Schon'n bissel älter aber egal.... ich fand's loostich!
| JOHN CLEESE'S LETTER TO AMERICA
| May 19, 2006|
| ----
|
| To the citizens of the United States of America:
|
| 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 other
| 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:
|
| 1. 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 'colour', '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." You will learn that the
| suffix 'burgh' is pronounced 'burra'; you may elect to respell
| Pittsburgh as 'Pittsberg' if you find you simply can't cope
| with correct pronunciation. 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.
|
| 2. 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."
|
| 3. You will relearn your original national anthem, "God Save
| The Queen", but only after fully carrying out Task #1 (see
| above).
|
| 4. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.
| November 2nd will be a new national holiday, but to be
| celebrated only in England. It will be called "Come-Uppance
| Day."
|
| 5. 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.
|
| 6. 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.
|
| 7. 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
| immediately and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both
| roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the
| British sense of humour.
|
| 8. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you
| have been calling "gasoline") -roughly $6/US gallon. Get used
| to it.
|
| 9. 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
| mayonnaise but with vinegar.
|
| 10. Waiters and waitresses will be trained to be more
| aggressive with customers.
|
| 11. 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.
|
| 12. 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.
|
| 13. 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, will 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.
|
| 14. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.
|
| 15. 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.
|
| John Cleese
