Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday December 24, 2016
Trump Tower failing to do its bit to Make Christmas Great Again
At a “thank you” rally in early December, Donald Trump promised that he would Make Christmas Great Again.
“We’re going to start saying ‘Merry Christmas’ again!” Trump told the crowd in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
“How about all those department stores?” he mused.
“They have the bells and they have the red walls and they have the snow. But they don’t have ‘Merry Christmas’.
“I think they’re going to start putting up ‘Merry Christmas’.”
Given this full-throated pledge, it might come as a surprise to learn that Trump Tower, the golden jewel in Trump’s property portfolio and the building where he is currently plotting his first term, has no signs saying “Merry Christmas” whatsoever.
Not one.
Visiting the Trump Tower on Wednesday, it was clear that holiday decorations have not been eschewed altogether. In fact, it’s the opposite. The interior of the building is festooned with festive frippery.
There is a 30ft Christmas tree. There are four-foot wreaths all around the entrance area.
There are scores of golden boxes, tied up with ribbons, laid around the place, as if Santa Claus gave up on his way to the Trump residence and dumped the presents in the lobby.
There are life-sized nutcracker statues, some holding trumpets.
But no Christmas signs.
The only mention of Christmas the Guardian could find in Trump Tower was in the gift shop, where a little Christmas tree bauble, which showed Santa Claus lying down on top of a yellow taxi, was described as a “Christmas ornament”. The ornament had been made in China.
Trump has promised that he will return Merry Christmas to common parlance before – most notably in November 2015, when he was gearing up for the Republican primaries.
It makes sense. The idea of a war on Christmas – that Americans are being forced to say “happy holidays” instead of “merry Christmas” because of political correctness – is a popular theory among some conservatives.
Trump has four years to force “merry Christmas” upon the American public, so perhaps change will eventually come to the US. He could certainly start by using the phrase in his own building.
But anyway. Happy holidays. (Source: The Guardian)