Marry Australia

Thank the Heavens our handsome Prince did not propose to that Berkshire girl - we don't need the Royals to marry further into England, what we need is for them to branch out to the other realms and give greater credence to the idea of a Commonwealth Royal Family. As Cato correctly points out, "one must feel that we have an historic opportunity: marry the boy off to an Aussie and kill the republic faster than you can say glossy magazine. If Queen Vicky had married her eldest off to an Indian princess, you just know that there would still be Emperors at Delhi."

Indeed, and I take back that bit about what the Royals do in their down time being none of our business. Kyle is right: what they do, how they conduct themselves, who they mingle with and who they marry is of obvious social and moral significance, as we painfully learned in the dysfunctional 90s with all those annis horribilisses. Instead of making a right royal mess of it and riding the wave of Britannia's retreat and surrender all the time, for once the Royal Family needs to go on the attack. That inevitably means shoring up the crown Down Under, and establishing a beachhead where the future of monarchy is most tenable, and by extension everywhere else. Would it not be worthwhile to have William carry out his naval training in the R.A.N., in convenient proximity to the girls of the Outback? If we have the Will, is it such a longshot to think of a Royal Wedding in Oz divorcing Australia from its republican ways?