The Conservative Hawk | Issue 4 December 2009

8/9/2019 The Conservative Hawk | Issue 4 December 2009

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war aside, the Christmas season

allows us to take a break from the

challenge of our busy lives and re-

minds us of the human element that

unites us all.The founding fathers of

this nation made it clear that they

had faith in a Supreme Being

God. Plaques in public buildings,

our currency, and even our Nations

official motto all read, In God We

Trust. This country was founded

on faith, or rather the belief in a su-

preme being, so that men could live

a morally and ethically just life. No

man was believed to be more im-

portant or valuable than another.

A higher power had created their

lives, and this faith allowed them

all to work together for the pursuitof happiness.

Regardless of your per-

sonal religion, the faith that perme-

ates this season is in believing that

something bigger than you exists.

Family, friends, even strangers are

all more connectedmore humble.

It allows our society to remember

each other and to reassure each

other that we are all in this pursuit

of happiness together. Faith is a

uniting factor, and as far as I am

concerned, it is beneficial for any

society.

On the other hand, as thetradition of Christmas has aged

with this great country, one could

make the argument that it has been

absorbed by the machine of capi-

talism, and faith has been all but

removed from its meaning. The

decreasing percentage of Chris-

tians adds evidence to this argu-

ment. While Christmas for many

is slowly but surely becoming asecular tradition, I take confidence

in that simple phrase that pops up

each holiday season: the meaning

of Christmas. Every year we are

remindedin movies, cards, and

songsthat we must not forget

why we are celebrating this holi-

day. Instead, we remind ourselves

that although life is hard, it is a col-

lective effort within our society to

retain the faith in something better.

I hope during this holiday

season, you feel what I feel when

I am with my friends and fam-

ilyjoy, peace, and a warm beliefin your own personal faith. I hope

you realize how easy it is to become

troubled by the trials of our hectic

lives, but remember that although

life is hard, unfair and seemingly

targeted at the individual, this is a

group effort and there is something

larger at play.

Happy holidays.


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By: Tyler CralleOnline Editor-In-Chief

Contrary to what Barack

Obama, Joe Biden, the main-

stream media, or anyone else in-

volved in the current administra-

tion might tell you, we are stillin a recession. This means that

all those store owners out there

are going to have an even harder

time convincing customers to

shop in their stores. However,

it seems there may be one way

to either keep current customersor attract new ones. It may be

as easy as saying Merry Christ-

mas.

Recently, upon leaving

a retail store, I heard the words

Have a happy holiday. Now

if, like me, you are not offended by the phrase, Merry Christ-

mas, congratulations. You hap-

pen to be in the biggest major-

ity this country has seen since

Ronald Reagan won 97.6% of

the electoral votes in 1984 (I use

electoral votes since the media

has made it quite clear that is

the biggest indicator of whether

or not an election is landslide or

not).

Ninety-five percent of

people are not offended by the phrase Merry Christmas, ac-

cording to a Zogby poll done in

2006. Therefore, when a store

chooses to extend a generic

holiday greeting, they are try-

ing to appease the other 5%.

This would make good busi-ness sense, if not for the fact that

same study found 51% of people

were bothered by hearing, Hap-

py Holidays. To make matters

worse, 36% of people said they

would either cut a visit short or

not shop at a store that used ageneric holiday greeting.

Now the question you

must be asking is, What does

a store risk by using the phrase

Merry Christmas? According

to the Zogby poll, only 10% of

non-Christians were offended bythe use of Merry Christmas.

According to The American

Religious Identification survey,

only 18.9% of the US population

is non-Christian. So, wishing a

consumer a Merry Christmas

only risks offending 1.8% of the

population. Compare that with

using a general Happy Holi-

days that may offend 36% of

potential customers.

It doesnt seem like a


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very tough decision. All these

numbers are great, but it doesnt

really mean much unless there

is some real-world evidence

to back it up. Back in 2005,Walmart shifted away from us-

ing Christmas in advertising and

advised its employees to avoid

the phrase Merry Christmas.

The company decided to be more

politically correct and advised

its employees to greet custom-ers with Happy Holidays. This

launched protests and boycotts

by the American Family Associ-

ation and The Catholic League.

The tactics apparent-

ly worked, because in 2006

Walmarts spokeswoman LindaBlankey told USA Today, We,

quite frankly, have learned a les-

son from last year. Were not

afraid to use the term Merry

Christmas. Well use it early, and

well use it often. Zogby even

asked its participants if this re-

cent change of heart by Walmart

would affect their shopping rou-

tine. 35% of the respondents

said they would be more likely

to shop the large chain now.

People, however, tend to

say one thing but do another. So

the real question is, Did more

people shop at Walmart after the

whole debacle? All numbers

point to yes. Walmarts net prof-

its for the 2006 Christmas season

were up 350 million dollars - an

almost 10% increase from the

year before. Now, this could be

a coincidence. However, due tothe fact we were seeing signs of

an economic slowdown by then,

it seems there was something

else helping increase Walmarts

sales.

The beauty of living in a

free society is that everyone hasthe right to do what they want.

Therefore, if store owners want

to risk offending 50% of their

potential customer base by ap-

peasing just 5% of them, they

have the right to do that. How-

ever, my advice is simple: Whena customer walks in and sees

your employee standing next to

Christmas decorations and wear-

ing Christmas colors, advise that

employee to wish that person a

Merry Christmas. After all, in

this economy, you dont really

have much to lose.

NOTE: The Conservative Hawk

will begin a feature on the the-

conservativehawk.com that will

post Christmas-friendly stores

in the Wilmington area. Anyone

that would like to help contrib-

ute to this list, just send an email

to christmaslist@theconservativ

ehawk.com.


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By: Kevin King

Editor-In-Chief

Since the last issue, The Conservative Hawk has drawn a

lot of attention. The most notable example of this attention oc-

curred during our monthly appearance on The Morning Beat

with Curtis Wright, on The Big Talker FM. While on the air, Cindy

Lawson called in from the University to clarify the inaccurate

things we had published about the ITSD department. The full audio

can be heard at theconservativehawk.com. In short, we still haveno answers. The Freedom Of Information Act request we filed was

returned with a two-sentence response. This is less than adequate,

and extremely insulting. If the answers are simple, why cant they

just show the full documentation as requested? We are on the case,

UNC Wilmington. Stay tuned.

ITSD Update


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41-60 of the Top Salaries at

UNC WilmingtonWe are through the top 60 salaries at UNC Wilmington, and still

havent broken six figures. Does that bother anyone? How many private

sector businesses have their top 60 employees making over six figures? Af-

ter all, the University is just trying to be more competitive with the private

sector. I hope that all of you who read this will begin to ask the necessity of

these salaries. Furthermore, I hope you begin to ask what they are doing to

help out in these tough economic times when we are all cutting back. Un-

til then, you can find these and more online at http://starnewsonline.com.

Sincerely, Kevin King, Editor-In-Chief


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The Conservative Hawk | Issue 4 December 2009