Gerard Baker, Washington correspondent for The Times, has been observing the visit of Great Britain's Prince Charles and his royal consort, Camilla. It's been, well, undramatic.
The truth is that this has been one of the most anonymous royal trips that I can recall. It’s the first official visit by the heir to the throne in two decades, but a poll in USA Today found 81 per cent of Americans expressed no interest whatsoever in the event.Posted by Alan at November 3, 2005 10:06 PMThe good news, then, for the royals is that their worst fears, that an America still in thrall to the Diana cult, would rise up in the spirit of 1776 and throw the monarchical chump out of the country, have not been realised. The bad news is that this is probably because nobody has noticed he’s here.
Not since the third Adam and the Ants comeback tour has so much energy been expended by so many to so little attention. The Prince and the Duchess have proceeded ceremoniously from one event to the next like harlequins at a convention for the colour-blind.
The papers and the nightly news have reported the visit, but it has generally ranked below items about the baby giant panda’s first steps at the National Zoo and yet another shake-up at CNN.
And yet the Prince and his courtiers should not be downhearted. That he is being ignored is an encouraging sign. It means that Americans, like the Prince himself, have finally grown up. All those years of Diana mania, all that breathless media coverage of the royal marital chaos seem so 1990s. In an America still hung over from all that excess, it’s reassuring to be able to pay no attention to a Prince who is just a harmless old bore with slightly batty ideas and a dowdy wife.