I learned today that R' Ysoscher Katz is also an opportunist

Otherwise it would make no sense for him to write an article about a girl he knew nothing about a day after her passing and blame an ENTIRE community for it. מילא all her supposed friends looking for revenge - we can expect that. But Rabbi Katz?! Could he not wait a week until the shiva was over? Could he not respect the obviously grieving parents who lost what seems to be one of two children? Parents who went out of their way to placate her current friends and thank them publicly for coming! Does this sound like parents who "shunned" her? And to compare his situation to hers is just absurd. The only reason I can think of for him to write such a piece is his need to either get his name in on the conversation, or worse, just stick it to the frummies who "shunned" him. Kind of like Eli Fink with a beard. I see now that he did not write the screaming, incriminating. The Forward people do that, as do all newspapers - write the title, that is. But wow, they sure are objective....

I am disappointed.

Now in "Jewish Action" magazine

I haven't been able to read it all, which means I cannot yet comment, but there is a slight mention of the fact that this is all very strange to a hereto very rational crowd, which you may have called the neo-Litvish crowd, since it did differ, albeit very slightly, from the mother country, Lithuania. I would also venture to say that many in that crowd, especially the old-timers raised on Hershey bars and Bnei Akiva, resent the fact that they're ultimately being told that the way it was just isn't good enough. Much like the black hatters who go off to the Yeshivos Hakdoshos in Eretz Yisroel tell their parents upon returning home... Again this is all without fully reading the article....

Rekindling the Flame_ Neo-Chassidus Brings the Inner Light of Torah to Modern Orthodoxy - Jewish Action

Links for non-Scribd users:

Neo-Chassidus brings inner light to the MO
Q&A with Rabbi Moshe Weinberger

Trying to reclaim the ModOrthodox?

Koren Shas

It's no secret that Artscroll is a Charedi company. Yet over the last two decades they've managed to corner the whole Modern Orthodox market when it comes to Torah literature, with most, if not all, Young Israels, etc. stocking Artscroll sidurim, chumashim and gemoras. While Steinsaltz gemoras were popular for a while, it didn't take long for the more Modern Artscroll shas to take over as well. I speak of the English gemoros. I'd venture to say that many in the MO community were not happy with the "black-hat" takeover of their lives and were looking to end what they saw as an unjust takeover of their Torah lives. But what could they do? the juggernaut was too big and strong, so they threw in the towel and stocked their shelves with as many AS seforim as they could get their hands on. But now it seems like there may be hope for those non-Artscrollers, and it comes in the form of the Koren-Steinsaltz Shas, a modern Shas that stays  with the traditional as well. The pronunciations just like the MO like them, with a nice, classic, Vilna Tzuras HaDaf. I don't know for sure if this was Koren's intention - to chip away at Artscroll's market share - but they may very well do it.

We wish them lots of success. Buy It Here or at Eichler's

Today's Link

BOF: Top Bansha"k Claims MOs Want Sainthood for Anti-Zionist Rebbe