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   West Wing Plus Red Sox Equals.?   
   By Rabbi Arthur Waskow   
      
   Dear folks,   
      
   Last night I watched two TV events: the new-season premiere of "The West   
   Wing," and the 7th game of the American League playoffs. My conclusions   
   about the coming elections are below.   
      
   Below are also the rules for A NEW READERS' CONTEST like our recent "Karl   
   Rove Tactical Intervention" contest. Be sure to enter -- There's a wonderful   
   prize!!   
      
   (You are surprised that from such data I would draw election conclusions?   
   Ha! Little do you know the soul of someone who remembers when the Baltimore   
   Orioles won the MINOR league Little World Series!)   
      
   In "The West Wing" last night, President Bartlett resisted enormous pressure   
   from his staff, Congress, & the public to respond to a Palestinian terrorist   
   attack on Americans in Gaza by bombing the Palestinians -- as he said, "Is   
   killing more kids going to end terrorism? WHY did they strike at Americans?"   
      
   Instead, he pressured and cajoled the Palestinian Authority & the Israeli   
   government to come to a last-ditch summit at Camp David.  They did, as the   
   program closed. (He wasn't just "wimpy"; as the Camp David delegations   
   gathered, he also ordered a bomber strike against a Syrian camp that trained   
   the Palestinian terrorist group.)   
      
   Then the Red Sox won, coming back from the worst conceivable deficit: three   
   games down.   
      
   And the key play really was in the 6th game, where as my very own eyes   
   bugged out a Yankee tried to bully his way into a safe single -- knocking   
   the ball out of the 1st-baseman's hand. (I was both stunned, and utterly   
   unsurprised: "Vuh den? What else would you expect from these pinstripe   
   Yankees?")   
      
   His body hid the foul from the first-base umpire, but the Collective   
   Multilateral Body of Umperial Justice convened on the field and said "Az   
   pasht nisht!!  No go!"   
      
   And even more -- the Televisual Public Witness for the American Citizenry   
   made apparent by split screens from half a dozen angles what the Yankee   
   arrogance had tried to hide.   
      
   That knocked the wind out of the Yankees' bossiness, exposing   
   Steinbrennerism as a fake version of the American Dream.   
      
   From both events, my conclusion is obvious:  Kerry will win the election.   
      
   I say this not out of favoritism or support for any candidate -- God, or   
   rather the IRS, forbid!! -- but as a scientific analysis of "The Media as   
   Advance Indicators of American Culture." (See my monograph on this subject   
   in the Journal of Unverifiable Results.)   
      
   It won't be simple, of course, any more than Bartlett's Detente or the Red   
   Sox turn-around was.   
      
   So we welcome all readers into a Cultural Indicators pool on the following   
   basis:   
      
   Choose the date, between November 2, 2004,  and January 20, 2005  (or even,   
   God forbid, later),  on which you estimate the Presidential election will be   
   decided. And choose the state with the closest division of Kerry-Bush votes.   
      
   Anyone who gets both facts right will win a free inscribed copy of Seymour   
   Hersh's new book **Chain of Command: The Road from 9/11 to Abu Ghraib.**   
   Plus a free ticket to our NEXT Hanukkah "Menorah Award" event in December   
   2005. If more than one person gets both facts right, we will spin the dreidl   
   to see who wins. Entire by writing office@shalomctr.org. (you must include   
   your email and snail mail address.)   
      
   And hoo-boy -- If the Houson Astros win the National League pennant, the   
   World Series --  TX vs. MA -- will be the election in miniature. Or   
   maxiature.  Is this a great country, or what?   
      
   -------------------   
   Rabbi Arthur Waskow is director of the Shalom Center.   
   To subscribe to the Shalom Report, click here:   
   http://shalomctr.org/index.cfm/action/subscribe.html   
      
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