An apology to QE2
by Pamela White (letters@boulderweekly.com)

Your Majesty, I find myself in the awkward position of having to apologize on behalf of all thinking Americans for the recent irritation you most certainly experienced while visiting our country. You might well have enjoyed yourself more if you'd have come incognito because you would have been able to visit Jamestown, where my ancestors arrived in 1610 after fleeing your ancestors, without having to endure a tiresome state visit with George W. Unfortunately, American women don't wear hats, apart from the occasional baseball cap or 'do-rag, so your millinery would have been a dead giveaway in any case.

I have to admit I was nervous from the moment I heard you were paying us a royal visit. I knew you'd have to spend at least some of that time in the presence of George W, and that worried me. You are a Royal Highness; he is a royal pain in the ass. You are a monarch; he is a moron. You helped your parents inspire your people through World War II; he lied to his people to manipulate us into what could well become World War III. You represent those who live under the Union Jack; he represents the corporations and millionaires who fund him — a union of jack-offs. In other words, there's no way you could reasonably be expected to spend any amount of time in the same room with him without wanting to toss your royal cookies. (That's "biscuits" in the Queen's English, i.e., Your English.)

However, you should know, Madame, that most Americans find him repulsive, too. Any time he's on the news, we hold our breath, wondering how many words he'll mispronounce, how many facts he'll butcher and how many lies he'll tell. We cringe whenever he takes his place on the world stage, hoping someone will bring down the curtain before he has time to act the fool. He's the comedy relief, only he's supposed to be the leader of the free world.

You probably heard the collective groan when George said you'd been present in 1776. That groan turned to mortification when he turned and winked at you. But think of it this way: At least he didn't grope you the way he did German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

After that wink, you must have thought yourself and Britain well rid of us — descendants of your country's religious fanatics, wingnuts and convicts. But there were millions of Americans who found themselves wishing that the Internet joke about Britain revoking our independence in the wake of the 2004 election were true. Many of us would even go so far as to eat kidney pie, drive on the left side of the road and say "lorry" and "petrol" when we mean "truck" and "gasoline" if it meant never having to see his face on the television again.

Not that Great Britain is a paragon of progressive virtues, mind you. If not for PM Tony Blair, who acted as George's enabler on the whole Saddam fiasco, there wouldn't have been a "coalition" and therefore no faŤade of respectability for W's invasion of Iraq. But even when your country's Parliament makes the wrong decision, it's still more interesting to watch than our Congress. In Washington, D.C., you'll never hear anyone say, "The honorable gentleman from Newcastle tells that the honorable gentleman from Liverpool to bugger off."

And that's just one example.

Thank you for taking the time to remember those who were killed at Virginia Tech. That was a gracious gesture for someone who was catching a beatdown — i.e, "taking a drubbing" — in our right-wing media. There are those on the neo-con right who sneered at your visit, cynically asking what all the hoopla was about and reminding Americans that you're not our sovereign. That's true, of course. I don't have to curtsy if and when I meet you face to face; I am free to be rude and to demonstrate my self-indulgent individuality. After all, many patriots died so that we could pay taxes to Washington, D.C., instead of London. It's important to remember that.

But when they call you a figurehead, they're forgetting that George is little more than a figurehead himself. Or maybe he's best described as a sock puppet, given that he only does what Dick Cheney tells him to do.

I find it reassuring that you Brits are a tough lot. This means you'll forget George's buffoonery soon after you return to your tea and scones. After all, you survived the Blitz with your dignity intact — months of nightly bombings that killed an estimated 40,000 and turned much of London into rubble — while we Americans compromised our own principles out of fear after a terrorist attack that killed 3,000 and leveled a few buildings.

Unfortunately, those of us on this side of the pond must endure George W until January 2009. That's a bloody long time. Although we killed lots of Redcoats to get rid of one King George, through our foolishness, we have saddled ourselves with another.

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