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Almost a Vice President — New Joe Lieberman Documentary Is Heartwarming and a Must-See
The official Senate portrait of Joe Lieberman.
In a world where politicians are not often trusted to do what they believe is right, Joe Lieberman was an exception.I once interviewed his mother and when I spoke with him in 2010 and asked about nearly becoming vice president, he said it was “all in God’s hands.”
The new documentary Centered: Joe Lieberman, includes the chaos of the 2000 election in which Republicans George W. Bush and Dick Cheney ran against Democratic Vice President Al Gore and Lieberman. The film includes that Gore called Bush to concede and retracted it. Ultimately, the Supreme Court voted 5-4 to stop a recount of an election in which some Jewish voters in Palm Beach County, Florida, said they accidentally voted for Pat Buchanan while trying to vote for Gore. The Gore/Lieberman ticket won the popular vote, but with Florida going to Bush, he won the presidency.
The film traces Lieberman’s political beginnings – losing a bid for Congress in 1980, but then becoming Connecticut state attorney general and upsetting Republican Lowell Weicker to take a Senate seat in 1988.
Lieberman, who observed Shabbat, was critical of Democratic President Bill Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, in which Clinton first claimed he did not have relations with the White House intern – then admitted he lied. In the documentary, Lieberman explains why he stood true to his values and spoke out.
A strong supporter of Israel, the film includes Lieberman criticizing Democratic New York Senator Chuck Schumer for giving a speech which called for the resignation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Lieberman was primaried and lambasted for supporting the Iraq war. In the documentary, Lieberman says that if he knew beforehand all the lives that would have been lost, he would have been against it.
“The fact that he acknowledged [that] was a pretty big deal for people who know Lieberman and his stance on the Iraq war” director Jonathan Gruber told me in an interview for this article in The Algemeiner. “When we watched a rough cut of it with him, he looked around the table and said, ‘I’ve never said that in public.’ Then he paused and said, ‘But I’m glad I said it.’”
The film also shows the backlash Lieberman faced for supporting Republican senator John McCain for president rather than Barack Obama.
Gruber said one of the challenges in making the documentary was getting Democrats to agree to be in it, because there was a lot of resentment.
“People were and still are upset at him,” Gruber said. “They feel betrayed.”
There are emotional moments of Lieberman’s funeral shown. He died at the age of 82 in March 2024, after complications from a fall.
“He did what he felt he had to do from a moral and ethical standpoint,” Gruber said. “There are a lot of politicians these days who know what they should do and they don’t.”
What was the main lesson Gruber learned from interviewing Lieberman and making the documentary?
“You should figure out how to disagree without being disagreeable,” Gruber said. “Discourse over discord, and that a person you don’t agree with is not your blood enemy. People on the extremes sticking to their beliefs, saying if you’re not with me 100 percent, forget it, is really simplistic and now we have extremes on both sides. Joe was one of the early cancel culture victims … because of his vote of the Iraq war. I didn’t agree with that vote. But he was excoriated for it.”
Lieberman lost in the 2006 Democratic primary for Senate but won as an independent. The film shows that one of the reasons Lieberman married his second wife Hadassah was they were at a similar religious level, and that the Secret Service would accompany him to the synagogue during the presidential campaign.
Centered also includes the fear of some Jews in 2000 who worried that if Gore/Lieberman won in 2000 and something terrible took place, Jews would be blamed.
Gruber said Lieberman told him that President Obama told Lieberman that his decision to run as an Orthodox Jewish vice-presidential candidate opened the door for him as an African-American presidential candidate.
Gruber, who directed the impressive Follow Me: The Yoni Netanyahu Story does great work again here, telling the story of a noble man who seemed at times too kind for politics, but was quite effective. Also touched upon was the No Labels Party, for which Lieberman was criticized, but ultimately, it did not put forth any presidential candidate in the 2024 presidential election.
Centered: Joe Lieberman is a well-crafted documentary that shows Lieberman’s humor, his guts, and his humility, and should be shown in Jewish schools where many students may not be familiar with the man who nearly became the first Jewish vice president.
The author is a writer based in New York.
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Iran Executes Man Accused of Spying for Israel Amid Rising Crackdown, International Outcry
An Iranian protester waves an Iranian flag while participating in an anti-Israeli multinational rally at the holy mosque of Jamkaran near the holy city of Qom, 156 km (97 miles) south of Tehran, Iran, on April 15, 2025. Photo: Morteza Nikoubazl via Reuters Connect.
Iran has executed a man accused of spying for Israel despite international condemnation over what human rights groups called an “unfair trial,” marking the latest escalation in the regime’s crackdown on dissent.
On Wednesday, a 41-year-old man named Pedram Madani was hanged outside Tehran following his transfer earlier this week from a prison in the capital.
“After identification, arrest, and judicial proceedings against Pedram Madani, who was spying in favor of the Zionist regime, and following the complete process of criminal procedure and the final confirmation and upholding of the verdict by the Supreme Court, he was brought to justice and executed,” a report from the Iranian judiciary news outlet Mizan stated.
Arrested in 2020, Madani was accused of transmitting classified information on strategic Iranian sites to Israel and obtaining money through illicit means.
He is the second individual Iran has executed on espionage charges linked to Israel in just two months, with activists warning that the rising executions are part of a broader campaign to intimidate the population.
Human rights groups and Madani’s family have condemned the case against him as deeply flawed, emphasizing that he was even denied the right to appoint his own lawyer throughout the legal proceedings.
Madani “was sentenced to death by the Revolutionary Court without access to a lawyer of his choice, through an unfair and non-transparent process orchestrated by security agencies,” Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, the director of Iran Human Rights (IHR) — a Norway-based NGO which tracks the death penalty in the country — told AFP.
“The Islamic Republic’s goal in executing Pedram Madani and others who are hanged daily is solely to instill fear within society and to conceal the regime’s widespread corruption and systemic failures,” he continued.
According to IHR, there have been at least 478 executions in Iran this year, including more than 60 hangings in the past 10 days. Most of those executed were accused of collaborating with Mossad — Israel’s national intelligence agency — and aiding covert operations in Tehran, such as assassinations and sabotage targeting the country’s nuclear program.
Among other activists condemning Madani’s trial, Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi, currently on temporary release from prison, also denounced the regime’s escalating repression.
“The Islamic republic uses the death penalty as a tool to instill fear and intensify repression against the people,” Mohammadi said in a video statement.
“There was not even a chosen lawyer on the case. Pedram’s cellmates testified he confessed falsely and under pressure. In Revolutionary Courts, these false confessions serve as the basis of death sentences,” she continued.
The regime’s growing crackdown unfolds amid rising tensions with Israel over Tehran’s nuclear program.
Iran — the chief international backer of Hamas and Hezbollah, providing the terrorist groups with weapons, funding, and training — has consistently pledged to destroy Israel.
For its part, Jerusalem has declared it will never allow the Islamist regime to acquire nuclear weapons, as the country views Iran’s nuclear program as an existential threat.
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Monroe Milsten, Founder of Burlington Coat Factory, Dies at 98
Burlington Coat Factory exterior. Photo: Flickr
Monroe Milstein, the enterprising businessman who transformed a modest New Jersey coat store into the national retail powerhouse Burlington Coat Factory, passed away earlier this month at the age of 98 from dementia.
Monroe Gerald Milstein was born on Jan. 14, 1927, in the Bronx, New York, to his mother, Ann Milstein, and father, Abe Milstein — founder of Amherst Fashions. When Monroe was 11, the family moved to Manhattan. He graduated from DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx and earned a bachelor’s degree in business from New York University in 1946.
In 1949, Milstein married Henrietta Haas, an elementary school teacher who had fled the Holocaust. Henrietta later played an integral role in shaping Burlington’s children wear division. She passed away in 2001.
In 1972, Milstein and his wife purchased a defunct factory in Burlington, New Jersey, for $675,000 with the goal of transforming it into a retail destination. The venture became Burlington Coat Factory, selling discounted designer and brand-name coats for women, men, and children. Eventually, the store’s offerings grew to include home linens, menswear, baby clothes, and shoes, laying the foundation for a nationwide retail empire.
Three years after the initial purchase, Burlington Coat Factory opened its second location in Copiague, Long Island. According to Family Business Magazine, Milstein’s eldest son, Lazar, was the store manager and, as an Orthodox Jew, would not open the store on Saturdays, the Jewish Sabbath.
In 1982, Milstein shut down Burlington’s wholesale operations and reoriented the company’s focus entirely to discount retail. Just a year later, in 1983, he took the company public when it operated only 32 stores — injecting the capital needed to fuel a rapid retail expansion.
In 2006, Bain Capital bought the company for $2.06 billion, with the Milstein family cashing out its stake for $1.3 billion. Milstein exited the business., and two of his sons, Andrew and Stephen, continued in executive positions for a period. The company returned to the public market in 2013.
“I’m a very average fella,” Milstein said on his 80th birthday regarding his business ventures. “I got lucky.”
During Milstein’s tenure, Burlington Coat Factory carved out a niche in the retail world by delivering brand-name goods at significant discounts. By the early 2000s, when he transitioned out of day-to-day management, the business had evolved into a national chain with hundreds of stores and a customer base numbering in the millions annually.
Burlington has grown to become the third-largest off-price retail chain in the US, following industry leaders TJX Companies (which operates TJ Maxx and Marshalls) and Ross Stores. Today, Burlington operates around 1,100 locations across the US, raking in roughly $10.6 billion in sales over the past 12 months.
He is survived by his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, many of whom continue to carry forward his values of hard work and integrity.
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Trump Says He Told Israel’s Netanyahu Not to Act Against Iran
US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hold a joint press conference in the East Room at the White House in Washington, US, Feb/ 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Leah Millis
US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week not to take actions that could disrupt nuclear talks with Iran.
“I told him this would be inappropriate to do right now because we’re very close to a solution now,” Trump told reporters gathered in the Oval Office. “That could change at any moment.”
Israel earlier rejected a report in the New York Times that Netanyahu has been threatening to disrupt talks on a nuclear deal between the United States and Iran by striking Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities.
Citing officials briefed on the situation, the newspaper said Israeli officials were concerned that Trump was so eager to reach a deal with Iran that he would allow Tehran to keep its nuclear enrichment facilities, a red line for Israel.
Israel was particularly concerned about the possibility of any interim deal that would allow Iran to maintain its nuclear facilities for months or even years while a final agreement was reached, the paper reported.
US officials were concerned Israel could decide to strike Iran with little warning and said US intelligence estimated that Israel could mount an attack on Iran in as little as seven hours, the paper reported.
Netanyahu’s office issued a statement in response to the article which said simply: “Fake news.”
The New York Times said it stood by the report.
“The New York Times reporting on this matter is thorough and based on discussions with people directly familiar with the matter. We remain confident in what we published,” a spokesperson said in an email.
The paper said Netanyahu’s minister of strategic affairs, Ron Dermer, and David Barnea, head of the foreign intelligence agency Mossad, met Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff in Rome on Friday.
The two then traveled to Washington for a meeting on Monday with CIA director John Ratcliffe, before Dermer met Witkoff again on Tuesday.
One of the main sticking points in the talks between US and Iranian officials has been US insistence that Iran give up its nuclear enrichment facilities, a demand Iran rejects.
On Monday, US Homeland Secretary Kristi Noem said she had a “very candid conversation” with Netanyahu on the negotiations with Iran.
She said she told the Israeli prime minister that Trump had asked her to convey “how important it is that we stay united and let this process play out.”
Trump bypassed Israel on his trip to the Middle East this month and has made policy announcements that have shaken Israel‘s assumptions about its relations with the US.
Netanyahu has dismissed speculation about a falling out with the US administration, while Trump has also brushed off any suggestion of a break.
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