Britain is Repossessing the U.S.A.
A message from John Cleese.
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, Gordon Brown, will appoint a governor for
America without the need for further elections.
Congress and the Senate will be disbanded and a
questionnaire will 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 have
been pronouncing it.
2. 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 will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable
levels. (look up 'vocabulary').
3. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises
such as 'like' and 'you know' is an unacceptable and inefficient
form of communication.
There is no such thing as US English. We
will 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. You will re-
learn 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 suing someone or
speaking to a therapist then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.
6. 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 a vegetable peeler in public.
7. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for
your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand
what
we mean.
8. 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 humour.
9. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been
calling gasoline)-roughly $6/US gallon. Get
used to it.
10. 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 cut, fried in
animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.
11. The cold tasteless stuff you insist 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 accepted
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.
12. 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.
13. 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 n innies). Don't
try Rugby - the South Africans and Kiwis will thrash you, like
they regularly thrash us.
14. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable
to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played
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.
15. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's
been driving us mad.
16. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her
Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition
of all monies due (backdated to 1776).
17. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups, never
mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; strawberries
in season.
God save the Queen.
Only He can.
John Cleese
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