An old one but a good one and still good today (enjoy ) Declaration of Revocation:by John Cleese
To the citizens of the United States of America, in the light ofyour failure to elect a competent President of the USA and thus togovern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of yourindependence, effective today.Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchicalduties over all states, commonwealths and other territories.
Except Utah, which she does not fancy.
Your new Prime Minister (The Right Honourable Tony Blair, MP for the97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a worldoutside your borders) will appoint a Minister for America withoutthe need for further elections.Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whetherany of you noticed. To aid in the transition to a British CrownDependency, the following rules are introduced with immediateeffect:
1. You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Then look up "aluminium." Check the pronunciation guide. You will beamazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.
The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and'neighbour'; skipping the letter 'U' is nothing more than lazinesson your part. Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' withoutskipping half the letters.
You will end your love affair with the letter 'Z' (pronounced 'zed'not 'zee') and the suffix "ize" will be replaced by the suffix "ise."You will learn that the suffix 'burgh' is pronounced 'burra' e.g.Edinburgh.
You are welcome to re-spell Pittsburgh as 'Pittsberg' ifyou can't cope with correct pronunciation.
Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels.Look up "vocabulary." Using the same thirty seven words interspersedwith filler noises such as "uhh", "like", and "you know" is anunacceptable and inefficient form of communication.Look up "interspersed.
"There will be no more 'bleeps' in the Jerry Springer show. If you'renot old enough to cope with bad language then you shouldn't havechat shows. When you learn to develop your vocabulary, then youwon't have to use bad language as often.
2. There is no such thing as "US English." We will let Microsoftknow on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted totake account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of "-ize."
3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents.It really isn't that hard. English accents are not limited tocockney, upper-class twit or Mancunian (Daphne in Frasier).You will also have to learn how to understand regional accents ---Scottish dramas such as "Taggart" will no longer be broadcast withsubtitles.While we're talking about regions, you must learn that there is nosuch place as Devonshire in England. The name of the county is"Devon." If you persist in calling it Devonshire, all AmericanStates will become "shires" e.g. Texasshire, Floridashire,Louisianashire.
4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors asthe good guys. Hollywood will be required to cast English actors toplay English characters.British sit-coms such as "Men Behaving Badly" or "Red Dwarf" willnot be re-cast and watered down for a wishy-washy American audiencewho can't cope with the humour of occasional political incorrectness.
5. You should relearn your original national anthem, "God Save TheQueen", but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not wantyou to get confused and give up half way through.
6. You should stop playing American "football." There is only onekind of football. What you refer to as American "football" is not avery good game.The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside yourborders may have noticed that no one else plays "American" football.You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead playproper football.Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is adifficult game. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowedto play rugby (which is similar to American "football", but does notinvolve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing fullkevlar body armour like nancies).We are hoping to get together at least a US Rugby sevens side by2006.You should stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host anevent called the 'World Series' for a game which is not playedoutside of America. Since only 2.15% of you are aware that there isa world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. Insteadof baseball, you will be allowed to play a girls' game called"rounders," which is baseball without fancy team strip, oversizedgloves, collector cards or hotdogs.
7. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry guns. You will nolonger be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous in publicthan a vegetable peeler. Because we don't believe you are sensibleenough to handle potentially dangerous items, you will require apermit if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.
8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 2nd will be anew national holiday, but only in England. It will be called"Indecisive Day."
9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap, and it is foryour own good. When we show you German cars, you will understandwhat we mean.All road intersections will be replaced with roundabouts. You willstart driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time,you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit ofconversion tables. Roundabouts and metrication will help youunderstand the British sense of humour.
10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call'French fries' are not real chips. Fries aren't even French, theyare Belgian though 97.85% of you (including the guy who discoveredfries while in Europe) are not aware of a country called Belgium.Those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called"crisps." Real chips are thick cut and fried in animal fat. Thetraditional accompaniment to chips is beer which should be servedwarm and flat.Waitresses will be trained to be more aggressive with customers.
11. As a sign of penance 5 grams of sea salt per cup will be addedto all tea made within the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, thisquantity to be doubled for tea made within the city of Boston itself.
12. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling "beer" is notactually beer at all, it is lager. From November 1st only properBritish Bitter will be referred to as "beer," and European brews ofknown and accepted provenance will be referred to as "Lager." Thesubstances formerly known as "American Beer" will henceforth bereferred to as "Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine," with the exception of theproduct of the American Budweiser company whose product will bereferred to as "Weak Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine." This will allow trueBudweiser (as manufactured for the last 1000 years in the CzechRepublic) to be sold without risk of confusion.
13. >From November 10th the UK will harmonise petrol (or "gasoline,"as you will be permitted to keep calling it until April 1st 2006)prices with the former USA. The UK will harmonise its prices tothose of the former USA and the Former USA will, in return, adopt UKpetrol prices (roughly $6/US gallon -- get used to it).
14. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns,lawyers or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers andtherapists shows that you're not adult enough to be independent.Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough tosort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist,then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.
15. Please tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us crazy.
16. Tax collectors from Her Majesty's Government will be with youshortly to ensure the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776).
Thank you for your co-operation.
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