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Dennis Prager

Dennis Prager (born August 2 1948) is an American syndicated radio talk show host, columnist, author, ethicist, and public speaker. He is noted for his conservative political views and for his study of the consequences of secularism in the 20th century.

Biography

Prager is a native of New York City. He has an elder brother, Kenneth (b. January 3 1943). His nephew is Joshua Prager.

Raised as Orthodox Jews, the Prager brothers attended Yeshiva Rambam from kindergarten through 8th grade and Yeshivah of Flatbush for high school, where he met his future co-author Joseph Telushkin in the 10th grade. Prager attended Brooklyn College, majoring in Anthropology and History; he graduated in 1970.

In 1969, Prager spent his junior year abroad at the University of Leeds in England. Having studied Russian, Prager was sponsored to be sent to the Soviet Union to bring in Jewish religious objects and meet with Russian Jewish dissidents. Upon his return, Prager began his career as a public speaker, lecturing several times a week about the state of Jews in the Soviet Union.

From 1970-72, Prager attended the Russian (now the Harriman Institute) and Middle East Institutes at the Columbia University School of International Affairs. He studied under Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski, who later served in the Carter administration as the head of the National Security Council.

Prager did not complete his Masters degree, dropping out instead in 1973 to collaborate with Joseph Telushkin on an introductory book about Judaism. Prager and Telushkin self-published the book in 1975 as The Eight Questions People Ask About Judaism, later published by Simon & Schuster in 1976 as The Nine Questions People Ask About Judaism. The book has been translated into nearly a dozen languages and remains a widely-used introductory text to Judaism.

From 1976 to 1983, Prager served as the director of the Brandeis-Bardin Institute in Simi Valley, California, teaching the tenets of Judaism to college-aged Jewish singles.

In 1980, Prager met his first wife, Janice Adelstein, who was a nurse there. They were married on January 15, 1981. Their son, David, was born two years later. In August 1986 Janice filed for divorce.

Prager started his radio career on August 8 1982 as the moderator of "Religion on the Line," a Sunday night program on KABC-AM, Los Angeles. The program featured discussions between representatives of various religions, typically including a priest, a Protestant minister, and a Jewish rabbi. Prager continued as the show's moderator for 10 years, and he continued to broadcast on KABC for several more years on "The Dennis Prager Show." He then began broadcasting for KRLA (national syndication started 1999), and recently celebrated his 25th anniversary in radio broadcasting. On September 4 1988, Prager married Francine Stone, an actress, in a Los Angeles synagogue. In November 1992, the couple adopted a son, Aaron Henry Prager. On December 30 2005, Prager announced on air that he and Stone were getting divorced.

He has been to all fifty states.

Political views

Prager often presents his political views in moral terms. He advocates the historical and uniquely American combination of Judeo-Christian values. He places great emphasis on moral clarity, that is, the ability to identify and combat evil.

Though Prager is an activist and advocate for conservative causes and a partisan of the conservative Republican party , he sometimes labels himself as "passionate centrist" or a "JFK liberal." The motto for his radio show is "I prefer clarity to agreement."

In his articles, broadcasts, and lectures, Prager has declared that the U.S. is engaged in a "second civil war," a "culture war" over the fundamental moral values on which American society was built. Prager argues that many influential American institutions (including universities, trial lawyers, labor unions, the ACLU, civil rights groups, and most large newspapers and television networks) are dominated by secular leftists, whom he depicts as attacking and misrepresenting the uniqueness of Judeo-Christian values and their positive historical effect upon America and the world. In 2005, 24 of his columns were devoted to explaining those values and how he believes they make the United States special. Prager has suggested that most contemporary social and political crises stem from the absence of a normative system of "ethical monotheism". Prager accuses the governments of Western Europe ("a civilization in decline") and Canada of suffering from "a broken moral compass," charging that the dominance of secular leftist thought in those countries has rendered their societies morally confused.

Prager is a proponent of "American exceptionalism", the view that the moral superiority of American values sometimes justifies unilateral action on the world stage, and that the U.S. should not always be constrained by international law or the United Nations in pursuit of its goals. Prager has been an enthusiastic supporter of the United States' initiative in the War in Iraq, as well as many other efforts that he sees as confronting oppression and working towards the liberation of people living in tyranny.

Prager is both a leader in Jewish life ("One of the three most interesting minds in American Jewish life", according to The Jewish Week) and an outspoken supporter of the traditional Christian culture in the U.S., with whom he often shares political views, even to the point of holding that Jews should publicly swear on the Bible. Prager often speaks of his disappointment with contemporary Jews' secularism: in a 1993 speech in Greensboro, North Carolina, Prager said that "the real religion of most American Jews is liberalism."

In 2004, he spearheaded an unsuccessful movement to protect the official seal of the County of Los Angeles from being redesigned in such a way as to remove a Christian cross from its imagery. The ACLU held that the cross on the official seal implied an unconstitutional government endorsement of religion, while Prager argued that it instead honored the founding of Los Angeles by Catholic missionaries, or the historical influence of Christianity in the region.

Dennis Prager is a former liberal.

The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council's Resolution

In 2006, he was appointed by President George W. Bush to the United States Holocaust Memorial Council (which, among other projects, governs the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum). Due to Prager's involvement in the "Quran Oath Controversy," the Council on American-Islamic Relations called for Prager to be removed from the council overseeing the U.S. Holocaust Memorial. Some members of the Memorial Council such as former NYC mayor Ed Koch were vocal in advocating his removal.

In the end, the executive committee of the council issued a resolution that has been seen as "distancing" the council from Prager's remarks. In an interview with the Associated Press, Prager stated "he was honored to 'continue serving' on the board, and that he understands the pressures that caused it to issue a statement.

Lectures, radio and writings

Prager has lectured on his views in Jewish communities across North America, at major business conclaves, to chapters of the YPO (Young Presidents Organization) around the world, and at churches and other Christian institutions. He is credited with lecturing on all seven continents. This claim appears to be at least partially in jest. During a cruise -- aboard which he gave lectures -- to Antarctica in 2002, a picture was taken of Prager speaking in front of a group of penguins, and posted on his official website.

On February 1, 1999, Prager began nationally syndicating his radio show. Now KRLA is his flagship station, broadcasting live across the country, 9:00 AM - Noon (Pacific Time) for the Salem Broadcasting network.

Bibliography

Prager wrote for several years for the Sunday Los Angeles Times "Current" section, and writes a weekly column published in newspapers and online at Townhall.com

and elsewhere.

He is also the author of four books:

Nine Questions People Ask About Judaism (with Joseph Telushkin) (1986) ISBN 0-6716-2261-7
Think a Second Time (1996) ISBN 0-0609-8709-X
Happiness Is a Serious Problem: A Human Nature Repair Manual (1999) ISBN 0-0609-8735-9
Why the Jews? The Reason for Antisemitism (with Joseph Telushkin) (2003) ISBN 0-7432-4620-9

Personal

Conducted 2007 Yom Kippur services in the performing arts center of a Catholic high school in La Cañada, California, which he jokingly called, "St. Francis High Shul."

Was a poor basketball player, went the opposite direction in one game.

His brother is a Doctor.

His producer is Alan.

Enjoys conducting orchestras.

Is an avid Cigar Aficionado and Audiophile.

Loves to travel the world, especially on cruises.

Some of his hobbies includes spider solataire, and is a big Manu Ginoboli fan..

Plays the accordian.

Bowls.

Collects postage stamps.