Ops & Blogs | The Times of Israel » Michael J. Salamon

A time for honesty

Michael J. Salamon — Tue, 18 Jun 2013 19:01:42 +0000

Abraham Lincoln said “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.” A recent series of articles and reports in a variety of media outlets suggests that some of the people are [...]

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Anomie

Michael J. Salamon — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 18:53:19 +0000

Emile Durkheim’s 1897 text Suicide was required reading when I was an undergraduate. The book can be read on many levels but is in essence a sociological review of the conflict between societal norms, expectations, individual practices and the pressures and freedom to develop both societal and individually. Durkheim used the concept of anomie to [...]

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Are you happy or satisfied?

Michael J. Salamon — Fri, 07 Jun 2013 18:32:07 +0000

Are you happy with your life? It is a question most people I see professionally expect me to ask. I almost never ask it. I do ask if you are content or satisfied with your life, and I ask about contentment in different areas of your life. Why? Very simple! After 30 years of research [...]

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Worse than blaming victims

Michael J. Salamon — Tue, 28 May 2013 19:51:44 +0000

Zelig (not his real name), a man in his 20′s, arrived to his therapy appointment with me yesterday with tears streaming down his cheeks. He was clearly in distress. At the age of twelve Zelig was molested by a teacher, a rabbi who was giving him “special” attention at the yeshiva he was attending at the time. Zelig had [...]

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Un-Bearded

Michael J. Salamon — Tue, 21 May 2013 18:31:02 +0000

My beard is off. I shaved it; well it was clipped with an electronic clipper and then shaved with an electronic shaver. If you will recall (http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/my-beard/) I had the beard for a little over forty days and it was developing quite impressively. Many people actually told me they liked the facial hair I was [...]

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Kotel Dissonance

Michael J. Salamon — Sun, 19 May 2013 12:50:56 +0000

Thomas Friedman is not my hero – far from it. His Op-ed pieces in the New York Times often turn my stomach but I continue to read his work because he has a position, a voice and a perspective that is important to hear even if I disagree. Let me make it clear – [...]

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Kotel Standoff

Michael J. Salamon — Sun, 12 May 2013 21:50:43 +0000

There are so many easier, smarter and more efficient ways to allow all people to pray at the Kotel, the Western Wall, than the limited and restrictive approach that led to rioting this past Friday morning, an approach that seeks to completely eliminate a small group of women from having access to the holy site [...]

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What makes a terrorist?

Michael J. Salamon — Tue, 07 May 2013 15:21:36 +0000

In the wake of the bombings in Boston and the renewed desire on the part of the media to determine the root causes for why people allow themselves to become extremists, act radicalized and terrorize others let me assure you, we have a pretty good idea of the basics. Whether it is a Muslim radicals’ [...]

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My Beard

Michael J. Salamon — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:57:38 +0000

Some people are polite. They just say nothing and try not to stare. Others say things like “If you keep it until December you can cash in on the season, just practice saying ‘Ho ho ho!’” Someone else said to me “I could not shave my beard the 30th day after my father died. It [...]

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My next life

Michael J. Salamon — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 02:29:30 +0000

There are no more worries now that I no longer have to sleep with one ear awake worrying that the phones will ring in the middle of the night with the message, “Dad’s nose is bleeding and it won’t stop” or “Dad slipped out of bed. I don’t know how he did it” or “He [...]

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I can’t keep up

Michael J. Salamon — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 13:01:50 +0000

One of the greatest thrills of my youth was going to work with Dad. He was a stern disciplinarian at home with a survivors approach to family but he was a very different man at work. I learned that the first time he took me along. I was probably no more than six or seven [...]

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Pseudoscientific coupling

Michael J. Salamon — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 17:39:14 +0000

It is definitely time to get out the Ouija boards or maybe the divining rods and use them to help make the latest marital matches. Maybe we can even hire some alchemists to help. If, as they claim, they can turn simple metal into gold then of course they too can help with a secret matchmaking [...]

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Discipline and Four Sons

Michael J. Salamon — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 12:40:05 +0000

As a mandated reporter, someone who is by law required to report any suspected case of abuse to the proper authorities, I have had, on occasion, to interact with both Adult Protective Services and the Association for Children Services. There are times when these organizations find that there is a clear case of abuse but [...]

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A broken wing

Michael J. Salamon — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 23:00:27 +0000

This is not a drasha. This is not a sermon or a religious exhortation. It is a simple observation of the human experience from the perspective of someone who is typing these days with one or maybe two fingers on my left hand. I could make this a column about neuroplasticity and coordination. I could make [...]

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Confronting Communal Avoidance

Michael J. Salamon — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 02:33:20 +0000

How is it that even now so many weeks after the trial of Nechemya Weberman there are still so many individuals raising funds for a legal appeal on his behalf? How can there be so many individuals who, at least publicly, firmly believe that he is innocent or that he was railroaded, or that he was [...]

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