Well, I have finally discovered the cause of Trump Derangement Syndrome. It is Donald Trump.

Now that we have behind us, we can get on to some other things.

First, it looks clear (very clear) that the next mayor of Washington will be Janeese Lewis George. I find this problematic in various ways. She is too young (38), even though she is older than Mayor Mamdani by four years. She seems, in what I have seen of her, to lack some maturity and perspective. She is a self-declared progressive, which would not bother me in most instances, except that the city of Washington is suffering from the Trump administration’s cutting of government jobs, and is in need of some business and employment attention, which I am not sure she will give it sufficiently. She is extremely anti-Trump (which of course, I am, too, but I am not running for mayor), which I am afraid will set the city on a collision course with the federal government over the next two years. But she is ahead in the polling by double digits, and the primary is only 12 days away.

Secondly, the price of oil has fallen a fair amount, and the stock market has continued to gain, even though the war between the U.S. and Iran and the war between Israel (and maybe Lebanon – hard to tell) and Hezbollah have not slowed down a bit. Can anyone explain that to me?

Thirdly, new jobs are up (172,000) last month, twice what was predicted. I have never understood how that is possible. The predictions come from sophisticated companies like ADP and typically have come in pretty close to the mark. Why now the consistent discrepancies? Of course, I have never understood the job figures. Ready for a challenge? Figure out how to go back to my post of February 3, 2023, and see what I said about the job report calculations there. My thoughts have not changed.

Now, let’s flip subjects completely for a minutes (I will do this one quickly). Last night, Edie and I went to Temple Beth Ami, a large Reform congregation in Rockville, to help celebrate the recognition of the 50th anniversary of the rabbinic ordination of Rabbi Jack Luxemburg, rabbi emeritus of the congregation. Jack is currently the vice-president of the Haberman Institute for Jewish Studies, of which I am president, so he and I work closely together and I have been able to learn to appreciate his many strengths. The Friday night Shabbat service also included something at least as special, maybe even more so, the dedication and acceptance of a new Torah, written by an Israeli Torah scribe over a two year period with the assistance of many Beth Ami congregants, as a result of a very generous bequest by congregant, David Jaffe. With this bequest, there were sufficient funds to commission the Torah, to make is small and light (that is more expensive than having it big and heavy), to scan the entire Torah so that (for example) Bar and Bat Mitzvah students can have a scan of what they will actually be reading from, even when they are not looking at the actual Torah, for new Torah covers for usual and High Holiday use for the Congregation’s seven scrolls, and for the establishment of a Torah maintenance fund. This is all quite impressive, as was the service itself which featured an address by Andrew Rehfeld, the President of Hebrew Union College. Rehfeld, who is 60, was previously a Professor of Political Science at Washington University and the CEO of the Jewish Federation of St. Louis (of course, until I looked him up this morning, I did not know that). More than that, Jack Luxemburg was the rabbi who led the Saturday morning service when Andrew Rehfeld had his Bar Mitzvah.

Small world.