December 05, 2002

CHRISTMAS WITH THE KLAN: There's

CHRISTMAS WITH THE KLAN: There's big trouble going on in Cincinnati over holiday displays in the downtown Fountain Square. Every year a Christmas tree is lit in the Square on the day after Thanksgiving, and other religious groups have been long been fighting to get their holiday decorations in as well. Last week the US Supreme Court ruled that the city must allow other, non-Christmas displays to be included, as a result of a lawsuit filed by Cincinnati's Chabad community. The Chabad wanted to put up a Menorah in the Square alongside the Christmas tree, but now that other powerful interest group in Southern Ohio, the Ku Klux Klan, wants in on the action too.
According to "Channel Cincinnati" (the website of the local NBC affiliate), an activist named Kabaka Oba is angry about the ruling because he believes that it opens the door for the Klan to introduce Christmas decorations of their own, as they've done in the past. Reasonable enough, until Oba charges that "we think [the Jews] are working with the Ku Klux Klan to further degrade black people." Oba's authority is further diluted when he threatens to hold a weekly anti-Menorah protest "each week this month," apparently unaware that Hannukah is only an eight-day holiday, that it's over in two days, and that the Menorah will likely be long gone by the time he and his supporters arrive for the second week of demonstrations.
The Channel Cincinnati story carries no byline, although it appears to be based on a TV news segment by reporter John London. Shame on whoever wrote it for letting the absurd accusation of a Klan/Jewish alliance go unchallenged. (Thanks to Dena for referring me to this story).

Posted by Stephen Silver at December 5, 2002 05:14 AM
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