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BALTIMORE, Dec. 23, 2009 – Two days before Christmas, the longest line today at the airport here wasn’t at a ticket counter, or at security checkpoints. It was at the international terminal, where hundreds of well-wishers lined up to welcome about 150 troops home from combat deployments. Troops returning from deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan get a hearty holiday homecoming as they arrive at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport. DoD photo by Donna Miles  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Families, veterans, beauty queens, students enjoying the first day of their holiday vacations and even Santa Claus began descending on...

<p>WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama won't leave Washington for his Hawaii vacation until the Senate finishes work on the health care overhaul, even if that means staying in town for Christmas Eve.</p> <p>"My attitude is that if they're making these sacrifices to provide health care to all Americans then the least I can do is to be around and provide them any encouragement and last-minute help where necessary," Obama said Tuesday.</p>

Bishop D'Arcy's final Christmas message for the Ft. Wayne/South Bend Diocese. Published in the Dec. 20th, 2009 issue of Today's Catholic. “My Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Link only (that's a shame) - Tips on protecting against Christmas tree fires

Has the Letter from Jesus about Christmas arrived in your email box yet? I’ve received it several times and I appreciate every person who sent it because I know they are trying to bless me. It’s filled with great ideas: We should smile at strangers, visit people in nursing homes, donate to the Salvation Army, and be kind to the clerks in stores that do not celebrate Christmas. Wonderful ideas. I applaud those suggestions. We should all follow them. If the letter’s intent is to infuse readers with the warmth of the season, I approve. The problem is, one concept...

(Dec. 11, 2009) — Just after the aftermath of yet another insult to our allies via the refusal to participate to the traditional events surrounding the award of the Nobel Prize including a dinner with the King, on the pretenses that the recipient was a very busy, sitting “President,” responsible for not one, but two, wars and facing the worst economic crisis “EVAHHH!”, the White House is quietly organizing yet another vacation-time for the Obamas. They would have you believe that nothing has been decided yet, when in fact the logistics of booking their 13 day vacations in Hawaii, from...

Now that the holidays are upon us, it’s time to get annoyed with the consumerism, secularism and political correctness that continue to whittle away at the meaning of the holiday season. The secular and consumption-driven nature of the season has become so routine that one has to work hard to remember to take time for the traditions and religious observances that once defined the season. I thought I had seen every example of how religious meaning has been stripped out of Christmas until a friend showed me the label on a festive seasonal bottle of Coca Cola the other day....

The first of five U.S. cities will be hit by a new atheist holiday ad campaign this Thanksgiving weekend. Washington, D.C., residents can expect to see ads proclaiming, "No God?...No Problem!" inside buses and rail cars. Washington, D.C., residents can expect to see ads proclaiming, “No God?...No Problem!” inside buses, rail cars and on the side or tail of buses by week’s end. The campaign, sponsored by the American Humanist Association, will then target the transit systems of New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco. According to AHA, the holiday ad campaign is the first by a humanist group...

“Most Americans are ignorant of the fact that Thanksgiving was celebrated in Texas 23 years before the first Pilgrim set foot by accident in Massachusetts in 1621"

“Thanksgiving: America’s Forgotten Holiday”Ah, Thanksgiving! Turkey, football, and the start of the holiday shopping season. No, wait, that started back around Labor Day. But seriously, is that what Thanksgiving has come to? An opportunity to eat 2,000 calories in one sitting, then fall asleep on the couch watching the Detroit Lions, so you can get up the next morning at 5:00 a.m. to buy presents for people you don’t like, with money you don’t have, for stuff they don’t need? Thanksgiving has become the Eve of Black Friday. And it’s a big day at the movie theatres, too. Got to...

The level of swine flu activity in the United States appears to be declining, although officials are worried about another increase of cases during the Thanksgiving holiday when many people travel and families gather. The news came as scientists in Norway announced that they had detected a mutated form of the swine flu virus ... It is the most recent report of mutations in the virus that is being watched closely for any change that could make it more dangerous. The two patients who had the mutation and died were the first swine flu fatalities in Norway. The third patient...

As Americans gear up for the holiday season, they're fine-tuning wish lists, digging out unfortunate Christmas sweaters and bracing for the onslaught of holiday advertising campaigns. This year adds a new contender to the long list of groups vying for attention, and it comes with a twist. The American Humanist Association today launched its first nationwide "godless holiday campaign." Its slogan: "No God? ... No Problem!" The ads, which show smiling people in Santa hats, will appear first on Washington, D.C., buses and subway trains over Thanksgiving weekend. In early December the campaign will expand to Los Angeles, San Francisco,...

As many families gather for this splendid holiday feast, there are too many others who in the year suffer the American equivalent of hunger. This is more like deprivation and thankfully not the clinical malnutrition and starvation it is in the Third World. At the same time, this super-rich nation is also battling what is described as an epidemic of overweight and obesity. Obesity, according to the experts, is mushrooming faster than any other health problem. If not slowed down, it will exact $344 billion in health care costs in 2018. By that time 43 percent of Americans, or 103...

Forget buying a ton of gifts. A week before Thanksgiving, the holidays are shaping up as a season of no frills. And for some, the joy of family time and gift-giving has been replaced this year by a quest for basic necessities as more jobs are lost and unemployment benefits start to expire. Michigan, with one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation at 14.8 percent in September, has a food crisis going into the holiday season. "We have people coming to the food bank who said they were donating to us last year, but who are now out...

Holiday Message to our Troops! Sign the Card With Your Message (Fox News Radio) A GroupCard for Our Troops! Started By: FOX News Radio Delivery Date: Monday, Dec 7 - 3pm Eastern This GroupCard can be signed and viewed by many people. Pass this card around: Message from FOX News Radio: FOX News Radio would like to send our troops a big THANK YOU from all our loyal listeners and friends. Please take a moment to send your note of thanks. Include a photo, or a sticker if you would like. More Message from FOX News Radio: Sign This Card...

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Retailers beware. Some tried-and-true discounting tactics for pepping up holiday season sales can be a boon for some products -- but a bust for others. First-of-its kind research from the Indiana University Kelley School of Business confirms that certain kinds of point-of-purchase discounts can effectively attract more buyers in the short-term but for some products can tarnish sales and brand equity over time.

The Hidden Truth About Halloween: Behind the Mask Does the Bible have anything to say about the strange customs surrounding Halloween? In fact, it does—and none of it is good.While God's Holy Days in the Bible celebrate the role of Jesus Christ in bringing mankind to salvation in the eternal family of God (as explained in the following article and our free booklet God's Holy Day Plan: The Promise of Hope for All Mankind), Halloween is a celebration of the opposite—of demonism, witchcraft, death and evil spirits.God's Word makes it clear that no one should dare entertain witchcraft or act...

Ward Churchill (remember him?) references the book, Smallpox and the American Indian, during his testimony in his civil suit against the University of Colorado at the City and County Building in Denver, Colorado March 23, 2009. Churchill is suing the University of Colorado for wrongful termination. AP photo. Today, I picked up 2 kids I carpool to the gymnastics club from their magnet school, as I do every Monday. Apparently, there was no mention about Columbus Day. Nada. Zippo. Nothing negative or positive. But they did watch a performance by dancers dressed like Mayan/Aztec Indians; and the older one said...

Barack Obama is merely following precedent by fleeing Washington and big headaches - the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the deteriorating prospects for health care reform, legislation to cool the globe (or should we worry now about warming the globe?), and various "czars" gone wild. He's in Copenhagen with the missus not on the nation's business, but the business of his cronies in Chicago. [Snip] The White House thought [it was a bad idea to skip town] last week, when the president's men said it was unlikely that the president would go to Denmark when there was so much rotten...

A video promoting tourism in Denmark has been removed from YouTube after complaints it promoted promiscuity. The three-minute clip shows a young blonde woman, trying to find a man whom she had a one night stand with, who fathered her child "August". VisitDenmark's manager, Dorte Kiilerich said the film was supposed to be a "nice and sweet story of a woman". But Denmark's Economy Minister, Lene Espersen, said it "was not a very well-thought-out picture of the country". In the advert, the woman says - in English - that she was "trying to find August's father". "We met one night...