The royals - Kitty Kelley [273]
57.4% believed taxpayers should pay less on the royals.
52.3% believed taxpayers should pay nothing on the royals.
In the face of raging recession and royal fatigue the Prince of Wales struggled to make himself appear relevant as a farmer, gardener, ecologist, cookie maker, architectural critic, and philanthropist, but each public-relations ploy seemed to backfire, making him look as fusty as mothballs. The writer Christopher Hitchens dismissed him in 2010 as “the Prince of Piffle.”
Stepping out of his apolitical role in 2002, Charles had protested the war in Iraq and was forced to cancel a trip to the U.S. because George W. Bush felt he might give aid and comfort to U.S. anti-war groups, which would undermine British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s support for the war. The Prince officially welcomed Bush to London the following year, and months later Charles became the first member of the royal family in thirty-three years to visit Iran. En route, he also visited British troops in Iraq, on a direct order from the Queen, who was said to be furious that her Prime Minister and his cabinet had ignored the country’s soldiers. Later on a visit to Pakistan, the Prince of Wales called for “greater religious harmony.”
Yet it was the disharmony of religion that disrupted the carefully laid plans for his wedding, with endless press speculation about the Queen’s absence or, as some inferred, her refusal to attend a ceremony outside the church, even for her son and heir. The House of Windsor, historically a bulwark against divorce, looked surprisingly modern on April 9, 2005, when Charles took Camilla to be his bride. He was the first heir to divorce and marry twice. Standing by Charles’s side were his three siblings, two of whom were divorced and one remarried.
Later at the wedding reception, which the Queen hosted for eight hundred guests, she raised her glass in a toast: “They have come through and I’m very proud and wish them well. My son is home and dry with the woman he loves.”
Two months later, Prince William graduated from St. Andrews in Scotland and was only the third royal in history to earn a college degree. The Queen attended his graduation, although she had missed the Cambridge graduations of her sons Charles and Edward years before.
Towering over his father at 6'3", William’s tall blond good looks evoked the memory of his mother and excited the media, which had made an agreement with the palace to hold off covering the Prince until he finished university. Now that he was graduating, reporters were eager to pounce, especially seeing Kate Middleton, the pretty brunette standing by his side, who also graduated from St. Andrews and was one of his housemates.
The class-obsessed media made much of the fact that Kate’s father was “in trade,” although highly successful running a mail-order business specializing in costumes for children’s birthdays. Kate’s mother, co-founder of the business, was invariably described as “a former airline stewardess,” prompting James Whitaker, commentator on the royals, to comment: “When Mrs. Middleton met the queen she said, ‘Pleased to meet you.’ There’s nothing intrinsically wrong in that, except it categorizes you as from a certain social background.” Kate herself, characterized as “middle class Middleton,” was smart and stylish, and the public followed her courtship by Prince William avidly, but the young man appeared in no hurry to marry. Over the next five years Kate became known as “Waity Katie” after the rush of rumors about a royal engagement.
After graduating from St. Andrews, William joined his brother Harry at Sandhurst military academy, where both received their commissions. Harry, known as Cornet Wales, sparked outrage when he went out partying, falling in the gutter after drinking too much. At Eton a teacher had accused him of cheating, but Charles’s office denied the charges, saying an Eton committee had found them unfounded. Carelessly, the spare heir visited strip clubs, experimented with drugs, groped a woman in a bar, was photographed receiving a lap