Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.The Grinch stole Christmas back in the days of innocence, but today climate change and sexual alarmism are doing just as good a job as Dr Seuss's mean critter.
A combination of freak weather and public paranoia about paedophiles means that this year American children will have to forego two traditional staples of their festive season – pumpkin pie and proper messages from Santa.
The US Postal Service has decided to end the heart-warming practice, first adopted in 1954, of forwarding letters addressed to "Father Christmas, The North Pole," to a remote town in Alaska called North Pole, where teams of volunteers send back individual replies, in envelopes carrying the local postmark. It's all because last year an "Operation Santa" volunteer was identified as a convicted paedophile. All "Father Christmas" replies will now be written by specially screened volunteers, in the region where they were originally posted.
In North Pole, where the streets have names like Santa Claus Lane, the locals are livid. "It's Grinch-like," declared Mayor Doug Isaacson, who noted that in 55 years the programme had never resulted in a single known case of child abuse.
Meanwhile, families gearing up for Thanksgiving next Thursday are facing grim news: a severe shortage of canned pumpkin, the major ingredient of pumpkin pie. Nestlé, which makes 80 per cent of the nation's stocks, says that freak rains in the Midwest meant farmers were unable to harvest the majority of their crops.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments