William on Graham Norton

[viques]

Poor Harry. As if his week hasn’t been bad enough he has now had to watch his brother appearing on the best talk show , holding his own, looking comfortable and relaxed, keeping up with the banter, making half decent jokes, telling stories against himself with humour.

Makes Harry’s attempt at tv chatting seem even more uncomfortable.

“Call me William” versus “I am a prince.”

Compare that interview with I’m a prince I am Harry GQ interview.

He came across SO well, he was wonderful, the audience loved him. Robert Irwin is adorable. Earthshot is a fantastic initiative and they are all so passionate about it, love how William never uses Me / I, always the collective ‘we’.

Since the Glorious Revolution, the constitutional monarchy has only continued to exist at the invitation of Parliament. Its powers are all predicated on the ability of MPs, who represent us in Parliament, to remove them from office, which is in turn predicated on our ability to remove MPs from parliament. It’s a cascade of consent to govern from the grassroots up. On paper, at any rate. If a monarch ever used any of its theoretical powers, it would almost certainly be the last day we had a monarchy. Instead, what the monarchy does is turn the PM into a civil servant by giving us an apolitical head of state (so we don’t have to have some one like Trump as our representative on the world stage). And the day to day job of the core royal family is to undertake soft power tasks like receive foreign heads of state and visit the vulnerable. Their ‘engagements’ are largely decided for them by Whitehall (the permanent civil service) on behalf of Parliament. Their engament with relatives who don’t toe the line is also a potentially diplomatic or domestic political issue, so is decided for them.

“The Prince is silent”

So funny

Almost every scandal in public life is preceded by formal denials. Sometimes those denials are true and sometimes not. The denial itself is not evidence either way.

The UK public would be able to choose who we wanted as president. And then choose again if we didn’t like what we picked. Perfectly acceptable risk compared to “you could get a racist/sexist/abusive/lazy monarch and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

We didn't choose Liz Truss or Andy Burnham as PM.
The UK public chose Brexit...

I’ve only seen the bit where he came on, but I cringed hugely when one of the guests curtseyed. What a twit.

I find this such a strange argument. Effectively you’re saying it’s better if the general public aren’t allowed any choice.

I've no idea why she curtseyed! The others didn't cutsey or bow, but I think she was a wee bit under the influence.

What? So that's evidence for the Rose Hanbury affair?

Just watching it now. Prince William is great. Really good fun. Robert Irwin is adorable! I do like Hannah W but she is reminding me of a chat show I saw Lulu on years ago when she just had to insert herself in every guests conversation and I never liked her quite so much after that.

Since the Glorious Revolution, the constitutional monarchy has only continued to exist at the invitation of Parliament. Its powers are all predicated on the ability of MPs, who represent us in Parliament, to remove them from office, which is in turn predicated on our ability to remove MPs from parliament. It’s a cascade of consent to govern from the grassroots up. On paper, at any rate. If a monarch ever used any of its theoretical powers, it would almost certainly be the last day we had a monarchy. Instead, what the monarchy does is turn the PM into a civil servant by giving us an apolitical head of state (so we don’t have to have some one like Trump as our representative on the world stage). And the day to day job of the core royal family is to undertake soft power tasks like receive foreign heads of state and visit the vulnerable. Their ‘engagements’ are largely decided for them by Whitehall (the permanent civil service) on behalf of Parliament. Their engament with relatives who don’t toe the line is also a potentially diplomatic or domestic political issue, so is decided for them

All very well except MPs weren’t able to do a good job of representing us in Parliament as was evident when they tried to seek parliamentary time to discuss AMW which was only eventually offered very grudgingly and fleetingly.

Our unwritten constitution relies on the people in power being well intentioned, honest and law abiding but they are nit scrutinised sufficiently well to ensure that this is the case.

How would the above system have worked if Prince Charles had died in a ski avalanche or polo accident do you think, and AMW became monarch, given that the Institution had covered up his nefarious activities whilst acting as trade envoy for over a decade?

That's your interpretation. All I said is that we get PMs we didn't actually choose. and given a choice, the UK chose to leave the European Union.

Effectively, you read my post and made an assumption.

The Irish are much more sensible politically - i very much doubt the UK public would be voting for presidents with backgrounds in human rights, civil liberties, social justice, poets, academics, lawyers, I just can’t see it here. Agree the lottery of the royal family is bonkers but inclined to stick with them for one last generation if they’re doing a decent job for diplomacy, tourism, and national pride for some.

not scrutinised

That didn’t happen and it had been proven it was a lie put about by someone close the Meghan.

It’s not evidence for the affair, nor is it evidence against an affair. Some people hang on to public denials as evidence that something didn’t happen. History demonstrates this is not the case.

So... nothing. Ok.

She was also desperate to prove how chummy she was with William and kept interrupting so all the attention was on her.

Perfectly summed up.

In a family at the head of our country,

jesus, if we’re looking to the royals for life lessons we’re screwed to hell and back again.

Exactly

Also, would Catherine's sister Pippa have called her daughter Rose if the rumours were true?
Arthur and Grace are named after her other IL's affair partners.

It is pretty wild. If it was a soap opera you’d think it was far fetched.