Proud to be a Monarchist

What I can't stand is this trendy, faux-republican attitude a lot of people in Britain have towards our Royal Family. The desire for disestablishment of the Royal Family befits only the mind of immature iconoclasts.

And in spite of my own criticism of Harry's gaming, I think Harry has proved himself a true lion heart with his exploits in Iraq.

But more importantly, we in Britain - and worldwide - should feel very fortunate that we have his father HRH Prince Charles to fight a number of good causes.

The causes he has championed demonstrates his sensitivity, lucidity and orthodoxy towards the environment which should force us to a consensus that, far from his privilege background making him an ivory-towered irrelevance, he lives above the limits and disinterest of the rat-race that provides him the means to address the plight of our planet.

In the last year, Charles has voiced concern for the London skyline and its conservation - Erstwhile mayor Ken Livingstone was wont to erect ephemeral glass monstrosities and Stalinesque cinder blocks which only violated the beautiful antiquity of the capital.

He has campaigned to save an historical town in Beijing from being demolished (the rate at which China is destroying its beautiful history in the name of progress is alarming).

Now, he has patronised a website to educate us about the fatuous destruction of the rain-forest. Credit where credit is due.

I will leave you with an article he wrote for the Telegraph:

Today is World Environment Day, a day that should remind us that there is
just the smallest window left for us to act to stop catastrophic climate change.
The frightening reality is that the consequences of global warming are being
felt far more rapidly than most scientists predicted even 18 months ago.Today is
World Environment Day, a day that should remind us that there is just the
smallest window left for us to act to stop catastrophic climate change. The
frightening reality is that the consequences of global warming are being felt
far more rapidly than most scientists predicted even 18 months ago... take me to the Telegraph to continue reading HRH Prince Charles' article

Celebrities In Karmic Universes Shouldn't Throw...

Is it too late for me to join in the Sharon Stone bashing? No? Good.

Stone has been worldwidely and rightly condemned for announcing that she believes that the recent earthquake in Sichuan, China was karma for China's violations of the Tibetan people.

What hasn't been suggested, I don't think, is that perhaps Sharon Stone should refrain from expressing such an opinion until she learns the metaphysical distinction between the concept of karma and the concept of a vengeful god.

Karma is not an entity and possesses no consciousness. Having no consciousness, it cannot act as a moral arbiter that can evaluate justice and mete punishment.

(I have always interpreted karma along the lines of a mathematical principle that by nature things just average out over the course of space and time - nothing more complex than that).

True, the Chinese themselves are asking whether the earthquake is judgement upon their government, but this self-scrutiny and hypothesising on the part of the Chinese is a different kettle of fish to Stone's rich (in both senses of the word), ensconced, moral showboating.

Like other celebrities who seem desperate to prove that the lavatory of their mind can boast the status "occupied", she can be considered no more than a non sequitur irrelevance.