Interesting Posts and Articles #80

1. At Arutz Sheva, how Obama staff camp deceived the Ex-Deputy IDF Chief of Staff, and used his words to make a campaign ad. {Update: See in the comment section below that the Obama camp was not behind the ad. The article identified the people behind this as "a Jewish group backing Sen. Barack Obama -- The Jewish Council for Education and Research." By camp, they presumably mean Obama supporters.}
   
   
2. At Circus Tent, a very detailed questionnaire to allow entry into a school, into computers in the home and at work for the father and mother, MP4 players, videos which are not family simchas or shiurim, etc.
   
   
3. KallahMagazine on making a political statement with your sheitel -- the Sarah Palin sheitel.
   
   And also, the power of a single word could sway a shidduch.
   
   
4. The Seforim blog on Eliezer Hakallir and his identity, and whether he was assassinated. And some fun with gematriah, showing how if you use gematriah to assign various piyutim to Eliezer haKallir, then you can use the same methodology to assign all of Tanach, and Mishna, etc., to Eliezer haKallir.
   
   
5. Lion Of Zion on the question of whether missing dots over words passul a sefer Torah. And here is the midrash about why these dots are necessary. I can see the argument -- if it is a defensive mechanism of Ezra in case those words do not belong, then without those dots, we have extra words. But the answer is that it does not really invalidate. One should not use it lechatchila, and if it is taken out and this is discovered during leining, then if during the week and it is possible to easily fix, do so, but if not, they need not being out another sefer Torah. And this based on various sources including Rambam.
   
   By the way, a very nifty way of getting texts online. It looks like he uses a digital camera to protograph the open book, rather than scanning. Very nice!
   
   
6. BlogInDm about how at a simcha, a caterer (whose contract did not stipulate this) did not like the family dancing together since it was mixed dancing, and cut off the music by cutting the power; how the band disregarded this by playing without power and moving towards the dancers; and how the caterer restored power, especially after being threatened with non-payment. Nice. (And I mean that seriously.)
   
   
7. Also linked to from BlogInDm, Hamercaz has the latest ban, on the Chabad Simchas Beis HaShoevah. And now I see it is also at the Yeshiva World.