California Court Upholds Yoga

A California appellate court unanimously upheld the teaching of Yoga courses in public schools, rejecting challenges that it was actually a form of Hinduism and thereby an Establishment Clause violation. I think this decision is exactly right and the opinion is well-reasoned and persuasive. While it is true that Yoga seems to have some religious roots, that is true of a great many elements of secular society. Religious concepts and ideals often percolate into surrounding society and become important for entirely non-sectarian reasons. This is why my public high school can teach the King James Bible in its English courses (as a piece of literature, not theology) -- the KJV is very important to our literary heritage in ways that extend beyond any religious or theological teaching. Other entities which have religious roots but no ongoing religious component include the days of the week (who do you think "Thursday" is named after?) and the sport of lacrosse. In this context, the court found that the Yoga courses in the school had no religious component, but were entirely secularized teachings focusing on mindfulness, flexibility, stress-relief, and other like concerns.

However, in my ongoing and futile crusade to police non-lawyers from too-eagerly making pronouncements about matters of law, I will cry foul on Jezebel's coverage of the decision -- particularly the following line:

The family plans to appeal the decision because simply opting out of ritualized prayers to the sun god yoga isn’t good enough.

No, no, no, no, no. The Yoga program is constitutional because its non-religious, not because it is non-compulsory. If it was religious, the existence of an opt-out provision would not and should not save it (as the court itself observes in a footnote). The reasons why should be immediately obvious if we substitute in a prayer event -- the Church/State harm wouldn't be resolved via an announcement that "all the people who don't love Christ, feel free to conspicuously refrain from participation". This is something the Supreme Court has be quite emphatic about, and rightly so. So while I appreciate the sense that the parents in this action are being hyper-sensitive (or perhaps more likely, concern-trolling), this is not actually a valid response to the claim (and again, the court here explicitly stated that the voluntary nature of the program was not a factor in its decision).

I Don't Always Endorse David Bernstein

But when I do, it's because he's right. And in his latest post on the Virginia Bar Israel trip cancellation fiasco, he's right in all relevant respects. The Bar leadership almost certainly stumbled into a hole and then panicked and dug deeper. The fact of the matter is, though, that the trip was almost certainly going to be canceled anyways due to lack of interest. Reinstate the trip, announce it will be canceled if there are insufficient sign-ups prior to a given date, and move forward. It's likely the trip won't go forward anyway (though the increased attention its getting might cause some people to attend who otherwise would have not paid it any heed).

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume XV: Jewish Friends Edition

This one is a little different from other entrants in the series. An Argentine labor leader referred to a government minister as the "little Jew boy". Then we went through the usual cycle: "That's offensive", "How dare you call me anti-Semitic", "We condemn it", "Everybody uses the term," until we get to the inevitable apex:

I didn’t discriminate against him. I have Jewish friends.

Ah yes, the classic "I have Jewish friends" defense. It is so ubiquitous that maybe it's time I stop closing my eyes to the pattern. Maybe the real cause of anti-Semitism is ... Jewish friends.

Think about it. When's the last time somebody who says anti-Semitic nonsense hasn't immediately referred to their many many Jewish friends? They go together like bacon and eggs latkes and applesauce. Obviously, we're doing something wrong. Either we're not very good friends, or we're subliminally feeding our goyish pals anti-Semitic messages so they can humiliate themselves in public.

Or having Jewish friends isn't a bar to anti-Semitism. But obviously that's the least likely hypothesis here.

The Stones on that Guy

I (probably) had a kidney stone on Sunday. You want to know what was the worst thing about that?

The agonizing pain.

There were other bad things about the experience too, and periodically I'd reflect on them and reflexively start think "you know what's even worse than the pain...." And then I'd stop and realize that, no, the pain is the worst part.

Anyway, as I said, I probably had a kidney stone on Sunday. I say probably because they never actually saw a stone, and it has not to my knowledge passed in my urine. Also, kidney stone pain usually moves from your back around your abdomen down to your genitalia, but I didn't notice any movement (it felt concentrated on the right side of my stomach). They diagnosed it based on the location of the pain (which was certainly in the path of a kidney stone), and the fact that I went from zero to "I need to go to the ER" pain in about 5 minutes, which is classic kidney stone. Also, there's apparently another stone currently sitting in my right kidney, which further implied that kidney stones were the cause. That stone might dissolve on its own, or it might drop and I'll go through the same thing all over again. No way to know for sure. Fingers crossed.

I woke up feeling normal Sunday morning -- maybe a slight stomach ache, but nothing different than normal indigestion. Jill announced she was going out to Starbucks, and as she left I jumped into the shower. All of the sudden, I feel this terrible pain in my right side. It rapidly got bad enough that I decided to get out the shower because I was genuinely afraid I might collapse and drown. I knew Jill was coming back soon, but I called her anyway and begged her to come home right away.

My first guess on what was wrong was actually appendicitis. I called my insurer's nurse hotline who squished that pretty quick -- it was too high on my side. But it wasn't getting better, and I was getting worse. Jill and I called an Uber and we directed him to the ER in Berkeley.

The Uber driver was somewhat less urgent than I would have liked. Jill hadn't put in the destination, and he would not even start driving until she plugged the hospital's address into the app. From my vantage point, he also seemed to be in no hurry, even though I was in pretty obvious agony in the backseat. I was still on the phone with the nurse hotline, who helpfully informed me that the Berkeley hospital was outside of my network. She suggested we go to Richmond(!) or Oakland instead. Fortunately, the Oakland hospital was only 15 minutes away. I could tough that out. Barely.

The ER intake line in Oakland was three patients deep, managed by an intake nurse who as best as I could tell was staring at his computer screen doing absolutely nothing. He was eventually replaced by another nurse who finally got the line moving. Patient #1 apparently had "excruciating" knee pain (which she described absolutely calmly and with no indication she was even mildly put out). Patient #2 was equally matter-of-fact in telling the nurse that he thought he had a stroke last night and could no longer feel half of his face; also he was having trouble breathing (that was more impressive). He immediately got taken in. Then we got to me, and the intake nurse also was pretty confident that I did not have appendicitis but that I probably had a kidney stone. We exchanged a sarcastic "hurray!" and she said she'd try to get me in as soon as possible.

This brings me to the first not-as-bad-as-pain problem with kidney stones -- they aren't really that serious. They're agonizing, but they're not going to kill you or anything. Which meant that, severe pain notwithstanding, I was actually pretty low priority on the queue. And that meant I sat in the waiting room for nearly two hours enduring steadily more excruciating pain. Well "sat" isn't quite accurate -- I paced for a long time in a futile attempt to "walk off" the pain, but eventually I couldn't even do that and splayed across several chairs with my eyes closed. I had not taken any painkillers, and I hadn't had anything to drink all day. This last part was actually more pressing in my mind, because as my condition deteriorated I began sweating, and eventually I was basically a human waterfall. Unfortunately, when I asked the nurse if I was allowed to have water, she told me no -- I might need surgery, and so I couldn't drink. By the end I was feeling like I might pass out, not from pain but from dehydration.

Kidney stones have been compared to childbirth in terms of how painful they are. I'm obviously in no position to evaluate the accuracy of that statement. Enough people have said it so that I assume it's true, but if that's the case I frankly have no idea how anyone has more than one child. The first can be chalked up to ignorance and bravado, but if you asked me "do you want to voluntarily feel like this again," I'd sacrifice a litter of puppies to avoid it. In terms of what it felt like to me, my best description was like doing and holding a crunch forever. You know that burning/tearing sensation you get when doing an ab exercise, and you try to "hold it" for as long as possible before releasing? Imagine the peak of that, except you can't release and its constant over two hours. I was asked to rate the pain on a 1-10 scale, with 10 being "worst imaginable". I gave it a 4 when I entered the ER and I later said it peaked at a 6. I may have been influenced by this comic, but basically my thought process was that being burned alive would be worse. More generally, on an instant-by-instant level the pain wasn't the worst I've experienced -- it hurts more to burn your finger on a hot stove, for instance. The problem was the duration -- burning your finger lasts a split-second, whereas this persisted for hours without relief.

But eventually, it stopped. In fact, it stopped about 10 minutes before I finally got called in to see a doctor, where I sheepishly informed the attending that I was feeling much better. They asked some questions, then gave me a tall glass of water (finally!) to facilitate a urine sample and scheduled a CT scan. This is where the diagnosis started to look like it might go off the rails a bit. My urine wasn't bloody at all, and the CT scan didn't seem to pick up a kidney stone. As noted, they eventually spotted one still in my kidney, but the one that had supposedly been the cause of all the misery 30 minutes ago was nowhere to be found. This is a bit worrisome to me. Nonetheless, I was instructed not to worry, given a prescription for 600 mg of ibuprofen (3x the strength of a Motrin!), and sent on my way.

I've been feeling mostly fine ever since -- a little wiped-out, perhaps, but in no physical pain. But I am now extraordinarily paranoid, and that's the second not-as-bad-as-pain problem with kidney stones. Even the slightest twinge in my stomach, the barest hit of indigestion, and my mind starts to panic -- it's all coming back. It hasn't, yet, but I'm terrified that it will. The discovery that I have a 3mm stone in my kidney right now is to my mind a ticking time bomb that I'm spending 90% of time willing to dissolve on its own (but how would I know?). It is very tiring to go through your day when every stomach burble sets off a mini-panic attack.

In any event, that's my kidney stone story. I honestly, honestly, hope you never go through it. And ladies, if you're thinking of having a child sans drugs -- take my advice and let them medicate you to hell and back. You do not want to feel what I felt unaided.

The Making of a Martyr at the Virginia State Bar

Late Friday afternoon, the President of the Virginia State Bar, Kevin E. Martingayle, sent an email announcing the cancellation of a seminar trip to Israel. The email cited "unacceptable discriminatory policies and practices pertaining to border security that affect travelers to the nation.,,, [presenting] enough legitimate concern to warrant cancellation of the Israel trip and exploration of alternative locations."

I'm not a member of the Virginia Bar (though my dad is); I was admitted in Maryland and waived into DC. So I comment as an observer, not a stakeholder. And as an observer, I'm more than a little surprised. To put it mildly, one would not expect a Virginia state governmental agency to be sticking its neck out on an issue like this. And one would expect other organs of the Virginia state government to react with less than equanimity to the news.

Does the author of the email recognize the blowback that's going to hit? Some signs point to yes -- the email was sent late Friday afternoon, which is a classic burial strategy, and there appears to have been no public deliberation or announcement of any kind before the decision was announced as fait accompli. On the other hand, the message's tone is so casual -- bordering on cavalier -- that it is hard to imagine the author knows he's in for a fight. Without knowing what sort of leverage the state government or the lay membership has over the Bar, I would still put better than even odds that this email will result in the end of Mr. Martingayle's tenure as leader. Yet in the email text, he acts as if the main "disappointment" emerging from his decision would be that people would have to rebook their flights. That, I think is evident, is going to be the lest of the Bar's concerns flowing out of this. So what gives?

One possibility is that Mr. Martingayle did not see this as what it is being interpreted as -- an effective endorsement of the global boycott, divestment, and sanctions campaign against Israel. One hint that this might be the case comes from careful parsing of the rationale -- it refers not to Israel's policy on Palestine or the occupation generally, but rather to "discriminatory policies and practices pertaining to border security that affect travelers to the nation," which to my ears sounds like a commentary on Israeli profiling practices at its airports. The most generous way to interpret this move is an individualized assessment by Mr. Martingayle that certain VSB members would be targeted by unacceptable profiling by Israeli security services, and that the seminar should be held in a place where that would not occur. Mr. Martingayle might have been totally unaware of the cultural meaning of his actions. Now to be clear, if that was his (non-)thought, then he's mistaken and disastrously so. And he still should have anticipated that there would be a reaction, though perhaps not as strong. In the U.S., the BDS movement as thus far largely confined itself to a few activist student boards and some feisty academic malcontents. For it to move into a staid white-collar professional organization is a big leap, and one that people will notice.

The second possibility, though, is that Mr. Martingayle is going in with eyes wide open. He knows the backlash that will emerge, and he fully expects it, and he fully expects it to win. Again, given what I know about Virginia and Virginia state politics, I do not believe that Mr. Martingayle has the political backing to take a stance like this and survive the fallout. But provoking an overreaction is a form of strategy too. A too-vitriolic response by the rest of the Virginia government -- a direct encroachment on the Bar's autonomy, for instance -- could have disastrous long-term consequences even if it ousts Martingayle in the short-term. And more generally, Mr. Martingayle benefits from the truth of any political controversy that has Jews at the center: If he wins, he's the man who boldly stood up to Jewish power. If he loses, he's the martyr who sacrificed himself before the unstoppable juggernaut of Jewish power. We still live in a polity where the exercise of Jewish political agency is presumptively illegitimate insofar as it clashes with gentile preferences. One reason that Jews Lose is that any situation where we don't lose is coded as a system failure. Jews losing means the system is working properly, Jews winning means we've successfully subverted the system. It creates a severe double-bind, and means that someone who comes in and is willing to play the martyr to demonstrate the malevolence of the big bad Jewish lobby will have little difficulty succeeding.

There is one last thought I wanted to share. I mentioned above that the most generous interpretation of what was going on here is that there might be a member (or members) of the VSB who would have liked to attend this conference, but knew he or she would be profiled (and perhaps denied entrance) at Israel's border. And so the Bar decided to relocate to a new space where everybody who wanted to attend would be able. Would that be so bad? Would that be so scary?

Maybe not, in the abstract. But in my last post, I quoted a English Jew who refrained from certain critical behaviors towards Israel "because I don’t want to be associated with people who freely use words like holocaust and ethnic cleansing." One of the many, many sins the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions regime has upon its head is that it has associated behaviors like this -- no matter what subjective motivations might lie underneath it -- with a truly vicious and uncompromising form of Jew-hatred. The cultural meaning of the VSB's decision is to associate with the BDS movement writ large, and the cultural meaning of that is to associate with those who really find independent Jewish agency to be history's greatest monstrosity. This sort of political action has effectively been taken off the table, for any reason, because of the message it communicates. And, whether or not it has anything to do with this decision in particular, that is a true cost.

The Sum of All Fears

This is a very interesting Tablet Mag piece on whether there remains a place for Jews in the UK Labour party. I'd have thought the article was hyperbolic -- not the least of which because a Jew is currently the head of Labour -- but it certainly is provocative. I had no idea that Jews were already voting at nearly 60% for the Conservatives.

All that said, I think the most important pull quote comes from a young English liberal explaining his reticence to link up with Labour:

“Some people on the left, educated people, are so quick to use the word Holocaust against Israel, almost with a grin because they think they legitimately can. Don’t get me wrong, Israel does a lot I don’t agree with, but I don’t find myself criticizing them to anyone who isn't Jewish because I don’t want to be associated with people who freely use words like holocaust and ethnic cleansing.”

Both sides of that resonate with me. I've definitely met people who love to use Holocaust-talk to describe Israel and do so with a smirk -- they're temperamentally identical to the folks who call Obama a "slave master" -- and I have the same recoil to them. They call Israel "the new Nazis" because they know it wounds Jews, and because they know in their circles they'll get away with it, and probably because they think it is so so unfair that Jews "get" the Holocaust and want to take it away from them.

And as for the second half -- well, that rings true too. Some people worry about criticizing Israel because they're afraid they'll be called anti-Semitic. Other worry because they're afraid that they'll give succor to people who are anti-Semites, or be associated with persons they consider to be anti-Semitic, or reinforce worldviews that are promoted by anti-Semites. One hears a lot about the former but much less about the latter, but the latter seems to be a more worrisome problem. After all, there is no entitlement to be free from the vicinity of anti-Semitism claims. But it is the case that we can't control the cultural meaning of the words we speak, and hence a world suffused with a certain type of anti-Semitism will and should act as a constraint on what sorts of statements people are comfortable making even if, out of context and in isolation, those statements would seem to be innocuous or even salutary. The problem, in that case, isn't that one is "worried about being called anti-Semitic" (a worry I'm not particularly sympathetic to), the problem is that one is worried about one's words reifying anti-Semitic attitudes or institutions even if that wasn't your intent (a worry I'm quite sympathetic to).

Of course, perhaps the reason one hears a lot about the former but much less about the latter is that the former instructs us to care less about anti-Semitism and what Jews have to say, and the latter demands that we be more attentive to anti-Semitism and what Jews have to say. But I'm sure that's just a coincidence.

It's a Trap!

David Bernstein warns us not to "believe Obama's faux-outrage at Netanyahu". "Faux-outrage?", you might ask -- "doesn't seem very 'faux' to me." And you'd be right, and Bernstein would agree: "I'm not claiming that Obama isn't sincerely outraged at Bibi; rather, the outrage, disgust, hostility, whatever you want to call it, has little to do with the events of the past week." Having retreated from the implausible, Bernstein then shifts to the banal: the frustration Obama is expressing with Netanyahu is not something that developed just this week, but rather stems from much longer-lasting animosity that has developed over a period of years.

This, presumably, is not a revelation: It has been beyond obvious to anyone with a pulse that Obama and Netanyahu do not like each other. Obama, I imagine, thinks that Bibi is craven, a sabre-rattler, at best indifferent to the creation of a Palestinian state, and committed to expanding Israel's settlements regardless of the impact they have on the Palestinian people. Bibi, for his part, seems to think that Obama is weak, unconcerned with Israel's security, too-focused on an (at best) tertiary issue of securing Palestinian statehood, and is in opposition to the settlement project that Bibi and his party fervently support. There is no reason to think that the two would be besties. And so it is not surprising that Bibi would prefer a disempowered Obama in favor of an emboldened Republican Party, and that Obama would rather see Bibi kicked to the curb in favor of a more left-wing coalition. The idea that people prefer their ideological compatriots is not anything astounding.

So Bernstein begins with an argument that is unsupportable and ends with one that is unoriginal and uninformative. What on earth is in the middle? And here is where things go off the rails, for Bernstein has in his head an elaborate plot where President Obama is deliberately seeking to hurt Netanyahu in order to undermine the U.S./Israel relationship (Sayeth Bernstein: the current flap-up mostly derives from "the president’s discomfort with the (positive) trajectory of U.S.-Israel relations (i.e., 'no daylight') in the Clinton and Bush years"). This, presumably, is meant as a counter-hypothesis to the more-immediately intuitive one, which is that Obama is taking the actions that he is because he genuinely thinks that a two-state solution is important and he's genuinely skeptical that Netanyahu has any serious intention of pursuing one. What's the evidence?

Well first, Bernstein cites State Department funding of OneVoice, a prominent NGO working in Israel and Palestine to foster grassroots support in both communities for a two-state solution. Indeed, OneVoice may be the single most important NGO in Israel or Palestine devoted to that project; for that reason it is an eminently sensible recipient of State Department funds given that American policy has long been to promote acceptance of a two-state solution within both the Israeli and Palestinian communities? So what's the problem? The problem is that OneVoice came to the conclusion that Netanyahu posed a significant threat to the two-state agenda, and so (apparently after State Department funding ceased) organized and campaigned against him (and in favor of more left-ward candidates). But the fact that an organization (correctly) identified by the State Department as committed to enabling a two-state solution felt the need to campaign against Netanyahu isn't a strike against State, it's a strike against Netanyahu and all those who think that he'll do anything to make that dream a reality. This, in other words, is evidence that independent political actors in Israel committed to a two-state solution don't trust Netanyahu. It's hardly unreasonable or manifest of a plot for Obama to react the same way.

The second bit of evidence, though, takes us much deeper down the rabbit hole. Follow if you dare:

On March 6, less than two weeks before the election, a major Israeli newspaper published a document showing that Netanyahu’s envoy had agreed on his behalf to an American-proposed framework that offered substantial Israeli concessions that Netanyahu publicly opposed. Let’s put on our thinking caps. Where would this leak have come from? The most logical suspect is the American State Department.

So here’s the dynamic: Netanyahu, while talking tough publicly about terms for an Israeli-Palestinian deal, was much more accommodating privately during actual negotiations. Just before Israeli elections, the U.S. government likely leaks evidence of his flexibility to harm Netanyahu. As a result, Netanyahu starts to lose right-wing voters to smaller parties, and the left-leaning major opposition party takes a lead in the polls, putting Netanyahu’s leadership in question, just as the U.S. wanted.

Netanyahu responds by using increasingly right-wing rhetoric (including denying that he ever agreed to the framework in question), to win back the voters from smaller parties that the leak cost him. He wins, and almost immediately announces that his campaign rhetoric was misunderstood, and that he still supports a two-state solution when conditions allow. The Obama Administration then announces it nevertheless has to reassess relations with Israel, allegedly because Netanayahu is no longer committed to the two-state solution.

So you get it? The Obama Administration, or someone with similar motivations, leaks a document showing that in practice, Netanyahu was surprisingly flexible in negotiations sponsored by the U.S. Netanyahu then tries to compensate by sounding tough in the closing days of his campaign. The administration then pretends that this is much more meaningful than its actual experience with Netanyahu, as indicated by the document it likely leaked, because it was out to punish Israel for electing Netanyahu regardless.

Only Imperial Stormtroopers could be precise, said Obi-Wan in one of his less-perceptive moments, and this reeks of that. Under Bernstein's chain of logic, we know the State Department leaked the information in attempt to weaken Netanyahu because ... it had the exact opposite effect. The actual result of the leak, as Bernstein notes, was that it pushed Netanyahu further to the right and caused him to make a declarative statement that a Palestinian state wouldn't occur "on his watch." Even under Bernstein's theory there's no reason why the Obama Administration would have wanted that outcome. And while it is of course possible that State miscalculated and its plan backfired, even under Bernstein's logic it wouldn't make a lot of sense -- as he notes, if it had worked "as planned" the result wouldn't have been to weaken the Israeli right, it would have simply redistributed right-wing votes to parties even further to the right. Again, there's no reason why Obama would want that. As much as Obama dislikes Bibi Netanyahu, I think it's fair to say a Naftali Bennett premiership would be far more distasteful.

Rather than assuming that a counterproductive State Department plan backfired, it would be far simpler to just ask who really benefited from the leak, based on what actually happened. And that's pretty straightforward -- the leak caused Bibi to issue statements quite antagonistic towards the creation of a Palestinian state, which energized the Israeli right and unified them behind Likud. The folks who benefited were members of Bibi's ideological camp who were unhappy with perceived Netanyahu softness towards a Palestinian state and wanted to push him right-ward. Plenty of folks meeting that description; quite few of whom are currently residing in the Obama State Department. I'm not saying that a discontented member of Bibi's coalition was responsible for the leak; I have no idea who did it. I am saying that the chain of reasoning Bernstein presents to concoct an elaborate Obama administration plot is transparently ludicrous.

Really, the roots of the discontent between Obama and Netanyahu are just as straightforward as they appear. Obama thinks the creation of a Palestinian state is really important. Bibi doesn't care one way or the other about it. That's what Israeli NGOs on the ground who are committed to this issue think. And even if you believe Bibi's apologia for his pre-election comments, and take him at his word that he wants a Palestinian state just not under "current conditions", it is still obviously the case that he's not planning on taking affirmative steps towards changing those conditions. After all, he didn't say "I'll do what I can, but ultimately I don't think the Palestinian leadership will sign on the dotted line." When he said "not on my watch," he said that he wasn't going to take any steps, that he had no interest in creating such conditions, or even taking what initiative he could to move things in the proper direction. One does not have to think Israel is entirely or even primarily responsible for the "conditions" not being right for a two-state solution and still believe that there are things a committed Israeli could do to make those conditions more favorable. For those of us who agree with Obama and think that a Palestinian state is a priority now, Bibi's stated preference for a Palestinian state in some undetermined theoretical future is hardly sufficient to label him an ally to the cause.

Bernstein concludes by saying that the ultimate goal of the devious Obama plot is to enact "a divide-and-conquer strategy to split off liberal Jewish Democrats from the communal pro-Israel consensus." He doesn't say what "pro-Israel consensus" he's talking about. If it's just the idea that we are "pro-Israel", then there's no split necessary -- advocating aggressively for two-states fits comfortably within the confines of "pro-Israel". If it's the idea that Netanyahu is a true-blue supporter of a two-state solution, then there's no consensus -- indeed, it's difficult to imagine that anybody seriously believes that. Liberals have no need to believe it because they never liked Netanyahu that much, and conservatives have no need to believe it because they never liked a two-state solution that much. In any event, Obama hardly needs to take steps to peel off liberal Democrats from anything -- liberal Democrats were already solid Obama backers to begin with.

No, what's really going on is a much deeper game of which Obama is only a small part of. The "pro-Israel consensus" for the past several decades has been quite clear: a two-state solution is the only valid solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There have been dissenters from that consensus on both the far-left and the far-right, but a consensus it has been. But recently, there has been an emergent challenge to this consensus from the more mainstream right. Sometimes they've come out and stated their opposition outright, other times it has come cloaked under a muttered mantra of "in theory yes, but...." It is these persons who are trying to crack -- or perhaps more aptly, reshape -- the pro-Israel consensus so that it no longer views pursuit of a two-state solution as a necessary part of what it means to be pro-Israel. And in response, those of us who are committed to that vision are seeking to the hold the line, and reaffirm that ours is the true pro-Israel position, and if you're going to express indifference or hostility to two-states, then you can hang out with your buddies in the JVP.

It is divide and conquer, but the group that we're trying to peel off isn't liberals away from pro-Israel. It's proto-one-staters who want to stay under the mantle of "pro-Israel." That's not going to fly for much longer. Being pro-Israel isn't simply a matter of subjective sentiment or mouthing the right words at the right time. If you aren't willing to put in some elbow grease to preserve Israel's standing as a secure, democratic Jewish state -- which is to say, if you're not willing to actually fight for a two-state solution -- then you have no business calling yourself pro-Israel at all. And if that means the American pro-Israel community finds itself lining up against the third of Israeli MKs who don't seem to share that vision, then that's the way things crumble.

Fancy That!

This past evening, on his show Last Week Tonight, John Oliver criticized Bibi Netanyahu. Specifically, he mocked his flip-flop on whether he supported a two-state solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict -- prior to the election he had blustered that a Palestinian state wouldn't be created during his tenure; after the election he was insistent that he's all in favor of the creation of a Palestinian state. Oliver proclaimed that if Netanyahu could get away this stunt, he should "go on the road as Netanya-houdini -- 'words cannot hold him!'"

It was a funny bit. I laughed. And here's what I didn't see happen: Anyone calling Oliver anti-Semitic.

How? How is this possible? We all know, after all, that any criticism of Israel (or its current leadership) immediately tars one as an anti-Semite. And this was a criticism on a popular national television program no less! And it's not the case that he's just saying something everyone agrees with -- many American Jewish groups have taken pains to argue that there was no inconsistency in Bibi's position and, indeed, nothing to see here at all. Yet even though we had a criticism, and even though it's a criticism that (it's fair to say) many mainline Jewish groups disagree with (I'm not among them -- I trust Bibi about as far as I could throw him on the two-state solution area), nobody argued that Oliver was being anti-Semitic. Because, as it turns out, there are plenty of perfectly fair-play criticisms one can make about Israel and its government that won't be called anti-Semitic.

The refrain "you can't criticize Israel without being called anti-Semitic" continues to be a lie, and an obvious one at that. Yet no matter how many times it is falsified, no matter how many stakes are put through its heart, it will no doubt keep on shambling forward.

The Train Still Has No Brakes

An Australian branch of Hillel asked a Sydney theater if it could put on a series of performances related to the Holocaust. The theater responded thus:

“Our policy does not support ­colonialism/Zionism. Therefore we do not host groups that support the colonisation and occu­pation of Palestine.”

Of course, the shows had nothing to do with either "colonialism" or "Zionism" (and, not to put a fine point on it, but unless this theater is run by Aboriginal Australians there might be something to say about specks and logs here). And the group clarified that it is "apolitical" but supports the creation of a Palestinian state (I did a quick perusal of Hillel's website -- I don't know if they're affiliated with Hillel International -- but found no substantive discussion of issues regarding Israel). It didn't matter.

It was a Jewish group that was putting on a performance regarding Jewish history. And for some, that's too much. The train has no brakes.

2014 2015 Will Be The Year

Rep. Steve King (R-IA), Congress' most trusted source on voting rights work ethic basic English vocabulary the Jewish people, sounds off on inexplicable American Jewish voting habits:

"Here is what I don't understand, I don't understand how Jews in America can be Democrats first and Jewish second and support Israel along the line of just following their President," King, a hardline conservative from Iowa, said Friday on Boston Herald Radio,

"It says this, they're knee-jerk supporters of the President's policy," King said.

Here's what I don't understand: How so many Republicans can within the space of a single sentence call Jews mindless delusional robots and then wonder why they don't vote for their party. Pro tip: this is not how you persuade an out-group that you're their friend.

Called It!

Hey remember that time when, right after the Israeli elections, I insisted that Moshe Kahlon's Kulanu Party wouldn't be a water-carrier for the far-right? I believe my precise words were "I am extremely skeptical that he wants to be the furthest left member of the government coalition." Kahlon has the leverage to make a lot of demands, since any coalition (really for either left or right) has to go through his party. And lo and behold, look at the news today:

Kachlon flexes his muscles: demands that Lapid also be in government to give it a less right-wing profile. No Kachlon, no government

— Chemi Shalev (@ChemiShalev) March 20, 2015

Fancy that! There are a couple of ways this might play out. Bibi might hold his ground and Kahlon might blink first -- nobody wants to go through another round of elections. But assuming that Kahlon is insistent, this might knock the religious parties out of the coalition (they hate Lapid and his Yesh Atid party with a passion). With Yesh Atid in, they're not necessary to reach 61 MKs (the right bloc plus Kulanu and Yesh Atid equals 65 seats). And while the religious parties aren't superhawks on Israel-Palestine or other foreign affairs issues, it is definitely the case that subbing in Yesh Atid for them is a shift for the better. It's hard to see how a coalition that includes both the religious parties and Yesh Atid lasts very long.

In other fun news for Bibi, Naftali Bennett's Jewish Home party is demanding that any coalition agreement include a statement opposing a Palestinian state. Given that Bibi spent most of this week walking back his opposition to a two-state solution, earning (to my mind undeserved) plaudits from many pro-Israel organizations who desparately want to believe Bibi is and portray him as on the side of a Palestinian state, this is going to be a fun needle for him to thread. Assuming Yesh Atid and the religious parties can't sit together, Bibi needs Bennett as part of his coalition -- but it is unclear if Lapid (or Kahlon, for that matter) would sign on to any anti-Palestinian-state position that would be satisfactory to Bennett.

The drama never stops.

Look Who's Talking

This is one of those posts that's really about saving a link for myself, but I am interested in these poll results asking Whites and Blacks about the amount of time we spend talking about race. The results aren't really surprising -- most Whites think we talk about race too much, most Blacks think we don't talk about it enough. The reason I'm interested is because I've noticed in several contexts a disjuncture between how different groups view how much time we devote to different issues. For example, in the sexual assault context, there is a "left" narrative that says we undersell the problem -- we need to "break the silence", we need to bring the problem to the surface -- and there is a "right" narrative that suggests that talk about sexual assault is ever-present to the point of absurdity -- everything is being called sexual assault, sexual assault talk is crowding out other related but important issues. Racism seems to also fit inside this mold; I suspect anti-Semitism does as well.

Nasty, Brutish, and Short

Blogger legend Kevin Drum explains why the 2016 election is so personal to him. Simply put, he was recently diagnosed with cancer, and Obamacare guarantees that he will remain insured regardless of what happens to his job at Mother Jones. If Republicans are elected and repeal Obamacare, he'll be left in the cold -- "And I feel quite certain that Republicans will do nothing to help me out." Sayeth Richard Mayhew:

Cancer can hit anyone, and under the Republican plan, a one time cancer diagnosis and recovery screws a person for life. Under the Democratic current law and future policy plans, that person is not screwed for life.

Yeah, but in defense of the GOP, under their proposal that screwed life will be a hell of a lot shorter.

Israeli Electoral Endowment

My Israeli electoral quick reactions are already somewhat obsolete, as they were based on exit polling which turned out to underestimate Likud's performance dramatically. Nonetheless, some of the observations still hold, and I think there is an interesting psychological effect going on here in which perceptions about how the election will go (days or hours before the polls close) are affecting perceptions about how the election did go.

Let's be clear -- I'm not happy about the outcome of this election. The parties I support didn't do as well as I would have liked, by a considerable stretch. And it looks almost assured that Bibi will remain Prime Minister, which is a burgeoning disaster for Israel's international image, its relationship with America, and its long-term viability as a Jewish, democratic state. It feels like the right-wing won big last night.

But if one looks at the actual results, something odd emerges that conflicts with the narrative of a "crushing conservative victory." Let's divide the Knesset into five blocs: conservative, centrist, liberal, Arab, and religious. The conservative bloc in the last Knesset had 43 seats (20 for Likud, 12 for Jewish Home, and 11 for Yisrael Beitanu). The conservative bloc in the next Knesset will have ... 44 seats. 30 will be for Likud, 8 for Jewish Home, and 6 for Yisrael Beiteinu. Even from a progressive standpoint, it is more than a bit weird to think that an election where the right basically tread water, but individual seats shift from the far-right parties to the (relatively) mainstream right is a bad thing.

So if the right didn't increase its seat count, who did? The centrist bloc (Yesh Atid and Kadima) entered with 21 seats. It emerged the exact same -- 21 seats split between the newcomer Kulanu and Yesh Atid. The religious parties (Shas and UTJ) dropped from a combined 18 to a combined 13 -- a five seat dip. The liberal camp -- the seeming clear losers -- entered with 27 seats and left with 28; ZU gaining 3 seats while Meretz lost 2 (so a shift from the left to the center-left). The real winner was the Arab bloc, which pulled in 14 MKs (a gain of 3) to become the third largest party in the Knesset.

So basically, the election left us in a similar position to where we started, except that the Arab political parties gained at the expense of the Ultra-Orthodox Jewish religious parties. Why all the long faces?

One answer is that staying in a "similar position" is not exactly good news for people who think Israel's current position is all too precarious. To the extent this was an opportunity to reverse Israel's eroding global standing, it is a dramatic missed opportunity. Abba Eban would be rolling in his grave. Another possibility is that others don't view Kulanu the way that I do, basically viewing it as part of the right-wing camp. If one takes that perspective, then this was a landslide conservative victory. As noted, I don't take that position -- but the proof will soon be in the pudding.

But I think the bigger issue is that many people really believed that this election would be different -- not just based on idle hopes, but based on polling data. The last few days of polling all pointed to a big Zionist Union victory, and so that became the baseline of what "success" was. When the exit polls came out and showed a neck and neck race, that was a big comedown even though a few weeks prior "neck and neck" was the watchword of the entire race. And when the actual results started to come in and demonstrated that the right had done even better than the exit polls predicted, it felt like a calamity -- not because it objectively was one, but because we had sufficiently altered our expectations and then seen them dashed.

Maybe this is putting on a brave face. Not too brave -- I'm very pessimistic about the next few years for Israel -- but "brave" in the sense that I'm resisting a narrative of a right-wing groundswell emerging out of this election. But I honestly, truly don't believe its accurate. More than half of Israelis, now-represented by 62 MKs, voted for parties that reject both right-wing nationalism and ultra-Orthodox religious conservatism. This is not the worst thing. This is not a catastrophe.

It's just the regular type of bad.

Israeli Election Quick Reactions

Confused about the Israeli election outcome? I guarantee you you're not alone. And while my knowledge is highly partial and Americanized, I'd still like to think I'm decidedly above median. In any event, take what I'm saying with a grain of salt. And what I'm saying can be boiled down to, "things are probably going to be okay, but with a non-negligible chance of catastrophe."

Note: For numbers, I'm going to rely on this average of exit polls, though of course final allocation of MKs may vary. Those results are as follows (parenthetical indicates current seats):

Zionist Union: 27 (21 -- Labor 15, Hatnuah 6)

Likud: 27 (18 [previously in coalition with Yisrael Beiteinu which added another 13 MKs])

United Arab List: 13 (11 across three parties)

Yesh Atid: 12 (19)

Kulanu: 10 (N/A)

Jewish Home: 8 (12)

Shas: 7 (11)

United Torah Judaism: 6 (7)

Meretz: 5 (6)

Yisrael Beitenu: 5 (13)

The main potential shake-up at this stage is if the far-right Yahud party squeaks over threshold and takes four seats. If it does, those seats would likely come at the expense of one each from Zionist Union, Kulanu, Yesh Atid, and the United Arab List -- in other words, a pretty substantial right-ward swing.

Okay, without further delay, here are the highlights as I understand them.

Bibi the Cannibal. The main headlines you're reading now talk about Likud's late-breaking surge to either tie or exceed the vote count for the left-of-center Zionist Union. And while that's true, it's also misleading -- the question is where those votes came from. It appears that for the most part, Bibi cannibalized votes from other, further right-wing parties. Naftali Bennett's Jewish Home is at 8 seats and Yisrael Beytanu is down to a mere 5. The upshot is that those three parties dropped from 43 to 40 MKs.

Many attribute Likud's late turnaround to him taking a hard right turn in the final days of the campaign -- capped off by his best Paul Revere cum Pam Geller cry of "the Arabs are coming!" Now that the immediate danger of a liberal landslide has dissipated, he's sounding more conciliatory notes by promising to promote the welfare of "all of Israel's Jewish and non-Jewish citizens."

The Arabs are coming. Racist though its intent and effect may have been, Bibi was at least descriptively accurate -- this was an election where the Israeli Arab community flexed its political muscle. Two additional seats in the Knesset may not seem like a ton, but becoming the third biggest party (behind traditional powerhouses Likud and Labor) is no small thing. And having united under a single banner, the UAL is poised to wield unprecedented influence in the next Knesset. Indeed, the big question now is whether the Arab parties will break their long-standing policy of refusing to join the government. Of the constituent elements of the UAL, only Balad (a pan-Arab nationalist party) seems absolutely implacably opposed to such an arrangement. Sufficient incentives from Labor could encourage a UAL split and a landmark moment in Israeli political history.

Whose coalition is it, anyway? People keep talking about the right-wing having an easier path to forming a government than the left. And, well, maybe ... but it isn't really as straightforward as that. Canvassing the results, the right bloc starts with 40 MKs (from Likud, Jewish Home, and Yisrael Beiteinu). Add another 13 from the religious UTJ and Shas and they're up to 53. To get over that 61 vote hump, they need somebody else -- and pretty much the only plausible "somebody else" is Moshe Kahlon's Kulanu party. Though running an avowedly centrist campaign, Kulanu's conservative roots have caused many to slot them into the right-wing camp. This is an evaluation I continue to pushback against. Kahlon is, to put it mildly, no fan of Bibi's. And I am extremely skeptical that he wants to be the furthest left member of the government coalition. The political positions he's run on bear a lot in common with the Zionist Union. Moreover, Kulanu's highest-profile member, former US Ambassador Michael Oren, has expressed significant concern over the deterioration of the US/Israel relationship, and he has to know that this would accelerate in dramatic fashion under a purely right-wing government.

So what about a left-wing government? They start with 44 MKs via Zionist Union, Yesh Atid, and Meretz -- with another 13 if UAL was in the picture. In that case, Kulanu's additional 10 MKs puts them over the top, and one has to think Herzog will pull out every stop to make that happen. But assuming that isn't in the cards, Isaac Herzog's path to the Prime Minister's office becomes much harder. Adding in Kulanu puts the center-left camp to 54, but it would be well-nigh impossible for him to get above that because the religious parties and Yesh Atid are mortal enemies. Perhaps he could buy them off, but it seems more likely that they'd be able to fit into a right-wing government without as much trouble.

The final alternative is a unity government combining Likud and the Zionist Union with Kulanu. Those three parties alone carry more than 60 MKs (and that coalition could probably bring in Yesh Atid too). It's not clear whether ZU or Likud really would like that (though it might be the best option available to ZU). But I have to think Kulanu would really like that -- it'd be a centrist party in a centrist government. The other party which would be a big winner in this arrangement would be none other than the UAL. It would become leader of the opposition as the largest party outside of government -- arguably the best possible outcome for the Arab list because being head of opposition means they are incorporated into many high level security and policy decisions. It's a way to "enter government" without actually entering government.

Kahlon the Kingmaker. Ultimately, the results of this election really boil down to Kulanu and what it wants. Does it want a pure right-wing government? It can easily make that happen. Does it want a left-wing government? Harder, but potentially still doable with the right suasion. Does it want a centrist government? If it holds out for one, it's hard to see how either of the big parties can avoid it. All roads lead through Moshe Kahlon. And since my gut tells me he doesn't want to be part of a hard-right, anti-Arab, and internationally isolated coalition, my sense is that he'll be able to force an outcome that isn't great, but isn't catastrophic either.

UPDATE: ...or the exit polling could be entirely off and Likud has a five seat advantage over Labor. Incredibly, this doesn't change the above analysis that much -- the right core now sits at 44 MKs, with another 14 from the religious bloc. So it'd still need Kulanu. But with these results it is easier for Netanyahu to claim a mandate.

If I'm trying to salvage anything, it's that (a) it looks like Yahud is still out in the cold, and (b) a very thin majority of voters voted for non-right-wing, non-religious parties. The center, left, and UAL together combine for 62 seats.

Revolutionary Fervor

One of the more stressful things about being a graduate student, or other aspiring academic, is the constant refrain that there isn't necessarily a job waiting for you at the end. It's an exceptionally tight market right now, and many extremely smart and qualified candidates won't end up with a position. It can get a bit wearying. And it can get a bit infuriating when you see who has gotten these oh-so-rare positions:

An American college professor was arrested by Miami-Dade police on Saturday for launching into an extended rant about Venezula and smoking on an airplane, all of which was captured on video.

Karen Halnon, identified as an associate professor of sociology at Penn State, was on an American Airlines flight from Nicaragua to Miami, according to television station WFOR.

“The United States has declared war on Venezuela,” Halnon repeated throughout the video, which was posted to YouTube as a clip titled "Crazy woman on a plane."

“Venezuela has been declared a national security threat," she repeated on the video.

"You're a national security threat," another passenger shot back.

Halnon later told WFOR that she was returning from a trip to Nicaragua working with single mothers and felt the need to talk to people about the destructiveness of U.S. imperialism.

On the tape, she eventually unbuckled her seatbelt as passengers around her groaned.

"My great hero Hugo Chavez nationalized the oil supply," she said. Halnon was then informed by a flight attendant that the police would be arresting her shortly.

Oh lord. You "felt the need" to go on a bender about the joys of your favorite autocrat? Which do you prefer -- his paeons to Carlos the Jackal and Idi Amin, or his penchant for jailing judges he dislikes? To quote Ron White, "next time you have a thought, just let it go."

Oh, but it gets better:

At one point, Halnon calmly lit a cigarette as the passenger next to her got up and left.

"This girl's a gangster," another onlooker said.

Hanlon confirmed to WFOR that she indeed lit a cigarette on the plane.

“I took a few puffs out of it," she said. "Every other revolutionary smokes. Fidel. Daniel Ortega. Tomás Borge. Che Guevara."

"Every other revolutionary smokes"? What are you, twelve years old? This is a joke.

In any event, if you're a sociology graduate student wondering who's getting the job you so desperately want, here's your answer. Blergh.

Everybody Knows Nothing

It is a long-standing piece of advice on this blog to never listen to journalists talking about a legal issue, because they will butcher it. Badly. I would like to be able to say that this is contradistinction to listening to someone who (a) is a member of Congress and (b) has written the legal provision in question. Alas, that isn't always the case either, as the latest fiasco surrounding Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) demonstrates.

For those of you who missed out on the latest, there is a media narrative that Senator Cotton (while a House member) introduced langauge that "would 'automatically' punish family members of people who violate U.S. sanctions against Iran, levying sentences of up to 20 years in prison." In other words, the claim is that if I violated Iranian sanctions policy, Cotton's amendment would allow for my mom to be tossed in jail for 20 years ("automatically").

The Popehat link above pretty conclusively demonstrates that this is untrue: the law prohibits trade with certain high-ranking Iranian officials; Cotton's amendment would have similarly prohibited trade with close relatives of these officials (so, for example, one could not evade the sanctions by giving a fat contract to the prohibited-person's wife). This is a policy that can be supported or opposed on the merits (it does close a loophole for getting around the sanctions program, but it also arguably punishes innocent people if the bad guy's grandson has no real connection to the human rights violations). But no matter what you think of it, it is not (and is a far cry from) what is described in the preceding paragraph -- jail terms for family members of those who violate the sanctions law.

The problem is that Cotton, Harvard J.D. '02, doesn't seem to know what his own law would do. In a colloquy with then-Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) (Harvard J.D., '83 -- Harvard Law really is coming out poorly here), it is evident that neither one understands how this law interacts with a mens rea requirement. Honestly, Grayson seems more confused here than Cotton does -- but since it's Cotton's language, it would be nice if had cleared things up rather than engaging in irrelevant blather about the constitutional rights of Iranian citizens. Instead we got much confusion in Congress, which, naturally, the media made far worse by conflating who can and can't be traded with with who will be punished.

In conclusion, never trust anyone about anything, because everyone is a moron.

An Eruv in the Hamptons

Lest you thought that the "Jews call everything anti-Semitic" defense of obvious anti-Semitism was limited to the Israel context, check out these remarks by an activist opposing the construction of an eruv in the Hamptons:

The Forward felt compelled to ask whether [anti-eruv activist Jack] O'Dwyer thought some of his more inflammatory comments might get construed as anti-Semitic.

“I’m not going to fall for that,” he said. “I don’t feel like answering questions about whether I’m a bigot against Jews. That’s like asking, ‘When did you stop beating your wife?’ They throw it [the anti-Semitic charge] around too much. Nobody believes it anymore.”

With that in mind, Jack, any final words for your Orthodox Jewish neighbors?

“This is America. This is not Israel. This is a rotten thing, for religion to lie its head off and sue a town. Get that stuff off our telephone poles. Go back to where you belong. You don’t belong in the Hamptons with that illogical superstition. That’s my message.”

Also, while I have often joked that half of Orthodox Jewish scholarship is imposing atextual onerous burdens on the community and the other coming up with increasingly clever loopholes to get around them, it really doesn't make sense to me this narrative that the eruv allows Orthodox Jews to "break" Jewish law. Obviously it doesn't -- Jewish law restricts certain activities (on the Sabbath) in locations which are not enclosed by the eruv. It's part of the law, it's not a breach of it (which is why it's probably a good idea for non-Jews not to tell Jews what their religious obligations are, but that ship has long since sailed).

Well That's Certainly Symbolic

Lithuania Church Uses Jewish Headstones as Stairs.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: Review

Jill and I finished Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt last night (we started on Saturday). I know what you're thinking: "13 episodes in 5 days -- what took you so long?" And while that is a slow pace for us, we had unusual obstacles: We were vacationing in Vegas and missed our normal Sunday TV, so we had a lot to catch-up on. Even a great new show has to yield when you're behind on Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

The most amazing thing about Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is how fresh it feels. This is particularly astounding when you turn over the constituent elements. The music and comedic beats are highly reminiscent of 30 Rock (unsurprising given the Tina Fey/Jeff Richmond nexus). Character-wise, Jane Krakowski (Jacqueline) is playing the same role she did in Thirty Rock, Carol Kane (Lillian) is playing the same role she is in Gotham, and Ellie Kemper (Kimmy) is (I'm told) playing the same role she did in The Office -- though I see more than a little Liz Lemon in her. Even Ki Hong Lee (Dong) feels like he's playing a character I've seen before, even though a quick IMDB search reveals no prospects.

Yet the concept feels like something that's genuinely new. Kimmy Schmidt escapes from a doomsday cult and, rather than going back to her old life in Indiana, decides to try and make it in New York. I'm pretty sure I came up with something similar in a New Year's Balderdash game, but it would not have anywhere near the polish. The closest cousin to Kimmy Schmidt might actually be Big Love (a great show in its own right). But Kimmy Schmidt is different in important ways, and not just because it is a sitcom. Kimmy was kidnapped in 8th grade -- she neither was a born-and-raised believer in the cult, nor is she completely unaware of the workings of the modern world. Plenty has changed in 15 years, but not so much that Kimmy is utterly lost -- she mostly doesn't know about contemporary slang ("troll the respawn, Jeremy") and pop stars. And she is not particularly conservative -- though she's understandably a bit stunted in her personal and romantic development, she is excited to have a boyfriend and kiss a boy. Kimmy has enough difficulties on her plate without the show going overboard and pretending like she doesn't know what a car is, and that restraint is greatly appreciated.

Another element that has to be remarked upon here is the incredible cast diversity. I give credit to Brooklyn Nine-Nine for being majority non-White male. But Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt might be unprecedented -- there isn't a single White dude in the main cast. The four largest roles are three White women (Kemper, Krakowski -- playing a passing Native American -- and Kane) and a gay Black man (Tituss Burgess as Titus Andromedon). There are a few recurring White male characters amongst Ellie's boyfriends, and of course Jon Hamm as the cult leader Rev. Richard Wayne Gary Wayne (and can I just say how lucky Jon Hamm is to have Mad Men? Because literally every other part I've ever seen him in he's been typecast as "charismatic idiot"). But they're firmly on the periphery.

But by far the most impressive attribute of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is how it deals with the very real trauma Kimmy experienced. It manages to treat this in a manner that is realistic, sensitive, subtle, and hilarious -- a combination I would not have thought possible in advance, particularly in a comedy of this sort. The trick is that the "jokes" on this front blend in with the overall comedic rhythm of the show, but on closer examination they are obviously distinct. When Kimmy's colleague sneaks behind her to do a playful "guess who" and Kimmy whirls while screaming "I don't like that" (before immediately plastering back on her normal chipper face upon seeing who it was), that's the sort of gag that fits in well with the show's overarching run of jokes. But if one thinks about it, it is clear that this isn't part of Kimmy's normal personality. It's a product of the hell she went through for a decade and a half. She knows it and she wants to escape from it as best she can, and is taking impressive strides in that respect. But while Kimmy might be unbreakable, she is not unaffected, and the series shows that in surprisingly vivid (but not melodramstic) fashion.

And that's what Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is about, ultimately. It is about a bright and irrepressible girl who went through something terrible and is getting past it in her own way. The comedy is there but never at her expense, and underneath it all is a surprisingly poignant commentary on surviving. It really is an excellent show. Indeed, I think it's got a strong case to be the strongest original series Netflix has ever produced.