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Post by Libyan Sibyl on Dec 21, 2006 15:53:34 GMT -5
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Post by Libyan Sibyl on Dec 21, 2006 15:54:40 GMT -5
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Post by Libyan Sibyl on Dec 21, 2006 15:56:11 GMT -5
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Post by Marc LeVine on Dec 22, 2006 9:35:45 GMT -5
There's another take on this story - an anti-illegal immigration take... PA Town to Ban Santa as Undocumented Worker Wednesday, 20 December 2006, 10:51 am Press Release: www.NoSantaForHazelton.com December 19, 2006 For Immediate Release PA Town to Ban Santa Because He is Undocumented Worker The people of Hazleton, PA are proud to announce a citizen-organized public awareness campaign called "No Santa for Hazleton." The campaign will use Santa Claus' status as America's most-loved illegal worker to demonstrate Hazleton's new "zero tolerance" policy toward illegal aliens. Hazleton has been at the forefront of the War on Immigration since this past summer, when, in response to a surge in illegal immigration, the city passed its `Illegal Immigrant Relief Act.` The public response was immediate and overwhelmingly positive. Mayor Lou Barletta`s heroics gained the town national attention, including appearances on '60 Minutes' and CNN`s 'Lou Dobbs Tonight.' Following Hazelton`s example, over 30 other towns across America have passed or are considering similar laws to drive out illegal immigration and labor. This Christmas, a grassroots coalition of concerned citizens and elected officials have come together to conduct a public awareness campaign against the nation`s most prominent undocumented worker: Santa Claus. The group intends to keep Santa out of Hazleton this Christmas, as he represents everything the town has rallied around Mayor Barletta to oppose. According to the Mayor, "We are waging a war of culture, and Santa is a dangerous idea whose reign must be put to an end." The group's website lists the following evidence against Santa Claus: -- Santa is not an American nor is he legally recognized for residency or occupational purposes in this country. Oblivious to this fact, millions of Americans delight in inviting him into their homes and allowing him to work unsupervised every year. Children and the elderly are especially vulnerable to his costume and demeanor.-- Santa does not work alone, but employs hundreds to thousands of elves in what are clearly described as sweatshop or slave labor-type conditions. This takes jobs away from honest and hard-working Americans who play by the rules. Appearing unlawfully for too long to remember, Santa Claus has come to represent a range of labor practices that undercut the American workforce in favor of unfair foreign competition or informal domestic laborers. Across America, the economies of small cities like Hazleton have been decimated as a result. For further information, the group has launched a website, www.NoSantaForHazleton.com, which will serve as a resource for the town and a model for other towns to adopt in a national movement. The website will be used to collect donations to air a television advertisement the group has prepared, but includes additional features such as tips for parents to talk to their children about Santa, and an internet action tool for people of all ages to send letters to Santa asking him to stay away. In Hazleton, as the No Santa For Hazleton looks boldy to the future, this Christmas promises to be like no other. ENDS |
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Post by Guest on Dec 22, 2006 13:12:03 GMT -5
This is a really SAD story...  . Talking about going off the deep end. Someone please call this town and tell them that Santa is NOT real... Maybe there is still time to save Xmas. Happy Holidays to ALL on the board!!! ;D ;D ;D |
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Post by admin on Dec 25, 2006 9:08:49 GMT -5
The above story about Santa is a hoax. It started as a satire and there are similar stories circulating about Bagota as well. The NY Post had a small blurb about that story.
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Post by Libyan Sibyl on Dec 27, 2006 9:39:58 GMT -5
Cancel Christmas, the Government Owns Your School
by Scott McPherson, December 27, 2002
The moral case for separating school and state was made long ago. Still, the role that government played in micro-managing the holiday season in America’s public schools this year proved yet again the wisdom of this cause. In the December 20 Washington Times, readers got to glimpse another of the fiascoes which make up our government-run education system.
“An increasing number of public schools nationwide are becoming no-Christmas zones this year in an effort by school officials to accommodate different cultures and not offend non-Christians,” the report began. I feel obliged, so as not to test the limits of credibility, to quote the newspaper directly on these “efforts,” which could arise only under monopoly government control of our schools:
“Several” elementary teachers in Sacramento, Calif., said they had been banned from using the word ‘Christmas’ in class, and a mother in San Diego was barred from reading a Christmas story to a fourth-grade class.
“In New York, some school administrators asked teachers to limit holiday decorations to generic messages, such as ‘Happy Holidays’ or ‘Season’s Greetings,’ and some city schools barred Nativity displays . . . .
“Meanwhile, music and band teachers in Maryland, Virginia and Michigan are not having students sing or play some carols, such as ‘Silent Night’ and ‘The First Noel’ . . . .
“In the San Juan Unified School District in Sacramento, several first-grade teachers said they were told by the principal not to say ‘Christmas’ at
school . . . .
“Montgomery County [Maryland] Public Schools officials suggest that titles include such words as ‘December’ and ‘winter’ for concerts held during the holiday season.”
This is the reductio ad absurdum of our public school system. Government schools are funded by taxes paid by everyone, so everyone gets a say in how they’re run. Naturally, this means that every disagreement that might possibly arise has the potential for becoming a full-scale political battle. As a result, even Christmas is now regulated by the local school bureaucracy.
“What [public schools] need to do is develop a balance in the kind of [Christmas] songs they are teaching to children,” said Wendy Wagenheim, communications director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan. No, what needs to be done is for the wishes of every family, regardless of their faith (or lack of faith), to be respected by removing the government from the education business, so that they may choose for themselves what “balance” of Christmas celebration will be taught to their children at school. What they don’t need is for the ACLU or school “officials” to try to make that decision for them.
This isn’t a problem of conflicting faiths or cultures, as many would have us believe. It is a problem manufactured and nurtured by the government’s continued involvement in education.
The government “solution” is to take Christmas out of the Christmas season, apparently to make it, uh, a Christmas everyone could enjoy. It would be wiser to take the government out of the schools — and out of Christmas — so that people can send their children to schools that observe Christmas in a way more consistent with their own beliefs. The word has lost all meaning in our modern welfare-warfare-state society, but that’s what is meant by “Freedom.”
Naughty or nice, separating school and state is a Christmas present we all deserved.
Scott McPherson is policy advisor at The Future of Freedom Foundation in Fairfax, Va.
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Post by sonofsilencedogood on Dec 27, 2006 14:15:41 GMT -5
This whole topic is one that has gotten under my skin for the past several years. I'll tell you what...all of those school administrators, local legilators, and all the way up to the Federal Senators and Representatives who want to remove Christmas from our society, start going to work on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. If you are really so against this holiday being observed in the schools, the towns and the department stores, then stop taking advantage of the days off that it gets you.
I'd be more than willing to bet that even those advocates who scream the loudest about the "separation of church and state" enjoy having those days off...so let them start working on those days instead, since they are so opposed to the idea of the holiday.
That's all I am going to say on this one...I've just grown so tired and frustrated with this whole subject.
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. Talking about going off the deep end.
