Filtering by Category: The Giants Amongst Us

#1,088: How Low Can They Go?

August 03, 2026 / Kurt F. Stone

In just about every aspect, Anthony Fauci, MD, longtime (1984-2022) director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), was the best physician/medical researcher in the history of the United States. During his nearly half-century in the American public health sector, he acted as an advisor to every U.S. president since Ronald Reagan. As head of NIAID, Dr. Fauci made lifesaving contributions to HIV/AIDS research, the 2009 swine flu pandemic, the 2014 Ebola virus crisis, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Hauntingly, although IT was a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, established in late January 2020, Dr. Fauci did not meet with IT until three years after his inauguration as POTUS. And while America’s Fondling Father was making outrageous suggestions about how to treat COVID (such as using bleach), Dr. Fauci was hard at work conducting real medical research.

The recipient of nearly 4 dozen awards, including the 2008 Presidential Medal of Freedom (awarded by President George W. Bush), Dr. Fauci was also granted a preemptive pardon in January 2025 by President Joseph R. Biden, Jr., to protect the good doctor from what POTUS described as politically motivated and unjustified investigations and prosecutions threatened by the then-incoming Trump administration and congressional Republicans.

I believe a solid majority of the American people see Dr. Fauci as a professional’s professional; a physician who has long taken the Hippocratic Oath to heart in every imaginable way. And yet, of late, Congressional MAGA-ites and senior members of the regime have been building a case against him; urging that despite his preemptive presidential pardon, he be found guilty of “illegally” taking the Fifth and thus committing perjury before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, chaired by Kentucky senator (and former ophthalmologist) Rand Paul. When one takes into account Senator/Dr. Paul’s occasional votes against issues near and dear to The Fondling Father’s heart, the Kentucky legislator’s contempt for Anthony Fauci seems to have nothing to do with him getting back into the good graces of the president. It does, likely, have everything to do with professional jealousy. How and why? First and foremost, when Dr. Paul considers Dr. Fauci, he sees a man who has near-universal respect from both the medical and scientific communities. Senator/Dr. Paul, on the other hand, suffers from a backstory about his medical board certification. In brief, Dr. Paul has long claimed to be a “board-certified physician,” but in truth, he isn’t certified by the respected, century-old American Board of Ophthalmology (ABO). Instead, he is “certified” by the National Board of Ophthalmology (NBofO), which he founded. He is president, his wife is vice-president, and his father-in-law is secretary.

In a 2010 statement to Politico, Paul described how his certification saga was his battle against a "hypocritical power play that I despise." Paul basically protested against the ABO's decision to require recertifications of medical licenses every 10 years for anyone who was board-certified after 1992. He fell into that group, found the decision to be "discriminatory," and took it upon himself to set up the National Board of Ophthalmologists (NBO). Paul was board-certified for around 10 years by the ABO until letting it lapse in 2005. So it turns out, this folderol may have nothing to do with politics, but everything to do with professionalism . . . and insecurity. Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO), another member of the committee, focused on documents released by Senator Paul, purporting to show that during the pandemic, NIH staff helped Fauci solicit nominations and ethics approvals for awards, including a $900,000 cash prize that he received. “You used federal employees so that you could go and get cash money,” Hawley said.

Citing thousands of pages of government records, Hawley and Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) held Dr. Fauci responsible for school closures and lockdowns during the pandemic; accused him of enriching himself as people died; and even mocked his interactions with celebrities. Most significantly, they accused him of funding research that led to the creation of the coronavirus that causes Covid, and of lying about it under oath to Congress. And they threatened to hold him in contempt of Congress, saying he was not even eligible to invoke the Fifth Amendment because President Joseph R. Biden Jr. had granted him an unconditional pardon. It should be noted that while Senator Hawley is a graduate of Yale Law, Senator Tuberville is a former football coach (Ole Miss, Auburn, Texas Tech and Cincinnati) who knows as much about Constitutional issues as RFK, Jr. does about vaccines and autism.

Sen. Bernie Moreno Lashes Out at Dr. Fauci

Then there was Ohio Senator Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), who lobbed an expletive at Dr. Anthony Fauci during the Wednesday hearing about the origins of, and government response to, the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreno said he decided to run for office soon after learning that a woman was arrested at an Ohio middle school football game in 2020 for refusing to wear a mask, which was reportedly against the school’s policy at the time. Moreno, who defeated then-incumbent Democrat Sherrod Brown for the Ohio Senate seat in 2024, is best-known for being the former father-in-law of Ohio Representative Max Miller, who has been accused of viciously assaulting Moreno’s daughter. Moreno is so furious with Miller after holding his own counsel for several months that he has now called for Miller’s resignation from the House.

As angry and accusatory as members of the Republican congressional caucus are about Dr. Fauci’s having pleaded the Fifth about 110 times, virtually none seem to recall - or care - that their boss invoked his Fifth Amendment rights over 400 times in a deposition for his civil fraud case in 2022. A judge in that case stated in a motion appointing a court monitor to oversee the Trump family's businesses that Trump used the Fifth Amendment to refuse to answer questions over 400 times — a claim Trump's defense team did not appear to dispute When their guy takes the Fifth, it’s a constitutionally sound move; when a guy from the other party does so, it is a criminal offense for which he should be sentenced to life in Leavenworth.

During the hearings, Senator Paul released more than 1,000 pages of Dr. Fauci’s personal diary. The diary does not provide the smoking gun that Senator Paul is seeking. Rather, it echoes past disclosures showing Dr. Fauci wrestling with a fast-moving crisis as scientists’ views evolved. But it further inflames a polarizing political battle over the origins of the virus and how history should treat Dr. Fauci. Hey, let’s face it: tons of famous, not-so-famous, and otherwise accomplished souls have kept diaries throughout the ages. Ever heard of - let alone read - the diary of Samuel Pepys (pronounced “Peeps”), without whom no one would know the first thing about the Stuart Restoration in 17th-century England? (Sorry to be such an intellectual snob; I’m not terribly smart, but I just love to learn . . . ).

One of the most fascinating - and nauseating - aspects of the release of the Fauci diary involves Katie Miller, the wife of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller. It turns out that before calling for his imprisonment, Mrs. Miller and Dr. Fauci were actually on very friendly terms. Katie Miller, a former Trump administration official and current conservative podcaster, has, of late, been calling for Anthony Fauci to be jailed. How’s that? During President Trump’s first term, when Katie Miller was then-Vice President Mike Pence’s communications director and involved in the White House’s response to Covid-19, she appeared to be quite close with the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Fauci provided regular medical advice to the Millers, counseling the family after Katie tested positive for the virus in 2020 while she was pregnant, when her husband had Covid-19, and when her newborn child had a medical episode. NOTUS (News of the United States) quoted the following diary entry: “I am calling Katie frequently to check on her a couple of times per day. She is very anxious about getting very ill since she is 10 weeks pregnant. Tonight she had an anxiety reaction. I calmed her over the phone,” Dr. Fauci wrote in his diary on May 9, 2020. Fauci wrote in another entry how he called the doctors treating Miller’s child directly, to discuss the baby’s medical care. Imagine that: a doctor making daily calls to check in on the health and progress of a pregnant woman who, in truth, was not even his patient. As a rabbi and medical ethicist, I cannot tell you how much time I’ve spent calling and chatting with people who were having medical, psychological, or spiritual woes and worries. Why would I do it? Because that is what a caring human being does. Today, Katie (who grew up within walking distance of Cleveland Clinic, Weston, Florida, where I worked for nearly 20 years), accuses Dr. Fauci of being a "narcissist" who "weaponized" her pregnancy and child "to aggrandize.” So: if I am to understand this properly, all those who keep daily diaries (myself included) are nothing more than narcissists. Oy! My mother, my sister and my wife would be shocked to learn this . . .

So what lies beneath this rush to humiliate, shackle, arrest and imprison a galaxy-class epidemiologist? Two words come to mind: COVER UP. I’ve got to believe that beyond Rand Paul’s professional jealousy, Josh Hawley’s deliberate misreading of legal history, Bernie Moreno’s lack of an off-switch, and Katie Miller’s stunning hypocrisy and need to significantly boost the number of people who subscribe to her podcast, there is the need to give Americans something other than the Epstein Files, the war in Iran, high gas prices, and POTUS’s frontotemporal dementia (naming just a few among tens of dozens of issues) keep Americans engaged . . . and far, far away from what really, truly matters.

It all brings to mind a slight reworking of a line in Chubby Checker’s 1962 hit Limbo Rock: “How low can they go?”

Dr. Anthony Fauci, M.D., does not deserve to be trashed in public. He has devoted countless decades to the service of humanity and earned the near-universal respect of physicians, scientists, and clinical researchers on all seven continents. Because of him, millions more people are living healthy, productive lives. Let the good doctor live out his well-deserved retirement (or for him, pretirement) with dignity and the deep thanks of a grateful planet. Dr. Fauci has always done his best to raise the bar of professional excellence in the service of humanity . . . even as they (and you know who they are) keep lowering it for your own psychopathic purposes.

There are a mere 93 days until the 2026 Midterm Elections.

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1,083: Shep'n Nachas (שעפּן נחת)

June 22, 2026 / Kurt F. Stone

For all those who believe that Yiddish is nothing more than Jewish jargon or slang, I’ve got news for you: it’s a real, honest-to-God, living, breathing language . . . it’s even taught at all 8 Ivy League schools. Such diverse writers and poets as Émile Zola, Jules Verne, Charles Dickens, Arthur Conan Doyle, William Shakespeare, and the Scandinavian writers Ibsen, Strindberg, and Knut Hamsun have all been translated into mama loschen (Yiddish for “the mother tongue”). Writers of classical antiquity, such as Aeschylus, Sophocles, Plato, as well as Aesop’s Fables (משלים פון עסאפ - m’shalim fuhn Aysaf), have long been available in Yiddish translation, as well as important nonfiction works like Darwin’s Origin of Species, Nietzsche’s Also sprach Zarathustra, a few volumes of Freud, and countless volumes of socialist and communist theory—usually bound in red.

But a mere jargon? Not on your life.

Whether you know it or not, most English speakers make use of Yiddish words daily without batting an eyelash. Who, as an example, doesn’t have such words as kvetch (complain), kvell (beam with joy), gonif (thief), kosher (proper, or apt), goy (a non-Jew), or kibitzer (one who gives unsolicited advice) in their vocabulary?

(n.b. It is not well known that the popularity of the term “kibitzer” likely dates back to the late 1920s; in 1929, future motion picture superstar Edward G. Robinson [Emanuel Goldenberg] starred in a well-received Broadway play entitled “The Kibitzer,” which Robinson had also written. It was made into a motion picture of the same name in 1930; That long-forgotten film starred the equally long-forgotten Harry Green [Blitzer]). Almost immediately, expressions like “don’t be such a kibitzer” or “all she knows how to do is kibitz” entered the glossary of possibilities.)

There is another Yiddish expression that has been getting a major workout the past couple of days: שעפּן נחת (pronounced Shep’n nachas). The first word (shep’n), which is an infinitive, literally means either “to scoop” or “to shovel”; while nachas, which comes from the Hebrew (where it is pronounced “nachat,) means “quiet joy.” So, when one translates the term shep’n nachas, through דער קאָפּ (der kopf - “the head”), it literally means “scooping quiet joy,” which is linguistically impenetrable. Ah, but when translated through the די קישקעס (kishkes - “the guts”) it takes on the feeling of “reaping limitless joy.”

“The Boss” dings “Land of Hopes and Dreams”

Watching the live broadcast of the Obama Presidential Center dedication this past Thursday has had me shepping nachas ever since. Listening to the brilliant, humble, almost sermonic remarks of the President and former First Lady; seeing the obvious love the two share with one another; watching a real A-list of world-class performers like “The Boss,” Stevie Wonder, U-2’s Bono and The Edge, John Legend, and The Roots tear up the stage (while the camera was all along panning Barack, Michelle, Malia and Sasha singing along) brought tears to my eyes, a bounce to my step and hope to my heart. Indeed, it was precisely what the good doctor ordered. The entire event, from start to finish, was, in short, that which fuels nachas, makes us want to live and act with greater purpose, makes us want to look to the future with greater hope. . . . and points out in stark detail how great a role intelligence, class, literacy, modesty, decency, humility, and just plain kindness can and should play in our leaders lives’. And by this I mean in both public and private.

As someone who has written more than his fair share of political speeches for others, it has never ceased to amaze me just how great the Obamas are on the podium. Rarely do you hear the word “I” in their addresses. They can easily turn a terrible truth into a breath of fresh air, while leaving those who despise them and/or wish them ill wondering what in the world they just heard. Hebrew sums up this profound skill in a mere 2 words: ha-maskeel ya-veen (המשכיל יבין), namely “The wise/understanding one will understand.

Ever since then-Illinois State Senator Barack Obama was chosen to address the Democratic National Convention in the summer of 2004, political cognoscenti knew that this was a truly special man; someone who had an unlimited future. At that speech 22 years ago, he said something that could have easily been said last Thursday: “There is not a liberal America and a conservative America—there is the United States of America. There is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America—there's the United States of America." He was just as electrifying then as he was last Thursday. The message on that summer’s evening in 2004 was just as powerful and persuasive then as it was last Thursday: that hope is the greatest fuel there is.

I have to wonder what would have happened in the intervening 22 years if it had been Michelle Obama, not Barack, who had given that convention speech; for like her husband, she is a gifted and truly remarkable communicator. Like her husband, she is brilliant, humble, charming, and self-confident . . . without needing to - in the memorable title of Norman Mailer’s first autobiography, write "Advertisements for Myself.” Just watch and listen:

Those watching the former FLOTUS’s speech (or watched it live), will no dubt recognize that both she and her husband made obvious and telling references #45/#47 on innumerble occasions without once stating his name; a perfect example of what it means to possess class, forswear retribution as a modus operandi, and understand the meaning of ha-maskeel ya-veen (“the wise one will understand.”)

In his speech, President Obama dealt more specifically with the purpose and nostalgic underpinnings of the Center. It is, after all, unlike any other presidential “library” ever built. It is not some kind of “Egyptian crypt” meant to serve as a hagiographic gathering spot for a leader few still remember. (According to the National Archives, the majority of these presidential libraries stand empty more than 90% of the time.) No, Barack and Michelle Obama purposefully designated this spot a "center,” rather than a "library.” It celebrates the American people far more than a presidential family. Where Melania Trump replaced Jacqueline Kennedy’s Rose Garden - once festooned with vibrant floral beds of subdued pastel roses - with paved limestone walkways, the Obama Center now has rose gardens where citizens themselves can come in and plant roses to their heart’s content - all under the watchful eyes of professional gardeners. Where IT built a gigantic octagonal cage for bloody MMA fights on the White House Lawn, the Obama Center has a full-sized basketball court for normal people to engage in the former president’s favorite athletic pastime (well, he is the only president who has a 6’8” college basketball coach as a brother-in-law). Within its 19 acres, the Obama Presidential Center has outdoor picnic areas, walking paths for hand-in-hand strolls. The main structure is built of concrete, a material that will last for untold centuries. In short, the Obama Center, far from being a place to learn more about him, his family, and his presidency, is a place for all of us to learn more about ourselves and the country we call home. It is a place for shep’n nachas.

For those who somehow missed President Obama’s masterful speech, check it out:

One wonders what was going on in the mind of the current POTUS as he watched and listened to his predecessor’s speech. One cannot imagine how much ego pain he felt upon seeing 4 living ex-Presidents and First Ladies sitting behind the current POTUS First Lady. Did the size and heartfelt merriment of the guests, musical superstars, and just plain Southside folks get to him? Could he even come close to understanding why he and Melania weren’t invited?

The Bidens, Obamas, Bushes, and Clintons

In short, how could The Fondling Father go through a day that was so overwhelmingly not about him? Especially one in which a former president - one who actually was and is a happily married self-made man with an obviously loving family - was standing there giving this wreck of an eighty-year-old man a powerful masterclass in leadership, democracy, and American values. As the current POTUS watched, listened, and stewed, his younger, far more beloved predecessor summed up the American experience in precisely 114 words:

“A belief in the intrinsic dignity and worth of all people and that no one is above the law or beneath its protection. A belief in … accountability that comes with an independent judiciary and a robust free press. A belief that our military and law enforcement owe allegiance not to any president or political party but to the people and our Constitution. “

“A belief in the peaceful transfer of power after the people have spoken in fair and free elections … And a belief that qualities of character – honesty, integrity, kindness, compassion, a sense of duty and honor – those things matter in our public dealings just as they do in our private lives.”

Is it any wonder that so many Americans and friends around the world are shep’n nachas? For the first time in quite a while, we have been reminded that class and compassion. energy and empathy, integrity and intelligence can actually beat in the heart of a leader . . . along with a great sense of humor!

And best wishes for a slightly belated Happy Father’s Day.

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categories / The Giants Amongst Us

#1,066: The Snow Shoveling Queen of Eau Claire, Wisc.

February 02, 2026 / Kurt F. Stone

This coming Wednesday, February 4, 2026, marks precisely 21 years since I posted my first blog essay, entitled As Dad Used to Say. Back in 2005, as a handful of you will recall, the name of the blog was Beating the Bushes - a none-too-witty double-entendre. Looking back to that first post, political reality seems to have been one heck of a lot less perilous and a tad more urbane, than it is today. And while this observation is undoubtedly true, that first blog did end with a kvetch that seems more appropriate for 2026: Unless we, the loyal opposition, mount a serious unified campaign in both 2006 and 2008, America is going to become a second-rate nation. It’s time to begin beating the Bushes . . .

21 years ago, Beating the Bushes (not to be renamed The K.F. Stone Weekly until the election of Barack Obama in 2008) started with less than a hundred readers, made up mostly of family and students at a couple of South Florida universities. Over the years, I am humbled to report, its readership has grown, if not like Topsy, then most pleasantly. Today, there are thousands of readers located on several continents. Back in 2005, the vast majority of readers agreed with just about anything I wrote. And while that might have been somewhat OK for my ego, it didn’t make my work all that challenging. With growth in readership came folks who took deeply partisan - not to mention occasionally brutal - umbrage at my opinions and point of view. And while I have yet to become completely inured to be called a "fool,” "idiot” or “f . . . ing libtard,” it does keep my juices flowing.

Among my favorite readers (of both this blog and its companion, Tales From Hollywood & Vine, which began life about a decade ago), there is a delightful woman up in Eau Claire, Wisconsin who, for the sake of privacy, I will simply refer to as Barbara. Originally from an Albanian family up in snowy, snowy Buffalo, Barbara has lived in the same house in snowy, snowy Eau Claire for half-a-century. Prior to retiring from gainful employment, Barbara specialized in TESOL: Teaching English to Students of Other Languages. She got her break as a writer by nationally publishing educational materials on the subject. This led to her writing essays, reminiscences of growing up in Buffalo (“The City of Good Neighbors”), the daughter of recently-arrived immigrants from Albania, and poetry. As an adult, she married, moved to Eau Claire, raised a family, became politically active (she’s a consistent, contentious progressive) and took to riding a bicycle all over town. And then there was all the snow shoveling . . .

As of 2024, Eau Claire, Wisconsin consists of 72,331 hearty souls. And hearty - not to mention both healthy and helpful - they must be. Sitting at the confluence of the Eau Claire and Chippewa rivers it is a really cold, snowy place. The average annual temperature is only 46 F; its average annual snowfall is more than 55.5”, reaching an average depth of more than a foot. Needless to say, for much of the year the city’s streets, parks and residential areas are encrusted in white. In Barbara’s neighborhood, the city is responsible for clearing enough of the snow in the residential areas to make it possible for people to get their cars onto the roadway and get to work . . . or the grocery store. What they are largely not responsible for are the sidewalks.

Years ago, Barbara decided that she would take it upon herself to do that which the city could not (or would not) do: shovel the sidewalks around her house. Since she lives on a corner lot, that meant a lot of shoveling. And of course, that also meant shoveling nearly every day during Eau Claire’s long, long winter. Over the course of time, she started clearing the sidewalks further away from her property . . . and eventually across the street. Before too long, she became a fixture; an elderly woman with long hair, bundled up to the 9s, brandishing a shovel with an 18-inch blade, clearing the sidewalks from one side of the neighborhood to another.

And mind you, today, this shovel queen/cum/writer/poet/bicycling enthusiast par excellent is 85 years young!

Not too long ago, the City of Eau Claire decided to accept nominations for the “Shoveler of the Year.” Intrigued, Barbara entered the contest and, much to her amazement, won. In her application for the contest, Barbara wrote: “I am the person who shovels this area and my lovely house, which I take pride in owning. My house is on a corner, so it has two streets to shovel, and I put de-icer on icy spots. Plus, I always shovel the corner curbs that have snow piled high from City plows, so pedestrians can cross at corner walkways.” As the senior queen shoveler, she was interviewed by the local press and even appeared on the evening news. In her weekly posting, Eau Claire City Manager Stephanie Hirsch noted: Barbara shared that she wants to be sure that people coming and going to the nearby hospital and elementary school can walk safely and comfortably, without having to go through slush. Barbara said that she grew up in Buffalo, New York (which gets even more snow!), and she treasured the neighborhood mindset of everybody shoveling. She said she learned growing up to take care of her property and neighborhood. You are amazing and inspiring! Thank you Barbara!!

Of late, the nation has learned the ways of neighborliness which are part and parcel of life in Minneapolis . . . like Eau Claire, a place of constant cold and snow. In places with such climates - and I must include Traverse City, Michigan, the current home of Pete and Chasten Buttigieg and their children - it is really, truly the norm for people to come out and help one another. Living with the potential - and reality - of extreme isolation during near sub-arctic winters has a tendency to bring out the best in people; to make sure their neighbors have both heat and food in the house . . . a ride to the doctor . . . the knowledge that they are not alone. People like Barbara . . . who go above and beyond . . . remind us that there are still good, feeling, tender folks out there who still give a damn about their neighbors. At such a time as this, it is a delightful tonic.

But even more, my friend, fellow activist and constant reader Barbara shows that combining the proper attitude with energy (as well as the fortune of inheriting good genes), helps make that old saw about “Growing older is mandatory; growing up optional,” more real than one can imagine.

I congratulate you, my friend on your victory, and wish you more years of writing and reading, of protesting and poeticizing, of biking and beaming.

Let me close with my favorite of your poems, Hope for Dummies, which sums up your incredible philosophy of life in a mere 10 lines:

Hope for Dummies

It would be easy to say
take two aspirin today
and when you wake up
it will all be okay.

But, as everyone knows
that ain’t how it goes.

Treasure this day.
Never give up.
Imagine what’s lost
if Hope slips away?

You go girl! Keep on shoveling . . .

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categories / The Giants Amongst Us

#1,045: Zelig Eshhar: A Giant Amongst Us

July 27, 2025 / Kurt F. Stone

You’ve got to feel a bit sorry for British writers Aldous Huxley (best known for Brave New World and The Doors of Perception) and C.S. Lewis (The Screwtape Letters and his 7-volume The Chronicles of Narnia). Not because they were unknown, unsuccessful or unread, for such is certainly not the case. Both men sold tons of books, saw many of them turned into motion pictures, and one - Huxley - was honored with having a seminal rock group (The Doors) take its name from one of his books by a grateful a turned-on fan named Jim Morrison.

The reason I feel sorry for them is pretty much the reason I feel badly for the recently-deceased Israeli Immunologist Zelig Eshhar. “Who in the hell is Zelig Eshhar?” I can hear you ask, “ . . . and what does he have in common with two British authors?” The answer to the first part of the question forms the basis of this week’s post; the answer to the second part is pretty simple. Both Huxley and Lewis had the bad fortune of passing away on November 22, 1963: the day JFK was assassinated in Dallas. On just about any day ranging from, say, April 12, 1945 (the death of FDR) to June 5, 1968 (the day RFK was assassinated in Los Angeles), Huxley’s and Lewis’ deaths would no doubt have been frontpage-above-the-fold headlines, all across the globe. But no: their passing barely received notice on the back page; that which Grandpa Doc would have playfully referred to as being “beneath the truss ads on page 97.”

Zelig Eshhar, PhD, had the bad luck to pass away during a month in which more than a half-dozen celebrities shuffled off this mortal coil; the list includes such well-known people as:

The “Prince of Darkness,” John Michael “Ozzie Osbourne”,
Singer Concetta Rose Maria Franconero (Connie Francis),
WWE wrestling legend Terry Gene Bollea (aka “Hulk Hogan”),
Cosby Show alum Malcolm Jamal Warner,
Jazz legend Chuck Mangione,
Composer Lalo Schifrin (“Mission Impossible”),
60’s teen idol Robert Cabot “Bobby” Sherman,
Brian Wilson, the front man for “The Beach Boys” and
M*A*S*H actress Loretta Swit, aka “Hot Lips Houlihan.”

Whereas the vast majority of people have no problem identifying the celebrities listed above, most folks - with the possible exception of Epidemiologists, Immunologists, Oncologists or those who engage in Medical Ethics - have the slightest idea of who Zelig (Lipka) Eshhar was. And while Professor Eshhar’s contributions to society were neither entertaining, hummable nor particularly understandable, they did affect the lives of millions upon millions of people all over the world . . . and perhaps for the rest of time.

So just who was this man, and why do I refer to him as a “giant amongst us?”

Zelig Lipka was born on Feb. 25, 1941, in Petah Tikva (Hebrew for Door of Hope), in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine, and grew up in Rehovot (Hebrew for Wide Expanses). His parents were both from Poland; his father, Jacob, was a truck driver who brought agricultural products to market, while his mother, Sarah, was a teacher. At age 18, Zelig, (now named Eshhar [אשחר], Hebrew for the Buckthorn plant, which is found all over northern Israel) enlisted in the Israeli Defense Forces (I.D.F.) and joined a brigade on a kibbutz. After his military service he stayed on at his kibbutz, where he started his scientific career as a beekeeper.

Between 1963 and 1968 Eshhar earned his B.A. and M.A. in biochemistry at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and a PhD in chemical immunology from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot. His doctoral dissertation was on the role of T-cells. (T cells are a type of white blood cell called lymphocytes. They help the body’s immune system fight germs and protect us from disease. There are two main types: Cytotoxic T cells destroy infected cells. Helper T cells send signals that direct other immune cells to fight infection.) Dr. Eshhar went on to study at Harvard Medical School under Baruj Benacerraf, who would share the 1980 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery that the strength of an individual’s immune response is controlled by a group of genes.

While at Harvard, Dr. Eshhar began to focus on cancer as a target for T-cells. In an interview he gave to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz in 2017, Dr. Eshhar was quoted as saying “Benacerraf discovered a distinctive molecule that characterizes the cancer cells, and he wanted to get a handle on it. That was my task, and I gained recognition when I succeeded because no one had done it previously.”

After years of doing research at both Harvard (Dana Farber) and the National Institutes for health, Dr. Eshhar returned to the Weizmann Institute. In his research, Dr. Eshhar learned that by enlisting the help of “a receptor that sits on the T-cell and binds with molecules of the foreign invader (e.g. a cancer cell), the binding activates the T-cell’s killer mechanism, which eradicates the alien cell. Eradication occurs, for example, when a virus invades a body cell.”

T-cells and antibodies in patients and animals are part of the immune system, capable of distinguishing tumor cells from normal cells. These cells, however, are not enough to fight the cancer cells, which manage to “evade and avoid them,” as Dr. Eshhar explained it. The end result is cancer and an immune system that is not efficient enough to thwart it.

Dr. Eshhar’s eureka moment came when he decided to combine the antibodies with the T-cells, he said: “Two are better than one.”

Dr. Eshhar turned what had been a theory into a reality. He wound up extracting the T-cells and genetically engineering them to include a molecule that has the cancer recognition skills of both the antibodies and the T-cells. The modified T-cells are then injected into patients.

In making this combination, he was able to produce a hybrid known as a “chimeric antigen receptor T-cell . . . the short version of which is “CAR-T”, which essentially grabs onto the antigens (proteins) that appear on cancer cells. When reintroduced in to the bloodstream of a subject who has a blood cancer (such as acute lymphoblastic leukemia, non-Hodgkin lymphoma or multiple myeloma) these newly-created T-cells have the ability to target and destroy cancer cells. To date, the process has shown itself to be extremely effective.

According to Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), “Eshhar’s invention was no minor tweak in the lab; it was a conceptual leap. The notion that these genetically engineered immune cells could be re-engineered to home in on cancer,transformed what once seemed a distant vision into an imminent reality.” Dr. Gottlieb, (himself a survivor of Hodgkin’s Disease) currently sits on the board of on of the American Enterprise Institute and various pharmaceutical companies. Next year, HarperCollins will be publishing his new book, “The Miracle Century: Making Sense of the Cell Therapy Revolution” in which he writes extensively about Dr. Eshhar and the creation of CAR-T therapy. I for one am excited about reading his book.

Ever humorously humble, when asked to describe himself during an interview, he answered, simply: “I am a PhD and a doctor of mice.” When asked to estimate how much money he thought he might make from selling the rights to his patent for CAR-T therapy, he flatly stated: “I am not a banker and I don’t know the laws,” I don’t know how much I will get. I prefer not to relate to this. Research is what interests me, to improve the treatment and make it more effective.”

May Zelig Eshhar’s memory be a blessing for all those who worked with him and all those who will find hope and health in the future.

Indeed, there has been a giant amongst us . . .

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