In a conference call with more than 1,000 rabbis before Rosh
Hashanah, President Barack Obama encouraged the religious
leaders to use their sermons on the Jewish New Year to promote
health-care reform. It is more than ironic that liberal Jews,
who call for a complete separation of church and state, saw
nothing wrong with the president scripting their sermons. The
reason may be that the script came from a modern sort of Jewish
holy book, what Norman Podhoretz calls the "Torah of
liberalism."  "Why Are Jews Liberals?" is a fine and bracing
examination of a question that has vexed Mr. Podhoretz for
decades. He displays, along the way, the skill for supple
reasoning and pugnacious argument that was the hallmark of his
long editorship of Commentary magazine. Mr. Podhoretz grew up on
the political left and remained there until the late 1960s, when
he moved to the right. In "Why Are Jews Liberals?" he ponders,
with a sense of deep frustration, why so few other Jews have
made his journey.  Acknowledging that the alle