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I'm on a "Merry Christmas" mission and I'm in full throttle. My little yellow VW Beetle has turned into a Christmas billboard with Merry Christmas written across the back window. Yes, I've decided to trek off to work everyday on the public highways with a message that seems to offend people.

French Christmas soup not for Jews or Muslims Thu Dec 22, 2005 2:13 PM GMT By Pierre Thebault NICE, France (Reuters) - An extreme-right French group has found a way to distribute Christmas cheer only to a chosen few by offering homeless people free hot soup containing pork, which observant Jews and Muslims do not eat. The soup kitchen, set up at the harbour of this Riviera town, draws about as many protesters as poor people. Police stand guard between it and a Catholic charity group distributing vegetable soup outside their church. Dominique Lescure, head of the small ultra-nationalist group...

Danish Ambassadors Warn Rasmussen: Insult to Religion not Freedom By Hasan Cucuk Published: Wednesday, December 21, 2005 zaman.com The Danish cartoons found insulting to the Prophet Mohammed caused Denmark's 22 former ambassadors to react strongly. In a joint declaration they issued the ambassadors said: "What was done is a violation of Islamic tradition. We are extremely perturbed," harsh retorts against Danish Prime Minister Rasmussen followed: "Using freedom against the beliefs of a minority should not be our stance." Recent events in Denmark have been found outrageous by the world; particularly the cartoons including insult to the Prophet Mohammed published in...

The war on Christmas continues. Today my wife came home with the news that the director of the daycare stated that there wont be a Christmas party for the kids this year or ever again. No decorations, no singing songs and they wont even allow a "Holliday Tree" More of the same, don't want to offend those of other faiths. SINCE WHEN IS SANTA A RELIGIOUS FIGURE ANYWAY ??? My daughters have had 5 Years of Santa, gifts, songs and candy and now the daycare is caving in to a few that are complaining. The best part is, all of...

Ahmed Omar Abu Ali sat at the defendant's table in a small federal courtroom last month, a youthful man with a sparse beard accused of a serious crime - conspiring to kill President Bush. Several dozen supporters chanted softly in Arabic, drawing a rebuke from a security officer. A veiled woman explained that they were merely praying for the 24-year-old American student, who had confessed that he aspired to hijack and crash an airliner into "the leader of the infidels." To Abu Ali and his supporters, the trial that ended a few days later with the young man's conviction was...

It shouldn’t have taken a threatened law suit and being held up to nationwide public scorn but Washington State University officials have stopped paying student hecklers who shout down speakers with whom they disagree. Unfortunately, the stench remains strong at Washington State University of a Stalinist suppression of political views that deviate from the politically correct academic liberal orthodoxy. Regular readers of this space will recall from this July column that the controversy began when it was learned university administrators were paying students to heckle the production of a controversial play by a student author. Student playwright Chris Lee warned...

RALEIGH, N.C. -- Everyone celebrates religion and holidays in their own individual ways, but currently there are questions about whether the two should be more connected. One of the latest places involved in the controversy is a McDonald's restaurant in Raleigh.The sign at McDonald's on the corner of Falls of Neuse and Spring Forest Road reads: "Merry Christmas, Jesus is the Reason for the Season." It is a holiday message that Amanda Alpert thinks comes on a little too strongly. "It offends me because it specifically talks about Jesus, Merry Christmas. It doesn't give credit to anyone else," Alpert said....

Christmas is sacred, Pell warns race gangs Jill Rowbotham and Elizabeth Gosch December 14, 2005 CATHOLIC Archbishop George Pell has warned gangs of Middle Eastern descent not to target Christmas celebrations, after families were abused and gunshots fired into cars at a primary school's carols night in western Sydney on Monday. Cardinal Pell said the attack in the multicultural suburb of Auburn, where Lebanese Muslims are believed to have turned on Lebanese Christians, was "apparently motivated by religious intolerance". He said: "I am deeply concerned about the targeting of Christmas celebrations at schools for students as young as five years...

A SCHOOL principal has apologised for overusing the word "Christmas" in a controversy branded political correctness gone crazy. Queensland's Yeppoon State School head Laurelle Allen wrote the apology after a family claimed she had discriminated against them by using "Christmas" too many times in school newsletters. Paul and Melanie Jowsey, whose children Charles, 10, and Harrison, 8, attend the central Queensland school, do not celebrate Christmas and oppose the "historical dominance of Christianity" in Australia. They complained that Ms Allen used "Christmas" at least 10 times in three newsletters over a week and had subjected them to "direct and indirect...

TAMPA - Muslims may get a religious holiday recognized by a public school in the Hillsborough County school district. Terrace Community School, a charter school housed at the Museum of Science & Industry, is considering changing its school calendar to give a day off for Eid al-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of Ramadan. The school's board will vote on the proposal at its monthly meeting at 7 p.m. Wednesday. The proposal came from Principal Gary Hocevar after controversy erupted in the Hillsborough County school district. Last month, the Hillsborough County school board decided to eliminate all days off coinciding...

A group of top Muslim clerics have demanded that Orthodox Christian symbols be removed from the Russian coat of arms and have complained about the Russian authorities and power-wielding structures allegedly refusing to abide by the principle of secularity, the Interfax news agency reported. “This is not only a question of the Russian coat of arms. We can say that icons are all but put up on the walls of state offices,” Nafigulla Ashirov, chairman of the Spiritual Board of Muslims of Asian Russia, told journalists. He accused units of the Defense and Interior Ministries and the Federal Security Service...

Despite a policy allowing religious head coverings in driver's license photos, several Muslim women have complained that workers at the Motor Vehicle Commission required them to remove their head scarves or pull them back so that a substantial amount of hair is showing. The agency responded by writing letters of apology and promising to redouble its efforts to make sure that employees apply guidelines on head coverings equally. Sarah Elfayoumi, who went to have her photo taken at the Lodi office in October, said an employee had told her to take off her hijab, the head scarf that observant Muslim...

COMMENTARY White House to Host First Non Offensive Christmas By Political Satirist Chris Davis Nov 30, 2005 Washington—Besieged by legal troubles, conservative Christians, militant minutemen and dwindling support for the war, the White House has decided to host the first non offensive Christmas this year. The decision reportedly came after the polls showed that Americans no longer showed support for the war in Iraq and on terror.  America's dissent, followed by Democrats demanding an immediate withdrawal, drove the final nail to the end of the White House Christmas.  This year, according to Laura Bush, things are going to be different....

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert has told federal officials that the lighted, decorated tree on the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol -- known in recent years as the "Holiday Tree" -- should be renamed the "Capitol Christmas Tree," as it was called until the late 1990s. The Capitol's senior landscape architect confirmed the name switch yesterday for The Washington Times. "It was known as the 'Holiday Tree' for several years and just recently was changed back to the 'Capitol Christmas Tree.' This was a directive from the speaker," said Capitol architect Matthew Evans. "The speaker believes a Christmas tree...

LAST MONTH, Islamic radicals threatened to kill actor and Muslim convert Omar Sharif. Sharif had recently played St. Peter in an Italian TV film and spoke highly of the role, saying that he "seemed to hear voices" during filming and that "it will be difficult for me to play other roles from now on." Although Sharif's comments seem innocuous, they prompted a death threat. According to the Adnkronos International news agency, a message on a web forum which has been used by al Qaeda in the past linked to another website that threatened Sharif's life. The website containing the threat...

Ready, set, go: from the Observer nine days ago: "Olympic costs set to double: Londoners face huge tax rise". Oh, come on. Only double? You can do better than that. Remember the 1976 Olympics? Well, no, you probably don't, unless you're in late middle age. But they were held in Montreal. I'm a Montrealer and our 2006 tax bill is projected to be the year we finally pay off the debts on the games. The '76 Olympics were opened by the Queen, just like the London Games will be, and the city built a big stadium in the East End,...

FOX NEWS reporting on Christmas Trees arriving in Washington D.C. (revering to them as Holiday Trees).