As part of Pensito Review’s War on Christmas during this, the holiest of all shopping seasons*, we want everyone to know it’s not O.K. to say “Merry Christmas” to us. Save it. Zip it. Nip it.

The “It’s O.K. to Say Merry Christmas to Me” merchandising campaign has pushed us, when commanded on how to observe this holiday, from simply wincing on behalf of non-Christians, to groaning and rolling our eyes on behalf of reasonable people, to all-out open hostilities, as they say in the military, which incidentally, fights real wars.

We find the latest gambit from the Focus on the Fambly folks, whose revenues during 2005 were nearly $140 million, especially repellent. Through its Alliance Defense Fund (2004 revenues: $18 million), it claims an astounding 95 percent of Americans celebrate Christmas. That would be a huge jump from Oct., 2005, when a Harper’s article identified considerably fewer Christians in this country.

Depending on which poll you look at and how the question is asked, somewhere around 85 percent of us call ourselves Christian…a smaller number of Americans—about 75 percent—claim they actually pray to God on a daily basis, and only 33 percent say they manage to get to church every week.

But, Christian, Jew, Muslim, or Other, we evidently loves us some Christmas!

We’re not buying it — literally. We personally know both Christians and Non who do not celebrate the birth of Christ, or more accurately, Cool, Now What Else Did You Get Me Day.

What those who use the holiday to ostracize people who choose to do something else on Dec. 25 is really all about is apparent from the ADF “It’s O.K.” web site. “Products” is listed first in the home page navigation, followed by “Donate,” “E-Card,” “Your Rights,” “Attacks on Christmas” and “Legal Request.”

My favorite is the rip-off (can you rip off a rip-off?) site “itsoktosay.com.” It offers design-free t-shirts with the hostile phrase, along with the complaint, “IT’S HIS BRITHDAY AND YOU CANT EVEN SAY HIS NAME!” Maybe they should ask Santa for a spell checker this Xmas.

* Thanks, Earline Gilley

Organizers Appear to Have Time to Make Up Shortfalls in Donations and Signatures

On Saturday, the Los Angeles Times reported that the Republican-backed effort to give about 20 of California’s 55 Electoral College votes next year is lagging both in fundraising and in the number of signatures required to place the measure on the ballot next June:

As deadlines came and went, backers of [the initiative] continued struggling Friday to gather enough signatures to place the measure before voters.

Organizers had set this week as a deadline for wrapping up their petition drive, but said they had not raised the roughly $2 million needed to pay petition circulators. Secretary of State Debra Bowen had recommended a deadline of Nov. 29.

Campaign manager Dave Gilliard said that agents would work through the weekend to obtain the 434,000 valid signatures required to put the Electoral College initiative on next June’s ballot and that he expected to submit the names by midweek.

The report says Gilliard is “less than certain” that paid signature collectors hired by the campaign would meet their goal 700,000 names this week. The 300,000 “extra” names are needed to replace invalid signatures that will be tossed out during the next step: vetting of the names and addresses by election officials in local districts.

Gilliard also told the Times that fundraising goals have not been met:

Tapping some Republican stalwarts, proponents have raised more than $1 million; the actual figure won’t become public for several days. But Gilliard said $200,000 to $250,000 more was needed to pay circulators for the signatures they have gathered.

“Until it is the bank, I don’t want to make any pronouncements,” he said.

According to the California Secretary of State’s website, the deadline for the initiative is Feb. 8, 2008, so despite the current difficulties, it appears there is technically enough time for organizers to meet both their signature-gathering and fundraising goals.

If the initiative passes and goes into effect next November, the 20 or so Electoral votes ceded to the Republican nominee — roughly the equivalent to those of the state of Ohio — would more than enough to “win” the presidency.

The life cycle of this initiative has been plagued with scandal. In October, a previous version was withdrawn after the lead organizer discovered that the campaign’s only anonymous donor was a major back of Rudolph Giuliani’s presidential campaign.

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