I am here now. It was a planned trip to visit my son at Carnegie Mellon and my parents and to see Warren haynes and Gov't Mule tomorrow. I've been taking my son Jacob to see Warren in different bands since he was 2, so a good excuse for a visit. Needless to say, the terms of this visit have completely changed. one of the victims Mrs. Fienberg is my parents' friend and neighbor - she lived across the hall. Rose Mallinger, 97, was the mother of my junior high basketball coach Al. Everyone who ever played sports at the Pittsburgh JCC in the last 40 years - and that includes a lot of non Jews - knows Mal well. The brothers Cecil and David Rosenthal were known by everyone in the neighborhood - developmentally disabled and sweet, sweet men who greeted people all around, with, "Hello, how are you." They were greeters at Tree of Life for decades.
This has hit out community here like a bomb. And Pittsburgh is a unique place. The pain and empathy extends to every corner. Just this morning I met George Warhola, Andy's nephew, on a walk.My sister and I were just hoofing it all over the city this morning, walking off our grief and talking as we explored the city's North Side. When I saw the sign, "Warhola Recycling," I knew it had to be Andy's family. He asked where we were from and we answered Squirrel Hill, he crossed himself and said "God bless."
Trump just announced he was coming here tomorrow. Virtually no one wants him. Gasoline on a flame. Pain upon pain. The old Holocaust poem "first they came" rings so true. It started with the Mexicans, continued with the "Moo-slims" and right on through the Trans, the Hondurans... of course, it always comes to the Jews. Wake up everyone, before it's too late. The pain we feel here is profound and it's coming for everyone, if we don't proactively stop it. Stand up and be heard. If you vote for any Republican next week you are endorsing this hatred. No matter how good any individual may be, if they caucus R, they must go.
Thank you.
Alan Paul
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Bob, what happened in Pittsburgh broke my heart ... again. I am originally from Paris and I moved to America one year ago. To say that I moved here just because of work would be lying. One of the reasons why I moved is, because as you know, France is one of the worst countries to live in when you're Jewish. I can't even count how many tragedies like this we've gotten in the past couple of years.
Some unspeakable crimes, starting with Ilan Halimi who - at 23 - got kidnapped, tortured and killed in Paris, just because he was Jewish. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Ilan_Halimi)
I think one of the biggest problems causing anti-semitism is the misinformation, clichés and lack of education. The press is also at fault.
- People believe that Jews have the money and they're all rich.
- Because they hate Israel, so Jews = Israel
- Because, beside the fact that Jewish people represents not even 3% of the population, a lot of them are on top of different industries.
Also, from what I've heard and saw in Paris right after one of tragedies that happened in France: anti-semitist people hate that Jews stick together. They hate more than anything this notion of communitarianism.
Remember the latest war in Israel? During the war, in France, I saw something deeply shocking from my window: people burning the Israeli flag and screaming "Jews, get out of France. It's not your home". The exact same day they burned a couple of cars in my city, which is about 20 mins away from Paris, and wanted to burn a Synagogue down.
It's important for everyone, Jewish or not Jewish to fight this, to inform and educate those around you - not just your children but your friends, your co-workers, everyone - to stick together, to take a stand and be like one. France - which was the biggest Jewish community in Europe - is doomed. Don't let America follow the same path.
Pamela Charbit
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If you forget who you are, someone will remind you.
Nathan Mann,child of holocaust survivors
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This guy (Chris Linck) nailed you Bob.
Richard Rosenberg
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Well, Chris Linck sure is a fucking prick, isn't he?
Mike Newman
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This guy (Chris Linck) is ignorant and illiterate. A common combination. Thankfully he is no longer working in the music business. "Premiere" Talent indeed. I wonder if he even spelled his own name right.
Toby Mamis
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Re: Chris Linck
Bob spews hatred?
Where?
Christian D
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Wow. Fuck Chris Linck. By that screed of his, it appears the only that eclipses his massive ego in thinking he gets to dictate to you what you should/shouldn't write about, is his massive inferiority complex.
Michael Moniz
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I cannot but help think of what Frank Barsalona or Barbara Skydel would have thought of Chris Linck.
Thank you Bob, for your good and heartfelt thoughts.
Bob Meyrowitz
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Well, the responses to your comments on the Pittsburgh shitshow were about 8 gazillion in favor and 2-1/2 against. You hit a nerve.
Keep it up.
Rik Shafer
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Re-Ted Pearce
Wow.
1. There is no such thing as the "Democrat" Party. It is, and has always been, the "Democratic" Party. The use of the variant "Democrat" is a tool of the alt-reich to try to diminish it. Way to show your true colors
2. The far right idiots are NOT policed by rank-and-file conservatives. At least they weren't last week in Pittsburgh and Florida and Kentucky.
3. No Democratic leaders went to Jerusalem for the embassy opening because they disapproved of the move, so they had nothing to celebrate. Any potential embassy move to Jerusalem was always seen as one of many negotiating for when and if there ever are serious peace negotiations, and the political amateurs, misguided by religious Evangelical Christian and right wing American Jewish businessmen, gave it away.
Toby Mamis
________________________________________
FYI, in case you're not aware, speaking of the "Democrat" Party instead if using its proper name, the Democratic Party, is Rush Limbaugh code. It's a shorthand dis. Its use reveals the writer for what he is.
Jon Sinton
________________________________________
Wise words. For what it's worth I'm not alone in saying that I'd die to preserve a country where justice and peace live. We need to be organised, as we were back in our day,
TT
LA
________________________________________
I wanted to let you know that my neighbor Bette who lives on the other side of our duplex, lived in Pittsburgh and raised her daughter Mara there before moving here, probably about 5 years ago. That was their temple, they were very active in the community, Bette's ex was president for 8 years and she was on the womens board for years and Bette knew 7 of the people killed. You have met both Bette and Mara - it is a small world that is all interconnected...
Kate O'Laughlin
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Im a freelance audio engineer as my side job (the music industry connection).
By day, I run a AV & Security installation company doing high end work. Most of our jobs lately are in Yeshivas and Synagogues looking to stay ahead of the sure coming tides of change of public sentiment.
I've been reading you for years and have wanted to comment many times.
This time you got me.
While I don't agree with your positions on guns, as you clearly spell out why we need them. However, I am in lockstep with you about being jewish and that when history is ignored, it is sure to be repeated.
Keep up the awareness and the awesome music musings.
Regards,
Albert Bale
________________________________________
Don't come to Canada for less anti-Semitism. That's BS. Lesser gun culture, sure.
Jeremy Speigel
________________________________________
Powerful letter. I've lived in the states for almost 31 years. My wife and I are working on plans to move to Canada, the way I see it even if the dems get a president in 2020 and the house and the senate with a super majority for four consecutive terms it still wouldn't be enough. So heartbroken over what America has eroded into, I love it here but don't think I can take it much more.
My grandma was a safe house for draft dodgers during the Vietnam war. It got to a point when the border guards in Detroit would call her up at her home in Windsor saying Jean, there's another one on the way and click they would hang up. I remember this, though at the time I did not understand it, too young at the time. They would stay one night and she would get them on the bus or train to Toronto where more support was available. When Trudeau granted them amnesty and 20,000 decided to make Canada their permanent home - well after seeing what trump has done to empower racism, neo natzis, and white supremacy - I have to think they are happy they took him up on his offer. Canada is far from perfect for sure but damn man it's loony tunes here.
Owen Dearing, potter
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As a Jew from the south who now lives in NYC I have seen this problem from so many angles. I grew up in Norfolk/Va Beach and even though there was a tight knit Jewish population it wasn't massive.
In middle school we took a field trip to the filming of the 700 Club with Pat Robertson because his grandson was in our class. After the taping he walked down the isle and thanked everyone for coming. When he got to me he asked, "You're Eric Kramer right, the Jewish kid in class? You know you're going to hell if you don't believe in Jesus Christ". He said this in the sweetest old man tone. It threw me back even as a 13 year old. I said, "Thank you for your prayer". I should have punched him.
The death knell of the religious status quo is here. There are going to be some broken eggs. Thousands of years of "normal" don't just go away without a fight. Jews have always been survivors because we use our insistence on education and we stick together.
Hell even Nas talks about Jews vs Blacks. He raps, "It's because we can't see ourselves as the boss
Deep-rooted through slavery, self-hatred
The Jewish stick together, friends in high places
We on some low level shit"
All of this fear and hatred is uniting the "minorities" the status quo is scared of. Well the minorities aren't going to be minorities for much longer. They will be on parity with the WASPs. So it may get worse before it gets better. But it's going to get better for my future kids. I hope. For now I'm staying in my "bubble" but I understand what he world is like better than most here.
Eric Kramer
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I am the son of proud Jewish immigrants who escaped their Polish masters and fled to Toronto.
My Mother ran a boarding house and my Dad made pockets in a sweat shop.
My Mother had 2 grade schools to choose from.
One was loaded with Jewish children of immigrants, the other had a small sprinkling of Jews. She sent me to that one.
I still don't know why.
I got the crap beat out of me daily by 4 Brothers while calling me all those names that don't deserve mentioning.
The school principal said "boys will be boys" and the cops did nothing.
And then it escalated.
When I was 9, they hung me in an abandoned garage and my screaming attracted the attention of a man who came in and took me down.
It was fortunate that I was a small boy.
Since that day, I have lived with a broken neck which I didn't know about until my dentist showed me a 360° x-ray of my neck not too long ago.
When I look at my kid photos, I am also slightly crooked.
So, how do I feel about anti semites?
For years, I despised these 4 brothers, one of whom is in prison for murder; retributive Justice.
I no longer despise them. I have forgiven them because it must be just awful to live with such hatred in their dark hearts. And in forgiving them, it freed me.
I'm 82 and anti semitism has come in waves all my life. I am not religious, but I am Very Jewish culturally and for many years was a member of the Canadian Zionist Organization.
I have my own personal feelings about the state of our world today. It didn't start yesterday.
It wasn't Trump or Obama or Alinskey.
It's been there for thousands of years and every so often it erupts.
The Romans, The Turks, The Arabs, The Egyptians, The Spanish, The Brits, The French.etc.
It would be hard to find a dozen countries where Jews have not been murdered, raped, enslaved, disenfranchised and forced to convert or die. It is our heritage.
So fellow Jews, we can all hope 'to come together as Americans' and rid this cancer from our midst, but it ain't gonna happen.
It'll come & go in waves.
It will Never end; Ever. Jews are and always will be the world's Bete Noire.
Alan
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I read you every day and very rarely respond. Obviously I think it's great what you do and just want to weigh in right now....
My heart is bleeding for "the Burgh" and more so SQUIRREL HILL. Some of my best memories are in that neighborhood around the corner from this tragedy. I have spent the past few days contemplating who to call, scared that I've lost them. I don't want to know the truth. So instead I am choosing to appeal to a broader audience.
People are all acting foolish. It is time for us as a community of people that can reach each other to actually "reach each other!"
There is this constant bickering happening about bullshit. Why is no one focused on affecting a change amongst themselves and their family and their friends. Why does all the blame fall on someone else? We hired potus Trump. Why am I, and you, and every other reader not to blame for the bull shit you put up with?
Are you a millennial that believes your parents ruined everything? Are you the parent of a millennial that believes media screwed you over? Where is your mind? Where is your ability to cut through the bullshit and find truth? Did google tell you "what's for breakfast?" Get your head out of your ass and pay the fuck attention. Maybe we all forgot to talk to each other. Maybe reality is dead. Just life on the screen. We can not continue to be this stupid as a country, as a community, as a collection of humans cohabiting a space in the world. We are all in this together, and to anyone that can't see that, please walk your dumb ass off a very tall bridge. I am tired of ignorance and everyone above me with a voice that plays to people with ignorance. It's about time the musician minds start reminding us all why we are here and what we should stand up for... the heroes of my past didn't write "hits" they wrote the songs that the world needed to hear and feel. It wasn't about the money. It was about the connection.
I miss the connections. I miss my friends. I miss the truth. Mostly I miss reality.
Thanks Bob, keep it real,
dk
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I am in Pittsburgh tonight doing the Byrds. I was so looking forward to this and they are so great. The trumps were here today to try and ruin my day. I didn't watch the news on purpose so I could keep tonight pure in my mind and grieve for those we lost. I hope we all get thru these next couple years.
Danny Zelisko
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Last Sunday evening, I happened to be in Madison WI. I attended, along with about 800 concerned and affected individuals, an interfaith memorial service, giving voice to the outrage we all feel of Saturday's senseless tragedy and loss in the Squirrel Hill community. To hear the heartfelt messages of many faiths and ethnic communities, together in solidarity, simply wanting to live in peace and freedom of religion should inspire us all to effectively make a difference.
Making a difference matters!
Roy Liemer
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The sad truth is "Trump is a uniter" in the most perverse sense. He has "united" conservative Jews and Nazis into a voting block. Sheldon Adelson and Richard Spencer pull all the same levers.
Larry Brown
________________________________________
In spite of the fact that he's a racist, Trump enjoys solid support from the Jewish community in Florida. Did those supporters think his racism would stop with Mexican immigrants and African-Americans?
I didn't understand it when he was running, and I don't understand it now.
Vince Welsh
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keep hearing, "...but this isn't America. This isn't who we are!"
From this vantage point outside your borders, it sure looks like this is who you are.
The pattern is too great, the numbers are too high and the consistency is well... consistent.
Acknowledge it, call it for what it is, and try and fix it... the U.S. really is at war... with itself.
Most of the rest of the world hopes you can get it together...
Ken Hunter
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I wrote this song after seeing the demonstrators in Charlottesville chanting "Jews Will Not Replace Us." It sent the intended chill up my spine - our greatest fears for our people were coming true. I looked at these monsters and thought "Damn right I'll replace you motherfuckers."
I share your rage and often your resignation over this past weekend's act of terror. But I still need to believe there's hope. Our persecution often defines us, but so does our strength. And so does America's.
open.spotify.com/track/4mkwZ9bx4EYvXWQKiDSsoj?si=VCCEVvhvTiSZ36IvT6kVkw
Lyrics: genius.com/Steven-page-white-noise-lyrics
Steven Page
________________________________________
Sad to say but with the way Trump TV and the speedy hour to hour news cycle culture operates today, Pittsburgh is already old news.
What's next? Only Trump and his GOP posse knows what we'll get outraged or distracted by next.
I replied back when Trump won the election and suggested the title of his next book when he's out of office...The Art of Distraction.
Next.....
M 1
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