Thursday, July 30, 2009

9 ’Av

Jewish date:  9 ’Av 5769.

Today’s holiday:  The Fast of 9 ’Av.

Relevant to today’s holiday:  A message from the National Council of Young Israel.

Today’s quasi-holiday:  National Cheesecake Day (very poor choice).

Worthy causes of the day:  “CNN: Dump Lou Dobbs”, “CNN: Deal with your Lou Dobbs problem”, “5% FOR THE WORLD'S MOST VULNERABLE:  ASK YOUR SENATORS”, and “Tell the Gang of 6: Give back your dirty insurance money.” I had not planned to post today at all, but all these worthy causes ganged up on me.

Relevant to Divine Misconceptions:
  1. More religious oppression:  “Hindu Temple and families ransacked and looted”, “UZBEKISTAN: 'Joy' children's holiday camp attacked”, and “Sudan 'trousers trial' adjourned”.  I am not making that last one up; in Sudan, they arrested a woman for wearing pants.  It may sound like a joke, but Islamic morality police are anything but funny, especially when someone may get 40 lashes just for dressing wrong.  One may think it not right for women to wear pants (I suppose), but surely Sudan has more urgent problems to deal with, e.g., genocide?
  2. The strangest “honor killing” of which I have heard yet:  “Rights groups: Gaza man suspected of killing daughter for owning cellphone”.  Anything I could say to explain this would be pure guesswork.
Today’s news and commentary:
Weird things will resume after the Nine Days.

Aaron

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