Posted on 12/21/2011 5:57:44 AM PST by IbJensen
WASHINGTON, DC, December 20, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - This year, the Christmas wars are coming to Capitol Hill. Members of the House of Representatives have been banned from using the phrase “Merry Christmas” in any “franked,” or taxpayer-funded, correspondence to their constituents, but have been told that “Happy Holidays” is permissible.
A December 12 memo from the Franking Commission Staff reported by the Washington Examiner noted that the “Franking Manual” already bans using taxpayer-funded postage for correspondence whose sole purpose is to mark special occasions such as birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, births, retirements, or holidays.
This year, however, members are being told that even in correspondence sent for otherwise legitimate purposes, the phrase “Merry Christmas” cannot be used.
The ban extends to any e-mail, website, or social media posting that uses “official resources,” according to the memo.
“I called the commission to ask for clarification and was told no ‘Merry Christmas.’ Also told cannot say ‘Happy New Year’ but can say ‘have a happy new year’ – referencing the time period of a new year, but not the holiday,” an anonymous Hill staffer told the news service.
Another Hill staffer reported having been advised of the regulation after submitting a draft mailing.
Franking commission spokesman Salley Wood confirmed that “incidental use of the phrase Happy Holidays is permissible, but Merry Christmas is not.”
Some Congressmen, however, are fighting back.
Illinois Republican Joe Walsh and Arkansas Democrat Mike Ross sent a letter to colleagues Monday asking them to support an effort to change the rule.
“Political correctness is slowly dismantling the meaning of the Christmas and Hanukkah season,” the letter reads, according to the Huffington Post.
“We are not celebrating winter this December. We are celebrating significant moments in two religions that have fundamentally shaped our nation—and as Members of Congress who represent thousands of constituents celebrating these holidays, we ask you to reconsider these outdated and restrictive rules.”
Walsh told the Chicago Sun-Times that the rule was “political correctness run amok.”
The Senate, which operates under different rules, still allows its members to extend Christmas greetings in franked mail.
‘Banned’? Actually, I think what they said was you can’t use taxpayer money to send ‘Merry Christmas’ cards; only Merry Jihad cards.
someone always has to come along and say something rational
when others are foaming at the mouth..
Tax payers should not have to foot the bill for politicians to send holiday greetings or Christmas cards to their supporters. The tax paying public pays for their own Christmas and holiday greeting and its about time the political hacks do the same.
A government that’s easy to despise!
Let’s overthrow it. Give me a candidate that sends the ‘legislators’ home and return them to Washington every other year. Give me a candidate that will eliminate AT LEAST five worthless agencies of the central socialist govenment!
Wait. Two have said they’ll do exactly that: Perry and Bachmann. Another said he’d slash over one trillion dollars during his first year in office and would abolish the evil FED.
Since our government is dishonorable, they do it on the honor system.
Happy Kwanzaa is okay, as is anything ‘holy’ about the evil, pedophile religion, Islam.
“Deck the halls with bodies of stoned dead muslim woman, tra-la-la!”
Message from the Prophet: “Please stop sending ‘martyrs’ down here to the camel jockeys’ paradise; we’ve run out of virgins!”
MERRY CHRISTMAS MY FELLOW INFIDELS!
No its true. But if they could say it what would the greeting sound like? “Merry Christmas. We just passed the Armed Forces Defense bill that allows us to snatch you up off the street and incarcerate you indefinitely.”
Of course, it’s perfectly ok for the usurper to send out Christmas cards on my tax dollar.
Then perhaps abusing the franking privilege to provide for religions that are not christian is actually a violation of the establishment clause and thus, unconstitutional.
Open and shut. Congressmen can send whatever they want by the franking privilege. FUBO.
I wonder how many millons of dollars we taxpayers could save if:
(1) there was NO Congressional “franking-privilege”? and
(2) there was NO Congressional Franking Commission?
I say fire this lazy conmmission and let each Congressman pay for his own stamps for his own mail — just as we citizens do.
It just seems to get worse by the day.
Btw, I’m now in the Philippines visiting my fiancee’s family members in Iloilo, and also in eastern Mindanao (near Koronadel).
“Btw, I’m now in the Philippines visiting my fiancee’s family members in Iloilo,
________________________________________
Welcome to the Philippines.
I had girlfriends just south of Iloilo, and one in Antique.
I am over on Cebu, two hours south of the city.
I’ve been enjoying my stay here, nice to take a break away from Obozoland.
I have been staying at Balabag, Sta. Barbara, Iloilo. I’ts an agricultural area (rice, poultry and whatnot), just north of the city.
I’ve been enjoying my stay here, nice to take a break away from Obozoland.
I have been staying at Balabag, Sta. Barbara, Iloilo. I’ts an agricultural area (rice, poultry and whatnot), just north of the city.
“I’ve been enjoying my stay here, nice to take a break away from Obozoland.”
___________________________________________
Enjoy your stay.
I have not been in the USSA since 2004, and have no intention of ever going back. I do not expect it to ever recover from the Marxist overthrow.
I moved here from Slovakia in Jan. 2009
Last time I checked, CHRISTmas was a national holiday. If I was in Congress, I would send a CHRISTmas greeting out and let them take me to court. It would be great theater, no?
Who is making these rules?
Oh fooey, if I were a Congressman I’d ignore that. In letters about other matters, I’d still wish constituents a blessed holiday of whatever legitimate kind in the appropriate terms. Probably Christmas and Chanukah, and the latter not as politically correct but because the Festival of Lights makes a cameo in the gospels and because its Jewish story uncannily presages the Christian one. If necessary I’d even do it on my own dime if the franking people got too snotty and snooty.
The devil is (or trying to).
It’s time for Christians to rebel, this time from within. A widespread Merry Christmas rebellion would begin to mow the evil down if we did not give in to it when it wails and screams later.
If you have Christ in your heart you are always home in the kingdom of heaven no matter what earthly land you’re in... and “a mighty fortress is your God.” (The world has no rights nor power to bust in, though you need to be careful not to let it in to pollute you.)
The God-less leftists and Lamar Alexander.
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