For the last few years, Bill O’Reilly has led a crusade against businesses who use "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" in their stores and advertisements, arguing that by using a more generic term, those businesses are trying to remove Christmas and religion from the public square.
Now, in a odd twist on that controversy, we’ve gotten a complaint that the White House is apparently dissing Chanukah because the invitation to the president’s much-discussed "Chanukah party" — already the subject of overheated complaints over the slimmed-down 400 person guest list — says "holiday reception" instead of using the word Chanukah. One expert notes that all of the Bush Chanukah party invites used the word Chanukah (although some Bush critics did snicker when last year’s invite included what looked like a Christmas tree on the front).
Is it likely that this was an simple oversight by White House officials, who were probably calling the many parties the president hosts last couple weeks "holiday" receptions in order to be inclusive of many religious traditions? Yes. Should they have specifically used the word Chanukah on the invite, especially because they’re kashering the White House kitchen for it? Of course. Should this be something worth complaining about? No.
Enough already. It’s a party. Go enjoy it, before the White House decides that dealing with all the silly whining from the Jewish community makes holding a Chanukah party more trouble than it’s worth.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
