I wonder if anyone has written at length about how much community life for everyone in Los Angeles has been impacted by traffic.

I guess it does give a person a true "sense of place" however, to be on the 405 near Culver City at, say, 5:15pm. Nothing quite like it.

When I worked as a stage manager at Hollywood Center Studios many years ago, studio management adjusted everyone's hours so traffic would never impact prompt arrival to work. So, does that make this a "Hollywood issue" too?

To suggest this is a "Jewish issue" is ludicrous, something on the level that Luke Ford might come up with. It's a Los Angeles issue. 700 suburbs in search of a city.

Ludicrous for a Jewish community publication to write about how some larger issue affects Jews? I disagree.

Ludicrous to mention the Jewish Journal once a week and the Tidings never ever? Quite. Believe it or not, Kevin, there are a few dozen Catholics in town too.

The traffic on Pico is ridiculous at sundown, and walking can be dangerous. Sounds to me like that's a slice of the problem of which the Jewish community gets a unique bite.

While I agree Kevin could cast his eye toward Tidings occaisionally, one cannot deny that traffic is vastly better at 10am Sunday than Friday afternoon.

Joseph, I'll overlook your factual hyperbole and skip to what I think your point is: that my rare JJ mentions should be rarer, and my even rarer Tidings mentions should be more frequent. All I can say to that is, if the Tidings becomes more interesting to me as a layman and the JJ less so, it'll take care of itself.

Alternately, Joseph could send Kevin things of interest, so Kevin isn't single-handedly responsible for reading every scrap of paper tossed on a flat surface west of the Colorado.

I don't like sending Kevin things, and it's not my job anyway; newsgoogling "los angeles catholic" once every other month should be easy enough for a Los Angeles scribe in a town of a zillion Catholics.

I'm far from a hardcore Catholic myself, in fact I'm a completely deconstructed one, but all I ever see in print about Catholicism is pedophile this and someone being denied communion for spurious reasons, and those kinds of issues are not at all the faith. I've certainly never seen an article linked here about how Catholics might be having a hard time getting groceries because of the supermarket strike, or how they might be having a hard time getting to mass because of the MTA strike, both of which I gotta think affected a few million more Catholics than LA diasuburbospora has affected Jews getting to temple, especially when Luke tells me they don't even go anyway.

"Is traffic a Jewish issue?" Give me a fucking break.

...all I ever see in print about Catholicism is pedophile this and someone being denied communion for spurious reasons...

Phew, at least I'm off the hook. I can't link to what isn't there.

Though I guess one could argue I've been unfair in not picking up enough Catholic pedophile stories.

I really don't get the complaint. The JJ article looks at the challenges posed by traffic for "community-building" among Jews in L.A. There is no suggestion that it isn't a problem for others, as well. Reading that into the story seems completely unreasonable.

This seems like a new and interesting take on traffic and its effects -- at least I haven't seen traffic looked at from this sort of angle before. It might have been done by other publications oriented to particular communities in L.A. -- the JJ happens to have done it first. I don't see any reason why Kevin shouldn't link to it or why his taking notice of the story should be seen as a sign of favor or disfavor to anyone.

Let's build a wall, oops, I mean a fence, and install some checkpoints along these vital arteries. Or how about some "Jewish only" roads like those on the West Bank? Won't that solve the traffic congestion?

i unfortunately guess it's not at all ludicrous to see that some people still can't read.

"Is traffic a jewish issue, then?"

That's the sentence. A jewish issue. That DOES NOT say it's ONLY a jewish issue. I think that leaves it open for a lot of other people to jump in and bitch about the traffic.

Give me a fucking break! If you are an observant jew, you are required to begin worship at, or just before, sundown (the exact time is pretty irrelevant in this context). So if you work in encino, but your house of worship is in redondo beach, you have a real friggin problem if you cannot leave work until 5:30 p.m.

it's a simple fact of la life - and any other city where gridlock takes over at rush hour. you cannot make certain engagements ( seeing a therapist, happy hour, getting to a second job, picking up kids from an after school program ) if you have to spend a lot of time on the freeway during rush hour. so the jewish journal (a niche paper) looked at it from their niche.

what's the big deal?

and while mr. roderick gave you a pass, joseph, i'm interested in seeing how many times JJ is mentioned here. so i'm hoping you can do some very basic reporting to back it up.

The Jewish press, which is mediocre, is still far superior and more interesting for outsiders than the Catholic and Protestant press is for outsiders. Like Kevin said.

Is that just an opinion, Luke, or do you have comparative analysis to share with us? I would like to see it. Seriously.

It's based on my research for my forthcoming book on Jewish journalism. Also, I've lived most of my life as a gentile, and have read extensively Protestant journalism. I'm also acquainted with black and latino journalism. I'm acquainted with coverage of clergy sex abuse, where the Jewish press was way ahead of its Catholic counterparts.

All well and good but isn't the thesis of your book that Jewish journalism is "lousy" (your verbiage)?

Precisely. But from what I am learning, it is still leagues above its Catholic and Protestant counterparts.

Pick up the Jewish Journal in LA, or read it online, and compare it to its Catholic and Protestant counterparts.
Part of the reason the Jewish version is more compelling is that most Jews are secular (while no Christian by definition can be secular) and journalism is overwhelmingly a secular pursuit.

Good God, I hate to jump in here. I shouldn't, but I will. It couldn't be more ironic -- adding irony upon irony upon irony -- that there is a continuing story about a Catholic two posts above -- about the NYT and the evidently erroneously bestselling Tony Hendra and Father Joe. God help us, Catholics can't seem to get a fucking break these days. Irony, comedy, satire -- mockumentaries -- in this thread? I'll just leave the jump at that.

Luke forgot to add that the reason he converted is he found Jewish journalism so much more interesting than gentile journalism.

Also, while I'd wager that many people in L.A., Jewish or not, are familiar with the Jewish Journal, how many have heard of Tidings? I never have. And I actually know quite a few more Catholic publications than I ever thought I would, because so many raked me over the coals a few months ago for defending Playboy in my NRO column.

No doubt Cathy Seipp got raked over the coals by all manner of conservative religious publications for "causing controversy" by defending Playboy in the National Review.

Traffic as a Jewish issue. Give me a break.

Actually, it's not so much give me a break as give me a brilliant satirical mockumentary: "Traffic as a Jewish Issue." It really is a good one.

I hear you can't find a decent deli in Stevenson Ranch, a major pocket of "white flight" in L.A. Is this a Jewish issue too?

How do you feel about the Christian Science Monitor, Luke? Think carefully before you answer. Take a few minutes to do research if you have to.

I know it used to be a good paper. I don't read it much now. It is also not applicable to the discussion. The discussion was about papers aimed at Jews, Catholics, Protestants that are frequently written, at least in the Jewish case, by those outside the group. The Monitor is a general interest publication.

Anyone who can't see why it is legitimate for a Jewish paper to look at a general interest issue such as traffic and apply it to their specific community is a moron, which applies to at least a third of the posters above.

OK, let's flip this conversation:

What issues should the JJ not cover? The Sentinal? The Tidings?

Frankly, I'm tired of the dumb goyim telling us Chosen Ones what we may put in our community paper. We don't tell you what to put in your homey community newsletters you call Catholic and Protestant newspapers. We don't tell you that you were fooled by some carpenter from Nazareth. We don't even believe you're going to Hell because you're not Jewish.

The sheer animosity towards Jews by many of these posters is saddening. If a Catholic journal had been cited, would there have been such an outpouring of vitriol? I doubt it.

Careful, Luke, your intolerance is showing. I was under the mistaken impression that we were having a discussion here. At least Kevin respectfully disagreed but referring to one-third of the participants in this dialogue as "morons" is simply unacceptable.

How about referring to half of them as morons? That's probably more accurate.

Amazing how little you need to scratch the surface of self-congratulatory leftists to find the anti-semitism underneath. And yes, Joseph, this means you.

Kevin: I thought your post was interesting, informative, something a bit diffrent -- and, indeed, innocuous. To read anything further into it seems a foolish and ill-founded exercise.

Also, while I'd wager that many people in L.A., Jewish or not, are familiar with the Jewish Journal

Yep, people all over are talking up a storm about the latest Jewish Journal. . . sh!t, I just asked three of my Jewish friends at lunch, and none of them had ever heard of it. One queried, "who the hell would read that?"

At least Cathy didn't say that Jewish traffic was more interesting than gentile.

From years of driving through Koreatown, I can vouch that Korean traffic is near heart-attack exhilarating. How about a piece from a Korean magaizine on Korean traffic? Couldn't we extrapolate that to Westside Jewish traffic, and South Bay goyim as well?

Samantha: You want to see anti-Semitism on display? Go to www.LukeFordSeeksaWife.blogspot.com/ and read Luke talking about "all the inbreeding in Jews." Yeah.

Traffic is a Jewish Issue? Um, no, unless you want to make a mockumentary. Traffic is an Issue for Jewish Sabbath Services? Well, sure. :-)

Please...I beg of you, don't feed the uber-troll Ford.

As an Israeli, I'd like to say that you guys are wasting time on trivialities. Yes relevant, no relevant. Who cares? There are more serious things to concern us - see last paragraph.

I didn't think that any of the posts were anti-semitic. There's enough real stuff without inventing.

The only annoying ones were Ford's. I second Joy's request.

Finally, the most disturbing one was JDT's. His implicit comparison between traffic problems and terrorism is frightening. Or is it his ignoring terrorism completely more frightening? But then again, you can't fight blindness. So I'm wasting bandwidth here.