Never under-estimate the British

I think there is a lab somewhere producing these ghastly people.

One even governs the UK.

Here he is holding up a bra for a five-breasted woman.

 

The British public is resisting Cameron's attempts to privatise the health system.

Which shows that the British public has a modicum of good sense.

They probably derive that good sense from their occasional glances across the pond to the health morass that is the American health system.

Health systems run by private enterprise are about what private enterprise cares most about - money. Any health "services" they might deliver (and the US delivers health care on a par with Costa Rica) are just an inconvenient by-product. The NHS is a good system. It does not need Americanisation.

 

In a desperate bid to hold on to power, Clegg is showing how to destroy his party.

It happened in NZ in 1996 when the centre-left NZ First party got into bed with a rightwing government. It was annihilated in a subsequent election (though it has since temporarily risen from the dead after a long burial in the polls).

This will be the fate of the LibDems in the UK.

 

Oh1 Come on now Awryley be fair, he may have been spawned here but we managed to sell him off to the Yanks some time back.

 

And we don't want him back!

 

You already have him back. News Limited owns half your media.

 

It's been a Great time for the British recently .
We stand firm , as all around dither and even fall .
We have cemented ourselves along with Germany as the base countries on which a new EU will develop once the EZ finally collapses when Greece finally officially defaults .
We have a good , strong Coalition Gov't that has defied the Silly Billys who forecast it would collapse in 6 months .
We are extricating ourselves quietly and honourably from the American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan .
And we have the Olympics to look forward to .
The OP is right -- never underestimate the British -- that small island , inhabited by a race that seems to have a whiff of the "Super" about it , and which privately somehow manages to lead the US by the nose to better and fairer paths .
It was good to see Obama recognise Cameron and his team as a world force for Good and an example that this Western Society so badly needs , whilst America struggles to regain its Moral Compass and Humanitarian values .

 

Yep! Trust the Yanks not to keep their word!!

But he is still an American citizen

 

Vassal is the wrong word.......I think (*)(*)(*)(*)(*) is more fitting.

 

And you're joking, right?

 

Why?
Don't you follow current affairs ?

 

Indeed I do.

The average Brit is under assault from the government they were stupid enough to elect.

Even grannies are losing part of their rewards for being grannies.

 

This will come as no surprise to Australians who said a thankful farewell to this guy decades ago. Though his influence still infests their media (just look at Paul Murray).

But it will probably come as a vast surprise to the Americans who adopted him into their greedy embrace.

 

For the benefit of Americans, especially those in far-flung reaches of the Republic like North Dakota and Arkansas who may not know or care, Rupert runs The Wall Street Journal, Fox News, and an equally fiction-generating Hollywood film studio.

They should take notice that he does not amuse The Queen.

 

The point is that the line between "what the public is interested in" and "what's in the public interest" has not been respected.

The former is gossip, the latter is public understanding what its government is up to behind closed doors.

 

Please forward details immediately .
Nobody in the UK has even an inkling of your world exclusive .
Remember to tell us how this country , still with a triple A rating , has under performed versus the US or balance of the larger EU individual state economies -- Germany possibly the one short term exception .
But please hurry .

 

You are clearly not living in Britain. You describe Norway with uncanny accuracy and have obviously survived the Utoya massacre.

When I can take time out of the business of putting America right, I will tell you all about the regulation of the British banking system, British MP taxpayer rip-offs, the sale of public policy to Rupert Murdoch, how to get to see the Queen for a paltry half million pounds, the strenuous efforts to privatise the sacred cow that is the British health system, the "trickle-up" effect in British capitalism, political cronyism, how to supplement your police income from donations by newspaper reporters, how to sell arms to Arabs while pretending to save them from themselves, and the British penchant to fall in love with anything and everything the US decides they should fall in love with.

But I may not bother.

It has just occurred to me that I have just described the Americans.

 

Gotta hand it to the Brits.

They do pomp, pageantry and ceremony like no-one else can. The Diamond Jubilee celebrations were simply outstanding.

And you've gotta hand it to their queen. 60 years in that job would have killed most people long ago.

 

The only way I underestimate the British is to forget that some of them don't realize that America is every brain cell as intelligent as Britain. And 100% as happy. And aside from those Brits, I support Britain 100%. That's where we came from.

Well, I even support those guys in Britain who are so personally insecure, they spend time trying to demean America. But that's only personal insecurity, not typically British.

 

Said heavily laced with irony, I trust!

She may have her sycophants, but I am a person, not her subject.

Celebrating...sixty years of being the country's biggest welfare claimant.

If you believe the media, every person here cannot get enough of the Royal Family.

It's just PR and false represenatation in the media.

Meantime, they never give any voice to anyone that doesn't take a Royalist stance, in some form.

If they do, it tends to be to set them up.

Jack

 

I was talking about what I saw happening in the streets.

We have republicans here too. One day we may ditch the monarchy as titular head of state but it would be a rather pointless move. The British monarchy would still head the Commonwealth of which we are part.

 

What did you see happen in the streets?

 

OK. You got me. The Mall is not a street. It's a supermarket.

 

I have developed a wee thesis.

The British monarchy is a force for whichever political party is in power.

I watched David Cameron lauding the street parties he and others held across the British Isles and the wonders of the British monarchy to unite the country and the Commonwealth. Well, at least in England.

That's bound to give him a few points in the electoral stakes.

 

Indeed, our pomp seems magnificent and while I think the Queen has rarely put a step wrong as head of state, I just cannot get past the fact that the Monachy are born into a position where they cannot "fail". They cannot fall through the cracks, fall on hard times etc... This sets the wrong example. How can we condemn welfare spongers, whilst supporting the monarch, which are a form of welfare professional claimants?

Furthermore, people say "well they bring a lot of money into the country, true, but look at this critically and you'll find a different story. All Brits pay taxes and contribute to the upkeep on the Royal family, tourists come to the UK and predominently spend their money in London, mainly on hotels, which are owned by large chains. Who do the Scots benefit? How do Northerners benefit? In short, the financial side of this is a red herring.

Saying that, under no circumstances would I ever want to take the chance of a person such as GWB or Blair becoming Head of State - I'd take the pragmatic view and keep the royal sponders before that.