Free Republic

Stage farce lets Israelis see funny side of the Fuhrer Stephen Farrell, Tel Aviv 17feb06 IN a khaki blur of bad taste, SS uniforms and prancing Fuhrers, the Mel Brooks Broadway farce The Producers has come to Israel for the first time. The show, in Hebrew but replete with swastikas and Nazi salutes, is playing nightly in Tel Aviv to chuckling audiences of Holocaust survivors. Even as they chat during the interval about the best lines, many recall the horror of Kristallnacht. "If ever there was a place that has full licence to make fun of Hitler, it is probably...

Kingdom of Heaven: Propaganda or History? by James F. Burke New Republican Archive After the anti-Christian Left was blind-sided by the popularity of Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ, key influencers in the media complex were eager to promote the release of Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven. Indeed, one finds the loudest praise for the film coming from the pages of the most radical left-wing papers and journals here in the U.S. and, of course, in Europe. Why then is turnout so high here in the U.S.? Viewers hoping for a more positive (or at least less anti-Christian) take on...

Until the 18th century, there was basically only one kind of Judaism, that which is now called Orthodox. It meant living by the religion's 613 laws, and doing so suffused Jews' lives with their faith. Then, starting with the thinker Baruch Spinoza (1632-77) and moving briskly during the Haskala, or "enlightenment," from the late 18th century, Jews developed a wide variety of alternate interpretations of their religion, most of which diminished the role of faith in their lives and led to a concomitant reduction in Jewish affiliation.These alternatives and other developments, in particular the Holocaust, caused the ranks of the...

The power of music in the soul--described to Jessica marvelously by Lorenzo in the Merchant of Venice--has been recovered after a long period of desuetude. And it is rock music alone that has affected this restoration. Classical music is dead among the young. This assertion will, I know, be hotly disputed by many who, unwilling to admit tidal changes, can point to the proliferation on campuses of classes in classical music appreciation and practice, as well as performance groups of all kinds. Their presence is undeniable, but they involve not more than 5 to 10 percent of the students....

<p>But it may be premature to celebrate as the key Imperial district has not yet approved the deal.</p> <p>A historic agreement settling an age-old California water dispute was signed into law Monday by Gov. Gray Davis, although the deal could still be tripped up by opposition from the rural Imperial Valley.</p>

Miramar-based Maritime Telecommunications Network, which earlier this year built for NBC the satellite-based mobile communications platform widely known as the "Bloommobile," today announced the special-purpose truck is helping the NBC network in its live coverage of Hurricane Isabel. MTN, which makes satellite-based communications, networking and other services for the cruise and offshore oil and gas industries, designed the vehicle NBC reporter David Bloom used to broadcast live reports from the war zone in Iraq before his death there April 6. "NBC's use of the Bloommobile further confirms the versatility and value of this unique satellite-based mobile communications platform," said David...

On Saturday night, President Bush spoke at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. He included in his remarks a moving tribute to Michael Kelly, columnist and editor of the Atlantic Monthly, and NBC's David Bloom, both of whom had died in the war in Iraq. The president quoted Kelly's father and the praises of his colleagues, and held Kelly's intellectual honesty and fearlessness up for the approval of the audience, and the audience clapped. The president then read from David Bloom's last e-mail home, in which the rising star of NBC wrote to his wife that he cared not much for...

DAVID BLOOM'S LAST E-MAIL [Rod Dreher] NBC reporter David Bloom, who died last week in Iraq, sent a final e-mail to his wife on the eve of his death. It was eerily prescient, almost an epitaph. David was a born-again Christian; a friend of mine who was in a men's prayer and Bible-study group with him says David was passionately devoted to his family and his God. That friend told me David's last e-mail was read aloud in a deeply moving Friday meeting with his prayer partners, at which a number of David's NBC colleagues were present. It was no...

David Bloom's Last Ride The NBC journalist's death was possibly caused by the hours he spent reporting cramped in an Army vehicle -- just another way war kills   BusinessWeek's Balfour is "embedded" in the 3rd Infantry Division Five short lines to summarize the last day of a man who was, by all measures, in the prime of life. Already known by millions of Americans as a co-host of NBC's Weekend Today show, Bloom's live coverage of the Iraqi war gained him an even wider audience, in large part because of the "Bloom-mobile." He traveled most of the time in...

I'm TV deprived, anybody watching MSNBC? Somebody just called and told me he had died, but from a pulmonary embolism. Anybody got news?

Rare, Stinky Flower Set to Bloom By Discovery News Aug. 6 — A rare, huge, stinky flower that only blooms every three years is poised to release its rancid scent this week at The Huntington Library in San Marino, Calif., the library reports on its Web site. Amorphophallus titanum is also called the Corpse Flower for its fragrance, sometimes described as a mix of rotting flesh and excrement. The flower was discovered in the rainforests of its native Sumatra in 1878, and came via London's Kew Gardens to the New York Botanical Garden in 1937, where it bloomed for the...