
- Trump was heading toward a massive election victory. Suddenly the counting stopped in Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin. The counting resumed in the middle of the night with the lead flipping from Trump to Bidden. Cameras in Fulton County, Georgia, showed that all the observers were told to leave at 10:30 p.m. At 2:30 a.m., four people came in without observers and pulled out ballots from some hidden suitcases. This is illegal counting of ballots.
Lie#2: “Over 84 cases have been brought by Trump to overturn the election results. The judges ruled that Trump is a liar and the election results were perfect.”
- Most of the 84 cases were filed by individuals in various states. The cases were dismissed on technicalities such as standing and laches. There was no hearing on the merits of these cases.
- Trump only filed a handful of lawsuits. He argued that in the battleground states of Michigan, Nevada, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, and Pennsylvania, the state election law was not followed. The relief requested was an audit of the mail-in votes. The Democrats fiercely opposed this. The Courts ruled that they would not hear these cases because they were filed too late. If these audits are not carried out, we will never know who really won the election.
In the view of Warren Hecht and other liberals, it doesn’t matter who really won. In their mind, Trump is worse than Adolf Hitler and he must be destroyed. In their deranged minds, Trump is responsible for a myriad of crimes. His worst crime was his successful war against terrorism. This has saved many Jewish lives. Biden has already sent millions of dollars to the Palestinian Authority that will be used to commit terrorism against Israel. In the liberal mindset, this is the best thing that ever happened. In their way of thinking, anyone who fights against anti-Semitism is a Nazi, and anyone who supports anti-Semitism is a tzadik.
Leonard Moss