By Debbie Schlussel

Happy Thanksgiving to all of my friends and readers. We have much to be thankful about here in America at the end of 2009.

To those who wished me a Happy Thanksgiving, I regret I cannot respond to each of you personally, but Right Back At Ya! A joyous, delicious, fun Thanksgiving to you!

On this Thanksgiving, I am thankful for you who regularly read my words. I will remember all of those who serve our country in the U.S. Armed Forces and those who gave their lives so we can enjoy our turkey in freedom and without wearing a niqab, hijab, or jilbab; so that we can enjoy our lives as we wish and live freely. While left-wing self-hating Americans want us to recall their phony version of history–ie., that we are the oppressors, don’t forget that the real oppression is going on elsewhere . . . all over the world today. A large part of it is under Islamic totalitarian rule, some of it under Communists and “former” Communists. I give thanks that we are not like them.

If you are reading this site, you know that I still have the freedom to write whatever I wish on its pages and that you have the freedom to read it and whatever else you like. I am thankful for all of our freedoms here in America, since (for now), we still have them.

Though we have a socialist President and times are tough for Americans all over, we are still citizens of the greatest country on earth. Most of all, I am thankful to be an American.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
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Over the years, many people have asked me how, as a Jew, my Thanksgiving might differ from yours. Well, first, it doesn’t differ at all. We are all Americans, and I am as thankful as anyone to be able to live and practice my religion freely in our great country. I eat turkey and most of the same “fixin’s” as you do, with the exceptions noted below.

But there are differences in the meal:

1) My turkey is kosher. That means it’s slightly more expensive (most kosher meat and poultry usually is because you are paying for the kosher slaughter, a rabbi’s supervision of it, etc.). That means the turkey was slaughtered in captivity, pursuant to kosher slaughter rules (of which the Muslim halal is a complete rip-off and a lite version). The live animal is inspected to make sure there are no defects, missing parts, blemishes, etc. If none, then it is slaughtered with almost a guillotine like beheading. The idea is that, even though we are not animal rights/PETA freaks, we want the bird to feel as little pain as possible and die instantly. Also, we don’t need to brine the turkey, because kosher poultry is always slightly salty, anyway. Kosher meat/poultry is salted to get rid of the blood.

2) If you keep kosher, as I do, then we don’t have any dairy ingredients with our meal or up to six hours afterward (I wait the full six, other observant Jews wait five or whatever their family custom is). So, no buttering the turkey, or cream-enriched mashed potatoes, plus we use a non-dairy pumpkin pie at dessert, etc. That’s, again, because of the kosher/Jewish idea of humane treatment of animals. We eat the animal, but we don’t want it to suffer. And in the Bible, it says, “Thou shalt not cook a goat in its mother’s milk.” In those days with small, self-sufficient family farms, if you cooked a goat in milk, it probably was its mother’s milk. We believe that it’s enough that we killed the animal and are eating it, but to cook it in its own mother’s milk would be to embarrass it/make it suffer more. So we never eat meat/poultry ingredients with dairy ones and wait up to six hours in between for the two not to mix in the digestion process.

3) I noticed that most gentiles I know start their Thanksgiving in the very early afternoon. Most of my many non-Jewish friends are done with their Thanksgiving dinner much before we’ve even started ours. Most Jewish people I know don’t start our Thanksgiving dinner until the early evening/regular dinner time. That’s anecdotal, of course. I don’t know every one of my 5.2 million American fellow co-religionists. But this is my observation.

4) The obvious: there’s no ham, pork, bacon, or any pig products at my Thanksgiving dinner table.

Other than that, my Thanksgiving is pretty much the same as yours.

Enjoy. And give thanks.