historiblogography

sounds familiar

From the publisher's description of this book, with emphasis added:

Gould attributes British support for George III's American policies to a combination of factors, including growing isolationism in regard to the European continent and a burgeoning sense of the colonies as integral parts of a greater British nation. Most important, he argues, the British public accepted such ill-conceived projects as the Stamp Act because theirs was a sedentary, "armchair" patriotism based on paying others to fight their battles for them. This system of military finance made Parliament's attempt to tax the American colonists look unexceptional to most Britons and left the metropolitan public free to embrace imperial projects of all sorts -- including those that ultimately drove the colonists to rebel.

You can use the low up-front costs of colonial wars to sell facile militarism, but there's a balloon payment that eventually catches the owners by surprise: Wait a minute, I didn't order this.

And the king was even named George.

posted by Chris Bray @ 8:02 PM