Americans of conscience may be casting around for a phrase or even a word that captures the repulsive spectacle this week of King Charles III and Queen Camilla of the United Kingdom being wined, dined, and treated almost like the Founding Fathers of the United States by the U.S. President Donald Trump, a joint session of the U.S. Congress, and almost the entirety of the fawning establishment media. The two arrived on April 27 for a four-day state visit to the United States, in order to celebrate, according to Buckingham Palace, “the historic connections and the modern bilateral relationship” between Britain and the United States—all in the context of the celebration of the 250th year of America’s freeing itself from British colonial rule.
Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche called it a travesty.
In her April 29 weekly webcast, Zepp-LaRouche stated about the king’s visit: “I think it was a travesty. And obviously, it’s up to American patriots to remedy this disaster,” such as those represented by the independent candidacies of Diane Sare, who is running for U.S. president and Jose Vega, who is running for Congress in New York’s 15th congressional district (the Bronx). Zepp-LaRouche elaborated: “It was an amazing spectacle. I think there are several aspects to be noted. The most obvious one is that it was a blatant attempt to completely wipe out the memory of what the American Revolution was all about, that it was, after all, a war of independence against the British Empire … and to completely replace it with what Trump unfortunately called the ‘Anglo-American Revolution’—as if this would be one piece, as if it could have been a joint venture, when one was clearly directed against the other.”
Trump Bows to Britain, Smears American History
Speaking at an April 28 ceremony for Charles on the White House lawn, President Trump praised the UK’s “culture,” “character,” and “creed,” claiming that the United States is heir to Great Britain’s “majestic inheritance.” Shamelessly, Trump even said that “our ancestors would surely be filled with awe and pride that the Anglo-American revolution in human freedom” has today spread across the world (emphasis added).
King Charles was clearly pleased. In his address to the joint session of Congress, he made many of the same points, arguing that, even before the United States declared its independence, “our destinies as nations have been interlinked.” He falsely claimed that U.S. institutions and founding documents were influenced, “often verbatim,” by the UK, and that the friendship between the two nations is “one of the most consequential alliances in human history.” Unfortunately, Charles received a rapturous response from both sides of the aisle in Congress, with repeated standing ovations and a sustained minute-long applause at the conclusion.
At the White House gala dinner later that evening, Trump and Charles went even further, delivering speeches which jointly attacked the principles of the U.S. Declaration of Independence of 1776 and the U.S. Constitution of 1787-88. Trump stated:
I want to congratulate Charles on having made a fantastic speech today at Congress.… Americans saw themselves as free men carrying forward central liberties and ancient rights of the Anglo-Saxons into this new and beautiful world. In the eyes of America’s founders, our war of independence was fought not to reject this heritage, but to reclaim it and perfect it…. But even though the political bonds between the United States and Great Britain were dissolved forever, on July 4, 1776, the more powerful strands of memory, culture, and identity proved unbreakable in any conflict and grew into a friendship unlike any other on Earth.
Trump went so far as to endorse British imperialism outright, attributing it to America as well:
History has known no more powerful force than the combination of American patriotism and British pride. The British Empire that began here in America certainly did not end here. The sons and daughters of the British Isles went on to found more countries and spread more civilization than any nation before. They built an English-speaking world upon which the sun never sets…. Today, most of Britain’s former colonies have no idea what they truly owe to this towering legacy of law, liberty, and British customs they were given.
