If I Were King: Holidays

If I were King (of the USA not MLK), I would re-order the national holidays.

1.  The US government would recognize no religious holidays.  That is for the religions and their followers to do.  They do not need the government to help them.  So… Christmas, Hanukkah, Eid and Thankgiving will be treated exactly like Halloween, St Patrick’s day and St Valentine’s day.
2. No paid time off holidays for government employees.  All holidays will be carried like they do in the private sector.   Government employees get paid time off as part of their compensation.  They don’t need or deserve additional free time off on top of that.  So schools, businesses and government offices will be OPEN on holidays, just like other days. So, new year’s day, labor day, Veteran’s day, MLK, President’s day, Columbus day, and Memorial day are gutted and become irrelevant.  Just like Lincoln’s birthday became forgotten once it stopped being a paid holiday.  This eliminates the constant tug of war to rename politically incorrect holidays for more virtuous versions (Lincoln’s birthday becoming MLK day.  Columbus day becoming Indigenous persons day).
3. If the King (me not Elvis) decrees a holiday that is so important that the government should be closed to recognize it, then EVERYTHING shall be closed to recognize it.  This would be limited and rare thing like to celebrate the end of a war or the death of the King (me, not Elvis).
4. Congress can continue to proclaim every day on the calendar some special day for their lobbyists, like “National Beef consumption day”, but it will be irrelevant.

Basically, I don’t like ANY of the holidays we currently have or how they are treated in the USA.  The owners of holidays have lost control of them and the culture that benefits from them is collapsing in on itself.  The only way to fix that is a total reset.  But lacking the powers of a King (monarch not MLK family member), it simply isn’t possible to do anything about this.

The list of perpetual national holidays would be limited to:

a.  Foundation day:  Celebrates the foundation of America.  Shall be celebrated on the first Sunday of July.

b.  Armistice day:  Celebrates the end of WW1.  Shall be observed on the 11th of November by 1 hour of remembrance between 11 am and 12.  It shall include a message about the profligate wastefulness of aristocrats and as a warning that governments don’t care how many of their citizens they kill as long as they “win”.

c.  International Communist Martyrs day.  Celebrated on the 1st of May.  Observed by the reading of public announcements reminding Americans that Communists killed over 100 million people in the 20th century and would have killed a great many more but the century ended on time. A reminder that Communism brings with it unimaginable human suffering everywhere it is tried, except for the people at the top, who do quite well, and a reminder that it could happen here too.  This is such an important lesson, that it is too important to leave to public schools to teach.