The time was early February 1981. The location was the Roosevelt Room in the West Wing of the White House, not far from the Cabinet Room. President Ronald Reagan asked William Casey, the newly-appointed Director of the CIA, what he considered was his primary role as head of that agency. Barbara Honegger, assistant to the...
On June 10, 1963, President John F. Kennedy delivered a commencement address at American University in Washington, D.C. that many historians believe helped seal his fate in Dealey Plaza on that infamous day of November 22 later that year. What did he say that was so unacceptable and inappropriate that it may have fueled the...
In the final words of Sefer Zecharyah, prophesying about a time in the future when the Holy Temple will be rebuilt in its place in the holy city of Yerushalayim, we read something most peculiar (Zecharyah 14:21): וְלֹא־יִהְיֶה כְנַעֲנִי עוֹד בְּבֵית־יְיָ צְבָקוֹת בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא (And in that day, there will no longer be a Canaanite...
In the 1980s, a team of neuroscientists at the University of California, San Francisco led by Benjamin Libet published numerous papers interpreted by many, including Libet himself, as demonstrating that our brains initiate conscious voluntary movements as well as the will to move before we are consciously aware of the will to move. As Libet...
Fake ice cream. Fake money. Fake friends. Fake free markets. Fake free speech. Fake education. Fake elections. Fake news. Even fake spirituality. Everything seems fake these days Why is this so? What happened to the real stuff? The truth is that what we are seeing in our world today is merely the revelation of the...
Why There's No Peace in the World and What We Can Do About It With a major war raging in Europe, the USA weakening and becoming more dysfunctional by the day, and China acting more aggressively than it has in recent history, it is no wonder that many people are becoming concerned of a major...
Every study that we have seen shows that levels of depression, sadness, despondency, anxiety and many types of mental health disorders have skyrocketed since the outbreak of Covid, reaching record levels across practically all demographic groups including the very young. As the verse says in describing the conditions of our world just prior to the...
We hear a lot these days about ‘speaking truth to power,’ i.e. a phrase connoting the necessity for people to stand up for what they believe is right or needed and to tell people who are perceived as being ‘in charge’ what’s what, whether the powers that be want to hear such truth or not....
Many civilizations and religions over the course of history have taught that the world, including man, is composed of four fundamental elements (sometimes called foundations or forces): fire, earth, air and water. Although perhaps not well known to everyone, these four foundations are also important in Jewish tradition (אש, עפר, רוח and מים). In recent...
Everyone speaks of it. Some people yearn for it; some people might even be willing to sacrifice their lives for it. But how many of us really know what it is? What are we speaking about? Freedom. Much has been written about it, but it still seems to elude us in many ways. Is it...
Since Russian military forces invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, people all around the world have been inundated with news of the latest developments in this terrible war. Each side is doing its utmost to frame its position in the conflict in righteousness while characterizing the other position in wickedness, duplicity and aggression. Truth is...