Britain is Repossessing the U.S.A.

---

ROTFLMAO! I love John Cleese.God bless you, John Cleese! Thanks Craig, that just made my day!

cant stop laughing thats great.... er... brilliant

What about Japanese cars :-(And baseball is played in a lot of American nations (America, not the U.S.A. I mean) as well as Japan. Would have been better to talk about Hockey. I don't think any other country apart from the U.S. and Canadia play it; correct me if I'm wrong.

Not written by John Cleese: http://www.snopes.com/politics/satire/revocation.asp

Why did you have to kill my happiness, Ineligible?(It's still funny though, lol)

Rebuttal Quote: SUBJECT : Notice of Revocation of IndependenceTo the citizens of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland:We welcome your concern about our electoral process. It must be exciting for you to see a real Republic in action, even if from a distance. As always we're amused by your quaint belief that you're actually a world power. The sun never sets on the British Empire! Right-o-chum!However, we regretfully have to decline your offer for intervention. On the other hand, it would be amusing to see you attempt to enforce your new policy ( for the 96.3% of you that seem to have forgotten that you have little to no real power). After much deliberation, we have decided to continue our tradition as the longest running democratic republic. It seems that switching to a monarchy is in fact considered a "backwards step" by the majority of the world.To help you rise from your current anachronistic status, we have compiled a series of helpful suggestions we hope you adopt:1. Realize that language is an organic structure, and that you aren't always correct in your pronunciation or spelling. Let's use your "aluminium" example. Sir Humphrey Davy (an Englishman) invented the name "aluminum"(note spelling) for the metal. However, in common usage the name evolved into "aluminum" to match the naming convention of other elements. In 1925 the United States decided to switch back to the original spelling and pronunciation of the word, at which point we dominated the aluminum industry. We'd also like to point out that the process of actually producing aluminum was developed by an American and a Frenchman (not an Englishman).However, we'd like to thank you for the Oxford English Dictionary. It's an interesting collection, considering that over 10,000 of the words in the original edition were submitted by a crazy American civil-war veteran called Dr. William Charles Minor.2. Learn to distinguish the American and Canadian accents, and then we'll talk about the English and Australian accent issue.3. Review your basic arithmetic. (Hint 100-98.85= 1.15 and 100-97.85=2.15)4.If you want English actors as good guys, then make your own movies. Don't rely on us for your modern popular culture. We liked " Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels","Trainspotting", and "The Full Monty". We've also heard good things about this "Billy Elliot". But one good movie a year doesn't exactly make a cultural powerhouse. However, you're doing pretty well with the music, so keep up with the good work on that front.5. It's inefficient to have a national anthem that changes it's title whenever your monarch dies. Let's not forget that your national anthem has an extremely boring tune. We suggest switching to that Rule Brittania ditty, it's toetapping. Or maybe Elton John could adapt "Candle in the Wind" again for you guys. 6. Improve at your national sport. Football? Soccer? This justin: United States gets fourth place in men's soccer at the 2000 Summer Olympics. United Kingdom? Not even close. By the way, impressive showing at Euro 2000. You almost managed to get through the tournament without having your fans start an international incident.7.Learn how to cook. England has some top-notch candy. Salt 'n' Vinegar chips are quite yummy. However, there's a reason why the best food in your country is Indian or Chinese. Your contributions to the culinary arts are soggy beans, warm beer, and spotted dick. Perhaps when you finally realize the French aren't the spawn of satan they'll teach you how to cook.8. Your doing a terrible job at understanding cars. The obvious error is that your drive on the wrong side of the road. A second problem is pricing, it's cheaper to buy a car in Belgium and ship it to England than to buy a car in England. On the other hand, we like Jaguars and Aston Martins. That's why we bought the companies.9. We'll tell you who killed JFK when you apoligize for "Teletubbies".Thank you for your time. You may now return to watching bad Australian soap operas. P.S.-Regarding WW2: You're Welcome.

Originally Posted By: IneligibleNot written by John Cleese: http://www.snopes.com/politics/satire/revocation.asp Well I'm SURE he must have READ it!! And that's good enough for ME!!So there!! GBH - Craig!! PS I hope you're OK.

I trust that her majesty will also address such atrocities to the language as "with regards to" and "PIN number" as well as refering to a club house sandwich as a "triple decker"

The thing I would love for her to address is the recent phenomenon of supposedly "educated" people (usually 30-ish and under) insisting on misusing the pronoun "I".

"I" is a subjective pronoun. It is never to be used as an objective pronoun.

Never EVER say "He gave that to my girlfriend and I."
or
"Everyone's against my friend and I."

Kind of a pet peeve of mine...

Hi damien!! I hope you're OK. Oops!!I mean....ME hope you're OK!! lol Just kidding!!I know exactly what you mean. Another 'thing' that bugs me is how all of us are now referred to as 'guys'. Guys are guys and GIRLS are guys. "Hey you guys....!!" UGH!! How very 'trailer park'.GBH - Craig!!

Damien, I hear ya bother! cripes that is such a simple rule of grammer that is so often forgotten!
Craig, unfortunatly one of the places that English is lacking is gender neutral pronowns. That's why you hear people use the word "they" when they don't know if they are refering to "he" or "she"
That, of course, is incorrect because "they" is plural.
Now, possibly saying "guys" is technically in keeping with the rules of grammer if you consider that the correct default pronown is "he".

On the word they, people don't usually want to say "he or she" in normal speech, so they is used instead. In 50 years, I bet it will be grammatically accepted.Same with in Spanish. When you refer to guys and girls you say "ellos". Although, on the subject I sort of brought up with quotes, I'm always unsure whether to put a comma after or in when just referring to a single word in quotes and not a specific quote (which would have it inside).

A few years ago, I saw the word "themself" in a magazine (instead of "himself or herself", which is awkward).I always take punctuation marks outside quotes.

Originally Posted By: CiderOn the word they, people don't usually want to say "he or she" in normal speech, so they is used instead. In 50 years, I bet it will be grammatically accepted."they" will never be accepted as a singular pronoun. It doesn't make sense.but there again, ignorant abborations of the language do occasionally gain acceptance... like "organic food"

I say it like that to make people annoyed like you :-PProbably should have added "heavily" and "well" to the sentence :-P And here I go forgetting about the movie Miracle :-P

July 4 will always be a holiday in my house, Noone can actually take away your birthday!the great part of that holiday is my 4 year old thinks the parades and fireworks are for his bday, he always wants to know why people are at HIS parade.

Originally Posted By: Ineligible"himself or herself",I always take punctuation marks outside quotes. That's wrong, at least as I was taught (not that I always follow it). Periods and commas always go inside the quotes, question marks it depends._________________________________________________________________ I found this with a quick search.

to be more accurate, you puntuate the quotation within the quotation marks, you punctuate the sentence containing the quotation outside the marks, with the exception of the closing puctuation wich you do not repeat...He said "I love you." on one occasion, "I hate you, I'm leaving." on yet another.ok, that's a bit of a clunky example but you see the point. Wow, this is taxing my memory a bit and I'm generally pretty good with punctuation. (makes up for my spelling issues)

I think there may also be a difference between US and British practice on this. I would myself writeHe said "I love you" on one occasion, "I hate you, I'm leaving" on yet another.Including the full stops (US: periods) in this example doesn't fit the way you would say it.I would writeHe said, "I hate you, I'm leaving".rather thanHe said, "I hate you, I'm leaving."which I think would be the usual US practice, and also common in British writing. But I don't think it anything worth being pedantic over.

very true, I may ve been heavy handed with the periodsall will be made more clear with this explanation of phonetic punctuation