I stopped being a regular reader of the New York Times several years ago. Their slanted coverage on the Israeli/Palestinian situation led me to doubt the veracity of their reporting on subject areas I did not follow closely. I found myself reading the NYT cover to cover today when it was shoved under my door at the posh Pennisula Hotel in downtown Chicago. Needless to say not a whole lot has changed.

Their perennial full page article about Israel tells us that "Palestinians Worry About the Cost of Peace". The article proceeds to lay out the story of a family in the Palestinian village of Jayyous and the hardships they face as a result of the wall/security barrier that separates them from their land. Paragraph five of the article tells us about this hardship

"A relative of the mayor, Tawfiq Salim, 57, owns prime land with his brother, Jamil, that is the center of a dispute roiling the village and beyond. On Dec. 10, bulldozers acting for an Israeli company uprooted nearly 650 of their olive trees, some of them 600 years old, he said. The men at the controls said the land, which lies on the Israeli side of the barrier, belonged to the company."

"I depended on my olives for everything," Mr. Salim said. "I have not one inch of land inside the village." He has five sons and two daughters. "How can my sons think of peace when they've paid such a heavy price?"

Then in Paragraph 12 we learn

The head of civil administration talked to both sides and found that a Jayyous resident sold the land to the Israeli company in a deal approved in June 2003. The company had a permit to uproot the trees.

You would think that this article could be entitled "Swindling Liar Wastes Reporter's Time". Maybe tomorrow. In fairness there is this

The Salims, who dispute the accuracy of the Israeli maps, are examining legal options, including a lawsuit. Israeli, Palestinian and foreign peace advocates are planning demonstrations, including a replanting of olive trees on the disputed land.

Where would the world be without foreign 'advocates' trespassing on 'disputed' lands and planting olive trees?

Finally we learn that

Perhaps more important, he says, because of the permit system and the timing of the fence openings, he cannot hire enough regular workers to help him tend his land or bring in any water trucks, because they take longer than an hour to fill.

His son, Muhammad, 25, was arrested and spent 10 months in prison, Mr. Omar said, and so cannot get a permit to cross the barrier from Jayyous to the family's farmland. He has two other sons and four daughters, but he says they cannot get permits either, because "they are the brothers of Muhammad."

No mention why Muhammed was arrested and spent 10 months in prison. He just was arrested. Perhaps jaywalking, tax evasion or aiding a suicide bomber. We will never know. My guess is that it wasn't shoplifting or our fearless reporter would have mentioned it.

How any of this is related to "Palestinians fearing the cost of peace" is beyond me.

The next article that caught my eye was a headline which in the print version had the title "Ohio Recount gives Bush Smaller Margin" (Note: Quoting from memory) but on the NYT website is "Ohio Recount Ends, Shows Vote Closer". The article proceeds to tell us that 8 weeks and 1.5 million dollars later it turns out that Bush was credited with 300 more votes that he deserved. In the end Bush garnered 118,457 votes more than Kerry. The difference between the original number of votes Bush defeated Kerry by and the new number amounts to just two tenths of one percent (0.2%).

Although it is true that the recount did show Bush had a smaller margin it would seem to me that the fairer and more accurate headline would be "County wastes 1.5 million dollars to find out what they already knew" or perhaps the less stinging "Ohio recount confirms Bush Election".

The day was not a complete waste. This moving article is well worth a read and tells you what a paper is capable of when they report the news rather try to invent it.

On a lighter note Martin Gilbert makes the case for Bush and Blair as unappreciated heroes. Nothing short of the journalistic equivalent of Megan's Law could have made The Guardian publish this editorial.

Haaretz reports that residents of Gaza have decided to "...end orange Star of David protest against pullout". They "apologized to Holocaust survivors who were offended by the campaign" but "stopped short of calling on the public to stop wearing the symbol". The actions of those behind this campaign are so repulsive it defies words.

Over the past few years I have noticed a distillation of the Holocaust narrative into bite-size iconography. These single serving chunks of horror have then been further abstracted to the point where the crux of the event, the willful genocidal murder of over 10 million innocent non-combatant citizens, has been made irrelevant. Thus the animal right fundamentalists over at PETA run an ad campaign drawing the world's attention to the rather obvious similarities between animal slaughterhouses and Auschwitz. Left wing Democrats amass this incredible compilation of Bush = Hitler references. The very word 'Nazi', once a synonym for abject evil, has been relegated to the role of adjective defined as 'mean' such as the case of the now famous Soup Nazi.

With the exception of Noam Chomsky, who makes the rather incredible claim that the United States is in fact Nazi Germany, I can't imagine that anyone really believes that Bush is Hitler or that someone with rigid rules of soup distribution is in fact a Nazi. This hyperbole, however insensitive to the suffering of an entire nation, is to be expected from people who were not a direct party to it. For the Israeli citizens of Gaza it is inexcusable.

Last Chanukah I received the curious gift of a first printing of Martin Gilbert's historical work "Holocaust". This book, written more in the format of an shopping list than a narrative, dispassionately recounts what really happens when six million Jews are killed over the course of a few years. It is nothing like not getting soup because you did not have exact change and it is most certainly nothing like being offered full recompense for withdrawing from territory based on a democratic process. I strongly suggest that the Yesha representatives give this book a good read the next time they feel like willingly debasing our nations suffering to score a cheap political point.

Very little can surprise me from a country where even the unemployed threaten to go on strike to get a Christmas bonus (the so-called 13th month). The sense of entitlement evident in this altercation certainly leaves one wondering what other wonders the socialist miracle we call France has in store for us.

Pauvre Santa!

Update: On a more serious note run this Liste des actes antisémites recensés en France depuis janvier 2004 (List of recent Anti-Semitic acts since January of 2004) through your favorite translator (Google has a good one). It is not encouraging.

An article in today's Personal Journal section of the WSJ (subscription required) seriously upset me. It seems that

"Carnival Corp.'s Holland America Line, which had a longstanding "tipping not required" policy, this spring shifted to an automatic gratuity program that charges guests $10 per day, per person, to cover gratuities. Holland's previous policy made it more like luxury cruise lines, which have either kept tipping optional for passengers or included gratuities in the fare. The new Holland America policy means a couple on a 10-day cruise could see a charge of $200 for gratuities on their cruise bill, though they can request to adjust the amount afterward."

I find this policy completely unacceptable. Tipping is the means by which a customer rewards a service industry employee for exceptional service. In fact 'tips' is an acronym for "To Insure Prompt Service." A mandatory tip is no more than just a price increase. Customers wanting preferential service will continue to tip cruise line employees while customers who decide not to tip will inevitably be overlooked.

I was having lunch today with a friend who told me that he has eight doormen who are expecting Christmas gratuities. This got me to thinking about the pervasiveness of tipping in US society and how completely out of control it has all become.

When I go to a restaurant I am expected to tip my waiter between fifteen and twenty percent of the total bill. Good manners requires this level of gratuity since if I don't tip them then they make next to nothing. Restaurant owners are actually exempt from minimum wage laws for waiters. How did it come to pass that a businessman sells me their wares at a massive markup and I need to pay the order taker? Why is the gratuity a percentage of the bill? Does a waitress at a diner work less to write down the words "Hamburger with fries" as a waitress at a steakhouse? I actually had a sushi delivery guy complain to me that I only tipped him three dollars when the bill was sixty. He actually expected a percentage of the bill.

Recently I stayed at a ski resort in Utah. When my friend and I were packed and ready to go I considered the tradition of leaving a tip for housekeeping. I decided against. It seemed like insanity to me.

I can't seem to wean myself from tipping taxi drivers even though it is the perfect example of senseless tipping. If the driver was particularly courteous, helped with a large package or was delayed unfairly because of a slow passenger I can understand augmenting the cost of the fare. For taking me from point A to point B while chatting on a cell phone I can't see why I should pay anything more than the indicated fare. Do I reasonably expect to have this particular driver again and do I hope by tipping him well that he will be courteous to me during that upcoming journey.

There are countless examples of tip creep. Tip jars at coffee places. My mail carrier. I recently found out that the person who cuts my hair does not share my tip with the person who washes my hair. It turns out to be a separate line item!

It all comes down to a few basic rules.

• I will actively tip people who have provided exceptional service where merely adequate service is all I could have reasonably expected.
• I will acquiesce to tip in cases where the policy to do so has been socially implemented and I plan on returning to that situation in the future.
• I will agree to have a tip extorted from me in cases where I reasonably fear that by not tipping my future will be adversely affected. I don't mean in the kharmic sense. I mean intentionally lost mail, misplaced packages, or no heat in the middle of the Winter.

None of these rules apply to the case of the cruise and as such I would not pay the extra charge.

Update: Dash Riprock points out the acronym 'tips' actually spells out to 'To Insure Performance'. I did a bit of research and the general consensus is we are both wrong. I will posit that with the staggering number of pages available to debunk this misnomer if 'tips' was not originally shorthand for 'To Insure Prompt Service' it is now by virture of popular use.

To many people The Gift of the Magi is one of the most romantic stories ever told. To me the story is a sad tale of a dysfunctional couple too proud to communicate their financial difficulties. Odds are strong they will never make it.

This rather incredible story convinces me that there are people in this world who have been sold down the river by such romantic fables.

This from the Washington Post article, "Arabs Reject U.S. Push for Reform "

Gheit, the Egyptian foreign minister, said in an interview that he resisted
the notion that "reform" was necessary in the Arab world. "I prefer the word
'modernity,' " he said, on grounds that reform means something is wrong and need
to be fixed.

I can't think of anything wrong in the Arab World. Can you?

I am reading a fascinating book called, "The Incredible Bread Machine." Published in 1974 by six young fiscal libertarians the book outlines the case for free markets and shows the catastrophic effects of government economic intervention. A bit Ayn Randian in flavor it makes for great reading even if you don't know much about the field of Economics.

One paragraph in the book really resonated with me. In discussing the nature of inflation the author states,

"... during a period of inflation, wages usually rise to meet the higher
cost of living. A salary raise does not mean that you are making more
money, because you are forced to spend more as well. In essence you are
exactly where you were before the raise, except in one important area: you are now in a higher income tax bracket. In other words, the only beneficiary of your increased salary is the government -- they are receiving more taxes from you."

This analysis of one major side effect of inflation could not have been more prescient. There are many Americans who have suddenly fallen prey to the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) but are not expecting Robin Leach knocking at their door anytime soon. By virtue of the AMT not being indexed to inflation it is estimated that one third of US households will now be paying a tax that was intended by its 1971 framers to be targeted at the top 100 taxpayers.

I am not suggesting that we move away from policies of inflation. Anyone watching the havoc that deflation is having on the Japanese economy can tell you that inflation when used correctly is a great economic tool. But with "All boats lifting in rising tides" I fear a trap is set for us as we ascend to the heavens.

With the last day of Chanukah upon us I would like to spend a few paragraphs writing about the special prayer of Al Hanisim that Jews recite repeatedly over the course of the holiday.

The section that I am most interested in is the description of the miracle that occurred

"in your abundant mercy rose up for them in the time of their trouble ... delivered the strong into the hands of the weak, the many into the hands of few, the impure into the hands of the pure, the wicked into the hands of the righteous..."

I can easily ascertain the miracle in the weak overpowering the strong or the few defeating the many. The problem I have is the miracle of the pure defeating the impure or the righteous experiencing victory over the wicked. It would seem rather cynical to exclaim as a miracle that the righteous beat out the wicked, the pure beat the impure.

To this seeming paradox I bring the context of the world that I currently live in. In the current existential struggle that Israel finds itself in the 'mediators' of a just solution are called The Quartet. It is called the Quartet because of the four parties, the United Nations (UN), the European Union (EU), the Russians, and the United States (US), that it is comprised of.

• The EU has a scandalous record of moral perversion. This BBC article discussing Babies found in Iraqi mass grave has the incredible revelation "... that work to uncover graves around Iraq, where about 300,000 people are thought to have been killed during Saddam Hussein's regime, was slow as experienced European investigators were not taking part.
  The Europeans, he said, were staying away as the evidence might be used eventually to put Saddam Hussein to death. "
• Where do I start with the UN. Perhaps their stellar performance in the Congo, Bosnia, or Rwanda. I of course would want to withhold any judgment on their performance in Iraq until the results of the numerous fraud investigations have a chance to emerge.
• Russia. When they are not busy bungling attempts to fix elections, poisoning the opposition, or murdering their own Muslims by the tens of thousands they manage to find the time to offer Israel advice.

With these people as friends who needs enemies.

It is in light of this reality that I feel the Al Hanisim is not commemorating the miracle of Chanukah as the miracle of the pure vanquishing the impure. Rather, we rejoice in the miracle that for one brief moment in Jewish history there existed the moral clarity to actually tell the difference between the two.

Update: Apropo to lists relating weaklings to bullies this great list comes from the Wall Street Journal's opinion page article, "The Real (French) Thing" (Subscription Required). This quote describes the reason that France's Pompidou center should have exclusive rights to build a modern art museum in Hong Kong and not be forced to be a party to joint venture with the US based Guggenheim:

But [French] Curator Alain Sayag offered an explanation of sorts when he said, "The
Pompidou and Guggenheim are on different levels. We're world class, they're
second class. We're national, they're small and private. We're Europe, they're
U.S."

Hah!

Update: This hilarious coincidence is on a site called of all things http://answering-islam.org.uk

Many years ago I dated a woman who, at the time, was completing her dissertation for a PhD in Psychology. Among the positive benefits of that relationship is my current familiarity with quite a bit of the psycho-babble that I assume comprises my ex-girlfriend's day-to-day life.

A great example is the concept of Projection. This notion is one of the most powerful in the psychologist's toolkit. The Jewish equivalent of calling anyone who is critical of you an anti-Semite, projection allows a psychologist to infer that any accusation you make is really a base unfulfilled desire of your own. "I'm rubber your glue" in layspeak.

In spite of my personal bitterness on the this topic projection is a valid principle. A great example of this behavior can be seen in this laughable expose by CBS News on the topic of bloggers. CBS reveals its own basest fears and desires in the form of an attack on the group they fear most. If one considers Dan Rather's Memogate report on Bush's army service was predicated on patently fabricated documents it is not hard to guess what motivates CBS in issuing this piece. Some money quotes:

"Hypothetically, if The Washington Post discovered that The New York Times had a reporter being paid by the Bush campaign it would report it. If proven, the suspect reporter would be fired and likely never work in mainstream journalism again. Hence, the courts have been satisfied with the industry’s ability to regulate itself. "

"People are pretty smart in assuming that if a blog is making a case on one side that it’s partisan. The problem is when a blog pretends to hold neutrality but is actually partisan."

It is the cry of the tell tale heart and CBS can't stop hearing the screams...

I believe that Economics can explain anything. I believe that these Economists can explain anything to me. I loved this one about a minor passion of mine -- Rock, Paper, Scissors.

Last night at the Yeshiva University Chanukah Dinner my brother-in-law directed me to this eye-opening article in the New England Journal of Medicine. I think the article speaks volumes about the value the United States Armed Forces places on each and every life of their service people. It is extraordinary that any society will go to such logistical lengths to save the lives of their combat wounded soldiers.

A few years ago my wife and I spent a portion of our honeymoon in Vietnam. During that trip we spent three days on Cat Ba Island. After a day on the beach we decided to take a tour of a hospital used during their American War (US readers may be more familiar with this conflict as the Vietnam War). Accesible by a secret entrance and completely inside a small mountain the hospital was hidden from the outside world. No amount of air reconnaisance could have uncovered this hospital. Inside were 20-30 small rooms as well as 2-3 operating theatres. Although there was no direct sunlight a generator provided electric light. A series of vents and fans provided fresh air. After exiting the hospital my first remards were, "Wow! no wonder we lost this war." It struck me that a society that could create such immense infrastructure was ready to win the fight they were engaged in.

When I compare the attitudes of societies that value the lives of their combat troops with the dead-ender societies that preach combat through suicide attacks I can't help but feel that the former have moral superiority. During the cold-war the US and the Soviet Union were bitter rivals. Even within the rancour there was always the underlying trust in the rational pursuit of self-preservation. Each strategic move was predicated on the belief that neither side desired to be obliterated and as a result neither side initiated obliteration. I fear that we do not have the same sort of rational players as adversaries in the current war on terror.

Roughly six years ago I went to India to help my friends U and L adopt a baby girl. After the adoption was complete the three of us, now four, parted ways. U, L, and M headed to Vijaiwada in Andhra Pradesh to meet up with U's long lost family on a rural farm. I headed to Kovalam Beach in Kerala to relax and take a course in Aryuvedic massage.

It was on this beach that I met Steve and Sandy. Steve is from New Zealand and Sandy is Dutch. We became instant friends with me using Steve as my massage lesson victim and Steve vainly attempting to teach me how to surf. The three of us continued our travels together heading north though Kerala as far as Cochi.

A few months later Steve and Sandy made their way through New York and I hosted them at my home for a week or so. Steve's sister Jane lives with her husband Jack in a great ski house in Killington Vermont. I went with Steve and Sandy to Vermont and was once again the gracious recipient of Steve's lessons. After a week or so I was a reasonable skier.

Jack has the rather interesting profession of building ski lifts. This job takes him all over the country and the world leaving Jane to fend for herself alone with her two kids. To ease the burden each year Jane invites someone from New Zealand to visit her for three months. In return for some babysitting and general help the guest gets to hang out in the United States for a while.

It is this arrangements that has created my New Zealander of the year club. No self respecting Kiwi would fly half way around the globe to Killington without being at least slightly curious about New York City. At some point during the three months Jane will call me and see if I can host her nanny/helper.

And so it goes that our Kiwi of the year arrived this past Tuesday in time for us to light the Chanukah candles. She asked what it was all about and we explained about the Jews beating up on the Greeks a zillion years ago and the miraculous oil. Of the entire story she seemed most impressed by the Jewish attention span. It was in this context that I started to think about the Jewish obsession with history. To put it in the words of my Italian friend Marco after I explained to him why I was fasting on Tisha B'av, "Man, you guys really know how to hold a grudge."

But then I read an article about this recent poll of Germans. It would seem that 51% of them think that there is no difference between what the Nazis did to Jews and other minority groups and the situation between the Israeli Defence Forces and the Palestinian people. I have to believe that these people are truly ignorant of their own history to make this comparison. I will no go into details but I think it is safe to say that there is a wide gap between the actions of two peoples fighting for ownership of the same small tuft of land and the workings of a nationalist party convinced that they are a super race killing entire populations in an organized fashion based upon racial differences.

I was more shocked when I read about the complete lack of knowledge exhibited by the English. Here are people that are simply unschooled in one of the seminal talking points of the twentienth century. It is truly hard to understand.

Against this backdrop of historical malaise and malicous revisionism I am thankful that the Jewish people place so much importance in studying and remembering our own history. Without this diligence we would most certainly be in far more trouble than we ordinarily are.

Update: Conservative journalist and blogger Melanie Phillips has something to say on this topic.

A few years ago I had the incredible idea that I would create a cellphone breathalizer. This handy widget would attach to your cell phone and automagically remove key names from your cellphone's phonebook based upon your degree of inebriation. I originally envisioned three levels.

1. Lightly drunk -- Cuts you off from phoning family members
2. Moderately Drunk -- Cuts you off from all long distance service. This stops you from realizing at 2AM that it has been years since you last spoke to your college roommate and feeling the urge to correct that injustice.
3. Heavily Drunk -- Cuts you off from ex-girlfriends. If you need to ask why you have never truly been heavily drunk.
   

Of course I never really expected this idea to come to fruition but it made for great conversation and in a pinch it was great intro verbiage to a post drunken phonecall apology.

It would seem that those clever Australians have stolen my idea . It is pragmatic stuff like this that makes me really love the Australians. This is the same nation that woke up to the reality that nearly all of their citizens spend most of their day in water and as a result came up with plastic currency. All this and an overwhelming voter turnout for John Howard. Vivre le Australian!!

I have always contended that the defining difference between man and beast is the skill of denial. There are no lions skipping across the planes of the Serengeti thinking to themselves "I'm not fat I'm just big boned". Human beings are uniquely qualified at drinking their own Kool-Aid and it would seem that I am no different in this respect.

For years I told myself and anyone else who would pay attention to me that I loved being a middle of the road skier. I was a blue trail man through and through. My shpiel included how I loved the Zen of sliding down a mountain with dextrous calm. Ski fast? Break that amazing sense of oneness with the mountain that can only be achieved with the perfect slalom across fresh snow? I don't think so!

This past weekend I discovered just how full of crap I have been all along. The ski areas out west can really change your perspective on the sport. At 11,000 feet, up to my knees in fresh powder and surrounded by hard-core skiers and riders (snowboarders) I suddenly found myself craving the steepest, fastest, most dangerous path to the bottom. It turns out however that my Zen relationship with the snow was just a cover-up for being a piss-poor skier. Try as I did I could not manage to fly down the ungroomed trails in the effortless manner of my peers on the gondola.

My friend and I decided to take a lesson from the sassy Georgia Dumais. Georgia is Snowbird's star instructor and we quickly learned the power of great technique. She managed to mock us into submission with such a genuine love for the subject matter that we were taking on steeper and steeper patches without noticing. After a fall that was so pathetic that my skis flew up in mid-air and landed many feet away Georgia taught me the word 'eggbeater' to describe my performance.

Sunday was our last day out and we both showed remarkable improvement. I hope to post a few pictures when I have the chance. I look forward to trying out my new skills back home but fear that I have been spoiled by the Champagne Powder of the west.

One last anecdote: While dining one evening I mentioned to my friend how surprised I was by the absolute lack of diversity at Snowbird. And by lack of diversity I meant the complete absence of African-Americans. We spent 10 minutes trying to remember any African-Americans we had seen in the past three days and could only come up with three, one of which was the restaurant's host.

The next morning,while we were having breakfast, the National Brotherhood of Skiers checked into the hotel. At this point hundreds of African-American skiers were on the slopes and we were just amazed that there was a National Brotherhood of Skiers. We met a guy named Albert who was 61 and an avid competitive speed skier. The kicker was that he started skiing at 52 because of his grandkids. Just amazing.

Update: Here are some photos

Special thanks to Dash Riprock for his sage advice on the emotional cycles of the unexamined blog. Frankly I skipped right past Exuberance without even realizing it and I am now deeply enmeshed in Trepidation.

I am off to Snowbird for some well deserved R&R

The West is the best!
-Jim Morrison (The Doors)

Someone needs to take responsibility for this mess...

Last night while packing for my trip to Snowbird I heard a panicked call for help from the fourth bedroom. "My computer is frozen! I didn't do anything and it is just hanging." When I arrived I knew immediately that her computer had been hijacked.

If you are not familiar with this term then you are probably one of the three people on this planet that has escaped the reach of the helpful people at BuddyBar or one of their many competitors. The upstanding citizens at these companies just can't seem to rest until every PC user has a screen filled with context sensitive pop-up ads. Search Google for postage stamps and the Artificial Intelligence Engine(tm) provided to you at no cost will let you know that you can see lesbian kittens fornicate. Looking for the latest book on yoga at Amazon and as if reading your mind 10 to 12 pop-up ads appear on your screen reminding you that amateur pornography is only a click away. Your computer has been rendered useless.

It scares me to think that I share a planet with citizens who engage in this form of commercial activity. It scares the hell out of me that they are successful. There are consumers on this planet that are so easily distractable that they can have their computer hijacked, rendered useless, and will then actually buy pornography.

Leaving all that aside I am looking for a responsible party to pin this on. Three wasted hours of my life spent ridding a machine of malware seems to deserve a little research into the culpable party.

The most obvious party to hate would be the perpetrators of these attacks. The people who write these programs, distribute them through websites, and collect the cash for click-thrus. These people have broken into my home and stolen from me. They should be tried as criminals and fried.

To stop there would be to overlook the real root cause of this problem. As this USA Today article point out a PC with Microsoft Windows XP installed that is simply connected to the Internet can expect to be attacked 341 times per hour. The computer in this article was compromised just four minutes after being attached to the network. Four minutes!

To distribute an operating system this vulnerable is criminal negligence on the part of Microsoft. The security issues that gave rise to this incredible phenomenon have been known since at least Windows 2000 (released in the year 2000) if not earlier. Microsoft has made no credible effort to stop these attacks rather they leave their consumers to download or buy a confusing array of firewalls, virus protectors and spyware eliminators.

I think it is time for a class-action suit comprised of consumers fallen prey to these evil applications to stand up to the folks at Redmond. Your product is dangerous and you need to be held accountable.

Update: It would seem that there is no honor among thieves. Also a quick write-up on the actual malware that hit our computer.

Update: It would seem that Walter Mosberg, the Wall Street Journal's longtime technical columist, agrees with me. (Subscription Required)