Roy Moore ran for Senate in Alabama in 2017 and lost. He had many weaknesses as a candidate, but the most important one was the accusation that he had made sexual advances to an underage girl four decades before. The Washington Post, which reported that allegations could not prove it, but bolstered it by adding claims that Moore had legal relationships with young women in their late teens when he was in his late twenties.
I was asked, on the spot, to comment on the Moore story when it came out. I said that the underage allegations, if true, were very bad, but I also pointed out that the Post had deliberately conflated legal relationships with an illegal one. I didn't say this at the time, but one of the reasons I was sensitive to the issue was that I myself met my wife when she was 17 and I was 27. We began dating at 18 and we have been happily married for nearly 14 years, with three children.
Long story short -- I was accused of defending a pedophile, and pedophilia. A writer for the Bulwark -- the Trump-hating, so-called "conservative" outfit -- repeated the false accusation today. I responded on Twitter. But it's worth noting the depths to which some people will descend in an attempt to smear their opponents in a political argument.
One more point: Moore recently won a defamation suit against a Democratic super PAC for the kind of conflation I am describing.
This week's show will be slightly different from the norm: we'll focus on clips and topics, rather than guests -- and that, hopefully, will mean more input from the callers (unless you are all watching football on opening weekend).
Topics:
- The state of the economy
- The fight against crime
- The midterm election fight
- The struggle for peace between Russia and Ukraine
- The airstrike on the Venezuelan drug cartel
- The attempt to sink Kennedy
- The war in Gaza
- The case against Harvard
- The Trump presidency
Tune in: SiriusXM Patriot 125, 7-10 p.m. ET / 4-7 p.m. PT
Call: 866-957-2874
This week's Torah portion includes several laws about conduct in civic and personal life, the common theme of which is boundaries -- setting bounds to what one may do at home, at work, and even in the battlefield.
One noteworthy passage concerns Amalek, the evil nation that attacked the Children of Israel as they made their Exodus from slavery to freedom. Deuteronomy 25:17-19 commands Jews to obliterate Amalek's memory.
The South African government accused Israel of genocide on the basis of a story about Amalek in the Book of Samuel, in which King Saul was commanded to wipe out the entire evil Amalekite nation.
Because Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quoted this week's portion -- "Remember what Amalek did to you" (25:17), the South African government claimed he was commanding soldiers to commit genocide.
It was an absurd and malevolent misreading of the Bible and of Jewish tradition. The commandment, as observed by Jews today, is to remember the evil of Amalek and fight ...
