National Post editorial board: Beware America’s ruthless burger monarch
National Post Editorial Board | August 28, 2014 7:21 AM ET
Oh, he smiles nice for his royal retinue. But remember that the Burger King — like any absolute monarch — cares not a whit for the common people, especially if they are Canadian.
The Burger King’s expansionist desires have been clear for many years. But with the brazen annexation of an iconic Canadian restaurant chain this week, the time for appeasement is over.
In interviews with the Financial Post, the Burger King’s minions assured Tim Hortons customers that their coffee-and-crullers experience would remain untouched. Words in the wind. We recall hearing similar soothing noises from the last quick-service imperialist to darken our door: the deceptively avuncular Dave Thomas, who claimed Tim Hortons for Princess Wendy’s empire in 1995. Soon enough, Tim Hortons was playing Hungarian to Wendy’s Austro, with the aromas of coffee and beef mingling outrageously under the same roof in suburban and roadside “combo locations” while King Dave counted his golden doubloons in Florida.
The ensuing Fast Food Wars of the mid-2000s were bitter and protracted, coming at a great cost in blood, treasure and condiments. Had so many Thomasite forces not deserted en masse after King Dave’s death, we might have lost Tim Hortons forever. But we prevailed, and on IPO Day we danced in the streets as businessman Nelson Peltz became our unlikely Cromwell. Now, the carno-monarchists are back, and we are living among the first days of the Burger Restoration.
Yet in the face of the Burger King’s naked aggression, the Conservative government, outrageously, has rolled up the rim to this flame-broiled feudalism — even crowing about the benefits of its corporate tax cuts. “Canada has become a very attractive place for capital and for growing businesses,” quisling Finance Minister Joe Oliver mewled on Tuesday, effectively putting out the red carpet for his ermine-robed burger masters.
The normally pacifist New Democrats are pushing back more strongly against this violation of our sovereignty. But their reaction, too, is woefully inadequate. “It seems pretty clear why Burger King would want to move its headquarters to Canada,” said industry critic Peggy Nash. “What’s less clear is what Canadians get out of the deal … Any foreign takeover needs to pass a net benefit test and not just a Conservative government rubber stamp.”
A net benefit test? We’re being invaded by Targaryens, and Ms. Nash wants to sit at Parliament counting coppers? Have we learned nothing from losing The Bay and Molson’s? Where does it end?
The Burger King’s U.S. apologists might accuse us of republican paranoia. But given their revolutionary history, the Americans of all people should understand what it’s like to live under the occupation of strange foreign people with offensive culinary customs. What was the American Revolution itself if not an effort to let the American people “have it your way,” writ large?
“The history of the present [Burger] King is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States,” is how the authors of the Declaration of Independence put it. “To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.”
The authors admittedly were concerned primarily with the political status of the 13 united states of America. But we believe that the general principles enunciated in the document clearly were intended by the Founding Fathers to be applied to the domain of tasty sandwiches, donuts and caffeinated beverages.
Though we are not Americans, we, too, hold it self-evident that our citizens are endowed with certain unalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of a double-double. We also believe that whenever the ownership structure of a fast-food holding company becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute it anew, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to preserve the taste of their coffee, the speed of their drive-thru service and the cleanliness of their washrooms.
The history of the present Burger King is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over this culinary dominion. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Burger Tyrant, is unfit to be the fast-food purveyor for a free people.
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Re: Levitas
“There are a lot of killers. We’ve got a lot of killers. What, do you think our country’s so innocent? Take a look at what we’ve done, too.” - Donald J. Trump, President of the USA
The Kushner sh*t is greasy - Stevie B.
The Kushner sh*t is greasy - Stevie B.
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Re: Levitas
The "Beautiful Women" thread should not get all the 'Cutie Pi's'.
“Christ has no body now but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks with compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks among His people to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses His creation.”
Teresa of Ávila
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Re: Levitas
“There are a lot of killers. We’ve got a lot of killers. What, do you think our country’s so innocent? Take a look at what we’ve done, too.” - Donald J. Trump, President of the USA
The Kushner sh*t is greasy - Stevie B.
The Kushner sh*t is greasy - Stevie B.
Re: Levitas
8wonf-Lb94k
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
Re: Levitas
Mel Brooks gives hollywood the finger
Mel Brooks brings 6th finger to Hollywood ceremony
inShare
Tuesday - 9/9/2014, 9:18am ET
Director/Comedian Mel Brooks displays his cement-covered hands, including one with a prosthetic finger, during his Hand and Footprint ceremony marking the 40th anniversary of the movie "Young Frankenstein," in front of the TCL Chinese Theatre in the Hollywood section of Los Angeles on Monday, Sept. 8, 2014. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Mel Brooks has given the finger to Hollywood.
The extra finger, that is.
Brooks, the writer, producer and actor responsible for the classic movie comedies "The Producers," ''Blazing Saddles" and "Young Frankenstein," sank his hands and feet into cement in front of the TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood on Monday -- a ritual followed by decades of movie legends.
But Brooks, who's 88, wore a fake sixth finger on his left hand.
He said he left the unique mark "just in case somebody from Des Moines, Iowa, says 'Harry! Harry! Look, Mel Brooks has six fingers on his left hand!'"
The ceremony was held in conjunction with Tuesday's release of "Young Frankenstein" on Blu-ray to mark the movie's 40th anniversary.
Read more: http://www.wtop.com/541/3697902/Mel-Bro ... d-ceremony
Mel Brooks brings 6th finger to Hollywood ceremony
inShare
Tuesday - 9/9/2014, 9:18am ET
Director/Comedian Mel Brooks displays his cement-covered hands, including one with a prosthetic finger, during his Hand and Footprint ceremony marking the 40th anniversary of the movie "Young Frankenstein," in front of the TCL Chinese Theatre in the Hollywood section of Los Angeles on Monday, Sept. 8, 2014. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Mel Brooks has given the finger to Hollywood.
The extra finger, that is.
Brooks, the writer, producer and actor responsible for the classic movie comedies "The Producers," ''Blazing Saddles" and "Young Frankenstein," sank his hands and feet into cement in front of the TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood on Monday -- a ritual followed by decades of movie legends.
But Brooks, who's 88, wore a fake sixth finger on his left hand.
He said he left the unique mark "just in case somebody from Des Moines, Iowa, says 'Harry! Harry! Look, Mel Brooks has six fingers on his left hand!'"
The ceremony was held in conjunction with Tuesday's release of "Young Frankenstein" on Blu-ray to mark the movie's 40th anniversary.
Read more: http://www.wtop.com/541/3697902/Mel-Bro ... d-ceremony
"I fancied myself as some kind of god....It is a sort of disease when you consider yourself some kind of god, the creator of everything, but I feel comfortable about it now since I began to live it out.” -- George Soros
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Re: Levitas
fP3HJVp3n9c
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
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Billionaire Richard Lugner, 81, Marries 24-Year-Old Playboy Model Cathy Schmitz
Seems legit.
Seems legit.
“There are a lot of killers. We’ve got a lot of killers. What, do you think our country’s so innocent? Take a look at what we’ve done, too.” - Donald J. Trump, President of the USA
The Kushner sh*t is greasy - Stevie B.
The Kushner sh*t is greasy - Stevie B.
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Re: Levitas
YMix wrote:Billionaire Richard Lugner, 81, Marries 24-Year-Old Playboy Model Cathy Schmitz
Seems legit.
her tits seems too low
.
Re: Levitas
Tip of the hat to NH:
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
Re: Levitas
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
Re: Levitas
dhBkWdeLHFQ
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.
Re: Levitas
Heracleum Persicum wrote:
Talk about justice!
Live by the wanker, die by the wanker.
If this happened in Merika, his widows would sue Viagara for loss of income!
Re: Levitas
TUHgGK-tImY
May the gods preserve and defend me from self-righteous altruists; I can defend myself from my enemies and my friends.