Britain: Not as dead as it looks

Newsweek's Stryker McGuire indulges in the venerable sport of declaring Britain dead and the only thing left to do is for everyone to curl up in their shrouds to await burial. It's an old, old mantra that I've heard every time the country has hit a rough patch–usually sung by those who would be perfectly happy to grab a shovel and pile the dirt on.

Thing is, it keeps turning out to be wrong. Take defence, for example. As we've pointed out here on more than one occasion, the problem isn't that Britain can't afford a first-class military, it's that the government, regardless of party, prefer to pour money down Socialist rat holes that deliver nothing in return rather than pony up for an adequate defence budget. The same is true for just about any other problem that Britain faces. We could be out of the EU in an afternoon, the House of Lords could be "reformed" by putting it back the way it was just as quickly, and the crime rate would receive a healthy dent if the police were charged with catching criminals instead of enforcing Guardian diktats.

As Mrs Thatcher demonstrated, the problem is always less a matter of "can't' than of "won't". And sooner or later, freeborn Englishmen stand up and say "will".