Apart from the obvious benefits of tourism, there really doesn’t seem to be much point to the Royal Family. They remind hecklerspray of ghouls, hired to occupy large houses and rattle around staring at old oil paintings and eating from 200 year old plates. And that’s about it.

Of course, countries like America wish they had a royal family. They love the heritage of it all. Well, consider this Americans – The Queen is just our version of Paris Hilton. She’s wealthy for no reason and doesn’t understand how the world works.

At least Paris Hilton has the decency to live it up with purses filled with cocaine. That said, no-one wants to see the grainy sex-tape of Her Majesty and Prince Philip going at it hammer and tongues.

For too long, the Royal Family have been almost entirely pointless. They appear on our stamps and are the subject of the most boring national anthem in the universe (even more boring than the national anthem of the very boring planet of Meh where inhabitants are discouraged from doing anything that might quicken their weak hearts).

However, the new breed of blue bloods coming through seem to be headed up by a pair who are keen to prove that the Royal Family aren’t just a group of people who take up valuable space in Britain which could be used for something more interesting or useful.

And Prince William is stepping up to announce that he’d like people to try and kill him.

Now, it’s worth pointing out that he doesn’t want any old person to try and pass bullets through his well-bred torso, but rather, he is determined to serve on the front line Afghanistan, following in the footsteps of his younger brother, Prince Harry.

Fair play to him. If we were in the same position, it’s fair to assume our vast wealth would be spent getting drugs up our noses and indulging in very dubious sexual practises.

William has said that he wants to head to Afghanistan where Britain has some 10,000 troops as part of a NATO-led force fighting a fierce Taliban insurgency. Harry served in Afghanistan for 10 weeks but was withdrawn after media reported the deployment, which meant that they’d effectively painted a neon target on his back.

William says:

“My heart was in the army and that’s why I first joined them. It’s just a pity I didn’t get to Afghanistan. Which, you know, many people say ‘well that’s very understandable’.

“There are some slightly valid arguments as to why not, but many of them are hyped up as to why I couldn’t go.

“I still have hope and faith and a real determination to go out there.”

The mad fucker.

Now he’s been pegged as Hollywood’s leading creepily insincere sci-fi nutjob, Tom Cruise needs all the fans he can get.

Unless, you know, those fans keep turning up at his house without permission because they’re fanatical veterans’ rights activists with a history of psychiatric issues who keep shutting down freeways by allegedly waving flags and guns around.

That’s bad news for Edward Van Tassel – he’s exactly that, and he’s been given a restraining order forcing him to stay away from Tom Cruise. Phew, that was close – it’s a good job these mentally ill gun-toting rogue soldiers respect court orders so diligently, eh?

Tom Cruise’s powers are perfectly self-evident to everyone. He can help car crash victims better than people who know how to help car crash victims, he can impregnate virgins young enough to be his daughter and he can also take any number of sure-fire hit movies and make people not want to watch them just because of who he is. It’s incredible.

But Tom Cruise is only human – or part-human and part-Jesus alien or whatever – and so sometimes his powers fail him and he needs outside help. Like when mentally-troubled Iraq veterans come to his house and try to hand him slightly unsettling letters, which is the case with Edward Van Tassel.

Van Tassel is a former soldier who gained notoriety recently for walking into a radio studio in fatigues and a mask with a gun as a massively ill-advised Halloween stunt, and for shutting down a freeway by standing on an overpass waving a flag and a gun around. Oh, and for spooking Tom Cruise out by visiting him with letters and books and friendship requests and whatnot now, too.

But it’s OK because, as E! Online reports, Tom Cruise has managed to get a restraining order taken out on Van Tassel:

Darryl Perlin, senior deputy district attorney for Santa Barbara County, tells E! News the order issued Wednesday bars 28-year-old Edward Van Tassel from having any contact or communications with the 46-year-old Cruise. It also forbids Van Tassel from coming anywhere near the actor’s Beverly Hills estate. “He’s definitely a threat. He’s a celebrity stalker,” said Perlin.

We know what you’re thinking – why would anyone want to stalk a film star as creepy and unapproachable as Tom Cruise when it’d be easier just to draw macabre pictures of Uma Thurman or send Britney Spears a big box of dildos?

Well, given that Edward Van Tassel is a veterans’ rights activist, and in Born On The Fourth Of July Tom Cruise played a veteran struggling to come to terms with civilian life, there’s a good chance that that’s the link.

Or maybe Edward Van Tassel just really, really liked Lions For Lambs. We suppose statistically someone had to. No wonder the poor chap seems so disturbed.

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