David P. Goldman is a senior editor of First Things.

RSS Feed

Cut-Price Judaism? Puh-leeze!

From First Thoughts

Newsweek religion commentator Lisa Miller complains that the cost of synagogue affiliation is driving Jews away from their religion. Man-bites-dog has nothing on this one; when is the last time that anyone has argued that the big problem with the Jews is that they are short of money? Nonetheless, . . . . Continue Reading »

Americans Who’ll Never Work Again

From Web Exclusives

How many Americans will never work again? Perhaps a lot. A close look at the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Current Population Survey raises some alarming questions about the prospects of significant parts of the American population. Thirteen percent of Americans twenty-five years and over without a high school diploma were unemployed in June … Continue Reading »

Petraeus Redux

From Web Exclusives

Whether Gen. David Petraeus fainted upon receiving travel orders to Afghanistan”as he did in last week’s Senate hearings”is not clear from the news reports, but President Obama managed a double-whammy by replacing Gen. Stanley McChrystal with the “king of the conservative lecture circuit,” as the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg dubbed the ambitious general… . Continue Reading »

Child Martyrs of Palestine

From First Thoughts

The Britain-based Islamic satellite channel “Birds of Paradise,” which is aired in Gaza, offers a musical number in which children sing the following to a bouncy Middle Eastern tune: “When we die as martyrs We will go to heaven. No, don’t say we are young, This life has . . . . Continue Reading »