I woke up this morning - England and Scotland

One of the great blues opening lines has always been “Woke up this morning …”, and it almost became a cliché of the blues lyric.

I woke up this morning, ready to pen my riposte to Kenny Farquharson’s article in Scotland on Sunday, which he had trailed in advance on Twitter last night was to be about the SNP embracing Britishness.

But having come out of my corner swinging, I find I have nothing to fight. This is a perceptive and insightful analysis of the sea change that has occurred in the SNP in the last decade and a half over their concept of independence. For me, it is one of the best things Kenny has written, and is a vital contribution to the independence debate. He has rightly said that some in the party won’t like it, but they would be foolish in the extreme to ignore it.

So I have no comment to offer at this time, because I think it is that comparative rarity in the great independence debate – an objective analysis from a senior Scottish journalist who I think would accept that he is a supporter of the Union. He also cares about Scotland. Read it carefully and reflect …

Cultural revolution as SNP learns to love the Brits

The Royal Wedding - a Union symbolising a divided nation?

Celebrations across Britain? Technically true, but in fact concentrated on London and the Home Counties.

Anglesey and St. Andrews effectively had to stand for Wales and Scotland, for obvious reasons - the royal couple live in Anglesey, and went to St. Andrew's - a Scottish University that is predominantly the province of rich English students.

This was a wedding attended by the rich and privileged (plus a few brutal tyrants), the British Establishment and a few token peasants. It was almost exclusively white - apart from the dictators - and entirely unrepresentative of the United Kingdom. It was a huge expensive PR exercise for the British Establishment, militarism and organised religion, mainly Christian.

It was reported in either hushed reverential tones or a nauseatingly jolly jingoistic and patronising manner by the BBC and ITV both nationally and regionally, and grossly distorted the reality of the widespread indifference of Scotland, Wales and the Midlands and North of England.

Only Channel 4 offered any kind of realistic debate and critique. We expected little else, and it's over - till the next time.

Happy St. George’s Day to the people of England – best wishes from Scotland

May I wish all my English friends and colleagues a very happy Easter and and Happy St. George’s Day. A special wish to the great counties of Durham, Yorkshire and Lancashire and the city of Newcastle.

From Saint George and the Dragon