When The Stiletto was but a little penknife, a family member who was a young child during WWII recounted how easily the locals could pick out American spies: When an Americans eats, (s)he holds the fork in the left hand and the knife in the right hands while cutting food, then puts the knife down and switches the fork to the right hand and eats with the tines facing up. Europeans keep the fork in their left hands - with the tines facing down - and push food onto the fork with a knife that is kept in the right hand.

Not yet knowing what she wanted to be when she grew up - and not wanting to preclude herself from spycraft because of how she wielded her fork and knife - The Stiletto immediately began practicing the European style of utensil handling, and in the process discovered she is ambidextrous.

This blast from The Stiletto's past was provoked by an article in The Washington Post that notes an odd fact: Five of our seven most recent presidents - and both 2008 contenders – were born lefties.

But this section on how Obama eats was revealing, because while the candidate assiduously avoids discussing his upbringing in Indonesia, it offers some evidence that he was raised in accordance with the Hadith - the Prophet Mohammad's commentary on, and interpretation of, the Koran:

In Indonesia, where Obama spent four years as a child, travel guides warn visitors not to use their left hands (it's considered rude), particularly when touching food or drink. This might explain why the candidate uses his right hand to eat finger food but his left to eat with utensils.

Um, not quite. The Hadith - as much a how-to manual for daily life as an exhortation to wage jihad against infidels until they convert - instructs the faithful that the left hand is to be reserved for "unclean" tasks such as cleansing after excretion, because Mohammad believed Satan to be left-handed. Thus, no Muslim would ever use the left hand both to wipe (or otherwise clean) his or her ass and to eat, especially as in many Muslim countries food is often eaten by hand - a lavash-style bread is used to scoop up a stew-like main dish set in the middle of the table for everyone to share.

While it may well be considered “rude” to contaminate a communal bowl or platter by using your left hand to eat from it, as Muslims Indonesians also consider it blasphemous because Mohammad instructs it is haram (forbidden).

This article was written by Melissa Roth, author of The Left Stuff: How the Left-Handed Have Survived and Thrived in a Right-Handed World - who presumably should know why Muslims never eat with their left hands. So either she deliberately omitted the information about it being haram, or the WaPo staffer who edited her piece excised it. Which is as revealing as which hand Obama uses when he eats finger food.

Editorial Note: Muslims consider dogs “unclean” and profess to be “insulted” at the mere sight of one – even a photograph, if this account from the UK is to be believed. As it happens, the Obamas do not own a dog – the McCains own 24 pets, including four dogs - but the presumptive Dem nominee has let it be known that he promised daughters Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7, a dog after the election, explaining that they hadn’t had a dog before “because of allergies” (it is unclear which member of the Obama household has the hypersensitivity to canines). Hmmm. A suspicious person might wonder whether Obama’s sudden interest in dogs is kinda sorta like Gov. Charlie Christ’s (R-FL) sudden interest in getting married. Good thing The Stiletto is not a suspicious person.

Jews For Jesus?

The New York Times reports on the discovery of a tablet 36 inches high and inscribed with 87 lines of Hebrew that “scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus [that] may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days”:

If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re-evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time. …

It is written, not engraved, across two neat columns, similar to columns in a Torah. But the stone is broken, and some of the text is faded, meaning that much of what it says is open to debate.

Still, its authenticity has so far faced no challenge, so its role in helping to understand the roots of Christianity in the devastating political crisis faced by the Jews of the time seems likely to increase.

Daniel Boyarin, a professor of Talmudic culture at the University of California at Berkeley, said that the stone was part of a growing body of evidence suggesting that Jesus could be best understood through a close reading of the Jewish history of his day.

“Some Christians will find it shocking - a challenge to the uniqueness of their theology - while others will be comforted by the idea of it being a traditional part of Judaism,” Mr. Boyarin said.

Tel Aviv University archaeology professor Yuval Goren, an expert in verification of ancient artifacts, tells The Times he has no reason to doubt the authenticity of the tablet, which was found near the Dead Sea in Jordan.