Army Rumour Service

Well, it's the same old sh!t, different day isn't it. Republican tw@ts who would see the destruction of the monarchy, and offer us NOTHING of value in return. Parliament - have you been watching and reading the news over the last few weeks?

Even when the Monarchy was abolished hundreds of years ago by your ignorant type, they had to bring it back, and why? Because of the troughing, lying, thieving sh!theads who replaced the Monarchy not being fit to govern us.

Who would I rather have as head of state - some elected president?

Let's stand some of the elected bosses around the world next to HM The Queen and/or HRH PRince Charles.

Charles vs Clinton?
Charles vs Blair?
Charles vs Broon?
Charles vs Bush?
Charles vs Mugabe?
Charles vs ah, I could go on for weeks. Fact is, none of them even stand up to HRH Prince Charles when it comes to character, decency and loyalty to this country.

WTF are you republicans offering that's better than these people? Nothing at all.

Let's actually have a boss, with real powers, who can make decisions and hold Parliament to account.

Let's call that boss Her Majesty!

As a stab in the dark the combined civil list costs of the monarchy is around £10m, which I know is a fair amount in these cash straped times. This is split up between all the royals and there are a number of other incomes as well. As has already been stated, heads of state don't come much cheaper, if anything they can be alot more expensive.

However, to me the really whinge about £10m of tax payers going to the royals is missing the point. The Queen gives the income (profit) from the crown estates (her land and houses) to the Govt / taxpayer. This amounts to somewhere in the region of £200m per year. Overall, the taxpayer is some £190m up each year due to the royal family and I wouldn't even attempt to put a figure on the goodwill etc they project on the many engagements they undertake.

I think that the PoW gives damned good value for money and anyone who says he doesn't should just look at the pure monetary values, and carry on normal whinging.

www.thecrownestate.co....tfolio.htm

www.royal.gov.uk/TheRo...lList.aspx

They have no power - except of the ceremonial/symbolic kind

You're right - it's not the cost. If it was, the MPs (our elected, so-called representatives) would not have just paid back 1/20th of that amount (£500,000) back into the public coffers - that's £500,000 they admit they should not have claimed for, tax free.

Subservience? Should I offer my oath of allegience to Gordon Brown instead? Should I offer it to Tony Blair? If not HM, then who should I offer my allegience? Whom should I serve?

Now is when you say 'nobody'. Thus, none of us should have a boss, a guvnor, a head honcho, a leader. We should serve no man or woman, only ideals! How quaint. Who's ideals? Who's moral code? Who's laws? Who should make them? Do we simply do as we will, with no consequence?

If you remove the Monarchy, you leave us with nothing, nothing but the fat, greedy, lying, self serving scumbags who claim the moral, legal and elected right to make our rules, to levy money from our pockets, and then decide how it is spent - and no alternative, no overwatch, no ruler who we can turn to if it all goes wrong - only those career pigs, who fought tooth and nail to climb up the greasy pole of corruption, stabbing each other in the back and face on the way up. The most succesful at this game of deceipt, corruption and greed gets to lead us, run our economy, decide which wars we shall fight, who gets paid, and who dies.

Neither Prince Charles nor Her Majesty are in their roles through an innate ability to lie, steal and back-stab - having been born to the role, they are there purely to serve in it - for the betterment of Britain. They have demonstrated their devotion to us and our lands for many, many, many years. It is not for them to swan off and make millions out of book deals, or speaking tours, regailing us with tales of conversion to religion, whilst seeking to pontificate from the moral high ground.

Her Majesty hasn't retired - Her work goes on. Her son, born to be a Prince and then a King has served our nation for most of his life, child and adult. He hasn't made the most of it, filled his pockets and then p!ssed off to some lucrative job in a bank somewhere - he works on, and he will not retire.

Not from Her Majesty do we hear 'I'm no leavin 'til ah get wut ahm due! A didnae do this joab all this tahm t'naw git mah due' like the ennobled Speaker of the House Michael Martin.

Tell us, o sage Republican - who shall watch those that govern us?

And the kind that allows Liz to dissolve Parliament and forcibly remove the government if Gordon stops taking his pills and tries to cling to power via a State of Emergency.

And the kind that allows Liz to refuse the Royal Assent if Labour decide to pass legislation to make MPs immune to prosecution before the next general election.

The queen does have that power, but only technically. If she tried it these days, it would be taken away, most likely the monarchy would go with it. However, the royal family cost us about 20p a head per uk citizen, they work extremely hard for our country, and are part of our heritage. why would you want to be a republican? In what way would the royal family offend you? Its a plus for our country, and we have precious few of those these days.

Why wouldnt you wish to be republican most other countries seem to get by without wasting millions on these parasites, two members work hard the rest should be got shot of

A Presidency with the potential of Blair and his Hideous wife occupying the position is just too horrifying to contemplate. Long may they (the Royal Family) reign over us. They do an exceptional job.

It would be good to see a coherent argument that puts the case for a monarchy as opposed to a democracy.

The economic arguments and the comments about today's crop of politicians are not convincing arguments in favour of a monarchy and against a sound democratic system. At the crux of this argument lies the essential question of how we would like to see our political system - keep the status quo or change it in favour of a more democratic one? I grant that no political system is perfect, but surely we should strive for a democratic utopia and better political systems than sticking with an archaic throwback to feudalism?

They, too, are human and fallible - the difference is that you and I have absolutely no say over whether they are in that position or not.

Im not espousing any argument, the Royal Family are there and have been for hundreds of years in this country, there is no need to change the arrangement, I am perfectly happy with the way it functions. Its not broken so why try to fix it.

If you want to see what happens when you try to "change" things look at the state of the House of Lords, and now the House of Commons. Meddling by a government that had no clue what it wanted to achieve has done more to despoil democracy in this country than anything in our history. When people pronounce change for more democracy be careful what you wish for, because the opportunity for politicians to meddle with the running of the democratic processes is simply an opportunity for them to reform it more in their favour, and achieve less choice for the citizen.

Any thoughts that Brown and his cronies will do anything to "improve democracy" or amend the voting system in the favour of the electorate are simply pipe dreams, and will achieve anything but an improvement to our democratic processes.