Touche!

It's really annoying when I have nothing to write, because then it's difficult to write. It's even more annoying when I have what to write and it's still difficult to write. The reason I bring this up is because MyYeshiva, the Yeshiva High School of the Twin Cities, visited Postville, Iowa for the weekend. One would think that I'd have lots to write about; after all, there's so much exciting shtuff going on in that bastion of world Jewry. Truth is, it's quite impressive that all types of Jews live and interact there with no one getting killed. The problem is that I really don't feel like describing how cows are slaughtered, processed, and turned into tasty burgers. In case you're interested, Agriprocessors has recently started making precooked shnitzel that you just microwave, and let me tell you that it is good. No garbage in that product, just chicken breasts. I was quite impressed. As I was saying though, I really don't feel like telling you all about wading through pools of blood and guts, or standing inches from a dying cow, or watching atrocities reminiscent of Israeli dealings with Arabs. All right, I'm just joking about that last one. The Rubashkin Mafia threatened to shoot us if we said anything bad about their operations.
I almost became a member of PETA, but then I ate some of that shnitzel, and I realized that the reason the good G-d gave us meat was to enjoy it. Actually, I wouldn't become a member of PETA even if was a vegetarian, simply because they're a bunch of lying hypocrites who advocate death for all normal human beings like me and you. Am I being harsh? Possibly. Nu Nu.

In the Shushan Purim Maamar from 1954 the Rebbe talks a lot about angels, but the main focus of the discourse is on a pretty basic question. We all know that the Jew's completed their acceptance of the Torah on Purim, and the question is raised, why is it that the Megilla, depending on circumstances, can be read on five days, while the original acceptance of the Torah, Shavous, is only one day? The Maamar obviously goes into this in great detail, but the main point is that the reason there is only one day that the Torah was given to us is because-oh, that's it! The Torah was given to us. It was a gift from above. From above everyone is equal. On Purim, we worked hard, and we accepted the Torah. We did it, and since we're all different, there are different days of Purim.
What's the practical application? We have to know that everyone got the same gift, but we all have different purposes, and therefore different abilitys to do different things. Wow, wasn't that a soppy liberal sentence. I almost made myself vomit.
There was a guy Farbrenging in Postville who was telling a couple of the Shluchim from YHSTC that if you think good about a kid then he'll turn out great, and if you look at him as if he's bad then he'll be bad. I felt like punching him in the head, but decided against it because after all he is a ritual slaughterer, and as you know those guys can be pretty dangerous. My problem with his statement is that it's needlessly positive. Life isn't so perfect that by mere attitude behavior can be changed. It takes much more than that. It takes massive amounts of cash to accomplish anything.