From a friend in America

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JOHN CLEESE's ADDRESS TO U.S. CITIZENS

In light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA
and

thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of

your independence, effective immediately. Her Sovereign Majesty Queen

Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states,

commonwealths, and territories (excepting Kansas, which she does not

fancy).

Your new prime minister, Tony Blair, will appoint a governor for

America
without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate

will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year to

determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following

rules are introduced with immediate effect:

You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English
Dictionary. Then

look up aluminium, and check the pronunciation guide. You will be

amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and

'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without

skipping half the letters and the suffix 'ize' will be replaced by the

suffix 'ise'.

Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable

levels. (look up vocabulary).

Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such

as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and
inefficient form of

communication. There is no such thing as US English. We will let

Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be

adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the

elimination of 'ize'.

You will relearn your original national anthem, "God Save the
Queen".

July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers

or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists

shows that you're not adult enough to be independent.

Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to

sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then

you're not grown up enough to handle a gun. Therefore, you will no

longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a

vegetable peeler.  A
permit will be required if you wish to carry a

vegetable peeler in public.

All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for your

own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we

mean.

All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start

driving on the left with immediate effect.

At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without

the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will

help you understand the British sense of humour.

The former USA will
adopt UK
prices on petrol (which you have been

calling gasoline)-roughly $6/US gallon. Get used to it.

You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries

are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips

are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal

fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually

beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to

as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be

referred to as Lager. American brands will be referred to as

Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of

further confusion.

Hollywood
will be required occasionally to cast English actors as Good

guys. Hollywood
will also be required to cast English actors to play

English characters. Watching Andie MacDowell attempt English dialogue

in "Four Weddings and a Funeral" was an experience akin to
having one's

ears removed with a cheese grater.

You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of

proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in

time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American

football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds

or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies).

Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host

an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside

of America.
Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world

beyond your borders, your error i s understandable.

You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's

Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all

monies due (backdated to 1776).Thank you for your co-operation.