Kosher wine has gotten better over the years, but many have not received the memo.

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Facebook.

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Not true. Not at all.

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However, as for the "make-believe"-ness seder, I'm sure he had good religious guidance, seeing as how Michelle has a Rabbi in her family:

[www.nytimes.com]

And, as a Jew, I'm pretty excited to see this development. They're the American First Family and showing some respect in learning about/exposing themselves to non-Christian aspects of America (besides a damn menorah, which has minimal-to-no religious importance in the Jewish faith). I hope to see similar treatment of important Muslim, Hindu and other holidays as well.

At the best seder I ever organized, there were 13 goyim and 3 Jews. I'm pretty sure God forgave us all for any religious unorthodoxies.

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Not being Jewish, I would like to ask which brands/vineyards, so I can get it on sale next week.

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No joke, actually, I'm just a cheap bastard.

I appreciate the tips.

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Wine only has to be boiled if non-Jews or non-observant Jews touch or handle it directly or in unsealed containers.

The extended discussions of wine in the Talmud (link) indicate that the tradition of boiling wine is ancient. I will attempt to summarize (please keep in mind I am no authority). Wine is considered holy by many peoples and used accordingly in religious rituals. Jews are forbidden to benefit from anything that can be used for idolatrous purposes. In the ancient world, wine was regularly used for idolatrous rituals. Therefore, if a non-Jew or an unobservant Jew was involved in the creation of wine, it was impossible to know whether the wine could have been created with the intention to be to used for idolatrous purposes. The question was particularly serious when the requirement of temple offerings and tithes to the priest caste are considered: one would surely not want to bring into the Temple wine that had been produced with the intention, however small, of idolatrous use.

Here is a typical scenario for non-boiled kosher wine: a family of observant Jews owns a small plot of land, on which they grow grapes and from which they produce wine. It’s kosher: there is no need to boil it. (In the time of the Temple in the land of Israel, for it to be kosher, they would also have to give a portion of their wine to the priests at the Temple, and some of the fruit to the poor, leave the land unworked every seventh year, etc.)

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For $20,000 you could get Baba Sali to leap out his grave and grant a one time exemption on cheeseburgers.

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