FREEDOM!!!! [4]

"Preparing for Brexit
Planning for when the UK leaves the EU
We’ve collected information that could help you plan for our exit from the EU, to ease the uncertainty that comes with it."

The message I saw when I went on my online banking, made me smile really, They seem to know more than anyone else Ive now got to the stage..Why ?? Its like being in a queue. You've been in it so long you forget what you're queueing up for

{{ Glad you are on board Figg.

And Blue I will be ready to canvass again as required- but it wont be now. Reading between the lines Sturgeons position hasn't changed- there will be another referendum called, but not right now. Imagine if she had done what many in her party wanted way back at the start of Brexit and we also had an independence debate and potential split as well as Brexit at same time!

So my reckoning is she will wait to see how the pieces fall from Brexit and depending on how quickly that happens (if MP's cave and support Mays bill on the 3rd try it could be very quick) then the SNP will start working for a second referendum.

Sturgeon is talking a lot of indie right now and referendum, but thats mainly to appease the ever anxious to get on with it SNP base, its coming up on conference time and they need some red meat.

But there is first the hurdle that May, and so therefore Westminster, as she says it will not grant the legal right to hold another referendum. And that will be an interesting fight. }}

{{Some insight into the last days of the previous indie referendum in a new documentary.

Its by the BBC so you can take their admissions in it to being less than unbiased to be the tip of the iceberg they are willing to admit to.

'Little, who was the BBC's Referendum Correspondent, said: "I know how hard my colleagues in London work at trying to get it right. It's in the DNA when you are a BBC journalist. I'm not cynical about that but I was quite surprised by some of my colleagues failing to understand their own assumption that the Yes side was wrong."
He added that some colleagues thought "that our responsibility was to produce a series of pieces to demonstrate how foolish it would be to vote Yes".'

Of course this admittance is not the official BBC line which is this-

Ken MacQuarrie, who was the director of BBC Scotland, told the programme BBC journalists "left behind" their own opinions when reporting.
He said: "People were doing a professional job as far as was possible in every situation that they came across."

And what of Nick Robinson the BBC chief political reporter? You may or not remember in the last days he was drafted in from London to take the place of the head of BBC Scottish politics, you know the unbiased guy who has years of experience understanding Scottish politics replaced by a Londoner how obviously had not a clue what he was talking about, no former experience reporting on Scottish politics or on Scotland in fact- but the unbiased BBC Scottish political editor was not doing the job of attacking indie enough.

Anyhow once in place Robinson did a series of hatchet pieces on indie and the SNP, the most famous being when he asked a question of Alex Salmond over RBS moving its HQ if indie happened, and got a 15 minute answer which was then utterly edited out of the actual news report replaced with Robinson delivering the verdict "he never answered the question."

Here's his response to that bit of editorial barbarism-

Robinson told the Yes/No programme: "In the end it was a subjective view as to whether he did or didn't properly answer the question.
"It wasn't a clever script line. In truth, given the chance, I would have rewritten it."

Yeah sure he would love to rewrite that line given it was easy for folk to just look at the unedited footage with the 15 minute answer and see it was an utter lie designed to give a false impression that the RBS were taking all their jobs out of Edinburgh to London (they weren't just re-registering the HQ in London with no staff movement as a means of operating in the EU ironically if Scotland was temporally forced to leave and reapply).

And I do say watch the footage for yourself, its not only an answer its an in-depth one.

So at least I suppose some admission from the BBC that their reporting was less than stellar, or even fair and balanced.
You might wonder why they are revealing this now, well the BBC just launched a new dedicated Scottish channel, with for the first time a national news bulletin (up till now Scottish news has got the same slot after the UK news as English regions get! as till now Westminster and the BBC have been against a Scottish news bulletin on the basis it undermines UK integrity, but the SNP have been fighting for it for decades) and all this; new channel, finally letting us produce out own news etc is a response to the increasing distrust and disdain for the BBC news reporting when it comes to Scottish matters.
This slight admission they might not have been at their best during the indie referendum is their first steps at attempting to win back the trust of the Scottish public which was very badly tarnished. I think they will need to do a lot more than this.}}

I must admit I am always impressed by Ian Blackford. He sticks it to May on every occasion and whats worrying for English people is he sounds more like the Labour leader SHOULD SOUND but Corbyn totally fails to.

I dig his one-handed paper shuffle too.

{{He has done an excellent job both at representing the SNP in Westminster and just at being good opposition to the government, I agree he makes Corbyn look even more inept. }}

"Indyref2 should take place 'within this parliamentary term' says Nicola Sturgeon"

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/17593412.indyref2-should-take-place-within-this-parliamentary-term-says-nicola-sturgeon/

Strong and balanced proposal by Sturgeon, who puts the ball squarely in the court of the other side with the citizens assembly.

The response from Westminister is as expected, but in reality their wriggle room is rather small. Any hint of the hard hand and Sturgeon can hold up the example of Spain, and any move in that direction will create serious issues at the HoCs for the UK government. Can the UK prevent the expression of Scottish democracy without delving to the depths of Spain? Unlikely, so the choice for UK politicians are in reality rather limited. Respect Scottish democracy or.. what? Send the police to attack voters? Jail SNP leaders and charge them with lenghty prison sentences? In a democracy there is one decent way to deal with a self-determination conflict of this kind, and it is in the examples of Quebec and Scotland(2014).

Hopefully the SNP can learn from the pitfalls of the case of Catalonia. In the current case of Scotland there is little valid argument for continued union beyond the identitarian. If that hurdle can be passed then I see the independence-chances as good. In this case, laughably you might say, the Brussels elite are on the side of Scotland. (Currently a principle-void opportunist lot if there ever was one.)

I wonder if there has been much reaction yet form the middle ground that can give hope of a fair and democratic debate on merit this time around?

{{ There is a few things of note going on here with this announcement.

Firstly and most pressingly for Sturgeon the SNP Conference is soon to start and she needs to feed red meat to the loyal party members and especially the grass-roots who have been pushing for a 2nd vote for a long time and are getting restless. This gives them a target date of two years down the line to aim for and a sense of their being an achievable end point to proceedings. She can give her speech, promise a 2nd referendum and send the grass-roots out to campaign for 2 years fired up for the cause.

Secondly when she wants the vote is notable. Its before the next Scottish Parliamentarily elections. The reasons for this are that the system is a PR voting system, one specifically designed to ever stop any one party, particularly the SNP, ever getting a majority. But they did at the time of the 1st referendum, which is how they were in a position to get a independence referendum through the parliament with ease- they simply had the numbers. Given the PR system its unlikely to happen again.
Currently they run a minority administration, they are by far the largest party but they are outnumbered by all the other parties combined. At the moment the greens are pro-Independence and they hold enough seats to ensure a vote will be passed paving the way for a 2nd vote.
But if the vote come after the next Scottish elections those numbers might change, and if the SNP lose any seats, or the Greens do, the numbers might not be in the Parliament to even get the legislation through to have a 2nd vote. The SNP might be in power after an election as a minority government but in a pro-Union parliament. That would be the ideal for Westminster and I strongly suspect therefore a major tactic of Westminster will be to try to find ways to delay things so that date is missed in the hopes the SNP can't get it through a new Parliament.
This bit, the timing of it, is Sturgeons biggest gamble- she is both trying to delay it as long as possible thinking the unsettled nature of the UK position will harm more than help her right now, uncertainty never encouraging people to take a risk of more uncertainty, but at the same time by pushing it back close to the end of the Parliamentary term she risks missing her date  through interference from England and risking not having the numbers afterwards to legislate for it.

And lastly its about the mandate to hold one. At the last election the SNP stood on a manifesto that called for a 2nd referendum if there was a significant change in the circumstances of the Union deal within the term of the Parliament. Giving the specific example of Scotland being taken out of the EU against its people wishes.

It would be hard for Westminster to argue leaving the EU was not a significant change, especially as the Union side sold a large part of their argument on a vote for the Union as being the only way to safeguard staying in the EU.

At the moment therefore the SNP has both the mandate from their manifesto, the argument to base their demand on in getting permission for a referendum from Westminster, and the votes with the Greens to legislate for it.

Like her or not there is no doubt Sturgeon ways up the pros and cons of this politically pretty closely, and her choices here seem to me at least based on reasonable assumptions, whether it pays off of course is yet to be seen. }}

go for it I say, after what the Tories have done, the gloves are off.

One of the most interesting things to me was the citizen assembly. If the Scottish people can manage a debate on merit about whatever future, half the battle is won. If the Scottish people can decide to discuss this on merit, you will, whatever the result, have a healthy democratic debate and a result the people as a whole can recognise themselves in.

This is also a positive for the independence side. If you go beyond the identitarian independence to me is simply the best option on merit. Whether it's independence as a commonwealth nation, with the Queen as head-of-state, or a Scottish republic. With the mess that is Westminister and the UK, and the lack of any care for the opinions of the Scottish people, Scotland needs to be in a situation where its people can make its own decisions on its path in the world.

Sadly that also leads me to believe that the unionist parties will fight this with all and any means possible, to keep the matter identitarian, while painting themselves the moderate responsible non-identitarian side. Expect a shitstorm if the unionists are still uninterested in winning on merit and argument, and are still only interested in winning by any means.

By appealing to the public-at-large however, this tendency can perhaps be undercut. With the world as it is, with identitarian populism carrying the day in different elections, perhaps a healthy skepticism can keep the broad majority of the Scottish people from the same trap. One can but hope.

Try the translation of this Petty, a view on matters from Catalonia:

https://www.elnacional.cat/ca/opinio/agusti-colomines-2021-tornar-comencar_377926_102.html
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=es&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.elnacional.cat%2Fes%2Fopinio%2Fagusti-colomines-2021-tornar-comencar_377926_102.html

{{Thanks Blue I will have a read.

Well my prediction that the UK govt position will be to try to put off and delay the vote seems about right-

'When asked by BBC Scotland whether this meant the UK government was ruling out granting a Section 30 order - which formed the legal basis for the last referendum - before 2021, Mr Lidington replied: "Yes. We don't see the case for that.
"This was supposed to be settled for a generation in 2014 and we should stick to that."
He added that there was "no evidence since then that the appetite of the Scottish people to go through a referendum once again has surged up".

In response the Scottish government has said-

'"I'm not going to spend too much time bothering about the diktats of a government that I expect will be out of office before too long."
And she said the UK government should have to answer "why they think it is acceptable to block a democratic vote that has a clear mandate in the Scottish Parliament and with the Scottish people".

Early battle-lines then being drawn. The main fight is going to be over the timing, Westminster are desperate to push that back to after the Scottish elections in the hopes the SNP cannot get it through at all. }}

Petty and I have discussed this a lot. I'll paraphrase my opinion to this:


The political machine that is Westminster will never allow Scotland to gain independence. I fully believe that they have and will continue to use every trick, no matter how dirty or low it may be, every media source will be primed with questions and topics to make the SNP look weak and foolish. No attempt will be entered into for a meaningful discussion because until there is anything meaningful to discuss no one will discuss what they could in fact be discussing about. If you thought the blatant media bias and very questionable reporting was bad during the last independence referendum I can promise you that next time it will be worse. Or rather it will be better done. They've had a trial run at it, now they have a much better idea of the SNPs weak spots,of the public's weak spots.

As as long as Scotland remains a financial asset to the UK, we are stuck here. Not only that if there is another referendum and it doesn't pass, Scotland will be dissected by Westminster, powers will be stripped and Holyrood will be nothing more than a glorified council office - because that is how Westminster see's it just now.

{{ For the record I argue for a less pessimistic outlook, believing the power of crabbit will win out in the end, either folk will vote for it to stop Sturgeon going on about it, or because they want it.
And Westminster can be overcome this time, as the SNP likewise are better prepared and Westminster have mishandled two referendums (they won the Scottish one but they slipped more 30 points in the course of their campaign). So their is hope they are simply incompetent still, which Brexit would indicate to be the case.

But that's not to underestimate what Nagual says, he is not wrong in his assessment of how low or dirty Westminster will go to keep hold of Scottish assets and usefulness militarily and strategically (a side often underestimated in the balance sheets). }}

Looking on the bright side though, after this long long list of appalling failures and the terrible treatment of the weakest citizens, this government and the Tories in general, are weakened and have lost their authority, people have now had the scales dropped and they are aware of all the crap going on which was once hidden. I think the tories are so discredited and weak that the SNP could do what the useless Labour leadership is utterly failing to do, that is, capitalise on the situation. This is the worst government in UK history, now is the time to take advantage of it. If they crank out the propaganda it needs counter arguments and calling out, for example something the remain campaign failed to do last time was counter the 'take back control' bollox, they will try the same tactics because they worked last time, but this time you need to be ready for them and the lies.

I'm not so sure that enough people are fully aware of events and causes. Many many people get their news and politics from the tabloids. Brexit is a classic example of it. The masses don't get involved as deeply as some. Then there is the voter who becomes apathetic, bored or just fed up with it all. These types of voters are the ones who will keep the status quo as it's easier than dealing with the potential of independence. Sure there are people who are fed up and angry, they will vote. But never doubt human nature to keep the same crap instead of risking it for different crap.

Um...the voters who are fed up are the ones who give you Trump.  I was tempted to vote for the guy just for entertainment value before he fully revealed just how truly despicable he was. But others won't mind someone who breaks all the norms so long as they more or less are headed in a direction they want. And nationalism is on the rise around the world, which seems to feed this mentality.

halfwise wrote:Um...the voters who are fed up are the ones who give you Trump.  I was tempted to vote for the guy just for entertainment value before he fully revealed just how truly despicable he was.  But others won't mind someone who breaks all the norms so long as they more or less are headed in a direction they want.  And nationalism is on the rise around the world, which seems to feed this mentality.

Trump looked at what was upsetting a lot of people and made an issue about it. He inflamed them with blatant lies and made impossible to keep promises. He said that he was going to drain the swamp, clear out people only in power for money, in it for themselves. People believed him.  He said there was an illegal immigration problem and would build a wall and Mexico would pay for it.  People believed him. He created the catch phrase "alternative facts", which is just another word for lies and still people believed him. These people were not fed up, they were deliberated targeted and motivated by lies.

In the Uk since 2014 we've had 2 referendums, 2 general elections, and several local elections. Some people are just burnt out from listening to politics all the time, and even with all the voting that's been going on, nothing is really changing. They may feel that if nothing is changing what's the point in voting?

Being apathetic or fed up means that you simply don't have any interest or the energy to take part.

I have to disagree with you when you say people were not fed up. We had a non-functioning two-party system where nothing could get done. By acting completely different, and as an asshole who would go his own way, people felt he could get something done. His lies fed this belief, but he didn't create the environment that allowed him to be elected, he just manipulated it.

I think we may be taking different meanings of 'fed up'. In the interests of clarification and removal of doubt, I'm inferring that those people whom I reference as being 'fed up', to be of an apathetic state and lack motivation. Your interpretation of 'fed up' would be that they are frustrated with what they experience or hear about, I think?

Yes. Though you would think well-fed folks would be lethargic, over here for some reason some-one who is "fed-up" is considered close to the point of explosion.

Well, while I can't say for the rest of the Uk with any certainty but we have probably got several hundred words to describe how angry or irate we are. Same with rain. We get a lot of rain so tend to have a lot of ways to describe it. We get irate at getting raining on a lot so have a lot of words particular to getting wet. We generally adapt all of these various collective descriptions and mix them up to make things interesting.

I think we are overlooking the current incompetence and madness going on in Westminister. The mistakes of the UK government are electoral gold for the SNP, and heading into the next parliamentary elections you might see a pro-incependence majority, if the SNP play their cards right, manage to give fed up voters some hope and Westminister continues the incompetent frefall.

Another grave error:

https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/michael-gove-unveils-plans-to-take-control-of-holyrood-cash-1-4920727

{{ In recent discussions on this subject with Nagual he postulated just this sort of thing, a power grab from the devolved administrations to weaken them.
We had been thinking it would be more along political lines than a straight direct grab tot he cash, but going for source is certainly a good way to throttle the devolved administrations and lessen the impact of what they can do.

What I felt telling in that article is Groves main contention here seems to be that the SNP spend the money wiser than England (see yesterdays study in falling Doctors numbers in the NHS, except in Scotland as an example) and that the SNP are claiming these as 'Scottish success' not as UK ones. Thus strengthening an independence agenda that Scotland is better doing everything its self.
Gove would much rather he takes that money, decides how to spend it in devolved areas (if at at all!) and then gives credit for it to Westminster as being a strength of the Union. Its the SNP getting credit he doesn't seem to like.

Problem is most of the innovations the SNP brought in over the years; free prescriptions, free eduction including university, smoking ban, free travel for pensioners, offsetting the odious bedroom tax, freezing council tax bills, baby boxes, minimum pricing on alcohol, earlier breast cancer screening and many many more, would never have been initiated by Westminster in the first place who are still playing catch up in many of these areas.
Its just a way to throttle what the SNP can do by taking the money back, and then when anything is done with the money claiming it be a success of the Union and only because of the Union. }}