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Jun 26, 2016

Ivory Tower Agita: On Israel And The Past, The Left Loses Its Way

The Tower

Never before have liberals and progressives had so little in common; indeed, the words themselves are beginning to mean very different things. The Democratic Party is suffering through a summer identity crisis, courtesy of Bernie Sanders’ now-unwinding insurgency against the liberal establishment. His promises—of universal healthcare, tuition-free state college, and a more aggressive taxation of the top one percent—are forcing liberal Democrats to decide whether equality of outcome, rather than opportunity, is the new rallying cry of the old Left.
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Jun 7, 2016

Ali And The Jews On Miami Beach: An Excerpt From Thane Rosenbaum’s Comic Novel “how Sweet It Is!”

Jewish Week

This is an excerpt from Thane Rosenbaum’s most recent novel, “How Sweet It Is!” (Mandel Pillar Press), which will be out in paperback in the fall. The novel is set in Miami Beach in 1972, featuring a host of historical characters who all happened to be in the city during that year, one of whom was Muhammad Ali, who died last week at 74. What Ali, a recently converted Muslim who was outspoken in support of the Palestinian cause, was doing in Miami Beach, living among the Holocaust survivors and Jewish transplants from the Northeast, is a novel all on its own. Actually, the mere thought of Ali in this exotic Jewish habitat is stranger than fiction, which Rosenbaum maximizes to full comic effect. In this excerpt, Ali is befriended by an irreverent local rabbi who is as unorthodox as the always-clowning, loud-mouthed boxer himself.
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