I can’t imagine why, but Kathleen Parker’s “Or Should We Send Paris?” post brought to mind the one and only joke ever attributed to King George V of England, who was not a humorous man.
In 1935 the British Foreign Secretary Sir Samuel Hoare went off to Paris (France) to negotiate the Hoare-Laval Pact, which more or less acceded to Mussolini’s demands in Ethiopia. British public opinion was so outraged, Hoare had to resign. Greeting his replacement, the King remarked: “No more coals to Newcastle, no more Hoares to Paris.”