Unplugging from the wired world sounds ideal, but impossible. We have never been more connected than we are now, and taking a break even for a nano-second can seem unconscionable. But now, fresh from creative minds at Reboot, and the feature of a popular NY Times article is the Sabbath Manifesto – a clarion call to those caught up in the face paced, hectic world, to observe the ancient call of the Day of Rest:

And the Children of Israel observed the Sabbath, to make the Sabbath for their generations an eternal covenant. Between Me and the Children of Israel it is a sign forever, that in six days did HASHEM make the heaven and the earth,and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.’

Ok, that was not the Sabbath Manifesto, per say, it is a passage from the Torah, recited during prayers Friday Night and Saturday, and recited during the ritual blessing of the wine on Saturday afternoon.

The Reboot Manifesto is right now: 1. Avoid Technology, 2. Connect With Loved Ones, 3. Nurture Your Health 4. Get Outside 5. Avoid Commerce 6. Light Candles 7. Drink Wine 8. Eat Bread 9. Find Silence 10. Give Back

Reboot are far from being Luddites. These are hyper-connected folks. Rather they are advocating one day of keeping the Sabbath as a means to better our lives (and make Bubbe proud.)

Join us in fighting back against the tidal wave of technology taking over society and our lives. Are you sick of having conversations with people with their noses buried in an iPhone? Are you that person?

Put down the cell phone, stop the status updates on Facebook, shut down Twitter, sign out of e-mail and relax, as part of our National Day of Unplugging.

Amen.

With the huge success of the getting the word out about the Sabbath Manifesto – I really do hope that tens of millions of people join – I would like to recommend that Reboot take on some addition modern issues with ancient Jewish ideas.

To heal monotonous, romance-less marriages, create a project advocating marital abstinence one or two weeks a month to help rekindle that missing spark: MikvahManifesto.org

To feed the poor, protect the widow and orphan, cloth and shelter the homeless, create a project advocating tithing ten-percent of our net earnings for donations to the poor. See the tzedakahmanifesto.org

That is just for starters – we can do a lot to help improve our lives, and those around us, with some of that Torah stuff.

We will be making a L’Chaim to Reboot tonight. Shabbat Shalom!

Two weeks ago Los Angeles was rocked by a Purim party of Olympic proportions. JConnectLA, the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles, and Atid – the young professional group of Sinai Temple and took over the entire Rodeo Collection on Rodeo drive. Music was provided by Moshav, Ram2, DJ Miles, and one of LA’s top DJ’s DJ Felli Fel.

When the party hit about 1000 people, the Beverly Hills Fire Marshall said enough. Purimpalooza party goers filled Purim baskets that were delivered to the Jewish elderly, and a local bone marrow registry swabbed party goers for bone marrow matches.

Purimpalooza in LA was started by Cheston Mizel, when he began the organization that became JConnectLA. The first event drew about 50-75 people. Purimpalooza has grown from year to year, changing venues and designs.

I just want to give a huge mazal tov to all the organizers, and the participants, for making the dream blossom that started seven years ago – an event to draw together Jews from all backgrounds – to help unify, inspire, and connect young Jewish people in Los Angeles. Shabbat Shalom!

Co-Sponsors: Valley Alliance, LEV Foundation, Jewlicious Festivals, Chai Center
Partners: Jews for Judaism, JAMS (of USC), Sephardic Mizrahi Young Leadership (SMYL), LA Jewish Chamber of Commerce, Jewish Big Brothers Big Sisters
Media Sponsor: www.LosAngelesBlueprint.com

With all the buzz in LA this week about the Oscar voting – here is my vote— Inglorious Basterds should win Best Picture, and many other accolades for Quentin Tarantino and his brilliant cast. Basterds is the most intriguing movie about WWII and the Holocaust to be made in decades.

Writing about the film this week, a few days before the holiday of Purim, I am drawn to a parallel between Basterds and Purim. In the Purim story, Jewish salvation came not at the hands of politicians and power-brokers, but through a Jewish woman who had hidden her identity from everyone including her husband. In Basterds, it is also a Jewish woman, whose past and Jewish identity a secret, and is being romanced by a Nazi poster-boy, who is the heroine.

Basterds is a film about WWII and the “face of Jewish revenge” portrayed by a band of American Jews scalping Nazi behind enemy lines. There is also the Jewish woman who plots to murder the entire Nazi leadership as revenge for her murdered. None of these things actually happened, Basterds is a fairy tale.

The film is brilliant from every angle. It has drama, humor, romance, and suspense. The plot twists are compelling. The story, the photography, the script, the acting, and the drama all are detailed, textured, nuanced, colorful, and captivating.

I was apprehensive. I had never seen a Tarantino film, and heard there is a lot of violence. While Basterds has some pretty graphic violence, it is a WWII movie after- all. The scalping made everyone cringe. Yet the violence pales in comparison to portrayals of mass murder by Nazi death squads or gas chambers.

The Jews are tough in this film. More James Bond than Woody Allen, more Mossad, that Seinfeld. There are no sheep being led to the slaughter. The Nazis are brutal, interesting, grotesque – not unlike the real Nazis. The leader of the Basterds played by Brad Pitt brands Nazis with Swastikas on their foreheads so they cannot escape into regular life afterward. They cannot escape what they have done.

It is clear that Tarantino did a ton of research on his subject matter. He read up on the Nazi film industry, and the war, and real life WWII spy stuff. He digested all the previously exulted WWII movies and hints of them appear in the film

I enjoyed many parts of the film for their poetic justice, suspense, and dialogue – but this one I love to retell.

Winston Churchill, when hearing of the Germans plans to replace Jewish cinema with Nazi cinema, says “You say [Goebbels] wants to take on the Jews at their own game?”

If we cannot laugh we cannot heal. If we cannot dream we cannot move on. Tarantino’s film helps us heal, and move on, but that is not why he made it – he made it because it needed to be made.

If they would have murdered Hitler – millions would have been saved, but it was not the priority of the Allied forces. In fact, the only ones that made a serious attempt at it late in the war were fellow Germans.

The Allies tried to win the war the old-fashioned way, with infantry, tanks, planes and bombs, with propaganda, cloaks, daggers and brute force. I don’t know if this was Tarantino’s goal, but Basterds shows that redemption can come from average people doing extraordinary things. To stop an evil tyrant we cannot depend solely on conventional means, and conventional players, we need to act and hope that we are helped by the hand of God.

In the past, we have had organizational resistance to putting our Festival Schedule online. Folks were concerned that potential competitors would be handed a veritable blue print for what we do and simply copy our program ideas.

However, this year, we are committed to an open source model and so here it is – a pdf version of our program over the next three days. You think the Festival is just a program? It’s so much more. it’s a community that rallies its resources to make this happen, it’s untold unsung people who gave freely of their time, it’s donors and organizations and bands and maintenance people and hard friggin work. You want to reproduce what we do? Go right ahead. Best of luck. As for the rest of you, check it out and see what’s happening!

See him at Jewlicious this weekend!

The LA Times featured Yuri Foreman in an article today:

Foreman, the unbeaten “Lion of Zion,” became the latest to join the list after twice knocking down heavily favored Daniel Santos to win the World Boxing Assn. junior middleweight title last November in Las Vegas. That made him the first Israeli fighter to win a world title and earned him one of the championship banners that cover the walls of the dingy gym… Yet after climbing to the top of a sport he has long attacked with zeal, Foreman finds that his accomplishment has to share the spotlight with his other pursuit. The boxer, you see, is studying to be a rabbi, spending each morning in the middle of the Torah learning how to interpret the will of God, and each afternoon in the middle of a gym learning how to break the will of his next opponent.

The LA Times also interviewed our own Rabbi Yonah Bookstein:
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…and why is he talking like he knows Jewlicious?

He’s not the king of Jewlicious. Jewlicious is this crazy multi-headed hydra fed by angst and motivated by fun. The bastard love child of the Chofetz Chaim, Charlie Chaplin and Dahliah Queen of the Berber tribes, Jewlicious is an anarchist collective with cholent. And now there’s this crazy Jewlicious Festival happening this weekend in Long Beach, CA. If you are near there (unlike me) and you don’t go, then you are a massive loser. Massive.

Thanks Leadel.Net!

How much do we love Eli Winkelman? Watch this video and find out how she captured our hearts with her savvy Challah making skillz, humanitarian spirit and the fact that she’s helped staff every single Jewlicious Festival ever. I frankly have no idea where she gets the energy or the drive! Eli will be in Long Beach this weekend for the Jewlicious Festival. Come and learn how to bake Challah while simultaneously repairing the world. Or just stand next to her and absorb her energy. It’s better than a case of Red Bull.

Back by popular demand - buy tickets to see the concert portion of Jewlicious Festival 6.0 while supplies last!
$25 Online Concert Tix Sat or Sunday / $30 at the door.

2/20 Saturday Night Bands (9 p.m.- 1 a.m.)
Kosha Dillz Band (NY)
Rinat (Jerusalem)
Electro Morocco (NY)
Moshav (LA)
and other special guests

2/21 Sunday Acoustic Series (11 a.m. – 3 p.m.)
Basya Schechter (of Pharaoh’s Daughter) (NY)
Rav Shmuel (NY)
Yael Meyer (LA)
Adam Weinberg (Miami)
And other special guests

Now you can bring the Festival home. This first volume of Jewlicious Festival recordings was mastered and mixed under the supervision of Adam Weinberg in Miami, FL, pressed and printed by Rainbo Records in LA, and recorded live with ProTools at Jewlicious Festival 5.0 on Feb 27 and 28, 2009.

I have been listening to these tracks for a week and it feels like you are there at the Festival.

So you want a copy? To get your copy of the Jewlicious Festival Live – Volume 1 all you have to do is make a
modest $36 donation to the Festival, and you will get the CD as a free gift! (If you want you can also get one at the Fest – We are giving away copies of the CD at Jewlicious Festival thanks to Repair the World!)

Featuring music by Moshav, Aharit Hayamim, Y-Love, Diwon, Kosha Dillz, Rav Shmuel, Jewdyssee, Dov Rosenblatt. Enjoy these high-fidelity live recordings that will bring you front and center to the Saturday Night Mainstage Concert.

Again this is not available for purchase. The bands have graciously donated their tracks to help us raise funds and spread the music of the Festival around the world. This CD is your gift with a donation of $36 or more which goes to subsidizing student tickets to the Festival.

Donation of $36 / S & H: $3.99

This CD was made possible thanks to Repair The World.

OK, that title was total nonsense

But seriously, when I want to know the latest in teen religious Jewish boy band news, the first place I go to is Heeb magazine. And they never disappoint! After the bump check out these uh… cuties, called the Moshiach Times Band. JDub dubs them the “Jewnas” brothers and raves about their “skinny jean/Tzitzit combo” while Tablet Magazine says that they are “the religious Jews’ answer to the Jonas Brothers.” Me? I don’t even know who the Jonas Brothers are and I’m definitely not going to make any cracks about scoring sem girl booty in the temple bathroom (I leave that to Heeb). All I can say is that I am heartbroken that the David Kelsey approved musical line up at the Jewlicious Festival is all booked up and that we won’t be able to invite the Moshiach Times Band to play before they hit puberty and their sweet, angelic voices begin to crack. Oh well.

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Such a bargain for you!

This is one of the questions we get asked the most and I am uh… pleased to say that the answer in all cases is “unequivocally yes.” Every attendee at Jewlicious costs us between $150 and $200. That covers the discounted rate we pay for the JCC that hosts the event, expenses associated with speakers, expenses associated with bands, transportation, food expenses etc. etc. We charge as little as $36 per person for the entire weekend because we don’t want money to be an issue with regards to participation. Even then, if someone flat out can’t afford it, we’ll always find a way to get them to the Festival. But we’re not Birthright Israel. Heck we’re not even Oranim. In this era of free trips to Israel, we even get people calling from out of town asking if we subsidize air fare! I mean we’d love to be in a position to do so but, well, we’re not. I could throw myself at Michael Steinhardt’s feet and assure him most sincerely that there are in fact ample hookups at the Jewlicious Festival but that would be, I don’t know, undignified? And as everyone who knows me knows, I am if nothing else, the very model of a modern uh… dignified man.

So yeah, bottom line, those of you trying to figure out our budget? $150-$200 a head. That’s pretty cheap and definitely does not include all the blood, sweat and tears expended by our awesome volunteers, committee members and community leaders, all dedicated to making sure that our participants have an awesome Jewy weekend. Now go and buy your tickets today!

I promise you are not paying retail!

No. Really.

Well, they for sure like this woman. And not only will AEPI be at the Jewlicious Festival, but they are sponsors as well! Visit their Web site, their Wikipedia page or their blog. Also, AEPi is no longer just for Americans or Canadians, they are invading Israel too! Better watch out ck!

Smooth E aka Eric Schwartz

One of the nation’s hottest rising stand-up headliners, Eric Schwartz aka Smooth-E, is a comedian, rapper, and MC. His music have appeared on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno,” BET’s “Comic View,” Showtime’s “White Boyz in the Hood,” Mun2, SiTV and more. This bespectacled rhyme spitter wears multiple hats, writing, producing and performing countless characters in his songs and videos. Pulling off funny, authentic-sounding parodies is a tough nut to crack, but Smooth-E cracks away, appealing across the board from hip-hop heads to soccer moms.

http://smoothe.tv/

Kira Soltanovich (Star of Girls Behaving Badly)

A regular for four seasons on the Oxygen and Nationally syndicated show, Girls Behaving Badly, Kira has also appeared on such shows as Jimmy Kimmel Live, 3rd Rock From The Sun, and The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. She has been a winner, finalist and semi-finalist of several comedy competitions, including Comedy Central’s Laugh Riots, NBC’s Last Comic Standing, The Cape Town International Comedy Festival, the Boston Comedy Festival, and the Seattle International Comedy Festival.

http://www.myspace.com/kiracomedy

Simcha Levenberg

Born in Washington DC and bred in New Jersey, Simcha is our only comedian who also doubles as a Rabbi. A self-dubbed spiritual gangster, he draws out the comedic side of sprituality, G-d, world religion, meditation, drugs as well as the counter-culture, music, and everything written by Tom Robbins. We are happy to welcome Simcha back to the festival to once again press the reset button on all stereotypes: Jewish, Rabbinic or otherwise.

http://simchalevenberg.com/

Robin Reiser

Robin Reiser is a stand-up comic and super model. The modeling career is really going badly so she is now a writer. To keep up appearances she writes in full runway make up and does an outfit change every fifteen minutes. http://www.myspace.com/robinreiser

Lizzy Cooperman

Lizzy Cooperman has been featured on “The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson”, and has been featured on NBC’s “Last Comic Standing”, MTV’s “Most Valuable Players”, and The History Channel’s “History of the Joke: Part One”.

She is a winner of the Laugh Across America Contest and her stand-up comedy has also been featured in “New Faces” and “Dating It” at the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal. Lizzy was a finalist at The Las Vegas Comedy Festival, and featured in “Best of the Fest” at the New York Underground Comedy Festival. http://www.myspace.com/lizzycooperman

Line-up is subject to change.

…so far

Yes, we’re still accepting donations, but here is a list of folks and organizations that have helped make the Jewlicious Festival happen:
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This year’s Jewlicious Festival, our 6th in as many years, is going to be an Open Source event. What does that mean? Well, allow me to explain. From day one, it was our fondest hope to run similar festivals in other cities. To date however, the only Jewish community that has been able to get it together enough to host a Jewlicious Festival has been that of Long Beach, CA (and this year Los Angeles as well). The Festival has been otherwise successful beyond all our original expectations, attracting young Jews from across the US and Canada and top notch speakers and musical acts from around the world. Why hasn’t Jewlicious spread beyond Long Beach? Maybe it’s because we’re just exhausted. Maybe only Long Beach can muster the necessary, albeit modest resources and communal will to make it happen. Maybe it’s because people continue to assume we’re a Chabad Kiruv organization. Maybe we just suck at writing grant proposals. I don’t know.

But this year, we’re going to do something different. We’re going Open Source so that anyone who cares to can follow along and learn about what it takes to run the largest Jewish Student and Young Adult Festival in the world. And I promise you, it’ll be interesting. Seriously.

So what am I working on now? About a zillion things, but for my first Open Source Post I decided I’d write about t-shirts. Seems like a pretty straight forward issue, right? Wrong. Every year we print up a mess of commemorative t-shirts, hoodies and other apparel. Everyone loves a good t-shirt and we figure if folks wear the shirts after the festival, the wearer essentially becomes a walking advertisement for us, the organization.
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OK so you jokers put up a pic of me in a tux, presented absolutely no context and of course the conversation inevitably devolved into football and Brett Favre. Before that happened though, one of our readers left a comment stating that our Night of Unity fundraiser was “epic.” That it was. I had just flown in the night before after a whirlwind tour of New York and Montreal via Rome and Tel Aviv. Of course our crew in LA had worked like crazy people to organize the event and by the time I walked in, everything was basically done. The El Ray Theatre was packed to capacity with fancy shmancy LA Jews who donated big time to JConnectLA and Jewlicious and who enjoyed an awesome evening in honor of fellow Moroccan Jew David Suissa. Suissa who is a columnist for the LA Jewish Journal, a community activist and philanthropist, received our first annual Jewish Unity Award and we all enjoyed the open bar, yummy food, various entertainers and the musical stylings of Moshav and Matisyahu.

OK so really? I was totally overwhelmed and tux or no tux I felt completely out of my element. Everyone was all fancy and dressed up! The one thing that stood out in my mind though was that none of this would have happened, none of it, without the support and imagination of the Jewish community of modest little Long Beach, CA. Both on a communal and individual level, the Jewlicious Festival has benefited from the sort of support for innovation that many talk about endlessly, but few actually bring to fruition. Except for those guys down in the ELBEE.

It’s no secret that we’ve always wanted to do a Festival on the East Coast. I’ve even managed to start basic discussion on the issue with some communal leaders here and there, but after 6 years, the Jewlicious Festival is still available only in Long Beach. This despite many requests from young Jews around the country. Only modest lil’ Long Beach has been able to pull this off year in year out, both in times of plenty and times of economic distress. So yeah, big ups to the Alevys and the Alperts and the Booksteins and the inumerable volunteers who help make our Festival happen and prosper.

The Night of Unity provided an opportunity for the Jewish Community of Los Angeles to step up and put in their 2 cents, so to speak. Truth is we didn’t make a massive amount of cash, but we did increase our local profile significantly. That’s been a problem as even after 6 years, many people still think we’re some kind of Chabad program.

Seriously. I mean do I fucking look like a Chabadnik?

I know Rabbi Yonah is well, a Rabbi. And that’s been obvious in all the publicity he’s been getting of late, from being featured in Vanity Fair, to being a Jewish Heroes Finalist to his selection in the Forward 50. But message to secular Jewish America: NOT ALL RABBIS ARE LUBAVITCHERS, ok? And the Jewlicious Festival is the only gathering in the world where you will find everything from Breslav Chassidim to Lesbian Peace Activists. OK? OK! Now give us some money so that we can help spread the love!

So, back to the original point of the post. Our fundraiser. It was an old skool affair featuring an honoree, VIP tables, big donations, sponsors and all that. But it wasn’t stuffy. People mingled, shmoozed and rocked out. All our student and young adult leaders were in attendance and rubbed shoulders with the attendees. It really was an old skool meets new skool kind of thing and please shoot me if I use the term “skool” one more time. Whatever, it was fun. Now we’re in full Festival prep mode. Oh what fun awaits. Yay. Stay tuned!

Rav Shmuel’s annual Jewlicious promo done in stop animation – very cool. Rav Shmuel has jumped around fields, bars, and tables all in the pursuit of the great promo video. Check out his offering for this year.

An if you have not purchased your ticket — do so before the costs goes up on Jan 31!

We are just four days away from a watershed moment in our young organizational history. On January 20, we present A Night Of Unity, featuring music, comedy, magic, games, opulent food, drinks, and a special acoustic performance by Grammy Nominated, Gold Record recording artist MATISYAHU.

This benefit will not only support Jewlicious, Jewlicious Festival, JConnectLA, Shabbat Tent, and other programs, but also introduce what we do to America’s second largest Jewish community in a way we have never done before.

We will be honoring David Suissa, founder of Olam.org, columnist for the Jewish Journal, and one of Jewish LA’s great personalities.

This event is a tikkun on the normal benefit dinner. There will be no rubber chicken, open seating, complimentary bar, casino games, silent auction, food from around the world, and desserts from the finest dessert company in Los Angeles. All our performers, vendors, and organizers are doing this for free or for song – because they know that this is an important fundraiser, and want to support our work.

Even if you cannot make this event – consider making a donation, a tribute, or sponsor someone else to go.

Marcus Freed’s Website Hacked :

My website has been hacked by an incompetent pro-Iranian Anti Semite! http://www.marcusjfreed.com/gigs/ – although he has only hacked two pages on the *old* website that is badly due for a relaunch. I’d like to thank the hacker for thoughtfully keeping with my black-background colour scheme, although I much prefer the… muted green in his palette as opposed to the lurid flourescent 80’s tone. Watch this space – in a few days my web wizard Simon is going to HACK THE HACKER and mash-up the site!!! Look out for pictures of the Ayatollah Kho-Freedy coming soon….

Here is the stuff the Iranian Hackers left on the Jewish Yogi’s site:

Our belligerence is religious and does not own any borders, thus we are here as long as atheism and blasphemy exist. We do know that effrontery of blasphemy to Imam Khomeini is what that only you can do. This is just a warning to your governmental sites!

Marcus is taking it in stride. After all, he is on another world tour, and will be in LA for the Night of Unity, and Jewlicious Festival!

On Wednesday, January 20, at 6:30pm, we will celebrate Jewish unity with music, comedy, and poetry at an unforgettable, delicious, cabaret-style event at LA’s famous El Rey Theater. This Night of Unity is our first ever Gala fundraiser. Please join in our effort to make this a night to remember while helping to raise funds to keep Jewlicious Festival, JConnect and our other projects going.

We are honoring DAVID SUISSA with the Jewish Unity Award. Suissa, an advertising executive and LA Jewish Journal Columnist, is founder of OLAM magazine, Meals4Israel.co, Ads4Israel.com and the newly launched OLAM.org. Suissa speaks up for justice, Jews, and israel, bridging communities and cultures. He embodies Jewish unity in bringing together the many parts of our community to solve problems and provide mutual support.

There will be great entertainment at this cabaret-style event, headlined by a special acoustic performance by Grammy Nominated, Gold Record Recording Artist MATISYAHU.

Our Night of Unity Honorary Dinner Chair is STANLEY GOLD, the outgoing chairman of the board, Jewish Federation of Los Angeles

This is no rubber chicken fundraiser dinner. There will be an speak-easy style Casino, Silent Auction, live music all evening, wine and a wide variety of delicious food. For VIP ticket holders there will be bottle service and complimentary drinks as well.

Special appearances have been confirmed by Craig Taubman, Rhoda Weissman, David Sachs, Adam Weinberg, Marcus Freed and others! It is a snazzy night, so dress code is – Black Tie Optional

You can buy tickets, or make a tribute – tickets and tributes start at $180. We have a few sponsorship opportunities for individuals or companies that would like to participate in this event. Please contact us as soon as possible – we have only a few left.

*$50 of ticket cost is not tax deductible.

HOST COMMITTEE
Tom and Jill Barad Brett Barenholtz Stanley & Joyce Black Michael Borkow Etan and Emily Cohen Brad and Amy Conroy Daniel Eisenstadt Rachel Ephron Yosi and Wendy Finn Noah Flom Selwyn & Glynis Gerber Stephen Grynberg Bob Hale Josh and Stefanie Kaplan Mellissa Lewkowicz James and Debbie Lustig Nick Meyer Tahlia Miller Larry and Carol Mizel Courtney Mizel Maxine Morris Dr. Sharon Musher Gal & Rabbi Elissa Ben Naim Harry & Dorit Nelson Mark and Renee Phillips Sheri Porath Rockwell Roz and Jerry Rothstein David and Judy Sachs Dr. Rami and Sofia Sadeghi Evan Schlessinger Lou Sokolovsky Alan and Lisa Stern Dubby Teichman Sari Tuschman Gary and Dana Wexler Shawn Landres Joshua Avedon

When Oregon and Ohio State take the field tomorrow in Pasadena at the Rose Bowl, there will be more going on than meets the eye.

Enter Rabbi Drew Kaplan, newly appointed head of Jewish Student Services and SoCal Campus Rabbi at Long Beach State, and across Orange County. Rabbi Drew is loves Torah, his family, and Buckeye Football. A native of Ohio Drew will be praying for a Bucks victory at the Rose Bowl.

Then there is me, past head of Jewish Student Services and a SoCal Campus Rabbi, and now Director at JConnect. I love Torah, my family, and Duck Football. I am a native of Michigan, and will be praying for a Ducks victory in Pasedena.

Now both of us being Shabbat observant Jews, our passion for our respective college football teams could not help but be tempered by the reality that we cannot watch any of these games live. The only times I seem to ever see the Ducks play football is in a Bowl Game. And this is a big deal — Ohio State (10-2) hasn’t played in the Rose Bowl since 1997, while Oregon (10-2) hasn’t made it since 1995.

If measured in Jewish students, Ohio State has a clear edge. With 3,200 Jewish students approximately, it is the 16th largest concentration of Jewish students at a public university in the country. Oregon, has perhaps 1,000 Jewish students, and doesn’t even rank in the top 30.

The Ducks have a famous Jewish alum who plays now for Dallas, Igor Olshansky. Ohio State has John Frank, who also was part of the Israeli Bobsled team!

We were going to set out and go together to the game. The moment that this matchup was announced, we realized the monumental nature of this contest, and the ramifications for Jewish life in California and beyond.

I had dreams of a kosher tailgate party, where Jews from both sides of this contest, could break bread together, and enjoy harmony before the war of roses.

I imagined the scene of praying mincha at half-time, one part of the minyan in Duck colors, the other in Buckeye colors. Jews, divided by geography, and allegiances, could lay down their vocal weapons and for a moment give thanks to the almighty. I imagined a harmonious moment that could usher in the Messianic age.

But then we realized that this game was being played on Erev Shabbat. I frantically contacted Drew and we began thinking of plans. We could try to get rooms (unlikely) staying at a hotel near the stadium, in case the game was still going on when Shababt arrived. We contemplated making a Shabbat Tent in the Rose Bowl parking lot, but management doesn’t allow overnights.

This once-in-a-life-time contest would have to be watched from the comfort and affordability of home. When the dust settles on the field, we will get back to planning Jewlicious Festival.

Go Ducks, Go Buckeys, Go Shabbos!

A side note — both teams are staying in five-star hotels down the street from our offices on Avenue of the Stars. They arrived on Monday from the airport with police escorts in four large tour buses.

Yesterday, a story featuring Rinat Gutman was on the front page of the Ynet (Hebrew) Web site. She had been interviewed about the whole Orthodox female rapper thing that she does, and they delved a little into her family background. Turns out her Dad is a Rabbi and her Grandfather is Rabbi Joseph BaGad, a Rosh Yeshiva and colorful former MK with the right-wing Moledet and Moreshet Avot parties. The interview discussed issues relating to the extent of the prohibition against Kol Isha (a man is prohibited from hearing a woman’s voice in song) and how her family feels about her musical career. They also featured Rinat’s newest video Agas (Pear) shot last summer in London:

The talkbacks were mostly encouraging – though there was some pretty spirited discussion related to what is and isn’t “religious” etc. reminiscent of previous discussions on the topic. OK fine but, did you notice that I was credited with two photos that appeared in the article, including the bad ass pose shown here (Unisex Matte Faux Leather Hoody courtesy of American Apparel Jerusalem, of course)? So far I’ve had photos published in Heeb, YNet, Haaretz, the JTA etc. Can I now consider myself “an interdisciplinary artist and documentarian investigating post-normative forms of Jewish cultural expression?” Please? Can I?

Rinat Gutman is going to be on some Channel 2 morning show tomorrow. I don’t ever watch Israeli TV so I can’t tell you more, but it’s a big deal apparently. You can also see her perform at the Jewlicious Festival in Long Beach, California on Feb. 19th. Buy your tickets today!

UPDATE:
Here’s the video from Rinat’s Channel 2 appearance. It’s in Hebrew but as soon as I figure out how to snarf it, I’ll upload it with subtitles. As it is I can’t even embed it even though the code is provided. Oh well. Here’s a photo from the studio interview instead:

It was widely reported in the press, that Carter asked for forgiveness from the Jews, and I don’t forgive him. The former president, and master of distortions, wrote to JTA: “As I would have noted at Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, but which is appropriate at any time of the year, I offer an Al Het for any words or deeds of mine that may have done so.”

In order to seek forgiveness, one has to acknowledge the mistakes that one made and resolve to repair the damage caused. If we Jews don’t forgive Carter, God certainly never will. As our tradition teaches — God will only forgive one who has made peace with those that they wronged. And Jimmy, you have a long, long way to go.

Carter’s admission that he has caused the Jewish community harm might work in confession, but doesn’t work with on Yom Kippur, and it doesn’t work with me.

Carter admitted no specific mistakes. He offered no way of repairing the damage caused by his irresponsible accusations.

I personally heard Carter tell an audience of 3k students at UC Irvine, to the applause of the administration and students, that the US Congress was “in the pocket” of the Jews.

How many other college student audiences around the country heard the same accusations? How many books did he publish accusing Israel of things that have no basis in fact? How many times has he appeared on TV demonizing Israel and backing Hamas?

In order for me to forgive Carter he has to admit to his distortions and lies and publicly renounce his books and speeches. Carter needs to return money to anti-Semitic Middle Eastern countries that back his center. He needs to replace Habitat for Humanity with Hadassah. He needs to go on Birthright Israel. He needs to listen to Matisyahu. He needs to watch G-d Cast, read The Forward, spend the winter in Miami. He needs to study Judaism with Rabbi Telushkin, and volunteer for Challah for Hunger. We need to see Jimmy Carter crusading against the humanitarian track record of Hizbollah, Hamas, and Fatah, and doing brunch at Jeff’s Gourmet Sausage on Pico. While he is on this apology tour, he needs to appear at every campus where he defamed Israel, and give speeches urging that Muslim extremist recruiting groups like the MSU and MSA be banned permanently. He needs to learn Hebrew, spend Shabbat at Beit Jewlicious, and sit at David Abitbol’s feet and learn about the expulsion of North African Jews, Sephardic Jewish culture, and eat chumous. And that is just for starters.

There is a perfect venue for this rapprochement to begin with the Jewish community; the perfect place for Carter to ask forgiveness, renounce his former ways, and promise to live a life free from anti-Semitism and criticism of Israel — Jewlicious Festival 6.0.

Friday Night at Jewlicious Jimmy, stand up in front of a hundreds of young Jews, ask forgiveness, break bread with us, and tell us how you will attempt to undo the vast damage you have wrought.

Watch the video after the bump.

What? I don’t know! It’s well done and kind of cute and acts as a reminder to all that the 6th annual Jewlicious Festival will take place on February 19th in Long Beach California. Go to the Web site, check it out and then buy tickets!! Then you’ll be able to meet Rabbi Yonah, live!
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MATISYAHU was on Letterman Thursday night, the seventh night of Chanukah. Check out the enormous custom disco driedel MATISYAHU uses for his Festival of Lights! The crowd at the end of his performance on Letterman go nuts. One Day is a great song – it’s simple, the message is pure and awesome. Repost, replay, download.