![\"badges\"](\"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/badges.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nI read it carefully as it was about the literature put out by the Yes Campaign and the No Campaign, and the No literature was duller but repetitive \u2013 and the word \u201cBetter\u201d was suspect in my view, after all the whole No programme was \u201cBetter Together\u201d but it was a Yes slogan.<\/p>\n
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The Anniversary of the Referendum has now passed and still the press is full of the plaintive message from the winners \u201cWhat part of NO do you not understand?\u201d and shock, horror, dismay that there would be another referendum.\u00a0 Just last week I watched David Mundell the Secretary of State for Scotland speaking to journalists at a press conference and saying \u201cThe SNP is ignoring the votes of 2 million people\u201d.\u00a0 He says this from the lofty stance that in the General Election this year 2,476,458 voters in Scotland did not support his party, but that doesn\u2019t count- he\u2019s a Tory Supreme Being, and England voted Tory, so there.<\/p>\n
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What he and his like do not understand is that we are in the 21st century War of Independence, and the Referendum was the first major battle.\u00a0 What they think is \u201cWe whupped them, and they should have gone off skulking with their tails between their legs and sat at home licking their wounds until we condescended to throw them a few scraps.\u201d\u00a0 Quite honestly I also felt that we would need a few years to recuperate before we tried again, which depressed me as I do not have the years to wait for another go.<\/p>\n
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What happened on 18th<\/sup> September was not an outright defeat of ideas, but the undermining of the political will of those made to feel vulnerable; pensions, health, defence (now there\u2019s an oxymoron if ever there was one) and scares about banks and financial institutions and a falling oil price. The No crowd still rejoices about the falling oil price, blithely ignorant of the fact that Scotland never got one penny of oil money, as it was all poured into the gaping maw of the Treasury, and the only people hurt by the fall are themselves because the Treasury has less money to squander.\u00a0 So there!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n No one could have foreseen the explosion in the membership of the SNP; come next year I will have 50 years service with the party and I never thought we could get this close.\u00a0 Mind you I might have been prescient as I bet \u00a310 on the SNP getting more than 50 seats, and complained that the odds were only 7\/4 \u2013 in my view that was poor odds for such a long shot.\u00a0 The bookie was confused when I placed the bet, and even more confused when I appeared to collect the winnings!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n We tend to think that our predecessors in the SNP expected to see independence but this was not so; they were just there to help along the way, sure that it would eventually happen.\u00a0 I myself did not expect to see it but hoped my grandchildren would \u2013 as it was my four grandchildren all voted Yes.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n And now Ms Dugdale says she will allow her MPs (well there is only one) and MSPs to campaign for independence \u2013 I watched her discomfiture on the Politics Show, where Gordon Brewer filleted her.\u00a0 So, Jeremy Corbyn does not believe in Scottish Independence, 93% of his MPs do not believe in Jeremy Corbyn, and none of them believe in Scottish Independence either.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 She expects that the Labour Party per se will be grateful if she helps take Scotland out of the United Kingdom, loses the so mythical oil money and gets rid of Trident thus ensuring rUK\u2019s ejection as a member with the power of veto from the United Nation\u2019s Security Council.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Ms Dugdale is known for changing her mind, or for having it changed for her.\u00a0\u00a0 Her assertion that Labour MSPs will all blithely dump their anti SNP role will run slap bang into the Westminster Parliamentary Labour Party wall; there is only one Scottish Labour MP, the likes of Gordon Brown, Tom Harris, Ian Davidson, Jim Murphy, Douglas Alexander and Margaret Curran are no longer in Westminster to head her off, Lord Darling will be comfortably ensconsed in the Lords retirement home.\u00a0 However, the Labour Party per se is still alive, but not sure if it is well, and these former Parliamentarians will still be in the Labour Party, and Labour south of the border is firmly Unionist so I expect storms ahead.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n And as the rUK will largely consist of England, one ditty from Gilbert & Sullivan\u2019s HMS Pinafore is running through my mind:\u00a0 \u201c For he might have been a Roossian, a French or Dutch or Proossian, or perhaps Italian, but in spite of all temptations to belong to other nations,\u00a0 he remains an Englishman\u201d.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n From Scotland\u2019s side any talk of a referendum in the next two years is injudicious.\u00a0 First, the SNP has to win power at Holyrood, and any talk of encouraging members to give their list vote to another sympathetic party is nonsense.\u00a0 This is not a game to spread fairness and equity all round; it is a hard political fight to get as many votes and elected members as possible.\u00a0 We bear no ill will to other parties but they have to earn these votes, not have them gifted to them.\u00a0 They will have their own supporters and should not be leeching off us.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Nicola\u2019s immediate task is to win the Holyrood Election and to keep all the Yes voters on board; we must not ignore them or take them for granted . The best maxim in politics is do not promise what you cannot perform, and the other parties will be hellbent on attacking the SNP for making promises, completely ignoring the fact that the delivery of these policies requires adequate cash and there is a shortage of cash \u2013 since the SNP took office the money from the Treasury has been reduced \u2013 strange how that happened.\u00a0 And remember also that this SNP Government has competence; John Swinney has managed the finances superbly for the last eight years, but you cannot spend what you have not got \u2013 well Westminster can, and look at the mess they have made.\u00a0 That bill will still be being paid by the aforesaid grandchildren.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Unionists will concentrate on three things, Education, the National Health Service and Police Scotland so we know where they are coming from. We are not getting everything right but we are still riding high in the opinion polls and keep winning by elections so we are trusted.<\/p>\n Case in point:\u00a0 a big fuss this week because the 15p cost of calls to Police Scotland goes to Vodafone, tax avoiders, to say the least.\u00a0 Up pops Willie Rennie of the Liberals bleating (all sheep bleat) that Nicola Sturgeon should do something about\u00a0 hundreds of thousands going to tax avoiders.\u00a0 The contract was awarded by the Home Office in 2013 (Tory Liberal coalition) despite law and order being devolved.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Mr Rennie \u2013 away and bleat at the mirror.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I came across the above title when I was reading a piece by Francis McKee in this week\u2019s Sunday Herald; he had read this on a placard in George Square Glasgow. I read it carefully as it was about the literature put out by the Yes Campaign and the No Campaign, and the No literature was duller but repetitive \u2013 and the word \u201cBetter\u201d was suspect in my view, after all the whole No programme was \u201cBetter Together\u201d but it was a Yes slogan. The Anniversary of the Referendum has now passed and still the press is full of the plaintive message from theRead More →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1025"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1025"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1025\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1027,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1025\/revisions\/1027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}And now we have another front opening up \u2013 Jeremy Corbyn.\u00a0 Strangely he is the MP for Islington, the parliamentary seat held by George Cunningham, a Scot, and the Labour MP in 1979 who planted the 40% rule into the 1979 Referendum, where the votes of the dead were counted as Noes.\u00a0 It is difficult to speculate on what effect Corbyn will have on the body politic.\u00a0 He was a rank outsider, and not expected to even \u201csave his deposit\u201d.\u00a0 So far we have seen Kezia Dugdale, leader of Scottish Labour who was scathing about Mr Corbyn and his pronouncements, now saying what a great guy he is and \u201cWe have every confidence\u2026etc etc etc\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 How success attracts admirers!\u00a0\u00a0 He might have some wacky ideas, and has appointed a Shadow Cabinet, but judging by some remarks the shadows will fade.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/a>