“When will we tire of make-believe wars?”, Ellis Henican Column, Newsday, March 31 2013
So how did the big war on Easter turn out?
Easter baskets, Easter services, premium-priced Easter brunches at hundreds of Long Island restaurants: Reports from the front say Easter is alive and kicking around here.
Some of my cable TV friends were sounding dire warnings all week. Cynical secularists, they charged, had launched a loathsome war on the holiest day in Christendom, although the w-word probably should have been wrapped in quotes. This “war,” like the “war” on Christmas, the “war” on smoking and the “war” on Big Gulps, was far more a rhetorical concept than a bombs-and-bullets operation. And all these make-believe battlefields had quickly devolved into predictable slogan contests.
This time, the alleged aggression involved a few school boards across the country hosting “Spring egg hunts” instead of “Easter egg hunts.” Before you knew it, it seemed, the entire Judeo-Christian tradition was at risk.
Uh, not quite.
Egg hunts by any name have little to do with the resurrection of Jesus. And even if the PC language police had managed to pull off a couple of tiny incursions, Easter isn’t at any greater risk than Christmas ever was.
Maybe the time has come for a truce on all these make-believe wars, including the one on women that some of my other friends have been so agitated about. Let’s pepper our rhetoric with a few fresh analogies — then all head off together to church or to brunch.
BOMBS AWAY
2. War on Overblown Rhetoric
3. War on Silly TV Arguments
4. War on Anything I Disagree With
5. War on Calling Things Wars
THE NEWS IN SONG
“War on War”
by Wilco
ASKED AND UNANSWERED
What made Simon Cowell of “The X Factor” book the Nassau Coliseum for an April 25 open call? Some special something about the unloved arena that no one else can hear or see? . . . Bren Smith of the Thimble Island Oyster Co. in Branford, Conn., says he’s about to become the first commercial kelp farmer to harvest from Long Island Sound? Anyone on this side beating him to the seaweed? . . . Did Lindsay do it again? TMZ says the ex-con from Merrick was accused of stealing clubbing clothes from the “Anger Management” set . . . After pop-up restaurants, why not pop-up churches? Manhattan pastor Parker Green’s been scouring Montauk with event planner Jessi Marquez for a Memorial Day-to-Labor-Day location . . . 1,400 boxes of knock-off Prada, Kate Spade and Louis Vuitton seized from a warehouse in Maspeth? Who knew Maspeth was so fashion forward? . . . Will Steve Bellone’s Comprehensive Master Plan 2035 really make Suffolk bus travel rapid in 22 years? How rapid is that? . . . You hear all the poor-mouthing from Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun? Are the tribal grumbles from Connecticut making LI’s Shinnecocks reconsider their casino dreams? . . . Is Southold too fit or just too crowded? Supervisor Scott Russell says too many biking and running events equal an “unmanageable situation” for his hard-breathing town.
LONG ISLANDER OF THE WEEK
MICHAEL HALTMAN
The Main Event isn’t until Nov. 25. But some large-hearted (and hard-headed) LI business people are already in training for a competition that could easily draw more than customers. The Long Island Fight for Charity Tale of the Tape could also draw blood. The three-round boxing matches feature suit-and-tie pounders like Michael Haltman, the 53-year-old president of Hallmark Abstract Services in Jericho. These days, he’s working the heavy bag at the Glen Cove Boxing Club and hoping for the best. Now in its 10th year, the charity event raises money for Genesis School, LI Community Chest and the National Foundation for Human Potential. Cheer the charities and the fighters at lifightforcharity.org.
E-mail ellis@henican.com
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