RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/

There was once an America that built its shining cities on a hill in the name of virtue. That nation has been replaced by another nation that builds housing projects in the name of guilt. We used to elect the best men for the job, or at least we believed we did. Now we hold elections of guilt, deciding which oppressed minority has been most shamefully overlooked, before casting our vote for a more diverse and equitable society.
Our American exceptionalism now is a small thing that takes place in the shadow of guilt. It is rarely mentioned now without implicit rebuttals of that guilt. Its advocates are forever laboring to get out from under the burden of slavery, segregation and a thousand other hissing sibilant S’s that have been used to mark us as an eternally unworthy nation.

Guilt is the shadow side of virtue. A politician who speaks about the virtues of a nation panders to his audience, and leads them with a golden halter rope to follow his policies. If he says that America is a great nation because it is a nation of immigrants, or a diverse nation or a nation where men can marry each other– his audience will internalize that lesson and repeat it back. If a foreigner accuses his country of being a bad place, he will reply that this accusation is false because it is actually a great nation where diverse gay immigrants can marry each other.

People are susceptible to building identities out of the compliments that they are given. Tell a man that he is a generous host and he is more likely to invite you, or someone else, over for dinner. That is how philanthropists are made, with dinners, awards and other social rewards for giving money. That is also how philanthropic nations are made. Americans keep giving money to the world and expect that one day an international rubber chicken dinner of some sort will be held in our honor.

http://www.ciweb.org/religion-lectures-week-eight/

Ali Asani

Professor of Indo-Muslim and Islamic Religion and Cultures, Harvard University

Ali Asani is Professor of Indo-Muslim and Islamic Religion and Cultures, Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University. He came to Harvard as an undergraduate in 1973 from his native Nairobi and has been there ever since. A concentrator in comparative religion, he later pursued his doctorate work on Near Eastern languages, developing his dissertation on the ginans, the religious texts of the Ismaili branch of Islam. Capitalizing on his multilingual fluency in Urdu, Hindi, Persian, Gujarati, Sindhi, and Swahili, he began teaching at Harvard’s Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations. Today a tenured professor, his research focuses on Shia and Sufi devotional traditions of Islam, as well as popular or folk forms of Muslim devotional life.

Using art forms, such as poetry, music, and calligraphy, Ali Asani is combating ignorance about Islam and Muslim cultures. He believes that the arts help to humanize cultures, whereas political discourses based on nationalist ideologies tend to dehumanize. He sees the arts as wonderful pedagogic bridges that help to connect peoples who perceive those different from themselves as “the other.” In keeping with his mission of promoting religious literacy, Asani held workshops for educators following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, to help them better understand Islam. He also recently developed a detailed historic and cultural curriculum for the study of Muslim societies for the Islamic Studies Initiative, an international professional development program for high school teachers in Kenya, Pakistan, and Texas.

Most recently, Professor Asani, who is also associate director of Harvard’s Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program, has been working on incorporating the arts into his “Culture and Belief” course, which is offered as part of Harvard’s new Program in General Education.

Imam Rami Nashashibi

Executive Director, Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN), Chicago

Rami Nashashibi has served as the Executive Director of the Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN) in Chicago since its incorporation as a nonprofit in January 1997. Dr. Nashashibi holds a PhD in Sociology from the University of Chicago, and has been an adjunct professor at various colleges and universities across the Chicago area, where he has taught a range of Sociology, Anthropology, and other Social Science courses. He has worked with several leading scholars in the area of globalization, African American studies, and urban sociology, and has contributed chapters to edited volumes by Manning Marabel and Saskia Sassen.

Rami has lectured across the United States and Europe on a range of topics related to American Muslim identity, community activism and social justice issues, and is a recipient of several prestigious community service and organizing honors, including the Norman R. Bobins Fellowship presented at the most recent Chicago Neighborhood Development Awards. Rami and his work with IMAN have been featured in many national and international media outlets, including the BBC, PBS, and a front page story in the Chicago Tribune. In 2007 Islamica Magazine profiled Rami as being among the “10 Young Muslim Visionaries Shaping Islam in America,” and most recently Chicago Public Radio selected Rami Nashashibi as one of the city’s Top Ten Chicago Global Visionaries. Invited by the governor of Illinois to serve on the Commission for the Elimination of Poverty, Rami was named one of the “500 Most Influential Muslims in the World” by The Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Center in concert with Georgetown’s Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding.

http://www.ciweb.org/religion-lectures-week-two/ Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is the Founder of Cordoba Initiative, an independent, multi-faith, and multi-national project that works with state and non-state actors to improve Muslim-West relations. In this capacity, he provides innovative solutions to those areas where conflict between Islamic and Western communities undermines local and global security. Under […]

www.geraldahonigman.com

WILL SOMEONE PLEASE CLUE ROMNEY IN? DON’T RECYCLE LEFTOVERS FROM PRESIDENT BUSH (BOTH) LIKE RICE AND BAKER AND NORQUIST AND OTHER “PEACE PROCESSORS’….RSK
I’ve been holding off writing this piece.
I don’t want to do anything which might risk, in any way, your defeat of Farakhan’s messiah and Reverend Wright’s virtual nephew in November 2012.
Nevertheless, I have now come to believe that silence might backfire even worse–so, here it goes…
Governor Romney, there’s much about you that any truly objective person should be able to find admirable. Having said that, I am still faced with a dilemma and will adress part of it below.

I recently heard news that former Secretary of State, James Baker III, has endorsed your candidacy… http://mittromneycentral.com/tag/james-baker/#channel=f175e8226deeb08&origin=http%3A%2F%2Fmittromneycentral.com&channel_path=%2Ftag%2Fjamesbaker%2F%3Ffb_xd_fragment%23xd_sig%3Df7012649af95c%26.

As a solid Republican who has served several occupants of the White House (especially both Bush I and II), that was to be expected. Yet, even though he is an influential figure in the Republican Party with important connections and other evidently attractive pluses, there is no doubt that Baker carries some very serious baggage along with him.

Governor Romney, it’s been really tough trying to convince many of my fellow Tribal members that Thor will not strike them dead from above with his hammer if they dare to vote against Democrats. As a former Democrat (and now an Independent), I have been working at this non-stop for years now. A close relationship between you and Baker, however, will greatly complicate these efforts.

Back in 2008, and for similar reasons, Baker was cozying up to Senator McCain as well. So, let me set the stage a bit…

Rather than reinventing the wheel, please check out these excerpts from a Jason Maoz article which appeared on May 12, 2006 in JewishPress.com:

McCain told Haaretz that as president, he would “micromanage” U.S. policy toward Israel and the Palestinians and would dispatch “the smartest guy I know” to the region, presumably to jump-start a new push for a comprehensive accord.

Asked who that “smartest guy” might be, McCain responded: “Brent Scowcroft, or James Baker, though I know that you in Israel don’t like Baker.”

McCain foresaw “concessions and sacrifices by both sides” and indicated that Israel would be expected to “Defend itself and keep evacuating.” Asked whether that meant “movement toward the June 4, 1967 armistice lines, with minor modifications,” McCain, reported Haaretz, “nodded in the affirmative.”

Before dealing with that last paragraph above, there’s something else related to this that’s even more troublesome…

Imagine, for just one moment, the public response if you suggested appointing someone for a sensitive, high position or took on as a key advisor a person who openly stated, “f_ _ k the Blacks, they don’t vote for us anyway” and who referred to African American employees and colleagues as his “Black Boys.”

A nauseating and disastrous thought…not so ?

Well, Governor Romney, James Baker III has said just those very same things about Jews.

Christian convert from Islam beheaded on Egyptian national TV

http://www.examiner.com/article/egyptian-tv-airs-slow-beheading-of-tunisian-muslim-who-converted-to-christianity

As published by The Christian Post, a video was recently shown on Egyptian television reportedly depicting the literal carving-off of the head of a bound Tunisian man who had abandoned Islam and converted to Christianity.

A heavily edited version of the video (sans actual bloodshed) was also aired on Canadian TV’s political discussion program “The Arena” hosted by Michael Coren of Canada’s Sun News Network (please see video link, left).

Coren begins his segment by matter-of-factly stating:

“There is a video on the web right now showing a man having his head cut off slowly and agonizingly, essentially because he has converted to Christianity from Islam.”

While rolling the video, Coren went on to say:

“… various Islamic chants going on right now, and this goes on for some time before this poor man’s head is actually cut off.

They taunt him for the longest time, he’s completely unable to move or resist.

And finally, his head is cut off and held up for the camera.”

With Iranian Freedom Fighters, Roozbeh Farahanipour, Homayoun Mobasseri, and Nicole Kian Sadighi (Director of, and star in, “I Am Neda,”)

Part I: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ax03VW-k1CY
Part II: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6Z5eVpit0w
Part III: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dV2Yi4nH2Vk&feature=youtu.be

MY E-PAL MICHAEL ORDMAN CATALOGS THE MYRIAD ACHIEVEMENTS OF ISRAEL….THE BOYCOTT AND DIVEST GROUPIES SHOULD BE DENIED ALL THE BENEFITS OF MEDICAL ADVANCES IN ISRAEL…..RSK
www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com
Diabetes revolution in Israel. A new method for treating Diabetes is being developed by Israeli biotech Orgenesis whose Chief scientist is Dr Sarah Ferber, Director of Molecular Endocrinology at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer. The therapy is called autologous cell replacement and uses a patient’s own cells.
http://unitedwithisrael.org/new-diabetes-treatment/

Israeli-Arab star. Nazareth based Alpha Omega has won the American-Israeli Chamber of Commerce’s Eagle Star Award for its medical device to treat neurological disorders like Parkinson’s disease. The sophisticated microelectrode technology allows doctors to stimulate and record the brain’s natural electrical impulses.
http://www.globalatlanta.com/article/25649/
http://vimeo.com/44057121

Detecting problems in pregnancy. (Thanks to Israel21c) Israel’s OrSense, announced successful clinical trial results for anaemia screening and haemorrhage detection using its NBM200 device. The non-invasive blood monitor measures haemoglobin levels in pregnant women.
http://israel21c.org/news/orsense-detects-hemorrhage-anemia-during-pregnancy/

The first medical smartphone. Israel’s LifeWatch Technologies unveiled the LifeWatch V- a first of its kind medical smartphone that measures ECG, heart rate, body temperature, blood sugar levels, body fat percentages, blood oxygen saturation and an index for measuring stress. Your phone becomes “a life preserving apparatus”.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/157483
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8UGYcX1RkA&feature=player_embedded

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
Israeli scientists can control insects. (Thanks to NoCamels) A robotics professor and an aerospace engineering scientist at Israel’s Technion have decoded the movement of insects. Replaying the electronic signals makes the insects move. Known as Biomimicry, this can help produce small controlled vehicle
http://nocamels.com/2012/07/haifa-researchers-able-to-control-insects-movements/

Detecting problems in pregnancy. (Thanks to Israel21c) Israel’s OrSense, announced successful clinical trial results for anaemia screening and haemorrhage detection using its NBM200 device. The non-invasive blood monitor measures haemoglobin levels in pregnant women.
http://israel21c.org/news/orsense-detects-hemorrhage-anemia-during-pregnancy/

ISRAEL IS INCLUSIVE AND GLOBAL

150 years of the Hospital for Nazareth. Now an Israel Government Hospital, our friend and childbirth educator Wendy Blumfield sent us this write-up of the Nazareth Conference held to celebrate the 150th anniversary of its founding. The audience was Arab Moslem and Christian, Jewish secular and religious.
http://haifadiarist.blogspot.co.il/2012/06/nazareth-conference-apartheid.html

“Windows to the world” opens on the work of Herzog Hospital. A fascinating art composition by the Canadian Friends of Herzog Hospital in Jerusalem has shone light on the wonderful work by the hospital for children with respiratory diseases.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikWLcrhd4xo&feature=player_embedded
http://www.herzoghospital.ca/

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com
· An Israeli company has produced a smartphone that constantly diagnoses your health
· An Israeli has controlled a robot-like machine 2000km distant using his thoughts.
· 14 Israeli scientists helped find the illusive Higgs boson sub-atomic particle.
· Israeli companies are securing systems at The Louvre and at British Telecom.
· Entrepreneur Richard Branson is marketing Israeli home water filters in the UK.
· Guns and Roses wowed their audience at their gig in Tel Aviv.
· A mosaic of Samson was excavated in a 1600-year-old synagogue in the lower Galilee.

While the French went on to bathe the nation in blood, beheadings and a reign of terror, the same year 1789, Americans elected George Washington our first and magnificent President who had been sworn in on April 30, 1789.

It was far from real “egalite” in America as only white men of property had been allowed to vote, but it was the embryo of what became the greatest democracy in history. Vive l’Amerique!

http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/gov_romney_please_meet_gov_coolidge.html

CAL COOLIDGE IS MY FAVORITE MODERN PRESIDENT…HOWEVER, HE WAS AN “ACCIDENTAL” PRESIDENT…LIKE TRUMAN….HE WAS ACTUALLY THE 29TH VICE PRESIDENT WHO BECAME THE 30TH PRESIDENT WHEN THE PRESIDENT WARREN G. HARDING DIED IN 1923. HE WAS ELECTED IN 1924 AND SERVED AS ONE OF AMERICA’S GREAT AND SUCCESSFUL CONSERVATIVES…..RSK

The American public may be about to do something it has not done in 88 years: elect a former governor of Massachusetts as president of the United States. In anticipation of this election, we can only hope that some of Governor Romney’s advisors will introduce him to his predecessor, Governor Calvin Coolidge.

Coolidge was one of the most popular presidents in U.S. history, but historians have tended to underestimate his importance. However, with the advent of Reagan and the revival of conservatism, Coolidge’s place in history has been re-appraised. Historian Paul Johnson has called Coolidge “[t]he most internally consistent and single minded of modern American presidents.” Amity Shlaes has written recently that Coolidge believed his first obligation was “to do no harm. His no harm rule came out of strength of character. By holding back, Coolidge believed he sustained stability, so that citizens knew what to expect from their government.” Perhaps one of Coolidge’s own supporters best summarized his record: “Coolidge never wasted any time, never wasted any words, and never wasted any public money.”

Before meeting his predecessor, Romney might well consider the following Coolidge administration accomplishments:

* Top marginal income tax rates were lowered from 73% to 24%.
* By the end of his term, 98% of the population paid no income tax at all.
* The federal budget was reduced by 35%.
* Per capita income increased over 30%.
* Unemployment averaged 3.3%.
* GNP grew at the fastest compound rate of any eight-year period in U.S. history.

There are some very important lessons that Mitt could learn from Silent Cal. First and foremost, Coolidge was a man of character who embodied the classic New England virtues upon which the Republic was founded: hard work, independent thinking (“common sense” as he called it), lack of pretense, sense of duty, perseverance, scrupulous honesty — in other words, the bedrock on which Coolidge had been raised in rural Vermont and on which he built his political career. The 1920s made for a decade of rapid social change, but Coolidge’s somewhat old-fashioned virtues resonated with the American public.