• In case you were concerned that Congress was shirking its ideological policing duties, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Min) has proposed "an investigation of Congress for “pro-America or anti-America.”
• John McCain has received the prestigous Al-Qaeda endorsement.
• The Peabody, Mass Police Department is gunning to become the first employer in American to recognize September 11th as a paid holiday.
• San Francisco residents will vote next month on Proposition K, which would decriminalize prostitution in the city.
• French president Nicolas Sarkozy is threatening to sue the company responsible for a Voodoo doll featuring his likeness.
• Look out, Moon, here come the Indians!
• The World Series of baseball kicks off tonight in St. Petersburg, Fla.

Mosely: If you click on the video link, you can see him naked!Proving once again that sex scandals are more entertaining in Europe, Formula One head Max Mosely was recently caught on film acting out a Nazi–themed orgy with five hookers, and then relaxing with a nice cup of tea. (Seriously. There is tea in the video, as well as nudity and a really unsexy striped concentration camp uniform. Not that a sexy one would have been any better. Actually, it almost certainly would have been worse. But I digress.)

It’s creepy, though not criminal, that Mosely gets off on Nazi fantasies. It’s significantly creepier when you realize that Mosely’s parents were two of the most prominent British Nazi sympathizers. Hitler came to their wedding, which took place—for some reason this is the detail that really gets me—in Joseph Goebbel’s drawing room.

Naturally, Britian is totally up in arms about this, as are some Jewish groups. Should Mosely step down? Is the UK’s answer to NASCAR permanently besmirched by its leader’s penchant for pretending to be both a concentration camp inmate and a guard? (If you watch the video, which I strongly recommend you don’t, you’ll see him in both roles.) Hilarious, crotchety British writer Howard Jacobson takes a clear-eyed look at the scandal, asking

why a man shouldn't indulge in a bit of retro-Nazi sado-masochistic role-play in the quiet of a house of ill-repute in leafy Chelsea when the fancy takes him, provided no one gets seriously hurt in the process – other than, one hopes for his sake, himself.

Jacobson is less repulsed by Mosely’s fetishes and more repulsed by his upper-crusty excuses:

The only reason he is to be heard speaking German, he insists, is that two of the five prostitutes he hired – at least one of whom is seen in a striped uniform reminiscent of those worn by prisoners in the camps – are German speakers. In other words, what we are watching is not depravity but good manners and a cosmopolitan education.

Oh, and also race car driving. He is also repulsed by race car driving:

I would prefer him to have owned up to depravity and told the News of the World to go hang. But he has his job as president of FIA to think about….Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Formula One dedicated to the promotion of the sale of killer cigarettes, the wanton spillage of expensive champagne, the encouraging of easily excited rich young men (and that is not an oxymoron) in their pursuit of acceleration, exhaust noise and extruded showgirls?

Jacobson concludes, in a logical flourish both utterly implausible and kind of brilliant, that Mosely must have been acting out some kind of Freudian destructo-urge aimed at both his father and Hitler. S&M is always parody, after all, he explains:

Certainly, if I were a Nazi I wouldn't appreciate Mosley's travesty of my beliefs and uniform. I put it to you, anyway, that it is not impossible he is avenging himself, now upon his Führer-fetishising father Oswald, now upon his Goebbels-glorifying mother Diana, once a Mitford "gel".

Lady Diana Mosley's biographer, Anne de Courcy, guesses that Max's Nazi romp in Chelsea would have shocked her deeply. "Even though she admired Hitler, she deplored any form or depiction of violence and cruelty." Drink deep of that. The monstrous hypocrisy of the genteel. Get the whips out more often, is my advice to Max. The more you parody the violence your parents were in awe of, the less of a sucker you'll be for it in reality yourself.

When Rav would visit the city of Dardishir, he would announce, "Who will be mine for a day?" And when Rav Nachman would visit the city of Shachnetziv, he would announce, "Who will be mine for a day?" (Yevamot 37b)

What is the Jewish response to the Eliot Spitzer affair?

Predictably, most of our leaders have joined in the chorus of disappointment, condemnation, or just plain embarrassment at the ex-governor of New York, whose brilliant political career was felled by a single (okay, octuple) transaction with a prostitution ring. Certainly, it's a shonde. But if we were more careful with both our sources and our values, we might not rush to judgment.

First, the sources. The fact is that prostitution is a Christian, not a Jewish, sin. LookAshley aka Kristen for the prohibition in the Torah, and you won't find it. On the contrary, you'll learn of Judah visiting a prostitute -- without condemnation -- as well as of concubines and polygamy. (Cultic harlotry is banned by Deuteronomy 23:18-19, but not secular prostitution.) Even the Talmud is ambiguous; sometimes it appears to condemn prostitution and illicit sex of all kinds, and other times it tells of lusty rabbis visiting prostitutes and otherwise circumventing our expectation of chaste monogamy.

In fact, it was expected that men would have sex outside of marriage. It wasn't exactly celebrated, but it wasn't condemned either. In short, within the gendered context of Jewish law, it's a peccadillo.

Of course, Jewish law is very concerned about adultery. But "adultery" meant sex with another man's wife. As in the ancient British law from which the English term is derived, it was "adultery" in the sense of "adulterating" a man's bloodline -- and the offense was against the other man: abusing his property, confusing his lineage. The concern is about patriarchy, not sex. As usual, sex is problematic not in itself (indeed, you won't find any clear condemnation of heterosexual sex, by itself, in Jewish law) but because of its context.

The source of the religious disapproval of sexuality is not the Hebrew Bible, but the New Testament. Paul does condemn prostitution, along with all other forms of non-procreative sexual expression. And Paul reframes sexual sin in terms of carnality itself. The Jews? Not for another thousand years.

So much for the texts. What about contemporary values?

Some progressives today argue that prostitution is against Jewish (and universal) values because it objectifies and victimizes women, as well as supports an international slave trade. Certainly, these claims have merit, as does the observation that Jewish law is sexist and asymmetrical, banning for women what it permits for men.

But while all these concerns are important, are they really what's motivating our outrage today? Sure, progressives dislike prostitution for feminist reasons, but Christians hate it for Christian ones. And think about it: what really brought Spitzer down? Was it the hypocrisy? The objectification of "Kristen" the call girl? Or -- let's admit it -- the sex? Condemning Spitzer for feminist reasons creates an unholy alliance between the pre-modern Right and the post-modern Left.

Indeed, there are good Jewish arguments for seeing the Spitzer case as indicting society more than the philandering ex-governor.

We live in a sex-crazed society, and we are crazy because of repression. Few cultures in history have enforced the monogamy ideal as we do. Jewish culture was polygamous for most of its history, approved of concubines, and tolerated harlots. European and American cultures usually looked the other way at prostitution, regarding it as a (male) private vice. Many non-Western cultures had elaborate systems of concubines, harems, brothels, and so on, before Christianity told them it was evil and sinful. We are, in short, an anomaly.

And we are equally anomalous in our puerile approach to sex. Our media cultureSt. Paul: Chairman of the No-Fun Committee saturates us with cheap, vulgar sexuality, objectifying to women and pandering to men. Surely, if Spitzer is a hypocrite, our media culture is even worse: titillating us with the endless commercialization of sex, then wagging its moralistic fingers at someone who buys sex for money.

If Judaism celebrates healthy, robust sexuality, then it must condemn all three of these trends: the Puritanical repressiveness, the puerile vulgarity, and the pious hypocrisy.

But there is a fourth and final Jewish reason to hesitate before condemning the ex-governor. Yet again, a conservative party which defends thieves, crooks, and warmongers has taken down a liberal because of sexual peccadillos. No one cheered Spitzer's fall more than the crooks of Wall Street -- including those who just benefited from the multi-billion dollar corporate bailout of Bear Stearns. Just like no one cheered Clinton's fall more than those same crooks, and their war-mongering friends who embroiled us in Iraq.

If Jewish values mean anything, they mean that senseless war is worse than a blowjob, and that billions of dollars of thievery and greed are worse than a visit to a whore.

Of course, none of this is to excuse Spitzer's violation of his marital vows, or his own hypocrisy -- he portrayed himself as an ethical crusader, and so perhaps was right to resign. Nor is this an argument for legalized prostitution or open marriages. Questions of sexism, privilege, and economics are too serious for simple answers.

But our culture's rush to judgment, its phony piety, and its outrageous moral hypocrisy have neither textual antecedent nor philosophical basis. Not in the Jewish tradition anyway. Quite the contrary. While Spitzer may be a moral failure and a hypocrite, many of those who condemn him are worse.

Eliot Spitzer built his political career as a moral scold, parleying self-righteous prosecutions of financial malfeasance and prostitution into the governorship of New York. Now his career is over, thanks to a double-whammy of acquiring the services of prostitutes and paying for them with campaign funds (thereby extending the meaning of 'double-entry book-keeping' into unplowed fields).

So some good has already come of Spitzer's spectacular wipeout, what you might call poetic justice as fairness. More good may still come if we take the opportunity Spitzer has provided to rethink the moral and legal rationales underlying the criminalization of a widespread, victimless consensual behavior among adults.

There is a kind of first-principles argument for keeping prostitution illegal, which,Ashley aka Kristen: Eliot Spitzer thinks you should go to jail for hiring her; unless your name is 'Eliot Spitzer' like a common argument for banning pornography, manages to unite a certain brand of feminism with conservative religious prudery. The idea is that the exchange of sex for money is degrading to women, and that any kind of government sanctioning of that exchange would amount to an endorsement of the degradation of women. The difference between the prohibitionist feminist view and the religious conservative view is that the former locates the cause of degradation in the power structures surrounding prostitution, while the latter locates it in the act of sex, but in the end, the two views come out the same for practical purposes.

It's not common to hear this position enunciated publicly (though Ross Douthat gives it a sporting try) since we generally shy away from notions of intrinsic right and wrong in public policy debates. But since the utilitarian case for prohibiting prostitution is so weak, there must be some kernel of the first-principles argument standing in the way of public acceptance of legalization. In any event, the case for keeping prostitution illegal because of its inherent harmfulness or immorality is blatantly question-begging, since the inherent wrong of exchanging sex for money is precisely what's at issue. As Will Wilkinson puts it, there is "no interesting intrinsic moral distinction between brick- and other forms of laying."

In feminist terms, the 'intrinsic harm' case for criminalizing sex work looks even worse, since the linchpin of that argument is that various social structures --- particularly the differential ways in which society evaluates sexual experimentation among men and women --- ensure that female sex workers are deprived of their self-worth and autonomy. But there is no more effective means of reinforcing such inequalities than telling men who sell their bodies to lay bricks that what they do is a productive trade, while telling women who sell their bodies to lay men that they deserve to be in prison.

Alternatively, there is a utilitarian case for prohibiting prostitution, resting on allegedly telling facts such as the American Journal of Epidemiology's finding that "Women engaged in prostitution face the most dangerous occupational environment in the United States." Which isn't all that surprising, given that sex workers are forced onto the black market, where they are at the mercy of pimps and mobsters, and even have a disincentive against seeking protection from law enforcement, since, e.g., filing a rape allegation would be tantamount to turning oneself in.

Both arguments for keeping prostitution illegal fail on their own merits. The first-principles argument fails because it's not an argument, but an assertion, and an unpersuasive one. The utilitarian argument fails because the facts don't support it, and because, in any case, there are precious few people who truly oppose legalizing prostitution on utilitarian grounds. (For those who claim otherwise, try this thought experiment: The facts on the ground have shifted to the point at which there is clearly no utilitarian calculus that justifies keeping prostitution illegal. Would you support legalization then?)

Why then is prostitution still illegal? Because the two arguments operate in a tangled tandem. Put pressure on one, and the prohibitionist will leap to the other. Put pressure on the other, and she'll leap back, repeating the process as necessary. Legalization won't come until we get past the unstated, unargued assumption that prostitution is for some reason icky, which rests on the idea that sex itself is icky, which, in turn, rests on ages of cultural discomfort with female sexuality.

Nonetheless, there is no good reason anyone should go to jail for paying for something totally natural and healthy, that would be perfectly legal to give away for free. Except, that is, for politicians like Spitzer, who have the power to change the law but instead allow their fellow citizens to rot away in prison for non-offenses that they themselves engage in. Spitzer deserves the maximum penalty.

Too much testosterone: Elliot Spitzer and his giant man-chin Why does the Spitzer story feel so Jewish? Is it because New York is the other Jewish capital of the world? Is it because Spitzer has always been a bit of a Jewish stereotype—the pushy bulldog lawyer? Is it because of the Israeli pimp? It’s hard to say, but both Jewish publications and the mainstream media seem to think this is totally a tribal issue.

• In The New Republic, Noam Scheiber suggests that Spitzer is bit of an Alexander Portnoy:
  

  Like Portnoy, maybe Spitzer felt simultaneously driven (by stultifying parents) to be a good Jewish boy and rebel against his good Jewish boy-ness, and so you get the weird spectacle of the most upright guy in the world acting out some pretty deviant urges.

• In the Huffington Post, Rachel Sklar predicts how the story will play in the Jewish media "Oy, such a nice Jewish boy, on his way to becoming the first Jewish President! What's this girl's name, Kristen? Sigh. To think he threw it all away for a shiksa."
• Heeb thinks Spitzer’s pseudonym, “George Fox,” might have something to do with “a ho bustin’ Wild West Rabbi.” As a good Quaker Jew, I should point out that George Fox was also the founder of the Friends movement, although I can’t even begin to imagine a Quaker pay-for-play sex scandal.
• Jewschool wonders if Bush administration Justice Department appointees targeted Spitzer for a takedown.
  
• In the Forward, Alan Dershowitz asks everyone to give Spitzer a break: “These may be sins, but there are no real victims, except for family members.” Yeah, except for them. Also? Few things could be more humiliating than having your former mentor defend your libido-led mistakes in the Jewish Daily Forward.
• New governor David Paterson + New York Jews = BFF
• Not Jewish, just hilarious (which is, by the way, going to be the title of my memoir if I ever leave this job): Samantha Bee forces her husband to stand by her side as she confesses to infidelity on the Daily Show. I LOL’d; so did Jon Stewart.

This week we read the story of my namesake, the Biblical Tamar.  I encourage you to read the story for yourself, it’s chapter 38 of Genesis, but the gist of it is that Tamar is cheated out of a marriage by her father-in-law, Judah, after she has been widowed by two of his sons. When she figures out that she’s persona non grata in Judah’s family, she takes matters into her own hands, dresses up like a hooker and waits around in a place where she knows her newly single father-in-law will be passing by. He picks her up without recognizing her, and hires her, but doesn’t have any sheep to pay her with, so he gives her some identifying materials as an IOU, and promises to send someone to pay her later. Months later, when he hears that his long widowed daughter-in-law is pregnant he condemns Tamar to death by burning. Just before she is to be burnt she sends Judah the identifying materials he had given her as payment and explains that they belong to the man that impregnated her. Duly chastened, Judah cancels her execution, and she gives birth to twins, who we later learn are ancestors of King David. It’s a bizarre and illicit story, and I love it both because of its oddities and because I think Tamar is awesome—strong and feisty, but also committed to the standards of her community, and to the family she has joined.

Judah and Tamar: Is it me, or is that staff a phallic symbol? The sexual aspects of the story are fascinating because they’re presented so matter-of-factly. Tamar’s second husband practices coitus interruptus in order not to impregnate her. Tamar dresses like a harlot in order to seduce her father-in-law. Judah solicits a prostitute. These are all things that one would imagine should be kept private, not immortalized in a Divine work, right? I mean, what’s the good moral lesson here? Why should all this bad behavior be canonized when it could just as easily have been left out or glossed over in the narrative?

The wikipedia page on Tamar does a nice job of presenting a lot of the various theories that critics and commentators have come up with, and I think many of them are very convincing, and likely quite accurate. But I have my own interpretation.

Sexual impropriety can certainly cause all kinds of problems. Making poor relationship choices is the kind of thing that’s very likely to kick you in the ass somewhere down the road. Making bad choices about who you sleep with, and why, could have serious ramifications on the rest of your life. But these poor choices can also teach you important lessons that you’ll carry with you for the rest of your life. And perhaps most importantly, a person who sleeps around, or is otherwise promiscuous, may be completely competent in other areas. Judah, though obviously not the king of healthy and trusting relationships, is a good leader and an example for his brothers. King David, another guy with questionable sexual habits, is generally considered to one of the wisest men in Jewish history. His son, King Solomon, also considered a pretty smart cookie, is known for having hundreds of wives, and hundreds of concubines, and though the rabbis aren’t happy about that choice, they are pretty happy about the Temple he built, which he was able to do despite what one imagines was a fairly significant sexual distraction.

Today, especially in America, we have this sadly puritanical view of sex and sex scandals. We are appalled that our political leaders are at all sexually deviant, and we demand to know the details, to have them splashed on the front page of newspapers, and discussed ad nauseum on talk shows and blogs of every kind. I’ll be the first to say that I think much of the behavior we hear about is reprehensible, but it simply doesn’t concern me if Larry Craig wants to have sex in a bathroom stall with another man, or if Bill Clinton wants a blowjob. What I care about is health care, and human rights, and education. And if Craig can get it on in a public bathroom and then come out and balance the budget, then I support him (sadly, balancing a budget seems to be far beyond Sen. Craig’s capabilities, but go with me, just for the sake of argument). And if Clinton can get a blowjob and then negotiate the end to terrorism in Northern Ireland, then I say get the man a few more girls like Monica and send him off to Jerusalem.

At the end of the day, I don’t care what happens in anyone else’s bedroom as long as it’s consensual, and no one ends up hurt. And what’s more, I think that learning from the mistakes we make with our lovers is an important part of figuring out how to be good people. I love that the Bible includes stories of people fucking up, and then fixing whatever it is that they’ve done wrong. I wish American politics could take a page from that book.

IQ of 180. Body weight 100 lbs.Bridget Jones with a bit of edge is the best way to describe Belle de Jour, the popular London-based Jewish call girl blog that made such huge waves in England that it eventually became a book. Now comes the TV series starring Billie Piper as our favorite Belle.

What better than a nice, dirty Jewish girl and a sassy Brit all rolled into one and better yet, one that stars an actress that exudes a nubile Lolita melange of Kylie Minogue and Sienna Miller?

But enough drooling boys. Back to the blog and our favorite cynical, world-weary hooker du jour who is so admirably independent and bold she can express the same sentiment echoed by many a fearless single gal: Is it wrong to have made no plans for Valentine's Day, and be happy with that?