Intermission

davey boy

Is it really too much for you to say 'Merry Christmas'?

Winston Smith

Now that's a pity Melanie. I do know you need a well deserved break, but I thought we would have got a blog on President Ahmadinejad of Iran's forthcoming Christmas Speech to the British people, where I quote him from the Times :

"If Christ was on Earth today undoubtedly he would hoist the banner of justice and love for humanity to oppose warmongers, occupiers, terrorists and bullies the world over. "

I find this utterly amazing that and British terrestrial TV station would consider allowing this man a voice especially when one considers all the apostates killed, homosexuals and rape victims hanged under his regime, not forgetting Iran's support of terrorism and support for Islamist groups killing British, American and Israeli Jews.

No doubt, you'll have something to say about this when you come back after the Christmas break.

Dave

Well Happy Christmas would have been nice. Ah well. Merry Christmas, Mel. At this difficult time.

Herbert Thornton

Come on now folks. Melanie was using the modern spelling of the wish that we have a Happy Holy Day.

Frank Owen

When did he or has he supported islamist groups in the UK???

merry xmas and happy chanukkah

George Steiner

From the scourge of political correctness nothing but "happy holiday". No happy Hanukah and Merry Christmass. Big mouth small spirit. No surprise there.

PaoloGingrij

Thanks Melanie,

You too, Happy Holiday!

Anthony

The disgusting A'jad is already dealt with on an excellent post by The Skimmer over on Coffee House:

www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/3190051/by-inviting-ahmadienjad-to-deliver-its-alternative-christmas-message-channel-4-has-forfeited-its-right-to-be-a-public-service-broadcaster.thtml

Channel 4 may have adverts but a huge part of its budget actually comes from the government. It's a bit like The Guardian. You think 'Who pays for this stuff?' Well, actually it's no-one. The loss-making Guardian has to be propped up by the profits of Auto Trader magazine and its website (avoid both if you want to avoid indirectly funding The Guardian) and Channel 4, even worse, has to be propped up by the mug taxpayer.

Channel 4 is even asking for a slice of the licence fee poll tax collection fund, which I suppose would at the very least make it clear to the public that this is not a self-funded operation - it has always been funded by the public in one form or another. Whether this channel gets licence fee money or just state grants, it's still something we have no choice over paying for. This is the sort of propaganda state we live in.

Winston Smith, I'm afraid you are really living in Orwell's Britain.

W. B. Harris

For unto you a child is Born … so to all the readers – MERRY CHRISTMAS...

And to Melanie.. Especially, who has challenged, informed and even encouraged us, may your time off be rewarding, refreshing, renewing and up lifting for you and yours - - HAPPY CHANUKKAH. !!

Both Holy Days and times, are special to the Gentiles, who believe in the Savior’s birth and also a time to celebrate for the Jewish people who also reference their traditions of CHANUKKAH.

No cheap shots folks - with graditude I accept Melanie's outstrectched hand of friendship and her words of encouragement to us all who have supported her.

Finally as Tiny Tim said, “GOD BLESS EVERYONE”, the imaginary Santa Clause as he road away, “And to all a good night”, but even more important… JESUS when HE said – I go prepare for you a place… and I will come again” … so everyone Keep Looking Up!

Only then will Peace truly come.

d1carter

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukah, Melanie.

ahem

God bless you, Melanie.

Winston Smith

Anthony,

When I posted this, the thread by Skimmer had not been put up. I will certainly have a peruse.
You are very correct, I am living in Orwell's Britain. I've known this for a while(hence my nom de plume, as you know), even before NuLabour came into power as I could see the status quo shifting severely to the left in everyday life.
I have to this day boycotted CH4 having boycotted the BBC over their left wing, communist stance, hatred of Israel and the West and support for Palestine. Also their support of Anjem Choudary and other Islamists made me shift away from watching them.
I find it disgusting, nothing more. It is a complete betrayal of the freedoms of the UK to allow this man to dictate to us after the way people are treated in his country.

Ian G

Of course Melanie will not say Merry Christmas, for those who haven't yet realised it - Melanie is Jewish!!!

Happy Chanukah Melanie, and Merry Christmass to every one else!

rose

God Bless you Melanie. You are terrific.
Enjoy your roast ham and christmas pud:)

phil

I wish all of you a happy christmas and a joyous channukah ,coupled with the wish for a better2009 especially for those who post so bitterly.it is so good to see so many of you of both faiths joining in the spirit of these festivals .Rose I might even take a bite out of the kosher ham :)

Peter

Why not Merry Christmas Mel? Jesus was one of yours after all.

Tas Walker

Thank you for all your articles, Melanie. I look forward to them.

I am a great student, supporter and believer in your prophets: including Moses, Samuel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel and, the greatest of all, Yeshua, the son of God and our Saviour.

Happy Christmas.

Hoob

The spin of Al Jazeera has been exposed. They started to remove from their magazine website all comments that do not agree with their spin agenda. On the article “Christmas in Gaza” they wrote that this year Gazans will not be celebrating Christmas, there are no decorations, no Christmas trees, no Christmas lights. Al Jazeera removed all the comments including mine exposing their spin when questioned since when Muslim cerebrate Christmas? Here is for the “beacon of free speech in the Muslim world” as journalists in Britain like to describe Al Jazeera and award their journalists for an “outstanding work”. Despicable! Merry Christmas by the way.

Dixon

I hate hearing the word "Christmas"...because of the very strange way people say it. Listen to yourself! Listen to others. What are they saying? They are not saying "Christ-mass" ( what the phrase actually IS ) but "criss-miss". Its a strange sibilant hissing as of The Serpent, which maybe reflects the corrupted reality of a season of Great Mammon!

Yesterday I spent with a family for the first time in ...I dont know, thirty years maybe. It was great, as a change. But truth be that I am reminded of how fantastical, far-fetched and implausible the idealised version of "Crissmiss" and family life itself is.

Regulars will know I am a "conservative" on many topics, but not on social organisation. This "happy families" nonsense is just the biggest lie. I am for atomised society, elective association, the individual and The Community. Not random conjunctions of people who merely happen to be related by birth! What a recipe for disaster.

Ronnie

Merry Christmas to everyone and, as Dave Allen used to say, may your God go with you.

I'd also like to thank Dixon for his warm and spiritually uplifting post for this time of year.

Stephen Fox

Best wishes and Merry Christmas to all, a little after the fact, and Keep Warm.
It's cold here in Normandy. Al Gore must be somewhere near...

EC

Ronnie,

Mebbe Dixon has got the black dog. There is a lot of it about at this time of year.

This year the pagan jingle has a particularly hollow ring to it.

Frank P

Lest this blog should suddenly drown in syrup laced with a dash of ronsarcasm - here's another seasonal message:

http://americandigest.org/mt-archives/pinhead_punditry/the_12_days_of.php

h/t Vanderleun - of course.

Just to break the spell of tinsel and sleigh bells -and talking of Turkeys - did anyone watch the 'Frost Report' exhumed on Boxing Day evening. The geriatric Frost, dibbling and drooling in a veritable orgy of smug, sneering undeserved self-praise and self-satisfaction, aided and abetted by a little cadre of cronies, cackling at their own non-jokes and declaring a rout in the culture war, was just the emetic needed after the Christmas over-indulgence to rid the gastric tract of bile. Whattabunchawankers! Al Jazeera deserves Frost. One can only hope that he invested all his unearned income with Bernie Madoff. Now that would be just deserts indeed.

Nachman

Melanie
Come back the War has started in Gaza - we need your counter to "disproportionate" argument already being sounded off by the stupid airheads who do not know what fighting terrorism is all about

Shy Guy

Peter
December 25th, 2008 2:14pm

Why not Merry Christmas Mel? Jesus was one of yours after all.

So were Shabtai Zvi, Karl Marx and other false Jewish messiahs but you don't see us celebrating their birthdays either.

Dixon

He, he, he, I wasnt trying to be gloomy. Its just how I tend to seem in writing. If you heard me SAYINg the same things, in my customary jaunty, upbeat manner...you might then be truly freaked out!

There WAS a potentially positive point in there which I failed to see as I wrote it: the family of various members who might normally go mad in each others prolonged company DO hum along in loving harmony for that special artificially convened annual episode!

Augustus

Yes, not only are these radical Islamites Hamas full of blind hatred for Israel, they even treat their own women and children as less than animals. What in Heaven's name is Irael to do? Stand on the sidelines until the whole infrastructure has been destroyed? These intifadas will not end while such fanatics are in power.

Robin

Frank P:

That 12 Days vid - just terrific. :-)

Ronnie

Dixon, if that's your christian name them I'm guessing that your surname is Marley. I can hear the chains rattling behind various ghosts as they make their way through the dark and draughty corridors of your house.

Grumpy old man!

I do know what you are saying though. I used to derive pleasure watching the family pressures build throughout the day. You could sell tickets.

stanley Jerusalem

Jews [and Jewesses] of an orthodox persuasion are loath to employ the name of the Catholic and Protestant deity as much as avoiding such expressions as " Old Testament" - thereby appearing to give some form of recognition to the "New " variety.
Behave with a bit of christian charity and don't be so ready to criticise Melanie's omission in favour of an all-purpose season's goodwill and greeting to all.
P.S. I always told my gentile friends that the reason why orthodox jews don't celebrate xmas is if we had to commemorate the birth of every jewish boy we'd be celebrating 365 days every year.
God Bless You All

Enfisi Lafasar

I agree they treat women and children badly, a nation their women treated badly end up being unsuccsessful, and the children who treated badly when they are young become violence when they grow up, we can see now what is going on, the only thing we should do is pray for those children and there mothers to be safe and free from the hands of their terrorist people "Hamas".

Shy Guy

stanley Jerusalem
December 28th, 2008 6:07pm

P.S. I always told my gentile friends that the reason why orthodox jews don't celebrate xmas is if we had to commemorate the birth of every jewish boy we'd be celebrating 365 days every year.

Imagine a slice of candied fruit cake every day of our lives.

stanley Jerusalem

Shy Guy

Not on Yom Kippur, sunshine!

Harmania Shoemaker

That is funny!
Stanley Jerusalem,
I am laughing, not on
Yom Kippur because you have to fast,
it is true

Stefano

Happy New Year from (rainny) Rio!

Daibhidh MacAdhaimh

Happy holiday? I didn't expect to read this meaningless, PC sanctioned phrase on this site.
Anyway, a Tony Curtis and a very King Lear to your good self.

Danny

Melanie I am so grateful for your well researched and articulate articles. If only there were more like you to add their voices. Our media is extremely biased but unfortunately the general public are easily taken in.

John Thomas

But why, Winston Smith, are you surprised to find C4 showcasing the awful A'jad? I'm not surprised in the least. The unholy alliance between kinds of "liberal" left wing/"progressive"-ism, and Islamofascism is well established and bedded-down. Thus American "radical feminists" (or should that be Post-feminists?) have colluded with Islamist apologists, and one of the far-out British communist parties has a formal arrangement with one of the British Islamicist organisations to fight against "the war" (military efforts towards resisting Islamofascism). The point is that they both oppose, above all, Judeo-Christian Western civilisation - Israel, Christianity, democracy, Western ideas of freedom, etc. British media and A'jad seem obvious bedfellows, really, when you think about it.