After Christmas sales were bogus.

Nation: Via Instapundit who asked.

MORE BIG SALES EVERYWHERE. That’s happening all over. It’s like Black Friday II. UPDATE: Or are the sales phony?

Phony.

Two hours before the doors were set to open Friday morning, a Miami-area Wal-Mart parking lot was full of cars -- and possibility. But in a Christmas shopping season in which many Americans were unwilling to spend, even a packed lot doesn't always translate into holiday cheer for stores. As stores offered rock-bottom prices and extended return policies, shoppers returned to the malls the day after Christmas. But many were on the hunt for big bargains on specific items or hoping to return unwanted gifts -- not looking to splurge. Brenda Peterson was looking for "flat-out bargains" after driving 35 miles to arrive at a J.C. Penney in Raleigh, N.C., at 5 a.m., a half-hour before the store opened. But she left empty-handed. A toy that she had spotted before Christmas -- a stuffed dog that rolls over and shakes its paw -- was gone. And even sales of up to 60 percent off clothing and other items weren't too enticing. After all, she had seen those sales before Christmas, too. That was a common refrain among shoppers Friday, who appeared to be searching for a deal unlike any they had seen so far this year.

I went to two places that were making news about their sales, J.C. Penny and Sears. Both places among others like Walmart or the local Brandsmart just did not have any sales or just carried over from before Christmas. Put it this way. I got to Penny and Sears around noon. Penny's shirt department was basically spotless and in order. The same goes for Sears though they had some David Taylor stuff for 8 bucks. The malls had people but the parking lots were a lot less empty than before various pre-holiday weekends and the stores were just not crowded.

If you were looking for Christmas decorations and cards for next year you were in luck, but even that stuff wasn't sold out in the afternoon like earlier years.