Yes, Virginia, There IS a Christmas, (Even if Mayor Squidward says "No!"),...

Daniel Rubin: Philadelphia puts 'Christmas' back in the village

By Daniel Rubin

Inquirer Columnist

I'd like to thank Mayor Nutter for saving Christmas.

On Wednesday afternoon he announced that the city had overreacted in changing the name of the traditional German Christmas Village on Dilworth Plaza to simply "Holiday Village."

"Christmas Village" it will be once again.

And here I had been ready to bury the decision.

Why not? Pulling the word Christmas off the sign over the village gate seemed ridiculous on Tuesday afternoon when I walked around that dollop of Deutschland outside City Hall, sampling the hot nuts and sizzling bratwursts, and ogling the tiny elves and fat Santas.

After two years of trying, they'd finally built a pretty good Christmas market in Center City. Then they tried to paper over what it really was.

The name change struck me as way too P.C. as well as an offense to those who love language.

I stood in a media scrum Tuesday - news of the name change had made the Drudge Report - as city Managing Director Richard Negrin explained how he'd received complaints from city workers and residents about the market, how unwelcoming it was to those who don't do Christmas.

He told of how a little girl and her father had been walking by the market the other day, and the girl, who was Jewish, had asked, "Don't we get a village?"

Yes, dear, I thought. We call it New York.

So I was a little hostile. I was completely unbothered by a celebration of Christmas at City Hall, and was fully prepared on Thursday night, when the mayor was to light the "Holiday Trees," as they're called in a media release, to see more waffling in action.

Yes, it's the Christmas season. Get over it. I have.