Jewish World Review Nov. 17, 1999 /8 Kislev, 5760
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| At least somebody finds him funny |
Tim Boxer
KNOWING THAT Vice President Al Gore “likes a good Jewish joke,”
Manno Ratzker, international board chairman of Shaare Zedek
Medical Center, proceeded to tell about the elderly gentleman in Boca
Raton who goes into his favorite restaurant and finds a lady sitting
alone at the bar.
“I’ve never seen you here before,” he says. “Where have you been?”
“In prison,” she replies.
“Really? How long?”
“Almost 25 years.”
“What for?”
“I bludgeoned my husband to death.”
“Oh, does that mean you’re single?”
Gore broke up. He was the centerpiece of a recent Shaare Zedek dinner honoring basketball icon
Michael Jordan’s mother, Deloris, at Chicago’s Drake Hotel. Ratzker presented her with the Raoul
Wallenberg Humanitarian Award.
Chicago TV broadcaster Jay Levine noted the ecumenical aspect of the evening: “We are seeing an
African-American woman honoring a Swedish gentile who saved Hungarian Jews.”
“I like a good Jewish joke,” Gore confirmed, and offered one that everyone had heard before but
everyone laughed heartily because, after all, he’s the Veep.
The story concerns the first Jewish president to be inaugurated in January 2009. (Notice it will not
happen during the next two terms, which Gore aspires to fill.)
The man calls his mother: “Ma, I’d like you to be there and sit on the platform.”
“I can’t. I have nothing to wear. It’ll be too cold. Who’ll I sit with?”
“Don’t worry. I’ll buy you a new coat and you’ll sit with the secretary of commerce.”
As he takes the oath of office, the mother nudges
“Yes.”
1. “The second time she said 'shalom' I knew she meant goodbye.” [Editor's note: The word "shalom" has three meanings: "peace," "hello," and "goodbye."]
2. “I’ve got my foot on the glass (now where are you?”)
3. I was one of the Chosen People till she chose somebody else.”
Gore, who affirmed his strong support for Israel (“I took my whole family there”) said he was happy to
honor Deloris Jordan. They worked together two years ago in Nashville at his annual conference on
family policy.
He asked her what made Michael succeed as a basketball champion. Did she send him to camp to
become an outstanding athlete?
“Deloris told me she did not set out to raise a superstar,” Gore said. “She simply raised all her five
children to be upstanding individuals.”
Three of her five children, but not Michael, were at the dinner. At the beginning of the evening, daughter
Roslyn sang “Hatikvah” (Israel's national anthem) in flawless Hebrew.
Now that Gore and his wife, Tipper, have become grandparents for the first time (the baby was born on
the Fourth of July) he said he could use some grandfatherly advice.
“I learned one thing,” the vice president said. “I learned that the preferred technique is to give your
grandchild whatever he wants. If that doesn’t work, just send him back to his parents.”
Similarly, Deloris made mention of her 11 grandchildren, “whom I get to spoil and then send
06/28/99: Always A godfather, never a god
Jewish Humor With the veep
the secretary of commerce: “You see that man up there
with his hand raised in the air?”
“His brother is a doctor.”
Sensing his audience probably had heard this one, Gore told us something we didn’t know. He revealed
the three top Jewish country and western songs making the rounds in his native Nashville:
JWR contributor Tim Boxer is the celebrity columnist of the
New York Jewish
Week and author
of Jewish Celebrity Hall of Fame and Jewish Celebrity
Anecdotes. Send your comments to him by clicking here.
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