Polls, polls, polls – all HUNG PARLIAMENT

Consultation, devo this and devo that …

The factoid has taken root, and is now stated as fact – Alex Salmond wants a second question, and is happy to accept devo-something as second best – a consolation prize if independence fails to win a majority. The Scottish electorate are now safely marginalised - having shown disturbing signs of being a sovereign democratic voice – and the future of Scotland will be determined by Civic Scotland, Reform Scotland, and the outcome of the referendum consultation. In fact, there is no real need for a referendum at all, since a series of unelected bodies, representative of nothing but the agenda of those who lead them, and the outcome of a self-selecting online questionnaire will determine how we are governed.

When we get right down to it, anyone who wants to start up a body that they claim represents Scottish opinion can launch their own consultation on Survey Monkey. All this is very heartening – we can dispense with all the political parties, manifestos, elected officials, etc. and simply claim to speak for the people, whom we can rely on to remain safely silent.

Well, not quite – the forms of democracy must be maintained so as not to frighten the horses, so a referendum will be held, with a ballot paper so confusing that the outcome will be contentious enough to be dismissed, unless of course it gives the right answer, namely – anything but independence.

The world will be safe for WMDs, Trident will stay in the Holy Loch: death in foreign fields, the Labour Party gravy train and the House of Lords will continue, the poor, the vulnerable and the sick will still be the scapegoats for all our ills: the Tory conspiracy against ordinary people can press on relentlessly to destroy the NHS and the welfare state, and the military/industrial complex can expand the killing machine again. The parade of coffins draped in the Union Jack can continue, fat old men in berets, blazers and badges can revel in the death of the young, and the Last Night of the Proms will acquire a new resonance.

The scales have fallen from my eyes – I see it all clearly now, and can spend my declining years reading old copies of Boy’s Own Paper and singing Rule Britannia. Oh, happy Empire day!

Scottish Public Opinion Monitor - Impact of independence on Scots' economic optimism

View more presentations from Ipsos MORI

Who are we? - or - Who were we in 2007/08? Mitchell/Bennie/Johns report

Scotland on Sunday yesterday …

Well, Scotland on Sunday - and The Scotsman - are yesterday – they have little to do with political realities in Scotland today. The Herald, to their credit (I hope it reflects in their circulation soon) is awakening to Scotland as it really is, as Glasgow starts to emerge from its long, dark Labour night.

In an edition that reeked of superficial negativism and hostility to the SNP, the party of government, chosen so overwhelmingly by the Scottish electorate last May, SoS homed in on The Mitchell/Bennie/Johns report - who are the SNP members?

This report deserves much more serious examination than Scotland on Sunday’s and Kenny Farquarson’s tabloid analysis gave to it.

The Mitchell report is a four-year old snapshot of a party - the Scottish National Party - in a nation, Scotland, that is changing very rapidly indeed, a party that is the major change agent in that revolutionary historical process, a process which in its turn is a part of great social and economic upheaval in the United Kingdom, in Europe and across the globe. We are living in interesting times, times that the Scotsman and Scotland on Sunday either fail to, or choose not to understand.

THE REPORT BACKGROUND

A report like this is valuable in the way looking at the stars is valuable  - the delayed light we see tells us a lot about what happened in the past, but not about the present. When the survey was taken, there were 13,203 stars in the SNP sky – now there are over 20,000.

The SNP was into the second half of its first year in minority government, and the unelected Gordon Brown was just beginning to exacerbate the disaster of the Blair years and the process of bankrupting Britain. Megrahi was two years away from release, Wendy Alexander had been leading Labour in Holyrood for three months, George W. Bush was President of the United States, the Iraq War was only just over half way through it murderous progress, and a lot of men, women and children were still alive whose whose subsequent brutal deaths are now a shameful testament to the British Government and NATO’s supine deference to the Blair/Bush axis.

So whatever the SNP was, thought and said in the late 2007/early 2008 period, they have moved with these radically changing times. But it is still relevant to look back – and learn …

The report writers set themselves three objectives –

To offer a socio-demographic view of SNP members, to explore attitudes and identities, and to look at how these attitudes translated themselves into activity. They expected activists to be more radical, and to be more inflexible in their position on independence.

I, knowing sweet ****-*** about May’s Law of Curvilinear disparity (1972), interpret that as meaning that those who work hard in a party committed to the independence of their nation will want to radically change things, and not be easily shifted away from that. It’s how ye tell ‘em …

For the detail, read the full report – The Mitchell/Bennie/Johns report - who are the SNP members? It is well worth the effort for anyone who wants to understand how the SNP were four years ago. How that 13,000 members has changed in four years, and what the demographics and views of the new 7,000 are will have to wait for a new report.

But here are my perceptions of the Mitchell Report, as a kind of mouthwash to clear the bad taste left by Scotland on Sunday.

As the  report acknowledges, devolution changed the SNP’s status as a party with little presence in the Westminster Government and negligible influence on government, with an organisation largely of unpaid volunteers into Scotland’s second party, and the party organisation was transformed almost overnight into one of elected members supported by salaried professionals. The skill sets and experience changed, but there was a time lag of almost five years – till 2004 – before the constitution changed. There has now been a power shift from activists to MSPs, the leaderships, salaried party officials and, perhaps most significantly to the wider membership.

I would also observe that in the period since the report surveys were taken, there has been an explosion in the use of alternative media, and the lessons of their use in the Obama campaign  for the presidency of the US were not lost on SNP strategists, although to some degree the bloggers, twitterati, YouTubers and facebookers drove the agenda and the party followed.

I would argue that the experience of minority government and the skill sets forged in that challenging four year period – which was only 6-9 months old during the survey – not only changed the parliamentary party and its full-time professionals, but also the membership, old and new.

(If that experience could drive an old man like me, already in his seventies, looking forward to a quiet life of playing music and writing a bit of fiction, a lifetime Labour supporter, into the arms of the SNP and into a kind of unpaid activism and commitment, sustained through two heart attacks, a quad bypass and a cardiac arrest, then I take leave to think that it must have changed the mindset, the values and the priorities of those who had given their lives to the party in ways that the Mitchell Report could not of necessity reflect.)

All of these factors led to the most radical sea change ever experienced in Scottish politics since the 1945 Labour landslide, and the most significant event in UK politics for a generation – the May 2011 SNP landslide victory.

How have the demographics changed since 2007/2008?

What are the demographics of the 50% increase in the membership?

How have the attitudes of the 13,000 members changed and what are the attitudes of the 7000+ new members?

These are the exciting questions, and the party that has become the most professional political machine in Britain since the Mitchell survey, the envy of many European parties, possessed of opinion poll and confidence ratings that most UK and European leaders would die for, is addressing them daily in pursuit of its goal – the independence of the nation of Scotland.

The Scotsman and Scotland on Sunday could have been a dynamic part of these great events, could have addressed these questions, in the great traditions of journalism and a free press. Instead, they are locked in a dying past, and Scotland is moving past them with pitying glances.

Saor Alba!

Tom Gallagher in Scottish Review on the Paxman/Salmond interview

When this blog was posted,(Thursday, 29 October 2009) Barack Obama had been President for just under a year and Alex Salmond and the SNP were still a minority government.  Tom Gallagher popped up again yesterday in Scottish review, defending the notorious Paxman interview. This clip is now approaching 9000 hits, high by my modest standards, and there seems to be pretty much a consensus in the comment – and elsewhere in the media- about this little episode, which reflected no credit on Paxman, but did the SNP a lot of good. (Interesting to note Gallagher was attacking the Bannockburn theme way back in 2009.)

Why should Alex Salmond be caressed with a feather duster by Paxo?

Tom Gallagher got one thing right, although not as he doubtless intended it -

“ Lots of people are scrambling around trying to find the elusive artefacts of Britishness which will enable them to derail the nationalist juggernaut. It occurred to me that the mercurial and choleric Mr Paxman exemplified one of the strands that have defined Britishness in the eyes of the rest of the world. “ TOM GALLAGER

It would be too kind to call the unionist opposition a juggernaut so far – more of a rickety empire wagon with the wheels coming off – but the Paxman interview undoubtedly caused to to jolt dangerously as it ran into yet another Paxo rut …

BLOG FROM 2009

Thursday, 29 October 2009

Prof. Tom Gallagher, Alex Salmond - and the NED?
I sent the following letter to the Herald as a response to yet another misconceived attack by Professor Tom Gallagher of the Bradford University Peace Studies department. It wasn't published, and, in fairness to the Herald, I was really responding to Prof Gallagher's earlier attacks on Alex Salmond, and not the ridiculous charge of Anglophobia directed against him yesterday, and to that degree, I was 'off thread'.
Today's letters include a number of robust and effective responses to the Professor Gallagher, and I am content that balance has been served, however I reproduce my unpublished letter below because it refers to something that tends to be skated over in embarrassment by the Scottish media, and I am bound to say on occasion by the SNP itself, namely the hostility by America to Scotland's ambitions for independence on strategic - and covert - foreign policy grounds.
America's appalling - and murderous - record of interfering in democratic processes in other nations, notably in Latin America, is well known, or at least it should be to anyone who has not had their head firmly in the sand for the last half a century or so. In the Reagan era, a certain embarrassment set in over the egregious nature of the CIA's brutal suppression of democratic regimes, and an organisation was set up to sanitise this arm of America's foreign policy, called the National Endowment for Democracy.
The criticisms of this organisation are numerous, coming both from Americans and from the rest of the world. It has two aspects - a smiling public aspect of good works and worthy initiatives, and another, secret aspect of covert operations and the channelling of money to politicians and groups deemed to be favourable to American interest in countries that are deemed to be strategically important to America, which means just about anywhere on the globe. It uses a complex, concealed money trail as the conduit for these funds.
It also sponsors carefully selected academics from other countries deemed to be sympathetic to its public aims, and what ambitious academic could quibble with the aims of a foundation that endows democracy?

Professor Tom Gallagher is a Research Fellow of the National Endowment for Democracy.

UNPUBLISHED LETTER TO THE HERALD 29th October 2009
Dear Sir,
Tom Gallagher (Letters 28th October) remains entirely consistent, if increasingly intemperate, in his attacks on Alex Salmond, the SNP, and his interpretation of what he calls “ethnic politics”. He seems to wilfully ignore the fact that all political parties are engaged in ethnic politics, and have to embrace within their policies and their activities the realities of ethnicity, ethnic groupings, religious belief and its complex relationship to national identity, colour, and ethnicity.
Alex Salmond faces the reality of a Scotland where three large faith groups exist, together with a large secular block that professes no faith. He faces the reality of faith schools within the state sector for two Christian faiths, but not currently for the Muslim faith. I am personally opposed to faith schools, and believe that they can contribute to ethnic division in communities, but unless we are prepared to dismantle them for Christian religions, I cannot see how in equity we can deny them to Muslims. The vital thing is that they should not be faith schools of the fundamentalist, Christian Zionist type that Blair endowed, nor the extreme Islamicist type that propagate a violent version of Islam that is alien to the vast majority of Muslims
However, Professor Gallagher, as an acknowledged expert on ethnicity and religion as it affects politics, seems to be highly selective in what he attacks, and he displays a remarkable capacity to ignore the rampant militarism, religiosity and celebration of imperial values that characterises Britishness, and seems totally blind to an even more militaristic religious nationalism displayed by America. Perhaps the fact that he is a research fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington D.C. contributes to his myopia in this regard, because the NED is a very odd body indeed.
Founded in the Reagan era, this organisation was designed to sanitise the brutal suppression of Latin America democracies by the CIA – its purpose was, in the words of former CIA operative Philip Agee, “seeking to promote free, fair, transparent democratic elections, but in such a way that power went to the elites and not to the people.” We can see its dubious operations in Afghanistan and its spectacular failure in Iraq.
Alex Salmond and the SNP are resolutely anti-nuclear, and committed to the removal of weapons of mass destruction from Scotland. One would expect this to sit well with a Professor of Peace Studies, but perhaps not so well with a Research Fellow of the NED, an organisation that uses a complex system of directing money to shadowy political forces in ways that make it impossible to “follow the money”.
Scottish nationalism represents a threat to the kind of American foreign policy epitomised by the Bush, Cheney and Blair years, a bitter destructive era that we may be painfully emerging from under Obama. Prof. Gallagher can find better targets than celebrations of Bannockburn if he wishes to further this vital process.
Yours faithfully,
Peter Curran

 

LibDems - the failed, bitter, vengeful UK party that attacks the SNP

This is the failed, discredited party that attacks the most successful party in Britain - the Scottish National Party.

It has five - yes, 5 - MSPs in the Scottish Parliament. It would be obliterated if a UK general election was called now. It has lied to the electorate. It has failed to deliver in Coalition. It is now Tory in all but name.

Its former Scottish leader, Tavish Scott, is now bitter, vengeful towards the SNP, and blames his own UK party for wrecking his political career. Well, they helped, Tavish, but you did a pretty good job of wrecking it yourself ....

And the Colonial Governor of Scotland, Michael Moore, a LibDem, attacks the SNP. the decisively elected government of Scotland, and in doing so, attacks the Scottish people.

Adjectives for LibDems - ineffectual, naive, expedient - and vicious in failure ...

A lack of moderation–and its results …

I pre-moderate comments on my blog, and only allow access to those with an online ID. I do this because I have some experience of what unmoderated comment produces.

On my YouTube channel – TAofMoridura – I can’t insist on an online ID but I do pre-moderate, and it involves a lot of work.

Once in a while, I forget to set the pre-moderate requirements. Here’s what happened, on one video alone Scotland's independence and the English - BBC1 clip posted on 5th July 2011.

Some say this is a price worth paying to hear the raw, unmoderated voice of the people. I’m not so sure, given the religious bigotry, historical uncertainty and general abuse that appears. Education, education education – and information, information, information … But there is some good stuff, and some reasoned voices in among it all.

 

 

• It's none of England's business weather Scotland should be independent or not, the people of Scotland, the Scots, are the sovereign of Scotland, therefore what the people of Scotland want is absolute.

  And this news poll piece will probably be news to all the English nationalists/unionists who've been raving on for ages saying that "more English people want to see Scotland independent than the Scots do".

  Time to put an end to this rancid union once and for all, it's way past it's sell by date.

  segano1 1 month ago 7

• the english should vote for independence too for themselves away from the monarchy its a wakeupcall>com for them

  satelite1402 2 months ago 3

• @satelite1402

  the monarchy is scottish

  dublinricky 1 month ago 9

• @dublinricky - Are you having a laugh? The house of Stuart is long gone, its house of Hannover which is german. Which those people have settled in england and have had the throne there. The throne is english and they are of german descent. Whats Scottish about that? Anyway your a fake account, your a ulster loyalist living in scotland as a unionist, who sits on youtube making accounts to be either ; scottish nationalist, irish republican, to make those peoples look bad. Get a life

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888

  I am Irish from Artane. The Queen is not English whatsoever, the ancestry goes to Sophia of Hanover the grand-daughter of James VI of... SCOTS.

  dublinricky 1 month ago

• @dublinricky - your information is loyalist lies. Do you know what the Jacobite rebellion of 1745 was for? Bonnie Prince Charlie, a man of scottish royal blood, and his counterparts where Hannovarians, German Georgie. Read a book u scumbag, your on a fake account, keep your nose out our business wee man

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 The Queen is Scottish, she was born in Glamis castle in Scotland, near Angus and Tayside.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - she may have been born here, she has an english accent and is of german descent, that doesnt make her scottish. That same woman visited the Culloden battlefield to "honour it with her presence" WHY? cause it was HANNOVARIAN victory.

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 You sound a bit racist, are you saying that where an individual is born has nothing to do with who they are? That is part of their heritage, so if some one had a bit half ancestry from another country far away yet they were born in Scotland and identified as Scottish, they are not Scottish according to you?

  She has an English accent obviously because most of her work is involved down there, so naturally she'll pick up influences.

  And Culloden was not Scotland vs England.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - Im not racist, im saying the woman is english, she lives there and has an english accent, and she is of german descent. I am not slagging germans or english people so i fail to see why you came to that conclusion. she isnt HALF scottish lol, she was born here yes, her surname isnt, her accent isnt, she doesnt live here? Culloden was true scotsmen vs the british government, in the hope of home rule, and putting a man of scottish royal blood on the throne

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 You say you're not racist yet you use race in a discriminative manner to judge who somebody is with a complete disregard to their heritage (what they inherent from birth onwards) and their native birth rights.

  Yes she has an English accent, yes accent is part of your heritage also but she also has Scottish ancestry as well and holds the separate title of 'Queen of Scots', (there was no union of the crowns, she gave a separate oath to the Scots the night before her coronation).

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 And according to you, Culloden was 'true Scots vs Brits'?, so with more Scots fighting for the government because they did not want a Catholic monarch from Italy undermining their true Scottish branded religion of Presbyterianism, that means most Scots are not true Scots then?

  Bonnie Prince Charlie was born in Rome, an opportunist who wanted to restore as much Catholicism back as possible, the Scots by majority clearly did not want that, as they had their own church that was theirs.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - Your clearly sectarian. The Jacobites fought for Charlie cause he was of Scottish royal blood and the highlanders became part of Scotland cause of the Stuarts. The Jacobites fought for the clan system, many for Scotland, and they fought for their rightful king, but it is you who is the sectarian scumbag here who is totally against all that all because of the guys religion? The Jacobites opposed the union which is why i said they fought for Scotland

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Calengela - if your a scottish nationalist thats hilarious cause i feel as if im talking to the head of the orange order here with such loyalist lies

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Calengela - youv clearly called me everything under the sun with your false accusations. Bonnie Prince Charlie actually fought for the throne of his family, you know the house of Stuart? who were in the throne of Scotland, and booted off cause of militant protestants invited a dutchman over, and then when he died and never produced an air, they later fought for a german. You clearly hate catholics and celtic fans cause i never opened my mouth about religion untill u started it

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Calengela - Dont even go into the whole Culloden story, i know it and men in tartan carrying a scotland flag into battle fighting redcoats with a union jack taken into battle tells me who i want to win ok

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 Rubbed the wrong way? That seems like you've been touched the wrong way, I'm no royalist or unionist either, I believe in an independent Scotland and a re-united Ireland, but the Ulstermen just don't want it and Ireland is unlikely going to be able to even afford to run it.

  But I'm against historical revisionists in both sides here, I seen the flaws in your argument and responded.

  Culloden was Prodestants vs Catholics, what ever version of history you've consumed, it's wrong.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - LOL "Culloden was Prodestants vs Catholics" no it wasnt, for starters you cant even spell "Protestant". Yes in terms of who would be king, but it wasnt about that. Your clearly a bigot to even suggest that. People who sided with the hannovarians certainly had your view, you call me racist? yet your the sectarian person here. Im not racist, the Queen refused to wear the crown jewels of Scotland cause she didnt recoginise Scotland as a country, yet you say shes scottish

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 I don't think you're in a position to criticise my type of 'Protestants' when your every comment is riddled with illiteracy, not to mention, you're sub standard historical knowledge and hypocritical bigoted views.

  To say somebody is not Scottish even though they were of native birthright according to heritage is what bigotry is, your comments are saturated with contradictory opinions, and that's no exaggeration.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - i said she wasnt scottish cause she doesnt live here, she refused to wear the crown jewels of Scotland, therefore not recognising scotland as a country. When is she ever referred to as the "queen of scotland" or "scottish queen" exactly, get lost. Your a bigot, and youv got the cheek to say i am? and av explained and backed it up with historical reasons and you say your into history? you havent got a clue

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 When is the Queen ever referred to as the Queen of Scots? Look up the recent Queens visit to the Scottish parliament where Alex Salmond addressed her as 'Queen of Scots', she is bound by Scots law to address the Scots parliament every 10 years, the most recent was just two months ago, following the SNP's massive recent electoral victory.

  I can't believe you're this ignorant, it's laughable at best though.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 You're clearly an extremist, you must be a Catholic too judging by your unfounded crys of 'bigot'.

  The battle of Culloden was Protestants vs Catholics, this is a well documented proven fact, hence why there were even English Catholics siding with the Jacobite cause, their sole aim was to put a Catholic on the throne, Scotland was Presbyterian, they did not want a Catholic monarch in Scotland, hence why most Scots fought against them.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 - "most scots" fought for the government LOL, no they didnt. The Jacobite army had well more Scots. For the one thousandth time not all the Jacobites were Catholic, there were many presbyterians fighting for them its just you are too ignorant and too sectarian to comprehend that. In terms of who would be king yes it was between a catholic and protestant but you who claims not to be sectarian keeps saying it was a catholic vs protestant war? when IT wasnt, it was a JACOBITE war

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 You keep throwing opinion after opinion back with no factual evidence at all, give me one source that states more Scots fought for the Jacobite cause, and good luck with it, take your time finding a site where the Scots ever wanted a Catholic monarch over their own Presbyterian church, good luck with that...lol

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - your an idiot. Once again it was not a war of catholic scots vs presbyterian scots. Although the war did determine if the king would be protestant or catholic. I done the Jacobite rebellion in school in my teacher who had a degree in history bloody well told me. So im not listening to some faggot on youtube whos trying to tell me different. Read a book boy. Dispite the reformation many Scots stayed loyal to the Stuarts.

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 It's very clear here who the idiot is and it certainly isn't me, like I said, I'm not bothered about religion, I'm a realist, I like truth, not historical revisionism, and it just so happens that Catholicism is well known for it's historical revisionism, that is a well documented fact, not an opinion, hence why I don't read into it on face value. And 'faggot'? you must be a Yankee, as only these people think that is an offensive term to use when in reality it's quite lame 'faggot'.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 The Stuart house was one thing, the idea of a Catholic monarch from Italy who had no regard for the Presbyterian church and Protestants was another thing entirely.

  This is exactly why there is so many Plastic Paddies brainwashed by 100's of years of National Catholic propaganda from Ireland trying to undermine the Scots and make out that the Scots are Irish and vice versa which they aren't, modern science disproves myth made rubbish.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 And of course you are going to block, you're the cowardly type, I sensed it coming when I asked you to cite your sources to prove that bullshit you were saying, yet you came back with not a single source, you just recycled all your original garbage to spew out once again, your mere brainwashed opinionated beliefs.

  Yes Scotland becoming a republic is probably a possibility in future after independence, but not for a long time, even the SNP don't support republicanism.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - Yes there were Scots who fought for the government at Culloden 2 clan regiments and the blackwatch regiment. Whereas the entire Jacobite army was predominately Scots. Which means there were MORE scots on the Jacobite side. The Queen isnt scottish end of, if she got her ancestry looked up and to say she jumped out her mothers vagina in scotland then buggered off elsewhere hardly makes here even 50% scottish

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 The only reason you don't want to acknowledge the Queen as Scottish, even though she is, is because it goes against your political historical revisionism, hence your very hypocritical bigoted view on her native birth right. The Jacobite side was all Catholics, they came from the highlands down south, although not all regiments were actually Highlanders, many were Catholics who moved up to support the cause from there, there were even English Catholics fighting in the Jacobites.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888

  Dang, you gots schooled kid. Take a nap. Take a mothafuckin nap.

  ProtestantThomas 21 hours ago

• @Steely1888 Most Scots DID fight against the Jacobites, the whole point of the Jacobites existence was for the sole aim of placing a Catholic on the monarch, a Catholic from Italy. Being a Scot at the time, you're not going to want a backward barbaric Roman system of Catholicism taking over the Scottish way of life and undermining the Scottish religion. Why the hell would a Protestant fight for them?, the whole point of the Jacobite cause was to remove Protestants and ruin the Scottish religion.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - LOL the scottish way of life was banned after Culloden

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 The Scottish ways never died, many Scottish institutions have remained 100% independent to this day, Scots law, Scottish education system, the Scottish church etc to name a few.

  Ireland is not in Scotland, the Irish lost their true culture from 1537 onwards when King Henry of England wanted to influence the Irish as English so that they were easier to assimilate.

  After Ireland got independence in the early 1900's they adopted Scottish influence due to the emergence of Celt romance.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• There are scottish nationalists even on my youtube list who are presbyterian and support the old jacobite cause, so get lost ya bigot. You clearly are.  I take it you think in 1690 king william of orange rode a white horse and led an army of protestants to defeat an army of catholics? your history is a massive misconception, get a grip, and stop replying, av had enough of your bigotry. Any historian would piss themselves laughing at you with such views

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 Also, Culloden took place in 1746, 39 years after the union of the 'Great British' political construct. You may not want to hear it, but it's the truth, as I said before, I'm no royalist or unionist, I'm not even that bothered about religion, although given the choice, I'd probably go with Presbyterians over Catholics, either way though, I'm a realist, I go by the truth, not bias, that's why I exposed your comments as 'opinions', not 'facts', so if you can get the 'facts', go for it.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - Im blocking you cause iv gave you historical facts and youv chosen to ignore it cause it upsets your theory of a sectarian war. read a book and grow up. Im not wasting any more of my time educating you. I gave you facts and anyone who has learned about it and studied the event will tell u the same. You exposed nothing, all u did is declare your sectarian, by reading into a war the wrong way and seeing it in black and white

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 As for Scottish independence, even with independence, the United Kingdoms will still remain unless Scotland becomes a republic, but that's unlikely as the SNP's stance is to retain the monarchy but gain back political independence to the way it was prior to 1707. The UK has existed since 1603.

  The constitution would therefore be re-written from "The United Kingdom of Great Britain & N.Ireland" and into

  "The United Kingdoms of Scotland, England & N.Ireland".

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - There are republican members of the SNP. We would lately get a vote after independence on it. Why be nationalist and want a foriegn monarch? that is laughable. If you want to be a country you should grow a pair and want your own head of state. You say stuff on how bonnie prince charlie shouldnt of been on the throne? he had more of a valid claim than the hannovarians and the williamites. Take it your national anthem isnt flower of scotland? and its God save the queen?

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Calengela - you claim to be scottish nationalist and u dispise the jacobites for fighting for a man of scottish royal blood, and the same people opposed the union that your supposed to be nationalist and want to break? and why? cause u disagree with the mans religion who wasnt even devout. You have issues mate, a take it you go into ibrox singing about the 'billy boys' and wave union flags and singing about the queen?

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 One contradictory opinion of yours for example is that the Queen can't possibly be Scottish because she doesn't live in Scotland and doesn't speak with a Scottish accent, so does that mean that Mary Queen of Scots is not Scottish either? Using your logic, she can't possibly be, as she grew up in France for several years and had a French accent.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - well Mary queen of Scots had a scottish surname so she was of scottish origin. You however said the queen is scottish who is not of scottish origin, and was born here and then fucked off to england? does not have a scottish accent, and the only thing she wants with us is for us to stay in the union so she can have more power

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 Scotland being in the union or not makes no difference to what the Queen wants as the UK constitution will still remain regardless, because Scottish independence is about political independence not republicanism, this is a well documented fact, look up the SNP's white paper manifesto, you'll find it on their official website.

  The UK is a monarchy union, Great Britain is a political union, learn the difference.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 So a surname still holds as much value to who you are today as it did 500 years ago, are you actually still being serious with these endless hilarious comments? ROFL!

  The Queen is immediately Scottish if born there, if you are born in Scotland with not at least one Scottish parent, then you are still a Scottish nationalists, however if you have at least one parent who is Scottish then you are a Scot by nationality and an indigenous link, which the Queen does have.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Steely1888 If you are born in Scotland, you originate there, you are native to Scotland by birth right and heritage, the fact you try to disprove this reveals your bigotry and hypocritical nature.

  You have a very selective view on who is Scottish because you don't want to acknowledge people you don't approve of as being Scottish, try telling me again that that is not bigotry right there.

  I'm starting to get the impression that you aren't even Scottish at all now, either a racist Yank or Irish.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• @Calengela - youv really been rubbed the wrong way, i take it your a militant royalist unionist? not much point talking to me as im not royalist nor unionist

  Steely1888 1 month ago

• @dublinricky The monarchy isn't scottish, the monarchy is German. The Scottish Stuarts came down to England in 1603, one had his head chopped off and the other was chased away to France. The Catholic Stuarts were then blocked from the throne. the last one was seen running away from the British army at culloden

  billybob7ful 1 month ago

• @dublinricky The monarchy are germans.

  1966thewallace 2 days ago

• @satelite1402 In England, the Queens authority is absolute as the English are her subjects, however in Scotland, the Scots themselves are the sovereign, so she has holds a separate title as 'Queen of Scots' and reigns at the Scots whims, King and Kingdom have never meant the same thing in Scots law, the Scots therefore have always been more free and had some of the worlds earliest democratic powers that go as far back as the 1328 Declaration of Arbroath, legalised by King Robert I king of Scots.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• Con't, A clue to this is the very title of the monarchies of Scotland, they were titled 'King or Queen of Scots' rather than the monarchies of England where it was 'King or Queen of England' and not the English themselves, this means that the Scottish Crown worked for the people of Scotland rather than the country itself with subjects living on it like in England.

  The Scots had powers of freedom even back then.

  The London unionist elite will want you to believe otherwise and be ignorant however.

  Calengela 1 month ago

• I like the way they present the results of a poll of 1200 people as fact !! STV were really even handed in the run up to the election but they are back to their bad old ways again. Very noticable in the last few weeks. Unionist spin and selective story telling!!

  RobQos 2 months ago

• DOGGY :D

  darkarlok 2 months ago

George Bernard Shaw foresees the ConLib Coalition

And we see these few rising as if by magic into power and influence, and forming, with the millionaires who have accidentally gained huge riches by the occasional windfalls of our commerce, the governing class. Nothing is more disastrous than a governing class that does not know how to govern. George Bernard Shaw - 1910

100 years after GBS wrote these words, the 2010 General election threw up the ConLib Coalition. He would have recognised them for what they are - the 21st century manifestation of his description of 1910.

A confused electorate in England threw them up - now they should throw them out. But what will they get in their place? Tories Mark II - the god-awful Labour Party?

Scotland took the real choice open to it in May 2011 and chose their ain folk - the Scottish National Party.

Soon they will make an even more historic choice in a referendum, and will be free of the “governing class that doesn’t know how to govern” - the Labour Party - 13 blighted years, the Liberal Democrats and the Tories  - almost 15 incompetent, disastrous months.

Scottish Labour and the 'intellectual chasm' - Ken dives in head first

Professor Tom Devine advocates soul searching and radical reappraisal for Scottish Labour, and talks of the intellectual chasm.

All of this escapes Ken Macintosh, Labour smoothie, touted as replacement for Iain Gray. "Your front bench team were constantly outclassed by the SNP team ..." ISABEL FRASER

KEN MACINTOSH: "... over the last four years...in most of the Holyrood debates, the intellectual argument was nearly always won by Labour."

Ken wonders how many members of the public "actually watched" these debates. Well, I watched all of them, Ken (and have most of them on disk) but I wonder if you "actually watched" them, or if you were present, actually listened to them?

Ken exemplifies the blinkered, amnesiac denial of reality by the Labour Party, especially in Scotland. They cannot confront the chasm (two chasms, in fact - one intellectual, the other moral) so they dive in head first, hoping to learn to fly on the way down.

Ken, your mackintosh is not just keeping the rain out, it is also excluding reality. The eponymous inventor of rubber-proofing of cloth and of the mackintosh (born and brought up near my birthplace in Dennistoun) died of suffocation in his own coat on a hot day.

If the Scottish Labour Party elects you as its next leader, it is liable to do the same ...