IT'S ALL IN THE GENES

This morning I came across a talk which Melanie Phillips delivered at the end of last year. The reference to it is at her website, which links to the PDF version of the 17 page address.

What caught my attention was its relevance in light of the headlines today about Prince Harry and his donning of the swastika as part of a German Afrika Corps uniform.

Admittedly, I have always been a traditionalist when it came to the Monarchy. But, given the antics of the present Royal Family, I am not at all certain that they continue to serve a useful purpose. Charles is less than an inspiring example of a monarch-in-waiting. His siblings are no better. After Queen Elizabeth there is no steadfastness, no resolve. There is no appreciation of the duties and obligations that come with membership in the Royal Family.

They seem to think that they are Rock stars or sports figures, and should behave accordingly. Well, does anyone really want Ossie Osbourne as head of state?

My late father met King George VI in Scotland, and later in England, while serving with the Canadian forces in WWII. He often spoke of these meetings, and it was clear to me that he had been impressed by the King and his Queen. When the Queen Mother Elizabeth visited Canada, my youngest son waited so he could see her drive by. That same son met the Duke of Edinburgh in Toronto some years ago. He was highly unimpressed.

But back to Prince Harry. My late mother had a favourite Yiddish expression: "dos eppale falt nit veit fun boim", the apple does not fall far from the tree. Or as today's parlance would have it, it's all in the genes.

The Royal Family itself is of good German stock. Harry's great-great-uncle, the former King Edward VIII, later Duke of Windsor, was a Nazi sympathizer, and less than a sterling example of Royalty. Harry's late mother, Princess Diana, was not a paragon of stability. And while it is unfortunate that she died at such an early age, I doubt that, had she lived, she would have had an improving influence on Harry.

But, leaving all of that aside, the real culprit is the British media, which, to a very large extent is the cause of the anti-semitism that leads to the sort of behaviour that finds nothing objectionable in wearing a swastika as part of a party costume.

Of late I have been finding fault with the French for their anti-Israel, anti-Jewish attitudes. But a recent poll in the Telegraph shows that the British are no better. Indeed, they may be worse.

The BBC, the Guardian, and a large segment of the media feed Britons a daily diet of propaganda, half-truths, untruths and vicious incitement against all things Israeli. A BBC reporter cries as a mass murderer and supreme terrorist is flown off to die in a French hospital.

It is all of a piece. If you tell the big lie often enough, people come to believe it.

Prince Harry probably saw nothing wrong in what he did. More is the pity.

But now he has apologized. Should that end the matter? Absolutely not. Let him forego his ski holiday this winter and, instead of going to Gstaad, let him go to Auschwitz. Let him research the Holocaust and then deliver an address on the fruits of his studies.

Sorry does not cut it. If you aspire to be Royalty, the least you can do is act like Royalty. The kind of Royalty that my father and son admired, not the kind my son found less than admirable.