Humorous to put it mildly…
A MESSAGE FROM THE QUEEN
To the citizens of the United States of America from Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II,
In light of your failure in recent years 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. (You should look up ‘revocation’ in the Oxford English Dictionary.)
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except North Dakota, which she does not fancy).
Your new Prime Minister, Theresa May, will appoint a Governor for America without the need for further elections.
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. The letter ‘U’ will be reinstated in words such as ‘colour,’ ‘favour,’ ‘labour’ 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’).
2. 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 U.S. English. We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take into account the reinstated letter ‘u” and the elimination of ‘-ize.’
3. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.
4. 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 quite ready to be independent. Guns should only be used for shooting grouse. If you can’t sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist, then you’re not ready to shoot grouse.
5. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. Although a permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.
6. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left side 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.
7. The former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline) of roughly $10/US gallon. Get used to it.
8. 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.
9. 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 the British Commonwealth – see what it did for them. American brands will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat’s Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion.
10. 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 Macdowell attempt English dialect in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one’s ears removed with a cheese grater.
11. 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).
12. 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 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.
13.. You must tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us mad.
14. 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).
15. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 p.m. with proper cups, with saucers, and never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; plus strawberries (with cream) when in season.
God Save the Queen!
And a friend’s response-
Dear Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom,
We are in receipt of your July 4, 2019 notification that you would like to seize the United States and make her citizens subjects of the United Kingdom (hereinafter “Notice”). Your ill-advised Notice hinges on a claim that you have a right to “revoke” American independence and you helpfully suggest that Americans look up the word. We have done so and note that the Oxford English Dictionary properly notes that revocation is the “taking back of what was granted.”
I think that, perhaps, you have been misled by your ministers and that, like many of your countrymen, you labor under the misimpression that the United States is an independent nation because your predecessors granted us our independence and, so, can take it back through a revocation. This is ahistorical and we strongly suspect that the misunderstanding rises from the madness of George III, King of the United Kingdom (hereinafter “George III”), who never did seem to entirely understand the concepts of revolution or freedom.
Prior to our declaration of independence on July 2, 1776, George III sought to levy ruinous taxes and then seize our weapons so that we could not defend ourselves against his tyranny. (We note, with wry amusement, that you feature both goals so prominently in your Notice.) This resulted in a conflict in which former subjects of George III renounced their allegiance to the United Kingdom. They ceased to be subjects of the United Kingdom and its monarchy at that moment and became Americans.
This is apparently a difficult concept for you and your ministers to grasp but our ancestors did not ask for permission to be independent of the United Kingdom. They claimed a right inherent in their humanity, a right given to them by God, to dissolve the relationship between themselves and a tyrannical government. Thus, since George III did not grant the United States her independence, no subsequent United Kingdom sovereign can revoke it.
I trust it is clear to you and your ministers that Americans reject the very premise that there is any grant of permission for you to revoke.
I note too that the United States has possession of a substantial part of North America by right of conquest as well. Plainly stated, we beat you… Twice. George III, not satisfied with having expended the lives and fortunes of his subjects in a ruinous assault on our liberty in the American Revolution, sought war a second time in 1812. Again, our ancestors beat yours and, so, secured for themselves possession of the territory which comprised The United States.
Since your country did not grant the United States her independence, there is nothing to revoke. Since Americans seized United Kingdom territory and have been able to hold it, we possess it by right of conquest. This leaves you and your ministers but one choice if you wish to become sovereign here and that is to take it.
I caution though that the combined might of the British Empire was insufficient to keep American territory in 1775 – 1783 or to take it back in 1812 – 1815. Indeed, the British Empire found World Wars I and II challenging enough to require substantial American aid just to remain an independent nation. Additionally, without U.S. support during the Cold War, it is doubtful that the United Kingdom could have retained its independence and form of government.
Are your ministers entirely certain that they are prepared to seize the United States? From where we stand, even without the world’s strongest standing military, the odds are quite good that the Americans you seek to seize firearms from would pose a substantial bar to accomplishing that end by a military force as small and ill-equipped as that of the United Kingdom.
Finally, your disdain for North Dakota is perplexing. It is, after all, part of the same geographic area as the Canadian provinces which border the state. One must wonder what your Canadian Commonwealth subjects think of your distaste for their country. Perhaps this should not surprise though; after all, George III had similar views of his subjects in North America, and I think you can see how that turned out.
Sincerely,
The United States
h/t Dave S for the humor!
Well — at least there was no offer to allow New Zealand to teach rugby via the All-Blacks.
It’s a shame that it has not been updated to reflect the death of Her Majesty last year but that simply confirms the overall correctness of the post.
If I recall correctly, the War of 1812 was started by your lot…. manipulated into it by the French , who were then attempting to reduce the majority if Europe to an Empire under a single Dictatorship.
Ok, ok…. If I’m taking it too seriously, so is the reply to that obviously humorous “Revocation”. …..
Oh and BTW, the Monarch is never wrong…. Just “poorly advised”
Sometimes spectacularly so.
“George III, not satisfied with having expended the lives and fortunes of his subjects in a ruinous assault on our liberty in the American Revolution, sought war a second time in 1812.”
British warships were stopping American ships and seizing anyone they suspected of being a British deserter, basically anyone they fancied, and pressing them into the Royal Navy. No sovereign nation can allow it’s shipping to be so molested. So, war was declared. And while it went badly at times, the upstart Americans prevailed again.
Actually, yes they could “put up with it”.
It’s called “not harbouring criminals” and “not aiding and abetting crime.”.
A country that wasn’t looking for an excuse to start a war would regard it as a trifling inconvenience.
French dupes.
As for “prevailing”….. you should look at a map. Canada is still there.
So, George would have been ok with American warships boarding British vessels and taking anyone they pleased? I doubt it. As I said, they weren’t taking deserters, they were taking anyone they fancied, and calling them deserters.
As Captain Jack Aubrey said, your ship is your home and by extension, your country. A nation who allows it’s shipping to be molested at will is not a nation at all. Boarding an American ship is no different than landing and searching the streets of Boston.
Humourous or no, her late Majesty had a point, well made in the first paragraph, and perhaps reinforced by His Majesty the King gently leading Mr. Biden away the other day…
Not, mind you, that her late Majesty nor his Majesty the King has been all that well advised lately, either.
God Save the King!
I will also note that the FIRST time the alleged game was called ‘soccer’ was in Britain, and that the name ‘gasoline’ is a word of British invention. What have they against their own ingenuity and invention?
PK- Snort…
Bad- Point!
Peter- She suffers from that ‘affliction’ too? Wow!
Mike- Yep!
Ian- Agreed!
Orvan- No idea!
Jim. Yep… nice little legal fiction.
Everyone knows it, but it allows the machinery to work. 👍
Good thing is, that puts the blame back on the people who can be voted out if office. Which is where it usually belongs.
Peter- Good point! And yes, the elected idjits usually ARE to blame, along with the entrenched bureaucracy!
Agree totally with #8 and #9. #13 was ordered by Lyndon Johnson.
That was great. Was there supposed to be a down side there?
I love this timeline.
Imagine the vast improvement in DRILL and, to be fair, far more veiled corruption in public office. No more “Big Guy,” for example, all that’s decently hidden and quite right too.
And, of course, HRH EII should have ruled the Anglosphere. Philip wasn’t shabby either.