RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/author/jeff-benson/

Dear Rabbi Myers,

Please accept my condolences on the terrible murders of your congregants and fellow Jews this past Shabbat.

I want to express my deep admiration and appreciation of your gracious welcome to President Donald Trump, his family and aides when they visited you and your Beit K’nesset this past Tuesday in Pittsburgh.

I saw your first reaction in a CNN interview on Sunday to the question of whether you would welcome a visit by the President. Without hesitation, you affirmed that you are “an American and he is my president” and therefore you would extend respect and honor to him.

I know that you were challenged by many for taking this noble stand and I was happy, grateful and proud that you stood by your first instinct and welcomed the President’s visit.

This past Shabbat, the public chanting of the Torah portion of Vayera was tragically not heard in the Tree of Life synagogue sanctuary. Vayera (“and the Lord appeared”) begins with Abraham turning his attention from God to welcoming three visiting angels – God’s messengers. This teaches us, according to the Rabbis of the Talmud, that showing respect and concern for visitors, even when you yourself are in pain, is a value more supreme than communing with the Lord.

To Abraham and Sarah, the angels Michael and Raphael brought messages of comfort and glad tidings for the future. The angel Gabriel was tasked with a mission to destroy evil.

I believe that the President and his family, in visiting you when you were (and are still) engulfed in pain and grief, brought these same messages for you and your congregation.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-paradox-of-american-anti-semitism-1541080901?cx_testId=16&cx_testVariant=cx&cx_artPos=0&cx_tag=contextual&cx_navSource=newsReel#cxrecs_s

The national outpouring of grief and horror that followed the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh last weekend points to the great contradiction of American anti-Semitism. It is at the same time feeble and deadly—a fringe phenomenon that nevertheless has the power to determine the mood and shape of Jewish life.

America’s acceptance of Jews and Judaism is profound, certainly greater than in any other country where Jews have lived in the diaspora. Last year, the Pew Research Center released a poll in which Americans were asked to rate different religious groups by the warmth of the feelings they inspired. The group that received the friendliest response—as measured by a “feelings thermometer” on a scale of 1 to 100—was Jews, who scored just above Catholics and mainline Protestants. (The lowest-ranking groups were Muslims and atheists.)

Even so, when Robert Bowers walked into the Tree of Life synagogue and murdered 11 people, shouting “all Jews must die,” the reaction among American Jews was more shock than surprise. In part, this is because massacres in what should be safe places are no longer surprising in the U.S. If angry, heavily armed men can commit mass murder in kindergartens, high schools, movie theaters and nightclubs—as well as a black church in South Carolina and a Sikh temple in Wisconsin—there is no reason to think that a synagogue would be immune.

But the Pittsburgh massacre was no random shooting, and it seemed to confirm a growing anxiety among American Jews that anti-Semitism is on the rise. According to a widely quoted statistic from the Anti-Defamation League’s annual “Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents,” the number of such acts increased by 57% from 2016 to 2017.

If you look at the ADL report in detail, however, the picture is more ambiguous. In 2017, anti-Semitic assaults actually decreased by almost half, to just 19 in the whole country. The number of threats made to Jewish institutions jumped dramatically, by more than 100% over the year before, but almost the entire increase is owed to a single individual, an Israeli teenager who phoned bomb threats to dozens of American Jewish schools and community centers. If you take him out of the statistics, there was basically the same level of anti-Semitic threats in 2017 as in 2016.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/state-department-spokeswoman-expected-to-become-u-n-ambassador-1541096354?mod=hp_lead_pos4

WASHINGTON—President Trump is expected to nominate Heather Nauert as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, a senior administration official said.

Ms. Nauert, a former Fox News correspondent, joined the Trump administration last year and is currently the chief communications official at the State Department.

She would replace Nikki Haley, who announced plans to step down from the position last month.

Mr. Trump also has considered replacing Ms. Haley with Kelly Craft, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, or with Dina Powell, a prominent former White House official.

Other potential appointees have included Kay Bailey Hutchison, the former Texas senator who now serves as U.S. ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Another Texan, Nancy Brinker, founder of the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, also was considered.

Ms. Nauert has no prior diplomatic experience. She became the State Department spokeswoman in April 2017, serving under former secretary Rex Tillerson and continued in that job after Mr. Tillerson was fired by President Trump and succeeded by Mike Pompeo.

She also served as acting undersecretary of State for public diplomacy and public affairs from March 13 to Oct. 10, 2018.

Before her arrival, Mark Toner, a career foreign service officer and former deputy State Department spokesman under the Obama administration, briefed the press in an acting capacity.

At Fox News, Ms. Nauert served as a television news anchor and most recently appeared on the program Fox & Friends. She last appeared on Fox News in February 2017.

Ms. Nauert, who didn’t respond to a request for comment, hasn’t appeared publicly at the State Department this week. In her place, Robert Palladino, a career foreign service officer who has been Ms. Nauert’s deputy since August, has briefed reporters three times this week.

Remember when Democrats promised that if you liked your plan or your doctor you could keep them? Now they’re pushing another bogus claim, accusing Republicans of wanting to take away health insurance protections for people with pre-existing conditions.
Here’s the truth: everyone — Republicans and Democrats — support protecting people with pre-existing conditions.
Way back in 2009, Republicans proposed a health care plan “to guarantee all Americans, regardless of pre-existing conditions or past illnesses, have access to affordable coverage.” A 2009 news report noted that President Obama’s plan to provide insurance coverage to Americans with pre-existing conditions would “borrow from” Senator John McCain’s 2008 platform. When Democrats presented the framework of Obamacare in September 2009, the Republican response laid out “four important areas where we can agree.” The very first one was that “All individuals should have access to coverage, regardless of pre-existing conditions.”

Republicans supported these protections then, and they continue to support them now. The reason Democrats are claiming otherwise and trying to rewrite history is simple: They’re trying to protect the status quo created by Obamacare and set the stage for a single-payer health care system. They’re using the nine pages of Obamacare that deal with pre-existing conditions to defend the entire law — all 961 pages.

That’s silly. We don’t have to protect Obamacare to protect people with pre-existing conditions. I have introduced and supported other legislation to achieve that goal. And further, many people with pre-existing conditions have been losers under Obamacare.
One Colorado woman with a pre-existing condition had been covered by a high-risk pool for years, but her insurance plan was canceled under Obamacare. “Since then, my premiums skyrocketed. In 2017, I paid $735 a month with total out-of-pocket costs of $5,500. In 2018, my premiums went up to $1,100 a month with a deductible of $6,300,” said Janet. “I have to spend $19,500 before my insurance pays anything, and it doesn’t cover all my prescription costs. My old plan was almost a third of what I have to pay now.”
After four-year-old Colette in Virginia was diagnosed with cancer, her family became entangled in a nightmare of insurance company red tape that reflects both problems with Obamacare and the risks of letting the political uncertainty around health care continue. Their only option for health insurance did not cover the only local hospital with a pediatric cancer unit. They had to consider moving to a new zip code just to get the coverage they needed.