December 22, 2005 by s.z.

Secret Service Santa

It was a rough day today. I had to finish my Christmas shopping. I had to shoot another half dozen sales clerks who failed to wish me a Merry Christmas. I had to wrap presents (the kittens helped immensely by unrolling the Christmas paper, pouncing on it, and shredding it for me). Plus, I had to do other stuff having nothing to do with Christmas, but which still required me to shoot several people.

So, blogging was going to be rather sketchy today.

I had planned to tell you about Bill O'Reilly's New Year's resolutions, one of which was "Claim that the universe punished my enemies with disappointing book sales, box office receipts, and mediocre ratings because they mocked me." (Seriously, O'Reilly said that "karma" had taken care of Al Franken, George Clooney, and Keith Olbermann for making fun of Bill.)

Well, Bill's actual resolution was something like "Continue to alert 'Factor' viewers when well-known people are smearing others" -- but clearly, Bill meant "Continue to whine to 'Factor' viewers every time somebody hurts my feelings." Anyway, it seems that the resolution I had made for him ("Get some therapy") will have to wait for another year.

That would have been your blog report for today.

But fortunately, my friend Mary C. came through with some of that first-hand reporting from the trenches (you know, the kind of stuff that Stained Skivvies Media promised to deliver, and then took their $3.5 million and blew it all on lap dances and Yoo-Hoo).

So, we all owe a debt of gratitude to Mary C. (and to Scott C. who did some of that Jesse Malkin-esque fact checking of the piece). And somebody owes me today's portion of the $3.5 million in nerd money.

Anyway, here's Mary's story. It's a true, "just the facts, ma'am," account of the Secret Service's secret War on the War in Christmas, as fought in one L.A. public school. I think you will find it informative. And I think Bill O'Reilly will find it arousing ...

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SECRET SERVICE SANTA: AN EMBEDDED TEACHER REPORTS FROM THE WAR ON CHRISTMAS

There are 8 million stories in the naked city, and not very many of them are about the War on Christmas, but this one is. Los Angeles is like that. People tend to live day to day without thinking about the fact that they are on the front lines of a War On Christmas.  Or that they're naked.  But I do. I have to. It's my job. Who am I? MaryC. I'm a public school teacher. 

(cue Dragnet music)

December 14. A perfect winter day in southern California. Only 11 days before
Christmas, and the good people of Los Angeles were going about their ordinary lives: in the downtown office buildings, disgruntled temps put cover sheets on TPS reports, at the Farmers Market, housewives dickered with greengrocers over the price of Bartlett pears, while in West Hollywood, apple-cheeked young women with a stars in their eyes and dreams in their hearts searched for someone cosign the financing for their breast enhancement. Pretty typical. But beneath the comforting rhythms of everyday life, this day was anything but typical and the students at my school knew it. We all knew it. We had a special visitor coming that day. A man many know as Santa Claus. Alias St. Nicholas. Alias Kris Kringle. No distinguishing marks or scars.

He was coming to deliver toys to the children of our "inner-city" school. A dangerous assignment, but he was ready, and so were our men in blue, khaki and suits. Yes, Santa Claus was coming to town, with a Secret Service escort. Tall, broad-shouldered men with sunglasses and radio earpieces, any one of which was ready to take a bullet for Santa. More importantly, they were ready to kill for Santa. So I warned my first graders against making any sudden movements or rushing to Santa to give him a hug, lest that roly-poly belly that shook when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly was the last thing they ever saw.

9:30 am. We marched out to the playground. The students were happy and excited. I was tense and worried, and constantly scanned the crowd of children and adults. I’d been warned by battle-scarred veterans of the War on Primary Colored Napkins that we were under attack. Would one of these people try to stop Christmas from happening at a public school? Could the Secret Service agents hold off an assault of pro-Happy Holiday sentiments until Bill O’Reilly arrived with his bag full of horror?

Sirens began to sound in the distance, and an armored limousine came roaring onto the playground. Screams of delight rose from the crowd as Santa himself exited the vehicle, surrounded by a crack team of grim-faced security elves.

Carols were sung, and the Bomb Squad truck arrived with the presents. Yes, even Santa's presents had become potential weapons in this Yuletide Battle, but these gifts had been screened for explosives and deemed safe to hand out.

The students lined up and waited patiently for their turn. That's when HE showed up. The villain who’s tried to steal Christmas EVERY YEAR since 1966. It was the Grinch. The kids noticed him right away, and screamed for the surrounding agents to DO something. But like George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden, the Feds apparently just weren’t that concerned about the Grinch.

But our students eyed the green monster warily, shouting each time he crept closer to Santa. That's when we spotted it. The gun. The Grinch was strapped, and he’d come to waste Father Christmas (better known by his hip hop name, Malcolm Xmas). Suddenly, everything seemed to move in slow motion: The Grinch's paw going to his belt to retrieve the weapon. The children's shouts of terror, fingers pointing to the danger. The gun was out of the belt. It was aiming. But not at Santa! At the children! The fiend! Water sprayed forth in a deadly (well…a moist) fountain. Students ducked and covered! And that's when the agents reacted.

The Grinch was wrestled to the ground. Nightsticks disguised as candy canes where whipped out and used to bludgeon the monster. His hands were cuffed, and the children cheered as the verdant fiend was frog marched off the playground. I saw one agent rip open a package of glow sticks, and follow the entourage off to a waiting van. Someone was going to get some pretty interesting Holiday Photos in their Christmas card this year.

I breathed a sigh of relief as I lined my students up to return to our room. The class wrote their names on their presents and happily lined up for lunch. They didn't seem affected by their near extinction (or collateral drenching) at the hands of anti-Christmas insurgents from the ACLU and Media Matters. Or a Treasury agent who drew the short stick and had to wear the goofy green felt costume. But we survived. We had been on the front lines and lived to tell about it. I thought the danger was over. I was wrong.
A "runner" came to my classroom later that afternoon. She handed me a note which read: Don't forget! The Holiday Program is tomorrow! Be at the auditorium at 1:00!

Holiday Program. I smiled grimly at my class of brave 6 and 7 year olds. "All right, saddle up, you candyasses. Let’s get back in the War!"
4:16:47 AM