'Christmas' wars FOX'S BILL O'REILLY and others did nice work in saving the word "Christmas" from extinction in the commercial realm. Under ridicule and threat of boycott, Sears and other big retailers that had adopted the generic word "holiday," and orphaned "Christmas," in their seasonal ads and in-store displays are in tuck-tailed retreat from that policy.

Are average Americans? In casual greeting, "Happy holidays" has edged out "Merry Christmas" with that startling and ubiquitous swiftness that marks new-age communication. Consider, as another example, the sudden appearance in journals of all brow heights of the construction "an historic." Would anyone say "an history book"? The conformity cops are most insidious when you don't even know they're on the beat.

The whole Christmas-vs.-holidays debate shows that much of corporate America is agnostic on every subject except money. If it thinks that dropping the word "Christmas" will boost profits, it will drop it; or put it back, if that's where its perceived economic interest lies.

In this connection, no Christian should blame "the Jews" for "Christmas"' recent woes. Secularist sourpusses of diverse backgrounds are the culprits, along with Mammon-worshiping Big Business. It has been noted that movies were a lot more consonant with Christian values when six or eight Jewish moguls ran the industry, rather than today's multinational conglomerates.