As Clay Waters notes at Newsbusters, “NY Times Buried David Barstow’s Reluctant Pentagon Vindication on Christmas Day:”

An April 20, 2008 New York Times story by David Barstow, “MESSAGE MACHINE: Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand,” won a Pulitzer Prize for the explosive claim that the Pentagon had cultivated “military analysts” in a “trojan horse” campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the terrorist prison at Guantanamo Bay.

On December 1 of this year, the Washington Times reported that an investigation by the Pentagon’s inspector general, spurred by Barstow’s reporting, found no wrongdoing, and quoted a spokesman for former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld saying the New York Times should return its Pulitzer. But the New York Times itself did not report the Pentagon’s vindication until Christmas Day, on page A20.

If that sounds like a familiar M.O., recall what John Nolte wrote the day after Christmas at Big Journalism about the Times’ colleagues in ideology at the other end of the Northeast Corridor. The Washington Post also benefited  from what John dubbed the “Christmas Dead Zone” to easily bury news:

By finally bothering to look into the kind of scandal the MSM would’ve used to bedevil George W. Bush at every turn, the Washington Post is now on record devoting 2600 words to the story.

However, what the Washington Post quite deliberately did was to drop the story on – of all days — Christmas Day, into the Media Dead Zone between between Christmas and New Year’s.

What the Washington Post deliberately did was make sure this story won’t become a part of The Narrative, a narrative that would (and should) damage Their Precious One.

Jo Moore could not be reached for comment.

(H/T: SDA)

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Posting will no doubt be sparse on Christmas day (not that I was a posting machine yesterday, of course); but in the meantime, let me take this opportunity to wish everyone:

A Very Merry Christmas!

Related:

And via Hot Air:

Neo-Neocon: “Twas the bloggers’ night before Christmas.”

Orrin Judd has lots of Christmas-related posts. Just keep scrolling.

Kathy Shaidle proffers a big heaping helping of ’50s-style Christmas cheesecake.

And from Reason TV via Instapundit, it’s Christmas, TSA-style! (Shudder.)

Update: Happy Jewish Christmas!

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The sadly obligatory link to the video of the Great Indianapolis Air Jordan Stampede of 2012:

Air Jordan fever has swept the nation, as frenzied shoppers pushed their way into their local malls to get their hands on re-issued Nike Concords. We reported on Air Jordan arrests in Atlanta earlier, but perhaps the most insane footage of today’s sneaker assault comes from Indianapolis, where doors were snapped off and a full-blown stampede broke out with people actually being trampled on the way into the store.

Yet more reason to stick with Amazon at Christmastime:

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Obama goes Christmas shopping* with your money, and says to the unfortunate Best Buy clerk surrounded by multiple cameras, and a phalanx of Secret Service agents, “Let’s see if my credit card still works,” Real Clear Politics reports:

“It will be really embarrassing if it doesn’t,” remarked President Obama as he was attempting to pay for some items he bought while Christmas shopping. (at the 2:39 mark in the video [at RCP])

Obama was taking some time out of the Washington bubble and went shopping at a Best Buy store and Petsmart in Alexandria, Virginia.

That’s pretty much what 2012 is all about isn’t it? The voters will decide if we’ll keep making the payments on the anti-American Express Card of America’s self-proclaimed Fourth Greatest President:

* Say, at the risk of sounding churlish, who are the gifts for?

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Michael Graham slams It’s a Wonderful Life as “one of the most beloved holiday movies ever made. And one of the very worst:”

And, of course, Clarence is right, but how is that wonderful for George? Sure, his neighbors all bust their piggy banks to help out, but in the end George is still stuck in Bedford Falls, his friends are out their savings  . . .  and Potter still has the 8 grand! You call this “wonderful?”

You want to see a wonderful life? Forget Bedford Falls with George Bailey. Show me George Bailey without Bedford Falls.

Show me George in his New York penthouse, with that hottie Violet dressed to the nines, talking about the new dam he’s building in Central America, bringing power to an entire country. Show me his plans for a big-city skyscraper that will house thousands.

Show me the great life of George Bailey at his unfettered best, with a family safe and prosperous thanks to the wealth he’s earned making the world a better place for the most people. Now that is a wonderful life.

That was the story featured in the lesser-known remake made just a few years later starring Gary Cooper and Patricia Neal. Killer production design and story arc, but the dialogue was more than a little sketchy at times.

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… And Drudge has plenty of fun in response:

• Obama celebrates Hanukkah at White House...
• TWO WEEKS EARLY?
• LIGHTS ALL THE CANDLES...
• 'We Never Need an Excuse For a Good Party'...

We’ve been told endlessly by the media that Obama is a “constitutional scholar.” Nobody said he was a religious scholar as well (not even Rev. Wright).

Related: “President Obama has been a regular church-goer for decades,” the L.A. Times claims, with other than the last three years of course. At the Tatler, Roger L. Simon responds:

Say what? Let’s leave aside the eye roller that with “regular” church-going Obama was still somehow able to miss the multiple racist and anti-American excrescences of his pastor Reverend Jeremiah Wright (or so the then candidate assured us) and cut straight to the chase – the life of our president since he has been in the White House.

From Time Magazine (Dec. 23, 2009) – No Church-Going Christmas for the First Family:

But there’s one common Christmas practice not on the First Family’s schedule: a visit to Christmas Eve church services.

Church, in fact, has been a surprisingly tough issue for the Obamas. They resigned their membership with Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago in 2008 after Obama renounced the church’s controversial former pastor, Jeremiah Wright. And while the First Family intended to find a local church to attend when they moved to Washington, concerns about crowds and displacing regular worshippers has prevented them from finding a new religious home during their first year here.

Believe what you will of the last sentence and then move on to Ben Smith in Politico, roughly a year later (Sept. 2010):

President Barack Obama, beset by substantial public doubts about his religion and right-wing suspicions that he is Muslim, took a few steps on Sunday to dispel those image problems: He and his family crossed Lafayette Park to St. John’s Episcopal Church, just the third time he has worshipped in public since he became president last year.

I don’t think Obama’s a Muslim. I don’t think he’s anything. He’s more than likely an agnostic who attends church when he has to for political expediency. America is a largely religious country, after all. He certainly is not a regular church-goer, unless three times a year constitutes regular.

Keep rockin’, fellas.

More: “How to Light the Hanukkah Menorah” at About.com and “When is Hanukkah (Chanukah) in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015?” — but then, given how the Internet is the ultimate jobs destroyer in the president’s speechwriters’ eyes, you can see how they wouldn’t want to Google for advice.

Given that Hanukkah begins on December 8th next year, could the White House have confused the dates? On Tuesday, Allahpundit listed all the presidents that Obama has channeled since 2007 and quipped, “I’m honestly curious to see how he draws the inevitable Gerald Ford analogy before his term’s up.”

That didn’t take long at all, did it?

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Or going into them:

President Barack Obama said in a speech delivered Thursday evening that Americans should ponder the words of Jesus Christ this Christmas season and make their actions conform to them.

“So long as the gifts and the parties are happening, it’s important for us to keep in mind the central message of this season, and keep Christ’s words not only in our thoughts, but also in our deeds.”

Obama was speaking on the Ellipse in front of the White House at the ceremony for the lighting of the national Christmas tree.

– CNS News, via the Weasel Zippers blog today.

But here’s a quick flashback to some very different stories from the administration’s earlier, funnier days, back before they headed for the bunker:

“Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) tells People magazine in the issue out Friday that he and his wife, Michelle, do not give Christmas or birthday presents to their two young daughters.”

– The Politico, July 24, 2008

“When former social secretaries gave a luncheon to welcome Ms. Rogers earlier this year, one participant said, she surprised them by suggesting the Obamas were planning a ‘non-religious Christmas’ — hardly a surprising idea for an administration making a special effort to reach out to other faiths.”

– The New York Times’ profile of Desirée Rogers, the former Obama White House social secretary, December 4th, 2009.

“No Churchgoing Christmas for the First Family.”

– Time magazine headline, December 23, 2009.

Of course, Al Gore would argue that components of the Vast Right-Wing Media Conspiracy such as Time, the Politico and the New York Times had it in for the president right from the start, but that’s a subject for a different post.

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“C’mon, it’s Czechoslovakia. We zip in, we pick ‘em up, we zip right out again. We’re not going to Moscow. It’s Czechoslovakia. It’s like going into Wisconsin.”

Bill Murray in Stripes was right on the location, but wrong on the year. For these leftwing reactionaries in Wisconsin protesting Gov. Scott Walker’s progressive reform effort, it’s Czechoslovakia, but in 1942:

As Christian Schneider writes at the Corner, “In Wisconsin, Everything Is Political:”

During the ceremony itself, Walker dedicated the tree to members of the military. During this dedication, some protesters were photographed giving the “Heil Hitler” Nazi salute to the veterans.

While children sang traditional Christmas songs, protesters turned their backs on them to indicate their displeasure with Walker. Several booed Walker as he spoke to the gathering.

“They booed and protested a ceremony that honors our veterans and lights the Capitol Christmas tree,” said Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald to the Wisconsin State Journal. “Every time you think they’ve crossed the line, it’s like they invent a new line to cross.”

With the recall organizers having collected more than half the signatures they need, an election is likely to occur in May or June of 2012. That should give protesters the time they need to draw up new signs comparing the Easter Bunny to Hitler.

Perhaps they’re protesting the wrong religion.

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One of the greatest Christmas moments in television, as outlined by Lee Habeeb at National Review:

Melendez himself was somewhat hesitant about the reading from Luke. “I was leery of the religion that came into it, and I was right away opposed to it. But Sparky just assumed what he had to say was important to somebody.”

Which is why Charles Schulz was Charles Schulz. He knew that the Luke reading by Linus was the heart and soul of the story.

As Charlie Brown sinks into a state of despair trying to find the true meaning of Christmas, Linus quietly saves the day. He walks to center of the stage where the Peanuts characters have gathered, and under a narrow spotlight, quotes the second chapter of the Gospel According to Luke, verses 8 through 14:

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace and goodwill towards men.

“ . . . And that’s what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown,” Linus concluded.

The scene lasted 51 seconds. When Linus finished up, Charlie Brown realized he did not have to let commercialism ruin his Christmas. With a sense of inspiration and purpose, he picked up his fragile tree and walked out of the auditorium, intending to take it home to decorate and show all who cared to see how it would work in the school play.

When CBS executives saw the final product, they were horrified. They believed the special would be a complete flop. CBS programmers were equally pessimistic, informing the production team, “We will, of course, air it next week, but I’m afraid we won’t be ordering any more.”

The half-hour special aired on Thursday, December 9, 1965, preempting The Munsters and following Gilligan’s Island. To the surprise of the executives, 50 percent of the televisions in the United States tuned in to the first broadcast. The cartoon was a critical and commercial hit; it won an Emmy and a Peabody award.

Linus’s recitation was hailed by critic Harriet Van Horne of the New York World-Telegram, who wrote, “Linus’ reading of the story of the Nativity was, quite simply, the dramatic highlight of the season.”

A Charlie Brown Christmas is equaled only perhaps by the 1966 How the Grinch Stole Christmas! in its popularity among young and old alike. Thank God the Grinch-like executives at CBS chose to air the special back in 1965 despite their misgivings. If it had been left to their gut instincts, we would have had one less national treasure to cherish come Christmas time.

And six years later, by the time Fred Silverman took over CBS, it would never have aired — a reminder how dramatically the corporate overculture would shift within just a few years. (Of course, atheism was only one of its sins; taste went out the window as well.) That’s a topic thoroughly discussed in Ben Shapiro’s Primetime Propaganda, which contains a great outline of the political history of television from the 1950s onward, particularly its jag to the left in the late 1960s. Click here for my interview with Ben.

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As Mark Steyn writes, for the “supercomittee” formed to jumpstart deficit “reduction” in Washington,  it was necessary to spend the country to death in order save it:

Meanwhile, back at the Oval Office, the president is asking for your votes for the 2011 SAVE Award. To demonstrate his commitment to fiscal discipline, he set up a competition whereby federal employees can propose ways to cut government waste. A panel of experts (John Kerry, Paula Abdul, etc.) then weigh the merits, and the four finalists go up on the White House website to be voted on by members of the public: It’s like “Dancing With the Czars.”

Last year, Marjorie Cook of Michigan, a food inspector with the Department of Agriculture, noted that every year USDA inspectors ship 125,000 food samples to its analysis labs by “next day” express delivery, and that a day or two later the labs ship the empty containers back to the inspectors using the very same “next day” service.

Marjorie suggested that, as the containers are empty, they can’t be all that urgent, and should be mailed back at regular old ground delivery rates.

But this reform was way too radical, so it didn’t win. And happily, even as we speak, mail couriers are rushing empty containers back and forth across the USDA-inspected fruited plain at your expense.

This year’s SAVE Award nominees include Faith Stanfield of Toledo, Ohio, a “general technical expert” with the Social Security Administration. As someone who’s technically expert in a very general sense, she sees the big picture. It’s on the front of the SSA’s glossy magazine.

Did you know Social Security has its own glossy magazine? It’s called Oasis and it’s sent out to 88,000 SSA employees plus about a thousand government retirees. It’s like Vogue or Vanity Fair, but without the perfume and fashion ads, because who needs Givenchy and Yves St. Laurent to fund your mag when you’ve got the U.S. taxpayer?

It’s the magazine that says you’re cool, you’re now, you’re living the SSA bureaucrat lifestyle. But Stanfield thinks they should scrap the glossy pages and only publish it online.

Ooh, I dunno. Sounds a bit extreme to me. Could result in hundreds of Social Security lifestyle editors being laid off and reduced to living on Social Security.

But wouldn’t cutting back on printing the Orwellian-named Oasis magazine reduce the number of trees needed to be cut to print them, which could then be used in December as Christmas Trees, and thereby reducing the need for the Christmas Tree Tax?

(From promising to bankrupt the coal industry to threatening to tax Christmas tress, Obama has all of the winter solsticial holiday bases covered, eh?)

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Actually, as we’ve long known, there’s no way for satire to improve upon the absolutely absurdity of real life — not to mention whatever planet the current president inhabits.

But first, a quick flashback, reminding us that this really is two administrations in one:

• “GOP aims to gut Christmas, White House alleges.”

– The Daily Caller, July 28th.

• “Obama Couldn’t Wait: His New Christmas Tree Tax”

– The Heritage Foundation, today.

Punitive liberalism? Your tree is soaking in it, baby. (Will the administration be raiding Christmas tree dealers, a la their raids on another famous wood-based merchant?) And as P. J. O’Rourke famously once said, “I have only one firm belief about the American political system, and that is this: God is a Republican and Santa Claus is a Democrat.” Barry just wants to make it official. And as with everything done by the Obama Administration, it’s made for Drudge moment, with Barry in a SCOAMF Who Stole Christmas pose scaring the bejesus out of a small child, and even Janet Napolitano looking up, rolling her eyes at her boss, and wondering, just like the rest of us, what the heck is going on, and how do we get out of this mess?

In contrast, in keeping with the state’s long tradition, Wisconsin’s Gov. Walker is taking a much more progressive tack when it comes to Christmas.

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Frank: It’s made from aluminum. Very high strength-to-weight ratio.
Kruger: I find your belief system fascinating.

– Frank Costanza, discussing the Festivus “tree” in 1997 on Seinfeld.

“Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) tells People magazine in the issue out Friday that he and his wife, Michelle, do not give Christmas or birthday presents to their two young daughters.”

– The Politico, July 24, 2008

“When former social secretaries gave a luncheon to welcome Ms. Rogers earlier this year, one participant said, she surprised them by suggesting the Obamas were planning a ‘non-religious Christmas’ — hardly a surprising idea for an administration making a special effort to reach out to other faiths.”

– The New York Times’ profile of Desirée Rogers, the former Obama White House social secretary, December 4th, 2009.

“No Churchgoing Christmas for the First Family.”

– Time magazine headline, December 23, 2009.

All of which bring us to today’s headline at the Daily Caller:

“GOP aims to gut Christmas, White House alleges.”

So from the president’s point of view, this is a bipartisan feature, right?

Though conversely, in its own way, it’s also a reminder of P.J. O’Rourke’s famous aphorism, “I have only one firm belief about the American political system, and that is this: God is a Republican and Santa Claus is a Democrat:”

God is an elderly or, at any rate, middle aged male, a stern fellow, patriarchal rather than paternal and a great believer in rules and regulations. He holds men accountable for their actions. He has little apparent concern for the material well being of the disadvantaged. He is politically connected, socially powerful and holds the mortgage on literally everything in the world. God is difficult. God is unsentimental. It is very hard to get into God’s heavenly country club.

Santa Claus is another matter. He’s cute. He’s nonthreatening. He’s always cheerful. And he loves animals. He may know who’s been naughty and who’s been nice, but he never does anything about it. He gives everyone everything they want without the thought of quid pro quo. He works hard for charities, and he’s famously generous to the poor. Santa Claus is preferable to God in every way but one: There is no such thing as Santa Claus.

Especially when all of your credit cards have been maxed out for years, and the bill collectors are pounding on your door.

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Zombie’s latest, and possibly NSFW photo essay is now online. Zombie dubs it a test of the “Emergency Double-Standard System — If this had been an actual case of Christians mocking gays, you would have heard about it in the mainstream media.”

Zombie’s email promoting the new post notes, “There is a serious side to all this: Careful framing of the conservative narrative on this issue is necessary to take the morally and constitutionally defensible position. I hope to show the way with this post.”

It’s all about the narrative.

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Just in time for Easter, Mary Katharine Ham deploys the Peep Army, with a Billy Joel-inspired-assist, to bring everyone up to speed with current events:

And while the Peeps didn’t start the fire, I know someone who did…

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Happy Easter!

Here’s my Easter post from 2009; it’s only 12:30 AM on the West Coast, so maybe Google will update their splash page later today, but based on past experience, I’m not holding my breath:

Not surprisingly, I can reprint verbatim my Easter post from two years ago. And something tells me I won’t need to add an update later in the day correcting it:

Since this newly-born “holiday” lacks the historic significance of, say, World Water Day, Google, starting from zero, sits this one out with no special logo on its splash page. Again.

(At least Dogpile’s artists spent 15 minutes to dress up its mascot for the day. [And in 2010, so did Bing] And as Mark Steyn notes, sadly, some aspects of the season are becoming a bit too much for traditional churches)

And these days, some presidents as well.

More later today.

Related: “Good Friday: Google Celebrates Earth, Ignores Jesus.”

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“White House Easter Egg Roll ‘Goes Green,’” Fox Nation reports:

The White House announced Monday that this year’s Easter Egg Roll will be “more environmentally friendly,” including eggs made with wood certified by an environmental activist organization and packaging “to minimize waste and environmental impact.”

The press release issued by the White House states that the eggs will be produced in the United States from hardwood “certified” by the Forest Stewardship Council, a non-profit organization with a presence in 50 countries and a mission “to promote the responsible management of the world’s forests.”

The “greener” packaging for the eggs – available in purple, pink, green and yellow – is made from paperboard certified by the Sustainable Forestry Initiative. The paperboard “uses no wood fibers from controversial sources” and the printed carton the egg comes in can be recycled. The packaging is also decorated with vegetable oil-based inks and water-based coatings.

Sure, it’s politicizing the most important holiday in Christianity. Still though, it’s always nice to see two religions co-existing together, however tenuously they otherwise normally get along. Perhaps free copies of the new bible could be passed out by the White House as well.

Related: “PETA: Hey, Let’s Change Bible to Include More Animal Friendly Language!”

As long as the animal-friendly language involves phrases such as “medium rare,” and “boiled or fried,” I’m OK with that.

Update: Moe Lane describes the above story as “The Wrong White House Easter Egg Outrage.”

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As Tom Blumer writes at BizzyBlog, “It seems that the answer to ‘How do we spin Christmas shopping season?’ at the New York Times depends on which party occupies the Oval Office in Washington.” Tom spots the New York Times reporting that “Americans are splurging as if it’s 2007.” But then going back through how the Gray Lady actually reported those numbers back then, he finds they weren’t exactly impressed by the Christmas retail figures in 2007…0r 2006, 0r 2005.

But then, the Gray Lady is large and definitely contains multiples; in addition to spinning the retail sales numbers depending upon which party occupies the Oval Office, the various sections of the Times compete with each other as to whether or not increased sales in toto are good or bad. The Times seems to run several “brave anti-consumerist iconoclastic Greenwich Village figure gives up toilet paper/indoor plumbing/electricity” stories each year in sharp contradistinction to all of the advertising the paper relies upon to keep the doors open. Plus what do the folks who write all of the environmentalist columns think about America’s Christmastime consumption?

(Presumably though, Thomas Friedman is pretty happy with the amount of manufacturing Santa outsources from the North Pole to China each year.)

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If you overdid the eggnog yesterday, Sammy offers excellent advice:

embedded by Embedded Video

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More celebrity Christmas commercials spotted at the fun Ultra Swank retro-themed Website.

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(Via Theo Spark.)

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