WEBVTT - Chutzpah vs. Chutzpah 0:00:15.356 --> 0:00:22.716 Pushkin heads up. In this episode, I interview an old 0:00:22.756 --> 0:00:25.116 school guy from New York who drops a lot of 0:00:25.276 --> 0:00:30.836 f bombs. Just so you're aware, say your name the 0:00:30.876 --> 0:00:34.316 way in Israeli would say Melia Vital and say my 0:00:34.436 --> 0:00:42.956 name is Millia Vital in hebrewal, my name is Malcolm Glodwell. 0:00:43.156 --> 0:00:47.476 You're listening to Revisionist History, my podcast about things overlooked 0:00:47.516 --> 0:00:51.636 and misunderstood. So far in season four, i've talked about 0:00:51.756 --> 0:00:57.716 grand themes, huge issues. This episode is about something very 0:00:57.756 --> 0:01:08.436 specific a word. The word I'm interested in is hutzpah. 0:01:09.276 --> 0:01:12.076 I decided I would like to examine the phenomenon of footspot. 0:01:12.796 --> 0:01:16.196 Since Millie is my neighbor and in Israeli, she has 0:01:16.196 --> 0:01:19.956 agreed to help this teach Coushia Malcolm how to say 0:01:20.916 --> 0:01:23.396 this word appropriately. First of all, are we doing are 0:01:23.396 --> 0:01:25.516 we doing that kind of thing in the throat that 0:01:25.676 --> 0:01:30.516 so many the gutt do I have to the. 0:01:32.156 --> 0:01:36.276 Soft I think we have a closer to Arabic. It's 0:01:36.356 --> 0:01:39.596 deeper in the throat and there's a lot more contact 0:01:39.636 --> 0:01:40.476 of the soft palate. 0:01:41.596 --> 0:01:45.756 It's really deeper. Yeah, so so softer, not not a 0:01:45.836 --> 0:01:48.036 whole but footspa. 0:01:49.276 --> 0:01:54.396 No, who the this. Okay, So the sound is right, 0:01:55.316 --> 0:01:59.436 it is deep, but the vowel is not whole. It's 0:01:59.596 --> 0:02:01.076 who who. 0:02:03.236 --> 0:02:03.476 Yeah. 0:02:03.756 --> 0:02:07.876 In Hebrew there's only I A E O. There's no diphthongs, 0:02:07.916 --> 0:02:12.196 and there's no awe in there's no book and book right, 0:02:12.276 --> 0:02:16.636 there's only woo. So you understand what I'm talking to myself. 0:02:17.316 --> 0:02:19.316 For me, it's very clear, because sadly I worked on 0:02:19.356 --> 0:02:24.116 it so hard. But okay, so it's not hootspa. Yeah, 0:02:24.236 --> 0:02:28.516 just like it's not Milli, it's meally Meali e oh ooh, 0:02:28.836 --> 0:02:35.716 so it's who. H's the team who, not who who? Yes, 0:02:35.756 --> 0:02:36.716 that's better enough. Who. 0:02:39.156 --> 0:02:42.236 It strikes me that there is a lot of Hootspa 0:02:42.396 --> 0:02:45.076 in the world at the moment, and that maybe it 0:02:45.156 --> 0:02:48.476 would be useful to find out something more about it. 0:02:49.476 --> 0:02:52.036 So I started with Millie and the first thing she 0:02:52.156 --> 0:02:56.036 told me is that there isn't one hood spot. There's 0:02:56.076 --> 0:03:01.236 actually two, the American version and the Israeli version. Hootspa 0:03:01.716 --> 0:03:03.996 I knew, but not this other one. 0:03:04.556 --> 0:03:07.756 Hoots Spa not bad, but it's not a paw. 0:03:08.196 --> 0:03:10.356 Yeah, it's baa. 0:03:10.516 --> 0:03:15.316 It's a bottle that doesn't exist sexually in England. Now 0:03:15.316 --> 0:03:20.556 you've got to have the say, you gotta say certain Yeah, 0:03:20.596 --> 0:03:22.236 he's hit the second syllable. 0:03:24.196 --> 0:03:27.716 Bats it. 0:03:27.756 --> 0:03:29.356 There's a lot of air coming out of the mouth. 0:03:29.436 --> 0:03:33.876 And he said, why so when? Uh? But in America, 0:03:33.996 --> 0:03:38.876 the accidents on the first syllable yeah hots right, huts 0:03:38.956 --> 0:03:43.556 ba and huts ba and they are worlds apart and 0:03:43.676 --> 0:03:47.596 maybe our hoods. But problem is that we've confused the two. 0:03:51.276 --> 0:03:53.756 When I was in Los Angeles a little while back, 0:03:53.836 --> 0:03:56.916 I went to see a Hollywood legend named Al Ruddy. 0:03:57.516 --> 0:04:01.396 Tall guy, lean close to ninety. He lives up in 0:04:01.436 --> 0:04:04.836 the canyons of Beverly Hills, one of those nineteen sixties 0:04:04.876 --> 0:04:07.996 houses perched on a hillside that looks like something off 0:04:07.996 --> 0:04:10.676 the set of a James Bond movie. I had a 0:04:10.756 --> 0:04:14.036 specific reason to go and see Ruddy, But Ruddy is 0:04:14.076 --> 0:04:17.516 the kind of person that when he starts talking, specific 0:04:17.556 --> 0:04:19.116 reasons go out the window. 0:04:19.756 --> 0:04:21.636 I was born in Canada. Also, now that I know 0:04:21.716 --> 0:04:23.716 everything about you, I was born in Montreal. I know. 0:04:23.836 --> 0:04:24.356 I saw that. 0:04:24.556 --> 0:04:27.756 Yeah, I went to Montreal and then my mother, my 0:04:27.796 --> 0:04:30.756 mother snuck over the border with she divorced with three kids. 0:04:31.476 --> 0:04:34.556 We stuck over the border in New York. My mother 0:04:34.636 --> 0:04:37.596 said when they asked you junior and Junior highway you 0:04:37.596 --> 0:04:39.556 were born, saying, oh, no, what do you look like? 0:04:39.596 --> 0:04:41.436 A fucking mor I don't know where the fuck I'm born? 0:04:41.516 --> 0:04:42.236 You quit. 0:04:44.076 --> 0:04:45.876 Already was the middle child. 0:04:45.836 --> 0:04:47.996 So I was the one that worked harder for everything. 0:04:48.076 --> 0:04:51.196 I avercat because I had an oldest sister who was beautiful, 0:04:51.476 --> 0:04:53.836 and my brother, who was the baby. I was a 0:04:53.876 --> 0:04:56.676 schmuck in the middle, right, So I was always working harder. 0:04:57.116 --> 0:04:59.876 But I decided, and I learned it early, and it 0:04:59.996 --> 0:05:02.556 was it was actually a blessing, you know. I said, 0:05:02.556 --> 0:05:04.476 you know, I better learn how to take care of myself. 0:05:04.956 --> 0:05:06.956 No one's going to open the fucking doors for me anyone. 0:05:06.956 --> 0:05:07.516 I gotta do it. 0:05:07.596 --> 0:05:10.316 Al Ruddy way, we all right away meant going to 0:05:10.316 --> 0:05:13.596 Brooklyn Tech, then bouncing around working at a gas station, 0:05:13.876 --> 0:05:16.876 studying architecture at USC, and winding up with a job 0:05:16.916 --> 0:05:19.836 as a computer programmer at the Rand Corporation think tank 0:05:19.916 --> 0:05:23.716 in Santa Monica. While he's working at Rand, Ruddy meets 0:05:23.716 --> 0:05:25.676 an unemployed actor named Bernie Fine. 0:05:25.996 --> 0:05:30.276 So I tell Bernie, why don't I'm not Bernie? What 0:05:30.316 --> 0:05:32.156 the fuck they have they're not to write at a 0:05:32.156 --> 0:05:35.076 half hour show it's a one liner. It's the simplest 0:05:35.076 --> 0:05:38.156 format that the one act could break the high point 0:05:38.196 --> 0:05:39.516 and he resolve in an act too. 0:05:40.476 --> 0:05:42.396 So on the side, the two of them start to 0:05:42.396 --> 0:05:45.596 write a television pilot, a comedy set in a prison, 0:05:46.196 --> 0:05:49.356 not just any prison, a Nazi prisoner of war camp, 0:05:49.756 --> 0:05:51.716 and the comic leads are the head of the prison, 0:05:51.836 --> 0:05:56.276 Colonel Klink, and a prison guard, Sergeant Schultz, whose signature 0:05:56.316 --> 0:06:02.116 line is I know nothing, I see nothing, I hear nothing. Somehow, 0:06:02.196 --> 0:06:04.876 Ruddy gets the script to an agent named Mike Levy, 0:06:05.396 --> 0:06:08.236 and Levy gets them a pitch meeting with CBS. This 0:06:08.476 --> 0:06:11.396 was the mid nine teen sixties when CBS was known 0:06:11.436 --> 0:06:15.396 as a Tiffany Network. It was the most prestigious television 0:06:15.436 --> 0:06:20.916 broadcaster in the world, intellectual high class. Its president was 0:06:20.956 --> 0:06:22.516 the legendary William Paley. 0:06:22.796 --> 0:06:27.836 I'm sitting opposite William S. Paley, who fucking owns CBS. 0:06:28.276 --> 0:06:31.316 The whole room, CBS guys and me and Mike is 0:06:31.356 --> 0:06:38.116 that Mike discussed a show called Hogan's Heroes, Bill Pelley's 0:06:38.156 --> 0:06:40.716 across the table, and Mikey says, I find the idea 0:06:40.756 --> 0:06:43.916 of Nazis doing comedies. Those were totally reprehensible. 0:06:44.476 --> 0:06:46.516 Mike Leavy, the agent looks over at Ruddy. 0:06:46.956 --> 0:06:50.636 You tell him he blown away. Don't know what to 0:06:50.676 --> 0:06:53.436 say is oh, I'll have him tell you about it. 0:06:53.556 --> 0:06:56.196 He points to me. I never saw a fucking thing, right, 0:06:56.916 --> 0:07:01.036 I acted out the whole show idiotic. I'm jumping up 0:07:01.036 --> 0:07:03.756 and down. I know nothing but machine guns, and Bill 0:07:03.796 --> 0:07:06.436 Paley starts like he can't stop laughing. I swear to 0:07:06.556 --> 0:07:10.116 cross before I know it, the Paul romas clapping on 0:07:10.156 --> 0:07:13.836 the other side, So he got through and I thought 0:07:13.876 --> 0:07:16.676 it was Bill Pelly stands up. He says, I don't 0:07:16.676 --> 0:07:18.876 know if I can ever buy that show, but I said, 0:07:18.916 --> 0:07:20.676 I just want to commend you that that's one of 0:07:20.716 --> 0:07:22.516 the funniest things I've ever heard. 0:07:25.196 --> 0:07:29.436 Hogan's Heroes runs for six seasons from nineteen sixty five 0:07:29.476 --> 0:07:32.756 to nineteen seventy one. The show wins two Emmys, has 0:07:32.796 --> 0:07:35.556 a huge following, and makes CBS a fortune. 0:07:35.876 --> 0:07:39.356 Oh, I say nothing. I was not here. I did 0:07:39.396 --> 0:07:41.516 not even get up this morning. 0:07:46.156 --> 0:07:49.956 Now, since our topic is hutzba, let us break this down. 0:07:52.516 --> 0:07:56.316 A computer programmer named al Ruddy, who is Jewish, has 0:07:56.316 --> 0:07:59.076 his agent, who is Jewish, set up a meeting with 0:07:59.116 --> 0:08:03.156 Bill Paley, who is Jewish about a comedy starring two Nazis, 0:08:04.116 --> 0:08:08.356 and Paley says, I'm Jewish, I'm not interested. But then Ruddy, 0:08:08.556 --> 0:08:11.316 who is never who sold a screenplay before in his life, 0:08:11.636 --> 0:08:15.276 convinces him it's actually a great idea. And by the way, 0:08:15.476 --> 0:08:18.876 the lead Nazi in Hogan's Heroes, Colonel Klink, is played 0:08:18.876 --> 0:08:23.156 by Werner Klemperer, Jewish whose family fled Nazi Germany in 0:08:23.236 --> 0:08:26.716 nineteen thirty five, and the prison guard, Sergeant Schultz is 0:08:26.756 --> 0:08:30.596 played by John Banner, Jewish who fled Europe in nineteen 0:08:30.636 --> 0:08:38.236 thirty nine. The word hutzpa refers to audacity. This is audacious. 0:08:38.876 --> 0:08:41.476 Ruddy would go on to write The Longest Yard, starring 0:08:41.476 --> 0:08:45.556 Burt Reynolds, and Walker Texas Ranger starring Chuck Norris. He 0:08:45.676 --> 0:08:47.636 was one of the producers on the two thousand and 0:08:47.676 --> 0:08:50.956 four film Million Dollar Baby, which won a handful of oscars. 0:08:51.156 --> 0:08:54.036 I could go on and now, sitting with him in 0:08:54.076 --> 0:08:56.956 his kitchen as he wheeled his wheelchair back and forth 0:08:57.076 --> 0:09:00.596 to emphasize the highlight of each of his stories, I 0:09:00.676 --> 0:09:05.996 realized what Al Ruddy is. He is hutzpa. But this 0:09:06.396 --> 0:09:08.436 is a very specific kind of hutzpa. 0:09:08.596 --> 0:09:08.756 Right. 0:09:09.396 --> 0:09:12.716 Remember this show is being made only twenty years after 0:09:12.756 --> 0:09:14.636 the Nazis stopped terrorizing Europe. 0:09:15.316 --> 0:09:18.796 This camp clink, this camp is a black page in 0:09:18.876 --> 0:09:20.156 the glorious history. 0:09:20.236 --> 0:09:23.036 Is a sad right, which I shall report when I 0:09:23.076 --> 0:09:23.916 get back to Berlin. 0:09:26.556 --> 0:09:30.556 Paley admired Ruddy for the way he behaves. He rewarded him. 0:09:30.756 --> 0:09:33.836 If you and Bernie Fine were not Jewish, could you 0:09:33.876 --> 0:09:38.116 have gotten away with it? 0:09:38.116 --> 0:09:39.916 Didn't that to It didn't even enter my mind in 0:09:39.956 --> 0:09:43.076 those says yeah, no, and no one asks. No one 0:09:43.156 --> 0:09:45.716 knew that, no one, There was never an issue. 0:09:45.756 --> 0:09:50.276 It's funny Ruddy didn't brazenly set out to violate social norms. 0:09:50.796 --> 0:09:52.836 It didn't occur to him that there was a social 0:09:52.876 --> 0:09:56.916 norm to violate. In America. This is what is meant 0:09:57.276 --> 0:10:01.796 by hutzba, but not in Israel. Houts ba is a 0:10:01.796 --> 0:10:02.636 whole different matter. 0:10:04.316 --> 0:10:04.796 Hutzpa. 0:10:05.116 --> 0:10:05.596 Hootspa. 0:10:06.076 --> 0:10:09.276 Oh, you also don't say hutzpa like with this sort 0:10:09.316 --> 0:10:12.276 of curl to it, like a cute kind of hootspa. 0:10:12.556 --> 0:10:17.436 It's hot spot, you say, like it's a hot spot, 0:10:17.756 --> 0:10:22.076 like what a what an insult? It's it's edgy and bitter. 0:10:22.236 --> 0:10:25.516 It's not like she's got so much hootspot. That's a 0:10:25.556 --> 0:10:28.316 totally different word. It has the connotation I would say 0:10:28.396 --> 0:10:32.996 is like it's a hot spot, like someone who's someone 0:10:33.036 --> 0:10:39.676 who has no care about anyone else's life or feelings, 0:10:39.796 --> 0:10:42.676 or like if your child is rude to you. If 0:10:42.716 --> 0:10:48.316 I say to Benjamin it's it's this is like as 0:10:48.356 --> 0:10:50.356 low as it gets. He actually wants like teared up 0:10:50.396 --> 0:10:53.436 when I said that, I could see his face like shocked. Yeah, 0:10:53.476 --> 0:10:55.756 he knows what it means, like no manners or no 0:10:56.476 --> 0:11:01.476 or no regard to someone else's feelings or condition. That 0:11:01.516 --> 0:11:03.396 would be the spa. 0:11:03.716 --> 0:11:10.876 Yeah, one word, two very different meanings, and we've been 0:11:10.956 --> 0:11:15.236 conflating the two. I'll get into the consequences when we 0:11:15.276 --> 0:11:26.676 come back. Let's do a second Hutzpa k study involving 0:11:26.796 --> 0:11:28.676 an exact contemporary of Al Ruddies. 0:11:29.516 --> 0:11:31.436 I'm not sure how to introduce my next guest. He's 0:11:31.476 --> 0:11:34.596 a businessman with leads the most colorful life. His name 0:11:34.636 --> 0:11:36.636 has been in the paper, is a great deal lately, 0:11:36.996 --> 0:11:39.996 and I just met him backstage, but I'm anxious to 0:11:40.036 --> 0:11:43.556 meet him further. We welcome, please, mister Joseph COLUMBOO. 0:11:46.636 --> 0:11:50.516 In the late nineteen sixties, and early nineteen seventies, Colombo 0:11:50.596 --> 0:11:53.476 began making the rounds of talk shows and news programs 0:11:53.556 --> 0:11:57.956 in New York City. Invariably, the interview would begin with 0:11:58.036 --> 0:12:00.876 the question of what Joseph Columbo did for a living, 0:12:01.596 --> 0:12:04.636 and invariably his answer would be the same. Here he 0:12:04.756 --> 0:12:07.516 is on the Dick Cavit Show in April of nineteen 0:12:07.556 --> 0:12:08.916 seventy one, explain. 0:12:08.636 --> 0:12:10.236 What you do for a living, as if I had 0:12:10.236 --> 0:12:10.756 never met you. 0:12:10.876 --> 0:12:13.956 Well, I'm a real estate salesman, and I own a 0:12:13.956 --> 0:12:20.516 piece of a funeral home, and and that wasn't meant 0:12:20.556 --> 0:12:22.516 to be now, funny, Vick. 0:12:23.316 --> 0:12:25.476 You may have noticed, by the way, there's a lot 0:12:25.516 --> 0:12:27.996 of Dick Caviot in this season of Provision is History. 0:12:28.556 --> 0:12:29.956 I love Dick Cabot. 0:12:29.796 --> 0:12:32.556 And anything I can do to iron a living, honestly 0:12:32.676 --> 0:12:37.636 and sincerely, I hope so cause and an a florist, 0:12:37.676 --> 0:12:39.236 and I own a piece of a cut room in 0:12:39.276 --> 0:12:41.836 New York that we cut material for dresses. 0:12:42.956 --> 0:12:43.196 Ah. 0:12:43.316 --> 0:12:45.876 Yeah, it's a cut room. And with all these things 0:12:45.876 --> 0:12:49.236 put together, I iron eleven. Yeah, and I worked very 0:12:49.276 --> 0:12:52.076 hard at it, very honest and sincely. 0:12:53.116 --> 0:12:56.116 Colombo's media tour was to promote an organization he had 0:12:56.156 --> 0:12:59.516 started called the Italian American Civil Rights League. 0:12:59.836 --> 0:13:03.516 Well, we believe that we are escape goats. We have 0:13:03.556 --> 0:13:07.556 been labeled and stigmatized, and I maintain and I'll keep 0:13:07.596 --> 0:13:10.436 saying that it's each and every Italian American throu the 0:13:10.476 --> 0:13:13.396 United States that there is a conspiracy against. 0:13:13.956 --> 0:13:16.756 I asked the writer Nick Peleggie about him. Maybe you 0:13:16.796 --> 0:13:20.076 remember Pelgi from our fourth of July episode earlier this season, 0:13:20.396 --> 0:13:21.356 and what was he like? 0:13:22.676 --> 0:13:25.876 From everything I hear and I've seen him speak on 0:13:25.956 --> 0:13:30.676 occasion and live in rooms with him, he was as 0:13:30.876 --> 0:13:35.036 mild and calm and relaxed as you can imagine. He 0:13:35.116 --> 0:13:37.196 was like a dry good salesman. 0:13:37.316 --> 0:13:39.916 Pledge grew up with Colombo in benson Hurst, Brooklyn. 0:13:40.316 --> 0:13:42.836 He came up with this idea of the Italian American 0:13:42.876 --> 0:13:46.636 Civil Rights League. There are prebus was that Italians were 0:13:46.636 --> 0:13:50.356 being stigmatized by the mafia, that there was really no 0:13:50.476 --> 0:13:53.836 such thing as the mafia, but the media was going 0:13:53.876 --> 0:13:57.516 after Italian Americans and denying us our right place in 0:13:57.556 --> 0:14:01.196 the world, and we would be prejudiced against getting good 0:14:01.316 --> 0:14:04.516 jobs or because the New York Times couldn't stop writing 0:14:04.516 --> 0:14:05.276 the word mafia. 0:14:06.156 --> 0:14:10.156 Now, what was Joe Colombo's real job. Aside from running 0:14:10.156 --> 0:14:13.436 a funeral home and a cut shop and selling real estate, 0:14:14.236 --> 0:14:17.356 he was a big time mafia don the Profaci family. 0:14:17.956 --> 0:14:21.716 Old man Giuseppe Prafacci dies in nineteen sixty two. Colombo 0:14:21.756 --> 0:14:29.956 takes over the organization. American Jews had The Anti Defamation 0:14:30.116 --> 0:14:33.356 League formed in nineteen thirteen to combat the long history 0:14:33.356 --> 0:14:37.796 of antisemitism around the world. African Americans start the NAACP 0:14:37.876 --> 0:14:41.036 in nineteen oh nine because black people were being openly 0:14:41.236 --> 0:14:46.316 and ruthlessly deny their civil rights. The Italian American Civil 0:14:46.396 --> 0:14:49.356 Rights League was started by a mobster upset that the 0:14:49.396 --> 0:14:58.156 media was calling him a mobster. In April of nineteen seventy, 0:14:58.436 --> 0:15:01.156 Columbo and a group of his associates started picketing the 0:15:01.196 --> 0:15:05.636 Manhattan headquarters of the FBI. That protest eventually grows to 0:15:05.716 --> 0:15:08.996 five thousand people. They come up with a logo in 0:15:09.116 --> 0:15:13.356 evoking Christopher Columbus, the greatest Italian immigrant of them all. 0:15:13.996 --> 0:15:17.076 By the summer of nineteen seventy they have forty five 0:15:17.196 --> 0:15:20.956 thousand dues paying members. They throw themselves a big benefit 0:15:21.036 --> 0:15:25.396 concert in Madison Square Garden, starring, of course, Frank Sinatra. 0:15:26.196 --> 0:15:29.716 They go after Alka Seltzer for their most famous TV commercial, 0:15:30.076 --> 0:15:33.356 in which an Italian man, overseen by his doting wife, 0:15:33.596 --> 0:15:35.956 eats one too many spicy meatballs. 0:15:36.556 --> 0:15:39.516 Sometimes you eat more than you should and when it's spicy. 0:15:39.556 --> 0:15:43.636 Besides, Mamma Mia, do you need alca seltzer as. 0:15:43.436 --> 0:15:49.196 Italians eating meatballs, according to Joe Colombo, perpetuates harmful stereotypes 0:15:49.396 --> 0:15:50.276 about Italians. 0:15:50.516 --> 0:15:53.276 Mom of me, that's a spicy meat board. 0:15:56.436 --> 0:15:59.876 Here's my favorite story involving Joe Colombo. In the late 0:15:59.956 --> 0:16:02.796 nineteen sixties, Johnny Carson was the king of late night 0:16:02.836 --> 0:16:05.836 TV and one of the most famous television personalities in 0:16:05.876 --> 0:16:10.636 the country. According to his former attorney Bushkin, Carson was 0:16:10.676 --> 0:16:13.356 out drinking one night at Jilly's, a bar in Manhattan 0:16:13.396 --> 0:16:16.596 run by a close friend of Frank Sinatra's Jilly Rizzo. 0:16:17.156 --> 0:16:19.796 This is Bushkin telling the story on the Artie Lang 0:16:19.876 --> 0:16:20.836 Show a few years ago. 0:16:21.156 --> 0:16:24.156 It was on I think fifty second and eighth, a 0:16:24.236 --> 0:16:27.676 famous watering hole, and Johnny was in there one night 0:16:27.716 --> 0:16:28.436 with McMahon. 0:16:28.716 --> 0:16:34.236 Johnny being Johnny Carson, McMahon being his sidekick, Ed McMahon. 0:16:33.796 --> 0:16:37.076 And they try to pick up the wrong girls happened 0:16:37.116 --> 0:16:40.876 to be the wife and sister of a well known 0:16:41.636 --> 0:16:43.716 mafioso type of character. 0:16:44.156 --> 0:16:46.036 Who was not sensitive about stuff, like. 0:16:46.316 --> 0:16:51.876 Not happy, irritated, you might say. Carson ends up being 0:16:51.916 --> 0:16:54.676 thrown down the stairs at Jilly's. He's so banged up 0:16:54.796 --> 0:16:57.436 there's no way he can go on television. Then he 0:16:57.516 --> 0:16:59.996 learns that the mobster in question has put out a 0:17:00.036 --> 0:17:01.236 contract on his life. 0:17:01.636 --> 0:17:05.156 What happened was they went looking for Johnny. Johnny holed 0:17:05.236 --> 0:17:07.796 up in the apartment at U N Plaza. 0:17:08.236 --> 0:17:11.876 He's hiding out. He takes the week off work. He's petrified. 0:17:12.356 --> 0:17:17.956 So what happens Joe Colombo makes a deal with Carson's network, NBC. 0:17:18.316 --> 0:17:21.276 The Columbus Day Parade was about to come up. It 0:17:21.396 --> 0:17:24.636 was like three weeks away and no network who would 0:17:24.636 --> 0:17:27.356 agree to cover it then, because they knew it was 0:17:27.396 --> 0:17:30.916 the five families of New York that were sponsoring this 0:17:30.996 --> 0:17:34.556 parade to make the Italian Americans look, you know. So 0:17:34.676 --> 0:17:38.356 Carson's hiding out and a deal was struck. If NBC 0:17:38.516 --> 0:17:42.836 covers the parade, they let Carson go. So that year, 0:17:42.956 --> 0:17:45.916 NBC is the only network that covered the parade. 0:17:46.196 --> 0:17:47.116 Carson gets. 0:17:48.556 --> 0:17:52.196 Oh, and what happens the following year, nineteen seventy one, 0:17:52.716 --> 0:17:56.636 when Joe Columbo stages the second, even more elaborate Columbus 0:17:56.676 --> 0:17:59.916 Day event, intended to show the world that the Italian 0:17:59.956 --> 0:18:03.516 American community of New York is peaceful and law abiding. 0:18:04.596 --> 0:18:05.676 Someone shoots him. 0:18:05.996 --> 0:18:06.476 That's right. 0:18:06.516 --> 0:18:08.636 They had the first one a Columbus Circle. In the 0:18:08.676 --> 0:18:11.196 second one, he shot Joe Colombo. I mean, it's just insane. 0:18:11.556 --> 0:18:14.716 But you couldn't make this up, like oh at the 0:18:15.516 --> 0:18:16.036 grants too. 0:18:16.196 --> 0:18:18.996 They could have done at any location in the city 0:18:19.356 --> 0:18:21.716 besides Columbus Circle. 0:18:22.356 --> 0:18:25.036 But in the middle of a rally. 0:18:24.956 --> 0:18:29.436 Of a rally intended to whitewash the Italian American community, 0:18:29.516 --> 0:18:32.236 somebody offs the guy trying to whitewash that. What I 0:18:32.276 --> 0:18:37.116 mean is this is hootsba all over the place. But 0:18:37.236 --> 0:18:39.556 it's not Al Ruddy's kind of hoods. But is it 0:18:39.996 --> 0:18:42.996 Having a Jewish actor play a Nazi prison guard who 0:18:43.116 --> 0:18:46.436 runs around saying in the middle of the Holocaust, I 0:18:46.516 --> 0:18:50.076 know nothing, I hear nothing, I see nothing in a 0:18:50.156 --> 0:18:55.156 primetime television sitcom is well, it's kind of amazing. But 0:18:55.276 --> 0:18:59.916 Joe Colombo, mob boss starting the Italian American Civil Rights League, 0:19:00.316 --> 0:19:03.676 this is hutsba on a whole other level. For goodness sake, 0:19:04.036 --> 0:19:07.116 At the time he was shot, Colombo was under federal 0:19:07.156 --> 0:19:10.876 indictment on charges of controlling a ten million dollar a 0:19:10.996 --> 0:19:17.036 year gambling syndicate. This is not audacity, This is shamelessness, 0:19:17.556 --> 0:19:28.556 the other kind of hutzba hutzpah. In the Book of Genesis, 0:19:28.996 --> 0:19:32.076 there is a famous passage where the prophet Abraham speaks 0:19:32.076 --> 0:19:35.956 to God about the moral outrages in Sodom and Gomorrah. 0:19:36.436 --> 0:19:40.236 God wants to destroy both cities, but Abraham says, wait, 0:19:40.636 --> 0:19:43.476 what if there are fifty righteous people in Sodom and Gomorrah? 0:19:44.116 --> 0:19:46.996 Will you really sweep those cities away and not spare 0:19:47.036 --> 0:19:50.116 them for the sake of those fifty righteous people. So 0:19:50.236 --> 0:19:54.236 the Lord says, okay, if you can find fifty righteous men, 0:19:54.476 --> 0:19:58.676 I will spare the cities. Abraham then says, what if 0:19:58.716 --> 0:20:01.636 there are only forty five righteous men? You wouldn't want 0:20:01.636 --> 0:20:05.156 to kill forty five perfectly innocent men for the sake 0:20:05.196 --> 0:20:08.236 of five at the margin, and God says, you're right, 0:20:08.356 --> 0:20:11.436 let's sake it forty five, to which Abraham responds, why 0:20:11.476 --> 0:20:14.876 not thirty? I mean same logic. God says, okay, they 0:20:14.956 --> 0:20:18.796 keep going. In the end, Abraham gets him down to ten. 0:20:20.796 --> 0:20:24.756 Abraham is being very Israeli. Here, Israel is what is 0:20:24.756 --> 0:20:28.196 called a low power distance culture, meaning that it's a 0:20:28.236 --> 0:20:31.436 place where there is very little respect for hierarchy or 0:20:31.596 --> 0:20:36.756 formality in social interaction. France is the opposite kind of place, 0:20:37.276 --> 0:20:40.916 a high power distance culture. Nobody just calls up God 0:20:40.996 --> 0:20:44.236 directly in France. In France, Abraham would have had to 0:20:44.276 --> 0:20:48.196 file an application with the Department of Divine Communication, wait 0:20:48.276 --> 0:20:51.076 three months for an appointment, then present some kind of 0:20:51.116 --> 0:20:53.956 formal legal writ on behalf of the righteous of Gomorrah. 0:20:54.916 --> 0:21:01.356 Not in Israel. Here's another example of low power distance 0:21:01.396 --> 0:21:04.836 at work in Israel. It's the word new n you. 0:21:05.916 --> 0:21:09.876 New is what linguists call a reactive token, word used 0:21:09.876 --> 0:21:13.556 in conversation by the party that's doing the listening. Uh 0:21:13.636 --> 0:21:17.956 huh is a reactive token, so is really? The point 0:21:18.196 --> 0:21:22.396 of a reactive token is to signal involvement without claiming 0:21:22.396 --> 0:21:26.476 the floor from the speaker. I understand, I'm interested, keep going. 0:21:27.156 --> 0:21:31.876 But new is an unusual reactive token because it's not neutral. 0:21:32.236 --> 0:21:35.836 It's not I'm listening. It means hurry up, get to 0:21:35.916 --> 0:21:42.036 the point. New new now is new polite in virtually 0:21:42.076 --> 0:21:44.596 all cultures in the world. Of course, the answer would 0:21:44.596 --> 0:21:48.756 be No. New is not some gentle conversational nudge. It's 0:21:48.756 --> 0:21:53.476 a hijacking. The listener is interrupting the speaker in order 0:21:53.556 --> 0:21:56.676 to control the pace of the narrative. But in Israel 0:21:57.076 --> 0:22:01.236 this is not necessarily true. The Israeli linguist Isle Maschler 0:22:01.516 --> 0:22:06.676 has written extensively on new. She says quote. By exhibiting 0:22:06.756 --> 0:22:10.396 their impatience with the movement towards the climax of a story, 0:22:10.916 --> 0:22:13.356 to the point of taking the liberty of controlling the 0:22:13.396 --> 0:22:18.756 flow of another's discourse, hearers can show maximal involvement in 0:22:18.836 --> 0:22:22.436 the narrative, meaning we in Israel have no need to 0:22:22.476 --> 0:22:25.676 beat around the bush with neutral reactive tokens. We're a 0:22:25.716 --> 0:22:29.916 tiny country with zero power distance. What happens tell me 0:22:30.236 --> 0:22:33.836 I can't wait any longer. In Abraham's argument with God, 0:22:34.116 --> 0:22:38.436 Abraham talks God down very methodically, fifty righteous men to 0:22:38.516 --> 0:22:42.276 forty five to forty to thirty to twenty, and then ten, 0:22:42.756 --> 0:22:45.516 and surely, right around the forty mark, when it would 0:22:45.516 --> 0:22:48.876 have been obvious to any omniscient entity where Abraham was going. 0:22:49.436 --> 0:22:52.836 God must have interrupted. No, I love you, Abraham, you 0:22:52.956 --> 0:22:54.916 know that there is no need to drag. 0:22:54.716 --> 0:22:55.276 This out. 0:22:58.036 --> 0:23:00.676 My friend Milly says that since coming to America, she 0:23:00.756 --> 0:23:03.636 has struggled with the transition to a land of excessive 0:23:03.676 --> 0:23:07.356 social nicety, like this past winter when she was dealing 0:23:07.436 --> 0:23:08.476 with her children's school. 0:23:09.116 --> 0:23:11.476 If I say, for example, you know, can we have 0:23:11.636 --> 0:23:15.036 less snow days? Like even if there's a snow day, like, 0:23:15.036 --> 0:23:17.756 can't you just leave the school open? I'm just asking. 0:23:18.276 --> 0:23:21.236 My husband says, that's hot spot, Like you don't think 0:23:21.276 --> 0:23:23.396 about what their point of view is. You don't think 0:23:23.396 --> 0:23:25.356 about what the teachers have to do to get to school, 0:23:25.356 --> 0:23:27.356 you don't think about their safety, you don't think about 0:23:27.356 --> 0:23:30.516 the other kids. I'm not true, but I just want 0:23:30.516 --> 0:23:32.636 to know the like why can't I just ask the question? 0:23:32.756 --> 0:23:35.156 So that's you know, Yes, Let's say you were in 0:23:35.196 --> 0:23:38.956 Israel and the same scenario. I mean, I realize it's 0:23:38.956 --> 0:23:41.396 not snow days in Israel. But suppose you're making the 0:23:41.436 --> 0:23:45.356 same request at the school and I am the principal 0:23:45.396 --> 0:23:47.236 of the school and you're asked, I would like you 0:23:47.276 --> 0:23:49.676 to ask me, as an ISRAELI ask me why the 0:23:49.716 --> 0:23:50.876 school can't stay over more? 0:23:51.156 --> 0:23:55.316 Say excuse me, you know my kids at home, I 0:23:55.356 --> 0:23:57.316 don't have the time to take care of them. They 0:23:57.316 --> 0:23:59.836 need to be inside the school. You need to keep 0:23:59.876 --> 0:24:02.156 the school open so I can leave my kids there. 0:24:02.196 --> 0:24:04.316 And everybody else agrees with me. You want me to ask, 0:24:04.316 --> 0:24:06.036