SLANDERED BY THE PRINCE OF WALES

England, never known for its culinary accomplishments (never seen a "Billions and Billions Served" sign at a fish and chips shop, have you?), has none the less seen fit to make slanderous accusations about our own venerable institution, McDonalds. Yes, Prince Charles, the monarch in waiting whose subjects' waist lines are ever increasing, has lashed out blindly and without provocation to claim that McDonalds is what lies in the bottom of the belly of the beast -- the growing problem of obesity -- and suggested a ban.

The Telegraph has published an article documenting the Prince's intemperate remarks while in the UAE -- and then go even one better. They publish on the page a comparison between that staple of British food, available on every UK street corner, the Cornish Pasty (Ohhhhh my but they are delicious) and a BIG MAC. In traditional British understatement, they do not comment upon the comparison, but you can almost hear the author clearing his throat and shuffling his feet. It shows that by comparison, the BIG MAC is DIET FOOD. Lolllllll

Apparently, the Prince does not consume the same fare as the rest of the working class populace of Britain, else he would be outlawing that sinister Pasty while knocking back a Big Mac and fries to show how health conscious he is.

I think Ben Johnson, a loyal subject of the British throne who graced this earth some four centuries ago, should have the last word on this matter. And in so doing, he shows us that a true Englishmen need have no recourse to a McDonald's burger in order to attain near "divine" proportions:

Hymn to the belly

Oom! room! make room for the bouncing Belly,
First father of sauce and deviser of jelly;
Prime master of arts and the giver of wit,
That found out the excellent engine, the spit,

The plough and the flail, the mill and the hopper,
The hutch and the boulter, the furnace and copper,
The oven, the bavin, the mawkin, the peel,
The hearth and the range, the dog and the wheel.

He, he first invented the hogshead and tun,
The gimlet and vice too, and taught 'em to run;
And since, with the funnel and hippocras bag,
He's made of himself that now he cries swag;

Which shows, though the pleasure be but of four inches,
Yet he is a weasel, the gullet that pinches
Of any delight, and not spares from his back
Whatever to make of the belly a sack.

Hail, hail, plump paunch! O the founder of taste,
For fresh meats or powdered, or pickle or paste!
Devourer of broiled, baked, roasted or sod!
And emptier of cups, be they even or odd!

All which have now made thee so wide i' the waist,
As scarce with no pudding thou art to be laced;
But eating and drinking until thou dost nod,
Thou break'st all thy girdles . . .
. . . . . and break'st forth a god.

From: Pleasure Reconciled to Virtue,
Ben Johnson, 1618.