With George Bush in the White House for the next four years, a Republican-led Congress, and a Supreme Court that is likely to be stocked with conservatives for decades, life is pretty tough for Bill O’Reilly. Gloating is fun for a while, but it doesn’t sell. If you want to keep the ratings up, you need a boogeyman.

So let me introduce you to O’Reilly’s straw man of the season: the anti-Christmas Left.

“Once again, Christmas is under siege by the growing forces of secularism in America,” O’Reilly argues in a recent column. And while 90 percent of Americans celebrate Christmas, still, O’Reilly contends, “The tradition of Christmas in America continues to get hammered.” And you thought getting hammered was a Christmas tradition.

You may not have noticed this disturbing “national trend,” what with all the flashing red and green lights, pine trees, and white-bearded fat men roaming around. But O’Reilly’s eyes are wide open.

One of the three examples of anti-Christmas bias O’Reilly exposes in his column, on his syndicated radio show, and on Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor is New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s insistence that the big, brightly lit tree in Rockefeller Center is not a Christmas tree, but a holiday tree.

Some might call that excessive political correctness. O’Reilly calls it part of a “well-organized movement” cooked up by “secular –progressives” as a subterfuge to turn the United States into Canada, where the lack of public religiosity has spawned evils from gay marriage to decreased military budgets. Awful, isn’t it?

O’Reilly says Bloomberg is “one of the many scrooges in public life” who hides his lefty politics behind multicultural euphemisms. Bloomberg is, of course, a billionaire Republican, which sort of disqualifies him from being part of the Left.

Next on the list of Christ-haters is the entire city of Denver. For 30 years, the Downtown Denver Partnership, a non-profit organization that promotes Denver as “the unique, diverse, vibrant and economically healthy urban core of the Rocky Mountain region,” has been putting on a parade to celebrate the holiday season. For the past 10 years, the “Festival of Lights” parade has declined to include religious displays, opting instead to focus on the more secular Christmas icons: Santa, stockings, and gift-giving.

Bill O’Reilly would have his audience believe that the Denver has succumbed to a vast secular conspiracy to destroy Christmas. But the city itself has nothing to do with the parade, which is being put on by a private organization comprised of hundreds of local businesses. The fact is, any organization can have a parade through the streets of Denver, and invite any group they want to participate.

So here’s a suggestion for you, Bill:  Take some of the money you make from shilling coffee mugs and doormats, and put on your own damn parade.

The most preposterous of all of O’Reilly’s conspiratorial accusations is leveled at Macy’s Department Stores. That ungodly bastion of secular lefty-ness has opted to greet patrons with the pagan rallying cry, “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.” O’Reilly has apparently forgotten, so here’s a reminder: Corporations exist for one reason — to make money. If Macy’s executives thought that giving every customer the stigmata would help sell clothing and housewares, they’d find a way to make it happen.

So it appears as though O’Reilly’s conspiracy theory doesn’t hold water. But just to be sure, I spoke with Alexandra Walker, Executive Editor of TomPaine.com, a progressive website that O’Reilly cites as a player in the secular movement. Walker assures me that no anti-Christmas movement exists, and that Michael Bloomberg, the Downtown Denver Partnership, and Macy’s executives did not have any immediate plans to start a vast left-wing conspiracy against Jesus’ birthday.

If progressives were so inclined, she said, “You’d think that we could execute an anti-religion strategy with a bit more organization and some higher-profile victories.” Indeed.

henrypb