October 22, 2008 | 4:24 pm

McCain and Obama nearly even in AP poll

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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Last week Barack Obama was up 14 points in the polls. Today John McCain is running nearly even. From the AP:

The presidential race tightened after the final debate, with John McCain gaining among whites and people earning less than $50,000, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll that shows McCain and Barack Obama essentially running even among likely voters in the election homestretch.

The poll, which found Obama at 44 percent and McCain at 43 percent, supports what some Republicans and Democrats privately have said in recent days: that the race narrowed after the third debate as GOP-leaning voters drifted home to their party and McCain’s “Joe the plumber” analogy struck a chord.

Three weeks ago, an AP-GfK survey found that Obama had surged to a seven-point lead over McCain, lifted by voters who thought the Democrat was better suited to lead the nation through its sudden economic crisis. ...

The new AP-GfK head-to-head result is a departure from some, but not all, recent national polls.

Obama and McCain were essentially tied among likely voters in the latest George Washington University Battleground Poll, conducted by Republican strategist Ed Goeas and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake. In other surveys focusing on likely voters, a Washington Post-ABC News poll showed Obama up by 9 percentage points, while a poll by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center had Obama leading by 14. A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, among the broader category of people registered to vote, found Obama ahead by 10 points.

October 22, 2008 | 2:31 pm

Sen. McConnell’s anti-Semitic attack ad?

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Alex Balk at Radar calls Sen. Mitch McConnell on playing the New York Jew card in an attack ad (above) against his reelection opponent, who is supported by Sen. Charles Schumer, a big Jew from New York:

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConell (R-KY) is facing an unexpectedly tight race back at home to retain his seat. So tight, apparently, that his ad guys came to him and said, “Mitch, here’s what we’re gonna do: Get a guy with a real Jewy voice to narrate a spot making sure everyone knows that the Jews are after ya!” I mean, there’s no other explanation, right? The voiceover guy must be named Hyman Finkelstein, that’s how Hebraic his lilt is.

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October 22, 2008 | 4:11 am

Religious POVs: Maher or Spurlock?

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Morgan Spurlock is a genius. Sure, his shtick is shlocky. And, yeah, he might be reusing the formula he created for “Super Size Me.” But his film last year, “Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden,” is an insightful look at just how vile religious extremism is. In essence, the film, which I watched earlier today, is “Religulous” without trying to mock religion.

The key to Spurlock’s success is visiting some of the craziest place on earth and just letting people talk. Whereas Bill Maher’s interviews felt manipulated and edited to their most uncomfortable, comedic core, Spurlock sits back and just listens—like a good journalist should. And the things he hears are terrifying.

Granted, Spurlock looks like a glorified tourist when he wanders the mall in Saudi Arabia and walks through the mountains of Tora Bora—I was just waiting for him to find bin Laden in one of the caves he wanders into: “OBL, wassup?” But unlike “Religulous,” which critics loved and the godly panned (I was one of the exceptions), Spurlocks quest more accurately communicates the danger of religious extremism and the hopeless of resolving the war between the Muslim world—not Islam—and the West.

There are a lot of salient moments in the movie, but the scene that disturbed me most was when Spurlock visits a large mosque in Saudi Arabia. From on high, his camera captures the imam’s sermon:

“O God, one leader to lead jihad for your sake. To liberate the land of Palestine. And the land of Iraq from the Christians. O God, the strong and noble one. O God, go after the Christians. O God, make wars in their homes. O God, release your armies upon them. O God, make the land of Palestine a graveyard for the Jews. O God, make the land of Iraq a graveyard for the Christians.”

Yeah, that guy’s not too interested in coexistence. Neither in this film are the loony Lubavitchers who chase Spurlock out of their Israeli hamlet, swearing at him and shoving him as he makes a beeline for his van. Also frightening are all the folks who live in a parallel reality where the United States uses its technological strength to create fake videos from the 9/11 hijackers.

“Where in the World’s” trailer is after the jump:

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October 21, 2008 | 3:45 pm

A Christian at High Holy Day services

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Creator’s Note: I never republish entire stories but ... two weeks ago I took the plunge and attended Yom Kippur services. What follows is the first-person piece I wrote for the Journal about my experience.

My first mistake was arriving when the Yom Kippur morning service at Valley Beth Shalom was scheduled to begin. The flier said 7:45 a.m. and, this being my virgin voyage, I didn’t want to be late.

Naive? Certainly. I didn’t realize Jews attend High Holy Days services like Dodgers fans frequent Chavez Ravine: arriving in the third inning and leaving in the seventh.

The first hint of my folly came when, after poking my head into a nearly empty Niznick Sanctuary, I returned to my car, parked a half-mile away, and bumped into one of the temple’s main rabbis.

The morning rush, it turned out, was about two hours away.

It may be surprising that a reporter at The Jewish Journal named Greenberg wouldn’t know the standard practices of synagogue attendance on the holiest day of the Jewish year, but this ignorance hints at a more complex story of guilt, confusion and married identities.

I wasn’t raised Jewish. Both my grandmothers were, and so too was my paternal grandfather. But my mother was raised Catholic down south and my father as a non-religious Jew here in Los Angeles. (You may know a few like him.)

When I was young—6 or 7—my parents both began attending a non-denominational Protestant church. Soon they were baptized, and, as a teenager, so was I.

My sister and I identified as Jewish in name only, or, more aptly, by our name: When it comes to anti-Semitism, it’s not about whether you consider yourself Jewish but whether others do—and others did.

I still go to church most Sundays, but though I’m not with Jews for Jesus or a Messianic—that’s worth emphasizing—I’ve become increasingly interested in my Jewish cultural history. Yom Kippur, it seemed, was something I should experience.

So I selected three synagogues where I thought I would feel comfortable and find something meaningful to take home: IKAR, where Rabbi Sharon Brous has been recognized for her alternative, spiritually engaging community; Valley Beth Shalom (VBS), to hear Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis, one of the leading voices of Jewish conscience from the last half century; and Temple Israel of Hollywood because, well, I have a screenplay to sell.

I didn’t anticipate a problem blending in.

“The High Holy Days,” a friend had remarked before Rosh Hashanah, “is the time of the year when secular Jews pretend to believe in God and religious Jews pretend to believe them.”

The High Holy Days draw the biggest crowds of the year, and, just like Christmas and Easter services, you can hear the outreach from the bimah.

“To the privatized Jew, hell is other people,” Schulweis said during his morning sermon, paraphrasing the philosopher Sartre.

Yes, he said, huddling close causes pricks and pain, but so does remaining alone outside of a community.

“This is the porcupine’s dilemma. This is the human condition,” Schulweis said, soon adding, “Judaism depends on Jews being Jewish…. In Judaism, believing means belonging. For we are a family.”

At that moment, I felt a part of this family, the Tribe. I was praying and singing in Hebrew, wearing tallit and a kippah, and at 5:30 p.m. on erev Yom Kippur I had begun my fast, which I might have completed had I not driven past Pita Kitchen en route from VBS to Temple Israel of Hollywood. (They make a ridiculous lamb shawarma.)

Guilty? Maybe a little. But the day before I read on Ynet that only 63 percent of Israeli Jews planned to fast. And, besides, I’d already achieved a greater level of observance than at any point in my life.

Temple Israel hammered home what Schulweis had spoken of. I had been bored at VBS; tired from little sleep, with falling blood sugar, and, most importantly, no one to chat with in the surprisingly social hallways. But at Temple Israel I recognized people from the moment I walked into an afternoon breakout session on the presidential election—friends, sources, current and former colleagues.

As the time, spent in community and talking about shared concerns, passed quickly by, I several times reflected on my experience the night before, when I celebrated Kol Nidre at IKAR.

I felt strikingly comfortable in a packed gym at the Westside JCC. It might have been a shvitz because of a broken air conditioner, but when I looked around I saw a packed, spiritually moved house of Jews, many who looked a lot like me: Chuck Taylor sneakers, thick plastic glasses, the curly hair that always has reminded me of my family’s story.

When we prayed, I told myself the room was praying to my God, that I was praying to my God. The God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. The God of the Exodus. The God of all creation.

Of course, there was no mention of Jesus, but the sermon was one I have heard in one form or another in churches all my life:

  God is good. People are not. But we can do good, we can fulfill God’s will on Earth by stepping outside ourselves, by feeding the hungry and sheltering the homeless and helping the helpless—by, in two words, tikkun olam.

Faith is not bad, Rabbi Brous said, specifically taking aim at anti-god avenger Bill Maher, whose new movie “Religulous” ridicules godly observance. Yes, man has used God for his own selfish gain, Brous said, but we can change the course.

“It’s nice to see you here,” a friend said to me as I digested Brous’ sermon. “You should come for Shabbat.”

I wondered: Could I? Could I be part of a religious Jewish community without practicing Judaism, with—and there’s no other way to put this—believing in something that was a heretical outgrowth of Judaism?

Probably not.

Maybe I could just come around on the High Holy Days. I hear people do that.

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October 20, 2008 | 5:43 pm

Anti-Muslim hate at McCain rally

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

This video, from the American News Project, shows an Islamophobe attacking Muslim supporters of John McCain:

At a John McCain rally in Woodbridge, Virginia, three people handed out “Obama for Change” bumper stickers with the Communist sickle and hammer and the Islamic crescent, saying Obama was a socialist with ties to radical Islam. Several moderate McCain supporters, Muslim and Christian alike, struck back - relentlessly bombarding the group distributing the flyers until they left the premises.

This video is certainly offensive. But it is more limited in its scope—because it’s only one hater—from the Ohio voters who called Barack Obama a terrorist and the n-word.

Steve Garfield says that after Rick Sanchez aired this video on CNN, the McCain campaign forbid staff David Zuberi from speaking with him.

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October 20, 2008 | 2:00 pm

Best presidential debate ever

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

... was, of course, the debate I moderated Thursday night at USC Chabad. On the left was political strategist Randy Steinberg and on the right Republican Jewish blogger Eric Golub. The forum—similar to one I moderated at Temple Sinai in August between the RJC’s Larry Greenfield and Barack Obama surrogate Rep. Adam Schiff (that was before the Obama campaign’s RJC ban)—in that it evaluated the candidates from a Jewish perspective. Coincidentally, my cover story for this week’s Jewish Journal, which was published the morning before the debate, focused on the same topic.

Golub, who blogged the debate here, gave the two best comments of the night.

When Steinberg took issue with Republican smear attacks against Obama, like those mentioning his scary middle name (it’s Hussein), Golub responded:

“I never mention Barack Obama’s name. People who do disgust me. It’s bigotry and it’s disgusting. I call him BHMO—Barack Hannah Montana Obama. He’s really sweet. He’s just an adorable cherub that is not up for the job.”

From adorable cherubim to small-man tyrants, Golub had this to say about the Iranian president:

“Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a terrible man. He should be taken out on site and shot on Fox News.”

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October 20, 2008 | 10:05 am

Joe the Plumber on Jesus and the Iraq war

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Joe the Plumber is, as I’m sure you know by now, not a plumber. But he is a Christian. The God-O-Meter enlightens us on how Joe’s faith relates to his perspective of, say, the war in Iraq:

“Everything that Americans take for granted, I mean these guys haven’t had it—now they’ve got it. That’s an incredible thing. I don’t know if you guys are Christians or not, but that’s like someone coming to Jesus and being saved. These guys have freedom.”

No question Iraqis have a different life now than they did before Saddam was deposed. But let’s be clear about two things: I’m not sure any Iraqis, even those who have had the chance to vote and only now feel safe being in public for the first time in five years, are enjoying “everything that Americans take for granted”; and, more to the point, even if they were enjoying every possible freedom a human begin could, Christianity teaches us that such a life still would pale in comparison to the fullness of life in Christ.

Sorry, Joe. Whether we agree or disagree about the value of fighting in Iraq—though, I think we disagree—it can’t be compared to “someone coming to Jesus and being saved.” I love America, but her values, after all, are not my god.

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October 19, 2008 | 9:04 pm

Powell: Keeping Muslims out of White House isn’t American

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Not lost in Colin Powell’s endorsement of Barack Obama were the former secretary of state’s remarks about Muslim Americans.

“I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, ‘Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.’ Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian.  He’s always been a Christian.  But the really right answer is, what if he is?  Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America.  Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president?  Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, ‘He’s a Muslim and he might be associated terrorists.’ This is not the way we should be doing it in America.”

“I feel strongly about this particular point because of a picture I saw in a magazine,” Powell continued. “It was a photo essay about troops who are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.  And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay was of a mother in Arlington Cemetery, and she had her head on the headstone of her son’s grave.  And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone.  And it gave his awards—Purple Heart, Bronze Star—showed that he died in Iraq, gave his date of birth, date of death.  He was 20 years old. And then, at the very top of the headstone, it didn’t have a Christian cross, it didn’t have the Star of David, it had crescent and a star of the Islamic faith.  And his name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan, and he was an American. He was born in New Jersey.  He was 14 years old at the time of 9/11, and he waited until he can go serve his country, and he gave his life.”

This comment, which was commended by the Muslim Public Affairs Council, left me feeling a little guilty. I worry that in the media, when we have reported that Obama is not a Muslim and have referred to the whisper campaign against him as a “smear” that we have indirectly established a new rule in American society that being Muslim is unacceptable. (Glenn Greenwald has a good piece about the creation of this slur, which has never been my intention.)

Sadly, Powell’s comment about a Muslim-American kid dreaming of being president doesn’t have much hope right now. When it comes to presidential politics, Muslims are almost as unpopular as atheists.

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October 19, 2008 | 7:18 pm

Palin and Palin cross paths on ‘SNL’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

It’s not Sarah Palin’s interview with Katie Couric, but her appearance on “Saturday Night Live” is very funny.

You’ll also notice an ad for “Religulous” after this sketch. That’s Bill Maher’s film mocking religion. I’ve written a few posts about it.

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October 19, 2008 | 4:10 pm

Colin Powell endorses Obama

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Colin Powell’s endorsement of Barack Obama had been expected. And today, on “Meet the Press,” Powell made it official:

Mr. Powell told Tom Brokaw, the host of “Meet the Press,” that he had been disturbed in recent weeks by the negative tone of Mr. McCain’s campaign, particularly its focus on Mr. Obama’s passing relationship with William Ayers, a 1960s radical and founder of the Weather Underground. The McCain campaign has sought to promote the idea that Mr. Obama is “palling around with terrorists,” in the words of Mr. McCain’s running mate, Governor Sarah Palin, because of Mr. Obama’s weak links to Mr. Ayers.

“Mr. McCain says that he’s a washed-out terrorist,” Mr. Powell said. “Well, then, why do we keep talking about him?”

After the program’s taping, Mr. Powell told reporters that the thought of attacking Mr. Obama for Mr. Ayers was “over the top.”

Mr. Powell, who was secretary of state in the first term of President Bush, also said that he was concerned about Mr. McCain’s selection of Ms. Palin as his running mate and had come to the conclusion that she was the wrong choice.

“She’s a very distinguished woman, and she’s to be admired, but at the same time, now that we have had a chance to watch her for some seven weeks, I don’t believe she’s ready to be president of the United States, which is the job of the vice president,” Mr. Powell said during the taping.

Mr. Powell offered Mr. McCain a small dose of solace by calling him a different kind of Republican and said that he believed Mr. McCain would make a good president. The problem, he said, was that the Republican Party had moved further to the right “than I would like to see it,” and that over the last several weeks the approach of the party and Mr. McCain “has become narrower and narrower.”

I can’t agree with Powell more regarding Palin. Not sure how much water his endorsement of Obama draws, or whether Obama even needs it at this point Two weeks and we’ll know ...

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October 17, 2008 | 10:38 pm

Presidential debate will proceed at Valley Cities JCC

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Barack Obama’s presidential campaign still won’t allow official advisers and surrogates to share a stage with the Republican Jewish Coalition, but, with the help of the NJDC and former Rep. Mel Levine, a Democratic replacement has been found for the debate Sunday at the Valley Cities JCC, hosted by the Council of Israeli Community in L.A. Taking Levine’s place is an adjunct professor of law at UCLA, David Kaye.

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October 16, 2008 | 9:36 pm

Shapiro: ‘The Jewish Case Against Barack Obama’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I went to undergrad with Ben Shapiro, though my only dealings with him were listening to friends complain that his observations were overblown and his conservatism too caustic for even the tolerance crowd. He was a small-scale prodigy, entering UCLA at 16 and then attending Harvard Law School, but he was also an ideologue and a bit of a demagogue—which has served him well as a young, brash conservative pundit. While a student at UCLA, Shapiro penned a book on the liberal academic establishment—a preferred whipping boy of the right—though it was riddled with factual errors.

Oh well. The facts aren’t really of much concern to conservative columnists, or their counterparts on the left. And Shapiro has done pretty well for himself. In his latest column for Creators Syndicate, Shapiro, an Orthodox Jew and product of Los Angeles’ very own YULA, offers a jeremiad about how “Barack Obama is the most dangerous candidate for the State of Israel since its creation in 1948.”

Right ...

Shapiro hammers at Obama’s weakness: a brief record of supporting Israel based more on words than deeds. But he veers into all the standard guilt-by-association maligning of Obama’s “friends”—one of the attacks that led Obama’s campaign to suspend debates with the Republican Jewish Coalition—and claims that Obama does not care about Israel.

“Any American Jew who votes for Obama ought to be ashamed of him or herself,” Shapiro writes, continuing:

Obama himself has demonstrated his ambivalence about Israel. Before the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in July 2008, he stated that he supported an undivided Jerusalem. After pressure from Palestinians, he backtracked within 24 hours. He also declares that he will meet the leaders of Iran without preconditions, despite the fact that Iran wishes to turn Israel into radioactive wasteland.

Barack Obama is no friend to American Jews. I challenge Professor Dershowitz to a debate, any time, any place, on that question. I would challenge Sarah Silverman as well, but she will undoubtedly ignore the challenge.

Most of all, I challenge American Jews to hear the true facts about Obama before voting. In Barack Obama, they find a Democrat in the mold of Jimmy Carter, not Harry Truman. Jews — and Americans more broadly — cannot afford another Jimmy Carter.

To be clear, I’ve got nothing against Shapiro and even feel a little guilty calling him “a bit of a demagogue,” but I find this type of fear mongering so insulting and, worst of all, unhealthy. Political leanings aside, this is not the nourishment of democracy but the spoiled fruit of a divided country and Jewish community, which I wrote in this week’s Jewish Journal cover.

The complete column can be read here. After the jump is Shapiro’s accompanying video for the “Jewish Case Against Barack Obama”:

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