Sixty Joyless De-Britished Uncrowned Commonpoor Years (1949-2009)

Elizabeth II Vice-Regal Saint: Remembering Paul Comtois (1895–1966), Lt.-Governor of Québec
Britannic Inheritance: Britain's proud legacy. What legacy will America leave?
English Debate: Daniel Hannan revels in making mince meat of Gordon Brown
Crazy Canucks: British MP banned from Canada on national security grounds
Happy St. Patrick's: Will Ireland ever return to the Commonwealth?
Voyage Through the Commonwealth: World cruise around the faded bits of pink.
No Queen for the Green: The Green Party of Canada votes to dispense with monarchy.
"Sir Edward Kennedy": The Queen has awarded the senator an honorary Knighthood.
President Obama: Hates Britain, but is keen to meet the Queen?
The Princess Royal: Princess Anne "outstanding" in Australia.
H.M.S. Victory: In 1744, 1000 sailors went down with a cargo of gold.
Queen's Commonwealth: Britain is letting the Commonwealth die.
Justice Kirby: His support for monarchy almost lost him appointment to High Court
Royal Military Academy: Sandhurst abolishes the Apostles' Creed.
Air Marshal Alec Maisner, R.I.P. Half Polish, half German and 100% British.
Cherie Blair: Not a vain, self regarding, shallow thinking viper after all.
Harry Potter: Celebrated rich kid thinks the Royals should not be celebrated
The Royal Jelly: A new king has been coronated, and his subjects are in a merry mood
Victoria Cross: Australian TROOPER MARK DONALDSON awarded the VC
Godless Buses: Royal Navy veteran, Ron Heather, refuses to drive his bus
Labour's Class War: To expunge those with the slightest pretensions to gentility
100 Top English Novels of All Time: The Essential Fictional Library
BIG BEN: Celebrating 150 Years of the Clock Tower

Tuesday 19 December 2006

Tony Abbott's two cents' worth

Tony Abbott, the Australian federal Health Minister, last week gave a speech to a conference on The Journalist and Islam, organised by Macquarie University's Centre for Middle East and North African Studies at NSW Parliament House last week where he explained his opinion as to what made the Anglosphere (his words) great:

The Anglosphere has not maintained its economic, technological and military preponderance by pretending that there's nothing to learn from other cultures. English-speaking countries have not become beacons of hope and freedom by building walls against the world. We are always open to new ideas and better ways of doing things. We never assume that others have nothing to teach. To the extent that our political and ethical values are not potentially universal, we think that they're not values at all, just prejudices. This is the real explanation for the strength and resilience of our culture.

Where I part company with him is where he wonders "who faces the greater cultural shock: Australians who notice a few women wearing headscarves, or migrants from Muslim countries adjusting to almost complete sexual freedom, gender equality, cultural diversity and commercial laissez faire." No one forced them onto Australia's shores at gunpoint... Hell, here in China when I have to put up with the selfishness, poor manners, spitting, disregard for traffic lights and common rules, I'm constantly reminded that I'm a guest of the country.

3 comments:

Keir said...

I must say I prefer the old site. At least then the blog wasn't limited to one long narrow column and you could adjust the location of the images.

The Monarchist said...

You can still adjust the location of the images, only if you want wording to go down one side, you need to upload in small. The problem with the wide screen of TM 1.0 is that some (large font, big resolution) users had to scroll horizontally to view. This format is viewable by the universe.

Anonymous said...

There. I've given you another 100px of width, condensed some line space and bunched in the blockquote. I dare not go farther than that though, but it is much better.