Israel at 60
Posted 5/14/08 Two articles reflecting on this important point in Israel's history we found two articles on the subject that struck us as particularly worth reading. The first article was from the New York Time's William Kristoff, and the second was from Time Magazine's Tim McGirk.
Gilding Our Pockets By Praying to False Profits?
Posted 5/14/08 Filling my gas tank is much more painful than it used to be. With gas averaging $3.61 a gallon last week, I'm spending about $45 with each visit to the pump. Thankfully, my hybrid can drive 550 miles each tank – but that does not negate the pain of each fill up, regardless of the frequency. In a rash attempt to alleviate this discomfort, our political leaders have proposed a "gas tax holiday."
The Oft-Forgotten African Conflict: DR Congo
Posted 5/14/08 There is no question that the Jewish community has made ending the ongoing genocide in Darfur one of its most important policy priorities. Not just here at the RAC, but throughout the Jewish community, Darfur is an issue which we work on everyday constantly looking for new ways to help bring about an end to the genocide and bring peace to the entire Sudan which is stuck in what feels more and more like a perpetual conflict. However, it is dangerous to allow ourselves to become myopic in our human rights efforts -- to focus so much on the atrocity we know, that we forget to see the problems that we may simply be less familiar with. For our community, the Reform Jewish community, I firmly believe one of these conflicts that is too often forgotten is the ongoing crises in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Minority wins
Posted 5/14/08 There's a Jewish legal principle that, at least much of the time, we don't worry about something with a low likelihood of happening. In other words, if things go a certain way the majority of the time, but in a small minority of cases, things go the other way, we don't generally make law around the minority possibility. (there are, of course, exceptions, as with every law). This principle popped into my head when I read about the effort by the Missouri legislature to require proof of citizenship from all voters: The Missouri secretary of state, Robin Carnahan, a Democrat who opposes the measure, estimated that it could disenfranchise up to 240,000 registered voters who would be unable to prove their citizenship. . .
