I must confess, this wedding doesn't seem to be as negative as some of the anarchists have made it seem. Sure, it cost $45,000,000 dollars and is in all reality just a grand pageant and theater. However, theater is as important to life as anything else. People need things to believe in even if it is rather silly, its what keeps us relatively unified as opposed to constantly killing each other in the streets. Here in the US, Barack Obama optimistically intends to spend over $1,000,000,000 for his election campaign, the American equivilant to this Monarchy spectacle of public theater. There will not be 2 billion people watching simultaneously, there will not be quite as much sincere and friendly fanfare. There will not be so much international commradery. There will not be any kind of emphatic patriotism and community spirit.
No in America we are going to spend perhaps $4-5 BILLION on an election that will probably be nothing but scathing, centrifugal and vitriolic. It will only cut more lines in the sand. It will probably mend more fences than build new bridges. For that, the Brits should be commended..
This Wedding was an expensive theater, true, but cheaper than most Hollywood box-office smashes and with a far more positive wake and impact. (and I say this as Rastafari, devout anti-colonial, devout anti-British crown and also before that a pissed of anarcho-punk
)