If I were the sort of person to get offended by things, "Presidents' Day" would offend me. No, wait, listen. Sure, I get bent out of shape about everything, but I don't get "offended." You'll note that to be offended, one must have feelings. I don't have feelings, per se, I just hate everything. Now where was I? Right, Presidents' Day.

Calling this mid-February federal holiday "Presidents' Day" is a convenient way to lump together two of the by-almost-all-measures greatest Presidents in American history. (Taft was the greatest tub of lard, but see, we don't really celebrate that in America, we just live it.) Officially, the holiday is federally recognized as "Washington's Birthday," but it's kind of hard for the celeb-obsessed press to call it that when it falls on such a sexy date as Lincoln's 200th birthday. While both Washington ("Father of Our Country" and definer of the role of the President in the American Experiment) and Lincoln ("Great Emancipator" and the Commander-in-Chief who preserved the Union) are deserving of their own holidays, in most years in most of the country they usually get stuck together in honorary observation as this "Presidents' Day" mess. Unfortunately, that opens the door for losers such as James Buchanan and Warren Harding to join the party. If I were Washington or Lincoln, that'd piss me off. (Of course, that probably wouldn't piss either of them off, which is one of the many, many differences between those two Great Men and a lowly blogger who grits his teeth a lot.)

If it's got to be a Multiple Presidents' Day, couldn't we at least be a little more specific about who exactly we're celebrating? I propose we call it the "Official WaLi-Day of America." This will ensure that Gerald Ford and Calvin Coolidge can't flash their weak credentials to push their way into the spotlight while simultaneously giving the holiday one of those great modern slogans that will endear it to a public accustomed to such ridiculous drivel as "Clean Coal" or "Yes We Can." While I personally like the sound of "Washington and Lincoln Day," it's a little too old-school wordy to sell mylar balloons, greeting cards, and specially colored M&Ms, and that's really the whole point of modern holidays, isn't it?

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