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May 20, 2013

Richard A. Serrano: Is Meir Kahane's assassin now a changed man?

Hannan Adely: Town raises Palestinian flag at City Hall

Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Morgan Housel: When smart investors do stupid things

Sharon Saloman, M.S., R.D.: Hunger games: Eat more, weigh less, without starving

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star

The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation

David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church

Emily Alpert: Recession dragged down birth rates for less-educated women
Morgan Housel: The deep downside of home ownership

Peter Teffer: Will Dutch police soon be stalking cybercriminals on your computer?

Heidi McIndoo, M.S., R.D.: Meatless 'meat' can have its own set of problems

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Celebrate! This must-try appetizer is delicate yet has depth of flavor: Corn-Leek Cakes with Caviar, Smoked Salmon and Creme Fraiche

May 10, 2013

Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be

Caroline B. Glick: The dirty little secret about Israel's Arabs

Mona Charen: Hawking's Moral Calculus: The man and the movement he embraces
Morgan Housel: The biggest retirement myth ever told

Sandi Doughton: Eyes may provide new insight into brain problems

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : The Great Gatsby's Jewish Ties; Jews in the "Time 100 list" List; People's Most Beautiful Women

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: A sweet-hot meal: Pear salsa spices up salmon

May 8, 2013

Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas

Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate

Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
Amanda Paulson: Study reveals sad truths about community colleges

Harvard Health Letters: Evidence weak that zinc, echinacea are beneficial

The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility

May 6, 2013

Edmund Sanders and Patrick J. McDonnell: Think Israel's objective in Syria is to weaken Assad or embolden the rebels? Think again

Brian Bennett: Israeli airstrikes may show weakness in Syrian defense

Michael Ollove: Millions of ex-felons, parolees and those on probation are about to be entitled to tax-payer paid health coverage
Karen Kaplan: Most men can skip PSA test for prostate cancer, urologists say

Kimberly Lankford: How to track down a lost life insurance policy

Dream of Mars exploration achievable, experts say

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan M. Selasky: EGGPLANT WRAPS are an easy, sumptuous and scrumptious meal

May 3, 2013

Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Human Courage and the Unavoidable, Disturbing Text

Steven Emerson: Attorney General Fights CAIR in Court, Lauds it in Public

Mediterranean diet helps beat dementia: study
Harvard Health Letters: When to be screened for a hearing problem

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Iron Man's Jewish Connections; Marc Maron's New TV Show; Martin Landau Grows Up with Israel; Shalom, Allan Arbus

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: A sweet surprise for Mother's Day dessert

May 1, 2013

Jonathan Rosenblum: An Improbable Journey to Orthodoxy

Jonathan Tobin: Blame Obama, Not Israel for Syria Push

Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Halena M. Gazelka, M.D.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: What you need to know about implanted pain relief devices

Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine

Jessica Shugart: When it comes to math, MRIs may be better than IQs

The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: The celebrated chef on how high-maintenance ASPARAGUS RISOTTO need not be

April 29, 2013

Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust

Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?

Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Morgan Housel: He's rich, smart and old: Listen to him

Thomas Salinas, D.D.S.: Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: The safety of amalgam fillings

Harvard Health Letters: Tomatoes and stroke protection

Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA

The Kosher Gourmet by Diane Rossen Worthington: Swing into spring with lemon cream pie

April 26, 2013

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The world is a mirror

Caroline B. Glick: Time to confront Obama

Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Kimberly Lankford: New strategies ease pain of paying for long-term care insurance

Howard LeWine, M.D.: Ask the Harvard Experts: Too much ibuprofen?

Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Jewish Major Leaguers, 2013; New Movies and Comedy Show; Shalom, 'Lumpy' (Leave it to Beaver)

The Kosher Gourmet by Emily Ho : A bright and cheerful salad to herald the warmer months ahead

April 24, 2013

Steven Emerson: Boston Bomber Exposes Islamist Secret

Morgan Housel Admit it: No one has any idea what's going on
Harvard Health Letters: Can you get headaches from headache medication?

Kerri-Ann Jennings, M.S., R.D.: How to easily get more Omega-3s in your diet

Melissa Healy: Pot in a pill: All the pain relief without the smoke

The Kosher Gourmet by Susan Russo: Chipotle Chili Butternut Squash Soup is bold, zesty, hot

April 22, 2013

Ken Dilanian: Counterterrorism's future is unclear

US man departing country arrested on terror charges
Barbara Williams: An unorthodox but growing treatment in a 9-year-old's battle against cancer

P.J. Skerrett, M.D.: How to recognize a good whole grain product

Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom: Teen actor Jonah Bobo in New Flick: Hunky James Wolk on Mad Men; Erich Segal's Daughter Writes Prize-Winning Jewish Novel


Jewish World Review Sept. 11, 2009 / 22 Elul 5769

History Made to Order

By Paul Greenberg




http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | At the outset of the great break-up of the Soviet Union, many of us hoped Russia would emerge as a free country, if not an ally then a friend. Looking back, any outcome so idyllic was about as realistic as Russia's becoming something other than Russia. Instead, the new Russia that emerged looks a lot like an old one, specifically the tsarist one.


One hallmark of Russia's long night under Stalin and his successors remains essentially unchanged: a tendency to airbrush the past to suit the political needs of the present. Note some recent comments from Russia's new tsar and old KGB man, Vladimir Putin — former president, current premier and future whatever-he-wants-to-be. Making a ceremonial appearance in Warsaw on the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of the Second World War, he couldn't help but repeat a standard feature of the old regime's custom-tailored history: The war was the West's fault. KGB reflexes die hard.


Not that Comrade and now Mister Putin denied that Stalin's Russia brought on the war by signing an alliance with Hitler's Germany. For that alliance meant the Nazis could invade Poland without having to worry about being challenged from the East, so they could proceed to turn the full force of their war machine against the West.


But the Russian leader had to go and compare the Nazi-Soviet Pact with the Western powers' earlier appeasement of Hitler at Munich: "Without a doubt there are full grounds to condemn the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact of August 1939, but after all, a year earlier, France and England signed a well-known agreement with Hitler in Munich…"


But after all, while the British and French offered up a small country — Czechoslovakia — in hopes of bringing Peace In Our Time, they didn't join the Nazis in splitting it up, the way the Soviets did Poland. For, just as promised under the secret clauses of the Nazi-Soviet Pact a month before, the Russians grabbed half of Poland as it fell to the Nazi onslaught. An always-shrewd bargainer, Stalin would also get the Baltic republics as lagniappe, assuring they would become Soviet satrapies for half a century. The Nazi-Soviet Pact made war certain, and it would prove the greatest war in history, costing some 40 million lives ad casting whole nations into Soviet captivity.


In touching up Soviet history, Vladimir Putin overlooked a key difference between Neville Chamberlain's naive belief that he could do business with the aggressor and Josef Stalin's cold-blooded decision to join the aggression, and split the booty. At the time, the official Soviet line was that Russia had occupied the eastern half of Poland only to keep order on its borders. The Kremlin also used the opportunity to wipe out the Polish officer corps in the Katyn Forest, a massacre it would blame on the Nazis when it came to light. The Germans were already planning to exterminate millions; why not chalk up another 20,000 or so Poles to their account? Who would know the difference? And so, to all of Communism's countless victims, add history. And now Vladimir Putin continues to distort it even while acknowledging it. By now it's a Russian tradition.


Let there be no misunderstanding. Let's not pretend Western history is some objective, abstract exercise divorced from the passions of the day. History seldom if ever is. For history is not the same as the past but a selective view of it. Often enough our history has been another branch of our politics. The fight for history is conducted not just in police states. At least since Hamilton's and Jefferson's day, each of America's competing parties has offered a different version of the past in order to attract voters to its different vision of the future.


For example, the current administration keeps comparing the recession the country is slowly climbing out of with the Great Depression of the 1930s, although there can be no real comparison. Just look at the unemployment figures from each era, let alone those old photographs of soup kitchens and bread lines.


But in this country there's an opposition and a free press and mid-term elections, complete with a secret ballot, to check the party in power and its authorized history. But in an authoritarian state, the past is just one more nationalized industry. When those who should be correcting the record are silenced, the Stalins and Hitlers are free to remodel history according to their likes. And so are the Putins. Which is why this latest attempt to twist history should not go unchallenged.

Paul Greenberg Archives

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JWR contributor Paul Greenberg, editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, has won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing. Send your comments by clicking here.

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