Commentary

We Will Remember Them

We Will Remember Them

This morning, Sunday 8th Nov, at approximately 1045hrs, I took the final steps to the Black Watch Monument that overlooks the Fintry area of Dundee. This act of remembrance to the fallen, has become a regular feature in my life for many years – missed only when I have been working overseas. 

Under the grey skies, I paid my respects with other service veterans, while socially distancing. We refrained from shaking hands and hugging, but we Will Remember Them in the time-honoured fashion, regardless of the Scottish Government ban on gatherings.

Bienvenido a la Unión

Bienvenido a la Unión

Nationalists love to tell us that ‘independence is normal’. They will use false equivalences, manufacture grievances and exaggerate the most minute things, including chocolate bars, all in an attempt to further their narrative that they are singularly oppressed and that the cure for all lies in independence, even if that “cure” leads to even greater suffering.

They point to other countries, demanding to be like them, “independent”, without the slightest realisation of the errors or ironies of the comparison. But, as we have repeatedly seen, Nationalists don’t acknowledge reality and fact, they only see that which suits them. Their own echo chamber isolates them from the world and its uncomfortable truths. 

Standing up for Scottish business

Standing up for Scottish business

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBstNm-ESs8

This article is an edited version of the above video, first broadcast on Monday, 19th October.

Having spent most of my life running my own businesses, in Japan, the United States and now in Scotland, it makes me really angry to see how the Scottish Government treats businesses here in Scotland. 

I remember starting my first business in Tokyo, making what became Japan’s number one English magazine. Like a lot of business owners, we used all our savings to get started. It wasn’t enough, but we worked really hard and took huge risks, taking on credit and debt. Slowly, over many years we built a profitable business employing 40 people. It was hard work, extremely stressful and full of risk—which is why I really feel for a lot of businesses in Scotland today.

Bigger. Richer. Smarter.

Bigger. Richer. Smarter.

We are not now that strength which in old days 
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are; 
One equal temper of heroic hearts, 
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will 
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. 

Alfred Tennyson, 1833 

In his description of the social paradoxes of late Soviet social life, the anthropologist  Alexi Yurchak expounds on the concept of "hypernormalisation”, a social condition in which the established ideological paradigm has grown to be so total that it becomes impossible to imagine a situation in which it does not apply. It becomes so overwhelming that individuals inside the ideology cannot see beyond it.

Control Freakery

Control Freakery

Last night, I published a video I had been forwarded of a group chat in which Nicola Sturgeon’s sister says that although Nicola is very tired she won’t delegate to her deputy because she is a ‘total control freak’.

Personally, I think she needs a day or two off, and hand it over to her Deputy. But that's not Nicola, she's a total control freak. She wouldn't do that.

This video confirms rising concern by both Sturgeon’s opponents and admirers that her Government has become a one-woman show.

‘Are we the baddies?’

‘Are we the baddies?’

Most of us have seen the Mitchell and Webb sketch, where a Nazi officer, worried about the skulls on his cap, ends up asking his fellow Nazi officer:

Are we the baddies?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn1VxaMEjRU

The sketch strikes home because everyone thinks they are a good person, doing good things for good reasons. But sometimes even good people can find themselves doing bad things for bad reasons. Sometimes they can even be its cheerleaders. Until they start to question...

An Act of Clarity

An Act of Clarity

In an article in The Critic, Alliance for Unity’s Deputy Leader, Jamie Blackett, outlines eight ways which a UK Secession Clarity Act could clarify requirements before any secession referendum takes place. With many years before the next 'once-in-a-generation' vote, Blackett argues that it makes sense to work out the rules in advance.

These rules would apply to any Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish referenda and should be seen, not as roadblocks, but as paths to legitimacy. The Act should:

The moral low ground

The moral low ground

Time was when people could disagree about politics and remain civil. Taking a different view was a matter of opinion, not of moral superiority. Certainly, there were some politicians who cast moral aspersions (in Scotland, Labour against Tories), but public personal insults were not the norm. The referendum of 2014 changed all that. 

The tone was set by Nicola Sturgeon, whose idea of debate was to shout down opponents such as Johann Lamont and Alistair Carmichael. This was done on TV, with the ‘moderator’, Rona from STV, doing nothing to restrain her. No wonder some of us called it ‘Salmond TV’ at the time. I mention this because I am in no doubt that the deterioration of public discourse has been the result of SNP politicians deliberately giving a nod and a wink to their followers.