robbylad

Dope

After a yes vote, people like yourself, with all that experience, could help build an education system that's the envy of the world.

OQ... call it what you like. Like most of the rest of the world, apart from the ultra-Nats to whom the term is , I use the working title of "Britain" for the highly successful state which resulted from the aggregation of Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales, and from which part of Ireland (the "arc of prosperity" bit ) departed in 1922. And IF Scotland decided to secede from that, you could still call it what you like but in practice it would still be "Britain" because dropping off 8.3% of the population - sort of like Yorkshire - really isn't going to make that much difference to "Britain" which might regard it as a bit regretful, but perfectly bearable. However this would make one hell of a negative difference to the seceders who would lose the security and stabilising influences of something which was 12 times bigger. And we didn't cease to be "Britain" when the Irish went away in 1922. Our history over the last 1500 years or so has been one of ongoing aggregation. You had random tribes which became Strathclyde, Dalriada, Lothian, Pictland (that's the bit with the oil by the way ) Correspondingly the likes of Wessex, Mercia, Northumbria became England. The next stage was that Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales, by 1801, became Britain or whatever the hell you want to call it. Fast forward another couple of hundred years and the debate has moved on further to the extent to which there should be further integration in the form of the EU. That's except among you lot in you who just seem to want to turn the clock back more than 300 years to "Scotland" which was really just an intermediate step - and in a lot of respects a failed state until it aggregated with its neighbours - in an ongoing evolutionary process. It's a bit like being a Homo Sapiens and saying you want to go back to being a Piltdown Man! But if you want to turn the clock back, why stop at 1707? Go on - adopt the slogan "It's Pictland's Oil" "Highly successful state".... now you bring humour into it.

Bang on OQ When you see the word "lecture" in the same phrase as "Alex Salmond" you know this is something you need to avoid for your own sanity. But tell me something. When are the SNP going to start actually saying stuff which might have a chance of getting people to sit up and listen to their case? Since the 670 page publicly funded manifesto divebombed without trace, I'm just noticing nothing - apart from random defensive mutterings off the back foot in response to the now almost daily battering their stance is getting from all directions. I do have to say that, although somewhat lengthy and sometimes a tad resentful, the contributions on here from your good self have been as good as I have seen - and have been like a veritable Nationalist Sermon On The Mount compared with what is coming from official sources. I don't think you can call over 100,000 copies of "Scotland's Future" dive bombed Charles. I think it goes to show that people are engaged with the debate and want to know more. Just because you think it's a waste of time doesn't make it so. I usually find that people who call the white paper a waste of money are usually the ones who fear the debate. They would prefer people stay uninformed in case they make an informed decision.

Don't want them relegated and don't want Adams sacked. I want us to hump them every time we play them and then watch Adams head explode like an alien in "Mars Attacks"

Gordie... I am a republican I find this presumption of Royalism a bit bizarre. Just the union Jack onesie then?

At least if he was a non Scot, we could accuse him of being racist lol

No it's not. It's been there for millions of years. It's just that it wasn't until about 130 years ago that technology started to be developed which created a demand for it and gave it an economic value. It's worthless if it isn't recovered though. Like I said, I don't think it would go down well if an independent Scotland tried to claim any shale gas or other assets recovered in a future rUK. Not at all. It's no more worthless than whisky sitting in a bonded warehouse awaiting sale. And as far as the shale gas is concerned, if that scenario arose, it would be a result of an active decision by Scottish voters to secede from the UK - and its assets. But why not do a deal if the whole national debt and the oil are both UK assets, why shouldn't UK continuing not keep them both - after all the SNP seem to be quite happt for UK continuing to keep the whole debt? If I rented a room in your house (unlikely I know), and you defaulted on your mortgage (unlikely I know), the bank wouldn't persue me. They would go after the mortgage holder. The UK "continuing" took on the debt, therefore the UK "continuing" are liable for the debt. Now, this myth that the Scottish government would renege on the debt is just that. As they are perfectly entitled to do, they've asked why Scotland would be liable for a debt yet not entitled to the assets. Everything is up for negotiation only Westminster stamp their feet and refuse to negotiate. It's Westminster that is causing uncertainty, not the Scottish government.

No it's not. It's been there for millions of years. It's just that it wasn't until about 130 years ago that technology started to be developed which created a demand for it and gave it an economic value. It's worthless if it isn't recovered though. Like I said, I don't think it would go down well if an independent Scotland tried to claim any shale gas or other assets recovered in a future rUK.

So that's Scotland's 8.3% share of the BofE, the military, the national debt (unless Alex were to throw the rattle out of the pram)... and just 8.3% of the oil as well? On the other hand if the national debt currently belongs to the UK, does that not also apply to the oil... so the rest of the UK keeps all of that if Scotland decides to walk away from the current owner of that particular asset? Once again we return to the separatist presumption of expecting everybody to agree to the breakup of the UK, and on their terms into the bargain.... or at least until they got the wake up call that the rest of the UK wouldn't be engaging in currency union for a start. Oh but I forgot! The other UK parties don't really mean that!! So maybe Alex Salmond doesn't really mean it that he wants a yes vote in September either and he's only bluffing there too? I don't see how the UK government can claim the oil. That is a future asset. An independent Scotland couldn't claim part of any windfall from fracking in a future UK.

didnt you know? we're too wee, too poor and too stupid.

American

Can't wait to hear Adams bleating!

Charles thinks they are comedy gold though.

Just don't forget to vote.

If the rest of th UK are producing goods to sell to Scotland, why would they stop? What other market are they going to sell those goods to? Or are they going to see that jobs are at risk from cutting off your nose to spite your face?

Charles must be your researcher Laurence. "Dead in the water" ??? You must be kidding???

What has Carlisle ever done to you?

Not really since they all seem just to be yet further convoluted restatements of your fundamental dislike of Westminster , and your unshakeable resentment of what you perceive to be the bum deal "Westminster" has gone out of its way to dish out to the poor downtrodden Scots for the last 307 years. In any case, this week I have been focusing rather more on the backside even falling out of the SNP "oil bribe"..... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scotland/10616789/BP-chief-Bob-Dudley-attacks-Scottish-independence.html And there's also the strong concern that while even your and my pension prospects look to be under serious threat in the event of a yes vote, it will be far worse for younger people who face a generally more challenging pensions environment in any case.... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-26015455 When this referendum was first mooted back in 2011 (God! It actually feels like a century!) my strong inclination to vote NO was largely motivated just by a straightforward belief in the principle that the UK needs to remain intact. Now, after three years of people constantly banging on about separation, I am in addition seriously worried about the emerging threat to the standards of living and quality of life which a yes vote would also pose for Scottish people. Yes Scotland's strategy seems to be to try to get the turkeys to vote yes, without actually telling them that it's Christmas they are voting for. Pot and kettle springs to mind with your continual railing against the SNP, and Salmond etc! I speak re Westminster from what I know and have experienced.......maybe you have been luckier than a lot of us and Westminster policies have been good to you! Dearie, dearie me......where do you get "backside even falling out of the SNP "oil bribe" out of what was reported and what was said on the Beeb! What he said was You know there's much debate about currency, what would happen with the currency and of course connections with Europe or not."These are quite big uncertainties for us". What he said was " not concerned, but there's enough uncertainty to talk about it. " What he said was "it depends on what the tax regimes are" and he said "'quite big uncertainties' if the sterling issue isn't resolved. Now, I'm sure you will correct me if I'm wrong..but is it not Westminster which is promoting and promulgating that uncertainty for their own Project Fear purposes, when we all know very well, that the uncertainty can be removed completely if they just say first .....that there will be negotiations, in the event of a YES vote, re a currency agreement (as will happen, imo), just as they did with saying they would repay all the National debt to mollify the uncertainty among UK bond-holders.....and second....wrote an official letter to the EU regarding the positions of Scotland and the rUK in the event of a yes vote. Result would be no uncertainty.....but then that would mean the end of Project Fear, which is, to date, the only weapon in their "positive" case for the Union. As an aside....maybe Dudley is thinking of all the money he has wasted hiring George Robertson as a "special adviser" for his access to the Westminster corridors of power only to find that it mightn't be Westminster corridors of power he needs to influence. I dunno about you..but I paid my taxes and NI into the UK pot.....and the UK spent it when I paid it..and grabbed the VAT when I spent my salary.....so the UK owes me my pension, just as it owes it to everyone who buggers of to live in Spain or the USA to retire .and if, as Westminster says, rUK is going to be the continuing state....then the rUK pays my state pension...not Scotland. Cross-border and reciprocal agreements re pensions exist currently within the UK with different countries...why would that not apply to Scotland? At the end of the day, Charles...all these Project Fear scares are not based on commonsense or pragmatism, but petulance and huffing......not a lot different to the petulance and foot-stamping of the wee boy in the playground saying "if you're not going to pick me to play, I'm taking my ball home so nobody gets to play". In the end, between Governments, commonsense and pragmatism will prevail...you know it will...it isn't in any Government's interests to cut off their nose to spite their face. Pleased for you your standard of living is so good.....mine is OK as well....but we are the lucky ones (at the moment...though pensioners have been mentioned as the next targets by IDS). If you were disabled, in a rented house on state benefits with a carer, and being hit with bedroom tax, PIP, ATOS, the benefit cap, the coming cuts to Carer's allowances etc and a VAT increase to 20%, which hits the poorest hardest, would you be so sanguine. Or if you were under 25 and lost your entitlement to housing benefit, so you had to become homeless or go back to live with parents, who may have no room for you (because they have downsized to beat the bedroom tax). You may be happy to live in a country in which you are comfortably enough off....but which punishes the disabled, the unemployed and our young people, in a country in which there are relatively few real jobs because they can't find a job. (I don't count zero-hours contracts and part-time work as real jobs unless they are a choice deliberately made because it suits their life-style/family commitments).and at the same time, fails to plug the loopholes which allows the rich and businesses to avoid tax, which cuts the tax rate for higher earners, which subsidises, with taxpayers money, the profits of businesses by the payment of working tax credits, allowing them to pay less than a decent wage..and continues to keep the UK one of the most unequal societies in the Western World, which continues to allow the banks to rip us off, which has privatised the utilities.and then allowed them to soak us to make shareholder profits and pay themselves ridiculous wages, which is gradually privatising the NHS......and which has made sounds regarding doing the same to Scottish Water and the Scottish NHS. I'm not defending the benefit levels, which are ridiculous, particularly the working tax credits and child credits, and are a result of the tit-for-tat eternal change expensively produced after pretty much every election, because of promises made to their voting demography. You can see it now with the feather-bedding of the grey vote (for the moment) because we old folks are most likely to vote in elections.so we don't have to "be all in this together" but the benefits are the way successive Governments have made it..and any entitlement culture has been instilled by Governments over decades. Since Tony Blair, this country doesn't appear to like people who are taking out of the system, even though what they take out goes straight back in by spending, thus into VAT receipts and also the profits of businesses, adding to their taxable income (which they then pay accountants lots of money to hide from HMRC). We have an incompetent UK Government focused only on furthering their ideology, but without the ability to polish up the same type of crystal ball forecasting the future consequences of their actions that they seem to think the Scottish Government has! I really think Scotland can do better....I know Scotland can't possibly do worse.............and I am voting YES on that premise.....not for my benefit, but for my children, my grandchildren and my great grandchild. Aye. And bloody food banks too. That must be that quality of life Charles refers to.

When Wendy's brother mentioned supporting Man U and Barcelona, was he suggesting in an independent Scotland you won't be able to? Every time I see him I'm sure his eyes glaze over as the chip in his head activates and out comes the party line.

Quite frankly, I find Oddquine's lengthy monologues largely impenetrable - apart from their basic thesis of what a scandalously downtrodden bunch the poor old Scots have always been at the hands of their nasty neighbours. And it's there that the likes of inflated WW1 casualty figures and delusional interpretations of the Battle of Culloden etc become an important consideration, since such things have always been important to nationalists for the promotion of a sense of grievance. I have to say that, alongside football, shinty and athletics, another of my favourite sports is winding up Nats. This was something I learned as a boy on the streets of Inverness where we would manage to distract Willie Bell from ranting at English tourists and get him to chase us instead, and it's provided a lifetime of entertainment. And hey! We need some entertainment after two and a half years of having this referendum incessantly rammed down our throats, with the worst eight months still to come. You really do have to have a bit of a laugh or the whole thing will grind you down. What a lot of yessers seem not to understand is that most of us, although Scottish, have far more to our lives than constantly binding on about Scotland and we really want to get these lives back. I certainly can't accept Alex's contention that this referendum isn't really about the SNP and Alex Salmond. After all, the sole reason that we are having it is that the SNP got a Holyrood majority, and the publicity hungry Salmond is a very prominent mouthpiece, to the extent, for instance, that he didn't launch the 670 pages to his fellow MSPs at Holyrood but to the assembled media at the Glasgow Science centre. But there are indeed organisations other than the SNP supporting yes - such as something called "Wings Over Scotland" which has been mentioned a lot on this thread. Now I learn that "Wings Over Scotland" is actually one single wee Cybernat called "The Reverend" Stuart Campbell who seems to love Scotland so much that he lives in Bath in Somerset. Oh well, I suppose in the unlikely event of a yes vote, the MacStasi will come and put me on Rendition Flight 101 to Rockall where, since I have no great fear of rats, I will be exposed to the incessant sound of a pipe band Perhaps Charles, you should take your research info from something other than the rag you got that information. Wings over Scotland is not an organisation supporting YES. Indeed the Reverand Campbell is not a supporter of anything. Nor is he an SNP supporter. He's a Lib-Dem. Whether or not he's a reverend I dont know and nor do I know why he lives in Bath other than its where he earns his cash. WoS, as I said, is not an organisation. Its a website blog open to anyone with any view on anything. Oh! And he doesn't actually have a vote in September If you believe the crap that passes for journalism in the daily mail, you deserve all the scorn coming your way.

I see nothing wrong with the BBC seeking the raw data before reporting on this. Why on earth should they report on research which criticises them if they genuinely feel the findings are flawed. We all know that mud sticks and if they were to dutifully report it but make a statement that they were challenging the findings, the perception that they were biased would persist even if subsequent analysis of the raw data showed otherwise. Let's face it, this type of social science research is open to a lot of subjectivity and there is some seriously bad research about even where there is absolutely no intentional bias. If the BBC see content in the paper which suggests that the evidence may not reasonably lead to the conclusions reached, they have every right to challenge that. As an example, the report cites a story about a Scottish patient being denied a cancer drug which was available to patients in England. The implication here is that because Healthcare is already devolved matter, independence will lead to more of this. The BBC reporting the patient being denied the drug is therefore interpretted as taking an anti-independence stance! It goes on to state that there are examples of patients in England being denied drugs available to patients in Scotland but that this was not reported thereby increasing the bias. But why would a patient in England being denied a drug be a news story for the BBC in Scotland? The story may be a criticism of the NHS in Scotland and it may be an unfair criticism, but to interpret it as taking an anti - independence bias really is stretching it. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying the BBC is not biased, but I do think that this illustrates just how complex these issues are. The kind of soft research identified here is fraught with difficulties and the BBC are quite right to seek the raw data before reporting on this. Of course, once they have seen the raw data they should then report it objectively and offer their comments accordingly. They don't seem too concerned about the anti independence reports they broadcast. As for them offering their comments afterwards..... you'll get some crap legalise that means nothing to the people most affected by said crap. Twist and squirm off the hook.The BBC effectively had its balls cut off after the Gilligan report regarding Iraq. Disgraceful treatment of a journalist who dared to tell the truth.

How do you know? How can you or any other yes advocate speak for a Scottish government of unknown political persuasion elected years into the future? This just sounds like Alex's wish list politics with his series of "commitments" which no one is in a position to say could or would be delivered. That is presumably as specified in his 670 page publicly funded Toom Tome which must surely succeed the 1983 Labour manifesto as the longest suicide note in history. By the way you seem not to have quoted the section of the linked document which presumably says how you would replace the 4000 (due to rise to 5000 by 2017) direct jobs and the many other indirect ones which would be lost if the Faslane base were to close. Then of course there's the one thing that the SNP say they want to do and they can do now - improve childcare. But they won't because they want to keep that as a carrot to get women to vote yes and they're especially short in that department. The reason, they say, is that they don't want any cash generated by extra employment to go to the Westminster exchequer. Now how cynical is that? Giving their own anti-Westminster paranoia priority over the interests of the women of Scotland. It's called democracy Charles. At the general election after and in the event of a yes, parties will set out their manifesto and even you will get a say in these things. You're obsession with Alex Salmond and the SNP is blinding you to the fact that another party may have better ideas. On the other hand judging by the antics of Johann Lamont and Ruth Davidson, maybe not.

Scotland, the only country in the world to strike oil and become poorer!

Snotters