Who'd expect anything different from a bunch of backwards colonials? The Brits think it's funny because they already know we're a bunch of low-life scum who couldn't learn how to piss without verbal instruction in 3 languages and a demonstration by a government representative.
Factoid I heard on the radio recently - The UK medical system is fully socialized but is experiencing a severe shortage of doctors due to low wages and demand that is uncompensated by any merit-based rewards. An indication of how long this situation will last is found in the fact that of the over 1000 immigrant or foreign, fully licensed and accredited, physicians present in the UK, only 14 (yes, fourteen) have been allowed to begin work. The rest are tied up in bureaucratic nonsense that asks them to go through a number of expensive and time consuming steps (including asking experienced doctors to re-accomplish 2 more years of residence training), after which they're told that they're still not going to get credentialed, so sorry.
The Brits are the last people I'd ever ask for advice on government unless I specifically intended to send my country on a long slow slide to mediocrity. They have specifically set things up here in the UK to be unpleasant enough to have something to complain about over a pint at the local pub, but not quite unpleasant enough to actually DO anything. That's why it's the year 2004 and windows still don't have screens, doors don't have doorknobs, new houses are built without central air or heat, to get a hot shower they plumb cold water to the tub and then electrically heat the water on the fly so all you get is a trickle unless you pump in a few thousand watts, and they still can't figure out how to combine hot and cold water in a faucet to get warm water. I asked a home depot style store guy here what it would take to get warm water at my kitchen sink, and he directed me to a plumber he knew who could probably get it done for $2000, but he wasn't sure if he'd be able to get the parts. No demand for it you see, sorry old chap.
It's like the whole country is on some lab created socialist drug that causes people to think they're superior to everyone else and treat any change or innovation as somewhat less desirable than the black death. So if they pick Kerry over Bush... Well, that just about says it all for him I think.
