Greeting Cards from the White House

Note: This is a letter written to Chris Core of WMAL, host of the Chris Core Show.

Dear Chris:

I am writing to you because I have been listening the last few weeks over all the contraversaries people have been making up concerning the holidays. It's bad enough people our fighting over what to call a Christmas tree (come on, only people who celebrate Christmas plus maybe a few old-time pagans decorate a tree for a holiday). It's bad enough that we have to walk around on tippy toes on how to address people during the holidays (I've settled on saying Merry Christmas only if I know they're Christians or they are wearing a cross or Christmas related appearal and say "Happy Holidays" if I'm not sure.) All this to accomodate a few extremists on the left who want to wipe out any public practices of Christianity even though it is the religion of the vast majority of Americans. However, on the extreme right, there are also problems which has prompted to me to write you.

Last Saturday, I was honored to recieved a holiday greeting card from the White House, signed by President Bush and the First Lady. I suspect because of how it was addressed, it was sent to me because of my participation in my local Republicsn Committee. I'm not mover or shaker, just an average member, contributing some of my time and money. I appreciated the nice gesture from the Bushes. This morning, I was surprised to see in the Washington Post that some Christian groups have seen fit to make issue over the same greeting card, because it did not specifically state "Christmas" or make reference to Jesus' birth. Come on! The cards were sent to over 1.2 million supporters of the President. How is the White House suppose to know the religious preferences of each one of them and what would be offensive or not? I knew the card was to me because I'm an active Republican and it was addressed to me and not my wife, who doesn't get involved in the party. She is not listed in any party database, so she wasn't addressed. If the White House didn't know enough that I was married, who is it going to know if I'm a Christian (which I am) or Jewish or Muslim or another religion? There is no legal registry of your religious faith in America outside of the military. The military only does it so they can stamp your dog tags and send the right Chaplain if the need arises. So I do not think it is fair to slam the White House over this issue. There is no way the White House staff is going to be able to know the religion of each person who gets a card, so it was right for the staff to send cards which has a common holiday greeeting which should offend no one. However, there are always people who want to fight over anything.

I thought this would be a good topic and I would be happy to discuss it on your show.