To the citizens of the United States of America: In light of your failure to nominate competent candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy).
Your new Prime Minister will appoint a governor for America. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:
1. You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up "aluminium" and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you pronounce it. The letter "u" will be reinstated in words such as "favour" and "neighbour". Likewise you will learn to spell "doughnut" without skipping half the letters, and the suffix -ize will be replaced by the suffix -ise.
Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up "vocabulary".
Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noise such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication.
2. There is no such thing as "American English". We'll let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter "u" and the elimination of -ize.
3. You will relearn your original national anthem, "God Save the Queen"
4. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.
5. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not adult enough to be independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to sort things out without using someone or speaking to a therapist then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.
Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler; a permit will be required if you wish to carry one in public.
6. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for your own good. When we show you European cars, you will understand what we mean.
7. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables.
Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humor.
8. The former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline), roughly $10 per US gallon. Get used to it.
9. You will learn to make REAL chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips. and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cuts, fried in animal fat, and dressed it with catsup but with vinegar.
10. The cold tasteless stuff you insists on calling beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and acceptable provenance, will be referred to as Lager. South African beer is also acceptable as they are pound for pound the greatest sporting nation on earth, and it can only be due to the beer. They are also part of British Commonwealth - see what it did for them.
11. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as "good guys". Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie McDowell attempt English dialogue in "Four Weddings and a Funeral" was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater.
12. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies). In the meantime don't try rugby - the South Africans and Kiwis will thrash you, like they regularly thrash us.
13. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is played in only one city outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. You will learn Cricket, and we will let you face the South Africans first, to take the sting out of their deliveries.
14. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad!
15. An official from Her Majesty's Inland Revenue (i.e. tax collector) will be with you shortly to ensure the collection of all monies due (backdated to 1776). Until these are paid, there will be no representative government in the USA, in line with the policy: "No Representation Without Taxation".
16. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 PM with proper cups and saucers (never mugs), and with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes and strawberries in season.
17. Some tea has gone missing, and we expect it back! We will be searching Boston first!
God Save The Queen
John Cleese
2 comments:
This is hilarious...and somewhat true. We really need to be aware and involved in current politics. Oh and I love hearing British people pronounce the word aluminum!
I love it! Ahhhh....roundabouts!
But seriously, I'm not happy about either candidates....Long live the Queen????
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