Ezzie's Blog Roundup, 1/28

It is always scary when your hometown gets bomb threats, even if this has seemingly turned out to be a dud. About 20 years ago, right around this time of year, someone firebombed the Young Israel of Cleveland (housed inside the Hebrew Academy of Cleveland). They walked into the building, then into the shul/auditorium, walked up to the aron kodesh, and threw a firebomb - at the stage in the back. A few people were in the building (it was Shabbos afternoon), so they grabbed the sifrei Torah and ran out. By the time the fire was put out, most of the auditorium and a number of classrooms (including my kindergarden classroom) were pretty much burned out.

Elsewhere from the past week or so:

• WestBankMama is looking for posts by olim.
• Via JoeSettler, this interesting electoral compass helps you determine who you should vote for in the upcoming Israeli elections. I did it for kicks - I'm somewhere in between Yisrael Beiteinu and the Likud, which is about what I'd guessed (though that may surprise others).
• Life-of-Rubin has Hannity's interview with Rush Limbaugh. Interesting. Also interesting to realize context - the current hubbub of Democrats complaining about Limbaugh saying he wishes Obama to "fail" is far different in context: He says he wishes for him to fail at putting in policies which he feels will ruin the country - big government, higher taxes, higher government spending, etc.
  
• Matt's post (or rather, posting from others) on hashkafa touches on an important point, which is not getting too caught up in that one over everything else. A very wothwhile read.
  
• A Soldier's Mother talks about the worry that your son is about to go back to war after yesterday's attack... and how soldiers get rewarded.
• Via EK, Forbes discusses how overreactions and rushing to legislate harsh rules ends up causing major problems - in this case, for toymakers. Odds that this stops government? Zero.
• R' Aviner notes that someone should not collect money for Shabbos or a wedding al pi halacha, and discusses weddings he went to which were 20 and 50 shekels. Final line:

  If a person wants to live with extras it is a personal decision, but living with extras with other people's money is unheard of.

• R' Gil on lashon hara and newspapers.
  

Check them out!