Should Jews Own Christmas Trees?

Should Jews Own Christmas Trees?

By MARK OPPENHEINER and JESSICA GROSS

Slate
Dec. 13, 2010, at 8:37 PM ET

Dear Jessica,

Slate has challenged us to debate a truly crucial matter this holiday season, one of weighty philosophical significance—whether it's OK for Jews to have Christmas trees. We've never met, but I understand that you are a fellow member of the tribe, a Hebrew sister, and thus I feel a personal mission to save you from the blandishments of mainstream Christian material culture (a culture I happen to adore, but for other people). Also, I am hoping you can ask your mom if she has a good kugel recipe.

To start out, we should agree that the argument over Christmas trees is not a theological one, for Christians or for Jews.

Nixon Disses Us Again

Nixon's Jewish Problem
Speaking from the grave, Richard Nixon talks trash about members of the tribe once again.
By Jack Shafer
Posted Monday, Dec. 13, 2010, at 3:57 PM ET

From his throne in hell, Richard Nixon commands our attention once again with newly released White House tapes from February and March 1973 that drop another tanker load of piss and bile on Jews.

"The Jews are just a very aggressive and abrasive and obnoxious personality," he told an aide.

"Most Jewish people are insecure. And that's why they have to prove things," he said.

"I didn't notice many Jewish names coming back from Vietnam on any of those lists; I don't know how the hell they avoid it," he remarked.

When then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said, "If [the Soviets] put Jews into gas chambers in the Soviet Union, it is not an American concern," Nixon concurred. "I know," he responded. "We can't blow up the world because of it." (See the Dec. 11 New York Times story for more background.)