I am sad to report the passing of my dear friend and "struggle buddy" Theo Schkolne, who died Sunday evening at the age of 70 after battling illness for the past year.
Theo was my best friend in Cape Town during my 7-year sojourn there. We spent several nights a week dining together, including late Friday nights at our friend Sam Rabinowitz's cottage in Sea Point, a Shabbat gathering that sometimes concluded at a bar or two nearby.
Theo was a brilliant psychologist who was meticulous in his forensic work, which involved victims of serious physical trauma. He was the person who, more than anyone else, rescued me from a conventional view of politics and helped me see the human beings and personal motivations beyond ideological and rhetorical battles. Together with David Hersch, Theo and I mounted an independent effort to challenge dogmas about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in post-apartheid South Africa. Theo challenged participants in the debate to show equal empathy to both sides and to ...
Joel, what is your thoughts about South Africans currently seeking asylum in the USA? Do you think we ( they) have a realistic chance of receiving asylum? I have substantial amount of evidence of persecution, even a ANC letter stating “ they don’t condemn the violence by their comrades”. I saw your recent interviews and just starting to watch and read your posts on X. Would love to hear your thoughts on this. Thanks
We are coming up on the 100-day mark for the Second Trump Presidency. It has been the most intense "first 100 days" of any presidency. Will it be remembered as a success -- or as the peak of the Trump era, before a decline?
We will discuss. Much hangs in the balance -- including foreign policy efforts, the tariff gamble, and the fate of dozens of court challenges to Trump's policies. Things could go badly -- or they could go extraordinarily well.
Special guests:
Oliver Dunford -- Pacific Legal Foundation, on challenging Trump's tariffs
John Carney -- Breitbart News financial editor, on the economic situation
John Hayward -- Breitbart News foreign correspondent, on the world
Tune in: SiriusXM Patriot 125, 7-10 p.m. ET, 4-7 p.m. PT
Call: 866-957-2874
Hello to all...
It's my 48th birthday on Friday. I realize I've once again managed to do the Torah portion of the week at the wrong time (i.e. last week's portion turned out to be this week's portion). So let me try a different tack.
What a crazy year it's been. In some ways it has been the best year of my life. I put almost all of my self-published e-books on Audible, and one of them -- on Zionism -- will be coming out in print in the fall. I traveled to Israel several times and had incredible experiences. My wife gave birth to a robust baby boy. I'm in the best shape I've ever been in; I've lost 25 lbs. since November. And Trump won the election, again -- which, to me, is an amazing miracle.
But perhaps you know the rest -- the neighborhood destroyed by fire, the home still standing but inaccessible, the frequent moves around L.A., which I have discovered is largely unlivable outside my old Pacific Palisades town.
My wife has moved to D.C. with our baby, ahead of the rest of us. She's the ...
