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Churches Aiding Synagogues:
Dwelling Together In Unity
For the past few days, a song has
been running through my mind. Its
lyrics, in Hebrew, are "Hinei mah
toy u'mah nayim shevet achim gam
yachad." This is actually from the
first verse of Psalm 133, "Behold, how
good and how pleasant it is for breth-
ren to dwell together in unity:'
What prompted this was reading
Rachel Kapen's recent letter to the
Jewish News, "Interfaith Respect"
(Oct. 16, page 5). In this, Ms. Kapen
lauded Pastor Jon Good and the
Covenant Baptist Church of West
Bloomfield for graciously assisting
her synagogue, Congregation B'nai
Israel of West Bloomfield, with tem-
porary building accommodations.
The need was great, as Kapen and
her fellow congregants had found
themselves without a place of worship
for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
With the consent of the board and its
congregants, the church has hosted
B'nai Israel for the past three con-
secutive years for the high holidays.
Kapen concluded that Covenant was
"a model of mutual respect and good-
will between disparate faiths" and "an
object of emulation for others ... to
make our world a better place to live
for all of us."
I can also attest to the bonhomie
of Detroit area churches and their
display of goodwill toward their
Jewish brethren. Before moving into
its own building, Congregation Shir
Tikvah (then known as the Troy
Jewish Congregation) was allowed to
share space with the Northminster
Presbyterian Church.
Later on, as the membership grew,
there was not enough room for every-
one to park in the synagogue lot for
the holidays. But every year, Stone
Haven Free Methodist Church, the
synagogue's next-door neighbor, gen-
erously offers the use of its parking
lot to accommodate the overflow.
The beauty of these acts of kind-
ness is that these churches do not
engage in proselytizing Jewish con-
gregants nor is there any implied
hope for donations in the future. I
believe that their kindness, although
charitable, cannot be considered
charity in the common sense of the
word. It is simply an expression of the
spirit of cooperation, respect, broth-
erhood and unity. How good and how
pleasant it is!

Donna Edwards
Oak Park

Snyder's Tax Cuts Only
Help Business Owners
It was to be expected that the own-
ers of the Jewish News would repay
Snyder for his generous tax cut with
an endorsement, but please spare us
the litany of half-truths used to ratio-
nalize this self-serving transaction
("Our Choices: Snyder For Governor,
Peters For Senate Oct. 23, page 28).
The onerous single business tax
and personal property tax needed
reform, but this reform was all cuts
rather than an equitable realignment.
Snyder evaded the hard decisions
needed to find replacement revenue
to sustain state services. It was easier
to pass the burden to the local com-
munities, forcing them to take the
heat for cuts forced by legal limits on
their taxing authority.
We get the usual ambiguous canard
about wasteful spending, but no
accounting is ever provided with
numbers to prove the claim is more
than capricious slander. How is his
taxing equitable when Chrysler LLC
pays zero income tax while GM Inc.
pays 6 percent? (And, it didn't stop
Chrysler from leaving.)
What's equitable about cuts in
revenue sharing that turn cities into
economic ghettos isolating the rich
from the poor?
Michigan reaped the benefit of the
auto rescue by Washington, but there
is little progress not attributable to
that. Michigan lags despite its key
industry thriving because of Snyder's
recycled trickle-down economics that
never have and never will work no
matter how many terms we wait to
feel it.
Business doesn't hire people they
don't need, so tax cuts go directly to
profits. Jobs are created by customer
demand; but Snyder, like Robin Hood
in reverse, increased taxes for the
most likely to spend, the poorest citi-
zens.
He added a pension tax, raised
homestead eligibility limits, cut
earned income credits and reduced
unemployment relief, and gave the
money to rich corporations in tax
cuts.
Snyder's economics are destruc-
tive and immoral and are far from
equitable and, finally, he trampled
on Jewish rights establishing Vatican
theology through onerous restrictions
on abortion in blatant disregard of
the First Amendment.
The message I get from this
endorsement is, "I got a big payoff,

and I don't care who he took it from
to give it to me." Those low income
tax rates won't do you much good if
only business owners can afford to
subscribe.

Dennis L. Green
Farmington Hills

Consider Obama Policies
When Voting This Year
President Obama said the midterm
elections are a vote on his policies.
Israel defends itself from more than
4,000 Hamas rockets, yet it is blamed
for the resulting destruction, while
Hamas uses its population as human
shields.
The Obama administration railed
against Israel only to find out most
of the civilian casualties were caused
by misfired rockets and by Hamas
forcing civilians to stay in harm's way.
Hellfire missiles were blocked from
being shipped, and Secretary of State
John Kerry negotiated with Hamas'
allies Qatar and Turkey to try to force
a cease-fire.
ISIS is beheading Kurds, Yazidis
and Christians and selling their
women and children into slavery, yet
we refuse to provide heavy weapons
to the Kurds to defend themselves
and use only pinprick airstrikes
instead of massive air power. ISIS is
close to Baghdad and Kurds are being
decimated in Kobani.
Russia has annexed Crimea and has
invaded the Ukraine and we only sent
K-rations.
Iran openly says it will not give
up its nuclear program yet we ease
our sanctions and pray a miracle will
happen in November when negotia-
tions are to end.
Our allies cannot trust us to come
to their aid while our enemies fear us
not.
The handling of the Ebola pandemic
is causing major concern yet admin-
istration handling of immigration via
executive order allows tens of thou-
sands of children and adults to illegal-
ly cross our border without regard to
the diseases they may carry and they
are not subject to medical screening.
Our economy six years later is still
not creating the necessary jobs.
When you pick your candidate on
Election Day, will you be approving
or disapproving of the president's
handling of foreign and domestic
affairs?

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Eugene Greenstein
Farmington Hills

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October 30 • 2014

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