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<co:glossary_ignore value="Nissan" /> <co:glossary_ignore value="Moshe" /> <P>Today New York City hosts its annual marathon. </P> <P>I saw an interesting article by Juliet Macur in the Sports Section of the October 23 edition of <I>The New York Times. </I>The article – <I>"Plodders Have a Place, but Is It in a Marathon?"</I> – addressed the "straggler" issue at the NYC Marathon, those who finish long after the real marathoners have finished, eaten and showered. "It's a joke to run a marathon by walking every other mile or by finishing in six, seven, eight hours," said Adrienne Wald, 54, the women's cross-country coach at the College of New Rochelle, who ran her first marathon in 1984. "It used to be that running a marathon was worth something—there used to be a pride saying that you ran a marathon, but not anymore. Now it's, 'How low is the ...
<P>Under discussion at the UN Human Rights Council on Oct. 16 was the report issued by the UN Fact-Finding Mission on human rights abuses in last winter's Gaza War. The report, led by the former South African judge Richard Goldstone, was harshly accusatory of Israel, and most of the speakers on Oct. 16 piled on the vicious condemnation. </P> <P>Totally unexpected was the speech by Col. Richard Kemp, speaking on behalf of UN Watch:</P> <blockquote><P>"Mr. President, based on my knowledge and experience, I can say this: During Operation Cast Lead, the Israeli Defense Forces did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare… Mr. President, Israel had no choice apart from defending its people, to stop Hamas from attacking them with rockets."</P></blockquote> <P>I watched the <A target="_blank" ...
<co:glossary_ignore value="Yitzchak" /> <co:glossary_ignore value="Yosef" /> <P>The other day I watched the <A target="_blank" href="http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2009/10/16/felton.aus.baby.train.sevennet">most unbelievable video</A>. It was footage from a train platform in Australia. A young mother was fussing with her baby, protecting him from the strong wind. Then, in a split second, as she let go of the stroller to fix her belt, a gust of wind pushes the stroller towards the tracks. The mother and other bystanders rush to catch the moving stroller but can't. It topples over the platform, into the tracks, the very moment a train is passing by. You watch the mother reach over, her arm getting hit by the train, miraculously not falling in herself. Then you see everyone on the platform, their hands covering their mouths, horrified that this young baby was just killed before their eyes.</P> ...
<P>Surprise! The Norwegian Nobel Committee has awarded the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama. Everyone was surprised, including Obama. After all, Obama had been in office less than two weeks at the time of the February 1st Nobel nomination deadline. That is not much of a chance to do anything, prize-worthy or not. The Nobel Committee explained that Obama was chosen for having "created a new climate in international politics." In effect, Obama was awarded the prize for his intentions, for announcing that he would do things differently.</P> <P>Would Alfred Nobel approve of this hope-ridden method of choosing prize winners? This question – along with the question whether Obama's policies are indeed conducive for global peace – is the subject of considerable controversy.</P> <P>But this all got me thinking. Does Judaism, a results-oriented way of life, allow for celebrating good intentions? The answer was not long in ...
<P>On Friday, October 9, 2009, NASA scientists intentionally crashed a 2.2 ton rocket into the moon to determine whether water exists on our closest celestial neighbor. The rocket's impact – it came in at 5,600 mph, twice the speed of a bullet – threw up 772,000 pounds of lunar debris, creating a 6.2 mile high spray. </P> <P>Trailing closely behind the rocket was the sophisticated L-CROSS (Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite) which flew right though the debris and transmitted back to NASA images that scientists are scouring for evidence of ice. Flying so closely behind, the satellite also took the fatal plunge, plowing into the moon only four minutes behind the rocket.</P> <P>Though trumpeted by NASA as a low-cost satellite, the L-Cross – according to Northrop Grumman, the company contracted by NASA to build it – cost seventy-nine million dollars. The dimensions of this endeavor boggle the mind. We send a multi-million-dollar satellite ...
