For as long as I have been discussing Scottish independence, I have had Scottish nationalists tell me that after independence the people living in the other parts of the UK would not be foreigners. Nor would Scots be foreigners to them. Instead, we would be a family of nations, best friends, good neighbours and as close if not closer than we are now. But suddenly Humza Yousaf tells me “If we were independent, we would not have a foreign government coming in, for example, and vetoing our legislation.” Yet I wonder if that is true. Humza Yousaf wants Scotland to join the EU. Well, that ..read more

  Before we get too excited about the events of the weekend, it is worth remembering that there is still a significant chunk of the Scottish population who want independence. It’s hard to measure this chunk exactly. It is normally less than 50%, but it is normally more than 40%. It may drop a bit due to Sturgeon and Murrell resigning. It may drop a bit more due to the election for the SNP leader descending into chaos and the dishonesty about how many SNP members there are, but it’s still the case that around half the people you meet in Scotland, your colleagues and neighbours want indepen ..read more

Part 3 Once upon a time King Paul was sitting in the Butter Palace counting votes for who was to succeed Queen Nancy. He loved Prince Hārūn ibn ʿImrān best although he playfully called him Goneril this was because Hārūn always clapped the loudest whenever Queen Nancy spoke. So much so that he had been nicknamed in the Secession Normally Possible movement as the Clap. It may also have had something to do with what he gave his first wife after he decided to take a second wife, without actually telling the first one that it was allowed according to the book that she had signed up to. But that wa ..read more

 Part 2 Once upon a time there was a secret. Queen Nancy otherwise known as Nathan knew what it was. King Paul otherwise known as Paula knew what it was too. But no one except perhaps ex-King Alan knew just what the secret was. Queen Nancy had been forced to abdicate rather hurriedly because of the secret. King Paul’s task was to arrange the succession so that the secret would be kept. But the task was proving harder than either had foreseen. Prince Hārūn ibn ʿImrān had been useless at every job he had ever tried. When he had tried to drive a camel, it had been discovered that he neit ..read more

  The USA is facing a very important strategic moment which is similar to that which Germany faced in both 1914 and 1939. Far from the Cold War ending with the collapse of the Soviet Union it merely melted for a while only to come back twofold. The United States now has a Cold War not merely with Russia but with China too. It is a war on two fronts. You can deal with a war on two fronts like Hitler did in 1939. He made a pact with the Soviet Union and they both defeated and shared Poland. Having neutralised one front, the Germans could take on the French and the British in the West. After ..read more

  From the Pro UK perspective, it is blindingly obvious that we ought to hope that Humza Yousaf becomes SNP leader and First Minister. Yet he is the establishment candidate backed by Sturgeon and almost everyone else of significance in the SNP. It’s hard to see why? The SNP is an overwhelmingly white party, and most members could if they wished trace their ancestry back to the Jacobites if not Robert the Bruce. It is for this reason that Yousaf has in the past proved useful. He is one of the few SNP politicians from an ethnic minority. He makes the SNP therefore look just that little bit ..read more

There has for the past 30 years, or more been a steady rise in what used to be called political correctness and is now called woke. But it massively accelerated in 2020 with the death of George Floyd and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement. Suddenly topics that had previously been at best peripheral such as colonisation and decolonisation and the wickedness of the British Empire, became in certain schools and universities not so much the main topic as the only topic. But the topic of decolonising the curriculum is only ever presented in terms of Europeans colonising and migrating to o ..read more

  In 1914 Britain was indisputably one of the Great Powers including France, Germany Russia Germany and the USA. Not only were we powerful we were one of the richest countries in the world. At that time Poland did not exist. It was divided between Germany, Russia and Austria-Hungary. Now we are told Poland may in a few years be richer than Britain. How could this have come to be? Poland came back to existence due to the First World War and in particular the collapse of the German, Russian and Austro-Hungarian Empires. But it still had a tough fight on its hands particularly against the So ..read more

  When Isabel Oakeshott leaked Matt Hancock’s WhatsApp messages to the Telegraph even though she had apparently signed a non-disclosure agreement she did something that has become almost unimaginable in Scotland. We don’t know why Nicola Sturgeon resigned. We don’t know what she knew about Alex Salmond’s alleged misdemeanours and when she knew it. We don’t really know anything about what if anything Alex Salmond did when he was First Minister. There was a court case he was acquitted of all charges. That’s all we know. We don’t really know anything about the inner workings of the SNP or th ..read more

Part 1 When Queen Nancy, who preferred now to be known as former King Nathan left to go into exile she hoped to be known as the King Over the Water where he/she would plot rebellion and hope for a comeback. Nathan was helped by the Gaulish ambassador Saphotrix. Nathan hoped that he could please Saphotrix more now that he was Nathan rather than before when he had been Nancy. Saphotrix had become so frustrated that she had been led into temptation and unfaithfulness until Nancy had been able to iron out the infidelity. Meanwhile Paul who was now Paula had remained regent and still controlled wh ..read more