Wings Over Scotland

Last month we carried a view of the Scottish independence debate from the Canadian province of Quebec. Today we hear from the English-speaking side of the country.

In English-speaking Canada, few people seem to be aware of Scotland’s independence referendum. It doesn’t register much in the papers, much less our cheerfully oblivious TV news. The couple of friends I’ve told about it were interested, but mainly viewed the event as they would the World Cup: a distant, if intriguing, foreign phenomenon.

Conversely, Scotland’s view of Canada has been quite the opposite. Commentators on both the Yes and No sides have drawn explicit parallels with the Canadian experience, especially Quebec’s fraught history of referenda and sovereignty debate.

As a Canadian-American who’s spent a good deal of time south of the border, however, I think there’s a much more apt comparison to be made.

Canada’s bizarre love-hate relationship with our dysfunctional, arrogant, yet somehow still likeable neighbours and friends in the United States of America is both cautionary and optimistic. And it indicates the absolute need for a Yes vote.

Read the rest of this entry →

Earlier today we referred to a story from the Sunday Times, picked up by some of the tabloids this morning, about how Scotland manager Jock Stein tried to cancel a World Cup scouting trip to New Zealand in 1982 in a panic because he feared that Margaret Thatcher was about to start a nuclear war over the Falklands.

It seems remiss not to note a chilling passage from the original ST piece.

Read the rest of this entry →

In 2009, nearing the end of my Masters degree in Scotland and with the UK recession in full swing, I decided to leave for New Zealand. I’ll admit that the decision was somewhat influenced by a breathtaking TV ad. Sweeping helicopter shots of stunning mountain ranges, photogenic youngsters frolicking on sunny beaches, and a thumping soundtrack. I still can’t listen to “Forever Young” without goosebumps.

New Zealand is a country slightly larger than Great Britain with a population smaller than Scotland. Famed for its beautiful scenery, laid-back lifestyle and sporting achievements, this small and successful country where I still live, tucked away in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, provides an ideal argument for an independent Scotland.

Why? I’ll explain.

Read the rest of this entry →

As a French Quebecer belonging to a generation that was deeply influenced by Harry Potter, it was with great interest and concern that I read JK Rowling’s recent letter on why she opposes Scotland’s independence.

Of herself and her fellow Scots, she justly writes that “whatever Scotland decides, we will probably find ourselves justifying our choice to our grandchildren.”

Well, I’m one of those grandchildren previous generations now find themselves having to justify their decisions to, and I can tell you how it went for us.

Read the rest of this entry →

Read the rest of this entry →

“Great Britain” began with the Union of the Crowns in 1603, when James the VI of Scotland ascended to the Throne of England and Ireland, but the “United Kingdom” didn’t come into existence until the Act of Union in 1707, which effectively dissolved the Scottish Parliament. The “British Empire” began with the Union with Scotland and, if those in support of a Yes vote have their way, it will end with Scottish independence.

But what’s any of that got to do with Barack Obama?

Read the rest of this entry →

For the sake of our blood pressure we don’t normally tune in to Radio Scotland’s weekday phone-in show, but as Lallands Peat Worrier was on it today we stayed with it for a few minutes, and found ourselves getting increasingly annoyed as presenter Kaye Adams asked caller after caller if they thought Barack Obama’s comments on independence yesterday (in so far as he actually made any) had been “off the cuff”.

We knew they hadn’t been, so we rang up just to keep the record straight.

We wanted to have Obama’s awkward, halting delivery on file anyway, so this’ll do.

Yeah, whatever.

I’m Will McLeod and I’m the Government and World Affairs Correspondent for Netroots Radio in Washington, DC. I’ve been following the Scottish independence referendum for a few years now. Most of the fallacious arguments I’ve seen have been pretty well knocked down, but there’s one in particular that keeps cropping up which is absolutely ridiculous and needs to be dealt with.

I also do policy work for various people, and since no other foreign policy and government policy geeks have knocked down the NATO argument and the defense spending argument, I’ve decided to throw my hat into the ring.

Read the rest of this entry →

Dear God. It’s now almost two and a half years since this site first comprehensively debunked and disproved the notion that Scottish independence would give the Conservatives a permanent majority in the rUK parliament, in an article that’s been read many tens of thousands of times here and spread far and wide elsewhere.

So you’ll forgive us if we spend a few minutes smashing our heads against a brick wall in despair at the mind-bleeding idiocy of some slobbering, sponge-witted poltroon quoted at length in the Telegraph today.

Read the rest of this entry →

We suppose we should at least commend the “Vote No Borders” campaign for a certain level of frankness. While their output is little different to the daily hysterical fearmongering of “Better Together”, at least they don’t try to pretend that it’s “positive”.

Sadly, when it comes to the relationship their assertions have with the truth, however, they’re singing very much from the same hymn sheet.

Read the rest of this entry →

David Cameron, Prime Minister’s Questions, 30 April 2014:

“I think that what Alex Salmond said [about Vladimir Putin] was a major error of judgment and that all of us in this House should be supporting the Ukrainian desire to be a sovereign, independent country and to have the respect of the international community and party leaders for that ambition.”

(Our emphasis.) It’s not only us finding that just the tiniest bit hypocritical, is it?

Read the rest of this entry →