Reluctant Nationalists

My friend - I'll call him Hamish (because that's his name) - posted this yesterday and I see exactly where he's coming from:

<<The BBC radio 4 weather forecast this morning was brief,...”rain will be confined to Scotland, some brighter periods in the South West”. South west of where exactly? This may seem like a trivial point but it’s not, it typifies an attitude of what Scotland is and this from a national broadcaster which should be geographically and politically neutral. I’ve been a reluctant nationalist more so because I don’t believe any one party has all the answers, but on the issue of separation I am now completely convinced it's the way to go on the most important point of all, ...principle. In principle we as a people should, could and can govern ourselves just fine. If shit happens we can deal with it and learn along the way. If the likes of Boris can do it, anyone can>>.

I have great respect for how far along the road to independence the SNP has taken us, but, same as Hamish, I would call myself 'a reluctant nationalist.' I'm pretty sure we're not alone and I'm also pretty sure the result of the next referendum on independence will largely depend on 'reluctant nationalists.'

After Johnson's visit to Bute House on Monday, I found myself reading twitter comments. They were almost entirely written by unionists and they almost all focussed on the stuff unionists have been saying for 5 years now: independence is an obsession of Nicola Sturgeon's. They call her 'Nippy' and describe her as a 'harridan,' a 'jumped-up town councillor' and they are sure she'll soon be gone. There was no discussion of Scotland's place in the UK - let alone in the EU - no mention of what principles Johnson's cabinet might bring to Westminster, no discussion of whether Scotland should be the home of the UK's nuclear arsenal (which Johnson had just visited), no thought given to the need for immigration and the drugs policy to be devolved to Scotland. 

A lot of us are already way beyond wondering if Scottish Labour or the Scottish Tories have anything to offer us. I have little hope of a future with a Labour party that can allow itself to be ripped apart, not by policy but by a carefully orchestrated campaign by the media alleging they are anti-semitic with, as far as I can see, absolutely no proof. The media allegations stick because they are not dealt with by the party leader. There's no need for Labour to get rid of Jeremy Corbyn - the press and BBC will do that for them. I was also interested to see that yet another 'tall poppy' has been cut down: Jared O'Mara, a campaigner for disabled rights, who had a lot to offer his constituents in Westminster, was brought down by the media almost before he'd taken his seat. That's how the media deal with troublesome Labour activists.

As for the Tories, what can anyone say about a party that elects Boris Johnson to be its leader? And only elects him for fear of ending up with Farage instead? The media manipulation during that leadership election was blatant and should surely lead some of the other contenders to ask how the Tory party can be reformed - or will they do what the losers have always done: take the peerage in the Lords and the jobs in the City and move on? Johnson is not a 'buffoon'. He's a dangerous buffoon who is being manipulated by people who have worked for Trump and, I suspect, see him as a useful idiot, especially now that  he has stuffed his cabinet with far-right and not very bright ministers who like the idea of bringing back hanging, want military schools for the poor and won't even consider putting much needed funding into the essentials of a decent society: education, medicine, social security. 

The important thing is that, while the unionist parties have for 3 years since the EU referendum been tearing themselves apart, the Celtic nations - especially Scotland and Wales but soon to be joined by Northern Ireland - have moved on. There's an air now of the inevitable, a feeling that we should leave England to make its own salvation, that politics in England really bear no resemblance to politics in Scotland and that, as Hamish says in his post, independence isn't about any politician's personal obsession: it's about principle.