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.
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: You
should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary.
1. 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 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 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 nancies). 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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