I'd been hoping to read some of my favourite Welsh bloggers' analysis of the Scottish vote - not much so far, perhaps they're disappointed? If so they're surely wrong, as that 45% was a deathblow to the glorious Union. Here's what I think:
1. If the Scottish pattern for English-born voters was reflected in Wales, the Welsh-born would have to vote 57-43% Yes in order to scrape a victory. We shouldn't allow political correctness to block-out this reality.
2. The 65-and-overs voted No by a 3 to 1 margin and won the referendum for the Union. They are the luckiest generation in history - of course they were going to stick with a status quo that has served them well.
3. Ah but what about all those folk who lost their jobs in heavy industry? Well they probably didn't live long enough to vote last Thursday - life expectancy for Glasgow men, for example, being 68 years compared with 76 years in solidly pro-Union East Renfrewshire.
4. One thing is certain, everyday some elderly No-voter kicks the bucket and a young Yes-voter becomes eligible to join the register.
5. You can't just blame the OAPs, the Yes side were weak on their exit strategy. Plan B? Just print your own fiat currency like everyone else and let it find its own exchange rate - it's not as if Brown and Darling have much of a record on financial matters.
6. The EU? If they don't want you then just go it alone, oil-rich Norway isn't doing too badly is it? In any case a truly independent Scotland would have a far stronger voice in the UNECE, the body that really draws up the economic rulebook.
7. Don't assume the British government would have honoured a Yes vote. There would have been hardball negotiations followed by an insistence on a second referendum - Operation Fear on steroids.
8. Jack Straw thinks it perfectly reasonable to pass a law that makes any vote for the break-up of the UK illegal without the go-ahead of the English MPs. The only fly in the ointment for this cunning plan is the American Irish lobby who will insist it doesn't apply to the Six Counties.
9. In the Ukraine the British government and media show their true colours when it comes to democracy, ethnic cleansing and the killing of ordinary folk. Don't think it couldn't happen here - the times they are a-changin' and Scotland has it's very own Right Sector, ripe for exploitation by the London government, in the form of the Britannia singing unionist thugs attacking the Yes supporters in Glasgow's George Square.
10. One benefit of the No vote - we're not stuck in a room with just England and the Ulster Orangemen for company.
1. If the Scottish pattern for English-born voters was reflected in Wales, the Welsh-born would have to vote 57-43% Yes in order to scrape a victory. We shouldn't allow political correctness to block-out this reality.
2. The 65-and-overs voted No by a 3 to 1 margin and won the referendum for the Union. They are the luckiest generation in history - of course they were going to stick with a status quo that has served them well.
3. Ah but what about all those folk who lost their jobs in heavy industry? Well they probably didn't live long enough to vote last Thursday - life expectancy for Glasgow men, for example, being 68 years compared with 76 years in solidly pro-Union East Renfrewshire.
4. One thing is certain, everyday some elderly No-voter kicks the bucket and a young Yes-voter becomes eligible to join the register.
5. You can't just blame the OAPs, the Yes side were weak on their exit strategy. Plan B? Just print your own fiat currency like everyone else and let it find its own exchange rate - it's not as if Brown and Darling have much of a record on financial matters.
6. The EU? If they don't want you then just go it alone, oil-rich Norway isn't doing too badly is it? In any case a truly independent Scotland would have a far stronger voice in the UNECE, the body that really draws up the economic rulebook.
7. Don't assume the British government would have honoured a Yes vote. There would have been hardball negotiations followed by an insistence on a second referendum - Operation Fear on steroids.
8. Jack Straw thinks it perfectly reasonable to pass a law that makes any vote for the break-up of the UK illegal without the go-ahead of the English MPs. The only fly in the ointment for this cunning plan is the American Irish lobby who will insist it doesn't apply to the Six Counties.
9. In the Ukraine the British government and media show their true colours when it comes to democracy, ethnic cleansing and the killing of ordinary folk. Don't think it couldn't happen here - the times they are a-changin' and Scotland has it's very own Right Sector, ripe for exploitation by the London government, in the form of the Britannia singing unionist thugs attacking the Yes supporters in Glasgow's George Square.
10. One benefit of the No vote - we're not stuck in a room with just England and the Ulster Orangemen for company.
4 comments:
In the fervent hope that I may be counted among those you describe as your 'favourite Welsh bloggers' let me justify my silence by saying that I have not long returned from Scotland and hope to be posting my impressions and conclusions later today or some time tomorrow.
Never heard of you but I'll look forward to reading your impressions nonetheless:-)
It's deeply depressing seeing the Scots who are feistier and more thrawn than us Welsh and with their Oil reserves saying no.
But emotions aside the two main reasons you state the NO vote won, lots of old people and lots of English people are the reasons Wales hasn't got much chance of being Independent or even getting as far as a referendum, never mind almost winning one.
I'm optimistic about the Scots, it will be interesting to see how things pan out in May. An electoral pact with the SSP? In any case there must be a chance of breaking Labour's hegemony and even holding a balance of power at Westminster.
It's hard to be optimistic about Wales.
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