Donald Trump Has Not Convinced America There’s A War On Christmas (But if there were, Christmas would be winning.) – By Ariel Edwards-Levy (huffingtonpost.com) / Dec 9 2017
Some holiday crazes ― fruit cakes, Tickle Me Elmo, that outfit from last year’s ugly sweater party ― are better off relegated to the eggnog-induced haze of the past. Despite President Donald Trump’s best efforts this year, that list seems to include the “War on Christmas.”
Long before Christmas music hit the airwaves and Starbucks rolled out its red cups, Trump got a jump-start on the battle, pledging during a July speech that “we’re going to start staying ‘Merry Christmas’ again.”
It’s a theme that he’s revisited since.
“We are getting near the beautiful Christmas season that people don’t talk about anymore,” Trump said during a mid-October address to the Values Voter Summit. “They don’t use the word ‘Christmas.’”
As recently as 2013, a slim majority of Americans indeed thought that the holiday was under attack, according to a YouGov poll. But now, according to a new HuffPost/YouGov survey asking the same question, just 34 percent think there’s any sort of war against Christmas ― making the concept less popular than Trump himself, and giving it only slightly more backing than the GOP’s new tax bill.
(For the sake of complete data, we asked those who still thought there was a war whether Christmas was winning or losing. They said by a 15-point margin, 44 percent to 29 percent, that it was ahead.)
It’s hard to have a war over something nobody cares enough to fight over. The vast majority of Americans are pretty much fine with whatever version of seasonal greetings you’d like to offer.
Most people do have a preference ― 55 percent say they’d rather be wished a merry Christmas, and 11 percent prefer “happy holidays,” with the remainder unsure or having no preference. But only 11 percent of Americans say they’d be offended to hear a different greeting.
While 29 percent of those who say “merry Christmas” think the phrase would offend people who prefer “happy holidays,” just 11 percent of those who say “happy holidays” say they actually would be offended. Only 19 percent of “merry Christmas” partisans would be offended to hear “happy holidays,” similar to the 22 percent of “happy holidays” wishers who anticipate that the phrase would cause offense.
Even Trump’s base isn’t really biting. While 71 percent believe there’s a war on Christmas and 85 percent prefer to be wished a “merry Christmas,” fewer than a quarter say they’d be offended by a different greeting.
PB/TK – There is no ‘War on Christmas’ and if you think there is because someone says ‘Happy Holidays’ instead your ignorance is blinding. The so-called ‘War on Christmas’ can be seen in Sunday newspaper ads or on your television.. SALE! SALE! SALE! has taken over
