The death of HM Queen Elizabeth II is a great loss for the Realms as well as, of course, HM The King and the other members of the Royal Family. Her commitment to duty was unwavering. That She had a beaming smile as She appointed Her fifteenth and final Prime Minister just two days before Her death does make it a shock - despite Her looking frail and general decline in health these last two years. Determined to the very end.

God save The King.

Unfortunately for all of us, our human societies are never likely again to be served by any public official who possessed the singular devotion to public duty that this woman did ... literally until a scant days before she died. If she sensed that she was dying, she kept it well-concealed as she greeted her latest Prime Minister. (The first of which having been Winston Churchill ...) She gave no clue.

This kind of "dedication to duty" can certainly not now be found among anyone who is prepared to count his or her term of office as, say, "eight years or less."

Even though today's power of the British Monarchy is, as some might say, "a purely symbolic power," perhaps: "symbolism still means everything."

Her Majesty™ bore that power gracefully, and in doing so taught us all what said power actually meant.

"The world shall never see the likes of her again."

I am sorry to hear that anyone has died, regardless of their occupation or status.

I hope that Britain will soon become a republic, and that we won't continue grovelling to a family of hereditary multi-billionaires who were not even elected. Leave that to North Korea. The media coverage and adulation of either of them seems to be the same.

I note that, unlike everyone else, zero inheritance tax will be paid on the billions being inherited, so effectively the public is handing them many many millions like it or not.

At least KC has not got his finger on the Nuke button, unlike KJU.



To anticipate some counter-arguments -

1) France has more tourism, and they are a republic

2) Accounting tricks, and they only started paying some tax a few years ago.

3) We've already got a President, except we call her Prime Minister.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion! In fact there are quite a lot of republicans and semi-republicans in this country too. If they are rather quiet at the moment, that is because they are mostly decent people who don't want to be seen acting in a way that is tasteless and inconsiderate. I was never much of a monarchist myself – my parents belonged to the Old Left (a very different thing from the modern woke left) and raised me in that tradition – but I have gradually come to believe that the English version of monarchy is what Churchill described democracy as being: a poor option but still better than all the others.

If you don't have a monarch, you must either have an executive president or a "stuffed shirt" non-executive one with a prime minister, essentially the British system without the hereditary element. An executive presidency is usually a disaster. It allows a party politician to exploit patriotism to promote his own agenda. Think of Nixon or Trump. Or Macron for that matter. I would definitely not like to have that arrogant little turkey cock representing my nation. And they are the "good" end of the spectrum. At the other end, you have Putin, Xi and Kim.

On the other hand, a non-executive president is usually an ex politician and therefore unable to incarnate the country in a way that gives people a sense of national pride. Occasionally a country will have a revered cultural figure such as a great poet who will make a good ceremonial head of state, but it doesn't often happen.

If you have a monarch as the head of the armed forces, you won't have military coups. If you have a monarch as chief national symbol, you won't have ambitious and unscrupulous politicians usurping that role. And if you have a hereditary monarch, you won't have an ex-politician in that role either. All politicians lie; I've never known one who didn't! Is that really the kind of person you want to have as a national symbol?

Despite the North American spelling in his name and given his post, I rather think he is one of our republicans.

I shall resist commenting on the merits of monarchical vs republican government as that will no doubt further politicise this thread. And as it is necessarily a comparative exercise among countries, it risks offending others who are not my compatriots and may be seen as an attack on the dignity of their states, which is very much not what I wish to do.

The last time I looked, King Charles was paying 30% of the income from the duchy of Cornwall to the Treasury and he'll now be paying 85% from the duchy of Lancashire. I wonder how much tax our grumpy republican pays?

As I said, we've already got a president, we don't need another. I believe there is or was a deputy PM also.

Zero tax is being paid on the billions being inherited. A shocking disgrace.

KC is also getting paid £24 million a year of tax-payers money. (Over $27 million.) Doubtless someone will quibble and say some of this is for the upkeep of his palaces.

In 1022 we were ruled by a non-elected non-tax-paying multi-billionaire-equivalent family. One thousand years later, we are still gullible enough to have another family doing the same thing, even if they have learnt some celebrity charm over the centuries.

Top marks to Megan for telling Ginger to leave the Family and go and live in a republic.

And sorry about my ignorant spelling mistake.

Imagine that the Kardashians, the Trumps, or even the Osbornes had declared themselves royalty.

They then tell us that we must pay them £24 million every year for the upkeep of them and their property, that this must be handed down in perpetuity to their descendants, with them being always exempt from paying any inheritance tax on their many billions, and that they are entitled to use accounting tricks to reduce their apparent wealth and incomes, and paying a token amount of income tax on what's left is their choice.

They also stipulate that the media and the public must create many hours and many pages of favourable and adoring publicity.

In return, they promise to rubber-stamp all the legislation that comes from parliament, and award baubles to some deserving people but also to their supporters and helpers.

Obviously if they tried this they would quickly and impolitely be told to go away, and yet the Windsors have just done the above for another generation. Why are people so gullible? Probably due to receiving a lifetime of propaganda.

Even though the royals have been surrounded by sycophantic flunkies since birth, they still must have an inkling of what suckers the public are. It is said they call themselves "the firm". I cannot blame them for not wanting to give up their billionaire lifestyles particularly as people are daft enough to give it to them.

(Just think of how many multi-billions the unpaid back taxes plus interest would be. There used to be protests about big companies underpaying tax, but not a peep about the Windsors).

They go on as many holidays and outings as they like. If people turned out to cheer me and give me the best of everything, I'd be doing them almost non-stop.

Does anyone seriously believe that they are divine beings any more?

Not exactly what happens though. It is because of the agreement negotiated with Queen Vic, when she handed over a bunch of the crowns property to the state. Power was also handed over to a parliament. In return they get an allowance from the state. I don't recall how much the crown turned over to the state, but it was a bunch.

The British crown is a figure head. Head of state yes. They don't have a lot of lawful power. The one power that they still have is the ability to fire parliament. George VI did that right after the war. They aren't suppose to take sides. Not openly anyway.

A monarchy in this day and age is debatable. But I always though QE2 to be a class act. A woman of duty. Impeccable manners. Unlike some of the younger family members.

I would very much like to hear how the new King would personally inherit such values; Buckingham Palace, to take one example, is not the property of the monarch, but of the Crown. That makes Charles the resident governor of the place, not the proprietor. The two properties known to belong to Elizabeth personally, were Balmoral (in Scotland) and that place in Norfolk I currently can't remember the name of.

More generally, by the way, I sometimes get curious as to why some people are so very interested in what other people own or earn... Why on earth would I be interested in what some other person has, when it is my income and property that is what I can do anything about ?

Windsor. The castle that Bertie(EdwardVII) named the family after. Their name was Coburg-Saxe-Goetha, from Albert, Queen Vics husband(Her cousin). After the war(WWI) anti German sentiment was high, so they renamed themselves.

They had another castle, Queen ElizabethII said is was too costly to maintain so they sold it. Not Sandringham House, or Clarence house, or Kensington Palace, or St. James Palace, or Frogmore,

I'll have to look for the name of that, forgot.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List...yal_residences

They weren't short for places to sit.

Suppose to be rude to ask the crown what they may be worth, just not done. Some value the crowns assets at between 600 Million to a Billion pounds. In fact, QE2 may have been the richest woman on earth.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_monarchs
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fami...h_royal_family
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Windsor
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_monarchs

Fascinating study, the English, United Kingdom, British monarchy.

It would have been rather pointless at that, as the Crown is a collection of legal rights (including property) of which the monarch is the trustee, not the owner. Hence, Elizabeth never actually OWNED Buckingham Palace...

ELIZABETH II
CHARLES III
--------------
WILLIAM IV
GEORGIE V

Right?

Not quite. It will be William V. William IV was Queen Victoria's uncle. And William's son (if we still have a monarchy!!) will be George VII.