A Public Service to the Clintons

Not that anyone asked, mind you, but the Clintons may need a short course in Yiddish. What with Chelsea marrying a Jew over the weekend and all. Unless, of course, you picked up some of this amazing language in Arkansas, Bill and Hillary, consider it a public service. My very small way of saying 'Mazel tov!'

(By the way, I hope you didn't wish the bride and groom mavel tov. It's considered bad luck to wish a newly-married couple good luck. And, no, I'm not meshuggah.)

But, hey, what if the Clintons did pick up some Yiddish in Little Rock? It is possible, after all. Had they, then the wedding conversation might have gone something like this...

What a wedding it was! I'm sure you were filled with naches, Hillary and Bill, as Chelsea and Marc stood under the chupah, both looking so good, such a sheine punim, she in her Vera Wang, he, such a mensch in his nice kippah and tallis. And even as you were wondering why Chelsea couldn't have found a non-Jew (what, there were no goyim to be found?), you knew that this union was beshert. Indeed, altz iz gut, altz iz b'seder.

But, oy!, the gonifs! How many millions for the wedding? Good thing there was enough food, Hillary was heard saying to Bill. I mean really! Did you see the chazer at the buffet? Oy Gevalt! Nu? Like he's never heard of a nosh? Such a macher he thinks he is! It's so true what they said in the shtetl: A chazer bleibt a chazer. And later, so blechedich he was. Served him right, the mamzer. And did you see? He eats treyf! Didn't even touch the tsimmis, the schlemiel.

And then there's Marc's mishpokhe, Bill told Hillary (or was it the Rebbe he told?). Thankfully, not a nebbish to be found. (Well, the cousin seems a bit of a kvetch, a lemishkeh. Possibly a shaygetz, I don't know.) And his dad can kush mir in tuchas. He I need in my life like a loch in kop. And did you see the wife? The one wearing the schmatte? Oy!

Marc's parents seem nice, though, Bill continued. They'll make good makhatunim. I just wonder how we'll handle the holidays. They'll expect us at their shul, which is a shlep for us. I'm hardly a shayner yid, and definitely not a baal torah, but I've been known to hit the slivovitz hard. Very hard. Oy veh! Better not to get too shikker. Last time I got all schmutzig. Don't want that to happen again, certainly not on a simcha. They'll think I'm a putz for sure.

Later...

What a day, my daughter!, Bill said as he had the first dance with his now-wed daughter. As we tanz, me your tatte, your alter kocker, you my pritzeh, I remember you being born. I've watched you grow into the woman you are. And today, I can only kvell. May your life be filled with bruchas and may you and Marc soon perform a mitvah, which -- and I'm not being a nudnik! -- will bring the need for a moyhel! A bris! What a simcha that will be! And you, my lovely daughter, will be a balaboosteh just like your mother. Do that and your mother and I will plotz for sure!

Bill and Hillary speaking Yiddish? You can see it, can't you?

Right. Neither can I.

[Interested in the translation? Look here. You'll be glad you did.]