Lügenpresse

And judgment is turned away backward, and justice stands afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter. Yes, truth fails; and he that departs from evil makes himself a prey.

– Isaiah 59:14–5

Intellectual mendacity in academia and journalism has long been a personal bugaboo, well before The Age of Trump. Indeed, the Donald is the full culmination and epitome of the lies and sophistries which an American lügenpresse has long been precursor. Trump could truthfully declare, in the immortal words of another oddly groomed celebrity of Gotham, “You idiot! You made me!”

Yet another example of intellectual mendacity, or at least of deceit, emerges from Bloomberg News in regard to the recent reversal of fortune of house prices in Toronto. According to Erik Hertzberg, who seems to be go-to-guy for all things Canadian for that media empire, “Even amid the sales decline in May, Toronto benchmark prices were up 1.2 percent last month.”

Where does Hertzberg of Bloomberg News derive this statistic when the primary source of housing information for the Greater Toronto Area declares an across the board 6.2% precipitous monthly decline on an average basis, and a 6.6% decline on a median basis?

Month	Average Price	Average Price	Median Price
	TREB	CREA	TREB
February 2017	875,983	727,300	715,000
March 2017	916,567	772,500	765,000
April 2017	920,971	811,300	760,000
May 2017	863,910	821,400	710,000

It appears that Hertzberg of Bloomberg News acquired his statistics from a different source just as the market has reversed or whenever it befits his agenda. For in some prior reports of GTA house prices, his stats are taken from the TREB reports as in the  average price of 920,971 for April, a 0.5% increase from March. But for March and May, Hertzberg swaps over to information provided by the Canadian Real Estate Association. (Home price increases in March were reported as 4.6% by the TREB, and 6.2 by the CREA.) If any consistency can be detected whatsoever in his method of reporting, it is in putting forth a best face on any given situation; a hallmark more of the corporate shills on CNBC than that of a genuine journalist who serves the good of his audience.

In the end, these dual sources for Toronto prices will roughly correspond. However, the deliberated inconsistency in the immediate, (even if the reporter technically covers his behind by citing the source), serves to demonstrate what manner of man Hertzberg is, and adds to the general discredit of his profession. This becomes particularly pertinent when Hertzberg’s Bloomberg article is published by Toronto’s National Post before a local audience who largely know of the recent frenzy and tumult in the housing market.

Bill Kristol: Author of His Own Future Misfortune?

It highlighted what surfaced last year in the election; a very strong disaffection by the white working class towards the new upper class, fueled in large part, in substantial part by the open contempt and disdain that the new upper class has for the working class, and especially for the white working class, and most especially for the white male working class.

William Kristol, founding editor of The Weekly Standard, neo-conservative (a.k.a. member of any war party), pretentious  pseudo-intellectual, and a living facsimile of Rich Uncle Pennybags in the spirit of Sinclair Lewis’ Babbitt (1922), apparently failed to pick up on his colleague Charles Murray’s comments concerning elitist contempt for the working class in an event sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute on February 7, 2017.

Within the hour, he would be explicitly suggest that “new immigrants” were superior to the decadent, lazy, spoiled, coupon-clipping working class Americans and insinuated their replacement.

Gender Neutral Bathrooms and Circumcision

My wife and I never saw eye to eye with regard to the circumcision of our three boys. But she was a nurse from Britain, where this operation is a “minority” procedure; whereas at the time, most North Americans allowed the members of their boys to be given a slice.

The medical arguments which I floated, and which might have substance in ancient Israel or modern undeveloped countries, seemed feeble even to me. There is absolutely no Christian warrant for circumcision (Gal 5:6, 6:15). The best argument that I mustered was so that our sons would not feel alienated from their father and later their siblings if by chance, such members were sighted; the rawest form of traditionalism. I am loathe to admit that she was right.

So, when I see Mark Joseph Stern argue himself rouge that circumcision has significant medical benefits in the antiseptic West, it becomes obvious that other motivations are driving his drivel. Having lived in Israel for eight months, it is likewise obvious that circumcision serves as a fundamental distinctive ethnic, cultural, and religious marker. Mr. Stern’s arguments seems to be “pseudoscientific argle-bargle—it’s about religion and very little else.”

The American Jew in Light of the Implosion of Evangelicalism

The State of Israel and the American Jew has not found a more supportive constituency within the United States than the American Evangelical.[1] This is about to change.

This change shall occur because of a subterranean spiritual deterioration within Evangelicalism, which is now undeniable in light of the 2016 Republican Primaries and the Trump phenomenon. This change shall occur because the stream of Evangelicalism most favorable to the Jews, namely Dispensationalism, is declining in credibility and influence, relative to their “supersessionist” counterparts. This change shall occur because the political needs and actions of the American Diasporic Jew tend to work against Evangelical interests, even to the point of now threatening the latter’s socioeconomic welfare. This change shall occur because the prevailing cultural notions within the over-sized influence of American Jewry is contrary to the cultural heritage of the host country.

Blood Libel

In writing on this subject, I do not wish to be seen as pandering to the sensitivities of the Jews. It is not that I am hostile to the Jews. They are neither greater nor lesser in the Kingdom of God in Christ (Col 3:11, Gal 3:28, Eph 2:11–22), nor are they intrinsically more virtuous nor more villainous among the nations of men. If on balance, they appear superior in virtue and accomplishments, it must be remembered that in the judicial economy of God, “everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more” (Luke 12:48).

The rationale, in seeking to appear neutral as to their state and status, is so that any assertions and arguments made are seen as an outworking of an impartial and unprejudiced mind. I know that this will not be seen as the case. One is likely to be shot from both sides on contentious issues like these. However, I profess to the ever pursuit of intellectual integrity come what may.

“His blood be upon us and on our children.” (Matt 27:25)

This verse has become the lightning rod for Christian anti-Semitism, as reflected by Origen. In declaring “His blood be upon us, and on our children”[1] . . . “the blood of Jesus came not only upon those who existed at that time but also upon all generations of Jews who would follow afterwards until the endtime.”[2] Therefore, until now, their abandoned houses are in ruins.[3]

Although various churchmen held and expressed a somewhat more scripturally faithful and nuanced perspective, Jews as “Christ killers,” from mostly less sophisticated commoners, has been the frequent clamor throughout the history of Christendom, and with ensuing travesty and atrocity. The Jews have contrariwise sought to diminish the extent of their culpability for the rejection and/or death of Jesus of Nazareth to that of a negligibility or naught at all.

This whole paradigm, beyond being tedious, is quite alien to the scriptural/historical framework by which I conceive the Jewish element in the crucifixion of Christ or thereafter. However, there are few observations of this verse and response that warrant comment.

Jewish Control of Hollywood

How deeply Jewish is Hollywood? When the studio chiefs took out a full-page ad in the Los Angeles Times a few weeks ago to demand that the Screen Actors Guild settle its contract, the open letter was signed by:

• News Corp. President Peter Chernin (Jewish),
• Paramount Pictures Chairman Brad Grey (Jewish),
• Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert Iger (Jewish),
• Sony Pictures Chairman Michael Lynton (surprise, Dutch Jew),
• Warner Bros. Chairman Barry Meyer (Jewish),
• CBS Corp. Chief Executive Leslie Moonves (so Jewish his great uncle was the first prime minister of Israel),
• MGM Chairman Harry Sloan (Jewish) and
• NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker (mega-Jewish)

If either of the Weinstein brothers had signed, this group would have not only the power to shut down all film production but to form a minyan with enough Fiji water on hand to fill a mikvah.    – Joel Stein (Los Angelis Times)