Some time ago I wrote about the peculiar phenomenon of sockpuppetry, where people go around to various websites and praise themselves under a pseudonym.

It turns out that the latest person to be exposed as practicing sockpuppetry is Scott Adams, creator the Dilbert comic strip, who under the pseudonym “PlannedChaos” praised Adams as a “certified genius”.

Cartoonist Tom Tomorrow on how crazy ideas get mainstreamed in politics.

I have never understood the fascination that people have with the British royal family, a truly useless and parasitic group if there ever was one. And it is not only Americans who seem to be so obsessed. I was in Sri Lanka when Charles and Diana got married and the English-speaking community there seemed to talk about nothing else.

We are now seeing this replayed with the upcoming wedding of their son. What amuses me is that people are so concerned about the minutiae of ‘royal etiquette’ as if causing offense to the royal family by breaking some rule that does not apply to anyone else was one of the worst things one could do. In a previous post titled God save us from the Queen I said that it is absurd for the queen to expect any more respect than we would give any elderly woman.

Stephen Colbert deservedly pokes fun at all this.