January 20, 2008 | 12:48 pm

Martin Luther King, Jr.‘s 1965 sermon at Temple Israel of Hollywood

Posted by JewishJournal.com

It was a Friday night Shabbat service at Temple Israel of Hollywood that would be forgotten for years.

Rabbi Max Nussbaum z"l invited the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King to give a sermon. 

Someone taped it, and the tape was unknown until last year; as soon as I heard it, I knew it needed to be available online.

L.A. Observed’s Kevin Roderick came up with a bit more of the zeitgeist:

King was 36 years old at the time. Selma was heating up that month, and Malcolm X had just been killed in New York, so King arrived in Los Angeles under heavy guard. It was his first trip west since winning the Nobel Peace Prize. King dined with prominent Westsiders at the Beverly Hills home of Dr. Irving Lichtenstein and attended a screening of The Greatest Story Ever Told at the Cinerama Dome (now the Arclight.) The theater crawled with police because of death threats and the seizure of stolen dynamite connected to a racist group. King also spoke at the World Affairs Council at the Hollywood Palladium. The Times reported that an “overflow crowd” of 1,500 at the temple gave King a warm welcome. That Sunday he returned to Selma.

It’s worth listening to again:

Part I, 27 min., MP3, 3.1MB
Part II, 14 min., MP3, 1.6MB

As Rob Eshman asked after hearing the sermon, who is today’s moral leader?

January 18, 2008 | 2:43 pm

Tom Cruise, Jewish supermensch?

Posted by The Web Guy

First came the Scientology promo video from Tom Cruise.

Then came the Jewish version, from our friends at Jewcy.com:

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January 15, 2008 | 10:33 pm

Jewish leaders defend Baruch Obama

Posted by The Web Guy

You’ve heard the rumors, seen the email, etc.  Obama is really a Muslim, he went to a madrassa, his church is racist, etc.

Some prominent American Jewish leaders strongly disagree.

Jewish organizational leaders defended Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama on Monday from a smear campaign claiming that he’s a Muslim.

Obama has been the subject of an e-mail making the rounds in the Jewish community in recent days alleging that he is a Muslim, attended a radical Islamic madrassah in Indonesia, and took his oath of office on a Koran. None of the claims are true, and the campaign has published a detailed refutation on its Web site.

“These tactics attempt to drive a wedge between our community and a presidential candidate based on despicable and false attacks based on religion,” said a letter signed by heads of several national Jewish organizations. “We reject these efforts to manipulate members of our community into supporting or opposing candidates. Attempts of this sort to mislead and inflame voters should not be part of our political discourse and should be rebuffed by all who believe in our democracy.”

Among the signatories were David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee; Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League; Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism.

From our friends at The Jewish Telgraphic Agency.

[Photo credit: Presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) addresses the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) forum on Foreign Policy March 2007 in Chicago.Photo by Jeff Haynes/AFP/Getty Images]

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January 13, 2008 | 6:33 pm

U CAN HAZ LAFFS

Posted by The Web Guy

Michael Showalter responds to an audience member who—no joke—brought two cats in a carrier to one of the sold out shows  JDUB Records  recorded for his debut comedy album . . . out now and appropriately titled Sandwiches & Cats.

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January 11, 2008 | 2:38 pm

Powerful Jewish women are verboten at Ms. Magazine

Posted by The Web Guy

Ms. Magazine—a feminist monthly founded by Jewish Gloria Steinem—won’t accept a display ad that celebrates the postion of women in the government of Israel.

The ad (above), which features photos of the president of the Supreme Court of Israel, Israel’s Foreign Minster, and the Speaker of the Knesset (parliament)—all women—was apparently too controversial for Ms.

Here’s the AJC’s take:

Ms. Magazine Blocks Ad on Israeli Women

January 10, 2008 — Ms. Magazine has long been in the forefront of the fight for equal rights and equal opportunities for women.  Apparently that is not the case if the women happen to be Israeli.

The magazine has turned down an AJCongress advertisement that did nothing more controversial than call attention to the fact that women currently occupy three of the most significant positions of power in Israeli public life.  The proposed ad (The Ad Ms. Didn’t Want You To See) included a text that merely said, “This is Israel,” under photographs of President of the Supreme Court Dorit Beinish, Vice Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Tzipi Livni and Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik.

“What other conclusion can we reach,” asked Richard Gordon, President of AJCongress, “except that the publishers − and if the publishers are right, a significant number of Ms. Magazine readers − are so hostile to Israel that they do not even want to see an ad that says something positive about Israel?”

What can justify such censorship?

—Dennis Wilen

Note: I come from an AJC family.  My Mom was the Congress’ executive director in Philadelphia when I was a teenager.  I marched with the AJC and Martin Luther King on August 28, 1963.

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January 9, 2008 | 11:54 pm

RIP Johnny Grant, Mayor of Hollywood

Posted by JewishJournal.com

A gentleman and publicist of the old school.

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January 6, 2008 | 9:38 pm

Serenity now

Posted by JewishJournal.com

Thank you for your patience.

I think I’ve chased down most of the broken file paths that were collaterally damaged by our recent server migration; if you spot any I’ve missed, please email me.

I’m still working on the subscription shopping cart and the big list o’ front pages in the Archives.

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December 20, 2007 | 1:26 pm

Young Jewish male takes ‘crak’ at mah-jongg

Posted by Jay Firestone

Sure, mah-jongg is a game classically known for its appeal to old Jewish women, but so is bingo and scrabble.  And I love those games, so why not mah-jongg? 

But a 23-year-old nudnik playing mah-jongg?  I know, that’s almost as crazy of as an 83-year-old yenta playing Donkey Kong.

Unfortunately, these stereotypes only prevent our culture and society from enhancing and evolving.  For that reason (and because I don’t think we’ll ever witness an 83 year-old playing Donkey Kong), I decided to do something unheard of.  Something no 23 year-old would even think of doing. I decided to learn mah-jongg.

Check out my experience in the video below.

Also be sure to read the full mah-jongg story at JewishJournal.com

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