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Sundown: Our Mouthpiece, Ben Stein

Good hair, English roots, and an Egyptian synagogue

by
Ari M. Brostoff
August 20, 2009

• Ben Stein got props from a woman at a town hall meeting on health care, who credited him with “tracing the decline of America to taking prayer out of school.” No word on how Stein feels about her claim that America’s a Christian nation, or how Jews feel about her claim that Stein’s a “Jewish spokesman.” [Huffington Post]
• Egypt announced the restoration of the Moses Ben Maimon Synagogue in Cairo, named for the second-most famous Moses who lived in that country. The government says this is not a not a ploy to assuage the controversy over would-be U.N. official Hosni Farouk. [AP]
• Writer James Lasdun, who has a new story collection out, grew up in London, where his father—an eminent British architect—expressed his otherwise-dormant Jewish identity by insisting, “We’re not English.” [The Scotsman]
• A Chris Rock documentary about the politics of black women’s hair will be a must-see for many frizzy-haired Jewish women as well, a Forward blogger writes. Best part of the trailer for Rock’s movie: women at a beauty parlor referring to hair relaxer as “creamy crack.” [Forward]
• Some Oregonians are angry that an annual breast cancer walk in Portland is being held on Rosh Hashana this year, especially given that “Ashkenazi women have a genetic propensity toward breast cancer.” [USA Today]

Ari M. Brostoff is Culture Editor at Jewish Currents.