AS COMMON AS YOU AND I

Princess Nori, the only daughter of Japan's Emperor Akihito, wed a commoner in a private ceremony at a Tokyo hotel today and became Sayako Kuroda, in the process abandoning her privileged status as a member of the imperial family, now that she has been inseparably linked to commonness.

This unlike Sayako’s mother, who was mystically elevated from the taint of commonality to the throne of imperiality upon marriage to her husband, then crown prince. Also unlike her brothers, Crown Prince Naruhito and Prince Akishino, who upon marrying commoners did not have to give up their royal titles and generous taxpayer-funded royal allowances and move from the moat-ringed palace to Tokyo apartments.

Apparently, though, the sudden disappearance of nobility under the one-way rule is no big loss to Sayako, who will now live in a regular manshon and be privileged, for the first time, to drive her own car, do her own shopping and put out the garbage like everyone else.

Pay taxes and vote, too!

Later: Fast action on unbearable royal inequality, in contrast to the common type of inequality