[goldstategop]

For sheer ignorance, stupidity and effrontery, nothing excels (I hate that word!) better than Michael Lerner's insane scribblings on Israel and Operation Cast Lead! What kind of dope do they consume at Tikkun these days? If you ever needed any proof that liberalism is a form of mental illness, this is it! Oh and don't read this unless you have a very strong stomach. It deserves the MEGABARF warning for reasons y'all will understand from the first paragraph onwards. And yes, this leftist is not only a self-hating Jew, he's a Charter Member Of The Jews For A Second Holocaust.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[2banana]

Put Michael Lerner on a hill. Launch 3000 random missile and mortar attacks on him through out the year. Day and night. On holy days. Without rest.

Then let us talk with him.

[SonOfDarkSkies]

What idiot invented this concept of proportionate/disproportionate response.

If this idea carried sway in WWII...we would still be at war!

[ScreamingFist]

Hamas had respected the previously negotiated ceasefire except when Israel used it as cover to make assassination raids

There you go.

[Mr. Mojo]

Hamas can harass, but it cannot pose any threat to the existence of Israel.

Suicide bombing attacks against the Israeli population is far more than "harassment." So are Qassam rocket attacks. And when (not if) Hamas gets more sophisticated weaponry (both rockets and WMDs), Israel's existence will indeed be threatened. Lerner has his head squarely up his ass.

[Anti-Bubba182]

Michael Lerner (rabbi)

"...Michael Lerner is an American rabbi, political activist, the editor of Tikkun, a progressive Jewish and interfaith magazine based in Berkeley, California, and the rabbi of Beyt Tikkun Synagogue of San Francisco.[1][2]

Student activism

While at Berkeley, Lerner became a leader in the Berkeley student movement and the Free Speech Movement, chair of the Free Student Union, and chair from 1966-1968 of the Berkeley chapter of the Students for a Democratic Society. After teaching philosophy of law at San Francisco State University, he took a job as an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Washington and taught ethics, social and political philosophy, philosophy of literature and culture, and introduction to philosophy. Angry at the SDS group called Weatherman, which had introduced violence into the anti-war movement in response to police violence, Lerner created a new organization as an alternative, called the Seattle Liberation Front. After a major demonstration that his organization had called in protest turned violent, he and others were arrested for inciting a riot. The subsequent trial was the second nationally known federal trial against anti-war activists and became known as the Seattle Seven..."

Lerner is vermin.

[FlingWingFlyer]

“Disproportionate.” Only a bunch of liberal boneheads would come up with the idea that war has to be “proportionate.” On the other hand, I think the old Star Trek did an episode about this.

[Recovering Ex-hippie]

LOL!!!

Well written, I know its not funny, but your comments were great!

[ScreamingFist]

I like the idea (read here on FR), for every indiscriminate rocket launch, one indiscriminate mortar launch back. This sh#t would end in 2 days....

[Uri’el-2012]

The Rise Of Tikkun Olam Paganism

[Islander7]

Since 2000, over 7,000 rockets have been launched from the town of Beit Hanun, in Gaza, toward Sderot, in Israel.

"We have decided to make Sderot a ghost town," said a spokesman for Hamas in a recent article. "We are not going to stop launching our rockets until they leave." But in spite of this barrage of iron from the sky, the majority of the population has stayed, living in their homes and going about their daily lives.

Most of the press coverage has shown the panic that can take place when the rockets begin to fall. This is dramatic and has frequently been tragic, with thirteen people killed in the past seven years. But it is not the whole story. Although some of the residents have fled, many more have stayed and have become stronger. Instead of becoming a "ghost town," Sderot is a vibrant and energetic city which will not be defeated. This is an accounting of one month spent near Sderot in early 2008.

Iron Rain

Lots of pictures at the link

[jiggyboy]

Killing 500 Palestinians and wounding 2,000 others (at the time of writing) is disproportionate.

Some Moderate Proposals [Victor Davis Hanson]

1) Request that 50% of Israel's air-to-ground missiles be duds to ensure greater proportionality.

2) Allow Hamas another 1,000 free rocket launches to see if they can catch up with the body count.

3) Have Israeli soldiers congregate in border barracks so that Hamas's random rockets have a better chance of killing military personnel, to ensure it can claim at least a few military targets.

4) Redefine "holocaust" to refer to deaths of terrorists in numbers under 400 to give greater credence to Hamas's current claims.

5) In the interest of fairness, allow Hamas to establish both the date that war is supposed to begin and the date when it must end.

6) Send Israeli military advisers to Hamas to improve the accuracy of their missiles.

7) Take down the barriers to return to Hamas a fair chance of getting suicide bombers back inside Israel.

[Evil Slayer]

Hey, maybe Israel should just send one of these over there. Now, you can talk disproportionate but well deserved.

[tbpiper]

Hamas can harass, but it cannot pose any threat to the existence of Israel.

Harass? Is that what numbnuts calls the wanton, random killing of Israeli civilians? My operative analogy is this: Hamas is using the rocket equivalent of a Saturday Night Special. Just because someone uses a clapped-out snub nosed 22 at long range doesn't mean he isn't trying to kill you. He'd use a Glock if he could get one. Hamas would use laser/gps guided munitions if they could get them.

So, according to this dilbert, as long as Hamas can only kill a few innocent civilians, Israel shouldn't really be all that upset.

Hamas' stated goal is to destroy Israel. A 'proportionate response' would be for Israel to destroy Hamas.

[kcvl]

Michael Lerner is an American rabbi, political activist, the editor of Tikkun, a progressive Jewish and interfaith magazine based in Berkeley, California.

[rod1]

Is this Hillary’s Michael Lerner?

[mckenzie7]

1000 Palestinians for 1 Jew? That sounds about right.

Maybe Israel could lop off a rocket everytime one enters Israeli airspace. Heaven knows, they are better shots.

[elcid1970]

Thanks for this informative post, but consider the irony: that we FReepers don’t get paid a dime for having at least half a brain while posting common sense, while this certified idiot Lerner is wined, dined, and paid a king’s ransom for spouting pure buffalo plop, decade after decade.

[SkyDancer]

OK, you shoot rockets at us ... we run and hide. The UN condemns us (Israel) for attacking the rocket bases .... typical ....

[kcvl]

He sounds schizophrenic.

http://www.havelshouseofhistory.com/Lerner,%20Rabbi%20Michael.jpg

Rabbi Lerner, author of The Left Hand of God: Taking Our Country Back from the Religious Right

at Berkeley. Michael Lerner began his graduate school career in philosophy in 1964

Lerner’s academic work focused on ethical theory and social philosophy

became a national leader of the anti-war movement

Lerner was sent to Terminal Island Federal penitentiary where he served several months in prison, at which time J. Edgar Hoover described him as “one of the most dangerous criminals in America.”

Michael Lerner returned to Berkeley after his conviction had been overturned, and he completed a Ph.D. at Berkeley in 1972. His son Akiba was born to him and his partner Theirrie Cook in October, 1971.

in 1982 he became Principal Investigator for a multi-million dollar research project funded by the National Institute of Mental Health and focused on work and family life.

Some of the attention of the ILMH focused on the question of why so many working people were attracted to the politics of Ronald Reagan and the Right, even though the Right was pursuing policies that were in such dramatic contrast with their economic interests. And what they learned over the course of many years of research with over ten thousand middle income working people was the following: that there was a spiritual crisis in American society and that the Right was speaking to that crisis, albeit with a set of distorted solutions. What they were discovering was what Lerner would later call “the hunger for meaning” or “spiritual needs” which were every bit as important as material needs.

His ideas received national attention when Hillary Clinton adopted his notion of “the politics of meaning” and called for the country to respond to these ideas. Lerner was described by the Washington Post as “the guru of the White House,” and he became the subject of intense national debate.

The Clintons invited Lerner to the signing of the Oslo Accord in 1993, but Lerner soon found that though the Clintons were using his words, they were actually following policies that were antithetical to his core ideas. While he was being denounced daily on Rush Limbaugh’s radio shows for being the central idea person in the Clinton White House, Lerner himself felt that the Clintons’ approach had abandoned any serious ethical/spiritual focus and was being shaped by their own fears rather than by the vision of a meaning-oriented politics.

Lerner became very controversial among the denizens of the Jewish establishment and in the Jewish media because of the role he has taken in trying to build bridges of understanding between Jews and Palestinians.

In 2003, Lerner was barred from speaking at one of the major demonstrations opposing the invasion of Iraq because Lerner criticized the anti-Semitism that he perceived in the way that criticisms were being made of Israel. Yet Lerner has received a steady supply of death threats from others in the Jewish world who believe he is anti-Israel.

his stand (in TIKKUN magazine) which calls for Israel to respect Palestinian human rights and end the Occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.

Lerner resides in Berkeley, California with his wife Rabbi Debora Kohn Lerner.

http://tinyurl.com/89raus

[The people have spoken]

And in return for the captured Israeli soldier Gilad Schalit, it asks for the release of 1,000 Palestinians imprisoned in Israel.

That's disproportionate!