An End To American Influence?

[Mochas]

Some of the people in the Education section currently concerned

about the increasing cultural dominance of the USA, and particularly

about its impact on the purity of the English language, may be

reassured by the following news item:

Message from John Cleese to the Citizens of the USA

In light of your

failure to elect a competent 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 (excepting

Kansas, which she does not

fancy).

Your new prime minister, Tony

Blair, 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. Then

look up aluminium, and check the

pronunciation guide. You will be

amazed at just how wrongly you have been

pronouncing it.

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). 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".

July 4th

will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

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. 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.

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.

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.

The Former USA will adopt

UK prices on petrol (which you have been

calling gasoline) - roughly $6/US

gallon. Get used to it.

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.

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.

American brands will be referred to as

Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all

can be sold without risk of

further confusion.

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 dialogue

in Four Weddings and a Funeral was

an experience akin to having one's

ears removed with a cheese

grater.

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).

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 must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us

mad.

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).

Thank you for your

co-operation.

[JohnM]

I seem to recall that "a person of note" (I forget the name) once took a sip of American beer, put the glass back on the bar and said "Put it back in the horse". Has anyone else heard that story and can you remember who it is atributed to? It came to mind whilst in the US last week, but I couldn't remember who said it and it's driving me mad!

 

[Beryl]

It was

H. Allen Smith,

[Lori]

Mochas - I haven't enjoyed anything so much in ages !  Thanks for posting it.

[JohnM]

[quote user="beryl"]

It was

H. Allen Smith,

[/quote]

Thank you. although I must now confess that I don't know who he is! However, he is soo right, anything that has to have so much chilling to enhance/hide its flavour can not be good!

[Adrian Squires]

I worked with Americans on a base in Yorkshire for many years. One couple on being returned to the USA after a tour of duty here were asked what they thought of their time in the UK and had they visited lots of places. The told me that they arrived in the UK at Mildenhall 3 years previously and after arriving at their accomodation on base had never left. They had never even been into town a mere 5 miles away.

They said they hated Europe and England and couldn't wait to get back to the USA.

 

Says it all really

 

 

Aidy

[powerdesal]

I believe they also had deliveries of American bread and milk flown in

daily from the USA so that they did not get the 'nasty local stuff',

and some people think that Brits in France act strangly where food is

concerned!!!!!!!!

[Suze01]

Thanks Mochas, I really enjoyed reading that.

So, when's it going to happen?  [;)]

[Tresco]

What Mochas posted is very funny, but I don't think we should write our American cousins off just yet.

One of them made this! You can tell by the pronunciation of the word 'vitamin', (turn sound on) but we'll let that be for now.

http://www.wimp.com/guinea/

I promise this is the last time I'll post The Link That Jond[*] Found.

[WJT]

Very funny Mochas and Tresco.

I have met strange people of all nationalities but to use an individual case and then to make a statement of "Says it all really". "Says it all really" of the individual making the statement in my opinion .  Interesting that powerdesal knows these same individuals.

[powerdesal]

WJT,

My apologies for misleading you ( and others), I do not know the

individual family referred to by Adrian Squires, my use of "they" was

related to the US  Airforce as an organisation who fly in food

stuff on a daily basis for their personnel and families who are

stationed in UK and who do not wish to use locally produced goods or

services.

Apogies once more for the 'confusion'

regards

[hkm27uk]

I am new to the forum so hello.  That was brilliant and really wish it was true.

 

 

[le bouffon]

God bless the US of A,without them we would be speaking russian,as one who lived in the states I salute them,and not only for saving europe but the french vines as well.(something the french never speak about)

[Pip]

Spot on Bouff !  The France we enjoy today is greatly due to the many American kids who lost their lives to help set it free.

[Pip]

On a lighter note Mochas - your post creased me up !

[Harley]

Made me smile! Thanks. But, as someone took it onto the track of  WW2, could I ask if I am correct in thinking the USA only became involved in that conflict because the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour and prior to that, they were quite happy to let us get on with it?[8-)] Now before anyone jumps down my throat,  I am actually interested and I am certain that someone on this forum will be more knowledgeable on the subject.[:)] Cheers!

[Tresco]

[IMG]http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i76/twinm/canofworms.jpg[/IMG]

Harley I doubt we''ll ever know the truth but conspiracy theories abound about Pearl Harbour.

That it was not a sneaky unexpected attack; far from it, and it was allowed to happen because FDR wanted a solid reason to get the public and political reaction neccessary to get the USA into the war.

I have no idea how legitimate these theories are. I have tried to research it but I think you'd need to be an expert political/forces historian to be able to sift the evidence for yourself.

[le bouffon]

Think you will find that it was a german sub that sunk an unarmed US ship that got USofA into the european theatre in world war 2,does one take from you snide comments that you would of liked the USA to of stayed out?Just to add I have been to pearl harbour.

[Tresco]

[quote user="le bouffon"] ...does one take from you snide comments that you would of liked the USA to of stayed out? [/quote]

Which poster are you referring to?

[le bouffon]

Does one really need to say dear?

[Pip]

Personally I take my hat off to all our brave forces, of any nationality, who brought this terrible war to an end.  They are to be remembered and revered.

[Tresco]

[quote user="le bouffon"]Does one really need to say dear?[/quote]

Still not sure; as you used the word 'dear' I thought it couldn't possibly apply to me.

If it was me, I refute your claim that I was being 'snidey' entirely. Read my post again, and this time inwardly digest it. It was carefully worded, but there was nothing snide about it. Here's  part of the reason why:

HMS Nelson. Battleship: Mined twice while my father was serving on her.

[IMG]http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i76/twinm/hmsnelson.jpg[/IMG]

Here's another: HMS Manchester: Light Cruiser (my fathers descriptions of this ship don't conjure up the word 'cruiser' to me, but there you go).

[IMG]http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i76/twinm/hmsmanchesterlostthrteenaugninetenn.jpg[/IMG]

Torpedoed early August 1942, off the coast of Tunisia. My father saw and heard his friends dying. (For some reason Royal Marines were always best mates with the 'stokers' ).  My father heard, but was unable to help his friends who died very horrible deaths. Ship ordered to be scuttled by Captain. My father and his surviving comrades were in the sea for 6 hours. Many of them died. Some were picked up by the Italians and spent the rest of the war as POW's. My father was picked up by a friendly ship and returned to active service within days. The ship that picked him up was lost with all hands a few days later.  That's just my dad, just a very small part of the 5 years of that war that he fought. There were other 'conflicts'.  I'll leave the rest of the family out of this.

When I pointed out to Harley that the reasons America entered the war are not clear cut (and may never be in our life-time) I was suggesting that it is an interesting part of history, but that popular conception is not always neccesarily truth. Much of what people seem to believe about Pearl Harbour is based on propaganda films from that period, and their school history lessons. My father told me frequently that what I was taught inschool about WW2, what we saw in films and even documentaries was not true. Some things he only learnt long after the war, when he started going to various reunions.

I have respect for veterans. My father and I argued about just about everything, (as you can imagine, and funnily you and he would probably have got on very well LOL),  but I have always had great respect for what he and millions like him did in active service, on the front line so to speak, and, as Pip said, whatever their nationality.

That doesn't mean I can't be interested in and question the even less savoury aspects of war than the fact that thousands or millions of people die as a result of them.

Dig a little deeper for yourself Le Bouffon. Perhaps ask yourself if the Americans broke the Japanese war code 'purple' in 1940 why the attack on Pearl Harbour was not prevented?. I don't know, and felt I made that clear in my earlier post. Perhaps you can understand the complex documents and arguments better than I can?

Ask yourself if, in the early 1960's the joint chiefs were submitting documents suggesting blowing up a plane full of American Students, or an American military vessel, and making it look like it was the Cubans, why other events - both earlier and later - are not questionable?. Google 'Northwood Operations', you can go all the way back to the Natonal Archives to find the fascmiles of the original documents.

I feel I have made a reasoned response and I won't respond to anything other than one.

I've edited after checking some facts with my brothers (who between them know just about all of it, including the hand to hand combat). My father himself told me very little. Not suitable for girls, yet he taught me to always question it all, because he saw so many lies being told. I wish I had believed him when I was 20. 

 

[le bouffon]

So the code was broken,not all the ships that the japanese thought would be there were,and anyway what could the US of done to stop them,if they had shot the planes down that would of been an act of war.At the time the two sides were still talking was the bombing started.

[Harley]

Firstly apologies to Mochas for turning the direction of their post.  Le Bouffon, if you thought I was being snide, I suggest you read my post again.  It was typed out of a genuine interest.  I didn't take Tresco's post as being snide either, so why should you?  I do however, think that your response was snide....dear![:'(]  Tresco was correct, for my part, in saying that History taught at school is not always comprehensive enough in these subjects.  I wanted to learn about subjects like this but instead we learnt about thing like the Iran/Iraq war.  Thank you Tresco for your input.  I hadn't got as far as conspiracy theories but that just makes it an even more interesting line of discussion.  My Grandparent's lived through and took part in  WW2.  It was not a subject they liked to talk about.  I think it is a period in our history that should never be forgotten and a discussion of it doesn't need to turn into a battleground.

The world today could have been a very different place had not so many people given their lives to ensure that we continued to live in a free and democratic society.  The younger generation who were not there, can only try to imagine what it must have been like.  Terrifying I should think.  They all have my thanks, not just the Americans.[:D]

[le bouffon]

I learnt more about history after I left school all them years ago.As to your last few lines no one could disagree with then,but to infere that the USof A wanted a war is a little silly,that is what I find snidey.