Craig Murray, on his unsuccessful attempt to become an SNP Parliamentary candidate for Westminster:
"I was asked at assessment whether, as part of a Westminster deal with another party, I would agree to vote for the bedroom tax if instructed by the Party. I replied “No.” End of SNP political career. Problem is, I really believed we were building a different kind of politics in Scotland. I also knew that a simple lie would get me in, but I couldn’t bring myself to utter it...
"I’m afraid to say that the Panel did not feel able to recommend you for approval as a potential parliamentary candidate at this time. While you showed excellent qualities, you could not give a full commitment on group discipline issues...
"...the only question to which I gave an answer that could possibly be interpreted that way, was the one... on the bedroom tax. There was, incidentally, no corresponding question designed to test the loyalty of right wing people."
Party politics is ripe for culling. No wonder we have direct-democracy campaigns such as the Harrogate Agenda.
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Showing posts with label Scotland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Scotland. Show all posts
Sunday, December 28, 2014
Sunday, November 02, 2014
A lament for All Souls
This lament by Iain Dall MacKay was composed on hearing of the death of Patrick Og MacCrimmon - a family famous for its piping tradition whom I first saw mentioned in the writings of George Macdonald Fraser.
A commenter to the above notes that MacKay was mistaken, so that his friend heard the lament. A 1927 recording is here.
UPDATE (21 January 2021): Historical and musicological information here:
https://viurrspace.ca/bitstream/handle/10170/148/MacDonald%2C%20John-Hugh.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
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Scotland's independence: like I said... (2)
"Labour is paying a heavy price for leading the recent campaign against independence, and persuading the Scottish people they’d be better off voting ‘No’. Its core voters in cities such as Glasgow and Dundee felt betrayed by the party standing on a platform with the hated Tories.
"Accusations of treachery and trickery have a special potency in Scottish history, from the betrayal of William Wallace to the massacre at Glencoe. Now, however unfairly, Scottish Labour finds itself cast as the perfidious enemy within, and its poll ratings have plummeted. On the latest projections, at least three-quarters of Labour MPs in Scotland would lose their Westminster seats to the SNP if the Election were held tomorrow – the equivalent of the Conservatives losing every one of their MPs in Essex and Kent.
"I think it's coming anyway. The panic last-minute promises from HMG are a gift to the Yes camp, who can say, "Would they have offered these concessions if they didn't think we'd leave; will they keep their promises if we don't?"
"Then later, if the promises aren't kept, it'll be let's vote again, now we know; and if the promises are kept, then it'll be like one of those I-need-some-space "trial separations" that end in divorce proper.
"Salmond's done it, with the assistance of an incompetent and negligent Westminster."
- Sackerson, "Salmond has done it!" (9 September)
(Hat-tip for the heads-up to John Ward.)
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"Having done so, Labour is now held accountable for delivering the cross-party promises of further devolution made in that frantic fortnight before the vote. Every day those promises remain undelivered, the clamour grows that Miliband’s party has deceived Scotland into rejecting independence.
"Accusations of treachery and trickery have a special potency in Scottish history, from the betrayal of William Wallace to the massacre at Glencoe. Now, however unfairly, Scottish Labour finds itself cast as the perfidious enemy within, and its poll ratings have plummeted. On the latest projections, at least three-quarters of Labour MPs in Scotland would lose their Westminster seats to the SNP if the Election were held tomorrow – the equivalent of the Conservatives losing every one of their MPs in Essex and Kent.
"That would eliminate any chance of a Labour majority, and – one way or another – it would guarantee a second referendum on Scottish independence, which next time the SNP would comfortably win. Goodbye Union. Good luck, Scotland. And goodnight Labour."
- Damian McBride in today's Mail on Sunday
"I think it's coming anyway. The panic last-minute promises from HMG are a gift to the Yes camp, who can say, "Would they have offered these concessions if they didn't think we'd leave; will they keep their promises if we don't?"
"Then later, if the promises aren't kept, it'll be let's vote again, now we know; and if the promises are kept, then it'll be like one of those I-need-some-space "trial separations" that end in divorce proper.
"Salmond's done it, with the assistance of an incompetent and negligent Westminster."
- Sackerson, "Salmond has done it!" (9 September)
 |
(Source: The Independent, 30 October 2014) |
(Hat-tip for the heads-up to John Ward.)
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Sunday, September 21, 2014
The problem with democracy
Last week's Scottish referendum has lit a match to other firecrackers in this country and elsewhere - Belgium and Spain, for example. But how far (and in what way) should the collective will of the people be sovereign?
The sense of being effectively disenfranchised by a remote political elite leads to calls for localism and direct democracy, an example of which is the Harrogate Agenda:
The trouble is, any system can be gamed. The strategy and tools merely vary according to the way the game is set up.
The birthplace of democracy is said to be ancient Athens, and the classical scholar Peter Jones in The Oldie magazine runs a column in which he often compares current affairs with how matters were settled by the Athenians, who voted en masse on everything, in their weekly assemblies. Yet this democracy excluded women, and the slaves on which the city's economy largely depended. Not everyone's interests were represented.
And even for those who had a voice, there was the question of how their decisions were influenced. The way to game a system based on debate and voting is to refine the arts of persuasion, so that emotion can sometimes not assist but overcome reason. Set against Socrates, who asked questions to get at the truth, were the sophists such as Gorgias, who held that nothing really existed and who gave answers simply to sway opinion. Socrates was forced by his enemies - who persuaded the Athenian assembly - to drink poison at the age of 71, when he was still in good shape; Gorgias lived to 108.
As well as his opponents, the skill of the orator can ruin his supporters, and even himself. Demosthenes, reputedly the greatest speaker in history, caused Athens to resist the Macedonians, and it was only by the earnest pleading of Phocion with Alexander the Great that the city was spared the destruction visited on Thebes. Phocion also persuaded Alexander to give up his demand for Demosthenes and other crowd-rousers to be delivered up to him, which gave the orator a few more years of life (until he had another go at the Macedonians).
A modern example of the deadly persuader would be Adolf Hitler, whose speeches were electrifying even though he was eventually off his head with the cocktails of drugs he took daily. In the latter stages of World War Two the Allied decided to stop trying to assassinate him, because we were more likely to win with him still ruling his roost and terrifying his general staff.
Ultimately, democracy can be used to annul itself. The French Revolutionary Assembly quickly turned into a reign of terror that consumed its own leaders. Democracy turns to mobocracy and the rise of cliques and strongmen, as the Communists - heirs of Gorgias as far as respect for the truth is concerned - well know. Those who advocate local democracy can look across to the USA and see how wrong it can go in some communities - judges and police chiefs making decisions with an eye to re-election - just as democracy is failing in the nation as a whole, with a developing media-and-law-buying oligarchy that even the Federal Reserve chairman Janet Yellen can't quite deny.
And those who think referenda are the universal answer might like to watch Peter Cook's 1970 film, "The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer". What the Wikipedia synopsis doesn't make clear is how the antihero becomes a dictator: he offers the public the power to take part in all law-making via referenda , so that the ordinary man finds himself fretting at home over proposed legislation while his tea is getting cold, and eventually the people decide to leave it all in Rimmer's hands.
Nor do the people speak with one voice. I think it's an American spin doctor who describes the electorate as "a bag of magnets", that is, groups of people who feel strongly on both sides about issues and about other groups, so that the art is not to please all but to get a small majority polarised in the direction chosen by the manipulator.
Majority voting is not only decisive, but divisive, as we now see north of the border. Members of the minority have become sharply conscious of the numbers that share their view, and there will be work to do in reconciling the two sides. It is not enough that the greater number should have their will; their defeated opponents must agree to abide by the result.
Debate continues about voting systems and how fair they are, and we saw in 2011 how the Establishment united and fought hard against proportional representation. This misleads us into viewing the political crisis as psephological. It is not.
Far more important is what unites the community through its differences: a sense of common identity, equality for all under the law, the preservation of individual rights and liberties, and the justified expectation that by obeying the law and applying oneself it is possible to better one's economic condition. In these aspects there have been grave failures by the political elites and the magnates within and outside the country who have their ear.
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The sense of being effectively disenfranchised by a remote political elite leads to calls for localism and direct democracy, an example of which is the Harrogate Agenda:
The trouble is, any system can be gamed. The strategy and tools merely vary according to the way the game is set up.
The birthplace of democracy is said to be ancient Athens, and the classical scholar Peter Jones in The Oldie magazine runs a column in which he often compares current affairs with how matters were settled by the Athenians, who voted en masse on everything, in their weekly assemblies. Yet this democracy excluded women, and the slaves on which the city's economy largely depended. Not everyone's interests were represented.
And even for those who had a voice, there was the question of how their decisions were influenced. The way to game a system based on debate and voting is to refine the arts of persuasion, so that emotion can sometimes not assist but overcome reason. Set against Socrates, who asked questions to get at the truth, were the sophists such as Gorgias, who held that nothing really existed and who gave answers simply to sway opinion. Socrates was forced by his enemies - who persuaded the Athenian assembly - to drink poison at the age of 71, when he was still in good shape; Gorgias lived to 108.
As well as his opponents, the skill of the orator can ruin his supporters, and even himself. Demosthenes, reputedly the greatest speaker in history, caused Athens to resist the Macedonians, and it was only by the earnest pleading of Phocion with Alexander the Great that the city was spared the destruction visited on Thebes. Phocion also persuaded Alexander to give up his demand for Demosthenes and other crowd-rousers to be delivered up to him, which gave the orator a few more years of life (until he had another go at the Macedonians).
A modern example of the deadly persuader would be Adolf Hitler, whose speeches were electrifying even though he was eventually off his head with the cocktails of drugs he took daily. In the latter stages of World War Two the Allied decided to stop trying to assassinate him, because we were more likely to win with him still ruling his roost and terrifying his general staff.
Ultimately, democracy can be used to annul itself. The French Revolutionary Assembly quickly turned into a reign of terror that consumed its own leaders. Democracy turns to mobocracy and the rise of cliques and strongmen, as the Communists - heirs of Gorgias as far as respect for the truth is concerned - well know. Those who advocate local democracy can look across to the USA and see how wrong it can go in some communities - judges and police chiefs making decisions with an eye to re-election - just as democracy is failing in the nation as a whole, with a developing media-and-law-buying oligarchy that even the Federal Reserve chairman Janet Yellen can't quite deny.
And those who think referenda are the universal answer might like to watch Peter Cook's 1970 film, "The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer". What the Wikipedia synopsis doesn't make clear is how the antihero becomes a dictator: he offers the public the power to take part in all law-making via referenda , so that the ordinary man finds himself fretting at home over proposed legislation while his tea is getting cold, and eventually the people decide to leave it all in Rimmer's hands.
Nor do the people speak with one voice. I think it's an American spin doctor who describes the electorate as "a bag of magnets", that is, groups of people who feel strongly on both sides about issues and about other groups, so that the art is not to please all but to get a small majority polarised in the direction chosen by the manipulator.
Majority voting is not only decisive, but divisive, as we now see north of the border. Members of the minority have become sharply conscious of the numbers that share their view, and there will be work to do in reconciling the two sides. It is not enough that the greater number should have their will; their defeated opponents must agree to abide by the result.
Debate continues about voting systems and how fair they are, and we saw in 2011 how the Establishment united and fought hard against proportional representation. This misleads us into viewing the political crisis as psephological. It is not.
Far more important is what unites the community through its differences: a sense of common identity, equality for all under the law, the preservation of individual rights and liberties, and the justified expectation that by obeying the law and applying oneself it is possible to better one's economic condition. In these aspects there have been grave failures by the political elites and the magnates within and outside the country who have their ear.
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Saturday, September 20, 2014
Could the law order a fresh Scottish referendum?
 |
| http://i4.dailyrecord.co.uk/incoming/article4265480.ece/alternates/s615b/1.jpg |
On 15th September 2014, the leaders of the three largest political parties in Westminster made and published the above "vow".
I understand that when a contract is negotiated, any oral explanation, or additional undertaking given as a condition of agreement, forms part of the contract, even if it is not in the wording on the page.
So this "vow" must be considered as an integral part of the referendum held by the Scots. A vow is a binding commitment and for me the implication is that by making it the British Government has turned the No decision into a legal contract between itself and the Scottish people. If it fails to keep these promises in full, then the contract is invalidated and Scotland will be entitled to a fresh referendum.
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Like I said...
‘What price the union?’ said one senior Conservative MP angered by the last-ditch offers to the Scots. ‘And why is Gordon Brown the tail-wagging Westminster dog?
‘Nobody wants to cause trouble ahead of the referendum but these panicked offers mean Alex Salmond has won whatever the result.’
- Daily Mail, 16 September 2014
"I think it's coming anyway. The panic last-minute promises from HMG are a gift to the Yes camp, who can say, "Would they have offered these concessions if they didn't think we'd leave; will they keep their promises if we don't?"
"Then later, if the promises aren't kept, it'll be let's vote again, now we know; and if the promises are kept, then it'll be like one of those I-need-some-space "trial separations" that end in divorce proper.
"Salmond's done it, with the assistance of an incompetent and negligent Westminster."
- Broad Oak Magazine, 9 September 2014
Ye heerd it here fust.
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#indyref - accusation of vote-rigging in favour of No
Genuine? If so, on what scale?
htp: Karl Denninger
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Friday, September 19, 2014
Now for independence WITH the Scots
"How shall I be sad on my wedding day?" (at 48:40)
It's not business as usual today. As Professor Vernon Bogdanor said last night, there has been a collective rejection of all the major Westminster parties.
In England, this will tend to strengthen Farage's hand, despite the seethings of various independence/democracy purists who seem to hate UKIP as much as the Establishment does.
If, as now seems likely, the Scots have marginally voted No under intense cross-party Westminster political pressure (including reckless concessions re further devolution) - and with a biased and powerful news media - then we are on for Independence Royal instead of Independence Lite.
Alex Salmond has not shown signs of being able to ride the mighty horse he caught - keeping the pound and staying in the EU would tie Scots to a wider disaster still forming.
The idea that No - the status quo - is safe is almost laughable. Gordon Brown's gusty guff (where has he been these past four years?) lacked specifics on the security offered.
We are not secure.The UK's 90% government-debt-to-GDP is bad enough, but pales in comparison to our housing-soaked total national debt/GDP ratio of 500%.
And when some other place in the world - Frankfurt? Hong Kong? - gathers enough cheats together to replace the City of London, the golden goose in Britain's GDP flock will have been stolen from us - and what will be the debt ratio when that happens?
Everything is now in the pot, and we must play for all we are worth. The old arrangements and lazy political heirs must go for the sake of the nation as a whole.
Scotland, as so often before, we need you in this fight.
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Thursday, September 18, 2014
Scotland: the REAL question
If Scotland were an independent country today, should her people vote to give up self-government and be ruled from Westminster?
Your reasons, please.
Now replace "Scotland" and "Westminster" in the above sentence with "Britain" and "Brussels".
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Your reasons, please.
Now replace "Scotland" and "Westminster" in the above sentence with "Britain" and "Brussels".
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Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Scotland: today's precis challenge
Q1. Reduce the following article from 1,590 words to 650 or fewer.
Q2. "The union... has endured since 1707." Respond, with reference to 1715 and 1745 among other events.
Q.3 "... considerable benefits for all involved." Discuss to what extent the Union alone was responsible for growing prosperity. Your comments should take into account scientific and technological innovations, overseas colonialism and the defeat of Napoleon.
Q.4 If Scotland had always been a sovereign nation, what arguments could be made for subsuming it into the present British political and economic arangements?
____________________________________________
"Scottish independence: catalogue of errors that has brought UK to the brink"
Both sides of the independence struggle have failed to understand each other. The repercussions could affect millions
T ony Blair's New Labour tried harder, in part because its
leaders knew Scotland better and needed it more. Nonetheless, in formulating
its devolution measures in the late 1990s, his government fudged. It pursued ad
hoc measures in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, but declined to adopt a
systematic federalism that might properly have embraced England as well; and it
created a new Scottish parliament and local electoral system that helped the
SNP to acquire a degree of power that it had never previously possessed. And
Blair did more. One of the strongest arguments for the union has always been
that it helps defend the component countries from attack from without. But by
pursuing his unpopular war with Iraq, Blair allowed nationalists to argue that
the union was instead a machine that sucked Scotland into profitless and
expensive exercises in overseas aggression.
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Q2. "The union... has endured since 1707." Respond, with reference to 1715 and 1745 among other events.
Q.3 "... considerable benefits for all involved." Discuss to what extent the Union alone was responsible for growing prosperity. Your comments should take into account scientific and technological innovations, overseas colonialism and the defeat of Napoleon.
Q.4 If Scotland had always been a sovereign nation, what arguments could be made for subsuming it into the present British political and economic arangements?
____________________________________________
"Scottish independence: catalogue of errors that has brought UK to the brink"
Both sides of the independence struggle have failed to understand each other. The repercussions could affect millions
Linda Colley
The Guardian, Tuesday 16 September 2014
___________________________________________
The fiercer, more uncompromising, often utopian nationalism
that now grips some Scots possesses echoes in other parts of the world. In part
this is because the relentless advance of globalisation has fostered a desire
in many countries for a more distinctive and reassuring local identity. This
trend is particularly marked in Europe because it contains so many ancient,
culturally distinctive groupings – like the Catalans in Spain – who do not
possess a state of their own, and want to have one. But a growing desire to
secede from longstanding political unions so as to construct something fresh
and distinctive is evident in other parts of the world too. There is a lively
separatist movement in Texas, for instance, which only became a US state in
1845, and which is incontestably large enough and rich enough to flourish
mightily on its own.
As John Stuart Mill remarked in regard to Ireland, once
countries and regions become sufficiently enamoured of separation and
independence, political concessions on the part of their rulers lose effectiveness,
because men and women in such countries and regions will no longer settle
merely for concessions from above. They only want separation and independence.
If a majority of Scots have reached this critical stage, this will not just be
because of long-term British developments and international shifts and
pressures, but also because of more short-term and contingent events. In
particular, if Scottish secession takes place, this will largely be because all
of the main protagonists involved in this struggle have failed in recent
decades fully to understand the pull and repercussions of varieties of
nationalism.
As far as the leaders of the main Westminster groupings are
concerned, they have often seemed to exhibit a tin ear in regard to the importance
and volatility of national identities in at least two respects. At one level,
they have failed creatively and systematically to replace the old, declining
props of British unionism with new arguments and supports. At another level,
they have failed to anticipate and keep up with the challenges posed by a new
and more venturesome Scottish nationalism.
The litany of miscalculations and unforced errors is a
depressing one. Margaret Thatcher's decision to use Scotland as a testing
ground for the poll tax was arguably the most disastrous attempt at fiscal
engineering since London slapped the stamp tax on the American colonies in the
1760s. Thatcher did not understand that the union with Scotland had in practice
always been a limited one. From the outset, Scots retained their own legal,
educational, and religious systems, and were traditionally governed by way of
their own indigenous grandees and operators. It was sadly ironic that the
arch-prophetess of a limited state appeared to want to rip up this formula for
indirect rule and to impose on Scotland in radically new ways, one reason why
so many people there still detest Thatcher's memory.
For many Scots, all this is evidence that London is out of
touch and inward looking. Yet one can actually argue the reverse: that a prime
reason why many at Westminster appear inept in regard to nationalist and
identity issues is that they operate in a city that has long been
quintessentially cosmopolitan. London is not just an international financial
centre, it is also one of the most ethnically diverse places on earth. Three
hundred languages are represented within its boundaries, and – as is true of
some other English cities – more than half of London's inhabitants describe
themselves as non-white. By contrast, only 8% of Edinburgh's population is
non-white, and that is twice the average for Scotland as a whole. It is therefore
hardly surprising that some (by no means all) Scots espouse a degree of
cultural and ethnic nationalism that seems incomprehensible to many at
Westminster, or that the latter sometimes gets the former wrong.
Moreover, it is not just Westminster politicians that have
sometimes failed adequately to consider the full ramifications of national
imaginings. One of the undoubted achievements of the union is that over the
centuries it has put a brake on English national assertiveness, an important
factor as far as Scotland is concerned given that its population is now only a
tenth of that of England. Yet precisely because of the union's protracted
existence, some SNP activists – including Salmond – sometimes take continued
English complacency too much for granted. When in Scotland last month, I was
assured by one yes advocate that, post independence, the poison would be drawn,
and that Scots would be "full of love" for their southern neighbours.
Possibly so, but this is hardly the only point at issue.
The proposition that the referendum is only a matter for the
inhabitants of Scotland has become a mantra, but is of course substantially
untrue. Whatever happens on 18 September, not just Scots, but also the English,
the Welsh, and Northern Irish will be affected. Repeated polls suggest that a
clear majority of the population in these three countries badly want Scotland
to remain within the UK. If it secedes, a future division of the spoils is
likely to cost the English, Welsh, and Northern Irish money, time, influence
and face, and yet they will have had no democratic say in this outcome. It is
hard to think of a better recipe for future resentments and divisions.
It is still possible that all this may be managed: that even
if there is a yes vote, political actors in all parts of the present UK will
finally rise to the challenge of events, and work out new constructive
solutions together – perhaps a free federation of the isles. But we shouldn't
bank on it. As we commemorate the centenary of the outbreak of the first world
war, this referendum campaign may be yet another example of how easily fierce
ideologies, tribal passions, longstanding grievances, undue optimism and
political cock-ups can take hold, with consequences that go on to affect and
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Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Scotland: "No" is not the safe option
It's not about Alex, even though Mail columnist Jan Moir angled her coverage of the referendum to make it a vote on his sexual attractiveness, and Eddie Mair took up that refrain in his recent Radio 4 interview with the SNP leader. Media Lens has a good post on the co-ordinated bias and distortion of the British media here.
This is not a General Election and Salmond is not campaigning for a Parliamentary seat. It is about the future of Scotland, and much of the distortion and distraction in the media focuses on the risks of a Yes vote. Distraction, because the false implication is that the UK as a whole is the safe option. Peter Hitchens' Sunday column exploded that. Our economy as well as our polity is heading for what Carl Hiaasen* - vulgarly, but it's too good not to use - described as "a screaming nose-dive into the sh*tter."
I'll forgive the Scots for their resentment at the perceived absentee-landlordism of Westminster politicians, but they do not sufficiently appreciate how much their feelings are shared by much of the rest of the UK. Scotland must understand that it's not only England she needs to get away from but the EU, else she has exchanged her master for his master.
This is especially urgent since the EU is about to move to a majority-vote (not your vote, of course) system that will nullify our ability to veto their worst and most stupid decrees.
And beyond that there are the various international-capitalist schemes, of which the latest is the TTIP, that aim to make their commercial writ run untrammelled in all lands and disenfranchise the world's electorates.
The Scottish referendum is just a local instance of a global fight for democracy and self-determination.
That's the issue.
_______________________________
* From his novel, "Basket Case". Hiaasen is a brilliantly funny slapstick crime writer.
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This is not a General Election and Salmond is not campaigning for a Parliamentary seat. It is about the future of Scotland, and much of the distortion and distraction in the media focuses on the risks of a Yes vote. Distraction, because the false implication is that the UK as a whole is the safe option. Peter Hitchens' Sunday column exploded that. Our economy as well as our polity is heading for what Carl Hiaasen* - vulgarly, but it's too good not to use - described as "a screaming nose-dive into the sh*tter."
I'll forgive the Scots for their resentment at the perceived absentee-landlordism of Westminster politicians, but they do not sufficiently appreciate how much their feelings are shared by much of the rest of the UK. Scotland must understand that it's not only England she needs to get away from but the EU, else she has exchanged her master for his master.
This is especially urgent since the EU is about to move to a majority-vote (not your vote, of course) system that will nullify our ability to veto their worst and most stupid decrees.
And beyond that there are the various international-capitalist schemes, of which the latest is the TTIP, that aim to make their commercial writ run untrammelled in all lands and disenfranchise the world's electorates.
The Scottish referendum is just a local instance of a global fight for democracy and self-determination.
That's the issue.
_______________________________
* From his novel, "Basket Case". Hiaasen is a brilliantly funny slapstick crime writer.
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Monday, September 15, 2014
Scotland's golden window of opportunity
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| (pic source) |
Imagine starting a country with no National Debt, a balanced budget and freedom from EU interference.
Imagine controlling the fishing areas of the North Seas together with two other similarly independent countries (Iceland and Norway).
It is not Scotland that faces imminent economic crisis, but the UK. Scots have been granted an opportunity to escape before disaster hits:
Extract from the above:
"Listen to it – the poor Scots are threatened with currency collapse, bankruptcy, irrelevance and isolation. There’ll even be a frontier, doubtless with barking dogs, searchlights and minefields planted with exploding haggises.
"Well, what do you think we’re all going to get if we stay in the EU? The real scare story is that 40 years of EU membership and wild overspending have brought the whole UK to ruin.
"The current strength of sterling is an absurdity and can’t last. George Osborne’s boom is the most irresponsible bubble since the 1970s, based entirely on ludicrously cheap housing credit.
"Roughly half the containers that leave our main port at Felixstowe contain nothing but air, and quite a few of the rest are crammed with rubbish for recycling, because our real export trade has collapsed, much of it throttled by EU membership.
"The incoming containers are full, of course, of cars, clothes, gadgets and food – but how are we to pay for them?
"As usual, the biggest story of the week was buried – the rise in our monthly trade deficit during July to £3.3 billion. That includes the famous ‘services’ which are supposed to make up for the fact that we don’t manufacture much any more.
"It is impossible to see how we can live so far beyond our means for much longer. Both Government and people are deeper in debt than ever.
"So forgive me if I point out that it’s quite scary enough staying in the UK."
"Listen to it – the poor Scots are threatened with currency collapse, bankruptcy, irrelevance and isolation. There’ll even be a frontier, doubtless with barking dogs, searchlights and minefields planted with exploding haggises.
"Well, what do you think we’re all going to get if we stay in the EU? The real scare story is that 40 years of EU membership and wild overspending have brought the whole UK to ruin.
"The current strength of sterling is an absurdity and can’t last. George Osborne’s boom is the most irresponsible bubble since the 1970s, based entirely on ludicrously cheap housing credit.
"Roughly half the containers that leave our main port at Felixstowe contain nothing but air, and quite a few of the rest are crammed with rubbish for recycling, because our real export trade has collapsed, much of it throttled by EU membership.
"The incoming containers are full, of course, of cars, clothes, gadgets and food – but how are we to pay for them?
"As usual, the biggest story of the week was buried – the rise in our monthly trade deficit during July to £3.3 billion. That includes the famous ‘services’ which are supposed to make up for the fact that we don’t manufacture much any more.
"It is impossible to see how we can live so far beyond our means for much longer. Both Government and people are deeper in debt than ever.
"So forgive me if I point out that it’s quite scary enough staying in the UK."
(And - if you dare - just Imagine having the opportunity to issue your own debt-free currency as a sovereign country. Fare well, banking families.)
__________
The only regret is that we could have done much of this together, the UK as a whole... forty years of wasted opportunity. Only the (oft-repeated) short-sighted electoral calculations of the Labour Party have ultimately led Scotland to this unbarred window and the chance to escape; don't blame them if they take it.
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Tuesday, September 09, 2014
Salmond has done it!
As I comment on AKHaart's preceding piece:
I think it's coming anyway. The panic last-minute promises from HMG are a gift to the Yes camp, who can say, "Would they have offered these concessions if they didn't think we'd leave; will they keep their promises if we don't?"
Then later, if the promises aren't kept, it'll be let's vote again, now we know; and if the promises are kept, then it'll be like one of those I-need-some-space "trial separations" that end in divorce proper.
Salmond's done it, with the assistance of an incompetent and negligent Westminster.
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I think it's coming anyway. The panic last-minute promises from HMG are a gift to the Yes camp, who can say, "Would they have offered these concessions if they didn't think we'd leave; will they keep their promises if we don't?"
Then later, if the promises aren't kept, it'll be let's vote again, now we know; and if the promises are kept, then it'll be like one of those I-need-some-space "trial separations" that end in divorce proper.
Salmond's done it, with the assistance of an incompetent and negligent Westminster.
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Tuesday, August 26, 2014
Scotland and secession
1. Why is the pound such an issue? If Blair had had his way we'd all be in the Euro now.
2. Why worry about Scotland's dysfunctional economy? The UK as a whole is dysfunctional. It runs chiefly on debt it has no intention to repay, plus a system of helping City swindlers to thieve from the people and then taxing them to support the low paid and unemployed whose misery they have helped to create. If we're all off to Hell in a handcart, at least we can allow the Scots their own cart.
3. Perhaps the plan post independence is to slash benefits and build a Scots Sangatte by the border with England.
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2. Why worry about Scotland's dysfunctional economy? The UK as a whole is dysfunctional. It runs chiefly on debt it has no intention to repay, plus a system of helping City swindlers to thieve from the people and then taxing them to support the low paid and unemployed whose misery they have helped to create. If we're all off to Hell in a handcart, at least we can allow the Scots their own cart.
3. Perhaps the plan post independence is to slash benefits and build a Scots Sangatte by the border with England.
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Saturday, August 16, 2014
Vote with your gonads!
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| http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2726381/JAN-MOIR-Salmond-s-fatal-flaw-We-women-think-s-got-charm-turnip.html |
Write the rest of the article yourselves.
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Tuesday, August 05, 2014
Election mess
Electoral Calculus is currently predicting a 40-seat majority for Labour in the 2015 General Election:
You'll see from the above that despite polling nearly twice as many voting intentions as either the LibDems or "minority" parties, and nearly five times that of the "nationalists", UKIP stands to get no seat whatever. But if votes translated into seats in an exactly proportional way, then on this showing UKIP would be on course for 88 Parliamentary seats out of the total of 650.
Instead, the boundary system and unevenness of political support result in a heavy bias towards the two major parties and against all others. This is how the above prediction looks in terms of votes to seats gained:
EC's analysis of UKIP's chances suggest that the party needs to poll 16% of the national vote to get a single seat, and wouldn't get a fair ratio of votes to seats until it got somewhere around 30%.
Even then, because of the first-past-the-post arrangement, if UKIP gained votes solely at the expense of the Conservatives, the net effect (up to about a 24% vote for UKIP) would be to increase Labour's majority:
This certainly looks like an incentive for Cameron's Chameleons to talk to UKIP, or at least temporarily take on some of the latter's coloration in the hope that you can fool enough people for long enough.
In any case, DC can look forward to a wealth-multiplying post-Parliamentary life of directorships, consultancies and highly-paid dinner talks, just like his hero Blair, for whom he led the Opposition applause* in Parliament when the latter abandoned his constituents to do something more lucrative (and above all, attention-getting):
So really, why should Cameron care anyway? And as the saying goes, he who cares least has all the power.
Where does this power come from? Last week's Spectator leader drew a really thought-provoking contrast between the UN and the EC:
"There is a subtle but enormous difference between the European Convention on Human Rights, on which the Strasbourg court bases its decisions, and on the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The latter states:
How will you vote in the General Opinion Poll of 2015?
But maybe, even after the debacle of the 2011 Alternative Vote referendum, electoral reform is still possible, particularly in the event that Scotland decides to vote this autumn for secession from the Union. Already the Scottish Parliament has a much fairer system; perhaps the Scots will once again show us the way.
_________________
* I should like to know the names of those few who sat on their hands - they would be part of my first Cabinet if I were "in power".
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| Layout slightly modified; page accessed 04 August 2014 |
You'll see from the above that despite polling nearly twice as many voting intentions as either the LibDems or "minority" parties, and nearly five times that of the "nationalists", UKIP stands to get no seat whatever. But if votes translated into seats in an exactly proportional way, then on this showing UKIP would be on course for 88 Parliamentary seats out of the total of 650.
Instead, the boundary system and unevenness of political support result in a heavy bias towards the two major parties and against all others. This is how the above prediction looks in terms of votes to seats gained:
EC's analysis of UKIP's chances suggest that the party needs to poll 16% of the national vote to get a single seat, and wouldn't get a fair ratio of votes to seats until it got somewhere around 30%.
Even then, because of the first-past-the-post arrangement, if UKIP gained votes solely at the expense of the Conservatives, the net effect (up to about a 24% vote for UKIP) would be to increase Labour's majority:
 |
| http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/Analysis_UKIP.html |
This certainly looks like an incentive for Cameron's Chameleons to talk to UKIP, or at least temporarily take on some of the latter's coloration in the hope that you can fool enough people for long enough.
In any case, DC can look forward to a wealth-multiplying post-Parliamentary life of directorships, consultancies and highly-paid dinner talks, just like his hero Blair, for whom he led the Opposition applause* in Parliament when the latter abandoned his constituents to do something more lucrative (and above all, attention-getting):
So really, why should Cameron care anyway? And as the saying goes, he who cares least has all the power.
Where does this power come from? Last week's Spectator leader drew a really thought-provoking contrast between the UN and the EC:
"There is a subtle but enormous difference between the European Convention on Human Rights, on which the Strasbourg court bases its decisions, and on the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The latter states:
The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage.
The former states only that:
The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature.In other words, the European Convention respects the right to free and fair elections but does not demand that those elected respect the wishes of those who elected them, nor that a country’s legislature should be in ultimate charge."
How will you vote in the General Opinion Poll of 2015?
But maybe, even after the debacle of the 2011 Alternative Vote referendum, electoral reform is still possible, particularly in the event that Scotland decides to vote this autumn for secession from the Union. Already the Scottish Parliament has a much fairer system; perhaps the Scots will once again show us the way.
* I should like to know the names of those few who sat on their hands - they would be part of my first Cabinet if I were "in power".
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Thursday, July 31, 2014
Scotland's Government-appointed godparents
I don't know how I missed this...
"The proposal to appoint specific named persons from the NHS and councils to monitor every young person's well-being from birth to 18 is considered one of the most controversial aspects of the bill."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-26208628
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"The proposal to appoint specific named persons from the NHS and councils to monitor every young person's well-being from birth to 18 is considered one of the most controversial aspects of the bill."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-26208628
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Wednesday, May 14, 2014
Knowing that every vote makes a difference, makes a difference
I've previously noted the unfairness of the UK electoral voting system in Scotland, which gives Labour an unearned majority there:
But the system in the Scottish Parliament works far better. Each person gets two votes, one local and one party-list-based regional. In aggregate, here is what happened in 2011:
... bang on for Labour, slightly generous for the SNP. Not a bad hybrid, either: voting first for a local candidate, and then for a party, rather than combining the two and effectively voting for a Prime Minister (with all the personality-cult garbage that brings in its wake).
Even more interesting is the difference between how the two votes were cast:
In the regional contest, when it was no longer simply First Past The Post, and the vote was more likely to be taken into account even if one chose a minority candidate, the voting share for small parties leapt from 1% to 12%. Knowing that every vote makes a difference, makes a difference.
Electoral Calculus predicts that in next year's UK General Election, even under FPTP, UKIP may get over 14% of votes cast - and NO seats - so goodness knows what the voter behaviour would be under some form of proportional representation. Perhaps this month's European Parliament elections will give us a clue, and the differences between those results and GE 2015 could be worked up into some yardstick of democratic deficit.
Not, of course, that the EU Parliament decides anything, as Pat Condell points out in this splendid rant (htp: James Higham):
- which leads me to wonder why on Earth Alex Salmond would wish Scotland, if and when divorced from the rest of the UK, to remain in the European Union (or rather, join, legally speaking, not that the EU has much respect for law if it gets in the way of power).
I've already suggested that Scotland might do better to join forces with Norway and Iceland, maybe even Denmark (which, you'll recall, was expected to vote against the Lisbon Treaty and so the government cancelled the referendum and went ahead anyway). With North Sea fishing and oil, and firm Icelandic-style treatment of banksters, plus the energy and technical creativity of its people, a Kalmar-Union-plus might just work. Rather that than tie your jollyboat to a sinking megavessel like the EU.
One more question: should Scotland get independence, will the Scot Nats have outlived their usefulness? And has the shrewd Salmond already planned for that? Salmond the EU Commissioner? Salmond for EU President?
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| (Data: BBC) |
But the system in the Scottish Parliament works far better. Each person gets two votes, one local and one party-list-based regional. In aggregate, here is what happened in 2011:
 |
| Data: Wikipedia |
... bang on for Labour, slightly generous for the SNP. Not a bad hybrid, either: voting first for a local candidate, and then for a party, rather than combining the two and effectively voting for a Prime Minister (with all the personality-cult garbage that brings in its wake).
Even more interesting is the difference between how the two votes were cast:
 |
| Data: Wikipedia |
In the regional contest, when it was no longer simply First Past The Post, and the vote was more likely to be taken into account even if one chose a minority candidate, the voting share for small parties leapt from 1% to 12%. Knowing that every vote makes a difference, makes a difference.
Electoral Calculus predicts that in next year's UK General Election, even under FPTP, UKIP may get over 14% of votes cast - and NO seats - so goodness knows what the voter behaviour would be under some form of proportional representation. Perhaps this month's European Parliament elections will give us a clue, and the differences between those results and GE 2015 could be worked up into some yardstick of democratic deficit.
Not, of course, that the EU Parliament decides anything, as Pat Condell points out in this splendid rant (htp: James Higham):
- which leads me to wonder why on Earth Alex Salmond would wish Scotland, if and when divorced from the rest of the UK, to remain in the European Union (or rather, join, legally speaking, not that the EU has much respect for law if it gets in the way of power).
I've already suggested that Scotland might do better to join forces with Norway and Iceland, maybe even Denmark (which, you'll recall, was expected to vote against the Lisbon Treaty and so the government cancelled the referendum and went ahead anyway). With North Sea fishing and oil, and firm Icelandic-style treatment of banksters, plus the energy and technical creativity of its people, a Kalmar-Union-plus might just work. Rather that than tie your jollyboat to a sinking megavessel like the EU.
One more question: should Scotland get independence, will the Scot Nats have outlived their usefulness? And has the shrewd Salmond already planned for that? Salmond the EU Commissioner? Salmond for EU President?
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Monday, April 28, 2014
Scotland's democratic deficit
The UK has big flaws built into its system of democratic representation - and within the UK, Scotland's is worse. Should the two countries separate, it will have to be addressed, if Labour is not to have a permanent unfair advantage - see the graph below:
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| (Based on data from the BBC) |
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Sunday, April 27, 2014
Could a free Scotland manage economically?
I've already suggested that if it secedes from the UK, Scotland might seize the opportunity to remain outside the EU (rather than suffer the boom and bust of, say, Ireland and Greece) - and maybe should be looking to forge closer cooperation with other "semi-detached" European nations such as Norway and Iceland.
For example, look at the sea areas controlled by these three:
Save for a couple of loopholes, there is a vast contiguous sea area under the control of the "SIN" countries.
Indeed, if Scotland is to join with anyone, Norway would be far better than the corrupt, undemocratic economic shambles of the EU. Their population sizes are similar (c. five million) but Scotland clearly has a lot to learn from the Norwegians: GDP per capita c. $40k for the former, c. $100k for the latter (and a big sovereign wealth fund that will provide financial security for the foreseeable future). Further, Norway has claims to the Arctic shelf that could result in still more oil and gas:
I'm not suggesting that Scotland would roll up to the banquet with knife and fork to eat Norway's pie; I'm saying that the three countries might have a synergy based not only on geographical position but on their potential for joint economic and technological development.
For example, one reason Norway is so prosperous is that she can sell a lot of her oil abroad, since most of the country's domestic electricity comes from hydroelectric installations. Similarly, Scotland has 85% of the UK's hydroelectric resources and has great potential for other renewables (she provided 36% of the UK's renewables output in 2012). Some of the hydro power is used for aluminium smelting - just as Iceland uses geothermal energy for the same purpose.
Then there is the shared expertise of Norway and Scotland in shipbuilding and marine engineering.
And Scotland has fishing, tourism, brewing, the arts...
What if Scotland picked up the Treasury's gauntlet, dropped the British pound and floated its own currency to protect and develop its industries, maybe with some initial financial/investment support from her neighbours to the north-east?
Perhaps independence, with the help of carefully-chosen partners, is not such a romantic pipe-dream, after all.
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For example, look at the sea areas controlled by these three:
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| Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) & Fisheries Protection Zones (FPZ), Iceland and Norway (Jan Mayen & Svalbard are Norwegian) Source: Bates |
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| Scottish Sea Areas (from Scotland's Marine Atlas) |
Save for a couple of loopholes, there is a vast contiguous sea area under the control of the "SIN" countries.
Indeed, if Scotland is to join with anyone, Norway would be far better than the corrupt, undemocratic economic shambles of the EU. Their population sizes are similar (c. five million) but Scotland clearly has a lot to learn from the Norwegians: GDP per capita c. $40k for the former, c. $100k for the latter (and a big sovereign wealth fund that will provide financial security for the foreseeable future). Further, Norway has claims to the Arctic shelf that could result in still more oil and gas:
 |
| Arctic territorial claims and potential for oil and gas (Source: The Economist, 16 June 2012) |
I'm not suggesting that Scotland would roll up to the banquet with knife and fork to eat Norway's pie; I'm saying that the three countries might have a synergy based not only on geographical position but on their potential for joint economic and technological development.
For example, one reason Norway is so prosperous is that she can sell a lot of her oil abroad, since most of the country's domestic electricity comes from hydroelectric installations. Similarly, Scotland has 85% of the UK's hydroelectric resources and has great potential for other renewables (she provided 36% of the UK's renewables output in 2012). Some of the hydro power is used for aluminium smelting - just as Iceland uses geothermal energy for the same purpose.
Then there is the shared expertise of Norway and Scotland in shipbuilding and marine engineering.
And Scotland has fishing, tourism, brewing, the arts...
What if Scotland picked up the Treasury's gauntlet, dropped the British pound and floated its own currency to protect and develop its industries, maybe with some initial financial/investment support from her neighbours to the north-east?
Perhaps independence, with the help of carefully-chosen partners, is not such a romantic pipe-dream, after all.
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