President Bush made a speech the other day that was transmitted throughout the world in which he tried to persuade everybody that, even though the world is heading into a recession that will result in many being made homeless and, possibly, many people suffering from starvation and extreme poverty, lightly regulated capitalism is still the best economic model for the world to follow.
I see no reason to trust him on this. In the same speech he stated that computers, steamboats, aeroplanes, catscans, the internet and iPods were all invented by Americans. Of course, as I’m sure our Monday night quiz crowd will confirm, the computer was invented by an Englishman, the steamboat by a Frenchman, the aeroplane by an Englishman and the catscan by an Italian. The only two items on Mr. Bush’s list of achievements that are definitely American are the invention of the Internet and the iPod, and I leave it up to you to work out the relative merits of these two inventions compared to the others.
We Scots could add a few fairly useful inventions to any list, though, eh?
The Internet was invented by an Englishman actually!