"Merry Christmas" or not - a nice diversion

[question everything]

We slept late and turned on CNN, and to the local "news" on KARE11 while having our coffee. Nothing but fluff.

Scanned the newspapers online - nothing but the "disappearance" of the "Merry Christmas" and the angst about the "Happy Holidays" (hey, what about New Year that many celebrate and that comes a week later?)

But, really, is there nothing else to worry about these days? Like price of gasoline and heating oil, like many people still losing their jobs, like many people still do not have adequate access to health care, like the quality of teachers and schools (and I purposely do not mention Iraq) that all we have to worry is how we are greeted by poor retail clerks working at minimum wage?

Fine, let Kansas mandate that the cashiers in the local Wal-Mart have to say "Merry Christmas" or lose their jobs. But the rest of us?

We made the customary call to my mother in law in Los Angeles and she motioned a bit of news. How come we did not hear about it on CNN, I asked. That's because she gets up early and reads the LA Times which still, it appears, better covers national and international news than CNN, was the reply.