"From his childhood onwards this boy will be surrounded by sycophants and flatterers. In due course, following the precedent which has already been set, he will be sent on a tour of the world and probably rumours of a morganatic marriage alliance will follow, and the end of it will be the country will be called upon to pay the bill"
- Hardie, James Keir (on Monarchy)
It would be truculent of me not to acknowledge the 90 Th. birthday of Prince Philip the Duke of Edinburgh and Queen's Consort so consider it done. We should be thankful that he chose to settle in this island when his own Royal Family business went pear shaped, we should be proud that he chose us right? He has turned doing nothing into an art form and demands that he is given credit for doing whatever it is that he does and we are thus reminded by him that "there is one born every minute" Seemingly normal and reasonably intelligent people still queue at ungodly hours in all kinds of weather to gain a vantage point from which they can catch a fleeting glimpse of him and Betty as they pass by in a big car, why do they do it, what makes people so obsequious, do they in their more lucid moments really believe that there is any value in the charade they see before them? The great American showman P.T. Barnum once said "every crowd has a silver lining" that will have to do for now but, we are being taken for a ride by the greatest scam ever inflicted by one group of people on another , Monarchy.
One cannot but be impressed by Phil's longevity, considering the arduous life he has led; the trials and tribulations; the ruggedness of his daily toil. It is remarkable that he and of course Betty have reached such a grand age. Not only that but they are still able and eager to keep on robbing the public for as much as they can get out of us, say what you will but the word for this has to be devotion, some might say greed; off with their heads! it is nothing short of outstanding commitment to the cause of avarice. When you consider that others such as coal miners; deep sea fishermen; firemen; police; doctors etc. do not manage to live as long despite not having to put up with the harshness of life as a Royal you really have to give your forelock a tug and your hat a doff in their direction, Al Capone, The Krays, Ronnie Biggs; Bonnie & Clyde, sorry but you are amateurs when this firm is in town.
38 comments:
Truculent! You, Councillor? Perish the thought. I always think of you as exemplifying the generous, good-natured bonhomie one always associates with, er, Glasgow and its inhabitants.
Mind you, it's a good job the Royals don't sue for libel!
By David Duff on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 13/06/11
The Royals don’t sue for libel because they don’t want to be cross examined by a republican QC, it would be carnage for them. Can you imagine Phil the Greek, Betty Windsor, The intellectual giants Charles, Andrew, Edward and Anne not to mention the oafish princes Wingco Wilie and Hooray Henry, it would be the greatest entertainment since the Marx brothers in their prime.
Ah, you mean our Queen who served in a lowly capacity as a driver mechanic during the war; and her husband who passed out as top cadet from Dartmouth, earned a Mention in one battle and saved his ship in another; and their son Charles who set up the Prince's Trust which has helped countless thousands of young people (I would suggest probably more than all you Labour lot have ever done); and his brother Andrew who saw action in the Falklands; and their grandson Harry who served in Afghanistan; and his older brother who has to be prepared to steer his helicopter into highly dangerous situations in order to save people's lives.
Now, remind us, Councillor, how, exactly and precisely, have you served your country?
By David Duff on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 16:23
Well I suppose bravery must be in the genes then, the Royal genes that is, breeding always tells doesn’t it.
Go back and read it again and pause at the part where it says “there’s one born every minute” two if we include you.
Councillor,I'm unsure what part of Mr Duff's homage to the House of Windsor you take issue with... are you saying the things he claims, are not true?
Didn't you know?
Terry is an armchair warrior. He will keyboard you to into submission.
blogs were invented for people like him to fight socialist cyber battles but never leaving the comfort of his living room.
He will expand on the joys of the USSR and living in Cuba but never ever facing living there, that's for others to endure.
Sofa soldiers and Armchair anarchists. Gotta luv them/
So the answer to my perfectly polite question "how, exactly and precisely, have you served your country?" is that you have no answer.
Fair enough but we, your loyal readers, will bear that in mind as we read your various diatribes.
Terry,
Never thought you and I would agree on anything, but you have proven me wrong.
Good post.
Alba gu brath
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 14/06/11
Well let’s look at it; during the war the Queen drove a truck for long enough to get her picture taken for propaganda purposes, quite predictable but nothing compared to my mother and my aunts who worked as welders and crane drivers during the war.
A cursory glance at Prince Philip’s naval career shows someone who was nothing out of the ordinary who progressed because of who he was. Charles did not set up anything the Prince’s trust was set up in his name again for propaganda purposes,
Andrew’s Falklands heroics are shrouded in mystery because they don’t want to insult the public’s intelligence by making extravagant claims for him; his stupidity and arrogance are too tangible to claim he has any worthwhile qualities.
Last but not least are the clown princes Harry the hero who was not allowed any closer than 6 miles to the front line but just enough to get “saw action” on his CV and William who has never done anything more daring than fly his workshy brother and him to a stag night in a borrowed helicopter at our expense.
You forgot the bankrupt Prince Edward, he was a dashing Marine, didn’t you know that? his outstanding intellect also got him into Cambridge how could you overlook him? And Princess Ann? Let’s not go there eh? Margaret? The truly awful Queen Mother? Dear me.
I will always remember my late Father’s contempt and laughter as he watched them on the balcony at Buckingham Palace at some ceremony or other weighed down by medals; braid, false swords and fancy hats the balcony almost collapsing with the weight of all that junk. The laughter was because of the farce and the contempt was because he and his brothers and cousins actually served.
There's one born every minute.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 14/06/11
Well I’m getting on a bit I’m 62 and my health is not great but I’m still game enough to let everyone know who I am; what I stand for; and where they can find me. I reckon that makes me a better man than you Gunga Din.
By David Duff on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 12:47
Your question may well be perfectly polite but it doesn’t make any sense. What do you mean by serve your country? I can only imagine that you are referring to some kind of military activity? Like tens of millions of others I have never been in the armed forces, notwithstanding a 2 week stint in the Boy Scouts which I found repulsive, does that count. Does working and paying taxes to featherbed royal parasites for 47 years count?
As HRH had only made Commander when he left yhe Navy, being 'who he was' didn't do him much good.
And clearly, when he was laughing at them on the balcony, your Daddy didn't have you deep knowledge of history, else he would have known about Philip's Mention and that the King had served at Jutland.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 13:28
If you were a more discerning reader you would agree with me more. Please don’t be offended but is Alba Gu Brath some kind of industrial adhesive or something?
"Does working and paying taxes to featherbed royal parasites for 47 years count?"
In a word - no.
You see, you misunderstand the word 'serve' in this context which means to *volunteer* your services to your country in some way which involves anything from discomfort to danger. I don't think heated, hot-air arguments with Scots Nats in the Council Chamber counts, not least because, of course, you get handsomely paid for it. Well, you would, wouldn't you, because trousering money off poor council tax payers is now a well-established socialist practice.
Betcha the Windsor Godfather would also have made a better fist of getting shot of Blair than Brown, Balls and Milliband did!
Those three are more Marx Bros than Marx Militant.
And ignore Mr Duff - you're doing a grand job serving your country by making Labour unelectable.
Terry,
If I was more discerning, I wouldn't be reading your blog in the first place.
Alba gu brath
Dear me, and we were just starting to get along so well together, if it's not an industrial adhesive could it be some kind of drain cleaner? give me a hint.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 15/06/11
The Windsor godfather is a racist ignorant cretinous parasite. “Labour unelectable”? history will no doubt be a closed book to you then?
By David Duff on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 15/06/11
You have a strange understanding of the word serve, you have excluded millions of people with your definition; my bin man is subjected to discomfort and danger every day and he also saves more lives than any member of the armed forces ever could. The handsome payment you refer to is £16,000 per year in my case. Warmongers love idiots like you, you believe any old ‘pony’ they feed you because you are incapable of independent thought.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 15/06/11
It really depends on whether you believe the propaganda that is a constant in all our lives about the monarchy or you don’t and I don’t.
I believe my late father and my late uncles who all fought in the Second World War and they tell a completely different story. Let me give you an example of what this propaganda is really about.
Lyndon Baines Johnson arranged to have himself flown into a combat zone during WW11 he spent very little time there and flew right back out, this allowed him to include the fact that he flew in combat to serve his beloved country and he was de facto a brave patriot on all his political campaigns, he later became President of America.
The Royals are not the only guilty ones but they are no better than LBJ.
Source your LBJ quote for me, Councillor.
But, irrespective of what American politicians did, or did not do, HRH and HM were both at the pointy end, with people throwing large lumps of nastiness at them..... or do you know better?
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 16:07
I read about this in the seventies so I was quite surprised to find reference to it again but if you Google “LBJ’s Silver Star: The Mission That Never Was” you should see the story, strenuously denied of course but it’s quite common practice for people like LBJ and various Royals.
As I said either you buy the whole bill of goods or like me you learn to think for yourself. JFK was another presidential hopeful who came back dripping with medals which are rather mysterious. He also won a Pulitzer Prize for a book “Profiles in Courage” which he almost certainly did not write. Just like the idiot Prince Edward cheating in his exams, remember that? I pity people like you.Prince Andrew's heroic exploits in the Falklands were never detailed because they were categorised as top secret, just how gullible are you?
Kind of you to source the LBJ quote councillor. As I hate to be indebted to anyone, in return,can I suggest you Google Stalin+Katyn Forest?
But, back to the chase, I note you accept that HM and HRH both saw a wee bitty action in the 1st and 2nd World Wars.
Well done you...it takes a big man to admit he got it a**e about,
I do realise facts are, shall we say, incidental to th eopinions you form, Councillor, but here are just a few:
Pronce Philip: After leaving Gordonstoun in 1939, Prince Philip joined the Royal Navy, graduating the next year from the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth, as the top cadet in his course.[18] He was commissioned as a midshipman in January 1940. Philip spent four months on the battleship HMS Ramillies, protecting convoys of the Australian Expeditionary Force in the Indian Ocean, followed by shorter postings on HM Ships Kent, Shropshire and in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). After the invasion of Greece by Italy in October 1940, he was transferred from the Indian Ocean to the battleship HMS Valiant in the Mediterranean Fleet.[19] Amongst other engagements, he was involved in the Battle of Crete, was mentioned in despatches for his service during the Battle of Cape Matapan where he controlled the battleship's searchlights. During the invasion of Sicily, in July 1943, as second in command of HMS Wallace, he saved his ship from a night bomber attack. He devised a plan to launch a raft with smoke floats that successfully distracted the bombers allowing the ship to slip away unnoticed.[20]
Philip was also awarded the Greek War Cross of Valour.[18] Duties of lesser glory included stoking the boilers of the troop transport ship RMS Empress of Russia.[21]
Prince Philip was promoted to sub-lieutenant after a series of courses at Portsmouth in which he gained the top grade in four out of five sections.[22] In June 1942, he was appointed to the V and W class destroyer and flotilla leader, HMS Wallace, which was involved in convoy escort tasks on the east coast of Britain, as well as the allied invasion of Sicily.[20] Promotion to lieutenant followed on 16 July 1942. In October of the same year, at just 21 years of age, he became first lieutenant of HMS Wallace and one of the youngest first lieutenants in the Royal Navy. In 1944, he moved on to the new destroyer, HMS Whelp, where he saw service with the British Pacific Fleet in the 27th Destroyer Flotilla.[23][24] He was present in Tokyo Bay when the instrument of Japanese surrender was signed. In January 1946, Philip returned to the United Kingdom on the Whelp, and was posted as an instructor at HMS Royal Arthur, the Petty Officers' School in Corsham, Wiltshire.[25]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Philip,_Duke_of_Edinburgh#Naval_service
Of course, not a patch on your local dustman who, er, "saves lives" (details, please) but still, not a bad war!
Astonishingly, I almost agree with Terry. The monarchy is a bizarre institution: the last hangover of feudalism. But Terry being Terry, a reasoned criticism of the institution is beyond him. Instead you have a series of personal attacks on individuals-none of whom, I agree, should be within sniffing distance of any political influence simply because they have the right DNA. But you really do paint things in black and white, don't you, Cllr Kelly? Prince Philip did serve courageously in the last war, as did his father. The fact that other people did as well, without the privileges the royals had to return too after the war, doesn't detract from that: because an institution is rotten doesn't mean the individuals involved with it must be too. After all, I'm sure there must have been some decent people involved in running the USSR.
PS, at £16k a year I think you were probably massively overpaid. Don't you think it would have been the right thing to take minimum wage? Mind you, even then....
Oh no. Labour MP's campaign to get Labour backer Alex Fergusson made into a Lord.
Dear me Terry there will soon be only you left un enobled in the peoples party.
Are these more people you dont know who want the knee to the windsors and undermine from within.
Of course Tony Blair, Brown would fly out to whatever killing zone they sent other peoples children to for the action man photo op, requisite sleeves rolled up and fly right out again.
Gordo even had the nerve to be pictured holding a machine gun in a helicopter with a tie on. I am sure they wiped all the Afgani blood off it first.
Labour - all paper principles.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 16/06/11
You have got this wrong, probably deliberately. I am saying that King George and Prince Philip could easily employ the same tactics as LBJ and JFK to make themselves into heroes. Having studied the propaganda that surrounds the Monarchy I have no hesitation in saying IMO that is what is most likely.
As you are no doubt aware I do not normally refer to people’s mistakes but – “Pronce Philip” minus the ‘P’ is so close to a glorious Freudian slip that I can’t ignore it. You could have told me to just Google him and saved time. There is another version of his war exploits which he is too modest to mention. It says that he achieved all that you mention armed only with a rolled up copy of the London Times.
The question is ‘do you believe this stuff’?
This post was far too long make any others shorter or they will not get printed.
You will need to think hard about how the bin man saves lives try thinking about not having him.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 16/06/11
“A reasoned criticism” is it? – unelected power is an affront to democracy, not rocket science is it you pompous clown. “Prince Philip did serve courageously in the last war, as did his father” yes and Prince Andrew, Prince harry and Prince William are brave heroes as well. I believe that the British Monarchy protect their popularity by lies and deceit and I have no reason to exclude Prince Philip in that analysis. I don’t buy his story because I have been watching him for 40 years and I believe along with many others that based on the evidence he would be a danger to himself and his colleagues if he were let loose near dangerous equipment, the story simply doesn’t match the man who is a dangerous fool.
There were lots of decent people around in the USSR that’s why we are here today and perversely why Prince Philip and the rest of the Royal parasites are still here as well.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... on 16/06/11
You don’t understand the Lords and you seem to have written this very late at night.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 10:12
Politicians have always visited troops as have Royalty. If Labour PM’s did not do this the Capitalist Press would slaughter them.
Since all of our armed forces are her Majesty’s why doesn’t she recall them and stop sending them ever again.
Only getting £16k a year and still manage to go on cruises, watch Celtic and have Sky?
Osborne, Darling and Brown are not in the same league when it comes stretching the sterling... get your name down for Chancellor Terry.. you're a class act.
Or could it be you're also stretching the veritie?
Probably because parliament has the power to declare war not the Queen, except of course when Blair did it without parliamentary approval.
Check out the facts Terry more wars since WWII and troops dying fought under warmongering Labour Gov than Tory. Why would that be?
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 14:32
£16k a year as a councillor. I am a rich man apart from that, the cruises cost me nothing, I own the ship. Did you know that we are a 2 dog family as well.
By Anonymous on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 14:53
It’s my own fault I keep forgetting that I shouldn’t try sarcasm or satire on people like you.
It's all above your empty head.
Yes, yes, yes! Councillor Kelly must be enobled. Now, what shall he be called:
Lord Kelly of .....?
I leave it to other, er, admirers of the good Councillor to fill in the blank. I syggest: Lord Kelly of Polmadie which, I am reliably informed is a refuse centre about to be opened in Glasgow and given his huge admiration for dustmen would be entirely appropriate. What better way to celebrate his enoblement than to invite him to open it. He could print off some of his posts and throw them in as part of his contribution to rubbish collection. At the same time he could award DSMs (Dustman Saver Medals) for all those who have saved so many lives as they ride round on the back of their refuse carts.
Can't wait!
By David Duff on PRINCE PHILIP – AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, STILL STAND... at 17:12
I’m guessing that the penny has finally dropped re. The dustmen, don’t worry David we are used to waiting for you. I prefer an honest dustman any day before a Royal shyster. How about Lord Kelly of Balmoral? That has a ring to it.
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