While the exact date of the taping cannot be determined by bin Laden's words, he suggests it was made in August by saying, "… just a few days ago, the Japanese observed the 62nd anniversary of the annihilation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by your nuclear weapons." The anniversary was on Aug. 6. He goes on to call Noam Chomsky "among one of the most capable of those from your own side," and mentions global warming and "the Kyoto accord."

One could call this humorous if it weren't so obviously true, in the sense that Chomsky is indeed one of those most capable of accomplishing binLaden's goals of driving the West to surrender and destruction. Of course, they are both psychopaths with a Sadean fetish for mass murder, tyranny and death. Great minds, such as they are, apparently think alike.

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Robin Shepherd is not the first person to try and define the world's oldest hatred, but he is perhaps one of the most unlikely. The senior research fellow at the Chatham House think tank in London has no significant connection to the Jewish people, and his visit to Israel last week was only his second. But he still believes his decision to spend a year researching the new European anti-Semitism is perfectly relevant for any serious observer of international affairs.

Shepherd is only beginning what he expects to be a year of research on the subject, probably culminating in a book, but he already has a number of basic insights. The first is a clear differentiation between the old and new European anti-Semites, or as he puts it, "subjective" and "objective" anti-Semitism.

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The truth beyond the debate over whether Strauss is the neo-con devil incarnate or simply misunderstood is that Strauss probably would not have cared one way or the other. His primary concern was, in fact, the role of the philosopher in society; both in historical and theoretical terms.

Strauss, like other Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany such as Hannah Arendt, struggled throughout his career with the question of what, exactly, had gone so horribly wrong in Germany and in the West as a whole. He was, in other words, trying to wrap his head around the fact of Auschwitz; and the sense that Auschwitz was not some horrifying aberration from the Western tradition but the fulfillment of something dark and terrible at the heart of that tradition.

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On this July 4, we would do well to renounce nationalism and all its symbols: its flags, its pledges of allegiance, its anthems, its insistence in song that God must single out America to be blessed.

Is not nationalism — that devotion to a flag, an anthem, a boundary so fierce it engenders mass murder — one of the great evils of our time, along with racism, along with religious hatred?

Well, no. The great evil of the 20th century was atheistic totalitarian collectivism, of which Zinn has been a lifelong supporter. I believe the body count is now upwards of 100 million and likely to climb if the likes of Hugo Chavez get their way. The great evil of the 21st century, on the other hand, seems to be shaping up to be totalitarian theocratic collectivism.

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The Reform Movement recently published an expanded manual for the inclusion of homosexuals and transgender individuals, including list of three blessings to be said on the occasion of a sex change operation.

The 500-page Kulanu: A Program for Implementing Gay and Lesbian Inclusion contains among other things services for same-sex commitment and marriage ceremonies as well as advice for the inclusion of GBLT individuals in the community.

The original edition of Kulanu was published 10 years ago, and was considered at the time to be a modern and daring step for the movement, which had recognized homosexual individuals as legitimate and equal members of the community three decades prior.

I wont go into the problems surrounding such ideas as homosexuality being a defining factor of personal identity. I will only say that Foucault was self-evidently correct when he described it as a 19th century invention conducive to social control.

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Why not place a ballot box at Ben-Gurion Airport by the duty-free shops? Or by the entrance to a vacation club in Turkey? Not that it matters – Moshe Feiglin has already won.

There's no doubt that Bibi will retain the leadership of the party, but Feiglin and his followers would seem to be equally assured of getting what they want.

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What does this imply? That the soldiers who have done well in Iraq will be major figures in American life for the next couple of decades. These men and women are no less suited to national leadership than are entrepreneurs, lawyers or local community leaders. In fact, they've had to show more courage, they've had to operate in a more fluid and volatile environment–and they've risked their lives for their country. Just as John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush benefited from their experience as young officers in World War II–and from the high regard in which their experience was held–so the Iraq vets will have every chance to rise to the top of American public life.

More interesting is Kristol's assertion that the spirit of this new generation is active in both the civilian and military spheres.

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My name is Ronan O'Casey, and I played Venessa Redgrave's gray-haired lover in the film. The screenplay, by Antonioni ("just call me Michelangelo"), Tonio Guerra, and Edward Bond, told the story of a planned murder. But the scenes depicting the planning of the murder and its aftermath — scenes with Vanessa, Sarah Miles and Jeremy Glover, Vanessa's new young lover who plots with her to murder me — were never shot because the film went seriously over budget.

Apparently, most of the film's acclaimed mystery was the result of an intervention by legendary Italian producer Carlo Ponti

The producer was Carlo Ponti, and he had been supervising another production which delayed his arrival in London. When he got there, he was furious. "Basta, Michelangelo, finito, we are done!" Shooting stopped and the crew went back to Italy. Antonioni took the bits and pieces of the film that had been shot and wove them together in a film since hailed for its "mystery" and "enigma." Of course it was mysterious; it was never finished!

While this certainly sounds in keeping with Ponti's reputation (he's satirized as the portly, vulgarian producer in Fellini's 8 1/2) one has to wonder how accurate this story is, mainly because Blow-Up was not an original screenplay but based on a short story every bit as ambiguous and strange as the film that resulted.

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