Center for Consumer Freedom

For most of us, Christmas is a time for ice-skating, caroling, tree-trimming, and sipping eggnog with the family. But the Center for Consumer Freedom urges you to be cautious when leaving those cookies out for Santa. This is an age in which health activists lurk around every corner, just waiting to use the premise of obesity to launch devastating lawsuits against restaurants and food companies. And perhaps Santa's helpers.

John "Sue the Bastards" Banzhaf, for instance, has admitted that greedy trial lawyers will keep trying until they find the right "victim":

"Is it a shoo-in? No ... But if we pick our plaintiffs carefully, the guy who eats there every day, we can make our cases stick."

Banzhaf, you may remember, was a legal advisor to obese New York resident Caesar Barber, who sued four fast-food chains for supposedly making him fat. And at a 2004 conference, the Center for Science in the Public Interest's litigation director Steven Gardner gave a lecture titled: "Patience, hell. Let's sue somebody."

So before St. Nick makes his way down your chimney and indulges, make sure you leave out our official Christmas Cookie Liability And Indemnification Agreement (notary not required).  It includes 7 levels of legal protection against being pulled into court, on the basis of:

1. Failure to provide nutrition information and a list of ingredients (the “Grandma’s secret recipe” clause);
2. Failure to caution of the potential for overeating because cookies taste “yummy” and are provided at no cost;
3. Failure to advise that walking, biking, and jogging will shed pounds, but riding around on a reindeer-powered sleigh will not;
4. Failure to warn that Christmas lights, lawn ornaments (plastic reindeer, snowmen, etc.) and other holiday decorations may constitute manipulative marketing to lure Santa into over-consumption;
5. Failure to offer “healthier” cookie alternatives (e.g., tofu bars, carob blobs, or carrot sticks);
6. Failure to affix warning label acknowledging that milk, should it be provided, must not be consumed if Santa is, or could possible be, lactose intolerant; or
7. Failure to notify that eating too many cookies may lead to even greater levels of obesity.

Ho! Ho! Ho! ... Have a Merry Christmas (In moderation, of course)!