The Most Royal Candidate Theory is the idea that in US presidential elections, the candidate with the most royal connections is the one that always wins. As the author of the wikipedia article points out, this theory is obviously false, for the simple fact that there were four cases of US history when two candidates vied for the presidency and one would be defeated, only to win four years later.
And then the anonymous author points to the late Harold Brooks-Baker as a proponent of this theory, and how world press outlets would listen to his pronouncements despite there not really being any basis to how he came about these judgements of whether someone was more or less royal. There's a link to an obit in the Daily Telegraph, which is really nasty to Brooks-Baker, saying he wasn't really the publisher of Burke's Peerage but made himself seem like he was, and slights to his character.
I had dinner with Brookie, as he called himself, in London, as he was a friend of my wife's family. He was very charming and affable and fun to be with. I was very saddened to hear when he succumbed to polio a couple of years ago. Maybe he did make pronouncements to get media coverage, and maybe what he said didn't always have a basis in fact, but I don't really know or care that much. Because I think the whole business of trying to find who is related to Charlemagne is really pointless at best, and at worst indicitive of someone's ability to delude themselves into thinking they are more special than someone else without even trying to actually achieve anything.
I didn't have that kind of feeling about Brookie, and I guess I never knew that much about his work with the Burke's publications. But as he said himself, many British people had a problem with an American -- though one that had lived in England for decades -- to follow this subject, and this seems like anti-American snobbery, even as they were sniffing at his interest in royal lineages. And if Brookie did make things up, then I can understand that a bit better (wanting publicity for financial reasons or attention) than the types that follow this to justify a self-aggrandizing idea of blood and history (and I know this was not how Brookie was or what motivated him). Those latter types are fools to think there's any there there to be distorted by Brookie.
But for those that just didn't like the how the media would publish or broadcast what he said, because what the royals are doing or who they are related to isn't really news at all...well for that I have sympathy. But I'm suspicious of anyone who feels too strongly about it, because lets face it, that's unfortunately the kind of media we have these days, and you can't blame that on Brooks-Baker. You can't applaud him either. But look closely into it if someone is too vehement... then they are secret haters, with overt reasonable arguments, and covert dislike of someone because of nastier reasons and bigotries.
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