The Prime Minister’s time is valuable enough that the few hours faster an airplane is than an airship justifies the millions of pounds in taxpayer money it takes to keep the Rt. Hon. Prime Minister’s air transport fueled up 24/7/365.
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Wild row of applause. (The page rocks, in other words!)
I love her mug.
The aeroplane looks a little unstable, on second viewing: it has no horizontal stabilizers. Hmmm.
I’m rather hot for this PM’s character design. And the coffee cup just puts it over the top. 8 stars! But really Air Ship One would make for an amazing movie title…
I’m rather surprised that Ilthmir could get the Prime Minister herself out there without laying something concrete on the table (if only unofficially). As the commentary for the comic itself points out, the PM’s time is valuable. Figuring out the basics of what all parties are going to offer is something you leave up to your diplomatic corps. Personally I’d tell the bastards they have to give up slavery if they want to see economic aid one, but I am not a politician.
Remember there really hasn’t been any communication between nations and I seem to remember kidnappings being mentioned at one stage. This could be a very preliminary meeting in order to achieve some desperate end (I’m still trying to work out why Chartannia would need Beiguoese support so badly). I doubt its really about economic aid, probably even less restriction on the trade embargo would be appreciated. Besides, the Empress does not strike me as stable enough to accept aid.
Dang, look at those freckles. And those hips!
I’ll have to second Kaze’s motion on this one: what a cutie for a Prime Minister you’ve got there, RMG.
So it’sa republic, but the leader is a Prime Minister.
Interesting.
I cant be the only one who finds the coffee mug as funny as I do.
Good point, the occupant. What is up with that?
There are plenty of real-world republics where the head of government is a Prime Minister, including Ireland, Italy, and India, with the head of state being an elected President (with varying degrees of real power) instead of a monarch.
In the comic, both Kyokan and Chartannia are republics of this type, while Beiguo and the Coastland are Presidential republics.
Not to mention Israel and Germany, indeed.
The head of state probably some guy who looks good in military regailia and goes on parades.
Fantastic page buddy.
Isn’t the USA the only democratic country where the president is the head of government? Everywhere else, there’s a president who is elected directly and (depending on the country) has mostly representative functions in addition to having some say (great variation here) in how the government is formed, and a prime minister/minister president/chancellor who heads the cabinet and is (in some way or other, and at least in practice) chosen by the party that got the most votes in the latest parliamentary elections. Even in France and Russia, where the prime minister is appointed by the president (but the government still needs to have a majority in parliament), they’re still not the same person. (Hm… <scratching head> to be honest, I’m not sure, but I think Putin and Medvedev have actually been seen in the same room… ;-) )
Although this situation here involves so much representation that I’d expect the president to come along, the negotiations will be about real issues to such an extent that the prime minister has to be there. So that is not surprising.
Besides… we haven’t been told if the president is maybe on the same plane… though the first panel implies as much, unfortunately. Maybe the president got the swine flu.
The head of state better not ever put on a uniform, lest people think a military dictature is around the corner. Only (male) monarchs and dictators ever wear a uniform while in office, on this planet at least.
ARGH! Except in Germany, where the parliament elects the president, in Italy, where AFAIK the senate (upper house of parliament) does, and probably many others. But still, those are elections for a person, while the post of head of government is not directly filled by an election.
Oh, one thing: vis-à-vis has the accent in the other direction. There is no á in French.
If memory serves, appointment by the President in semi-presidential systems (France, Russia, etc.) either doesn’t happen or is a legal formality, thus leading to cohabitation (President and PM from a different party/coalition).
On the other hand, I suspect that ‘Prime Minister’ is being used to denote a mixture of Britishish flavor and possibly a parliamentary system. Two reasons:
A) The Ilithmiris, as implied by the monarchy and evident insistence on protocol, probably fall firmly into the diplomatic school, i.e. considering the primary negotiations of value to be between heads of state. (A similar belief dominated the Willy-Nicky correspondance between the Russian and German monarchies before WWI, in spite of Germany being functionally an (albeit aristocratic) constitutional monarchy at the time.) If there were a significant head of state in Chartannia it would be the office the Ilithmiris would probably prefer to deal with.
B) A defining feature of parliamentary and semiparliamentary systems is the strictly delimited role of the head of state, which historically evolved from democratic response to the institution of monarch as nation-state incarnate. In any case, the primary (and in some cases only legal) function of the head of state where a distinct head of government exists is some mixture of foreign relations, diplomacy, and PR.
Either the head of state is primarily internal and legalistic (as in the Commonwealth), consular (as in Switzerland), or weak, titular, or a legal fiction (the Horthy regime’s Empty Throne), otherwise not only would the PR’s time be too valuable to justify a diplomatic trip but that trip would be an extreme formal oddity, like sending the Speaker of the House to a summit with North Korea. (In this case, the oddity would be alleviated a bit by a half-Korean Speaker, but only very, very slightly.)
@khaan: do you mean only over A’s? Because I thought there were (reaches into the depths of his very cursory high school French) accent ague and accent grad? Can’t remember for the life of me what the little hat was called…
(on a completely unrelated note to the current political discussions..)
Interesting – first webcomic I’ve read where I saw my last name used. Been enjoying reading through the archives – keep up the good work!