Is there anything this woman can't do?
Queen Lizzie awarded good behaviour medal
Her Britannic Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second has been awarded the Long Service and Good Conduct medal for 65 years' military service without a criminal record. The news of Her Maj's gong, along with a similar one for her hubby Prince Philip, was rolled out in a government statement. Previously awarded to non-commissioned …
COMMENTS
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 10:57 GMT S4qFBxkFFg
"precipitate a constitutional crisis"
Excellent things, constitutional crises - they make for amusing new articles as the hacks get flustered over things that will affect them little, and their readers even less. Also, it keeps MPs and Lords busy instead of them trying to fill their time by passing unwanted and unnecessary legislation.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 11:49 GMT AndyS
Actually I suspect a constitutional crisis consisting of the monarch attempting to sack the government would, in fact, impact our daily lives quite significantly. Who knows how - most likely there would be a very severe recession (perhaps even making the pending Brexit mess look like a cake walk). It would certainly be more, uh, entertaining than "Does the media have a right to see Prince Charles' letters," for example.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 23:05 GMT Pompous Git
Technically it was the Governor-General, but he did so under advice from Her Maj.
Her Maj is not the CIA!
On 11 November 1975* Whitlam intended to inform parliament about the CIA's undermining his government. He was summoned by Sir John Kerr who used his vice-regal “reserve powers” to sack Australia's democratically elected prime minister. The USA's “Whitlam problem” was solved. Australian politics never recovered, nor have we regained our independence. (Hence the link to the drover's dog song the other day).
NB I am fully aware that Pilger appears congenitally unable to say or write anything positive about the USA, but that does not mean everything he writes is wrong.
* Remembrance Day. Whitlam exhorted us to never forget. Some of us haven't.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 07:59 GMT Afernie
Ah yes. More confirmed kills than anyone else
I remember well her first engagement as a scared young rookie in Korea, stalking silently on patrol through the jungle during the Malayan Emergency, hitting Argentine positions around Stanley in her Harrier.
Aww. It turns out that was just the alternative version in my head...
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 10:58 GMT Flocke Kroes
laws that forbid mocking Our Royal Overseers
We have plenty of laws against free speech, especially on the internet, as we were recently reminded by TheRegister. If anyone can read May's web site without throwing up, it would be interesting to check if it fits the crown persecution service's guidelines for hate speech.
IIRC, there was a law against insulting the Prince of Wales' girlfriend that came with a death sentence, but I can longer find any evidence of it. For the time being, you can still commit arson in the royal dockyards and soldiers can mutiny in time of war without getting hanged or beheaded or shot.
Various laws removed the death sentence from the UK, including the 6th and 13 protocol of the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act 1998. Theresa may has said "The Human Rights Acts needs to go". Shortly afterwards I am sure the Motion Picture Ass of America will bring back the death sentence for piracy.
(On a lighter note, I am looking forward to Liz 10.)
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 12:28 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Ah yes. More confirmed kills than anyone else
don't we have laws that forbid and punish plebs mocking Our Royal Overseers yet?!
1 - you clearly haven't yet caught on to the British sense of humour
2 - she is rumoured to be far more capable than you can imagine
3 - if you were really overdoing it, I think it is unlikely they would drag your plebish rear end into court. Instead, you'd probably get a visit from a couple of very fit people with a preference for dark clothes..
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 11:28 GMT I ain't Spartacus
Re: Ah yes. More confirmed kills than anyone else
To be fair Philip probably had enough frontline action for both of them.
But you don't know that the Queen isn't secretly in the SAS - and that's why they had to put that bit in the Olympic opening ceremony, as part of the cover story. Hiding it in plain sight.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 12:07 GMT PatientOne
Re: Ah yes. More confirmed kills than anyone else
You might want to check out what she did during WWII.
"After months of begging her father to let his heir pitch in, Elizabeth—then an 18-year-old princess—joined the Women’s Auxiliary Territorial Service during World War II. Known as Second Subaltern Elizabeth Windsor, she donned a pair of coveralls and trained in London as a mechanic and military truck driver. The queen remains the only female member of the royal family to have entered the armed forces and is the only living head of state who served in World War II."
So she wasn't really a rookie by the time the Korian conflict came around. But she clearly had you fooled :p
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 12:12 GMT Dan Wilkie
Re: Ah yes. More confirmed kills than anyone else
Was going to say the exact same thing.
Also for the most part, Officers aren't known for their high number of confirmed kills. If they're going round slotting something they're not busy doing officer-y type things. Which I presume are cocktail parties, or Kayak-Flaregun-Duels or whatever it is that they do.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 18:04 GMT Afernie
Re: Ah yes. More confirmed kills than anyone else
"The chronology is off by several years. She served in the Territorial Army in WW2 as a driver and car mechanic."
Ah, yes but she wasn't the QUEEN back then, now was she? Anyway, we're saving all that stuff for the Prequel. Celebrity carpool greasemonkey by day, SOE triggerwoman by night.
Few are aware that after the Battle of the Hook, when the 1st Bat. (Duke of Wellington's Regiment) fired red white and blue smoke at Chinese lines to mark the Coronation, it was actually Lizzie herself behind the gunsights. That lassie in the ermine? Actor. Didn't even look like her. True fact.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 09:30 GMT Anonymous Coward
Wellington quote
I think he had more than a long service medal.
Field punishment, inc flogging. And the commanders seem to think it worked except for a few hard cases
http://www.napoleon-series.org/military/organization/Britain/Miscellaneous/c_militaryjusticeinquiry.html
That Nosey quote in full
"The French system of conscription brings together a fair sample of all classes; ours is composed of the scum of the Earth—the mere scum of the Earth. It is only wonderful that we should be able to make so much out of them afterward. The English soldiers are fellows who have enlisted for drink—that is the plain fact—they have all enlisted for drink."
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 12:37 GMT Vincent Ballard
Not getting caught
Or if you get caught, knowing the regulations well. My grandad's war memoir includes an episode from 1946, in the British Army of Occupation on the Rhine, where as acting captain his duties included judging courts martial one week a month. I quote:
One of the few Army offences we heard concerned a Company Serjeant Major. He was charged with being improperly dressed.
The Prosecuting Officer outlining the case said - The CSM had been seen chasing an ATS Private across camp. The CSM and the ATS were both stark naked.
The CSM pleaded NOT GUILTY, - He agreed with the Prosecutor's statement of events, and submitted that "He had been dressed in accordance with KRR (King's Rules & Regulations) No 2352 of 1942 - Dress Sports for the Use Of - which says - "All ranks shall be appropriately dressed for the Sport in which they are engaged".
The case was dismissed.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 10:34 GMT Teiwaz
Missed cue.
This is what passes for publicity by the Buckingham Palace bureaucracy these days?
Obviously one of the younger Royal doxys failed to have a baby on cue so they had to go to plan B and reach for a medal she could qualify to receive and had not yet been awarded.
Couldn't they have had Harry dress up as a Nazi again? As publicity stunts go, this is pretty weak.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 11:51 GMT scrubber
Commander in chief
As head of the armed forces hasn't she sent "our boys" off to illegal wars to commit war crimes without so much as a frown?
And in nonmilitary terms why hasn't she ever stood up for her subjects and refused to sign any bill that stripped our historic rights?
She's a waste of space and the institution is a national embarrassment for a so called modern democracy.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 12:37 GMT Hans 1
Re: Commander in chief
>She's a waste of space and the institution is a national embarrassment for a so called modern democracy.
Come on, she is the crown attraction of London zoo. Mind, all the tourists see are her serfs dressed-up like prima donnas, but it works, they all come in the hope of seeing a medieval head of state.
Upvoted, but I disagree with her interfering with politics, shit, I would force her to step down immediately, dismiss all her mates in the house of hereditary lard, while we are at it and organize a presidential and general election for both houses ... you know, to achieve some form of democratic government, with an elected head of state.
One prime minister with one elected chamber is NOT enough, you have no counter balance, and the house of hereditary lard is undemocratic, so does not count.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 15:15 GMT Pompous Git
Re: Commander in chief
I would force her to step down immediately, dismiss all her mates in the house of hereditary lard, while we are at it and organize a presidential and general election for both houses ... you know, to achieve some form of democratic government, with an elected head of state.
So you could choose between a Hildebeast and a Donald? Are you a full-time idiot, or is it just a hobby?
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 16:39 GMT Pompous Git
Re: Commander in chief
Would May and Farage serve to fill those roles?
I am assuming that question is rhetorical. It would be difficult to find a more competent head of state, elected, or constitutional, than Queen Elizabeth. I have a very good and close friend whose wife is a communist and a monarchist purely on the basis of her admiration for our head of state. Dare I say it? She is without peer.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 21:25 GMT Kurt Meyer
Re: Commander in chief
@ Pompous Git
"I am assuming that question is rhetorical."
No,no,no, nothing of the sort! No seriousness intended or implied!
I meant it as a good-natured jibe towards a fellow who'd (perhaps inadvertently), introduced two names into a thread where I least expected to see them.
Mea culpa, Mea culpa, Mea maxima culpa.
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Thursday 13th October 2016 09:00 GMT Phil O'Sophical
Re: Commander in chief
I would force her to step down immediately, dismiss all her mates in the house of hereditary lard, while we are at it and organize a presidential and general election for both houses ... you know, to achieve some form of democratic government, with an elected head of state.
Ah, you mean like in the USA at the moment?
Would you really have wanted a President Blair? Or some equivalent to Trump or Clinton?
There's a lot to be said for having a second house that isn't elected, and so doesn't have to consider every decision in terms of "will I get re-elected if I do the right thing?", as a review body.
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 20:55 GMT Fruit and Nutcase
Re: Commander in chief
@scrubber
She's a waste of space and the institution is a national embarrassment for a so called modern democracy.
What's the alternative? Some politician as head of state? Tony (& Cherie) Blair?
(Actually, Ireland has this time got a decent person in Michael D. Higgins as President)
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 23:25 GMT scrubber
Re: Commander in chief
"What's the alternative?" [to an hereditary head of state]
Why are people so bloody unimaginative?
Selection at random, like jury duty.
A TV show called I'm a monarch get me out of here.
A cage fight.
Pistols at dawn.
Musical chairs.
A bake off.
Who cares? But it would be nice if the public has some say in, you know, a democracy.
It would also be nice if they could exercise their constitutionally granted powers without creating a constitutional crisis. Then perhaps Blair's massive mandate to smash our rights with 40% of the vote would not have happened.
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Thursday 13th October 2016 00:46 GMT Pompous Git
Re: Commander in chief
Who cares? But it would be nice if the public has some say in, you know, a democracy.
Dunno about the UKLand situation; I'm a bit parochial. In Australia at least we see the role of the Head of State (Her Elizabethness, Queen of Australia) to be the chief public representative of the state. That is she is there to act in our interests when they conflict with an elected government's wilful disregard of the Constitution. A hereditary monarch is trained from childhood for the role.*
You appear to be suggesting that the role is quite trivial and can be undertaken by any random idiot. I do not for one instant believe that to be so.
* It is a role that not all would wish to undertake. Cf Edward VIII.
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Thursday 13th October 2016 14:30 GMT scrubber
Re: Commander in chief
No, I am suggesting, among other things, that she has never undertaken this constitutional rile that she was trained from childhood to fulfil. Others are suggesting that should she ever do so it would trigger a constitutional crisis that would take down the monarchy. I am then left asking: if she won't, and can't, perform her supposed duty, then what is the fucking point of the position of monarch? And perhaps some oil chosen by lottery would be less deferential.to the political classes, especially since their position, and that of their family, is not dependent on the largess of the already privileged using public money.
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Thursday 13th October 2016 16:21 GMT Phil O'Sophical
Re: Commander in chief
No, I am suggesting, among other things, that she has never undertaken this constitutional rile that she was trained from childhood to fulfil.
No UK leader has given the order to launch a nuclear strike either, does that mean they've all failed and should be removed?
The important thing about having great executive power is to organize things so that it never needs to be used. That is why she meets regularly with her prime minister, and why all new parliamentary sessions start with her speech. She hasn't done anything which triggers a crisis, because she hasn't had to. That's how it should be.
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Thursday 13th October 2016 08:57 GMT Phil O'Sophical
Re: Commander in chief
And in nonmilitary terms why hasn't she ever stood up for her subjects and refused to sign any bill that stripped our historic rights?
Those bills only get to her after passing through Parliament, and since we (for good or bad) elect the members of the House of Commons, there is a presumption that we have presented those bills. The House of Lords is there to push things they feel are unconstitiutional to the Commons for review. At the end of the day if HRH did refuse the Royal Assent it would effectively mean she was refusing the advice of the people we elected, and would prompt a constitutional crisis. The last time that happened we eventually ended up at war with the American colonies...
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Wednesday 12th October 2016 22:18 GMT Kurt Meyer
Re: republicans
@ disgustedoftunbridgewells
"Who's Australian?"
The Pompous Git. I was attempting to give him some gentle ribbing over his mention of (looks around) "a Hildebeast and a Donald?" in one of the few threads that had been mercifully free of their presence.
Your part was contained in the phrase "the disgusting republican posts", and yes, I do recognize the difference between a republican and a Republican.
To recap this two act play:
The Pompous Git played the part of -
"The irresponsible Aussie."
You played the part of -
"The innocent bystander."
And I played the part of -
"The fellow who's calls are not returned by the local comedy clubs."
I hope this goes some way toward answering your question.
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Thursday 13th October 2016 22:40 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: republicans
"[...] how come no country not already brainwashed into it is looking to have Liz adopt them?"
Countries with no prior relationship to Britain's rule have joined since the eligibility criteria were changed viz Mozambique (Portugese) 1995, Rwanda (French) 2009
Other countries have expressed some interest for whatever reason they felt would benefit them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Nations_membership_criteria#Eligible_states
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