Britannia Hits an Iceberg

trump_flicker_face_yessEven on the eve of the final Presidential Debate in this increasingly bizarre campaign, with, it seems, the Trump campaign finally imploding into a welter of conspiracy theories on late night twitter, the question, “Why Do They Like Trump?” remains, even if American women are about to save American Men from making utter arses of themselves. Actually, ‘liking Trump’ is secondary, more of a symptom than a cause of illness. After all, even if seventy percent of American women say they oppose Trump, that still means thirty percent of them support him. The primary question of this American election has been “”Why Do They Hate Hillary So Much that Otherwise Sane People Can Even Contemplate Voting in Large Numbers for an Egregiously Awful Person With Glaringly Dangerous Pathology…” who just happens to be a Second Rate Orange Berlusconi called Donald Trump. Trump will be gone soon, as an electoral factor, anyway.  But the malaise which afforded him the opportunity to stomp his revolting personality all over the airwaves will still be around.

He and his noisiest supporters, despite appearances, are little more than a handful of refugees from daytime television who have made it onto the News.  This in itself is as much a comment on what has happened to mainstream TV – that the medium has abandoned any pretense at being anything other than pornography that sells Viagra- as it is on the recent descent of the Republican Party into the status of The American Taliban raging impotently against the waning of the White Man’s testosterone and sperm count. An interesting blog by David Wong on his Cracked site put the question of Trumpland vs the Rest in an interesting context for me recently.

1371225004flag_faile.jpg=s750x1300Wong argues that the Culture War in the States, which has roots as old as the Civil War, has reconfigured under the pressure of globalisation from a simple question of race into a much more nuanced and yet classical dichotomy of “country” and “city”, the metropolis and the periphery.  The metropolis in connected to the world as much or even more than it is connected to the country in which it happens to sit.  It is fast moving, prosperous, exciting, multi-cultural, a bit lawless and Darwinian – everything there is in the present tense.  The periphery has been “left behind”, stripped of its employment and purpose, of any forward-looking energy.  Crucially, it has been stripped of anything like ‘hope’.  That word, which was so central to Obama’s election in 2008 was an alien concept, and not just because it was being spoken by a black man.  The schism of race that was opened up by Obama’s victory is again only secondarily a question of racism: primarily the resentment of all those angry men and women is fueled by their exclusion from the global party of self-congratulatory “good” people who flatter themselves constantly about how hip and smart they are.  Fuck You is a not entirely unintelligible response to the bland, careless and above all smug privilege that Hillary Clinton so charmlessly represents.

And it’s when this question is put in terms of ‘metropolis’ and ‘periphery’ that the dialectic expands to include not just what is happening in the US in this particular election, but what has been happening everywhere in the world for quite some time. The change in the world from nation state yes back to city states is the kind of thing that fans of the long view have been talking about for some time.  And within that dialectic it is indeed possible not just to link in Donald Trump and the Tea Party to Nigel Farage and UKIP, but ISIS and the SNP as well.

Now, in this age of Twitter, I realise that to put things in the same sentence is to appear to say “these things are the same…”  So no, everyone, I did not just make an equivalence between these phenomena, what I made was an argumentative connection between ‘responses to globalization’, or rather to the hegemony of the trans-national which was so radically challenged by the slow motion Wall Street/City of London/Hong Kong crash of 2008.  It is in the very nature of ‘localism’ that these responses take on ‘local’ character.

As it happens, the current tensions WITHIN our own particular localism, between Nationalist nationalists and Post-National nationalists, both of which were on display at the SNP conference last week is mirrored by the tensions, for example, within the Tory Party between those who have rather startlingly found themselves in the ascendency recently – the “Hang the Economy, (and a lot of other people) England for the English” brand of Tory on the one hand, and the Managerial Tendency (Market Rules) brand on the other.

Likewise, the ancient Bevan vs Gaitskell conflict informs the pre-history of the Labour Party’s current struggles between Management and Movement, but the pathology of what is happening to the British Progressive Tendency is as globally involved as its inflections are profoundly locally determined by the ‘metropolitan vs the peripheral’ model.

Within this way of looking at things, both Brexit and the surge of Scottish National politics are secondary assertions in response to a historical movement. Both are constitutional consequences of the Break Up of Britain which is itself consequential of the local concentration of all wealth and power in one corner of the islands within a wider, longer story of what we used to call “managed decline.”

Within this way of looking at things, both Brexit and the surge of Scottish National politics are secondary assertions in response to a historical movement. Both are constitutional consequences of the Break Up of Britain which is itself consequential of the local concentration of all wealth and power in one corner of the islands within a wider, longer story of what we used to call “managed decline.”

Indeed, Imperial Hubris has been sinking since the Titanic ran into that Iceberg…we’ve been frantically bailing ever since.

Two other conversations, one on Twitter and one in Real Life are informing my thinking on all this at the moment. The first is a bit of trolling I’m getting online as to why I think that the EU is more important to Scotland in terms of trade than is the UK.  Of course, I think no such thing and have never said or thought any such thing. Neither the vote on Brexit nor a vote for Independence in and of themselves have anything like those consequences. What is useful about the question is figuring out what is wrong with it: why is it the wrong question? The second was a taxi driver telling me he had voted “Leave” in June in order to bring Full Employment back to the Clyde. That is, he had voted for a Time Machine.

The magical instrumentalism of both perspectives, that a vote is the prime cause of things happening, is one of the illusions that democracy is shedding right now, to all of our costs. Donald Trump, for reasons of purely personal pathology – he is always right and always “the winner” therefore the only possible cause of his NOT being right or the winner is black magic – is calling the election a fraud before he even loses it with possibly dire consequences for American democracy.  That’s what elections are like in far less fortunate countries. To return local questions, the truth of what is happening in Scotland right now is that we are dealing with the consequences, over a prologed period, of the decline from Empire to which British Membership of the EU was itself a stop gap solution. According to Angela Leadsom the other day, the answer is now to sell Tea and Jam to Johnny Foreigner on board the Royal Yacht Britannia.

To return local questions, the truth of what is happening in Scotland right now is that we are dealing with the consequences, over a prologed period, of the decline from Empire to which British Membership of the EU was itself a stop gap solution. According to Angela Leadsom the other day, the answer is now to sell Tea and Jam to Johnny Foreigner on board the Royal Yacht Britannia.

Scotland ceased to be the Prime Maker of its own destiny at 10pm on September 18th a couple of years ago.  What we are doing now, just like everyone else, is attempting to stay afloat in very choppy water driven both by our cultural reaction against the crisis of globalism and in our wish to preserve the best of its values.  The Yes Movement, in that sense, was and remains a cake and eat it proposition. More than ever, we are looking into a crystal ball.  If the Tories make a fearful total hash of Brexit and Britain, , as seems more than likely at present, then the economic, political and cultural consequences for these weary islands will be incalculable.  If they make a slight less than total hash of Brexit while trying to SAVE the only bit of Britain they care about, if the City of London (for example) manages to negotiate its REMAINING a global city-state metropolis while leaving the rest of us to sink into the mid-Atlantic, that will be more a continuation than a schism in our recent history as an economy. But Britain as it was sold to us in 2014 will be profoundly damaged…but if anyone thinks that is unalloyed good news for the National cause they are already as damaged as Liam Fox.

CvHmWLHWgAAZp2aThe third option, whereby Brexit is used as the context for a properly reasoned re-alignment of local power and its relationship to the wider world, one of whose aspects is the EU, is of course devoutly to be wished. One can see an idealized federal solution to the “Scottish Problem” where a sovereign Scotland pools that sovereignty rationally with ALL of our neighbours while asserting itself as a small metropolitan centre of gravity and civilised values that is no longer dependent upon those neighbours and so can have a healthy relationship with them. True federalism has always meant mainly that power would be devolved in the other direction with a democratic mandate.  That, for me, was always the logical outcome of the ‘if wishes were horses’ element of the hope in which I participated in 2014.

Whether or not Brexit brings that consummation closer or pushes it further off is not entirely in my gift. Despite the magical thinking of the internet, life doesn’t really work like that. Indeed, those who took the Brexit vote as a signal of ‘job done’ on Independence are already disabused.  And despite being a Yes campaigner, I am no clearer on what ‘Independence for Scotland’ actually means in the 21st than I was two years ago.  What has fundamentally changed, other than the cultural shift that the referendum represented in making our future, at least in part, our choice, is that the alternative, Better Together, must surely look a lot less like a sure thing to its own supporters than it used to.

We have a choice, maybe, between chaos and chaos, and are more concerned about who the Captain is than exactly what we call the boat.  Which, to close the circle, is maybe why a lot of people on the other side of the pond, are looking for a Berlusconi and not a Prodi at the moment.

Still, with a bit of luck, in a couple of weeks we won’t have Donald Trump to kick around anymore, and we can get back to crossing our fingers over more local concerns – and hoping that we’ve got the right Captain, or at least the right second mate on the Titanic who will try to get as many of us as possible into the lifeboats.

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  1. Yan says:

    All too late, progressive politics have hit an Iceberg Nicola Sturgeon’s SNP looks seriously dated and out of step with the Trump mood music.

  2. bringiton says:

    Getting on with my neighbours is very important to me and probably to most others with theirs.
    When you are saddled with a neighbour who demands to have complete say over what happens in your immediate vicinity and then compounds it by offending all the other neighbours by saying that he doesn’t want anything more to do with them and claiming that it includes you as well…..that is as far as it goes.
    Westminster no longer speaks for Scotland on the world stage.

  3. Crubag says:

    Interesting point about the broad church SNP, the Tories have historically been good at that, with their mix of social conservative and economic liberal tendencies, having arguments, but usually getting it together in time for the elections. Their UKIP phase has been the most difficult, intended to be solved by the EU referendum. Well, it has been, sort of…

    Labour has been struggling with its social democrat (one semi-successful breakaway) and socialist wings, but it may not survive a Momentum/Red Tory purge.

    Indy2 might only be 5 0r 10 years away, in which case I think tensions will be submerged. If it turns out to be more like 20, then yes, they may come to the surface (probably mostly around liberal/big business/big agriculture and the local/social/communitarian wings).

    “where a sovereign Scotland pools that sovereignty rationally with ALL of our neighbours while asserting itself as a small metropolitan centre of gravity and civilised values that is no longer dependent upon those neighbours and so can have a healthy relationship with them”

    But for this, this means no EU membership. Without the UK, euroland is likely to tighten. That isn’t a sharing of sovereignty, it is a surrender.

    1. Maria F says:

      Crubag
      “Indy2 might only be 5 0r 10 years away”

      I hope for the sake of Scotland and the Scottish people that indiref is much sooner than that.

      According to Ms May article 50 is going to be triggered towards the end of the first trimester of 2017. Negotiations take about 2 years. Why waiting 5 years for indiref2 so Scotland can be dragged out of the UK against its will and suffer the negative consequences of a bad decision made by another country? That would be totally undemocratic.

      Pushing indiref2 for after brexit is in my opinion the only honest way the Cons have to ensure that Scotland never lives the UK. That would be good for the Cons, but let’s not forget: only a 15% of the people of Scotland actually agreed to be governed by the Con party. Therefore Mr Mundell and Ms Davidson likes it or not, the Tory party’s interests here matter not one iota. Things have to be done for the betterment of the people of Scotland, not to ensure the permanency of the Tory party at Westminster government.

      On the 23 June 2016 a 62% of the electorate who voted in Scotland did so to remain in the EU. Waiting 5 years to offer the people of Scotland the right to decide which union they want to remain in is a way of saying to that electorate of Scotland that they are second class citizens and that their vote counts less so they can be dragged out of the EU against their will because an English party and its stooges here in Scotland says so. Why should the vote of the Scottish people count less than the one in England or Wales? Isn’t the UK a ‘equal’ union of 4 countries? Then let’s see it.

      I think the only way to honour the result in Scotland of both the referendum of 2014 and that of 2016 is by having indiref2 well BEFORE the end of the Brexit process. That to me is sometime during 2019 at the latest. In my opinion it would be wise to reduce the uncertainty by suggesting a date for indiref2 right now, for example, lets say 15 months after Article 50 has been triggered.

      I find it increasingly fascinating the fact that the 45% voting yes in 2014 are willing to accept the result of the 2014 referendum vote if things are done right for the electorate of Scotland by respecting the result of 2016 and therefore offering indiref2. However, I find it most disturbing to see that it is precisely those selfserving politicians that reneged on all their promises they made prior to 18th September 2014 so they could unethically mislead the electorate into voting NO are the ones that seem to be taking the rather undemocratic posture of rejecting the electorate of Scotland the right to decide which union to remain in. This is particularly interesting considering that it was the unionists who were dishonestly offering the electorate the false hope that remaining in the UK would be the way to ensure remaining in the EU. Wouldn’t those politicians think that it is time now to put their wrong right?

      Speaking on a personal note, who are the unionist politicians to decide for me which union I should consider more relevant for my country? That is for me to decide.

  4. J Galt says:

    The question for me is how the so-called progressive intellectuals over here can take Clinton seriously – a barely functioning android with a forever smile!

    Trump may, I repeat may, be a racist buffoon but he does not represent pure unadulterated evil like the Clintons do.

    They (the Clintons) are utterly corrupt, war-mongering fiends. Clinton is controlled by the people who wish to escalate Syria to the point of WW3, she represents the people who think it’s a great idea to incinerate Trade Unionists and shoot down airliners in Ukraine, that support child-beheading monsters over civilised Governments.

    But wait! For the pseudo-intellectual useful idiots she spouts the right cheap platitudes about the right issues – she must be alright!

    I tend to think both sides in the US are controlled ultimately by the same elements and who knows Trump may just be a smokescreen, but even 0.0001% of a chance of calming the knife edge World situation is better than nothing.

    If the price of avoiding a nuclear holocaust is having an (alleged) racist eejit in the White House then so be it!

  5. Clive Scott says:

    All a bit convoluted for my taste. Surely the simple proposition is that Scotland should be in control of its own resources and have the direction it takes decided by the people who are settled in the country. Decisions to be taken will include the best achievable cooperative arrangements with other independent interdependent countries or groups.
    In 2014 55% of the electorate who voted preferred the UK arrangement despite its many flaws and absurdities rather than take responsibility for decisions that every other country regards as perfectly normal.
    Scotland is extremely fortunate to have a leader of Nicola’s calibre during this period of upheaval. Although I would prefer her and her team to be much more aggressive in dealings with Westminster and act every day in every way as though Scotland was already independent, I accept her judgement. I have pencilled in Indyref2 to be Article 50 + 21 months or such later date that is 3 months before the actual EU leave date. The hysteria and bile from the unionist side encourages the thought that they see themselves on the losing side.

  6. Big Jock says:

    Scotland is more important to me than the EU, or the UK. But the EU is not sovereign,the UK is!

    Voting to remain in the EU and leave the UK. Is retaking sovereignty from a one sided selfish controlling partner, and staying in the EU is remaining friends with those who are mutually beneficial.

    The important point is sovereignty. Brexit is nonsense England is sovereign already. It was a vote about putting two fingers up to the rest of Europe. Scotland has not been sovereign for 300 years. We get nothing from Brexit other than more London rule.

  7. john young says:

    Yet most of the UK elite and pos the SNP slavishly follow this psychotic/chaotic very dangerous country to the edge of the cliff,hardly a voice raised against them.

  8. Tired says:

    What genius. Yes Trump is a manifestation of globalisation and the disenfranchisement of a of a section of society who have lost most – Clinton is the ‘smug’ liberal elite who has gained the most.

    The liberal elite will always lose against the populists (left and right) who make by virtue of never having held power can promise endless ‘moral luck’ alternate histories that tap into the anger without ever having to justify it.

    The very fact that Peter Arnot cannot see this exact same manifestation led to George Square in Glasgow decked out in Saltires, angry polemical sites like this, the effect that had in England and the English equivalent is willful blindness to an embarassing degree.

    Scottish nationalism is not exceptional.

  9. Tired says:

    Hello Mr Arnott,

    Can I set you straight on a few things. To justify your own ideologue, you project that…’What has fundamentally changed, other than the cultural shift that the referendum represented in making our future, at least in part, our choice, is that the alternative, Better Together, must surely look a lot less like a sure thing to its own supporters than it used to.’

    Please stop patronising the majority who voted NO. They are not stupid. They did not vote against the break up of the UK due to a ‘campaign’. They did not vote to maintain a particular state over another. Many many many, voted on instinctive principle against NATIONALISM. The fact that English NATIONALISM has now reared it’s ugly head does not change that principled stance. The fact is that Trump has everything in common with Brexit AND the SCOTTISH nationalism with its reduction of complexity and global roots.

    1. Maria F says:

      “The fact is that Trump has everything in common with Brexit AND the SCOTTISH nationalism with its reduction of complexity and global roots”

      The reasons for Trump’s success have a lot to do with those for the success of Brexit, I agree with you 100%.

      As for Trump having much in common with Scotland? I disagree 100%. As far as I know, the only thing Trump has in common with Scotland is a poncy Golf course, a lot of grief caused to honest people living in the area and a big fall out with the Scottish government due to some wind turbines that could spoil the views of his beloved golf course (I fully recommend the documentary ‘you have been trumped’ if you haven’t watched it yet) But, hey, I am happy to be corrected if I am wrong.

      I note your alias. I understand. After all the lies, broken promises and devo max to the max that never was, it must be becoming exhausting to attempt to keep your eyes firmly shut and your fingers stuck in your ears. But hey, it that makes you feel more British, that is your prerogative.

      But please I would appreciate if you do not pretend to know how the rest of the Scottish population feels or why they voted one way or another because you don’t (neither do I), no matter how much you put the words Scottish and Nationalism in capital letters.

      Your words
      “Please stop patronising the majority who voted NO. They are not stupid. They did not vote against the break up of the UK due to a ‘campaign’. They did not vote to maintain a particular state over another”

      Mine
      If you don’t want the author or anybody else to patronise the NO voters of 2014, I would invite you to listen to your own words and lead by example. Please do not pretend to know why they voted against independence or what they voted to maintain. If you must speak, please speak for yourself.

      You don’t even have a clue what many of those who voted NO on 2014 are feeling right now. I happen to live with one and I can tell you that, by his own admission, he voted NO due to the Better Together campaign: he fell for the lies and promises that were going to be broken. He genuinely thought that Scotland would prosper and would be economically better off within the UK. He, of course, also fell for the lie and the continuous deception in the MSM that the best way for Scotland to remain in the EU was to remain in the UK. He can see that he has been conned because, his own words, he can see that the only reason to maintain Scotland in the UK is to be able to apply policies that favoured English economy to the detriment of the Scottish one. Just in case you are thinking in using the ‘anti-englishness cards’, please let me tell you that this person is an English born in bred that has been living in Scotland for some years.

      As for ‘they didn’t vote to maintain a state over another’, again, speak for yourself. This person in particular voted for the prevalence of the UK over the generation of a new state of Scotland, because, as I am sure you know, both are currently incompatible.

      Please, learn from your own words: “The No voters in 2014 are not stupid”, so please, don’t dumb them down.

      As for the reasons why an increasing proportion of the population is pursuing independence from the UK, I speaking for myself I can say that it has absolutely nothing to do with “populism” and all to do WITH the fact that the reason why I want INDEPENDENCE is so SCOTLAND CAN HAVE CONTROL OVER ITS OWN AFFAIRS, rather than having the MPs and government elected by its neighbour country doing that for them.

      P.S. Please note, the only reason why I used capital letters in my comments is as a sign of respect to your own use of them in your comment. 😀

      1. Tired says:

        Very aware of the Mennie estate. I’m fae close to Brig o Don. If you are too stupid to see patterns and how those patterns manifest themselves differently qualitatively then… There is no difference to the populist sentiment driving Trump and the populist sentiment driving Scottish or Brexit nationalism or any other populist manifestation. Those supporting Trump are not rabid racists, nor are the Brexiteers, they are mostly disenfranchised blue collar workers with a limited way of expressing their grievance unlike the liberal middle classes. It is crude but it is real. They are the former miners and ship builders, the farmers and mill workers, the old Ford factory car makers who have seen their jobs go to China. This is the bigger picture.

    2. MBC says:

      Yeah Tired, and I’m sick and tired of people like you calling Scotland’s rational, principled aspiration for self-determination ‘Nationalism’!

      Autonomy is a natural thing to wish for.

      1. Tired says:

        As it is in Trumps America. That’s all they want, a big ‘autonomous’ ‘self determining’ wall between them and the Mexicans. But hey Scots are soooooooo different. Wha’s like us.

        1. Tired says:

          As for Trump having much in common with Scotland? I disagree 100%. As far as I know, the only thing Trump has in common with Scotland is a poncy Golf course, a lot of grief caused to honest people living in the area and a big fall out with the Scottish government due to some wind turbines that could spoil the views of his beloved golf course (I fully recommend the documentary ‘you have been trumped’ if you haven’t watched it yet) But, hey, I am happy to be corrected if I am wrong.

          YES YOU ARE 100% wrong, feel free to be corrected. The Scottish government aka THE SNP, overturned the legitimate planning objection using executive power – i.e) Bullying people from the North East from on high in the central belt. In doing so they helped destroy one of Europe’s most valuable dune ecosystems and were the first government since the 19th century to enact a law helping push people from the tennant land.

          But stick your head in the sand, your nationalism is better than everyone else’s nationalism. When it suits the SNP to lick Donald Trumps arse they did and will do whatever in pursuit of there singular populist agenda.

          Anyone who dislikes this post is in league with Trump and those in the SNP who destroyed Molly Forbes and other’s lives.

          1. Maria F says:

            “But stick your head in the sand, your nationalism is better than everyone else’s nationalism.

            Who on earth do you think you are to presume that you are in any position to command or bully me into anything? I didn’t join the army because I am stubborn and can’t stand brainless bullies in positions of charge, so don’t you dare attempting to bully me: reserve that for the ranks of the Tory party.

            I don’t want to be disrespectful, but you are doing a huge disservice to all the honest people in Scotland that still believes that remaining in this corrupt Union is the best for Scotland. It is precisely comments like yours what makes them look bad, aggressive, irrational and outdated. You are being unfair to them.

            “When it suits the SNP to lick Donald Trumps arse they did and will do whatever in pursuit of there singular populist agenda”
            “Anyone who dislikes this post is in league with Trump and those in the SNP who destroyed Molly Forbes and other’s lives”

            You seem to have an unhealthy obsession with Mr Trump. I wonder why. Fortunately Mr Trump has nothing to do with this country and the US election is, quite frankly, for the American people to worry about. What is it to you? Have you been hired by Mrs Clinton’s side? If that is the case, forgive me for bursting your bubble but you are wasting your time in the wrong blog.

            On the other hand, If you are meaning to use Mr Trump’s name as an insult, I simply think you chose the wrong blog channel. Perhaps blogs within the CBBC or CBeebies’ channels could be more in line with that level of skill.

            I am going to dislike your comment. Sadly I can only do it once, because, all credit to you, I think it deserves to be disliked far more than once. And just to be clear, I couldn’t care less about Mr Trump but he is the candidate the people of America choose to lead them, then so be it.

            As for Molly Forbes, I regret to admit that I do not know who she is. As for being in league with the SNP, well, I can tell you now that I intend to vote for the SNP until that day Scotland is an independent country and finally gains full control over its resources and affairs. If that makes me ‘being in league’ with the SNP, then C’Est la Vie!

          2. Maria F says:

            Correction of my comment above

            And just to be clear, I couldn’t care less about Mr Trump but IF he is the candidate the people of America choose to lead them, then so be it.

        2. Graeme Purves says:

          Nobody in Scotland is advocating building walls. ‘Quite the contrary. I do remember Ed Milliband being keen to recruit border guards.

  10. MBC says:

    How on earth can a bonkers, broke, Brexit Britain run by mad, incompetant Tory fruitloops have any interest in Scotland’s economic future? As Cameron said on the eve of the indyref, he didn’t much care if Scotland left or not, ‘because we only have one MP there’. Talk about putting party before country!

    It’s the lifeboat or nothing, we can’t stay aboard the Titannic for much longer.

    Comfortable No voters are still in favour of staying on board because they simply don’t believe that the Titannic is going to be holed below the water by the iceberg. A wee scrape, maybe.

    Time will tell.

    Ireland is also waking up to the fact that its economy will be hit by Brexit in exactly the same way that an independent Scotland out of the UK but inside the EU would be. As the bulk of its trade is with the UK, not Europe. It will be interesting to see how they cope – and what help will come from the EU. Note though that like Greece, Ireland does not have her own currency and cannot use monetary policy to steady the ship in rough waters.

    1. c rober says:

      Though Ireland did do a two finger salute to the banks , and seems to be the most recovered of the EU as a result – even without economic levers. Uk and the EU , held to ransom by state , private and central banks – still enduring austerity , still inflating mortgage assets , now gearing for 5x multiples of main income earners as the norm and offering 100 percent mortgages. Compare that to Ireland , fire sale , cast the banks to the wolves?

      Worryingly though , regarding the exports , is that this may also be an over the barrel situation regarding the flitting of the EU passport and 45 percent or so of the London banking to Dublin – Where perhaps France and Germany keen on themselves , and not the other being this global hub.

      In such a situation , of the State of London enacting such control mechs on Dublin politics , in order to blackmail them on Irish exports to the uk , and of course onto the EU through English ports…. Just how would any Irish electorate feel in such a situation , back under the cosh of Westminster? While it may be advantageous for the wealthy to be in that pocket , and historically not unusual for the Irish old money , it certainly wont be for benevolent means , and where there will be a cost.

      That cost has already been hinted at , the changing of ports to those in NI for exports , keeping or creating wealth as a result in Uk hands , the soft border if you will becomes a competitive disincentive , and one that the Irish electorate would be kept in the dark on – until the very last minute.

      But any acceptance of this by Dublin and their wealthy elite , might well be the knife in the back of the worker , kicking off uncertainty in Ireland as a EU hub.

      Where this is important is that even just this week MRS MAY has already hinted at special status for the capital as remaining in the EU … but what of Scotland you might ask? Well that doesnt even come into it.

      1. MBC says:

        The banking crisis in Ireland was a different crisis to the Brexit crisis. Ireland could do something about its own banks. Much more difficult to do something with trade which has developed with UK. Ireland providing a lot of food to UK, transport costs minimal, tariffs zero, key factor in making this viable. I read about a mushroom factory in Tipperary having to close down already because of Brexit. Only 2% profit margins in agriculture sector. Sector can’t take a further hit.

  11. Alan Findlay says:

    The Scottish Labour Party is more bother than it is worth. Nevertheless currently it is the main reason why public opinion polls for independence are not above 60%. I believe this to be the case after spending the most of my recent social life failing to convince working class comrades that their Daily Record opinions are garbage – quoting Keiser, Hartmann, Mason ‘Wings’ etc. is making little or no impression (politics to most I come across in pubs is an opportunity to demonstrate just how hairy arsed they are).

    I have come to the conclusion, long before Paul Mason. that the only way we will make immediate headway is by joining the Labour Party and convincing the few activists that remain that Independence as party policy is the only one that makes sense for all of us.

    1. c rober says:

      There is method in that madness , in that joining Slab would at least in theory create change. The Corbyn effect?

      However it is not structured that way , not autonymous enough , and the badge of Scots socialist worker that once held it together was long ago replaced by Nulabour.

      While Kinnock may have been right then , on the failures then of union control in the national party , of uneducated politicians , over the longer term it has in effect created something far more different than that of the Labour party – Where the only semblance of the old party is merely the word itself ” Labour” …. and importantly an entirely different problem now to be solved in its place.

      Scotland is still working class , it still is deep down like some sort of Blackpool rock with “socialist want and need” running through it.

      But the very people in control of that party are as alien to them , hazardous even , now represetn the very same Tories they have refused to elect of old in new red ties.

      This is the single reason why SNP has been accepted even outwith the Indy question , in that they now offer something closer to the socialism than that of Labour offer , either in Slab or in the national party.

      But as the SNP cloned the socialist veneer to appear more Socialist , as Nulabour had done with a veneer of Tory in England in order to be elected , Scottish Labour was that eventual cost – and where the Judas effect of both that and indy 1 have culminated in toxicity at the ballot box.

      The die hard believers still think that Nulabour is electable in Scotland , it is not , even the blinkered generational voters have seen the light post 2014 , the leaders though are protected through the list system so change will never happen , only extinction therefore should be the desired outcome.

      Until the day Scottish Labour backs its voters over the party and leaders , shuns project fear II , and enables the electorate to its original mandate of Hardie and Home Rule , then it is headed towards that extinction.

      Finger in the dyke memberhsip increases wont work until then , until that nationalist veener is adopted as SLAB party policy , just as the SNP did with socialst mantra in order to increase their employment.

      1. MBC says:

        I wonder what goes on in the minds of Scottish Labour and those that vote for it. Their Labour values cannot be realised in a UK dominated for decades by an English Tory party with no interest in either Scotland or Labour’s values.

        I suppose they must believe in a progressive UK, and though that possibility seems remote, they go on voting for it because they think it is the right and ethical thing to do.

        Just as SNP voters kept voting for independence even when the possibility was remote.

        I suppose then for Scottish Labour voters their unionism is simply stronger than their Labour values.

  12. Alasdair Macdonald says:

    Members and supporters of Scottish Labour are one of the groups to which supporters of independence should reach out. A second group is the people who do not vote or do not even register to vote. Stereotyping the former and being scornful is unlikely to be persuasive. There has to be an effort to establish significant common concerns. For the latter group, many do not see that voting is of any value and some are concerned that by being on the electoral roll they leave themselves open to harassment by public bodies. Groups like RIC made sterling efforts with the latter and more need to become involved, preferably people from the same communities.
    Of course, the unknown is the broad sweep of what LEAVE actually entails. The firmness of conviction of many NO and YES voters has been softened by the EU referendum outcome. They are open to persuasion one way or the other, but, being sensible people they are, understandably, hesitant about committing. what requires to be done is to present genuinely reasonable options and to provide ways in which they and the rest of us can gain some measure of control over events.

    1. c rober says:

      State bank and economy – supply an iron clad argument and many will change in the indecisive and pensioner demographic.

      In other words bring the argument to the table in a binary mode , indy good for your pocket , indy bad for your pocket. Shore that argument up with the worlds best economists , and where possible ignore the banks and IMF , where those economists are in the business of creating personal and corporate wealth.

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