Personally, I like having a figurehead head of state that is subject to a directly elected Parliament.
The King may have cerimonital power but he can never exercise it. As was proved in the Glorious Revolution we can remove our head of state anytime we like.
I would much rather see the House of Lords reformed than the monarchy ended.
> I would much rather see the House of Lords reformed than the monarchy ended.
I'd be very careful about that one. Making it elected would be a terrible idea. There are some reforms that are possible, but they'd need to be very narrow (for example, limiting the size, and limiting tenure).
Right. So many of us are like this -- more Elizabethists than Royalists.
Strongly suggest the USA leaves tinkering with other countries' political systems alone for at least a generation. No standing.
The British are actually quite conflicted about the monarchy.
It tends to be bound up in what a lot of people used to observe was the distinction between Royalism and Queenism (or Elizabethism specifically).
We don't much like the institution in the same way (only narrow approval overall), but we pretty much loved the Queen as close to unconditionally as we love anyone (she's like one or two rungs down from Judi Dench and the late Terry Wogan), and would not have wanted to see it go in her lifetime because it would just have been weird.
Now, not so much. Charles has yet to earn that kind of affection. Though surprisingly he is getting there, and Camilla's popularity (always a very serious problem for the monarchy) is genuinely surprising because she turns out to be a) really a friendly, kind person and b) genuinely liked by her step-family.
Another example: the Duke of Westminster is worth $12B and owns a large chunk of London outright, including a ton of large, notable buildings. (Also, I think, the Twinings tea company.)
There's the Crown Estate, which is controlled by the crown, but the family also owns the Duchy of Cornwall (45K acres) and the Duchy of Lancaster (45K acres), as well as numerous private holdings that are less visible. And this is predominantly highly developed city space.
How does the UK benefit from the royal family allowing this, rather than just having a non-monarchist government that does the same thing?
I wonder if the monarchy serves that role for the UK. Might be better to keep it.
The only real way that the monarchy can survive is if the kingdom stays united.
Also, president boris, stamer or farage is just a humiliation I can't really cope with.
I definitely appreciate the idea that if you lose confidence in the PM you can fire them pretty quickly. Being stuck with a crappy president for four long years kinda sucks.
I always tell people I don't actually want to risk an elected presidency until Jeremy Clarkson is too old to run for it.
The problem with demonizing people is that demons are badass and powerful.
> "The law is king!"
The 2024 Nobel prize in economics[1] was awarded to a team of three who investigated what causes a nation to prosper and identified "rule of law" as an essential ingredient[2].
[1]: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/2024/pre...
[2]: https://news.mit.edu/2024/mit-economists-daron-acemoglu-simo...
Charlie Munger recalled it in 2003 as “Where there is no bread, there is no law; where there is no law, there is no bread.”
It's going to be some easy picking if more figure that out ...
Yeah, I think reminding people that you don't get prosperity without rule of law is a good idea.
</sarcasm>
That's not to say that America doesn't have problems. That the problems aren't unique.
But there has always been problems, and they have always been new.
Over time America and the rest of the western world, will adapt and move on to new problems :)
The Nobel in economics is a perfect example of the infection of the arbitrary into the sciences, ie there is no such thing as "economic science"
"In 1968, Sveriges Riksbank (Sweden’s central bank) established the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel. The prize is based on a donation received by the Nobel Foundation in 1968 from Sveriges Riksbank on the occasion of the bank’s 300th anniversary. The prize amount is the same as for the Nobel Prizes and is paid by the Riksbank. The first prize in economic sciences was awarded to Ragnar Frisch and Jan Tinbergen in 1969."
For more on the illusion of economic science: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262049658/blunt-instrument/
We're way beyond the world of Paine's.
Given that this kind of deference to a perceived authority (which manifests in hero worship, tribalism, influencers, religion, celebrity veneration, sports figures, etc) seems to be built into the very genetic fabric of 99% of the general populace I despair at ever seeing it end.
People simply can't wait to anoint their own personal king (be it Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, MrBeast, etc.)
You really think there are only 1% of us that have no desire at all for any sort of king? I cannot think of a single person deserving of that role, cannot imagine what it would take for me to change my mind. I very much value our systems of government, and I do not ever want any one person to have too much control over them.
People Americans hoist into power (and many other countries do) often look like a poor man's replacement for a monarch. How many people in any country do actually lay claim to their own values and conscience? How many are genuinely emancipated and govern themselves?
In particular in this day and age where most of the wannabe kings are so obviously idiotic it's telling how eager people still are to subject themselves, sometimes in, as David Bentley Hart dubbed it crypto-erotic fashion, almost sadomasochistic and fully aware how incapable the demagogues are.
> For Cross, it is pointless to speculate about the present-day views of men who could not have imagined cotton candy, let alone the machine that makes it.
Some things, like “taxation without representation” seem to be timeless. You can call it irony or perhaps in some cases, a spade is still just a spade.
He believed in a universal basic income (Agrarian Justice), free trade, a land value tax. He was a georgist before Henry George. To this day, I look at Georgism as the only meaningful pro-market and good-for-buisness but unapologeticly left-wing movement we have.
Thomas Paine should be regarded as our best and most read founding fathers and liberal thinkers. He's often a footnote, or forgotten about. Just like Andrew Yang, Henry George, Smedly Butler, Benjamin Tucker, Lysander Spooner, Sinclair Lewis, Upton Sinclair etc.
Instead our modern "anti-authoritarian" movement, or whatever passes for it, claims ideologically descent and active influence from the likes of charlatans and defenders of authoritarianism like Karl Marx, Hegel, Freud, Foucault, Kant, Nietzsche, etc.
Remember Thomas Paine.
I mean he did literally dissolve into lunacy. He also was shunned for his "blasphemous" views on the role of the church. He died in penury, and largely in disgrace.
But, he should be read more, the rights of man is surprisingly readable, especially given the time and subject matter.
The fact that this point is largely lost on the audience of this site just shows how bad things have gotten.
People who want to amass power for its own sake need self-reinforcing systems that restrain them.
It’s impossible to successfully restrain another more powerful than you, by definition, as an individual.
And to do so as a group introduces the whole mess of politiking and intra-group dynamics that generates any significant power concentration in the first place.
The spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue etherial sky,
And spangled heavens, a shining frame,
Their great original proclaim.
The unwearied sun, from day to day,
Does his Creator’s power display,
And publishes to every land
The work of an Almighty hand.
Soon as the evening shades prevail,
The moon takes up the wondrous tale,
And nightly to the list’ning earth
Repeats the story of her birth;
Whilst all the stars that round her burn,
And all the planets, in their turn,
Confirm the tidings as they roll,
And spread the truth from pole to pole.
What though in solemn silence all
Move round this dark terrestrial ball
What though no real voice, nor sound,
Amidst their radiant orbs be found,
In reason’s ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice,
Forever singing as they shine,
THE HAND THAT MADE US IS DIVINE.
The only differences between the two groups are about 30% of their patronage networks. Half of the activity in this thread is probably inorganic. I'm also probably naïvely underestimating the amount, because this article says nothing. You can't even learn a thing about Thomas Paine from it.
Wouldn't it be super-cool if politicians would take moral stands, and argue for them, instead of repeating slogans in a desperate attempt to go viral and trying to figure out who can drape themselves in the most flags?
edit: thank god the patron of this site is too proud to let the inorganic run wild, even on a Sunday. It's going to be hard work to stuff this place with paid-for garbage. Also "theconversation" is a shady site with shady origins.
I haven’t heard a clear answer yet about why ‘King Red’ is bad and the prior ‘King Blue’ is any different.
rectang•1h ago
We can only hope that Paine's approach will win out instead.
jauntywundrkind•1h ago
Congress has never folded power to a president like this before. The Supreme Court has never faced such backlash from district courts (https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/11/us/politics/judicial-cris...). Scientists & researchers have never been up in arms about us health policy or what is being done. Colleges and universities have never been policed by a president, confronted with loyalty pacts.
Avicebron•56m ago
rectang•41m ago
But thanks to SCOTUS interpreting any amount of political gerrymandering as permissible, we may have in fact fallen into an irreparable hole in the US Constitution.
Even if some of us are disinclined towards tyranny, we may be faced with a choice: accept that we are shunted towards it by forces beyond our control, or roll over and accept tyrannical rule by others. I continue to hope that it will not come to that and that we can fight our way out of this situation using Paine's methods.
BrenBarn•28m ago
rectang•17m ago
So then we're looking at a constitutional convention. Can you imagine our current crop of politicians cooperating to negotiate something which improves on the current Constitution? I'd expect a prisoner's dilemma with a defect-defect outcome and the winner taking all of the diminished spoils.
I think we're stuck with what we've got and we have to hope that enough voters are persuadable, allowing us to emerge from the hole.
thom•1h ago