Last month, my daughter’s car lease was up. So we began researching cars that were safe, reasonably priced and of course “cool.” In my days, we drove whatever car was available. In 1980, I was thrilled to get the 1970 Bonneville that belonged to my uncle Morris, a”h. That car was the size of a small yacht. I think it had more room inside than some Manhattan apartments. It got me to where I had to go and I was thankful for it. more

Mazel Tov! After much anticipation, at 4:24pm in London on July 22, the Duchess of Cambridge gave birth. The Royal bundle is an 8lbs. 6oz. son, future King — and perhaps a real Jewish Prince. For those of you who haven’t heard, according to lawyer Alan Dershowitz, Kate’s mother, Carol, is the daughter of Ronald and Dorothy Goldsmith (whose parents, he claims, were also Jews). The Jewish line may thicken with hubby Wills. more

The Jewish people are finally, after 40 long years, making ready to enter the land of Israel. Most of the generation that left Egypt is gone, buried in unmarked graves in the desert, and their children, the second generation, born free in the desert, are preparing at last to cross the Jordan and enter the land. There will be no more manna from heaven, and no heavenly clouds or pillars of fire to guard them on their journey; they will have to fight, and even die, for the right to call this small piece of land their home. more

Weiner and Spitzer. Enough said. Will New Yorkers elect “Carlos Danger” as Mayor? Considering how quickly the scandal-tarred Anthony Weiner rose in the polls, before this week’s revelations, we shouldn’t discount it. And Eliot Spitzer as Comptroller? Also possible. There’s a thought afloat that “character” doesn’t count, that instead, we should weight a candidate’s “competence” when voting. Yet both character and competence count. more

My “association” with Helen Thomas began on a Friday, just over three years ago when my friend Rabbi David Nesenoff (who would subsequently become publisher of The Jewish Star) sent me a video, which contained a short explosive interview he had conducted with the veteran White House correspondent. In it, Thomas gave a statement that many people saw as telling the Jews to go face another Holocaust. more

Remember when buying a cup of coffee meant … buying a cup of coffee. Sure you had a choice of what type, regular or decaf; skim or regular milk; sugar or sugar substitute, and hot or iced. Then came the flavored coffee creamers, followed by flavored coffees. You could have made it at home, or bought it at a luncheonette, candy shop or coffee shop, which was basically a mini restaurant that served breakfast and lunch along with coffee. Today, coffee is no longer just coffee. more

This week’s portion, Re’eh, begins with Moshe’s dramatic presentation of the blessings and the curses, which seem at first glance to be all about the rewards and punishments that await us when we enter the land of Israel, just across the Jordan river: “Re’eh anochi noten lifneichem hayom brachah u’klalah…“See, I present before you today a blessing and a curse. more

There are six remembrances that are included in the siddur at the end of Shacharis. Remembering the Exodus, Shabbos, G-d’s presence at Mt. Sinai, what happened to Miriam, how you provoked G-d in the desert, and to destroy Amalek. This list does not include all the times the word zachor (to remember) appears in the Torah. more

After calling the ruling an atrocity on his MSNBC program, Al Sharpton wants the federal government to act. “There are grounds for civil rights charges here,” he said on Meet the Press, adding, “There would never have been protests if there had been an arrest and if the police department there did what it was supposed to do.” Despite Reverend Al’s protestations, local police did do their job. After examining all the evidence, police believed Zimmerman’s story. more

There’s a “new” star author on the scene named Robert Galbraith. The writer, who the publisher, Little Brown, described as “a former plainclothes Royal Military Police investigator who had left in 2003 to work in the civilian security industry,” debuted with a detective novel about the suicide of a supermodel called “The Cuckoo’s Calling.” more