This time of year is a favorite for children of all ages – I happen to be one of these kids – in part because of the television programs that are shown around Christmas.

A Charlie Brown Christmas, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas, have been favorites of mine since TV went from exclusively black and white to poor quality color. This is no coincidence as these programs were made in the mid 1960’s.

As I was watching this year, it occurred to me that if at this time in history Christmas had not yet been established, if somehow Christmas needed to be “started” in 2009, it wouldn’t stand a chance. Christmas would be doomed before it ever got started.

First of all, the only time you can say Jesus Christ anymore is when you hit your thumb with a hammer.

You can’t mention Him at City Hall, you can’t display a crèche at the Court House, it’s at least passé, and at most completely offensive, to pray in Jesus’ name except at a Nascar race south of the Mason Dixon line, and the President would incur enormous wrath from the press if he dared mention the Savior’s name in anyway other than passing or pandering for political gain – not that we have to worry about the current president properly and appropriately speaking the name of Jesus.

You can say “what the hell” on TV and if there is a “goddammit” in the movie it isn’t bleeped out. Interestingly enough you can also say the word “shit” without consequence. However, Jesus Christ, the standard for when time crosses from BC to AD is spoken of as a myth, as a constant source of ridicule, or feared so greatly that His name is not permitted to be spoken if it crosses the non-existent, yet simultaneously ambiguous, standard/line of “separation of church and state”. Apparently the goal is to take Jesus Christ completely out of Christmas. It seems pretty clear that removing Christ from Christmas leaves only a word that Roberto Duran understands. Remember when he quit in his fight against Sugar Ray Leonard by repeating, “No mas, No mas”? Maybe Roberto’s cry is really the goal – the complete elimination of Christmas, period.

Secondly, the baby Claus wouldn’t be born today. He would have been aborted by the mother who would see him as a choice and not a life. Maybe she would have gone for “tax free family planning” services as soon as she learned she was pregnant, or perhaps she would have been immediately uncertain about what to do, and waited to have a late term abortion without her parents consent. It is clear that she would have never left the red-headed Claus on the doorstep of the Kringle’s to be found, reared, and trained to make an enormous difference in so many children’s lives.

Since the baby who became Kris Kringle never would have been born, it really makes no difference, but the elf family the Kringle’s, never would have had a toy factory either. If these less than perfect children avoided the abortion doctor’s “treatment” and actually grew to be adults, the system would have cast them as victims due to their “disability” and they would have been “counseled” to be self indulgent louts living off the legal settlement that a “highly respected” trial lawyer was able to extract from the physician who made a tragic mistake during the their delivery that caused them to be, not elves, but “little people”. Forget moving to the North Pole and setting out to build toys for children who would watch out, choose to be good, and nice, instead of crying, pouting and being bad. Of course, you can’t speak about a child as being bad, or even as misbehaving anymore – that would “ruin his self esteem”.

Not that any of that matters, because you sure can’t build a toy factor at the North Pole. For one, it’s allegedly no longer frozen there because of man-made Global Warming. If by chance (certainly not an act of God though) or by species crossing evolution, the water were to refreeze, extremist environmentalists would protest placing a factory there by stealing the building materials, sabotaging the construction equipment, and if that didn’t work, flat out burning the place down. All that breathing, oh the carbon dioxide and other lethal green house gases that would be released! Of course the fact that when water does freeze, it is the only substance that floats so as to avoid crushing all marine life, gives a clear indication of evolution, the big bang, and random spontaneous appearance of matter – it couldn’t possibly be evidence of divine design and/or intelligent creation. Yet, how man can simultaneously be “basically good” while intentionally and irresponsibly destroying his environment is a contradiction that draws no conversation or question. 

No doubt the Grinch would be alive and well, surviving quite nicely, even thriving, in the current environment. He probably would have invented the internet or something like it. One thing is certain - no one in the current government or in the mainstream press would accuse him of “stealing” Christmas. He might be lauded for giving us an unconstitutional “experiment which may ultimately reduce health care costs ” called health care reform. He might be considered a genius for designing a system that causes profitable, jobs providing, businesses to move to countries that have no pollution standards of any kind, by creating something called “cap and trade”. He might be an “enlightened” congressman from a blue state or an unelected, constitutionally questionable, militant, practicing homosexual, czar in charge of educating the country’s children. But he won’t, under any circumstances, be called to task for stealing. 

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Charlie Brown doesn’t fare quite as well, but he does live a “dignified” life. Shortly after his diagnosis, he is allowed to miss work indefinitely, with government mandated pay of course, because of his mental “disease”. His company pays for his “treatment” (just like any other illness) for twelve years but “falsely” and unfairly accuses him goldbricking and stops paying. Health care reform kicks in and at age 50 he enters Medicare and government support, never working again. Having seen all the episodes of Married with Children, he is asked by Lucy to be the director of the holiday play, but declines when he learns that a “holiday play” has absolutely no point (except to avoid “offending” anyone with any mention of Jesus Christ). He never buys a “nice little tree”, and never sees it decorated - all on account of rainforest concerns about cutting down trees grown specifically for decoration. Charlie remains a blockhead until a government death “counselor” suggests that his constant back pain, as a result of kicking footballs, and the costs of treating his condition, could end. Charlie takes his own life after outliving his usefulness and his government capped health insurance cost threshold, at age 79.

Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer is the one character who is thriving in this environment. He is responsible for coining the phrase redproboscisphobic and in the process eliminating any and all intelligent discussion on the topic. After getting all the other reindeer permanently expelled from school for “bullying” as a result of their refusal to let him play in reindeer games, Rudolph successfully sues the American Psychiatric Association, requiring them to declare red noses as completely normal. In “careful” consideration the APA decides that any attempt to address or “treat” the malady is completely cruel and destructive to the self esteem of the “afflicted”. Rudolph is praised as the first elected, openly red nosed congressman from Massachusetts, sits on powerful house committees, but is never seriously investigated or called to task for his role in the AIG, derivatives, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and/or banking meltdowns.

Well, there you have it. Be thankful for Christmas. Be grateful that the meaning of Christmas began 2000 years ago, and that the celebration of Christmas started shortly thereafter. If Christmas needed to be started today, in this cultural, legal, and government environment, there’d be no reason to hope or for hope, because you couldn’t get Christmas started today.

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