Pro Commerce

New York Jews Are Responsible

I’ve spent time around the world with influential people. One thing is clear and very important: They get their news from the New York Times.  Journalists, around the world, also get their news from the N.Y. Times.

The two things in the headline to this blog that need explaining: ‘Jews’ and ‘Responsible.’

Jews.  The New York Times has been on its last legs, financially, for nearly a decade. Even the most recent online readership recovery due to puzzles and games has not relieved the financial finale.  What would destroy the New York Times, in a week, would be if most New York Jews canceled their subscriptions.

Responsible.  The greatest surprise to me and nearly everyone else was the October 8th discovery that much of the world and nearly all of American academia hates Israel. 

The U.N. has always reflected this global hatred of Israel with little consequence (except for the recent UNRWA troops in Hamas.)  The United States has always stopped the U.N. calumny.  Except for Obama’s last minute expression of vitriol.

The New York Times has been consistently an Israel hater and a Jew hater.  The Jew hatred has been evident since the 1930’s when Arthur O. Sulzberger was the publisher and tried to pass for an Episcopalian. Arthur O. denied the Holocaust and was strongly anti-Israel before and after its founding.  This has continued with A.O. Sulzberger, Jr.  It can’t be missed by accident. Every Israel based reporter has written false and defamatory articles for the Times.  Every article about American Jewry, for decades, has been malicious, such as the recent coverage of Haredi education.  

New York Jews just march on as if it didn’t matter. 

But it does.  The New York Times has been the fertile soil for global Israel hatred. New York Jews could have stopped it.

I am Guilty Too

The civil rights movement failed.  That is why the wokies say America is racist.

I was on both sides in 1964.  

On the one hand, I was made president of the San Francisco organization that was created to save Lowell High School, the merit-based high school that the school board wanted to make open to all students.  We won that battle and then had to fight it again,70 years later, in 2022.  I still believe that merit is a core ingredient in the structure of America. All three of my children later went to Lowell.

On the other hand I played a significant role in the design and implementation of school busing in San Francisco, the first city outside the South to have court-mandated busing. I vividly remember making a presentation to the parents at Hoover Jr. High on the busing plans for their school.  I have never faced an audience with so much hatred in my life.  Parents couldn’t stand the idea of busing for racial integration.

Busing was a total failure.  Half the population of public school children left the public schools.  From 80,000 enrolled in 1964 to 40,000 by 1984.  Parents with school age children moved out of San Francisco or enrolled their kids in private schools.  The black school children did not improve their test scores.  Nationally school busing was a failure.

Add to that failure, the generous Civil Rights payments to blacks from 1965 for the next two decades did little to change the status of the general black community.  Since it provoked the destruction of the black family, it degraded the status of blacks and brought on the greatest expansion of black crime in the 20th Century. The second failure.

I also brought the first and most successful employment discrimination lawsuit on behalf of minorities and women in 1971.  This had positive benefits for all groups but ended up having two perverse effects.

It was not appreciated by any groups, though the reality was impressive.  The results were viewed as failures partly because the homeless population grew rapidly, made up largely of black men, who became very visible. Leading to the growth of the perverse DEI (Diversity, equity, and inclusion) of today.

It also brought women into the higher ranks of business, successfully.  Which had the perverse effect of raising the income of married couples which in turn dramatically increased the price of housing in America. An increase in prices that today is a major barrier to home ownership by everyone in their 20’s, 30’s and 40’s.

Multiple failures and I was there at the start. These failures have resulted in the ‘wokies’ of modern life who have tried to create more equal outcomes in life for blacks, primarily, due to the failures of the past five decades of government programs.

Finding the Truth in 2024

At our recent Thanksgiving dinner I asked two family members what they think of Wikipedia.  One ‘loves it so much’ he sends money monthly. The other considers it ‘a truly reliable source.’

I personally approach Wikipedia with caution.  If an entry can be slanted in a Lefty direction it will be.  I am an expert witness in American courts in nine subject areas and have been cross- examined many times in my life as a legal witness. Much of the time where I know a subject because I have taught it at the university level or because I worked in the field for many years, Wikipedia is wrong.  In the dozen times I’ve made a correction with appropriate references, my correction disappears the next day.

The subject of this blog is the disappearance of reliable sources today.  The best thinker on this subject was Marshall McLuhan, his book was The Medium is the Message.  The medium of our time is the Internet.  The Internet is the reason 'authoritative source’ has disappeared. And has been gone for nearly two decades.

There never was a ‘truth’ other than in a syllogism. We have always relied on authoritative sources ranging from leading academics, to the New York Times, or scientific consensus, or expert opinion and maybe a professional or governmental authority.

I don’t need to recount the downfall of all these authorities. 

Any statement based on authority will lead to an Internet lookup which will give a variety of answers and many credible videos.

Virtually anything of importance that is treated as authoritative by one part of American society will be doubted or disputed by a large different part of our society. Thanks to the Internet and Internet video.

Thus, our society is deeply divided on many important issues. There are no commonly agreed authoritative ideas, issues, or values today.

What does that mean?

I would guess that we are returning to a tribal society where we only trust our own tribe.  Our tribe is our authority. And vice versa.

The fascinating genius of America has been that our assimilation has been so effective that tribal allegiance has virtually disappeared.  This in turn has allowed commerce to thrive.  The consequence of tribal return will be direct harm to modern commerce.  

Imagine going to work where people of different tribes can’t get along.  Much like China where Wongs only work with Wongs and Gees only work, bank, and rent from Gees.