The War on Charlie Brown Christmas specials

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Ladies and gentlemen… the American holiday tradition of the television Christmas special is under attack. But not in the way you may think.

As some of you may remember, last week President Obama’s big national announcement of his new Afghanistan  war policy caused the networks to pre-empt their scheduled programming — including the annual airing of “A Charlie Brown Christmas.”

Coincidence? Not according to Russell Wiseman, mayor of the Memphis suburb of Arlington, Tenn., who smelled a good, old-fashioned anti-American conspiracy. He took to Facebook to rant:

Ok, so, this is total crap, we sit the kids down to watch ‘The Charlie Brown Christmas Special’ and our muslim president is there, what a load…..try to convince me that wasn’t done on purpose. Ask the man if he believes that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and he will give you a 10 minute disertation (sic) about it….w…hen the answer should simply be ‘yes’…you obama people need to move to a muslim country…oh wait, that’s America….pitiful.” (via Mayor Says ‘Muslim’ Obama Blocked Charlie Brown – CBSNews.com)

But I would counsel Mr. Wiseman (seriously, that’s his name. In a story about Christmas specials, there’s a man named Wiseman. The Magi do, indeed, bear gifts, at least to headline writers) that there is a more pernicious threat to his beloved treatise on the meaning of Christmas as delivered by the blanket-wielding Linus Van Pelt. It’s a threat that’s also as old as the hills and also uniquely American: commercialization and greed.

As the great Ed Bark reports, deep in the heart of Texas, Dallas’ WFAA pre-empted this week’s showing of “A Charlie Brown Christmas” (having been bumped already a week earlier) in favor of showing a prime-time holiday version of its morning show, “Good  Morning Texas.” According to Bark, “GMT” is the crassest of bottom-line programming: bought-and-sold paid product placements strung together semi-cohesively to appear to be a talk show:

GMT, as noted here previously, basically is a collection of mini-infomercials sharing space with actual non-paid program content. It has its place, I guess, in WFAA8’s overall bottom line scheme of things. But that place is at 9 a.m. weekdays, not in prime-time. And especially not on a night when you’re rubbing out … family-targeted Christmas shows in favor of GMT hosts tra la la-ing about products whose purveyors buy air time to hawk them. …

The very briefly shown “Promotional Consideration Paid For By” disclaimer in the last commercial break listed Community Coffee, Northpark Center, Market Street and the Dallas Summer Musicals. WFAA8 also notes in fine print that “it does not endorse, sponsor or warrant any product or service referenced on Good Morning Texas. Any mention of products or services is for informational purposes only.”

That said, the hosts gushed about everything put before them… (via ‘Tis Not the Season for WFAA8’s ‘GMT After Dark’ – UncleBarky.com)

WFAA said it will air “A Charlie Brown Christmas” at 3 a.m. on Dec. 12, so viewers can record it. So helpful… thanks.

Mr. Wiseman, your honor, if you’re reading this, I would encourage you to aim your fire and ire in a different direction. After all, President Obama will be gone from office after a term or two, but American commercialism has always been with us and always will be. And, it appears, even Charlie Brown can’t fight it.

(Thanks for the tip, Uncle Barky)

UPDATE: As if on cue to prove the point, the Internets are burning up with this meme: it appears ABC chopped major parts out of the 44-year-old Christmas classic in order to make more room for commercials. One Leon Lynn, an anonymous TV viewer and Internet user, has become a hero to the Reddit and Twitter crowd with his open letter to ABC decrying their bowdlerization of Charlie Brown’s holiday joy. Read Leon Lynn’s letter here.