Ichabod's Kin
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    We know there’s a god, or the death of Osama bin Laden would have come the day before the royal wedding. Imagine then the shrieking and screaming from all who still believe in fairy princes and princesses, were the best news about the world’s worst terrorist allowed to infringe on Happy Times in Britain’s First Family.

  As in Wonderland, things already had gotten curioser and curioser by nuptial-time in Jolly Old England: polls showed that no one there or in America intended to watch the ritual nonsense but, in a last-minute miracle, nearly everyone did.

    But why all the fuss when in truth this particular generation of Royals has been the clumiest of all at maintaining decorum; like the House of Agamemnon, they have had nothing but woe upon woe but, in this case, all from their own doing, not the hand of Fate or capricious gods. We should have known nothing good would come from Edward VIII abdicating the throne for love: an omen indeed, when a man with any sense at all would consider an ordinary marriage more desirable than the mere illusion of power.

    That’s right: power is not what the royalty has. All that pomp, circumstance and money is a big, empty show. The monarchy may be older but parlimament and the prime minister hold all the cards, while trying hard to look like they don’t, of course.

    That was clear when Prince Philip, though but consort to the current Elizabeth, early imagined that he, as man of the house, could drag the monarchy into modern times. He was chased off that tuffet not just by the Queen Mum’s stiff opposition (where the hell was Lizzie in all of this?) But because Winnie, that lovable old cigar-chomping Churchill, decreed that the Family should remain its stick-in-the-mud self–the great stone face of immutable tradition in what otherwise would always be changing times.

    And I have no interest in all the wedding finery as supposedly filled with deep symbolism. That would better have been affected had a wheel from the wedding carriage fallen off, and tripped one of those silly footmen. After all, there was another wedding just as fine, that of Charles and Diana, and we know how that turned out.

    The Family has seemed almost intent on disappointing us, only to beg our indulgence for another Big Show. Presently there is a Queen who simply will not allow her own son to enjoy a year or two as King. Nobody wants to talk about it, but we all know what that says: she doesn’t trust him, as if she’s done all that great a job herself as the big cheese.

    So Charles has become a boring old thing and along the way taken on a frumpy old spouse who’s a painful reminder that there used to be golden days of dazzling Diana, dearly departed, and by now no one cares if Chaz gets the throne or not. Think too of Fergie, who had a tad too much spirit, but so did Liz’s sis Margaret, for that matter but, hey, she was family. The only thing worse for the Royals would be if one were to kill another.

    And we don’t know if Will and Kate can handle being king and queen. It’s all wishful thinking since, to this point, recent history is murky. And oh, yes, Will and Harry looked so dashing in their cute little wedding suits, but minus those threads they’re no different than a couple of frat boys waiting for a party keg to arrive. It’s all such smoke and mirrors.

    So back to the real news. Osama bin Laden got whacked, to the relief of many and to the fate he so richly deserved, and now he sleeps with the fishies, if you want to call that a funeral. And talk about symbolism, there was a lot of it around for that occasion. CNN got its gang on board in time for the quick turnaround in news on a Sunday night but, for Fox, it fell just as Geraldo Rivera was up to bat.

    There’s the luck of the draw for you. Just be thankful it wasn’t during Glenn Beck’s turn; we would’ve had him all night, and imagine that for a freak-show. Geraldo, Fox’s long-time lightweight and very un-funny reminder of Groucho Marx, once made us all wait through his Great Safe-Cracking Caper, to come up at last with an empty stash-box.

This time, Geraldo may as well have affixed a big red rubber ball to his nose to be more ridiculous for the moment. He mispronounced words and mixed up the names Osama and Obama (talk about Freudian slips) while other geniuses at Fox, in their haste to scoop the real journalists at other networks, wrongly posted that bin Laden had died a week earlier.

    Thus in the space of a weekend, a wedding reduced us tears and Fox left us laughing.

    Thankfully, bin Laden is really dead. And that’s no joke.