Free Republic

Perhaps no Prince of Wales in history has been less trusted — or more spied upon — than the boy everyone knew as Bertie. When he attended a military summer camp, at age 19, the future King Edward VII was surrounded by minders: two stern Grenadier officers, a colonel and a general. He even had to share a general’s quarters. Happily, however, they had not thought to lock Bertie’s bedroom window. So, one night, the heir to the throne wriggled out, made a beeline for the camp prostitute — one Nellie Clifden — and triumphantly lost his virginity.

Among the bordellos of Victorian Paris, Le Chabanais was the most exquisite, and the most lavish. Over the years this ‘maison de tolerance’ — the word ‘brothel’ was considered too tawdry — saw visitors as illustrious as Humphrey Bogart, Mae West and Cary Grant. But in the 1880s, one of its principal clients was the future King Edward VII, then known to everyone as ‘Bertie’, the playboy Prince of Wales. Each of the establishment’s 30 rooms had its own theme, such as Moorish, Louis XIV and ancient Roman — but Bertie’s favourite was the Hindu room.

In his acceptance speech for the 1976 Democratic nomination, Jimmy Carter said a memorable phrase: The income tax system, he said, “is a disgrace to the human race.” It is certainly the best rhyme of Carter’s presidency, and it is still apt, because it describes Carter himself to a T. After flunking as president, Jimmy Carter has now become an unalloyed embarassment. As president Carter almost managed to drive the US economy off the road, with the highest combined inflation and unemployment rate in a half century. Even worse, it was Carter who brought Ayatollah Khomeini to power, by refusing...