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When I tried to find the article mentioned as one of today's word's contexts:
"Why we must axe the Royals; The Mirror", this is what I got:

Did you mean : Why We Must Age the Royals; The Mirror (London);

I could not find that article. I copied the part of text in the browser, so I can't have made a mistake. I often try to find a source article, but to no avail this time. I really would like to read it.

When I add the writer they insist:Did you mean: Paul Routledge; Why We Must Age the Royals;

If the artircle is banned , where did Anu get the quote?

Would anyone know what might be wrong?

Last edited by BranShea; 02/01/08 03:57 PM.
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I could not find that article.

Bran, the article is from 2001, which is almost 100 years ago in InterWeb years. The Mirror probably just hasn't figured out how to save stories and columns to its archives, or doesn't want to (most newspapers thrive on repetition). You might contact The Mirror, or Mr Routledge, directly or use (a for pay) service.

Funny thing about axe for ask: the metathesis goes all the way back to Old English (cf. the forms ascian and æxian).


Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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THE monarchy must go. That is the inescapable conclusion of Simple Sophie's royal circus.

The Countess of Wessex may have ruined her own professional life with her serial indiscretions about people in public life.

Who would now wish to hire her as a public relations whizzkid?

But she has done the rest of us a big favour by putting a monster question mark over the future of the House of Windsor.

And about time too. The excesses of the foolish, self-indulgent and wayward children of the Queen - those who would rule us, let us not forget - cry out for radical change.

Not reform, because that would be a failure to grasp the nettle. Abolition is the only way forward, however long it takes.

Sophie's folly is the latest embarrassment in a cycle of shame stretching back years.

The divorces of every other royal in line for the throne.

The absurd and shocking behaviour that offers no example to Her Majesty's subjects.

The desire to make money out of being born with a silver spoon in your mouth.

Surely most sensible Britons now think that this costly, undignified farce must end.

Whatever the mystique of days gone by, the monarchy no longer brings millions of tourists to our shores.

It does nothing for the dignity of our nation. And it is a positive bar to the genuine modernisation of Britain.

So where is Tony Blair's so-called mission to modernise? He loves the weekly sessions with the Queen, where he is more forthcoming than he would ever be with the voters or the Parliamentary Labour Party.

He pretends to be a democrat, but he gladly bends the knee to unelected authority living the better-than-good life in Buckingham Palace.

I find this sickening. It is the final cop-out of an elected politician who would sooner curry favour with a dynastic monarch than look after the people who put him in power. It demeans us and him.

I have met the Queen. She is a smart lass. I would have her on the union branch committee, but I wouldn't make her chairman.

She works hard at the job to which she was born, and undoubtedly has integrity. But the hereditary system is wrong.

We do not expect the son of the England football team captain to follow him in the job or John Major's son to be Prime Minister.

So why do we exalt the law of succession in the case of kings and queens? Because THEY want to keep it that way. They rather enjoy the ruling biz. It beats emptying bedpans in an NHS hospital.

Simple Sophie has brought this suppurating carbuncle on the face of public life to the boil.

Her naive behaviour showed just how "The Firm" misuses public life to make money and have a good time.

Drinks in the Savoy with a fake sheik? Why not? "Hello darling, what a dreadful bore these Labour people are..."

If I am to believe Palace gossip, the clueless countess is only aping the Queen Mother, who is said to enjoy mimicking the working class accents of those who bring her piledriver gin and tonics.

Some Labour MPs are willing to wound the monarchy, but they are afraid to strike. They want fewer royals, not an end to dynastic rule.

Tony Wright, chairman of the Commons Public Administration Select Committee, has called for a slimmed-down Royal Family. "If we don't do it now I'm afraid the monarchy will not survive the life of the present Queen," he says.

Really? What is there to be afraid of? Christmas TV news without tired shots of the Queen at Sandringham? A 2002 without a day off for the Golden Jubilee?

Sorry. The Windsors have misbehaved the royal prerogative into oblivion.

When the Queen dies, or abdicates (which is unlikely), there should be a referendum on the future of the monarchy.

If the cringing politicians will not organise it, then the people should off their own bat.

A "No" vote should not send the Windsors into exile, more likely into working for Tesco as so many others have to.

And a "Yes" vote will not be the end of it. The Sophies, Edwards, Harrys, Charleses, Williams, Annes, Fergies and Andrews have signed their own dissolution warrants.

It is simply a matter of time. I may not live to see it, but I fervently hope that my grand-daughters do.

Copyright © The Mirror. London: Apr 10, 2001

(thanks to ProQuest)

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Thank you very much, tsuwm and for editing it so readable.That was quickly done!
Even though it's an old article, the essence of it still counts. And though our rather numerous Royal offspring behaves with more modesty, the question of whether the keeping of kingdom is just as costly as it is useless, is brought up every now and then since the sixties.
They have a binding sort of function, but a Republic would be just as well,(if not better as most of it is just decorum).

Last edited by BranShea; 02/01/08 04:50 PM.
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tsuwm, you might want to make it clear at the top that you are quoting the article rather than going off on a loooong rant of your own. (You know how I jump to conclusions)

BranShea,
1) Google does not have every bit of data in its evil clutches. In fact, all you have to do is add a few hidden key words at the top level of your website and Google won't (er, isn't supposed to) look at it at all.

1a) Certain sources are segregated by Google apart from the main site. Newspapers are one of these. If you go to news.google.com, you can actually find the article, but you still have to know that it is not current and look under Archives.

2) Google is not smarter than you (even though it tries to act like it). Its suggestions are based on what other people have searched on most. It would seem that many many people are more interested in how old Prince Harry is than his mad axe skills.

Last edited by Myridon; 02/01/08 04:56 PM.
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Google won't (er, isn't supposed to) look at it at all

In my experience, the Google bots pretty much follow the ukases of the robots.txt protocols. YMMV.


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Myridon, I'm a stranger in Google Paradise. (Though I'm flattered by your encouragement).
But I did understand quick enough that tsuwm had produced the original article.

This f.i. is completely way over my hat.
" the Google bots pretty much follow the ukases of the robots.txt protocols. YMMV. "
When things get too American or too inside computer-world I can not get it.

That still leaves to contemplate this ridiculous phrase:
Why We Must Age the Royals

Ha! What to make of that?

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Originally Posted By: zmjezhd
I could not find that article.

Funny thing about axe for ask: the metathesis goes all the way back to Old English (cf. the forms ascian and æxian).


I thought that the sc combo in OE was pronounced as our MnE sh. Is ascian an exception or are the experts wrong in suggesting that it was pronounced ass kee un?

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What to make of that?

Google search has a kind of spell checking function that gives suggestions based on what you type into the search box.

the Google bots pretty much follow the ukases of the robots.txt protocols. YMMV.

Search engine companies use software bots (from 'bots from robots), aka spiders, to crawl around the web indexing everything they can. The admin of a website can place a text file called robots.txt with some rules in it about which directories and files on the website hosting computer may or may not be indexed. (YMMV == your mileage may vary.)


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Oh! Thanks, there a lot of crawling going on. But oh boy, see, I readily thought it was cover-up conspiracy, instigated by the Royal House itself; to push the article under the Royal carpet.
Thanks for you patience, I'll always be an a-tecnical amateur.

Last edited by BranShea; 02/01/08 06:58 PM.

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