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The Seven Pillars of Wisdom From Chaim Amalek

Here is more tough talk from Chaim Amalek (whoever he may be):

Just when it seems that you can't get any more juvenile, here you are discussing the size of your rear end with a 15 year old girl. You would not have done this four years ago. Back then, you were engaged in the controversial and necessary work of taking on the adult entertainment industry and the rabbinate. But these days you are a capon, giggling like a school girl about the size of your derriere. Is it any wonder that real women, women with functioning ovaries and fresh eggs, reject you out of hand? Such women want real men to take care of them, not giggling middle aged men who act like schoolgirls.

My advice to you is this:

1. Stop play acting, and rejoin your gender and your demographic. You are 38, not 13; a man, not a girl.

2. Return to Christ and make peace with your Father.

3. If you refuse to do (3), then spend the next six months in Israel.

4. Spend some money and get yourself a decent car or truck and some housing that a real woman might want to visit.

5. Stop giggling.

6. Can the gerontophilia.

7. Resume the initiative in life.

AMALEK has told you what to do, now go do it!

JMT writes: Save your breath, Amalek. Luke is a quirkyalone."

Cecile's Donkey

Yaakov writes Luke: "Have you apologized to Cecile yet? If not, do so right now. It will make her feel better. You see, though a grandfather makes fun and though she chides herself, it's not a permission slip for you to join in. Her grandfather is wrong to do it. And she does it only to show that she's a good sport. Deep down, it hurts, beyond what you in your pathological narcissism, could ever imagine."

Luke writes Cecile: "I'm sorry for my 'chubby chasers' remark."

Yaakov writes: "CC me the apology. Not enough. you need to grovel."

Luke: "Fine, write it for me and I will send it."

Yaakov: "Write it yourself, you coward."

Luke: "I was simply trying to communicate to the secular Jew in her language."

Cathy Seipp's 14 year old daughter Cecile du Bois writes Luke:

My mom says she does not want my 'giant ass' on her delicate china-like lap. Your chubby remark may apply to this situation, but otherwise, I am relatively slim, (you can alert the media).

We shall from now on, with our dear friend Nicholas, mock you incessantly about your underwear shots, (which you don't look that hideous in--perhaps you'd like to be a model on frumster?)

Mom is now in the content phase of having a 120lb+ teen daughter on her lap.

FYI, I have to lose four pounds. How many do you have to lose? We can have a race or contest! (: We can be diet buddies! And can we co-start a diet blog from tips of the trade from Sugar Magazine.

Headline: Luke and Cecile burst into tears over their fat asses.

Headline: Luke and Cecile compare asses.

Mom is cackling, shouting, "YEAH!!!"

Mom will get her broom and start flying in the night air in ecstasy over the idea of her best friend and daughter being fat ass pals. Maybe we can start a trend for 39 year olds and fifteen year olds being 'buddies'.

I bet all my classmates are hot on the idea. What do you say? We can meet at Starbucks and start diet clubs from orthodox men to secular amoral teen girls. You can be our big brother! I have a friend or two that may be interested, seriously.

"ENOUGH!", my mother screeches, landing on the floor from her long adventurous ride. I have to massage her ass now.

I may be irrational, but helping each other on our diets doesn't seem like a bad idea. We can start a blog to rival Gastroblog. (OK not serious in the area.)

Or we can start a diet blog and learn how to cook nonfat kosher foods like lemonade, bland bean tamale, and other 7 day adventist friendly foods. And we can log our progresses, create charts and bet who will win the most amount of weight in the shortest amount of time. Whoever wins has to buy the other one a blogad--or the reward of your choice. What do you say?

I'd like to drop ten pounds, particularly everything excessive in my middle and cheeks.

David Deutsch writes: "Before Hollywood's powers that be get too excited by the fact that Dawn of the Dead has replaced The Passion at the #1 spot, they need to stop and consider that many of those seeing the former may have thought it was the sequel to the latter."

My Miraculous Afternoon With Cathy

Cathy Seipp writes:

I went to see that hockey movie "Miracle" with Luke Ford today. I liked it, although not in the same yelling, cheering sports fan way he did, and I don't get the same gratification he apparently does at seeing men in helmets bodyslam each other.

He seemed faintly peevish before the movie for some reason ("You're really pushing my buttons today!"); apparently I ate candy too loudly, squirmed too much in my seat, wrote too much about Sandra Tsing Loh this week. I don't know, maybe I was even sniffling or something. But he cheered up when the "Scooby-Doo" trailer came on, laughing happily all through it, especially when Scooby fell on people.

Cathy walks up to me at the Beverly Connection, invades my body space, and gives me a big hug and kiss. I loudly protest that is strictly against the rules. We normally do not touch. I save that for shiksas.

We dined at the newly kosher Baja Fresh. I had a bean and cheese burrito and she had a small quesadilla. She got a small iced tea and I got a large lemonade. There's a fountain where you can refill drinks as many times as you like.

Cathy tells me proudly that when she and her daughter dine at such places, they just order one small drink between them, and then share it, getting as many refills as they like. I say that is immoral.

I then extract from Cathy that she's told her daughter to lie about her age so she can get into things like Disneyland cheaper. Cathy also thinks it is just fine to smuggle food and drinks into theaters where such behavior is clearly prohibited. Cathy thinks only goyim play by such rules.

Cathy was good in getting me into a bathroom at Starbucks, albeit it was the ladies room. As a token of my affection, Cathy's always hinting for tokens of my affection, I consider allowing her to hold my peepee while I go weewee but the call of a Higher Moral Law intervenes.

Cathy has me pay for lunch and the movie as partial recompense for the numerous times I've violated her copyright, not to mention her person.

We enjoy the movie Miracle though Cathy has no clue about sports.

I beat a hasty exit without any exchange of tokens of affection, such as hugs. It's not easy to stay chaste in this sinful city. But if anybody can, Your Moral Leader can.

Cecile writes: "Save your apologies for a harsher penalty. And by the way--if you're apologizing, it means I'm chubby. And please, for decency's sake, please stop joking about 'violating' my mom."

LF.net Whites-Only Scholarship

I wonder if Lukeford.net should ape this and start up a scholarship for hot young white women only. First prize is one date with Luke Ford. Second prize is two dates with Luke Ford. Third prize is a weekend away with Luke in Bakersfield.

Prospective applicants for my scholarship should write an essay on why you are proud of your white heritage and include a recent picture to confirm your whiteness and hotness. Evidence of bleaching will disqualify applicants.

There is no GPA requirement; only a minimum C cup or better to qualify.

I Gave Good Advice

A few days ago, I ran into a friend for the first time in years. We used to have dinner once a month. She's been happily married for a couple of years. About three years ago, she said she was thinking of dating a good friend but she feared jeopardizing the friendship. I told her not to fear. A male-female friendship is inherently unstable (if you are spending time together alone regularly) so you might as well risk it for something more rewarding. My friend now thanks me.

LA Press Club Suckup To Frank Del Olmo

Read the February newsletter here. Here's an excerpt of Bob Baker's report:

Frank del Olmo, a Los Angeles Times associate editor and columnist who became an icon to Latino journalists during nearly 34 years at the newspaper, died of an apparent heart attack at his desk on Feb. 19. He was 55.

Del Olmo was a quiet, intellectual journalist who carried on the mantle of a more flamboyant crusader of an earlier era, Time columnist Ruben Salazar. But he had a greater impact because of the decades as a reporter, editor and columnist. Raised in Los Angeles, del Olmo spanned a half century in which Latinos rose from discrimination and invisibility to the leading demographic group in the region. His ability to bring historical and social perspectives to his writing made him one of the most insightful Latino journalists in the world.

XXX writes:

I wanted to hurl when I saw that the LA Press Club was doing a tribute for Salieri. Couldn't believe Baker's suck up to the dead in the 8-ball. Some major inaccuracies, too. Reported that Del Olmo had been a foreign correspendent, which he wasn't. His trips to Central America had been special assignments while he'd been on the Metro Staff or on the Editorial Staff. Reported that he had overtaken Ruben Salazar in his reporting, which also is untrue. Before he began his controversial column at the Times, Ruben had spent several years covering the war in Vietnam as a reporter for the Times, plus numerous other years covering other hard news for the Times. Ruben was meat; Del Olmo meat loaf. Then there was the quote from sad-sack shill Felix Gutierrez about Del Olmo being the first Latino to ascend to the heights of journalism or some crap like that. Before Geraldo was Geraldo, he was an outrageously good journalist, who broke some major stories in New York City and had an impact on righting wrongs in the state homes for neglected children. There was a reporter named Carlos Conde from Texas, a friend of Salazar's who in the mid-1960s won several national awards for his coverage of migrants in South Texas. So why this big memorial for Del Olmo? I mean, I used to attend the LAPress Club awards dinner and never saw his ass at any of them. I used to hang out at the old Press Club on Vermont, often closing down the bar there, and never saw him there or could get him down there. Was he himself ever a member?

What Do You Do As A Parent When Your Kid Gets Ejected From School?

The child of a friend of mine was ejected from an Orthodox day school (two months short of graduation).

My friend asked for my advice. I wrote back (I've censored out names):

First, my sincere condolences on this. I believe I have a special empathy here knowing both A and expulsion. This must be a painful blow all round.

Second, this expulsion does not surprise me. Not because I view A as wicked or this school or this rabbi as wicked. I just am not surprised that the two of them proved incompatible.

Third, I don't have any emotional investment in your taking any of my advice here. So whatever you do is fine with me and I'm your supportive friend.

Four. My advice is that you do not send the letter and that you and A do not raise any fuss over this. I guarantee you that the expulsion was not over the events described. They are a pretext to get rid of someone this rabbi believes is not compatible with his school. Just like when a couple fights -- it is rarely about what they are explicitly saying.

That you and A absorb the terribly painful blow, make as few waves as possible, and go on with your lives as best you can...and let the meaning of the events come to you in the months and years ahead. If you must, then at least wait a few more days before sending. I don't think you've been terribly intemperate in your wording but I just don't think as the parent of the child in question you can effectively advocate for A. Allow your friends to rise up, or not rise up, on her behalf.

Could the letter do any good for A? I don't think there's any chance she will be reinstated. I think it's a painful life lesson. There will be future classes, schools, friendships, relationships and jobs where behavior that seems to me, you and A as harmless childish fun is exactly the behavior that severs the relationship. A is your not average Orthodox kid and she is going to encounter a lot more of this type of ejection and rejection in life (as I have my whole life) and I think the important thing is get past blaming the ejector/rejector and just realize that A's independence (like mine) is a gift and a curse and that community/freedom are antipodes and the more you want of one, the more you have to give up of another.

My intuition is that this has nothing to do with this particular rabbi and everything to do with the independent A who will have to suffer these types of ejections in the future for being authentic to herself. And one day you both will be able to laugh about this.

I'd tell A that because of the way she is constituted, as long as she is authentic to who she is, she will encounter a lot of rejection. And she will have to be strong enough to pick up her bags and walk much of life alone.

I truly don't think the main issue here is this rabbi or this Jewish school or even Orthodox Judaism. A will still be struggling with similar issues to this when she's 40. There's no answer to them, just continual compromises to who she is and how much of that she'll give up to get along. I identify with A and I guess I'm writing this letter first of all to myself.

................

Cathy Seipp writes:

You seem to have hit a chord with that one. I liked your letter to your friend. Good adivce. On the other hand, I think Tony Castro also had a point. But somtimes it's possible to have it your cake and eat it too.

For instance, when that 400-lb principal at Maia's old elementary school didn't want her to keep her asthma inhaler in her backpack, and backed up the idiot teacher who'd screamed at her in class for using it, what I did was this: (a) with some help from Jill Stewart, had a fax on his desk within 45 minutes of our argument informing him that he was either lying to me or misinformed, since according to LAUSD code, students indeed ARE allowed to keep their inhalers with them instead of locked in the school office; (b) removed Maia from the school anyway, transferring her in the middle of the yr to the private one where she is now; (c) had a talk with the district supervisor, who had a talk with the principal, so that other kids wouldn't encounter the same problem; (d) wrote an article for Reason about how these zero-tolerance drug laws keep kids from asthma inhalers, to get the word out about misinformed school administrators, and also a Weekly Standard article about how 5 yrs as a public school parent turned me into a Republican; (e) won a $1000 award from an asthma association for the Reason article.

I had also hoped that the principal's stressful encounter with me would cause him to have a stroke -- I mean, he DID weigh 400 pounds -- but you can't have everything.

Fred writes:

It seems that the yeshivah sounds a good deal less like a school, and more like a North Korean training institution, where any sort of life and individualism is quickly beaten out of the students. Why in the world would anyone send a child there?

I speculate that what would really get the principle's goat is to send a letter (with a cc to all the rabbis) a) setting forth the facts, b) explaining that the real issue is the complete inability of the school to deal with anyone who shows the slightest sign of creativity, individuality, or original thought, c) the lack of teachers who merit respect because of their knowledge, intellect or ability. End with a paragraph saying that you understand that there is a nearby religious school, St. Mary's, that has a program for gifted and creative children that might be more appropriate.

In answer to your other question, I have had a few dates with women in my acting classes. I'm waiting for my moral leader to give me permission to score.

Tony Castro writes:

I was moved by both the incident and your words of counsel. From the distance of time, I would agree whole-heartedly with what you've advised.

From the heartbreak or a similar experience, however, I would advise almost the opposite.

Two weeks before my senior year in high school, I was forced to leave my school -- a school where I was a big cheese of some repute: newspaper editor, National Honor Society president, varsity athlete. At the time I did not feel that I had the supportive family that your friend appears to be. I sought out the advise of two close professors from the local university. They advised almost the same thing you have outlined.

I followed their advise, changed schools and went on my way. From the distance of time, I can see that little likely would have changed had I made a fight of it.

But at that time, and for a few years afterward, I became consumed by a sense that I had been wronged -- and, worse, that many people came to the conclusion not that I had been wronged, but that somehow I had been in the wrong, because of the way I had walked away from the situation.

Move the story along. Several years later, when I was a junior in college, I was secretly married to someone who was going to be a senior in high school (bad judgment, I know, but that's an entirely different story to be told later). Shortly before her graduation, it was discovered that she was secretly married. The school administrators then proceeded to strip her of several honors: valedictorian, National Merit scholarship, recognition in the yearbook for all her accomplishments -- cheerleader, honor society and more. We were advised by several people to just walk away from all that and begin our life together.

Much to our surprise, her parents chose to stand up and fight -- possibly redirecting their anger over what we had done to the school district. After consulting with a lawyer, they began legal action that threatened to hold up graduation exercises and hold administrators liable for emotional duress to their daughter. Within days, the school district backed down. My young bride was reinstated as valedictorian with all honors and awards.

My point, I suppose, is that you can't let school administrators -- be they secular or religious -- get away with the totalitarian approach they take with the lives of young people, at least not without a fight.

My high school journalism advisor felt that I had been disrespectful to her during a weeklong journalism workshop we had attended at Texas A&M University.

At this super-duper j-workshop, the students put out a newspaper. You need a little background, in Texas high schools at this time (and possibly still today) there existed a journalism circuit that included journalism workshops, conferences, competitions and more that took place every two weeks or so at various places around the state. Many of these students and journalism counselors knew each other. My j teacher happened to be a woman who was about 4-feet-8 who was also a ball of energy and enthusiasm. She regularly made fun of herself, and she was closely involved with all of us. At this Texas A&M workshop, we profiled two or three of the best-known teachers. Having know my teacher for two years, not only at school but during a lot of weekends on this journalism circuit, I thought I could do the best job profiling her. I thought I did. I certainly wouldn't have done anything to jeopardize my standing with her, knowing full well she would be one of my strongest letters of recommendation for college.

Well, she hated the story. She made things worse by telling the principal that this had been just part of some general misbehavior on my part during this entire workshop.

Two weeks before the school year began, I was called to the school to meet with her and the principal. They had already judged the situation and concluded that for the first semester, I would be suspended from any kind of extra-curricular activity -- sports, school paper, student government, etc. -- and that this might be lifted for the second semester, depending on my behavior and attitude.

I wound up that year at a local private school, where I was able to do all the things I would have been suspended from doing at the school I'd attended for two years.

Unfortunately, the story that began circulating about my departure had nothing to do with the facts. According to the story that reached my new school, I had been kicked out of my old school because I'd gotten a girl pregnant -- one version of the story being that I'd knocked up a teacher. The story followed me around for years.

Dawn Eden writes:

I experienced tremendous antagonism from students, teachers, and administrators at school, particularly during my elementary-school years. My mother used to lose work hours getting called in to meet with teachers over my "acting out" in class. As with A, I was not a bad kid or a kid who didn't want to learn. I was a creative kid, very easily bored, and I didn't fit into the teachers' neat idea of conformity. Did I deserve discipline? Sometimes yes. Did I deserve outright antagonism? Of course not. Yet that was how students, teachers, and administrators often responded to me. My mother used to tell me that things would improve as I got into high school. She was right. A sounds bright and I'm glad you're encouraging her not to give up on learning, but rather to steel herself and to know that a better life is in her future.

There are certain problems with authority in general that I will always have because of who I am. But one will never feel trapped by authorities in the same way that one does when one is attending school. And one does acquire skills during life that enable one to better deal with oppressive situations. I can confidently say that every time I advanced from one school to the next, my life got much better, and I was better equipped to handle whatever problems came my way.

Chaim Amalek writes:

I like this kid. I think that she is going to become a really nifty woman, and an enormous credit to whichever communities she calls home. I also think that her kind does not belong in an orthodox setting, and that rabbi did her a tremendous favor in expulsion (although in timing it as he did, he deserves to live to see his daughters or grand daughters marry muslim shvartzes).

Orthodoxy is not for the vivacious, it is not for the experimenter or the original thinker. And by and large, the orthodox jew is not vivacious, is not an experimenter, and certainly must not be an original thinker. No, orthodoxy is for the living dead among us, for those who wish to be relieved of the terrible burden of having to think for themselves. That is why orthodox Judaism is truly a fossile faith, sustained only by the program of inbreeding that the orthodox use to compensate for all the better people it must expel, lest they contaminate the rest. True, in expelling the likes of this young woman, they have bestowed yet another posthumous victory on Adolf Hitler, but that is their sin, not hers.

Doktorb Hassan's Haiku

Luke you must not mess
with moldy spinster jewess
her cave fills with dust

Further Coverage Of Sandra Tsing Loh Party

Luke Y. Thompson writes to Cathy: "Evil Luke is slacking. I've never beaten him to the party write-up punch before, and I imagine I got home later than he did. He's also starting to describe me in ever-so-slightly non-negative terms."

Cathy replies: "AND he listened to me about the off-the-record stuff! What's with him? He may be turning into a real boy."

Friend writes: "Checked out the photos at Cathy Seipp's site. Who is Moxie? This is someone dreams are made of."

Tiffany Stone writes:

Corey Levitan brought up in front of Sandra that I had e-mailed him that I was only interested in being friends with him. I don’t know why Sandra would care. I guess it would be best for no male writers to hit on me at Press Club functions. I don’t want to deal with your egos, OK? Anyway, Corey has a column at Playboy and I don’t.

Best dressed award for women goes to hostesses Cathy Seipp (always in cute shift dresses) and Emmanuelle who mixes and matches clothes in that French way that most women can’t pull off. If absentee hostess Amy Alkon had been in town, she would’ve been noted as well.

RiShawn Biddle was wearing a fabulous double breasted trench coat. Luke Ford was in a nice suit and red tie. Luke was having a particularly good hair night. I wonder if he bought some new hair gel.

LA Press Club Party With Sandra Tsing Loh

I got to hang out with New York Times Hollywood correspondent Sharon Waxman and our mutual friend Evan Wright, who has a book coming out in June about his adventures in Iraq.

Andrew Breitbart went up to Xeni Jardin (tall bleach-blonde) and said, "Hey Cathy! How's it going?" These blonde women are so confusing.

I thought it was an interesting choice by Cathy to bring her 14 year old daughter Cecile du Bois to a bar where immoral journos get smashed and wear obscene t-shirts and try to pick up on chicks. But that's just the kind of wild and whacky woman Cathy is.

In Australia and England, familes go to bars and eat meals while pops get smashed. American bars tend to be darker and more forbidding places with a lot less singing.

Cathy Seipp writes:

Above is Sandra reading from two versions of her f--- KCRW speech: The first, official one, and the second, profanity-laced one. Which was off the record, and isn't it lucky for everyone that Luke Ford, who'd tape-recorded the whole thing, has finally realized that he doesn't actually enjoy it when I get mad at him and so agreed to refrain from transcribing it.

Special thanks to Matt Welch for lugging in the mike and amp, Kate Sullivan for lending it to us and her brother Ben Sullivan for finding the power outlets.

Others were (to borrow my favorite Jody Jacobs phrase): art critic Ezra Jean Black, who came with her friend Mary Woronov (glamorous even on crutches!); Mickey Kaus; Rob Long, who called me Malibu Barbie, in a way that I think was meant to be insulting but I can't remember how; David Rensin; "And the Dead Shall Rise" author Steve Oney; composer Carlos Rodriguez; Dennis Miller segment producer Kevin Bleyer (I'm going to be on Dennis Miller next week); Sharon Waxman of the N.Y. Times; Greg Braxton, who's been writing about Sandra for the L.A. Times; Variety's Patty Saperstein; "Hollywood Interrupted" authors Mark Ebner and Andrew Breitbart; Kevin Roderick of L.A. Observed; "Culture of Fear" author Barry Glassner and his wife, literary agent Betsy Amster; RiShawn Biddle, late of L.A. Business Journal; the (U.K.) Independent's Andrew Gumbel; and bloggers Xeni (who wrote up the party on BoingBoing, Patio Pundit Martin Devon, Rand Simberg, Tiffany Stone and Steve Smith.

Cecile du Bois writes:

I just got back from the LA Press Club party at the historic gorgeous Figueroa Hotel. Honoring Sandra Tsing Loh, and wearing stickers designed by Bill Higgins emblazoned, 'No Loh, No Dough!', we all mingled and and chat after Sandra made a hilarious sarcastic eight minute speech recounting Ruth Seymour asking her back and how she should have reacted.

After an applause, the party resumed. I chat with a friend of my father's,
Mickey Kaus, Steve Smith, Matt Welch, and Emmanuelle, Andrew Breitbart and Mark Ebner, and the coordinator of the Dennis Miller show.

Everybody was passing out stickers. I received one, and I put it on my chest. Maybe too low, because when I was chatting, a man looked uncomfortable when he glanced at the sticker and replied, "Oh its there--where a man should not be looking". My dress was too low cut despite an undershirt. "Much better than yesterday when she was wearing a skirt that was meant for somebody half her size", my grandfather earlier remarked to Luke Ford. Luke replied describing the boys who run after me, "chubby chasers". I almost threw my purse on him, but retained my cool, as I'm not that fat--yet.

The coordinator said I could go to my mother's taping next week, but I replied it was up to my mother. Then I chat with Mark Ebner, (who with Andrew Breitbard wrote Hollywood Interrupted: Insanity Chic in Babylon.) I enjoyed what I read of 'Interrupted' although I didn't get a chance to finish the remainder because of my mom's piece on it. Besides, I'm reading Podhoretz's Bush Country, but I may suggest the apropriate chapters of 'Interrupted' for my book club to read. (Some are too colorful for school material in the descriptions and interviews with the ---- industry.)

Mark Ebner, when the conversation shifted towards college, remarked he went to Bard by Bard College's Immediate Plan and suggested I could go to Simon's Rock College and graduate with a Bachelor's by eighteen or nineteen.

Yaakov writes:

Did you actually tell Cecile that boys who were interested in her were "chubby chasers?" If you indeed said that, then you are even more far gone than I ever imagined. Maybe you thought it was cute, but I assure you it's brutal and you deserve a whipping. What is wrong with you?

Here's the Halacha, it's in the Rambam: never tella woman that she's of a certain age, and never tell a girl that she's of a certain weight. It's common courtesy and I want you to treat Cathy and Maia as they deserve.

Cathy writes Luke: "Well it really wasn't very nice. That skirt looked VERY cute on her! Also on the other hand, I suppose it's more appropriate for you to be mildly insulting than ogling..."

Luke Y. Thompson, a nice guy who consistently dresses in an obscene fashion but as an unchurched Gentile without a mother to boss him around, he doesn't know any better, writes:

Luke Ford shows up early and feigns righteous indignation at my jersey, which he alleges will corrupt Cecile (she high-fives me in response). I tell him I'm proud to see him coming out to support profanity. He claims he's here to protest it, and since he doesn't drink, or eat the free hors d'oeuvres, he has plausible deniability, though I suspect he's just scoping for chicks. I might be too, if I were any good at it.

Cecile places one [sticker] just above her cleavage, which I tell her will attract inappropriate glances. She asks who will care; I suggest a certain individual with the same first name as me.

Kate Coe, who incorrectly "corrected" me on two different sites about the word gauauauauntlet, introduces herself, expressing the possibility that I could have hit her (I never hit women unless they hit first). She seems nice, though I can't quite get her to admit I was right. She mentions that she knows a girl who might be right for me -- said girl's major qualities are that she's right wing and a drug addict, apparently. Why this would suit me, I have no idea.

To Sir, With Love: Can I ask you yet another favor?

Cathy Seipp writes:

I wanted to put on my blog that I'll send No Loh, No Dough stickers to anyone who sends me a self-addressed, stamped envelope, but then I realized: I don't have a PO Box! And I don't think I should let all these nutty people who don't like me know where I live. But...uh...YOU have a PO Box, and if you just collected the envelopes for me and I got them from you, like once a week, then this would solve the problem.

I would do anything you like in return, even make you that bland Seventh Day Adventist style bean pie again that you liked a lot and I didn't. Even say "Luke, you're right!" several times, in a sincere tone. Even refrain from commenting on the psycho bimbo turn your blog has taken this week.

Hey did you notice my blog ad? MY BLOG AD MY BLOG AD MY BLOG AD? And this one's for a whole month too!

Wait, let me rephrase that: Of course, you're the one who really deserves the blog ad. Because your blog is so much better. And bigger.

Cathy, my box is your box.

Geez I didn't know you were going to post my entire embarassing groveling email. Well, at least you left off the....part of your already lewd response. But...OK... as promised, everything you do this week is fine with me and maybe it's good for people to see how nice I can be when I want something...

Amalek's Plan to Tart Up Luke Ford

Women are rejecting you because you are neither safe and reliable like a jewish lawyer or dentist, nor a dangerous bad boy like, um, well, no Jews come to mind, but you get the idea. Instead you fall into that middle ground, which is where the creeps are. This must change. You need to do a better job of extolling your hidden manly virtues.

To begin with, you are a GENUINE street brawler, having taken on a man much larger than you who, at the time, was working for powerful pornographer Larry Flynt. You worked against numerous death threats, never doing a Spain by wimping out. You CHOSE to be a Jew, when all around you are Jews who wish they were goyim. You have the smell of hot women of loose morals about you. You can get laid by them anytime you wish. You play by your own set of rules. Granted, that may not be the set of rules Jewesses on the cusp of their spinsterdoom would want, but then, those women are destined to be cleansed from the human genome by their own inaccurate view of their prospects. You are Luke Ford, a man's man, whom the average LA Jewess isn't hot enough to catch.

Let you bad boy personum hang out for all to see, swingin' in the breeze, and to hell with the women who cannot deal with it. Stop apologizing for who you are.

I'm A Scarred Veteran

David Deutsch writes:

I spent two years in the 101st Airborne Division 15 years ago, and I've got lifetime "manly man" status (I also have lifetime "tough Jew" status) You should look into this, Luke. It shouldn’t' be too difficult to find an Australian actor (I suspect Paul Hogan is available) to show up and pretend to be your old buddy from the Australian SAS. "What, you mean "Deadeye" never told you he was in the SAS? I guess after what happened in Iraq, he doesn't want to talk about it." He drops a few other oblique references, and "voila," instead of being an emotionally stunted misanthrope who suffers from dubious boutique illnesses like "chronic fatigue syndrome," you're an emotionally scarred veteran, unwilling to open up to a world which has caused you such pain, who perhaps suffers from exposure to chemical or biological weapons while on secret missions in Iraq during Desert Storm. After all, does anyone really know what you did before you showed up in LA in '94? Think about it, Deadeye.

Just remember--the next time you see some act of violence on the news or in a movie, avert your gaze, look off into the distance, and say softly "I've seen to much killing..."

Harlequin Romance Presents "Hovel of Desire" by Chaim Amalek

The hidden story of Luke Ford and Cindy Alexander.

Gentile Robert Light writes:

Luke Ford, dear friend of mine, recent convert to orthodox Judaism, is a clever journalist, iconic L.A. writer, author of a book, and was raised by a fire-breathing 7th Day Adventist preacher-theologian father in the outbacks of Australia. Quite a handsome fellow, he nevertheless lives in a shoebox (the hovel, as he calls it), a squalid room not even the Underground Man would envy, which he rents in a predominantly orthodox neighborhood in Fairfax district, L.A. He spends much of his time longing for a beautiful Jewess to bond with him in matrimony.

R. Berman writes:

As a proud (ersatz) Canadian and a (former) Orthodox Jew, allow me to throw in my two cents: Cindy Alexander = Alannis Morrissette + Fran "The Nanny" Drescher. Yes, I think that Fran is pretty hot, even if her voice sounds like an ocelot mangled her larynx. I couldn't help but notice that Cindy's cover version of Tom Petty's "American Girl" was produced by none other than Matthew Wilder. Yes, the dude with the pornstache who hit the charts with "Break My Stride" in the early 1980s. John Oates without the talent.

By the way, I remember my grade 8 gym teacher used to pronounce larynx as "LAR-NICKS." I swear that his name was Mr. Wood, which is a horrible moniker for a grown man who gets paid for handing towels to naked 12-year-old boys. To quote Beavis, "Huh-Huh-Huh. He said Wood..." Apropos of nothig, when I lived in NYC I met a rich old socialite named Beavis Longstreth. His wife, Clara, was the conductor of a choir that my then-girlfriend was in...

Time to go back to sleep. Praye for Tammy Faye.

A Note To My Readers

Gentle Readers (especially those of you who may be hot chicks and get all excited just thinking about this sort of thing), many thanks to Chaim Amalek for having written most of the original material on this site in recent days (including this, which I should have written my own but was too lazy to).

Chaim, while it would be contrary to the holy moral code that informs my existence to do this for you, I think you deserve sex with all manner of hot chicks in gratitude for your yeowman work.

And Cathy - are we agreed that if Chaim pays us a visit we are going to set him up with the hottest women in all of bloggerdom? Seed that contains genes such as his should not go wasted.

Luke Hits The Wall

Der Rebbe Gazooked writes Cathy Seipp: "Someone close to you is going to have a birthday in a few months, an especially important birthday. Yup, Luke Ford is about to "hit the wall." And I know what he wants. No, not a challah - he can get one of those at any bakery. What he really desires is a very old divan sofa from europe that was once slept on by the Samover Rebbe of Roumania. If you set yourselves to it, I am certain that you could find something reasonably similar in appearance to present him as a gift and to sit on yourselves. But if that does not work out, why not get him a dog? Let's see if he can take care of a puppy."

From The NYT:

In her personal documentary film, "Divan," Pearl Gluck, a bright, spunky rebel with multiple causes, has made what may be the first movie to evoke in equal measure the attraction of the highly circumscribed, ritualized world of Hasidic Judaisim and the equally compelling reasons she abandoned it.

"Divan," which opens today at Film Forum in the South Village, is an elaborate, flighty push-pull affair in which a so-called chorus of voices of ex-Hasidic Jews comments on Ms. Gluck's campaign to maintain her connection with her devout father, even after she has "slipped" (to use her word).

An Open Plea to the Woman Who Rejected Me for a Song

Please give me another chance. Please. There is another guy named Luke Ford who used to do and say bad things but I am not that guy, I am somebody else now. I know I've not been myself lately, but that is on account of the stress pills my doctor has been giving me. (Boy, can those cloud your thinking!) I am on some new meds and feel as right as rain now. No longer do I feel the need to undercut my cause (which is you, sweaty!) by saying transgressive things that I know will get a rise out of you. I am okay now, really I am. Please let me court you. Please meet me for a meal. Please return my calls. Please do not block my email. Please do not abandon me on account of a problem with the medicines I take for my sickness like my mommy abandoned me when I was a little boy. Please let me prove to you that I can be a man who can make you happy and who can take care of you and the many children we will have and who will buy you a nice divan to sit on and live birds to feed the cats you must own. Please be my sweaty pie.

Dawn writes Luke: "Ah, that's how you do it--compliment a woman's glands! I guess it's for when you feel like going beyond your usual "dry" wit."

Cathy writes: "Just a head's up: Most girls don't like being called "sweaty." I think they prefer "perspire-ey.""

Chaim writes: "Tell Cathy she is my sweaty pie of the blog world."

Robert suggests: "Too swishy. How about ...'I'm packin' nine inches toots!'?"

Khunrum writes: "It is time for a new game plan. Luke, you have taken enough crap from these literary gasbags. Next time there is one of those writer's forums I want you to show up with a ho. Introduce her proudly, "Good evening, this is my date, Amy." You will gain respect from the women and envy from the men. Don't hide your Luke Ford persona, flaunt it. Use it to your advantage. You were the best at what you did. Why be ashamed?"

Been Down This Road Before

Robert writes: "She's probably thinking, "Once an Asshole of the Month always an" .... well, you know. Get smart, Luke. Fake your death. Move on."

Chaim writes:

We've heard this story oh, twenty times before? Luke, you need to dance with them that brung you to the ball. ---- chicks. Amongst ---- chicks you can be a beacon of morality, a special man worthy of a young woman's attention. In the world of LA jewry, you are an outclassed and outgunned creepy middle aged man with few respectable prospects.

You would be so much happier if you would simply listen to me and do whatever I tell you to do.

"I want to be more."

If you want to be more, make more of what you are. Don't count on any woman who is more than you (in a narrow - very narrow - sense) to fall for you. Women tend to mate with their betters.

Find a young woman dipping her toe into ----, save her from the degradation, and mold her young mind into the woman you want for yourself. Established women are not likely to fall for you, except maybe if they are nearing the expiration date on their eggs. You are better off making your own high class woman than finding one already made. I'll bet Cathy agrees.

Luke, if you took my advice, you could marry two or three women who'd work at suck-ass jobs just to support you. You could be a house husband, with a nanny to help out.

"Real men don't live off women."

Real men don't live alone in hovels. Torah scholars lived off of their women. So why not XXX scholars? XXX is no less useful than Gemara. Next to these women you covet, you might as well be running a leaf blower.

"I live in a hovel because I am dedicated to my art. Leonardo DaVinci lived in a hovel."

DaVinci hung around Michaelangelo, who was a fag.

Stop wasting your life going after these upity Jewesses who would rather be alone and barren than have to admit that they may need to "settle" for the likes of you.

You do better with a shiksa. And if you find that the shiksas you can get are barely half the woman that the jewesses who reject you are, then get yourself two shiksas.

On the other hand, maybe the reason that broad canceled on you is that she fears she may be falling in love with you too quickly.

Maybe she is a lesbian.

"Maybe she'll get a song out of it."

Maybe she has some dirty secret that she fears you may expose.

If this chick calls you, tell her that you want to have this discussion with her face to face. Turn on the charm. Then tell her you are not good enough for her. Keep her confused.

Meanwhile, time to be dating some young hottie.

Where does she live? Maybe you ought to camp out on her doorstep.

Wait two weeks after getting dumped, then call her. Her menstrual cycle will be 180 degrees different, and you might have better luck. The smart man is aware of the lunacy women go through each month.

Jackie writes: "Chaim is funny, but I wanted to cry for you reading his demolition of your worthiness. God doesn't make mistakes, so I'm sure he made you...uh, the way you are, for a reason. Someday soon, I think, that reason will be revealed. It's not THAT far-fetched that you may have a steady, respectable, intelligent, hot Jewish girlfriend by then. I mean, if Milli Vanilli can win a Grammy, you can find love. I just know it."

The Cindy Alexander Affair

Handsome Bob writes:

Luke -- I'm laughing my ass off over the Cindy Alexander affair.

Funny, I was just talking last night with this friend. She tells me about this guy friend of hers who is a struggling (i.e. unemployed) writer . . . . who is Annie Lennox's boyfriend. He's 37. (No joke, I'm not making this up). They've been dating since last October. He had always wanted to meet Annie Lennox. It then occurs one evening at some Hollywood party he attends that she's also present. He walks up to her, introduces himself and they hit it off.

There is some tension that has developed over the last few months . . . . because Annie (who's net-worth is, oh, $100 milliion) is fed up with "footing the bill" for the poor bloke.

Now, isn't this ridiculous? Women in Western democracies achieve near parity with men in many areas of life. They've insisted ad nauseam that the sexes are (except for the plumbing), identical. Interchangeable. But if that is the case, then why doesn't love transcend material(istic) interest? Hmm? Wouldn't Annie's demands belie this silly claim that the sexes are perfectly interchangeable? Doesn't this just go to show that most women nevertheless want their "cakes" both for the having AND eating? After all, "man" (i.e. humankind) said Dostoevsky, "is the ungrateful biped."

I think there is something unseemly about a woman supporting a man. Yeah, I've been a gigolo in the past but that was then and this is now. I've been transformed by Torah. I pay for almost all my dates and then I'm repaid with their lovingkindness. That's the way God and nature intended. Men give a woman fancy food and gifts and then she gives them of herself.

Have you ever been to the Kabbalah Center for Kabbalat Shabbat?

A friend of ours (who has not been affiliated since I've known her), recently started going. She's been sucked in (bought a Zohar, and scans a few lines every day, even though she has no idea about the Aramaic text itself), but she goes there every Friday evening and Saturday morning.

She asked us to come for a service, and we finally said yes. I must say, there were many hot women there. I have no idea how many were Jewish. I also have no idea how many were taken with the New Age stuff. I have no idea how many were single.

I was sitting/standing right in front of Madonna and Demi Moore. Literally. They were in the pew behind me.

Why Cindy Alexander Should Look Favorably Upon Luke Ford

Chaim Amalek writes:

Dear Cindy:

I have known Luke Ford for what seems like, well, forever. I know him as well as a man, a real man, can know any other real man. I know his strengths, his weaknesses, and the middle ground too. Simply put, this man is a diamond in the rough, passed over by women too addicted to flash to gauge the solidity of what lies beneath.

We begin with the most important thing in life, genetics. As a born Jewess, you must be aware of how inbred we Jews have become. Consider me, Chaim Amalek, as a prototypical example. I am stooped, have a hairy back, coarse, rat-like white and grey hairs on my balding greasy scalp, allergies, breathing disorders, suffer from a weight problem (I'm currently 350 pounds) and I have a bitterness towards the goyim that only 200 generations of inbreeding can produce. Yes, I am more intelligent than your average gentile, but what has it gotten me? I own narry a bank nor newspaper, make no movies, and I wield no power over the moral development of the goyim. I live in fear of muslims, blacks, and I envy whites.

Now consider Luke Ford. As a convert to Judaism, he has none of my genetic deficiencies. Luke is the product of a hardy breed of white man who set forth from the Anglo-Saxon homeland to settle lands of the Southern Cross. He is strong, hearty, optimistic, smart, kind, not neurotic, not stooped, and has thick, luxuriant hair. Women - lots of women - like to be around him. But he remains alone in the world, perhaps because he knows that he must wait for the one woman who can complete him.

I suspect that you are that woman. And let's face it - you suspect that he is that man, although you have a few doubts. That is to be expected, of course, but let me steer you away from whatever doubts you may have as a result of googling his name. Yeah, there is someone out there using his name to run a website that is not anything I would be proud of, but that someone is not Luke Ford. It is someone who bought from Mister Ford his good name at a time when he was sorely in need of money to begin a new life in accord with the teachings of the Torah, someone who would be nobody without the fame Luke had already won for himself as a journalist of great repute. Don't hold that against Luke! His greatest days lie before him. All he needs is the love of a good woman like you, the many children we hope you can provide him, and his good genes to become a great success in life.

PS As the world darkens for the Jews, it would be especially beneficial for you to marry a man who has both a gentile name and gentile genes, but who has chosen to be Jewish. Think about your children! Marriage to Luke would give them the best of all possible worlds. But if you choose not to, Chaim Amalek will catch you the next time around the block.

PPS A good woman judges the worth of a man by the company he keeps. I am willing to fly out to LA to meet your beshert.

Linda writes: "Balding? He seems to have a full head of hair on the picture on your web site."

Chaim replies: "Who is this Linda? Is she hot? For the record, there are such things as the Hair Club for Men, Photoshop, and old pictures. Still, thinking that I got a rise out of this woman (heck, thinking that I could get a rise out of ANY woman) did give me a *******. Unfortunately, it got lost in the folds that encircle me. Women can be very shallow."

How Should An Orthodox Parent React If Her Daughter Wants To Become A Conservative Rabbi?

* "I'll stick my head in an oven."

* "Better you become a Jew for Jesus."

* "I'm happy with any honorable choice you make, and the Conservative rabbinate is an honorable choice."

* "If you want to get into politics, dear, then exercise your influence in the kitchen and the bedroom (and not the pulpit) as God intended."

* "Darling, you should quietly submit to the Torah and not to your own ambitions."

* "I feel like I've failed as a parent."

Steve writes: I think the first question to ask is: What should an Orthodox woman do if she wants to become a rabbi?

Luke says: Become Conservative.

Diminishing Free Speech

It was while interviewing David Friendly, the producer of a Honeymooners movie, that I realized we have considerably less free speech in America today than 50 years ago.

The problem is not the ability to flash tit at the Superbowl halftime show, or joke about anal sex on Howard Stern, or say "F---" on KCRW. The problem is with sensitivity to race, women and homosexuals.

Fifty years ago, you could joke about smacking your wife around, not to mention joke about dykes, kikes, beaners, spics, Irish men, wild dogs, and pansies.

I was experimenting with some 1950ish speech on my friend Cathy Seipp today: "I got the sense from you that wife-beating jokes have gone out of fashion. When did that happen? It was cool in the 1950s TV show The Honeymooners."

Cathy: "Say, Luke, what's with you and this new sleeveless undershirt, "STELLLAAA!" persona you're assuming today? It's rather weird!"

Luke: "You're gonna get it, Cathy! I'm warning you. Right there in the kisser..."

People just aren't as understanding of domestic violence and bigotry as they used to be.

Luke writes Cathy: "You're more horrid than I am."

Cathy writes: "I have a better collection of extremely sharp knives and you sometimes are overly fond of the caveman-like blunt instrument. But that's why we go together like bread and jam, right?"

The Future Mrs. Luke Ford, Cindy Alexander

I've found in my long lonely life that chicks really dig it when you write on your Web site that you will marry them.

My new friend Tony Castro (who almost converted to Judaism 20 years ago) tipped me off to Cindy. She's a friend of his wife Renee.

He emailed me Tuesday with the subject line, "The future Mrs. Luke Ford." In the body of the email, "www.cindyalexander.com."

I emailed her that she was the future Mrs Luke Ford. She replies: "Wow. Thanks for telling me. An orthodox dude into ----? Hmmmm. I gotta go check the Application for a Significant Other that I filed with Destiny a while back."

Tony fills me in: "I've seen her in concert. She's great. She's sexy. And she's alive. She's in her late 20s or early 30s. USC grad."

I'd like to be Cindy's Moral Leader.

To check her tastes, I ask her which is the superior music - Igor Stravinsky's The Rite Of Spring or REO Speedwagon's Hi Infidelity?

Cindy replies:

REO Speedwagon of course. What is davening? I almost got kicked out of Hebrew School/Confirmation by the way (I kept my walkman on during class). I'm not into organized religion and I made some comment about "What makes you think WE are the chosen people?" I think the only reason they kept me in there was because I sang in the choir.

I'd love to go to that cult meeting [LA Press Club] on Thursday but I JUST got back from Germany this morning and I am sooo overwhelmed with meetings and events this week. I'm also afraid to meet the cult members when I'm jet lagged - I may lose my identity and end up wearing white sheets and flowers in my hair by the end of the night. Perhaps I'll be more awake and psychologically stable by Sunday.

Luke writes Cindy: "I just want you to know that your music has changed my life. Not that I've heard any of it, but I've looked at your pictures and I could feel the music."

Cindy replies:

That is being printed and posted on my mirror as an affirmation for daily living.

I'm warning you - if you write anything nasty about me on your site, you'll have to deal with the Pnut Gallery, an army of mutants that follow the moral teachings of the undersigned. CA

I found two of her albums on my AOL Music subscription - Smash and See Red. I've promised to sing them all back to her when we meet for dinner.

Cindy's mom wrote a book from her dog's perspective -- Pockets: Full of Love. AskPockets.com.

Cindy's parents survived breast cancer. My mother did not.

Cindy Alexander's Yahoo fan club.

Cool Cindy Alexander page.

Cindy Alexander interview.

According to an Internet rumor that she denies, Cindy Alexander had an affair with Russell Crowe.

Cindi writes: "Luke, She is gorgeous. Wow. If you can hit that mark, take it and run with it."

I hope I am not putting too high of an expectation on things.

Are You Looking For A Date?

There's an uneasy association between the legitimate date, in which a man pays for a woman's company, and a tryst with a prostitute, in which he pays for her sexual favors. Before the term "date" became common usage in America, it was prostitutes' slang for an appointment with a paying customer. Indeed, prostitutes still approach men with the query, "Are you looking for a date?" (Norrie Epstein, The Technique of the Love Affair, pg. 137)

When Girls Go Nuts

A friend of mine got a call from a girl on drugs: "I'm calling somebody outside of my family to let you know what is going on. I'm the product of a science experiment in Canton, Ohio, at Ross Laboratories. I was created on July 2, 1981. There was a big coverup. My dad has all this heavy equipment in the back of his storage room. I thought it was to build seesaws but it is to clone embryos. The Hells Angeles, the West Coast Chopper guys, the born again Christians, they are all out to get me."

Best unknown places to meet fabulous girls

Tony writes:

1. LA Museum on Friday nights, especially when they have directors commenting on their films.
2. Church of the Good Shepherd (Beverly Hills) singles club
3. Lucy's El Adobe Cafe on Melrose on almost any week night

Community College Girl Are Hot

This girl tells me she's majoring in "media criticism," I think she means journalism, at one of California's finest community colleges.

Luke, I really don't open up for most people but I like you! I am passionate about making love, I mean really being hate -----, chocked out, smacked around and verbally abused. I also love Jesus Criste and every morning I wake up and cook me some Farmer John honey baked ham with a side of yeast. It taste so good in my mouth, It makes me just sooo horny! I am also masturbate to Woody Alan movies.

I don't know what I'm passionate about yet. I'm only xx, give me a break here! In a perfect world I would be a famous poet, writer, journalist whom was coy, Innocent, intelligent and a genius. People would recognize me on the street and be so thrilled I walked past them and smiled, like a Guru from India thats very presence cured peoples sicknesses. I would be in love with the most amazing man, somebody so smart and funny that they challenged you to be a better person. And at the end of the day we would make love and I wouldn't care if I died in my sleep because at least I will have loved before death. And in the morning he would be the reason in which I awake. Or maybe I would have a job that did nothing but serve people that need help and I would be poor and self gratified. I would not have time for selfish love but I would sleep in peace and have beautiful dreams knowing that I live only to do good and not indulge in act of artificial satisfactions like booz, sex, and materials. I don't know. Now really what are yours?

Chaim writes: "No, you should not date her. You should be saving yourself for better things, like a smart 37 year old jewish lawyer from an ivy league school who wants to settle down before it is too late. Better that I should date her."

I'm The Babe Ruth Of Babes

Friend: "Why did you not meet any new chicks at Friday Night Live? That's not like you."

Luke: "Babe Ruth struck out more times than any other hitter. I'm the Babe Ruth of babes."

Ohr Ha Torah Turmoil

I was a member at this synagogue for three years. I had a good experience but I decided to rejoin Orthodoxy in 2000.

My favorite teacher of the inner life is OHT's Rabbi Mordecai Finley. Nobody can explain Jewish mysticism as he can.

In the past few weeks, seven families have left OHT over some controversy regarding remarks made to the sixth grade class that left many of the kids in tears. This pattern of families moving into and out of the temple has lasted as long as OHT itself.

OHT was formed as a breakaway from Stephen S. Wise's Shabbat morning minyan in 1993.

Rabbi Finley was named as a "rabbi to the stars" by Buzz magazine about eight years ago and one of the 50 most influential people in Los Angeles.

Here's an April 2, 1999 Jewish Journal cover story on Ohr Ha Torah.

I remember one Conservative rabbi complained to me about a synagogue where half the congregation believed in God and half believed in the rabbi. I immediately said OHT and he nodded.

Many OHT refugees went to Adat Shalom, the Conservative shul across the street from Redeemer Baptist in Westwood.

Rabbi Finley has always said that OHT is not for everyone. If you need more observance, there's Adat Shalom across the street.

Whatever organizational turmoil OHT is going through, it does not reduce my interest in learning from Rabbi Finley's teachings.

A member of OHT writes me:

Luke, I finally managed to see some of the OHT emails. They knocked me for a loop.

One of the most moving emails was a resignation letter written by a guy who had been a devoted fan of Rabbi Finley for many years, going back to the rabbi's tenure at Stephen Wise. The guy was a founding member of OHT, was married by Rabbi Finley, had his kids in the religious school. For years, he thought Finley walked on water. He was finally pushed to the point of resigning, with great sadness, because he just couldn't take it any more.

I agreed with every word that guy wrote. It really was demoralizing to look around and realize that all the people I had become friendly with over the years (O.K., so there weren't that many, but there were a few) had left OHT. And the whole "cult"-type atmosphere, where nobody dares criticize the leader . . . I guess it was inevitable that I would leave eventually, since I never made it to the "in" circle (although of course, a lot of those people left, too).

Here's an excerpt:

Even from the very beginning, there has always been a dark side to Ohr HaTorah. Within three weeks of the synagogue's inception, I started to hear things... about hurt feelings most often, usually due to rude remarks supposedly made by Meirav, or a cold shoulder, supposedly shown by Mordecai.

I didn't think much about these things at first. I thought that the people who were saying them were just too sensitive. There were cultural differences because of Meirav's Israeli background. And I knew how much stress both Mordecai and Meirav were under. They couldn't possibly attend to every whim, and we didn't have anywhere near the money for the support staff they really needed. Both of them were truly over-extended.

But as things became more comfortable, and we moved into a groove as a shul, the problem didn't go away. The negative whisperings grew to a very quiet roar which has been Ohr HaTorah's background music ever since.

Yes, people were coming to Ohr HaTorah in large numbers, but they also began to leave in large numbers. Many left because they decided to become Orthodox, or because they were moving out of town, or because Ohr HaTorah didn't offer a pre-school, or because Ohr HaTorah didn't offer a day school.

But droves of people left because they had been in some way hurt. They left in anger, they left in resentment, they left in bitterness. They left complaining of being offended, insulted, or verbally abused by Meirav. They left saying they had tried to address their grievances with Meirav and Mordecai, but that they had hit a brick wall in doing so.

Staff left in this manner too. One office worker told me that 'life is too short to work at Ohr HaTorah', and another said 'The Ohr HaTorah office is not a healthy place to be.' A third staff member told me she was publicly humiliated by Meirav into resigning.

With the constant change over in staff and membership, Ohr HaTorah, which once felt like a stable spiritual home, slowly changed into a place which sometimes felt like a strange kind of spiritual airline terminal -- where people would come for a few years, get what they needed, get alienated, and then take-off.

I cannot tell you how truly painful it has been for me to witness this process for the past ten years. Many friends have left. Many very good people have left. My own wife 'left', at least for the most part. Because she simply couldn't take the dark side anymore.

A whole lot of money has left too. Enough money to build, what, two synagogues? Three maybe? I couldn't possibly tell you for sure.

What have I been thinking all this time? Why am I one of the last hold-outs out of the something like 70 or 80 families who joined at the beginning? Well, because of my kids, for one, because of what Ohr HaTorah could give them - a fantastic religious school, the Torah procession on Saturday, the great holiday programs . . .

I have also been telling myself for a very long time that Mordecai and Meirav are on a spiritual path just like I am on one. That they're working things out too. That they're not perfect just like I'm not perfect. And I have even told myself many times that Ohr HaTorah itself is on a spiritual path. That the 'dark side' problem, as I have thought of it, was something that the shul was going through in an evolution toward greatness.

I still think that perhaps that could be the case. But I cannot wait around for that to happen. I am simply too exhausted. Dayenu.

I can no longer be at a place when I am constantly wondering which of my friends is the next to go away in anger. . . .

I can no longer be at a place where the attitude of the leadership is that you're either for us, or against us. I can no longer be at a synagogue where the leadership keeps at least informal tabs on who in the synagogue is friends with whom. I can no longer drink from a spiritual well which holds water which tastes so deeply tainted. I am a hypocrite for thinking I could drink at it for so long. . . .

The crisis with the sixth grade classroom seems like more of the same to me, except that this involves children. And that has upset me a lot. Because I have children in that religious school. And whether or not the allegations about what Meirav said to these kids are true or not, the fact remains that half of a sixth grade classroom left class in tears because Meirav scared them, and sixth graders don't cry that easily.

I know that if a teacher had made them cry, the teacher would be investigated at the very least, and most likely shown the door unceremoniously. I know that at my child's public school, a thorough investigation would have taken place. And that a whole lot of parents would be asking why they hadn't been told about a problem before it escalated to this point. I have also been disturbed by what seems like a cover-up. . . .

I was disturbed by the fact that board members are saying that these seven families that left were families that shouldn't have been at Ohr HaTorah in the first place, that they were characterized as 'Santa Monica types'. . . .

I'm disturbed by the fact that there seems to be so little in terms of an apology, or to make amends, and that my call for an independent investigation was completely ignored. I know from experience that this is par for the course at Ohr HaTorah.

I was also disturbed by a phone conversation I had last night with a board member who told me that the seven families that left are, in fact, 'evil' people, that they did everything they could to 'get' Meirav. . . .

This same board member told me that I was welcome to stay at the synagogue, despite the emails I've sent this week, but that I could only do so if I left all doubt about Meirav and Mordecai behind. She told me that I had to have an unwavering, unconditional belief in them. She said that anyone who does not have that kind of loyalty simply doesn't belong at Ohr HaTorah.

I'm sorry, but I think I will reserve this kind of faith for G*d.

Chaim Amalek Terminates Luke Ford; The Internet Weeps Tears of Cholesterol

Chaim Amalek writes:

1. Luke, I've enjoyed the time we've spent together on the web, but I feel that I must now grow in ways that must separate us. Best of luck to you.

2. Thank you for publishing my material, but I really think we have different interests.

3. Sorry, but I just don't think that knowing you is going to help my life any.

4. I'm really very busy now, but I'll be sure to write something for your website once things quiet down.

5. My imam tells me that you and your site are haram.

The Swan

Jackie writes:

I found a place for you to meet women. Check it out:

"FOX just keeps going too, too far with the reality shows. This new one sounds like a "Saturday Night Live" skit. It's a show called "The Swan," where they take 16 not-so-attractive women and subject them to all kinds of surgery and other alterations to make them pretty enough to compete in a beauty pageant. But some don't get pretty enough to make the cut even after all that work, and they're shown bawling their eyes out. I cry for the future generations of girls in this country, I really do."

Luke, I bet a lot of pretty-enough-for-you-and-emotionally-needy girls will be left bawling their eyes out, waiting on a Prince Charming like you to sweep into their lives, say all the right things, take what he can get, and leave them feeling even more worthless and used than they did before. You should be all over this.

'I'm Playing With My Clie Now'

I just got an email from someone I'm dating who wrote: "I'm playing with my clie now." What does that mean? I can only think of one "c" word that finishes "clie" and I don't think it is the one she means because she is a Republican and Republicans don't tell other Republicans when they play with their "c-------."

I replied: "Umm, I'm playing with my clie right now too and thinking of you in your soldier suit." Did I say the right thing? Please help me. I'm a retarded black boy who other boys made fun of in the shower.

I Feel Like A Retarded Black Boy

I just watched the movie Radio based on the true story of a retarded black boy who's adopted by the football coach in a South Carolina high school.

Donnyzona writes on Imdb.com: "Cuba Gooding plays a RETARDED man very well. Yes, he made super funny faces and said really bizarre things. I did like the movie overall. Ed Harris mentored RADIO because he was so nice. I liked the part where RADIO accidentally gave away the play at one of the FOOTBALL GAMES. I was SUPER afraid that Ed Harris was going to GET MAD at him. However, Ed Harris did NOT get mad at him. The actor from BLOOD SIMPLE was excellent in the role as the barbershop customer. He was great when he yelled at FRANK toward the end of the movie. Also, RADIO'S older brother was really good. He didn't have much SCREEN TIME, but his presence was very known. I like Cuba. He can now join the ranks of SEAN PENN and Julie Louise Drefuss as acrettes who can play RETARDED FOLK."

It struck a chord in my heart. All my life, I've felt socially retarded. Like a black boy in a white world.

When my mother had cancer, lots of other families took me in and cared for me.

In second grade, various members of my class looked after some retarded kids for a day. I didn't look after anybody. I just made fun of the retards.

I used to hang out at the college library from about fifth grade on. Older folks looked after me.

After I moved to America in sixth grade, it took me a long time to learn to play American sports. But a couple of PE teachers took extra time with me so that I learned. Another teacher took me to marathons. I finished five.

In high school, other teachers took extra time with me. I appreciated those who would let me walk home with them and just talk about life. I was grateful they didn't bring up my poor performance in school outside of the classroom.

In college, I formed special bonds with teachers.

After I converted to Judaism, I formed special bonds with older, more well adjusted people than I.

Through the Los Angeles Press Club, I found Cathy Seipp, and even the nights are better.

Thanks to the efforts of all my friends and mentors, I am who I am.

I identify with Radio. And my friends identify with Radio's friends.

Because I loved this film, I am immune from charges of cynicism, racism and hatred. The cynical will not like Radio. It reminded me of Antwone Fisher, which I also loved.

The poor black man has no bigger friend than Luke Ford.

Those illegal wetbacks sneaking across the border however... Yet I'm the first one to pick up illegals in my van when I need something moved or I want to make a movie.

I hope I touched you with my retarded black boy rant... Chicks normally love that stuff.

Jackie writes: "Yeah, but I'm also laughing and smiling...Don't ever change (apart from the whole sexually offensive line of questioning thing, and the "they just don't fear the white man like they used to" thing, and the "no place for a white man thing," and the mocking the dead while their bodies are still warm thing, and the treating Cathy Seipp like a little boy who can't articulate his feelings for a little girl, so he runs up to her in the playground and hits her and then runs away laughing thing)."

So you like that INXS song, Don't Change?

Jackie:

Nyet, but I like Never Tear Us Apart. In the film of your life, that's the song that will be playing in the background when Luke Ford meets Cathy Seipp for the first time.

I
I was standing
You were there
Two worlds collided
And they could never tear us apart

I found a CD that I made for you a long time ago. It's very funny and too cool for you, I suspect. It has your and Cathy's song on it -- To Sir, with Love.

Eugh, it looks as if I thought that "wetbacks" comment was cute, when really you added it after I read your I'm-a-retard thing. You may as well insert a remark about your disdain for taco benders and burrito rollers now. Way to make me look like a Luke Ford-style white supremacist, "Duke".

We have different interests.

Cathy writes Luke: "I do like "To Sir With Love," and I suppose at this point it is "our song," but I'm getting kind of tired of the way you always want me to dress up in strange outfits and sing it to you."

The Last Temptation Of Christians

Yvonne Gomez Nelson (we used to study Torah with husband in an Orthodox context) writes for Christianity Today about why Jews fear The Passion of The Christ:

Take Los Angeles, the city I live in. A couple of years ago there was an incident in the heavily Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Pico-Robertson in which religiously identifiable Jews, walking home on the Sabbath, were confronted and attacked by skinhead types who were apparently cruising the streets seeking targets. A Jewish teen ended up in the hospital after his assailants kicked and beat him, yelling epithets like "dirty kike."

Ask yourselves, fellow Christians, when do we in America have to fear walking home from church while wearing a cross and holding a Bible?

Last March, next door to the Simon Wiesenthal Center, someone shot out a front window of the offices of the Orthodox Union (a synagogue association) while a youth group was in session.

Four years ago, a racist gunman cased out the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Museum of Tolerance and other Jewish institutions, and upon finding their security too stiff, targeted a Jewish Community Center preschool, critically wounding several individuals, mostly children.

Do we Christians ever have to worry about having armed security at the religious schools that our children attend? Yet this is a common sight, not just at Jewish schools in L.A., but at synagogues and community meetings.

Then there was the well-publicized July 4, 2002, shooting of an El Al airline counter at the Los Angeles Airport. Even after 9/11, the airport's safety and security were not enough to protect the two Jews killed in the attack.

Please keep in mind that the size of the Jewish community is small enough that usually just a degree or two of separation exists between a victim of an anti-Semitic attack and most of their fellow Jews. It's true for me, too: one Jewish gentleman I know walks with a pronounced limp because two years ago he had been left for dead after a hate-related attack.

Jane writes: "I can't believe you expect me to click on every link you post, though. Do you think my fingers can withstand all that exertion?"

It's good practice for when you get the blessed glory of...

Jane writes: "I think your most attractive personality traits are your subtle charm and shy-guy vulnerability..."

Father Lloyd Baugh Changing His Tune On Passion And The Jews?

Evy Nelson AKA Yvonne Gomez Nelson writes:

Hey, Luke--I'm trying to figure out if Fr. Baugh, whom you heard at Sinai Temple, has been modifying his position on Gibson's treatment of Jews in The Film.

Before the film was released, Fr. Baugh had said in this regard,

In the version I previewed just weeks before the opening, the film assumes a balanced position. Although Caiaphas and his colleagues who push the Romans to condemn Jesus may be slightly stereotyped and their power over a weak and perhaps too good Pilate exaggerated, their position is balanced by the several dissenting members of the council—Jews who strongly condemn the judicial inquiry as a “travesty...a beastly travesty” and angrily quit the assembly.

During the “trials” of Jesus, regrettably, the film has too many people gathered in the courtyards, something against which the American bishops warn in published guidelines for the dramatization of the Passion (see Eugene J. Fisher’s article in America, 2/16). The bishops argue that the “small ‘crowd’” (historically more probable) should never be replaced by a “teeming mob.” As if to compensate for this lapse, Gibson does not include the usually offensive words of the crowd, “His blood be on us and on our children” (Mt 27:26), the sentence that has been perhaps the most notorious basis for the persecution of Jews by Christians over the centuries. Furthermore, not everyone in the large crowd is against Jesus. Dissenting voices can be heard.

A few moments later Gibson shows crowds of people crying out in favor of Jesus as he struggles to ascend Calvary. Their protests are so strong that the Roman soldiers have trouble controlling them. Furthermore, Gibson develops the character of Simon of Cyrene, referred to disparagingly by a Roman soldier as “You Jew!” The anti-Semitism here is the Roman’s, and the film clearly condemns him. Simon’s interplay with the agonizing Jesus is a beautiful touch and a clear statement against anti-Semitism.

Finally, the clearest evidence of the film’s stance is its striking penultimate scene. In a physically static but morally dynamic representation of the Pietà, Mary stares not at the dead Jesus but directly into the camera, and therefore directly at the viewer. This is the only time in the film that Gibson breaks the dramatic frame of the narrative and addresses the viewers directly. This shot, lasting a long 20 seconds, invites the viewers to enter the narrative and assume their responsibility, as sinners, for the death of this Jesus, who—the film repeatedly makes clear—has died for our sins. Gibson here is saying, more strongly than any other director has done, that it is not the Jewish people who killed Jesus; every one of us sinful human beings is responsible for his death.

When I saw Fr. Baugh speak at a panel discussion March 3 at LMU (Loyola Marymount University), it was his position that sounded a bit more "balanced." He seemed a little more cognizant than in the preceding film review of problems vis-a-vis Gibson's depiction of Jews. I myself addressed a pointed question to him in this regard in the Q&A afterwards.

Now you, Luke, report, "The priest said The Passion was soaked in Jew-hatred and not in line with contemporary Church teachings about the Jews and the death of Jesus." (I wish I had been there.)

Given what Fr. Baugh wrote in his Catholic publication review, would you agree that a transformation has occurred in his opinion (perhaps through discussing the film w/Jews since its release)? Or do you sense that he is tailoring his message to his audience?

These are not rhetorical questions.

LukeFord.net Yanks Luke Ford For Racial Slur

Luke was taken off the air for two days Monday after using a racial slur in a taped story about fired KCRW commentator and Asian-German-American author Sandra Tsing Loh.

Meantime, the website is being run by Chaim Amalek.

The suspension comes as part of a general repression of free speech and civil liberties by the fascistic Bush administration.

Just A Large Bladdered Jewess

David Deutsch writes: Ms. Seipp (and you may inform her of this privately, as I'm not trying to embarrass her, since she never claimed to be a Yiddishist, just a large-bladdered Jewess) is incorrect in saying that "spiel" means song. It means "play," and can be used, as in English, as both a verb or noun. It is the latter use that she is familiar with, like a Purim Schpiel (to use the Yinglish spelling, which gives the reader a more accurate key to pronunciation). In that sense, it can mean a "song and dance routine," but it isn't a song. A song is a lied in German, or a lied, zemer, or shir in Yiddish. I hope her ability to be set straight when wrong is as well-developed as both her ability to set others straight, and, of course, her ears.

Googled

Luke: Sorry about my delay in responding. It was nice speaking to you last week at the Purim party. However, I believe we have different interests so I am going to decline going out.

Khunrum writes: "That has happened to me twice recently...From women I really wasn't too keen on anyway. My advice is to act immature and write something snotty back to her. I did. I told both of them "no problem you were a bit old for me anyway" I believe that acting the asshole has merit at times. It feels good."

Jackie writes: "She was probably a liberal."

Fred writes: "Perhaps Luke should use a pseudonym."

Khunrum suggests: "Duke Ford?"

Robert writes: "More subtle. Long Dong Pushkin."

Fred writes: "This sounds like a tough problem. Luke, why don't you ask Ron Jeremy how he deals with it. What Shul does he go to, and how does he keep the young trendy Jewesses from doing a google search on him?"

Robert writes: "When you sold lf.com did you include in the terms of sale a future date when you could rebuy the site? That site is just a horrific albatross on you plus I note that Fayner is using that unflattering shot of you in your y-fronts and walkman on an ad at the top of the site. This is not acceptable."

Chaim Amalek writes:

Granted, that pic on the left is not all that flattering (thanks a bunch, Luke), but at least my privates are blocked out.

You would do well to use all of your influence to try to get that site (actually, the domain name plus all the stuff that ever appeared on your site when you owned it plus the name Luke Ford) back in your hands well before then. By 2006 you will be FORTY years old and well out of range (for your level of income and social status) of the women with whom you might build a life. Such women are smart enough to look up "Luke Ford" on the web, and when they do, the result is always going to be the same. Always. The good ones will say something innocuous or maybe even nice, and then get the hell away from you as fast as possible. Only women with mental problems or who are spinster-types are going to see lukeford.com as a plus. The rest might tolerate you as a friend, but no way as a husband. And sorry to break this to you pal, but the "I gave up that site x years ago" counts for s---.

Anybody got the answer to this - if you own the domain name, can you opt to delink to Google's database?

Khunrum writes:

I say unfortunately it is way to late for a makeover. Luke will be forever associated with the world of ----. He can attempt to erase his past (and present) but he is as socially branded as a starlet who has been doing triple ..... for ten years.

Luke can wear the black suit and attend the hip writers gatherings, he can adapt a prep school slouch as he feeds lines into the ears of trendy Jewesses, but some young sport is always going to whisper "you know what he did, don't you"?

Now if Luke were driving a fine car and lived in opulent surroundings whilst making hefty contributions to the shul of his choice, none of this would matter. But alas, he is a low to moderate income......

I suggest the only out would be an identity and scenery change. Luke, change your name to Biff Whitebread and move to Alaska. Have you ever considered getting into the field of gold~mining?

Putative Marc writes: "yes, it can be taken off google if you want it to, there's a code that can be put in the site to make it not show up there ...would also require getting others to take down any incriminating evidence but not a problem if you ask politely ... it's also embarrassing to show up in the google image directory with unflattering pics, that's a real annoyance when it comes to courtin' ..."

Robert writes:

BINGO! Do a Google Image search and what's the FIRST image of Luke to pop up? A scan of Hustler Magazine's image of Luke as their Asshole of the Month!! True. Check it out.

Realistically "the genie is out of the bottle." Once it's on the internet it's there forever. I suggest you fake your own death and then major plastic surgery. Good luck.

Sadly, if Larry Flynt Publications brands you "Asshole of the Month" your creditability is shot. What self-respecting Jewess would freely associate with such a pariah?

My husband's a dentist. Well, my fiance's a doctor. Puh-leze, I'll have you know that my boyfriend is Asshole of the Month!

Chaim writes: "I did one and spotted, on the first page of results (with google filtering turned off) a pic of luke groping the ..... of some woman. Click on it and you get a banner concerning "....videos" or something. No way is any computer literate woman who is both mentally and morally healthy (i.e., wifey material) going to date him. Sorry, Luke. You have got to get that crap off the web."

Cathy Seipp writes:

Here's one self-respecting Jewess who is quite happy to associate with you. And so what if Larry Flynt calls you Asshole of the Month. Is Larry Flynt some big social arbiter now? Who died and made him Brooke Astor?

That "different interests" line, frankly, makes me think you're well rid of such a dullard. If she's going to give you the brush-off, it should be a funny, insulting brush-off.

Words to Live By, Words to Study

Chaim Amalek writes:

Ah, but Cathy misses my point which is that we are not talking about Luke finding women willing to associate with him, but about Luke finding a woman to become his Mrs. Saying hello to someone in public, even having dinner with them, is not the same as taking them home to meet the folks, wedding them, and having their babies. The key question is this - how many desirable women does she know who, when fully apprised of your work history, and after googling you on the web, would want to become Mrs. Luke Ford? (By "desireable" I mean mother and wifey material sort of women: young, fertile, pretty, kind, and mentally well. Oh yeah, and you want Jewish.)

There is nothing that Luke can do about his history and not much he can do to hide that history (although buying lf.com and snuffing it would be a very good start),so he must try to make that history more palatable by becoming more successful in life. I, Chaim Amalek, have counseled him in great detail as to what he might do to achieve this end (an end which I share with him to an alarmingly symbiotic degree, hint hint), but he is too lazy, and too coddled by certain others to get off his rear and carry out my will. And so he exists in his hovel like so much old fruit turning bad, wondering why good women do not flock to him and puzzled by all those flies at hand.

By the way, when are you going to point out the obvious Big Issue of the Day, which is that al Qeada has successfully brought about its desired regime change in Spain/Andalusia? They are certain to try this neat trick again come November. HOLLYWOOD JEWS (Steven Spielberg, Bert Fields, etc.)- read up on the history of Jewry in Spain/Andalusia. The Golden Age of the history of Jews in America is coming to an end. What follows even AMALEK cannot tell.

Luke Adopting, Blessing Every Jewish Kid, Dog In Sight

LOS ANGELES—Concerned friends of Luke Ford announced Monday that in recent weeks the 37-year-old blogger has "just been adopting and blessing everything in sight."

Sunday afternoon, Luke saw the big black Dane of his friend Lynda sitting in a lonely state on the porch. Running back to his hovel for plastic bags to pick up after the filthy beast, Luke then ascended the stairs, liberated Cleo, and took him on a walk.

"I believe this is a better way to pick up chicks," Ford explained.

Sunday night, He encountered women looking at him in a whole new way. "Cute dog," one cute chick sighed.

"Dogs and kids are chick magnets," Ford explained. "The only thing that is not cool is having to pick up the crap."

Friday night at Israeli dancing at Temple Sinai, Ford was seen dancing with two kids.

Last Wednesday night, Luke was seen at Pizza Station in the company of two young kids.

"We are, of course, very concerned for His Holiness' mental condition," said chief Moral Leader physician Giuseppe Clementi, standing by Ford's bedside, surrounded by dozens of newly consecrated pill bottles, urine-specimen cups and orthopedic slippers. "Pretty much anything you hold up in front of his face these days, he blesses."

Side-locked but not sidelined

For today's young Hasidic couples, pleasurable sex just might be kosher after all.

By Rebecca Segall

Binyamin L. Jolkovsky, a Hasidic resident of Borough Park, Brooklyn, and editor in chief of Jewish World Review, says that in most parts of the Hasidic community, oral sex is considered degrading to women. "And from what I understand, women in secular society are also uncomfortable with such activity for the same reason: It's embarrassing for them. Even I'm turning red talking about it."

But after seven years of marriage, Moishe went down on his wife -- and pleased her. "We love each other more now. We feel an indescribable closeness." In the same breath, Moishe mentions that they don't have much to talk about. Hasidic men spend their days studying or working, while Hasidic women spend their lives raising children and maintaining the home. "But all the guys at work are jealous of the lunches she packs me: that every day she leaves a sweet note in the bag. She doesn't have to do that."

OK, Luke, It's Been Long Enough

Allison Kaplan Sommer writes:

I've been reading your blog for a while, ever since you interviewed my dear friend Sue Fishkoff, who wrote the book on Chabad.

I was Googling to see what people were saying about her book, and thought your interview with her was the funniest thing I ever read.

I'm a college acquaintance of Nancy Rommelmann (we were in some plays together at Wesleyan, but I was too intimidated by her to be her friend -- she was a beautiful much-cooler-than-me upperclassman -- far higher in the social food chain) and through her blog, have become reader of Cathy, and have exchanged E-mail with Cecile -- who I adore -- and Jackie D, who unfortunately was out of town when I was in London.

I am writing to tell you the following: if you are serious about this wife stuff, and not just screwing around, do yourself a favor and come to Israel for a while. You'll find someone here who will meet your checklist. They'll line up around the block for you in Jerusalem. Come for a few months, six months, a year, whatever.

If you play your cards right, you won't even have to relocate permanently, you'll find someone willing to relocate to LA. Hell, you might find someone who is originally FROM LA. If you are looking for a way to subsidize this adventure, there are a lot of fellowships going begging right now because people are put off of coming to Israel.

No personal stake in this -- I'm married with two kids and #3 on the way. Met and married an Israeli 11 years ago, and moved on over. I don't live in Jerusalem, but that's the place to go if you're interested in the dati singles scene -- both native Israelis, American and European expats.

XXX writes Luke:

Your blog and that of TiffanyAStone.com are among the best things on the web. It's like reading the letters of Katherine Anne Porter. Both you and Stone (who is she?) need to get published. You're both different, but what you have rings so true, not to mention being witty and clever.

Her Hollywood script reader work has the stuff of a great novel or maybe just a long piece on the life behind the scenes. Don't know if you're familiar with Gary Cartwright. He used to cover the Dallas Cowboys years ago and then became a writer with Texas Monthly and free-lanced around. He once did this great piece called Confessions of a Washed Up Sportswriter that made him a lot of money on options, turnarounds, advances, etc. Funnier than anything Dan Jenkins ever wrote in his sports novels. I think Tiffany's work on the script reading and observations on people like P Hilton, all put together and packaged, are as good as the Freeman accounts of life in Tinseltown. Hope she does something with it.

Amalek Explains Luke's Future Conduct to Allison Kaplan Sommer

Chaim Amalek writes:

As the official biographer of Luke Ford (his Errol Morris), I am perhaps better suited than anyone else to explain to you why Luke Ford will NOT take your eminently sensible advice and move to Israel in search of a bride. Simply put, he does not want one.

Women, real women, by which I mean the kind one marries and has children with, are messy. They bleed, they complain, they eat, they take up space and when they get fat they take up even more space. They endlessly disappoint the male imagination when shielded from real life. Simply put, Mr. Ford feels he can do better than this.

Luke has ensconced himself in a corner of the Internet where fantasy utterly trumps reality, where the women are always young and fresh because those who stop being young and fresh are cycled out to even lesser endeavors. With this endless supply of young, firm female flesh at his disposal, Mr. Ford has no inducement to seek anything more traditional.

Then there is the issue of who gains for all the pain. Mr. Ford likes being on the periphery of the LA Kehila because it is full of people who are certain to be more likely to be of more help to him than he would be to them. Not so, the situation in Israel, where Jews have to do more than read Variety to be Jewish, and where there are few Jews in a position to assist Luke. Why would Luke leave LA, which he knows and loves, and which is full of Jewish Mommies to mother him, for Israel, which is much tenser and fraught with danger?

For the record, I have repeatedly counseled Luke to move to Israel, at least for a year. But it will not happen. Not until the needs of his inner Amalek are first taken care of.

Ever wonder what they do with all that spare time and influence at the LA Times editorial offices?

This ran in the LA Times, March 21, 1996, page 1

Admissions Rules at UCLA Eased for Rich

By Ralph Frammolino, Mark Gladstone and Henry Weinstein

Special considerations in admissions for the rich and well-connected has been part of the UCLA culture for years, extending beyond University of California regents and state politicians to include friends and relatives of local political figures, university officials and major donors, a months-long Times investigation shows.

[Further down in the story] In 1992, for example, Frank del Olmo, then Times deputy editor of the editorial pages, wrote a letter on newspaper stationery to [UCLA Chancellor Charles E.] Young asking for "any help" that the chancellor could provide for the daughter of Janet Clayton, then an assistant editor, to be admitted to the (university's special -- my parenthesis) elementary school.

Del Olmo, now assistant to the editor, said that Clayton asked for his assistance and that he referred to the editorial board in the letter because he hoped that "saying this is a person in a significant position at the L.A. Times would move [the matter] a little higher on [Young's] radar screen than the dozens of things he has to deal with on a given day."

The child was not admitted, and Clayton -- now editor of the editorial pages -- said she feels that the request was a mistake.

XXX says: "I'd only recently run across the clipping that was sent to me some years back by a friend from East L.A., who found it amusing given the Times uptight moral code, Del Olmo's own self-righteousness and the general disdain with which a number of Latinos looked upon him and his work."

Latino Icon Hearthrob Lothario Frank del Olmo

From The 8 Ball, monthly newsletter of the Los Angeles Press Club

By Bob Baker of The Los Angeles Times:

Frank del Olmo, a Los Angeles Times associate editor and columnist who became an icon to Latino journalists during nearly 34 years at the newspaper, died of an apparent heart attack at his desk on Feb. 19. He was 55.

Del Olmo was a quiet, intellectual journalist who carried on the mantle of a more flamboyant crusader of an earlier era, Time columnist Ruben Salazar. But he had a greater impact because of the decades as a reporter, editor and columnist. Raised in Los Angeles, del Olmo spanned a half century in which Latinos rose from discrimination and invisibility to the leading demographic group in the region. His ability to bring historical and social perspectives to his writing made him one of the most insightful Latino journalists in the world.

Following Frank's death, George Ramos (who proclaims all over his web page what a "professional" journalist he is and essentially claims to be another Latino icon) writes on LAObserved.com: "i had no closer friend at the times than frank del olmo. i tried to mirror his relentless advocacy for latino issues and for fair treatment of latinos in the pages of the times. where i failed, he succeeded because was a quiet leader who commandered respect from everyone he came in contact with. i will miss him because he had a very calming view of a controversy or a personal dilemma. there aren't enough 'gente' like him around in journalism today."

Notice he claims on his website to be a professional journalist and on LAObserved to be a "relentless advoca[te] for Latino issues." Just imagine if a white journalist claimed to be a relentless advocate for white issues?

And why is this "professional" journalist unable to master capitalization? I guess on a blog comment he doesn't have copy editors to clean up for him?

Why don't other journalists weigh in on this stuff? Because of the paternalistic and frankly racist view they have of blacks and Latinos, i.e., that they should not be held to the same standards we hold whites and asians.

An observer writes:

FYI on Del Olmo and his reporting: There's a line in the bio of George Ramos, the former Timesman and longtime Del Omo crony that reads "Ramos served in the U.S. Army and saw combat duty in Vietnam as a first lieutenant in the fiels artillery."

I was going over some of Del Olmo's recent columns and found this