ballpoint

I'd suggest they give him a gofundyou. Only with the last two letters of "fund" replaced.

On a lighter note, the female residents in the former Russian occupied towns have been dancing in the streets upon seeing their liberators, singing "Ukrainian men, hallelujah!"

While thoroughly applauding the push back from the Ukrainians, and rushing back to Russia of the Russians, the pessimist in me keeps replaying a line from "Black Adder" in my head: "Not even our generals are mad enough to shell their own men". Replace "shell" with "nuke" and you get the gist of what I'm thinking about. Not even Putin may be mad enough to nuke his own men, but he may be mad enough to nuke Ukraine once his men are out of the way. Lets hope not.

That little fellow in the bottom left corner of the photo below has been educated in diplomacy and protocol his entire life. In our current world, full of self serving, mediocre (or worse) politicians, he has been meeting, and learning from, giants (his mother included) since the day he was born. For the position of a purely ceremonial head of state, I would argue that trumps some jaded movie or sports star being voted to represent the essence of his country by the clueless, self interested, population. Imagine if the towering achievements of a country's culture and architecture were voted on by the general populace? I'd wager there would be no great museums, cathedrals, opera houses, universities, or other major stand-outs from dreary every day life, dotted with football stadiums, Wetherspoon branches and greyhound tracks. The position of king or queen is far greater than the person who is currently performing that role - just as the position of President should, but often sadly isn't. Stephen Fry once said that the fact that a political leader must meet with the figurehead of their country once a week to discuss how things are going is of great benefit to that country, and in his opinion, the USA would be a better place if the president had to meet with a real Uncle Sam once a week to tell him what he was up to, and ask his advice and opinion. I happen to agree with him. I suspect most people's hatred of the monarchy rises from envy. They see a life of wealth and privilege, without considering that someone would be living that life whether elected to it or born to it - indeed, the cost of maintaining former presidents, let alone the current one, far outweighs the costs of maintaining a royal family. While I wouldn't argue with a system where those who fail to meet the standards of their country are stripped of their title and role (yes, Mr Andrew Windsor, the brick layer formerly known as Prince, I'm looking at you and your ilk), I would not change that system as a whole - though I certainly wouldn't want to be the one born into that role, as I don't envy them at all. To end my little Sunday morning rant, a quote from Richard Dawkins, on the reality of a republic with an elected head of state. Spoken as a political commentator should that eventuate: "And we watch as President Becks, and First Lady Posh, board the presidential yacht, Boaty McBoatface on their trip to meet President Kanye West of the US" (Ok, I added the US bit).

Correct, I was a little misleading. But many of his appointees, along with the senate and congress, have no term or age limits. And it still doesn't change the point of my post.

A country where: Federal judges, including those of the highest court in the land, are appointed for life according to their political affiliations, rather than their merits as a legal expert. Rather than one man, one vote, the President is elected by a marble count, where those who have always had the most marbles (and I don't mean that as a term for intelligence, as it's actually quite the opposite) get the most votes. The founding fathers - following a war for independence - thought it would be a good idea to allow the people to carry weapons, based on that war, in which two sides with equal, musket style, firepower slugged it out. No term limits are set for the executive and legislative branches, meaning they are both filibustering sinecures for life. Despite supposedly being secular, the church has a major say in law making, school agendas and people's rights. Looney, violent fringe groups based on religion, racism, conspiracy theories and whatever else some kool-aid dispensing psychopath is fighting for, have historically been abundant - in far greater numbers than any other country in the world. That's how.