Hey there and welcome back to Take One, the podcast that brings you just one

terrific page of Talmud each day. And on today's page

Huling 13, the Gammar points out that we may not benefit from an idol worshipper. We cannot,

you know, drink their wine, we could not eat their produce. We cannot benefit from anything

that idol worshippers have produced, which sounds, you know, pretty straight up.

But of course, as we live in an era ripe with what we call cancel culture, this rule seems to have

all kinds of implications for us moderns, which is why we need, as ever, the one man who sits

at the intersection of Talmud and American political history,

the great President de Cherov. Dr. Tevi-Troy, welcome back to the show.

Neil, thanks for having me to talk about my two favorite subjects, presidents and Gamara.

So first of all, I got today's stuff right, right?

We're talking about an issuer, a prohibition against benefiting from anything that an idol worshiper may produce.

Indeed, yes. A mean, is what it's called an idol worshiper, is completely cancelled, as it were.

Can't get anything from any year of your dealings with it.

Now, when I hear this word cancel, is still recovering from our own political cancel culture.

What political, historical, presidential tales come to mind when you think about this prohibition?

As, Leal, as you know, in these daily conversations, I try not to get political.

So I'm not going to talk about current cancel culture.

But let's go back into our past, almost a century ago, with Herbert Hoover, who was the president when the Depression came on, and he was defeated soundly by Franklin Roosevelt in 1932. Now, Hoover was very unpopular as a result of his starting the depression under his watch and his ineffectual efforts to

address it. And Roosevelt, as president, continues to use Hoover as a punching bag. And as a result,

Hoover becomes persona non grata across the entire culture. In fact, there's a famous 1930 song,

Who's Afraid of the Big Ball Bad Wolf? And apparently

...