A Chinese Mystery

 

The latest viral sensation in China is a video clip recorded by amazed citizens of Zhujiajiao, a city near Shanghai, of a cow falling from the sky in the middle of the day. To avoid panic (and leak probably secret information) the Security Apparat forbid all mention of the phenomenon. But already it was circulating on the web (pic). 

Then, a random comment in an Argentine TV show threw light on the flying cow of Zhujiajiao. Argentina procures its COVID vaccines from China, and the Aerolineas Argentinas return flight from Buenos Aires, is empty. Why not try to sell the Chinese some fresh meat and turn a fast peso? Once over Chinese territory, the pilot received a call that Argentina had passed a law forbidding meat exports; he understood that big trouble was waiting for him.  The pilot ordered the crew to immediately get rid of the cow. 

Another Chinese mystery solved. 

How is that Argentina, the land of infinite pampas, has no meat to sell? How is it that Cuba is importing sugar, Venezuela is buying oil from the Middle East, Nicaragua drinks African coffee, etc.? 

The answer in one word: Socialism. 

Memorial

 

The memorial monument/sculpture of Dani Karavan on the campus of Weizmann Institute is not bad, although the shining copper sheet needs to be cleaned and maintained frequently.  The inscriptions seem illegible, gibberish, and contain the tattooed numbers of Auschwitz inmates. It represents a Torah scroll split in half.  He died yesterday at age 90.

I dreamt that I am in Buenos Aires, and have no money for the bus. I was thinking - in the dream - that there was no need to worry, I have been in similar situations in former dreams, and I managed. Woke up not worried. 

Prime Minister Naphtali Bennet

Well, it seems inevitable. A government with Avigdor Liberman as Finance Minister and the Finance Committee controlled by Yisrael Beytenu, and six ministries headed by Labour and Meretz, will be a distinctly secular left-wing government. It will dramatically harm the Haredi community and change the status quo on issues of religion and state. 

Who is Bennet? He is, like Netanyahu, a former leader of Sayeret Matkal, Israel's elite commando unit. His parents are American. He founded the high-tech company Cyota, which specializes in online information security. The company employs some 400 workers, and in 2005 it was sold to an American company for $145 million. Bennett also served as the CEO of Soluto, which was sold for some $100 million. He lives in the neighborhood. He is bald, like me. In short, he is qualified to lead the country. 

I have to start selling stock to pay my obligations. I have about two weeks to liquidate the portfolio. Just now the political plonter is on the way to a solution and the bourse is rising... I cannot wait more and shall sell for less than I could get if I wait for more. But I cannot wait. Expletive deleted. 

Kosher Cellular Animal Husbandry

Things have evolved since my notes on extensive animal husbandry in Argentina and the Sahel. I was the first in Corrientes Province to study the profitability of cattle growing on grass and writing a paper showing that the "estancieros" were losing money. The investments in land and fixed facilities, as well as cattle, were so large that actually, they were making less than American T-bonds. I proposed planting groundnuts and soya, and Caribbean pine. I left the place in a few years and Corrientes' economy has changed. I am not saying I did it but surely helped a bit. 

Now I am witnessing a change to meat produced by in vitro cell culture of animal cells, instead of from slaughtered animals. As humanity is moving away from nature, the killing of animals is being rejected and soon it will be illegal. Cultured meat will become acceptable, which poses a question to Judaism. Is it kosher? 

According to the sages, if the original cells are taken from a kosher animal, the meat - cultured and otherwise - is kosher. The mashgichim will need to learn biology in order to stay relevant.  One may wonder what is the meaning of kosher meat: I thought it was a permitted animal slaughtered by a shohat. But what about its cell line? Is the kashrut transmitted in the genes? What is this obscurantist nonsense? I don't care: it works to keep the Jews apart from the peoples.  

Already the patties sold for barbecues in Israel have never been part of a bovine. Comment: the cheese in the hamburger above is parve, made from soybeans. 

Viejo Verde

 Joe Biden looks at a little girl in the audience, the daughter of a veteran, and says "I love those barrettes in your hair. Man I’ll tell you what, look at her she looks like she's 19 years old sitting there like a little lady with her legs crossed."

In Argentina, people like Biden were called - affectionately - Viejo Verde, Green Old Man. Signaling that he was immature or possibly senile. Left: a Spanish satirical magazine from 1914, documenting that the issue is not new nor unknown. General Peron used to visit girls' schools during physical education classes. Of course, he was a dirty old fascist dictator.

Houston, we have a problem.

Dark Perspectives for Israel

 It has been announced that Bennet, from the Zionist Religious Party, is forming the government with Secular Lapid and ferociously anti-religious Liberman (representing the Russian immigrant public, hated by the religious). The next government will include the far-left Meretz and Labor. And the extreme anti-Israeli Muslim parties This will be the first time that a defeatist antireligious government rules Israel, planning to dismantle the Haredi educational network and the settlements. Very bad. Hope they cannot hold it together and will fall soon and Netanyahu will come back to save the nation. 

The Land of the Windswept Bonsai

 

I am not here but inside the Inugami-ke no Ichizoku mystery, pondering the murders in the Inugami clan (a name meaning Dog God), solved by detective Kondaichi. It is a classical story but in a Japanese environment. The violence is highly stylized, the agonizing formality and politeness sound awkward in the ears of this uncultured Jew, but we are in refined Japan, the land of the windswept bonsai, not Shuk HaCarmel.