Free Republic

HOW DO we even begin to measure the degree of crassness embodied in Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s failure to show up at Wednesday’s Days of Remembrance Holocaust Observance at the Old State Capitol? There simply is no metric for an act of omission that so clearly demonstrates this governor’s lack of respect for so many things: for those who planned and participated in Wednesday’s event, for the history it represents, for the very office that he holds. The Holocaust observance is a 27-year tradition that, until 2004, always had featured the governor in attendance. Blagojevich missed it in 2004 because he...

BERLIN (AP) — A 55-nation group of European and North American countries on Thursday denounced "new forms and expressions" of anti-Semitism and rejected any attempt to justify them on the basis of strife in the Middle East. In a final declaration, the governments unanimously condemned "all attacks motivated by anti-Semitism or by any other forms of religious or racial hatred or intolerance, including attacks against synagogues and other religious places, sites and shrines." U.S. and German delegates welcomed the document as a strong, timely denunciation of anti-Semitism and a pledge by each member to combat hate crimes against Jews. The...