For the prophecy of BGII:EE to be revealed the following must occur.
- A new Pope to take office. - For a comet to be seen in the ethereal skys. - For Mt Etna to erupt, and pour forth lava. - For the masses to eat upon the flesh of horse. - For a new future monarch to be born.
So we're basically waiting for Kate to get a wriggle on.
For the prophecy of BGII:EE to be revealed the following must occur.
- A new Pope to take office. - For a comet to be seen in the ethereal skys. - For Mt Etna to erupt, and pour forth lava. - For the masses to eat upon the flesh of horse. - For a new future monarch to be born.
So we're basically waiting for Kate to get a wriggle on.
For the prophecy of BGII:EE to be revealed the following must occur.
- A new Pope to take office. - For a comet to be seen in the ethereal skys. - For Mt Etna to erupt, and pour forth lava. - For the masses to eat upon the flesh of horse. - For a new future monarch to be born.
So we're basically waiting for Kate to get a wriggle on.
Off-topic: Can't we just abolish them already? Nothing personal, just the idea of a hereditary monarch acting as unelected head of state and thereby earning free cash for their entire extended family really gets up my nose. They're also exempt from a number of taxes that the rest of us have to pay.
And in return we get a tourist attraction and occasional mock-hysteria when one of them does something stupid/gets married/dies/spawns another royal to perpepuate the cycle. The French probably get as much of a tourist draw to the Guillotine & Revolutionary sites, but that's just me being bloody minded.
*Edit* Rant over. Kings and Queens, Lords and Ladies etc work very well in fantasy settings. I remain unconvinced about their role in a 21st Century Democracy.
As a teacher and a kind of leisurely observer of human behavior. A monarchy takes the battle out of the "I wanna be top dog" crap.
When people claw there way to the top they need to do desperate and stupid things. Leaders around the world are a bunch of nasty individuals, prepared to smile whilst twisting the knife in your guts. Look at the problems in the world due to bad regimes. Evil monarchies? No. Evil Presidents? Yes. Many staying in power due to violence at the ballot box.
Monarchy, the stable kind, is not that great for the monarch. As a monarch your life would now belong to the states. If you try and hide we will find you. You will never have one day to yourself. Your daily activities will be analysed and organised to minute detail. You belong to them. With privilege comes duty.
Lastly, the winner to any such argument... and I do hope your British, name one person of British origin. ONE. Who you would accept as your president.
If you say Tony Blair. I will find you. And I will make a purse from your gonads.
We know there is 1 more character (Likely the mysterious evil female thief, or EFT as I like to call her), and around 200,000 words of new material. This is slightly more than the size of 1.5 ToBs. Beyond these, i don;t think much has been said.
Lastly, the winner to any such argument... and I do hope your British, name one person of British origin. ONE. Who you would accept as your president.
If you say Tony Blair. I will find you. And I will make a purse from your gonads.
george galloway or boris johnson
Galloway would just crawl around doing cat impressions all day. Which actually sounds better than what's currently going on now that I think about it. More amusing and probably considerably less damaging.
Rowan Williams, David Attenborough or Stephen Fry would all make a great British President. How about Judi Dench? She seems both sensible and pleasant. None of them are politicians, but nor is HRH ER II.
As Douglas Adams once pointed out: being President isn't about having power, it's about distracting the public from the real power. The British royal family do a good job of this, it doesn't make me like them though.
Due to terrible narrow mindedness, I do need to mention that a constitutional monarchy with democratic consensus is best. I would take arms if suddenly we returned to the age of sun king and absolute monarchies.
Also, civilised democracy with an elected president, elected fairly, with robust constitutional laws are also good. USA is not hindered by the lack of a monarchy for example... Although the president it seems is treated as if he was a king at times...
Why are people nominating celebrities for the possible post of a British president?
The only person I can think of with the qualifications is Richard Branson.
Boris Johnson would never be president as he is related to royalty... He would lose his chance of becoming king if the 324 hiers to the throne in front of him pop their clogs...
I still don't buy the fact that having a royal family stops people from doing terrible things to gather more power for themselves, especially when you factor in that the royals aren't -really- 'top dog' when it comes down to it. I think we'd be better off with a few less people who are famous for no reason other than being who they are...though that seems to be a common phenomenon in modern (or maybe its not even a new thing...) civilization, monarchy or no.
Also don't buy that monarchy isn't great for the monarch. Sure, being in the public eye brings a host of issues, but there is a reason people strive to be there. The stress of getting gossiped about nonstop and having to keep up a public image pales in comparison to the stress of having to work for a living, hunger, abject poverty, disease, etc. etc.
P.S. Let the record show that it wasn't me (this time) who derailed this thread so horribly! I just hopped on the crazy train and drove it a little further from the tracks.
People who want power are the worst people to be governed by, which is the fundamental reason why no government is ever the friend of its people. At least in a democracy we get the chance to sack the government from time to time, which restrains them from being as bad as they'd be otherwise.
Democratic politics is an extremely competitive game in which nice guys come last, it's stuffed full of back-stabbing power-hungry b@stards because politics attracts such people like flies, and the only way anyone of any party can ever get to the top is by pushing aside all the other back-stabbing power-hungry b@stards by being even more back-stabbing and power-hungry than the rest of them. No matter how broad their smiles, no matter how nice-guy their PR image, the reality behind closed doors is that top politicians in all of the parties are always very driven people indeed, yet all of them have to live a permanent lie to try to look like "normal" people to the voters. If you met any of these people in any normal walk of life, then you'd probably wonder about their sanity, but they have to be like that to succeed in politics because it's so viciously competitive.
Do I want someone like that as a President? Like heck! I'll stick with the Queen, thank you very much. The best thing about (limited, constitutional) monarchy is that it prevents grasping power-hungry politicians from becoming Presidents.
What's the point of having an elected president with no powers? It would simply become a beacon for pointless protest votes.
So if you want a president, they would need to be given some real powers. What would those be? And would this put us in a better position than the current British parliamentary system.
And for some things, I think there are advantages of having people who aren't elected. Unelected people don't need to pander to the latest popularity fads, but can take a more balanced view. Of course on the other hand there is more opportunity for corruption to set in.
Presidents without power do exist. In Germany, for example. And you know what, they're doing basically the same job as the British royal family, only their post is not hereditary. I guess you need both, one leader who does the work and one who leads and represents.
Off-topic: Can't we just abolish them already? Nothing personal, just the idea of a hereditary monarch acting as unelected head of state and thereby earning free cash for their entire extended family really gets up my nose. They're also exempt from a number of taxes that the rest of us have to pay.
And in return we get a tourist attraction and occasional mock-hysteria when one of them does something stupid/gets married/dies/spawns another royal to perpepuate the cycle. The French probably get as much of a tourist draw to the Guillotine & Revolutionary sites, but that's just me being bloody minded.
*Edit* Rant over. Kings and Queens, Lords and Ladies etc work very well in fantasy settings. I remain unconvinced about their role in a 21st Century Democracy.
In theory, the British sovereign does have various "royal prerogative" powers. The constitutional arrangement is that some of those powers are exercised on her behalf by the politicians, but some other powers are not exercised at all. I count it as another advantage of our current system that some powers are held but never exercised, because that slightly limits the scope for politicians and governments to push the rest of us around, and so helps to preserve what remains of our liberty. If we had a President instead, I'd bet that those reserve powers would soon come back into use.
Yes. When can we stop giving monies to governments and start giving money to overhaul?
EDIT: Did anyone see what I did there... I tried to get back on topic... You know... Less about the mild oppression of the peasantry... More about the game...
deltago
Member Posts: 7,811
Comments
- A new Pope to take office.
- For a comet to be seen in the ethereal skys.
- For Mt Etna to erupt, and pour forth lava.
- For the masses to eat upon the flesh of horse.
- For a new future monarch to be born.
So we're basically waiting for Kate to get a wriggle on.
"wriggle."
/snicker
And in return we get a tourist attraction and occasional mock-hysteria when one of them does something stupid/gets married/dies/spawns another royal to perpepuate the cycle. The French probably get as much of a tourist draw to the Guillotine & Revolutionary sites, but that's just me being bloody minded.
*Edit* Rant over. Kings and
Queens, Lords and Ladies etc work very well in fantasy settings. I remain unconvinced about their role in a 21st Century Democracy.
As a teacher and a kind of leisurely observer of human behavior. A monarchy takes the battle out of the "I wanna be top dog" crap.
When people claw there way to the top they need to do desperate and stupid things. Leaders around the world are a bunch of nasty individuals, prepared to smile whilst twisting the knife in your guts. Look at the problems in the world due to bad regimes. Evil monarchies? No. Evil Presidents? Yes. Many staying in power due to violence at the ballot box.
Monarchy, the stable kind, is not that great for the monarch. As a monarch your life would now belong to the states. If you try and hide we will find you. You will never have one day to yourself. Your daily activities will be analysed and organised to minute detail. You belong to them. With privilege comes duty.
Lastly, the winner to any such argument... and I do hope your British, name one person of British origin. ONE. Who you would accept as your president.
If you say Tony Blair. I will find you. And I will make a purse from your gonads.
EDIT: My previous comment on how much the monarchy brings to Britain was totally out. It is £44 billion! Check info here http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/mobileweb/2012/05/27/monarchy-worth-44bn-study-brand-finance_n_1548700.html
As Douglas Adams once pointed out: being President isn't about having power, it's about distracting the public from the real power. The British royal family do a good job of this, it doesn't make me like them though.
Also, civilised democracy with an elected president, elected fairly, with robust constitutional laws are also good. USA is not hindered by the lack of a monarchy for example... Although the president it seems is treated as if he was a king at times...
Why are people nominating celebrities for the possible post of a British president?
The only person I can think of with the qualifications is Richard Branson.
Boris Johnson would never be president as he is related to royalty... He would lose his chance of becoming king if the 324 hiers to the throne in front of him pop their clogs...
Also don't buy that monarchy isn't great for the monarch. Sure, being in the public eye brings a host of issues, but there is a reason people strive to be there. The stress of getting gossiped about nonstop and having to keep up a public image pales in comparison to the stress of having to work for a living, hunger, abject poverty, disease, etc. etc.
P.S. Let the record show that it wasn't me (this time) who derailed this thread so horribly! I just hopped on the crazy train and drove it a little further from the tracks.
People who want power are the worst people to be governed by, which is the fundamental reason why no government is ever the friend of its people. At least in a democracy we get the chance to sack the government from time to time, which restrains them from being as bad as they'd be otherwise.
Democratic politics is an extremely competitive game in which nice guys come last, it's stuffed full of back-stabbing power-hungry b@stards because politics attracts such people like flies, and the only way anyone of any party can ever get to the top is by pushing aside all the other back-stabbing power-hungry b@stards by being even more back-stabbing and power-hungry than the rest of them. No matter how broad their smiles, no matter how nice-guy their PR image, the reality behind closed doors is that top politicians in all of the parties are always very driven people indeed, yet all of them have to live a permanent lie to try to look like "normal" people to the voters. If you met any of these people in any normal walk of life, then you'd probably wonder about their sanity, but they have to be like that to succeed in politics because it's so viciously competitive.
Do I want someone like that as a President? Like heck! I'll stick with the Queen, thank you very much. The best thing about (limited, constitutional) monarchy is that it prevents grasping power-hungry politicians from becoming Presidents.
So if you want a president, they would need to be given some real powers. What would those be? And would this put us in a better position than the current British parliamentary system.
And for some things, I think there are advantages of having people who aren't elected. Unelected people don't need to pander to the latest popularity fads, but can take a more balanced view. Of course on the other hand there is more opportunity for corruption to set in.
^That.
The Royal Family is a cash cow for the UK.
EDIT: Did anyone see what I did there... I tried to get back on topic... You know... Less about the mild oppression of the peasantry... More about the game...