I am not a huge fan of the monarchy but I thought Charles’ speech to Congress was right on the money.
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Me too. I thought he might skirt round difficult issues but he seems to have done well. I wonder if Donny still loves him after the ‘checks and balances’ comment?
In any case, I predict it will be open season on Starmer and/or the UK within the week.
Did he really say “if it were not for us, you’d all be speaking French”?
There is a clip of him supposedly doing that but I can’t see the line in the transcripts which are posted online - eg here.
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It seems he did. Here’s a summary by the NYT.
Yep, he did say it, only not during his address to Congress, but at the State Banquet in the White House… which is why it doesn’t appear in the Congress transcript
Ah, I think my respect for him just went up (only slightly, but definitely up)
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The top irony of that statement if he did say such a comment is that the USA wouldn’t have lasted more a couple of years without French military assistance on land and their navy keeping the Royal Navy from landing British reinforcements.
So it’s your fault that my French isn’t perfect! My life here would be so much better…
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Who? me? I wasn’t even a twinkle within a twinkle of an eye in 1776.
I think it was a lovely, jokey, “turning the tables” on Trump re his previous insulting comment about UK.
Re America… French Settlers could well have spread all across the country (far more than they actually did) and if they had outnumbered other nationalities… French might have become the National Language of USA/whatever .
As it was, Brits settled over there, as well… and they spoke English… and the rest is history (long, involved history… aaargh)
(This is only a jokey, light-hearted explanation… )
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IIRC when they voted the official language English won by a vote if English didn’t win the official language would be German
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I would love to have seen the expressions on Republican faces during Charles’s speech. What I did see was Speaker Johnson’s almost instant approval in applauding and standing up when Charles mentioned Ukraine, but at the same time saw VP Vance’s look of what appeared to me to be a look of puzzlement and a slow reluctance to follow suit. He did so, but belatedly.
I found the applauses interesting in that they appeared to me to be coming from both sides of the house, but obviously more so from the Democrat side. Don’t know if the Republicans’ responses were genuine or just polite. Would be great if they were genuine. There were cheers and applause when Charles mentioned ‘checks and balances’ and I hope a lot of that came from Republicans.
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Ah, but you miss the point of my previous ramblings… If Brits hadn’t settled in that country the English language probably wouldn’t have been an option 
and, furthermore
Frankly, none of us can know exactly what was behind the King’s remark/joke… but we do know it made Trump feel uncomfortable
and that’s good enough for me 
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Only because he was trying to understand it.
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'course he would have been
I believe nearly everyone else laughed… either drunk or just recognising a daft joke when they hear it…
Charlie has been trained/coached to give these type of speeches for years, subtle messaging delivered with a decent dollop of humour and self deprecation.
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That was a state, Wisconsin I think or poss Minnesota. I don’t think the USA actually has a defined official language.
Off to check!
Checked. No statutory official language but lots of laws in various places say English is da lingo.
I hope this is accessible to all. Good NY Times article
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