Tea and Vitriol

For the last several years, the media has been paying a God-awful amount of attention to the British monarchy. Brexit, the collapsing economy, the illegal alien issue, the disintegrating social fabric and the political instability of its ruling elites have all taken rear seats to the antics of the costly and anachronistic House of Windsor.  In the last year, the struggling British taxpayer has been stuck footing the bill to fete the Royal Family three times, spending hundreds of millions of pounds during a time of economic hardship. First, there were the festivities surrounding the "Platinum Jubilee" of Queen Elizabeth the Second. Only the video of the Queen taking tea with Paddington Bear was delightful and heartwarming. It was the least expensive of the lot. That quite wore the Queen out, because in barely four months' time she was dead and then there were ten odd days of activities and rituals leading up to her internment. That wasn't cheap either. Today her son wa

Hereditary monarchy is an anachronism, conceived in the mists of a distant, more primitive and more superstitious past. The British monarchy is the ultimate expression of this concept. To me, it is is completely ludicrous. Based on the conquest of a kingdom by a distant ancestor, his descendants have a "right" to rule over the "little people," with whom they have nothing in common. It is a system of inequality, of superior and inferior classes, with the vast majority of the populace being inferior to the hereditary monarchy and aristocracy, since the whole thing is based on the accident of birth, not intelligence or accomplishments. And all the heirs to the throne have to do is wait around until the monarch dies. That is their only purpose in life, the only thing they were born for. The coronation is the ultimate celebration of the concept of monarchy, the zenith of an enforced period of waiting that the heir to the throne must endure. King Charles III, nearly 75 ye

Two hundred and fifty years ago, Americans rejected the British Monarchy, which is why I can't understand the American news media wasting so much time on the antics of one of the monarchy's errant members, Prince Harry, and his American-born wife, mattress actress (Rachel) Meghan Markle. The concept of monarchy and aristocracy is based on social inequality, of superior and inferior classes. The accident of birth determines the status of people born into such a system. And since such royal and aristocratic families considered themselves to be closed clubs to keep their blood pure, extensive intermarriage between cousins, uncles and nieces, and aunts and nephews were not unheard of. In fact, they were downright common. So common that the resultant mental problems and physical deformities that resulted from such inbreeding were merely considered to be the price one paid for having such pure royal or aristocratic blood, and didn't prevent the unfortunate offspring from such uni

Two hundred and fifty years ago, America rejected the British Monarchy. Many of our Founding Fathers felt that we had outgrown it and that hereditary kingship was no longer beneficial to our circumstances, hopes and goals. That the British have chosen to maintain the Monarchy up until the present time is their business, so let them look to it. Unfortunately, Americans are still obsessed with the glitz and glamor the Royal Family still exudes, since they are wrapped in a cocoon of fabulous wealth, privilege and prestige. Supposedly, in our republican and democratic political culture, we have foregone all of that, yet we miss the fairy tale of it all, the rituals, the pageantry and the jewels. Our First Families simply do not compare, nor do the political dynasties our history has brought forth, because they come and go, while the British Monarchy remains. Yet the concept of hereditary monarchy is based on the belief in superior and inferior classes, with the monarch at the top of the he