We got the New Look here at RadioJew's Revenge on Erev Shabbos B'Har-B'Chukosai, the same day the first video went up. It was a cheery Shabbos. The next four or five in the series are in pre-production and, resources permitting, will be up and out shortly.

* * * * *

So we now know that, as in all other things, the best comedian in our new admin in D.C. is Baruch Obama Himself. I've not seen the complete transcript of his recent gig at the Washington Press Club, but the sound bites I've heard show that, after two successful terms in office, during which he'll save the country, enlighten the world, and keep a constant flow of fairy dust sparkling over a freshly-scrubbed planet, he could make a second career in comedy.

Of course, the thing he's trying to do at this moment is to persuade Mr PM Netanyahu to join his predecessors in office by signing off on land giveaways, one of the few places where I part company with the Obama administration. Thank G-d, Mr PM Netanyahu has Mr Lieberman close by to remind him why he's back in office.

I would hope that Mr PM Netanyahu is coming with his own agenda, one item of which pertains to, at long last, making a proper claim on Temple Mount. The IDF liberated Temple Mount in 1967 and then, for unknown reasons, gave it back to the Arabs. This is Jewish land in the undivided capital of the Jewish nation, and it's well past time the Arab squatters clear off their shacks, lean-to's and souvenir stands from our real estate. We're forty years behind schedule building the Third Temple already.

Somehow, I find that scenario unlikely.

There's a load of protesters in D.C. for the occasion, including a big contingent from Hadar HaTorah. Sorry. They'll be out of earshot and visual range of the guys making the decisions. They'll get a few seconds' coverage on the Evening News, but I doubt it will have much impact.

* * * * *

On the local news front (yes, we do a little), we're having our occasional elections for Community Council. As in the Radio Daze, I'm not making an endorsement (also known as Bestowing The Kiss of Death), as I see no reason to jinx the candidacy of anyone I like.

Like any local election, there have been the obligatory town hall meetings and campaign posters. My favorite poster placement has a Yossel Mochkin poster right in front of Kingston Pizza. Certainly a random-chance accident, but one I find amusing.

* * * * *

Speaking of long-term concerns, I'm posting an e-mail I got last week, complete with a link I highly recommend. The issue of demographics came up frequently during the Radio Daze, and I wish I'd had this link to point to then, even though it would have taken an entire segment to give over the URL.

Dear Friends,

I know I've sent out many emails on various muslim
topics, but someone just sent me this link. If the information in this video is
correct, this is probably the most unique and most serious email you have ever
seen on this topic.

It is not violent or gory; it is not "bashing" Islam
in any way; it has nothing to do with Israel; yet it is one of the scariest
things I have ever seen. (which is why i'm taking the time to write this silly
letter...)

You must see this, and please forward it to every non-muslim
you know.

Yaakov (Jonathan)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-3X5hIFXYU

* * * * *
The good news is, there's a solution to the above problem: Jews, find another Jew, fall in love, stomp the glass, and Breed Like Mad! You'll like it, trust me.

Keep watchin' for new stuff, and thanx, UTube, for the stars.

Golus, however, still sucks.

Moshiach Now!

Free Manny!

Say It Ain't So, Manny!

I certainly hope he's appealing. The Dodgers (21-9 today) are behind him, and they should be; he was 15-1 on his drug tests before he got injured. I've been proud of my lifelong home team for having managed to stay off the Mitchell report - especially in a town harboring some of the most notorious juicers in the game.

As facts begin to emerge, it seems that he got the anabolics from a doctor not on the team's list of approved MDs. Jocks are not known for their high intellect and good sense and, while Sr Ramirez gets high marks for performance, teamwork, and being generally one of everyone's favorite guys on the team, he's generally acknowledged as no genius. That part of his reputation gets a big verification with this move.

I'm hoping it doesn't wreck his career, and that the worst that happens is he'll have a bit of time off to get healthy, and be ready for after the All-Star break, when the numbers start getting really meaningful.

* * * * *

A recent attempt by our seriocomic relief team, the Somali Pirates, to set up a base in Yemen (currently having its own civic and economic issues) seems to have backfired. As messed up and chaotic as Yemen might be, they apparently still have a functioning Coast Guard who scooped 'em up and shut 'em down - for now.

Of course, the whole situation gets a lot less funny when these guys explain why they're up to this. Not only is their country in the bag, but major commercial trawlers are fishing their local waters empty and dumping the wastes on Somalia's beaches because Somalia does not currently seem to have a functioning Coast Guard.

These are little guys in a tough situation, making a pretty desperate move. Hillary Clinton's perfectly appropriate assessment notwithstanding, it's hard to not see a little Robin Hood in 'em. After all, they did bring home an estimated $40 million last year.

Yo Ho Ho.

* * * * *

A rather overdue word on some long-time friends, the first to sign up as one of this blog's Rockin' MoshiachHeads, the excellent Kosher Rock Band, Merkava. Since their first CD, When Will The Master Come, they've been growing, changing, and moving in some new directions (still Kosher, of course), having recently added the talents of Ephraim Schwab, remembered, one would hope, from his work with Moshe Antelis and Teva. Epraim's been writing some arrangements for Merkava, and picking up right where he left off. He's writing some very advanced, complex instrumental and vocal arrangements for his new band which promise to take Merkava's next CD to some musical places well worth visiting.

Take a moment to follow their links. You'll be glad you did.

* * * * *

Today is, of course, Pesach Sheini, the Second Passover, and, R' Wircberg last night brought a bit of commentary on the reason for the observance. Of course, it says in the Torah that some of Bnei Yisrael had become ritually impure through contact with the dead and were unable to be part of Passover the one time it was fully observed in the Desert. What the commentaries tell us is that they were, in fact, those who carried Joseph's coffin, taking him - by his request - to his homeland for final burial. They were looking after the needs of their people, and G-d gave them a bit of space and a chance finish what they were unable to do on the theory that "it's never too late."

* * * * *

One more R' Wircberg story from last night: One time there was a guest teacher at Hadar HaTorah who was, by his account, a MoshiachHead like I've never seen. Everything by him was Moshiach and, at a Farbrengen, he offered the challenge to each guy in the room to name a Jewish song and he would find the Moshiach connection. Finally, one of the guys (who was dealing with some other issues and not in a very good mood anyway) threw the challenge back, sending our hero to find the Moshiach connection in, of all songs, "The Dredel Song."

Without missing a beat, our guy says the four words abbreviated on the dredel, nes gadol haya sham, "A Great Miracle Happened There," the numerical equivalent of the four letters (do a search for gematria) being 348. Gematria of "Moshiach?" 348.

Proving, of course, that Moshiach is everywhere, except actively among us.

Golus Sucks! Moshiach Now!

and Never Too Fast!

Yes! That Was me on The Takeaway this morning saying the story on my dad's wisdom. Many thanks to the great Mr John Hockenberry and his staff for running it.

Wow! Mexicans are becoming as unpopular worldwide as they are in California!

* * * * *

Real comedy writers have been counting on our distingushed Vice President, Mr Joseph Biden, to provide some comic relief for this new administration, which is so far proving too competent to be very funny. More on them later.

Meanwhile, Mr Biden (who, by the way, I like and admire and always have) has finally stepped out and, while his first foray into comedy may have only produced a few uneasy chuckles, check out the following little Blast From The Past in defense of our new VP:

In the going-on three years I did Jewish radio here in N'Yawk, I'm proud to say I only missed three shows. Two of those absences (the two Saturdays before the Yidstock shows) were scheduled; one was not. I never really expected anyone to buy my alien-abduction story, nor the one involving kidnap for an ever-decreasing ransom (insert scream here), but what really happened may match those for pure, real-world absurdity.

The head cold I had picked up during a cold and rainy Succos had settled so successfully in my lungs that nothing OTC would dislodge it, so I grabbed up my inusrance card and marched off to the nearest ER. I'd been through this before, and knew simple, basic pneumonia when I had it and what to do about it: five to seven days on antibiotics, a bit of bed rest - presto! Good as new.

But the lovely folks at the ER did not know me as well as did my erstwhile (now retired) Family Doctor, and subjected me to a dozen or so tests (these were the Space Alens who did the experiment on me involving the little, teeny-tiny artery in the wrist which hurts like &^*%* for them to get to!), one of which produced a result that looked suspiciously like TB.

Inside a sealed, isolated room, I was asked by a doctor, from behind his mask, if I'd been out of the country recently.

"On my budget?"

"OK," doc went on, "have you been any place where you might possibly have been exposed to something exotic?"

"I ride the N'Yawk Subway," I offered.

That crack landed me in Quarantine for five days, surrounded by creatures who resembled Donald Duck's nephews (in the dead of winter; the masks were blue), only taller and uglier.

So don't feel bad, Mr Vice President (see, I told ya I like him and always have); in the Real World of Real Medical Practice, public transit - especially here - is considered a rolling Petrie Dish in the best of times.

* * * * *

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away there was a second pro football league, and in that second pro football league was mighty and majestic team called the Oakland Raiders, coached by an imbued mad genius named John Madden (they did ok when Al Davis Himself was on the sidelines, but their glory days were under Madden), a kinetic presence with a gift for strategy and a way to coax miraculous performance from an array of unlikelies ranging from has-beens to the deranged.

And the Raiders rocked the AFL.

Then the Raiders rocked the NFL.

Then Madden's doctor called him a "time bomb," and told him to get off the sidelines immediately if he valued his life. Thank G-d he did.

The Raiders haven't been great since, but Madden spent the subsequent thirty years raising the bar for color commentators, thereby mastering two worlds.

Now he's packin' in a distinguished broadcasting career, and we wish him the best. Let's hope we've not heard the last of him.

* * * * *

Meanwhile, it's baseball season, and my beloved L.A. Dodgers are sitting, at 14-8 as of this writing, at the top of their division, while the N'Yawk teams stink up their new stadia like they closed out their old ones. I had harbored the fantasy that Joe Torre, now managing the Dodgers, would return to The House That Ruth Built, sweep the 2K7 Series in 4, and send Yankees fans out of their old home in tears. Unfortunately, the Yankees so sucked last year they barely managed to maintain their professional credentials, tossing yet another of my life's dreams and ambitions into the dumper, and sending Yankees fans out of their old home in tears.

And the Mets, at the bottom of their division, look as big a disaster as the corporation whose statium bears its name.

This week the Yankees announced that they were cutting their ticket prices. You get what you pay for.

Go Dodger Blue!

* * * * *

Everyone knows that the First Hundred Days milestone of a presidency started with FDR, who rammed through 15 pieces of legislation to distinguish his. Not quite that good this time, but, thank G-d, no disasters.

I do wish more federal money had gone to beleaguered citizens and less to multi-dipping corporate oligarchs, but that story is not yet over. And, at long last, more than payment of lip-service is being offered to mitigate the shenanigans of credit-card carriers.

And, of course, the U. S. of A. now has the hottest First Lady in the world, and the only one with a relative on his town's Board of Rabbis. Take that, Carla Bruni!

Even the new admin's Middle East policy isn't too alarming - yet.

President Obama is easily one of the smartest guys ever to hold the office. We need that right now

* * * * *

Oh, do tell me about time pressures! I'm havin 'em now.

tbc

The great Amurrican composer, Scott Joplin, wrote at the top of all of the manuscripts for his piano pieces, the words "Not Too Fast." Atop his later pieces can be found the words "Never Too Fast," implying that his earlier instructions were most likely disregarded.

As a regular attendee at the first (0620 ET) minyan at 770, I understand his frustration.

But let's not pick on just the guys at 770.

I have davened at shuls from the Bronx to Brooklyn, downstate, upstate, and Jersey's no better:

East Coast Jews Daven Too Fast!!!

Back home, we davened too fast, but it was nothing like here. I remember the time R' Rice (ChaBaD of Marin, http://www.jewishlantern.org/) brought in a new assistant, fresh from 770, and then, by way of welcome, sent him up to lead Ma'ariv, which he did, at the pace to which he had become accustomed at 770. He was nearly drowned out by the collective gasp at the beginning, and, at the end, everyone raced to be the first to notify the young man that he's not in N'Yawk anymore and that we don't daven that fast in Marin County, California.

And I always thought our regular speed was a bit fast to be properly respectful of the moment.

The Talmud (Berachos) tells us that three things prolong a person's life and one of 'em is takin' your sweet time when you daven.

Consider this: You're in shul, there on the East wall is the Aron Kodesh, in which resides the Holy Sefer Torah, the closest one will get in this world at this time to being in the Very Physical Presence of the King of All Kings, the Blessed Master of All Worlds. And how should Jews treat this transcendent moment? Certainly Not as a Race To The Finish so that we can rush back to the mundane details of earthly life - or am I missing something again?

Certainly I understand at least as well as anyone the conflict between a religious observance based on the sun and a commercial world based on the clock. The stories I could tell about what I had to do (and put some certain friends through) in the summer to do those Saturday all-nighters on the radio . . .

When, however, I see some of the most egregious speed freaks hangin' out at the bagel shop a half-hour after a Shacharis that is rushed through like a batch of matzah, I start wondering what the point is and who might be missing it.

Back home, we have a notion we discuss a lot, called Being In The Moment. Sweet, eh? That's California. In shul, one can take it to the next level and Savor Being In The Moment, and probably should. We used to back home. It was nice. It was Shabbos.

It says more than once in every nusach, "Shiru . . . ," Sing.

One time, when Butch Robins was doing his season with Blue Lightning, we got a request; one of my vocals. "How fast do you want it?" he asked. "How fast can you pick it?" I asked the man who holds the World Land Speed Record for "Earl's Breakdown."

Big mistake.

But I learned an important lesson from the experience, which became an operating rule in Blue Lightning thereafter: If You're Pickin' It Too Fast to Sing, You're Pickin' It Too Fast.

Works in shul, too.

OK, during the week we're in golus, we have to concern ourselves with material matters, frequently under employers who have no concern or sympathy for religious observance. We do what we have to do.

But on Shabbos?!?!? What are we rushing to on Shabbos?!?!? Where are we going - to the ball game?!? This, of course, is why I voted with my feet some few seasons back to hang on Shabbos and Yom Tov with the Moroccans. They (and the other Sefardic shul I've been to) start early, take their time, and still wind up sitting down to Kiddush while the ChaBaD shul upstairs (yes, we stack 'em in Brooklyn) is still by Kriah - at full-tilt N'Yawk speed. There's some sort of Kabalistic witchy-twitchy goin' on there I still haven't figured out.

Of course, once Shabbos/Yom Tov is over, my beloved Moroccans become the most outrageous speed freaks of 'em all; but that's rather a quibble here.

* * * * *

Of course, all this is because of the golus. In the Days of Moshiach this sort of thing wouldn't be happening. Time and accomodations would be made for religious observance so that we wouldn't have to rush like fiends to get to the bagel shop before leaving for work.

So, gather the kids around the computer and teach 'em well to say it loud and say it proud:

Golus Sucks! Moshiach Now!!!

. . . and Never Too Fast!

My favorite international comic strip, the Somali Pirates, has been back on Page One of late. I'm glad the U.S. captain and crew came away inconvenienced but unharmed. Of course, things did not go so well for the Somalis. U.S. Navy snipers took out three of 'em with a single shot - without, by the way, harming the parrots on their shoulders.

The parrots, for their part, were too involved discussing the Obamas' Puppy to notice much until everything fell out from under 'em.

* * * * *

Some concern was expressed some while back in this blog about the Obama Administration's silence on their plans relevant to the U.N.'s dog-and-pony show on racism. Bless 'em, they decided to follow the precedent of the previous admin and not even go. Those EU types who did attend, wound up leaving early, to their credit.

And, of course, I would be remiss to not say "who'd-a thunk it" that the Black guy with the muslim father winds up being the first U.S. president to hold a Pesach seder in the White House.

Maybe there's a family connection:

It turns out that Michelle has a cousin who is not only a convert, but a convert with smicha. Not only has this dude gone from zero to rabbi in a single lifetime, but he's become the first black guy voted onto the Chicago Board of Rabbis.

Maybe items like this are why real comedians find this administration and its respective families frustrating. Achievement, while admirable, isn't really funny. Not like Dick Cheney's hunting trips.

* * * * *

Simon Johnson's also in the news, this time for Congressional testimony on the notion of joining the Clayton and Sherman antitrust legislation and expanding the notion of a trust to include corporate entities that are "too big to fail." I hope Congress listens; clearly the executive branch has chosen not to, even in light of a report from the TARP's Special IG, that most of the bailout is going to the banks and their investors at the expense of beleaguered mortgage-payers, and that so much unsupervised money is, among other things, an invitation to fraud.

* * * * *

Back some years ago, in the L.A. recording studios, there was a phenomenon known as The Wrecking Crew. Led by (at the time the most-requested studio guitarist in town) Glen Campbell, and frequently produced by a brilliant, energetic young man from Tulsa, OK named Leon Russell, the Crew consisted of every guitar picker in L.A. that could be found crammed into a room and playing together for background. When there were enough guys and enough sound, Leon Russell was rumored to yell, from the soundproofed safety of the engineer's booth, "Take That, Phil Spector!"

Leon Russell was, and by all accounts, still is, a gentleman and a total professional.

Phil Spector has now officially joined the list of Great American Tragedies.

The jury's still out on Campbell, whose been on both sides of the equation.

* * * * *

Phil Spector was part of the illustrious graduating class of 1964 out of Fairfax High School. More than one of his classmates went on to bigger an better things, in particular one Herb Alpert.

Let me go on record as saying I never liked the Wall of Sound (loved the Crew, though), the distinctive muddied-up studio sound for which Spector became famous almost from Graduation Day. My musical opinions don't count for much now; how much more so then. The Wall of Sound was the Next Big Thing of its time, Phil Spector was a instant genius, and demonstrating right away that he was nobody's sweetheart. He distinguished himself outside the studio with his arrogance and reputation for a short temper.

By 1970, word was out on the streets of L.A. that Phil Spector's place was becoming dangerous. I was not part of that inner circle. so I don't know when cocaine made its entrance, but Phil's fascination with guns was much-too-common knowledge in L.A. by '68. Even back then, folks were saying that someone was going to get dead at Spector's someday.

Ronnie's memoir confirmed to the world what the L.A. locals had known for years, that Phil Spector was a violent, cocaine-fueled gun nut who needed to be brought under control before someone got killed. When was that? '75?

How this man, who hadn't had a hit record in over thirty years, was able to maintain that mausoleum of his in the Hills and his habits is beyond me. But he did. And someone got dead there.

And Michael Jackson's shenanigans were common knowledge in L.A. as early as '85. Of course, no one got hauled out of Neverland in a plastic zipper-bag.

Money talks. Money shields.

That's golus for ya.

So how does the Phil Spector story join with those of Bernie Madoff, Michael Jackson, Roger Clemens, Ken Lay, Mike Tyson, and Eliot Spitzer on the ever-increasing list of Great American Trgedies?

Mostly through proper use of the Language and some knowledge of the origins of the word tragedy.

The Oxford English Dictionary entry (from their website):

• noun (pl. tragedies) 1 an event causing great suffering, destruction, and distress. 2 a serious play with an unhappy ending, especially one concerning the downfall of the main character.
— ORIGIN Greek tragoidia, apparently from tragos ‘goat’ (the reason remains unexplained) + oide ‘song, ode’.

OED has taken on the contemporary expansion of the word, but the theatrical origins are reflected in its root in Greek. What the OED left out was that the "downfall" is most frequently the result of what's known as The Fatal Flaw. With Oedipus, it was ambition (leave his mother out of it!); with MacBeth, it was his wife's ambition, and so it goes. These dudes were kings and conquerors, masters of their universes - and they blew it.

So with our list of Amurricans above. We don't have royal dynasties here, so we make our own home-grown royalty out of actors, musicians, jocks, and, occasionally, politicians. Phil Spector, like the others, had it all and blew it in a big way.

Of course, because kingdoms do not depend on our Amurrican royalty, they can fall without causing any great or lasting harm, go into rehab when necessary, write the confessional, tour with it for a year or two (making a pile in the process, which helps to pay for rehab, I guess), and rebuild their careers. Glen Campbell's working on a comeback, as are Britney Spears and Eliot Spitzer. Mickey Rourke and Robert Downey pretty much deep-sixed their careers and look at the comebacks they've had - without writing the books.

Of course, no one got dead as a result of their antics. A comeback for Phil Spector looks as unlikely as for Bernie Madoff. Spitzer, on the other hand . . .

* * * * *

Something came up recently that told me it's time to tell this story here.

It was a few months before the radio show went silent, and its signoff, "Golus Sucks - Moshiach Now," was actually making it out onto the streets of Chassidic Brooklyn, just a little. A buddy of mine came up to me in shul and said that he thought the show was good, the signoff was an idea whose time had come, but he had concerns about his kid picking it up and saying it.

"It's for your kid," I told him. "We greybeards had our chance, and we were polite with G-d and not polite enough with each other. We blew it. Maybe our kids will do better."

I still think so.

So, go get the kids, gather around the computer and teach 'em to say it loud and say it proud:

Golus Sucks! Moshiach Now!!

I've been taking in the latest from the media's new economic darling, Simon Johnson (http://bottomlinescenario.com/), who seems to be getting out a lot since he moved from the IMF to MIT. His recent article in the Atlantic Monthly (http://www.theatlantic.com/) compares the current situation in the U.S. with what he saw in banana republics when he was the IMF's chief economist; economies that were dysfunctional because monied interests were intent on skimming off the top of whatever was being produced, and cited the banks, AIG, big oil, big pharma, etc., as our own home-grown "oligarchs." That's his term. Thought-provoking.

* * * * *

Did two days this past week on a NYU student film, made some friends and will, in the fullness of time, see a few bucks. Fun stuff. More on that over Chol HaMoed. Time and patience are in short supply right now, and the internet connection I'm reduced to these days is unreliable.

* * * * *

Pesach's comin' on, the 'hood's more psychotic than usual and, in the absence of the final halachic updates I was able to bring on the radio (insert scream here), there is a dim recollection of a seasonally appropriate Big Ending:

"B'nei Yirael went out of Mitzrayim with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm," we read from the Chumash this holiday. And from an obscure Midrash comes the following:

B'nei Yisrael at this time were approximately 600,000 men of "military age (20-50)," according to the commentaries. When we add in the wives, old folks, kids, girlfriends, and assorted hangers-on, the estimate goes up to about 3,000,000 mighty hands and outstretched arms.

That's a lot of mighty hands.

But B'nei Yisrael were an industrious lot, and found what to occupy all those mighty hands: A Banner. Appropriate to a large group on the march.

This was, we remember, the generation who would, seven short weeks hence, receive the Torah at Sinai. This was an industrious group with the gift to see more than what a normal person could, and they could see the colors of the respective banners of their respective tribes, all of which added into the collection of colors on this banner. The twelve colors were displayed, according to this Midrash in a way which reads suspiciously like the description of a twelve-color tie-die.

So now we have roughly three million mighty hands on three million outstretched arms, carrying a massive, twelve-color tie-dyed banner - rockin' out of Mitzrayim.

And, of course, there was lettering on this massive twelve-color tie-dyed banner; and it read, of course:

Golus Sucks! Moshiach Now!

Freilichen Pesach, y'all.