Chez Chesler

A little ad in the Boston Herald, bottom of the page in the sports section, next to the ads for adult videos, offers a "One hour erection in 5 minutes". How is that possible? Is this (pill, I presume) for busy people who want to engage in hour-long lovemaking with their partners, but only have five minutes in which to do it? Is it some sort of relativistic time-dilation device?

Though legal, general testing arouses concern (Cape Cod Times, January 6, 2005) See also Boston Herald Cape Cod Times NY Post Truro, Massachusetts police are asking all local men to volunteer saliva samples hoping to find out who killed, or left semen in, Christa Worthington three years ago. Since the collection is voluntary, wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to ask all men in Truro to fill out a postcard of the form: I ___did ___did not have sex with Christa Worthington. I ___did ___did not murder Christa Worthington. "Investigators will focus more closely on men who do not cooperate, Barnstable County District Attorney Michael O'Keefe told the station." But as long as it's voluntary and not coerced, what the heck, right?

Washington Jewish Week reports Bill O'Reilly tells a caller that if he is offended by the prevalence of Christmas celebrations in the United States, he should "go to Israel." BillOReilly.com: Bill's December 30, 2004 column (I'll try to update that URL when it is no longer the current article. December 13, 2004 column and ask Bug Me Not for a login and password if you don't want to register. This year's crop of "Put the Christ back in Christmas" columns seemed particularly virulent, and just when I thought it was safe to go back to reading the Op-Ed page, I saw Bill O'Reilly's December 30 column. I have written the following to him on-line:

Dear Mr. O’Reilly: I read your column in the Boston Herald. In your December 13 column you wrote: “Somehow I haven't been able to locate any of these folks who find a baby in a manger so off-putting it ruins their day.” Now you have. I assume your poetic license allows for some hyperbole. Most of the time my day isn't ruined, but I am offended when a government engages in religious celebration. My offense comes when the town is saying "We are equal, but some of us are more equal than others. Everyone is free to practice or not practice religion as they wish, but the official position of this town is that the Christian holidays are the most important. We'll throw in a token menorah for the Jews, who are just like regular people except that they call Christmas 'Chanukah', just to show how tolerant we are. (What? Their major holidays are in the spring and fall, not the early winter? Preposterous!)" As far as you're concerned, according to your December 30 column, the fact that I see this as too much entanglement between the government and an establishment of religion (and in fact see the nationalization of the "secular" Christmas as a slippery slope, greased by those who rightfully demand putting the "Christ" back in "Christmas") means I need therapy. What tyranny you ask? It's subtle. Of course we are all, as Americans, more free from tyranny than anyone outside a few ruling classes anywhere else in the world. That's a wonderful thing. But that doesn't mean we can't strive to be better than we are. We've come a long way in the treatment of women, of non-Whites, of non-Christians, of non-Protestants in our history, but we're not done yet.

Washington Jewish Week quotes others who spoke well on the issue, including the caller whom O'Reilly suggested leave the country, who said he was concerned about "Christmas going into schools" and said he "grew up with a resentment because I felt that people were trying to convert me to Christianity." According to a transcript prepared by Media Matters for America, O'Reilly suggested that the caller tell those who wanted to convert him that he wasn't interested. The caller then said that "Christmas carols or gift exchanges being done in school ... kind of sets the kids up to being converted."

and ADL national director Abraham Foxman who

said that the caller's concerns about proselytizing and Christian teachings in public schools were "legitimate." Foxman also said that O'Reilly's remark played into "one of the oldest anti-Semitic canards about Jews, that they are not full citizens of a country and are not entitled to all of the rights afforded to the majority."

Salon has two articles that address this issue as well, Bill O'Reilly hung up on me by Jerome Eric Copulsky, and The Grinch who saved Christmas by Eric Boehlert. (And what's up with the Grinch, with "garlic in his soul"? What's wrong with garlic?)

# posted by David @ 1/03/2005 03:55:00 PM