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This episode commenced with a isolated photograph, arguably the most significant ever taken of a member of the monarchy.

In the frame appeared the Earl of Inverness, with his arm around a female youth, while an associate smiled knowingly in the rear.

Without that image, taken at a gathering in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the claims of a adolescent who declared she was trafficked across the ocean and obliged to have brief sexual encounters with a prince of the monarchy?

A strange, telling move by someone who had overtly claimed to have no known about her, asserted he could no have had sex with her, and yet paid a large amount of family money to resolve a protracted legal case.

Years of Controversy

In this context, talk of the royals acting decisively to sever ties with Andrew are wide of the mark. This affair has endured for the largest portion of 15 years since that picture, and another photo of Andrew ambling amiably with a disgraced financier came to light.

• Arrogance: For what duration did his brothers and sisters, maybe even his mother and father, know that Andrew was so self-entitled?
• Problematic Connections: They must have realized, if his employees and the police were performing their duties, that he had some deeply disreputable friends given he publicly hosted them to royal residences.
• Monetary Excess: If the family did not know about his intimate behaviors, they certainly knew about his extravagance with taxpayer funds.

Travel were listed in public records: helicopter travel from the palace to a sporting venue and back again in time for lunch, private flights instead of regular transport, all for the convenience of "Airmiles Andy".

Existence of Entitlement

Then there was the arrogance which required respect when he walked into a space or the profound consciousness about his royal titles used on his letterheads in letters to his friends.

He managed to escape consequences while his parent, who unaccountably pampered him, was still surviving. The sovereign did at least strip him of public duties and ceremonial ranks in the aftermath of his catastrophic and, as revealed, untruthful media appearance six years ago.

Latest Events

Just in the last two weeks that events accelerated, following the release of accounts giving more grim information of his conduct and that of his associates.

Further disclosures have again revealed Andrew's assumption that he could escape being untruthful about his interaction with a notorious figure.

The public (and the journalists) were far more perceptive of the royal family. There was nobody of any consequence to support him, a consequence of all those years of arrogance.

Institutional Fears

The more astute royals realized that. The one imperative is to pass on the institution, if not as heretofore at least complete and unstained.

For generations the last 190 years trying to overcome the image of previous monarchs, showing they are useful, responsible and responsive to their citizens.

He was placing all that in jeopardy in an time when respect and privacy is no longer adequate.

Consequences

Eventually, the famously uncertain sovereign was pressured more. There was little choice. The institution had relinquished authority of the story.

Now it is the stripping of titles and the ongoing and life-long personal shame that will pain Andrew most severely.

• Downgrading: Demoted to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Past Example: The primary monarch to lose his titles in modern times
• Military Service: Especially painful given his role in the conflict

He continues to be a constitutional officer, on paper able to act for the king, and he is still eighth in line to the monarchy, but not any of these will actually come to pass.

What Lies Ahead

Can persons he comes across still defer to him? Might they still slip up and call him Prince? Would they say Mr,

Naturally, he is not retiring to an ordinary town, but to the sovereign's vast property at a monarchical property.

In that place, he will be supplied by the king with one of the royal residences and given some form of personal stipend.

This differs from his prior accommodation, where he paid a minimal payment for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit remote, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Pending Matters

This is not over. There are still documents in the custody of US Congress to be made public.

• Governmental Scrutiny: Could lawmakers seek further action
• Monetary Probe: Or scrutinize the misuse of state resources
• Legal Possibility: There may even be a police investigation into his actions

Perhaps for the time being the institutional damage to the institution is limited. The message from the royal household was clearly that the revocation of honorifics was what the monarch, and especially other senior monarchical figures, sought.

A Shift in Position

The cessation of pretence that Andrew was acting willingly. And, remarkably, the concise statement showed evidently that the royals were supporting the victim's version of events.

Furthermore, for the premiere occasion they finally showed concern for the survivors: "The measures are considered essential, despite the truth that he maintains his innocence of the allegations against him."

In the end it is presumption, selfishness and inactivity that will kill the crown. In his foolishness, self-indulgence and venality, Andrew seems never to have grasped that reality.