Being clear on the state of Scotland

This weekend’s Guardian contained a leader suggesting that Scottish voters are delivering mixed messages at the polling booth, having swept the SNP to power at Holyrood then backing Labour at the recent Inverclyde by-election.

Reaction to the article (check out the comments below the article on the Guardian web page) generally points to how the media south of the border seem to misunderstand Scottish politics.

Alex Salmond is not nudging Scotland towards independence. I wrote an article for t2u’s fptp magazine before the Inverclyde poll concluding:

“The Scottish electorate view Salmond as a competent leader who has done a decent job in running Scotland. The party’s “What have the SNP ever done for us?” TV ad, which ran prior to the election, struck a chord with voters. You should check it out on the SNP’s website. Additionally, Salmond’s surefootedness contrasted sharply with the shambles that Iain Gray, the then Scottish Labour leader, appeared as.

So the break -up of Britain is unlikely any time soon, and probably not during the reign of the current monarch. But given the broad sweep of balkanization of countries throughout the globe in recent years (e.g. Sudan/South Sudan, Ethiopia/Eritrea, the USSR, the Czechs and Slovaks), and other nation-regions showing a greater appetite for self determination (e.g. Quebec, Italy’s Northern League, the Flemish-Wallonia crisis), an independent Scotland appears inevitable, and the Union is almost certain to fail to celebrate 400 years.”

And the outcome of Inverclyde leaves me no reason to alter this assessment.