Photo: Wikipedia

Photo: Wikipedia

Two days after the Star Tribune carried Garrison Keillor’s War-on-Christmas op-ed, the paper prints a “Counterpoint” by Mitch Pearlstein, president of the Center of the American Experiment. Pearlstein calls Keillor “nasty” but “brilliant” — and agrees that Christmas is under seige.

Point by point, Pearlstein paraphrases Keillor and seconds his emotion.

“Christians are more frequently dismissed and ignored when they believe their traditions are dishonored than is the case with members of other faiths”

“I appreciate the point,” writes Pearlstein.

“[I]t has grown increasingly hard to celebrate Christmas in publicly full-throated and spirited ways.”

“I stand with him,” writes Pearlstein.

“[H]e’s had enough of ubiquitous sensitivity specialists staying up late worrying about whether otherwise decent men and women might possibly wish their diverse fellows ‘Merry Christmas’ instead of ‘Happy Holidays,’ thereby offending finely tuned feelings”

“I’m with him again,” writes Pearlstein.

“[S]teamed-up lawyers are bullet-fast to seek injunctions if a village chooses to add a crèche to its square”

Pearlstein writes, “the same holds.”

And while he’s counterpointing Keillor, Pearlstein extends the War-on-Christmas argument for good measure:

… why aren’t minority groups (defined in both religious and other ways) more readily expected to be just as respectful of the traditions and prerogatives of majority groups as majority groups are obliged to be respectful of theirs?

With counterpoint writers like Pearlstein, who needs friends?