Former USA Today writer dumps all over royal baby fever

Musing over the royal baby boy? Stop it.

Professional wet blanket and former USA Today editorial writer Louise Branson is here to quash any celebrating you might be doing about Prince William and Kate Middleton's newborn.

Branson, who also used to write for the London Sunday Times, writes in an op-ed for USA Today:

Americans, though, have the best of both worlds. After 237 years of independence, they are free to view the royal family as real-life Downton Abbey characters. King George III's unfair taxes are faded memories.

Not so for Britons. For Britain, too much royal family adulation can be harmful to its health. That's because Britons are grappling with just how the royal family fits its national identity. A bubbling debate asks such questions as: How relevant is Britain's ceremonial monarchy in the early 21st century? The cost of the royal family's palaces, trips and so on, is high, particularly in hard times. Is it too high? Should Britain, a democracy, have an unelected monarch as head of state? And what about those archaic traditions? In the Age of Twitter, should the world really have waited for news of the royal birth until the queen and heads of commonwealth governments were informed and the news posted on a board outside Buckingham Palace?

Fizzle.

@eScarry