I was sort of hoping the ladies would’ve written the blog for me again this week after their sterling efforts last time. It’s been a really busy week again and I’ve got any number of stories in my Internet Explorer Favourites that were stored as the basis for potential blog posts that I just haven’t been able to touch. In truth I could be posting every day considering the sewage heading the Yes camp’s way.
Before moving on though I want to mention something that ties in nicely with last week’s offering. Being an SNP party donor (not a member – I briefly was back in the 80′s before deciding that being in a political party wasn’t really for me), I received a letter on St Andrew’s Day asking for a contribution to “the campaign”. Presumably this will be the independence campaign? If so, why didn’t this come from Yes Scotland? Why did I also get a window sticker with a totally different logo on it which, after viewing it from 3 different angles, I finally worked out actually said “yes”? If I’m confused then you can bet that Joe Public is too. This needs to be handled and handled NOW. Politics MUST be taken out of this debate as it’s becoming too much of an SNP party election broadcast for how they’ll run the newly-independent nation from Day 1 and is playing right into the MSM’s hands. Just wanted to get that off my chest.
As I said there’s been so much going on this week – Leveson, shipbuilding, etc. and I had a post half-formed in my mind until I read Saturday’s online Daily Mail. You know you shouldn’t but it’s sort of like picking away at a scab. “The Saturday Essay” I think they call it and this week’s was a belter. I won’t link to it here. Google have recently changed their ranking algorithm to give more prominence to pages linked from social media sites like blogs, Facebook, etc. so I won’t do them any favours. Anyway, the apocalyptic title read “The shattering of Europe: It’s not just Scotland, almost every major European nation is threatened by breakaway movements. History tells us the result could be bloodshed, chaos and suffering.” I wasn’t aware bits of Scotland wanted to separate. Is there a Fifers for Independence movement? I might need a passport next time I visit my old dear. Anyway, the author starts off with one of these “in the future” scenarios:
“The year is 2022, and in the gilded splendour of his Brussels headquarters, the EU President is facing a tricky dilemma. Pressure is building on him to finalise his latest budget — yet the problems seem intractable. With so many small new nations scrabbling for funds, agreement seems impossible. Catalonia, for example, is demanding deep cuts in EU administrative expenses, while the Scots are calling for higher welfare subsidies.”
Now that’s not bad at all. He managed to hold off for nearly four complete sentences before remembering where his article was being published. O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us to see oursels as ithers see us indeed. Everyone knows there’d be no jobs up here post-independence except for those lucky enough to be administering unemployment benefit. All the companies would leave, the lights would go out and the population would regress to cannibalism, chomping up the unwary English traveller rash enough to set foot over the border.
“Like the Spanish, we live in a geographically and ethnically diverse country — once the epicentre of one of the world’s great empires, now bound together by the legacy of history under a popular but elderly monarch. To the great relief of those of us who passionately believe we are better together, polls show the Scottish separatists heading for defeat.”
I know I shouldn’t let guff like this wind me up but there’s that “better together” phrase again. Why? Er… cos we used to have an empire, once ruled the waves and continue to pay a family of foreigners long to reign over us apparently. The Yes sticker is already off my back windscreen.
“Those of us living south of Hadrian’s Wall will find ourselves in a rump kingdom of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The nationalist momentum would probably be unstoppable — and soon one country would become four.”
I could’ve been a Daily Mail writer if only I hadn’t stuck in at geography during my school years. Remind me – how is Newcastle United’s application to join the SPL coming along?
Things get even more bizarre though:
“But the rise of separatism is also a reminder that no nation lasts for ever. Look at a map of Europe in 1912, 1942, 1962 or even 1992 and you will see a very different picture from that in 2012… Another country facing disintegration is Italy, which never existed as an independent entity until the 1860s. Its people lived for centuries under different governments, the regions were at totally different stages of economic development and even ate completely different food. Perhaps, it really would be better to break Italy up, with Tuscany, Venice, Naples and Sicily all going their own way, rather like the states of the former Yugoslavia.”
Strange – it’s fine for these regions to go off on their own, but an ancient nation like Scotland? Different matter entirely. Still, you can guess the path that the mention of Yugoslavia led us down…
“As the media whipped up a storm of xenophobic feeling, neighbour turned against neighbour, with devastating consequences. Some 14,000 people were killed in Croatia’s war of independence, while in the bloodstained republic of Bosnia, rival nationalist thugs killed a staggering 64,000 — many of them women and children… Few nations disintegrate without some bad blood or even some bloodshed. And the results are usually very different from what the nationalist partisans expect… It may seem far-fetched to imagine ethnic purges, prison camps, streams of refugees and cities under siege. But it has not only happened before — it was the stuff of daily headlines just 20 years ago.”
Aye that’ll happen here too no doubt. If we ethnically cleansed places like St Andrews there’d be nobody left! How long do you think they’ll be able to hold out if they all seek refuge in the castle there? We could storm it from the beach but it’d probably be easier to enter through the Historic Scotland shop. Not so much far-fetched as completely round the twist. What a load of complete and utter s***e!
“For the past four centuries, since the union of the Scottish and English crowns under James I in 1603, we have shared a common history. Working together, we founded the most successful state the world has ever seen, unleashing the power of industry, the genius of science and the force of our moral example to lay the foundations of the modern world… To throw all this away in the name of a petty and narrow-minded nationalism would be a tragic waste of all we have achieved — leaving us weaker, smaller and poorer.”
Hardly a waste. Nobody’s going to uninvent everything. Folk will still be able to watch telly and stuff like that. It’s just that most of the map won’t be coloured red any more. Get over it.
“Of course, all states have a naturally limited lifespan.”
You said it. Especially ones created against the wishes of the ordinary poeple on both sides of the border. It looks like the sun has well and truly set.
A Cybernat
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Would this be the same Better Together crowd who left a post up on their website for THREE days calling for bullets to shot at the Leaders of the SNP before allegedly becoming shocked and removing said post and allegedly banning said poster.
Got to admit I’ve never heard of the Fifer’s for Independence either and being a Fifer born in Kirkaldy I would have I’d have been sent an invitiation to join.
Funny how the article’s author seems to overlook the completely BLOODLESS Independence of Slovakia from the Czech Republic. Guess the poor wee biddie was fast asleep when that happened.
Moral example??? Whose morals? Certainly NOT the morals of Scotland more like the war like morals of a Blair like Westminster.
leaving us weaker, smaller and poorer. The ONE true statement from Mr Daily Mail. Only problem for him is that it will be rUK that becomes weaker,smaller and poorer. We are on our way to becoming the 6th RICHEST country in the world thank you very much.
Aye these cyberbritnats – tut, tut. Wonder what Lord Foulkes will say?
Well to be fair the author did actually mention the “velvet divorce” between the constituent parts of the old Czechoslovakia. I just couldn’t take everything from the site – copyright and all that. I refuse to link to rubbish like that as well.
Just a bit pathetic all these scare stories. Mind you they’ve got nothing else. Sad really.
Dave
They only have one thing to do and that is continually attack Alex Salmond and the SNP. Patently obvious that IF there was ANY proof of the benefit of the union then they would most likely have produced said evidience. The absolutely total lack of ANY evidence just proves the point beyond any debating point that there is NO bernefit of the union. This is all we’re going to get from them until 2014. They have concept about debating despite the yells and screams from Lamont.
I had the misfortune of reading the whole article and in a fit of madness, also the comments section. Actually I think these over the top pieces will backfire badly on the BritNats. Funnily enough if you ever post – if we are subsidy junkies why do you want to hold on to us so much – you never get a reply. Is it because the only answers are well actually no you subsidise us and we need somewhere to stick the nuclear weapons so we can play big men with our permanent seat on UN Security Council. Somehow I don’t see the average Scot being too convinced by these “arguments”
I’ve posted before – don’t know why I bothered – and it never even got through moderation. Nothing abusive, just pointing out to someone who was ranting and raving about our elderly spongers getting looked after for free in care homes that my own family had £100k ripped out of its coffers by having to pay these very fees that we supposedly get for nothing. It obviously didn’t fit in with the agenda though.
I realised there’s no point in trying to discuss things so now I just have a laugh at them. The more extreme make good material for the blog.
It’s sad that there’s actually folk up here that’ll lap up this nonsense.
Dave
Dave, please don’t doubt the sincerity and honesty of the UK national press, don’t you think Leveson has given them a hard enough time recently? The truth will be
covered up,er, I mean come out. Don’t you know that global warming and the decimation of the UK bumble bee population is all a result of a secret summit the SNP Stazi (shush!) had with some, as yet unnamed, disgruntled weathermen at BBC Scotland, at a bus stop in Weymss Bay. But the plot thickens somewhat as I’ve heard of secret research and experiments to mutate the Ash Dieback disease in a cellar fridge in Springburn, and plant the resulting spores in graveyards across Scotland after Independence. This spore is purported to reinvigourate the stiffs below the ground into a zombie state. These zombies will be conscripted into a new army to march first south, then across the Euro zone, eating brains as they go (a slowdown when they reach Westminister is expected as food is reported to be scarce there).A trusted insider from the ranks of the Stazi secretly(!) tweeted, “this is only the start, we’re going to invade North Korea before they come over here, the poor minions need a bit of liberation, and some tartan to add a touch of colour to their drab garb, no wonder their population’s so depressed.”
Of course, no one will believe this as I haven’t informed the Daily Mail, or any of the other staunch and truthful unionist publications out there yet. But as they seem to have a catalogue of disaster scenarios to warn us unsuspecting minions about if we mistakenly tick the wrong box, I don’t have to worry about being lax on getting the info to the newsdesks!
All I can say is good job Lord Fraser has got his finger on the pulse, er ‘fire’ button. We need protected from ourselves.
Surrealistic comic brilliance as usual, Stevie!
I wonder how long it’ll be until the “Alex Salmond ate my hamster” headline”? We’ve had everything else.
Dave
I’m confused, does that daily mail article count as a positive case for the union or is it the usual pile of kech?
Roll on 2014
I think that’s the nearest they’ve ever got to one.
Dave
Thats some article you have gotten there Dave, the writer must be up for some Science fiction / FantasyAward, because they certainly are on a different planet from the rest of us.
Perhaps their will be a follow up piece made into film “Planet of the Welfare Subie’s”, featuring Lamont and Davidson leading the troops in the battle against the invading Separatist’s while wearing their red,white and muted blue battle bikini’s, —– ahhh brain freeze, brain freeze, BRAIN FREEZE.
Like that article somethings really should not be printed.
Cheers.
Its going to take a lot of drink to get rid of that image.
Lamont, Davidson and bikinis in the same paragraph without the phrase “Things I hope never to see in my lifetime”?
Nightmares for me tonight. I’ll need to watch The Exorcist and The Ring before I go to sleep to try and get these disturbing pictures out of my mind.
Dave
Hi Michael,It’s also called gliiolbsatoan however call it what you want because either way you can’t have that system and be independent.You continue to not answer the points i have raised which leads me to believe you know full well that the snp can’t have a call of independence while wish to be apart of the EU. The fact that it is difficult to have an independent country in this day and age is no excuse for handing your democracy over along with your freedom. Many people used to believe it was impossible to defeat the Romans or the English but they did.Stop just doing what is easy and start doing what is right. A country can be independent and still work with other nations without being held to ransom and made to change their laws to suit.Please wake up to the idea of morals and the sense of doing the right thing because only then will you see what we can do to benefit our country not what we are forced to do.