Posted on 05/08/2011 9:36:55 AM PDT by annalex
“Listen, strange women lyin’ in ponds distributin’ swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.”
Do you ever read anything that I ping you to?
This is a socio-political discussion and in my opinion does not belong on the Religion Forum in the first place.
The author is anglican. There are Americans of various religious backgrounds with a fascination for royalty.
I personally see no point in a monarchy for the US and also see that it would be logically impossible to create or maintain, hence it's building castles in the air
The monarchy in England is not "defender of Anglicanism", neither are the monarchies in the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark defenders of Calvinism, CAtholicism or Lutheranism.
Monarchs had their role to play but in this age of universal knowledge, opportunity and education, NEW ones do not serve a purpose and would be laughed out of power immediately -- haven't you wondered why Ghaddafi didn't declare himself king when he practically IS? Or Assad? Because no one will accept a new King in this day and age. The time for that is gone.
England, Spain, etc. got kings before WWII. To get one now would be just funny and no one would take it seriously -- not even in ex-Monarchial states like Bulgaria, Romania etc.
“write vacuous books, give million-dollar speeches, cozy up to anyone with money and influence to provide for retirement.”
A lot of the Scandinavian royalties are heavily involved in business and it seems like the British royals are the ones who seem to be the most impractical about making money and earning a living. With the BRF, all of them seem incapable of doing normal work, they still live like Victorian Era aristocrats and royalties.
Another facet of a successful monarchy is marrying the right people for the right reasons, not just political correctness or public relations. It’s not like royal princes and princesses are so unattractive that they are like frogs and there is little in the way of inbreeding as there used to be. Look at some of the new crown princesses and you’ll understand completely.
“A king is annointed to serve by God indeed. That’s bad?”
Kings are also human and have made huge mistakes that have cost many their lives. I don’t see how good kings automatically have perfect heirs; usually, they have failures for heirs.
are you opposed to all forms of Monarchism, irrespective of what religion the person espouses?
“The children of Queen Victoria were a feckless worthless lot - the Czar, the Kaiser and the King.”
It was actually the wives of the Czar and Kaiser that were worthless; Nicholas was a lot more retiring than an autocrat should have been, so his wife stepped in and started to run things (right into the ground) and it was King George V that ended up leaving the Romanov Family to get shot to death by the Communists, interestingly after the Prime Minister offered them (the Russian Imperial Family) asylum.
George V stepped in and prevented it, mainly because at the time he wanted to disassociate himself from his German cousin the Tsarina because of the anti-German antipathy during the first World War. Some family, huh?
And this has occurred over the years, hence all your posts get tinged with the same opinion and are not read by any. If you wish your posts to actually get read by those who disagree and those who agree with them, then some kind of sanity and lack of hate-filled bias in the posts would be a prerequisite.
Good point. Also, Alex, while there have been good kings in the past and yes, a monarchy served it's purpose at a point in time, I humbly submit that now there is no justification for an absolute monarch or even a feudal one. That time is passed
For a constitutional monarch, you can say that it works in the here and now, but where does it work? In countries that already had/have had monarchs or a monarchical tradition. It cannot be put on a country like the US now, it wouldn't be practical even if the majority wanted it.
Stability -- perhaps in the case of established monarchs it works, let's take 3 examples:
The US is more like Belgium (only with much, much more division) than anything else. There is no feasible choice for monarch and it is not a feasible option.
The Kaiser Wilhelm II was also to blame for German involvement in WWI -- he was too eager to be the next Frederick the Great (but I increasingly see WWI as inevitable and good in the way it freed many nations but evil in the number of deaths)
Well, the reasons are population: Norway's population is 5 million, as is Denmarks and Sweden's is 9 million and the UK's is 62 million.
This is quite a change from 1400 when the population of Denmark and Sweden were about 2 million each, Norway's was about 1 million and the UK was 4 (Engl+Wales) + 1.5 (Scotland) = 5.5 million.
the monarchy in the UK is an industry and more a sign of the nation than for the tiny states of Scandanavia.
Before the French Revolution, the idea of a "nation" was that you were ruled by the same government.
Hence in the Rzeczpospolita (the Republic of Poland-Lithuania), there were Poles, Lithuanians, Ruthenians, Jews, Germans, Armenians, etc. all who thought of themselves as citizens of this state
But post the French Revolution, chauvinistic nationalism in Europe spread.
This is obvious in France where regional languages from Breton to the O'il languages of the south were suppressed -- and still are (France does not acknowledge these other languages, yet they preach to everyone else about "tolerance") -- and they tried to make everyone speak and think French
The Russians learnt from them -- until the 1830s, the Russian court spoke French, the heads of the military were Baltic Germans (who spoke their dialect of Germanic) and they had a number of people of various ethnicities in their country who could learn their own languages etc.
But then, learning from the French (and the English), they pushed their language and culture on everyone else.
The Prussians did the same -- imposing standard German and the Prussian culture on all and even going so far as the KulturKampf to eliminate Catholicism (which, ha-ha, backfired badly on Bismarck as it ended up weakening the Union Church the most)
And the English were as bad -- they tried to and nearly succeeded in stamping out Welsh and Gaelic.
This kind of crazy nationalism never acknowledged that there are innumerable "transition regions" -- for example
the nationalism espoused in Europe prior to WWI was NEGATIVE nationalism while the American nationalism both past and present is POSITIVE(as I criticize your religious views as being negative not positive)
What do I mean by this? Americans are glad to be Americans, not glad to NOT be xx or yy (well that may be a secondary impulse but not the primary).
People in France in 1890s were taught to despise Germans for being German etc. etc.
Monarchy: Friend of Monarchs
“”I personally see no point in a monarchy for the US””
There will never be one anyway,dear brother. I am of the opinion and believe a Catholic Monarchy is a better system than we have here if it could applied with Social and Economic Morality as written by Pope Leo XIII and others.
RM,
How is it that Alex M is allowed to post something from Rao in post #117 and I can not even be allowed to rebuff this complex post by posting something from Rao to help understand this topic?
Why is Alex M given special status here on FR above others?
Friend of liberty? I’m sure the Lockerbie bomber would agree.
“”Rao is wrong about American nationalism””
If you really go into the historical depth of this like Rao does- you would find he is not wrong and not an anti american by pointing out certain error
Unfortunately, Rao can not be discussed here on FR because he was judged by snippets posted by others without understanding the broader view
I will send you a few thing by freepmail later today that might help
Valid enough, but again, that’s not even a plausible solution in Europe, sadly. I remember King BAudouin of Belgium who could not stop some legislation he felt was against his faith who had to abdicate and then was brought back. Right now the war is to be led by all of us.
Certainly it is. As outdated as slavery, bond servants and some of the remaining economic slavery schemes of today.
Some of my mother's ancestors were from Finland. Her family never talked about that. Some of the men served in the "White Russian Army" before they were able to immigrate. The decedents were ashamed of that to the point of hiding their Finnish ancestry. Ask a Finn about Russian Domination and subjection. By the way, Finns have a history of being good soldiers, the Russians (Communist) hated and feared them during a stage in WWII.
Free men do not have to ask permission. Serfs (to a king) do.
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