Oh Dear (tm) More surveillance, more taxes to follow

[zathras]

...if this empire of ours should last a thousand years..." -- Winston Churchill.

Wonderful example of taking what someone said out of context. He never said that the British Empire would last 1000 years. The full quote is

"Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty, and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, “This was their finest hour.”

He is not saying here that the Empire will last 1000 years. He is saying If it lasts 1000 years we will still say “This was their finest hour.”

[BrilloPad]

Wonderful example of taking what someone said out of context. He never said that the British Empire would last 1000 years. The full quote is



He is not saying here that the Empire will last 1000 years. He is saying If it lasts 1000 years we will still say “This was their finest hour.”

When did he say that? IMO the empire was finished by the end of WWI. I know that technically the sun never sets on the British "Empire" - but it is not much of a collection of countries is it?

[expat]

Wonderful example of taking what someone said out of context. He never said that the British Empire would last 1000 years. The full quote is



He is not saying here that the Empire will last 1000 years. He is saying If it lasts 1000 years we will still say “This was their finest hour.”

I know that. But I am far from the first to notice the strange coincidence of Hitler and Churchill using the "last 1000 years" phrase within a few years of each other, in both cases, of empires that did not.

IOW I was talking "used the phrase 'last 1000 years'", which related to the thread; not alleging that "WC said empire would last 1000 years".

Yes I took it out of context. Its context was not what I was talking about.

Jesus, where's the Bangs Head Against Brick Wall smiley?

[expat]

The Empire was finished once the Brits got out of India...

It was really finished before that. And then it lingered, as empires do, to bankrupt the imperialist.

What was not necessary was to spend all of the little wealth we had left in trying to stay as a world power: ending up just a poodle of a world power. Enoch was right about that.

[expat]

Apparently there was some obscure part of China that got relinquished in 1926 that marked the beginning of the end...

Was that Quemoy or Matsu?

[Churchill]

However, it must said that it's better than the start of the decline of the Roman empire, which seemed to involve legionaires having their bowels nailed to trees in some dark dank Germanic forest....

If you is talking about the Romans, don't you mean "Legionaries"?