Lawrence (Laurie) Baron, now retired, served as the Nasatir Professor of Modern Jewish History at San Diego State University. He served from 1988 to 2006 as director of SDSU’s Lipinsky Institute for Judaic Studies. He was the founder in 1995 of the Western Jewish Studies Association.
He writes two satire columns for San Diego Jewish World: “Humoring the Headlines” under his byline, and “Hounding the Headlines,” under the byline of his dog Elona.
Books to his credit, available on Amazon, include:
Projecting the Holocaust into the Present: The Changing Focus of Contemporary Holocaust Cinema
The Modern Jewish Experience in World Cinema
The eclectic anarchism of Erich Muhsam (Men & movements in the history & philosophy of anarchism)
His most recent articles are:
“Making Room for the Jews: The House I Live In (1945),” AJS Perspectives, Summer 2023, 86-88.
“The Revolt of Job: Salvaging the Lost World of Rural Hungarian Hasidim,” Journal of Jewish Identities, 16:1-2 (January/July 2023), 181-198.
“Persistent Parallels, Resistant Particularities: Holocaust Analogies and Avoidance in Armenian Genocide Centennial Cinema, in Armenian and Jewish Experience between Expulsion and Destruction, ed. Sarah M. Ross and Regina Randhofer (Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2021), 267-296.
“The Pioneering American Jewish Women Directors from Elaine May to Claudia Weill,” Jews and Gender (Studies in Jewish Civilization), ed. Leonard Greenspoon (W. Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2021), 217-243.
By Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO — President Donald Trump has left it to his chief of staff John Kelly to decide whether Jared Kushner can continue in his current position with a temporary security clearance. Actually the only document Kushner needs to retain his access to top secret information is his marriage certificate. * President […]
Humoring the headlines: March 1, 2018 Read More »
Lawrence BaronBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−San Diego Jewish World’s editor Don Harrison and his wife Nancy are about to celebrate their golden wedding anniversary. Congratulations to both of them! The publication will be on a hiatus throughout January and February, resuming March 1st. My final column of this year predicts what will happen in the
Humoring the headlines: December 30, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron January Trump still disputes the findings of American intelligence agencies that Russia hacked the Hillary Clinton campaign: “I know a lot about hacking. And hacking is a very hard thing to prove. So it could be somebody else. And I also know things that other people don’t know, and so they cannot
Humoring the headlines: December 27, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−At Mar-a-Lago undocumented elves are decorating Trump Force One to look like a giant sleigh. It will be powered by coal. Forget hitching up reindeers. Their survival is sketchy now that drilling will begin in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. * The President doesn’t need much padding to resemble Santa Claus.
Humoring the headlines: December 21, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−The Trump Administration has asked the Centers for Disease Control to stop using the words “diversity,” “fetus,” “transgender,” “science-based” and “evidence-based.” It will replace diversity with labeled homogeneity-challenged, fetus with in utero little person, transgender with perverse abomination, science-based with empirical hoax, and evidence-based with fabricated. * The Department of Energy
Humoring the headlines: December 18, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO-‘Twas Hanukkah eve, and in the White House, Donald Trump was tweeting, preparing to grouse. Insults of Bob Mueller were sent with great ire To warn him that one day he could be fired. The President fumed about his buddy Flynn Treated so poorly for his lying sin. Hillary should
Humoring the headlines: December 11, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO -New Words from the First Year of the Trump Presidency * Excoaliate: Opening protected wilderness areas to mining operations. * Mooreonic: Endorsing an alleged pedophile for Senate because he supports your political agenda. * Adfibbing: Improvising lies to exonerate yourself. * Meception: Believing your own lies. * Twescalation: Exacerbating problems
Humoring the headlines: December 6, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−The Senate passed the President’s Tax Reform and Cut Bill fulfilling his campaign promise that no billionaire will be left behind. * President Trump has kept another campaign promise by saying Merry Christmas every opportunity he gets. He is so intent on fostering the Christmas spirit in Washington that he didn’t
Humoring the headlines: December 2, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−Since it’s the Holiday season, I’m willing to give President Trump a second chance to honor the Navajo Code Talkers rather than offend them by calling Elizabeth Warren “Pocahontas,” but when I imagine what he’d probably say, I fear he’d bungle it again. * President Trump: “Though I make a point
Humoring the headlines: November 28, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & Satire, USABy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−Ads for New Cyber Monday Websites: * Racebook.com: Shopping around for derogatory epithets, memes, and slurs about your ethnic, racial, or religious inferiors. Look no further than Racebook.com. For the price of an annual subscription, you’ll always have the perfect caricature, stereotype, and term to demean your enemies. Our slogan is-How
Humoring the headlines: November 24, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−First, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced it had lifted an Obama-era ban on importing sport-hunted trophies of elephants from Zimbabwe and Zambia. President Trump initially agreed with the new policy but changed his mind because at first he thought the Obama policy banned the importation of trophy wives from Eastern
Humoring the headlines: November 20, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & Satire, USABy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−Advisors to President Trump have come up with a way that the President can disavow Judge Roy Moore without implicating himself in similar scandals. He’ll condemn pedophilia as long as it didn’t happen during a Miss Teen USA pageant. * Many evangelical pastors defended Judge Moore believing his denial of multiple
Humoring the headlines: November 16, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & SatireBy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−“And in all of my years of public life, I have never obstructed justice. People have got to know whether or not their president is a crook. Well, I am not a crook.” — Richard Nixon. * “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky.” –Bill Clinton
Humoring the headlines: November 11, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & Satire, USABy Laurie Baron SAN DIEGO−President Trump sharply contrasted North Korean communism and South Korean capitalism in his speech yesterday. North Korea is a dictatorial and impoverished hell. South Korea is a prosperous paradise where Korean women can aspire to compete on one of his golf courses. * Responding to the mass shooting at a
Humoring the Headlines: November 8, 2017 Read More »
Lawrence Baron, Trivia, Humor & Satire