I have read all the Bullshit excuses for why you Scots shouldn't leave the UK.
OMG did you know just like every Red State in the US they claim you get more money than you pay into the corrupt system?
Of course as a whole the US added another Trillion bucks to it's debt but supposedly lessened it's deficit by 20 some-odd billion?
How does that work exactly?
Anyway I find it funny the big government types want to use that as an excuse when no country or state in the Western world brings in more money than they spend.
Sorry it's hard to type right now as I just got done watching this video linked over at Ex-Army and I am laughing so hard I got tears in my eyes. I don't care if the comedian is a left-wing hack the damned skit is friggin funny.
At least if you run out of money I will have some of your old currency to use when I come visit as a tourist!!!!!
Do it Scotland!!!
Keep Prepping Everyone!!!
Do it Texas you mean and take us with you!
ReplyDeleteSf - Texas better hurry or they will soon be beyond the point of no return and might as well join up with Mexico.
DeleteBS -Texas and Alaska, as a matter of geological accident, have huge extraction economics that they can lightly tax and still make huge dents in the amount they tax their residents. Shoot Alaska often pays people just to live/breath in the State. They are anything but the conservative, pay as you go, ideals that their politicians make themselves out to be.
DeleteOn top of that: Scotland is a HUGE supporter of the labor party. They are so far from being a red state it is ridiculous.
Russ - I don't remember seeing any one ever claiming Scotland was Conservative at all. As far as the Alaska payout thing goes I thought that had trimmed itself down considerably the last few years but I guess we would have to ask RP to see what the real scoop is.
DeleteThe media is saying its too close to call. I wish them the best of luck. I also heard that 16 yr old got to vote. May god help them.
ReplyDeleteRob - Oh who knows in the end. Regardless of personal feelings smaller governments always end up better in the end.
DeleteRob, you are correct Alex Salmond lowered the voting age just in time for the referendum. He still lost.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately many of you over the pond think this had something to do with throwing off the English shackles without ever knowing why the act of Union took place.
Now I'm Welsh so indifferent to the english scottish thing, but the truth of the matter is that Salmonds plans were so full of financial and planning hole that you could drive a bus through them.
Scotland gives free university tuition to Scots and all EU countries apart from England and Wales. It fully funds all old age care, it has free prescriptions. To maintain this and more it receives 14 billion pounds per year in government funding than it generates in taxation. This in a country of 5.3 million. Now it doesn't take a genius to work out that as an independent nation either taxes habe to go up or services down.
The funding from Scottish oil is dropping year on year and so the gap widens yearly.
Salmond also didn't help his cause by not actually knowing what currency he would use. He had this pipe dream that whilst independent the BofE would continue to underwrite Scotland s debts. Would the US allow an independent Alaska to continue racking up debtat the Fed with no say or control on their spending?
His second great plan was to use the Euro yet he would have even less control over that and he couldn't even join the EU, Spain would block it because iof their separatist troubles, they had already stated so.
The rational Scots realised that an independent Scotland, which salmond wanted to go into the control freak EU with, would be a poorer Scotland with far less opportunity than now.
Salmond and the SNP by the way are staunch Socialists. It has been a source of amusement her watching so called freedom Americans urging Scotland to become a Socialist paradise. Almost as humorous as when many supported the IRA and SienFien more staunch socialist organisations. I guess the saying should be amended to better to be red than British. Amazing that if you put the word freedom in it the Americans will follow like sheep.
Anon - In typical English fashion you assume that you know more about historical motivation than as you put it "those of us over the pond" simply because you happen to remain a bit closer or something? I assure you many American's are as well aware of European history as the Europeans it effected our ancestors just as much as it did yours and in many ways still shows even over here.
DeletePerhaps you may know the motivations for some factions in the mix but I can assure you you are way off the mark in your assessment of American sentiments in the matter. If the Scots can make what they want work on their own we Americans are all for it. Smaller governments that are more responsive to the people is what we promote, we do not try and make some other country conform to what is best for us because the needs and circumstances are so very different.
As a matter of fact if some liberal cesspool like say New York or Kalifornia wished to break away from the US I would support them as well. Their local politics on the matter only interest me when they try and force them on me and mine or it costs me to help them pay for it.
To each his own in another words.
"In typical English fashion..." Actually I'm Welsh, something I pointed out above but again you run to your preconceptions really proving my point.
DeleteSmaller government is great, however Salmond is and never has been about small government.
Secondly that smaller government could not deliver the services that they currently enjoy. Services which I have seen you continually complain about your taxes funding. Taxes in Scotland would have to double to keep that funding. Or, like in your last paragraph, the rest of the UK would have to pick up the tab as it does currently. As a separate country you would find that unacceptable, funnily enough so do we.
Your comment to Matt about the percentage voting again is utter tosh. Salmond and the Scottish education council have had over a year of 'school projects' on independence to indoctrinate the young. As for them not getting the benefit, well when your state offers free university education to all not to mention housing benefit, unemployment benefit, ESA, bursaries for expenses, free dental, free health service let us know.
Land ownership plays no part in voting rights in any part of the UK, nor under EU do you have to be a citizen only a resident. Hence several thousand Germans living in Scotland had the vote.
Salmond though excluded Scottish soldiers from voting though if they were currently stationed outside of Scotland, but then he always has loathed the military and knew which way the majority would vote. He also excluded the 750,000 scotsliving in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, but then he knew their sentiments too.
Matt to give you an idea of the control freakery of the SNP not only did they want to tighten existing firearms laws they wanted all air rifles, bows, crossbows and edged weapons registered.
They already passed the crofting act which means that tenant farmers have the right to demand that a land owner sell them their land as well as grant access, water rights etc irregardless of the impact to the owner ofthe land.
GIRFEC and the named persons scheme. This, in Scotland, designates one person as an arbiter for every child. This person is not a parent or guardian, they don't even have to know your children or you but they have extraordinary powers over your children. They can, without evidence or judicial process, deny you the right to home school, they can sign a care or protective custody order and should you fail to get a judicial review, sign an adoption order.
No other part if the UK has those abilities and in Wales home schoolers are not even obliged to tell local authority unless the child is already in school.
Scotland have a set curriculum and inspections of home schoolers, we have none, England get a once a year visit from the local education authority but have no power to administer exams.
In Scotland obtaining planning permission on agricultural land is virtually impossible for new builds. Even overpopulated England is easier. Wales has Chapter 7 and the sustainable building plan. Look up projects like Lammas.
In short the statist SNP are far away from your vision of a smaller less intrusive government, they are socialistic psychopaths who desire control.
If you would like more points to bear this out let me know I can provide dozens.
Like Matt below I nor my family are particular fans of our current government but given the present alternatives we'll stay as we are.
I saw where you said you were Welsh. Doesn't make the your parroting of typical English arrogance any less though. As for your other points either something isn't adding up or the Scots in general just want to embrace Socialism because I saw nothing from the NO crowd attempting to champion individual or property rights at all.
DeleteIn fact if all you say is true I am amazed you would want them to stay. If they can't afford all the government they want the best thing to do with them is let em try in my opinion. I thought I had made that part of my stance very obvious.
The only way any of the Western debt problems are ever going to be solved is by smaller government and greater accounting. Make the spending come from the smallest number. The larger we let government get the less accountable and the worse the debt gets.
Personally the vote looks to me like the Older people want to be sure the benefits keep rolling in while the young are thinking it's time to go on our own.
If I was English or Welsh I would say more power to em and let em go.
I would also direct you to article over at Burning platform.
Deletehttp://www.theburningplatform.com/2014/09/19/fear-and-loathing-in-scotland-why-the-nos-won-and-lessons-learned-from-the-vote/
One of the money quotes from there:
The economy and pensions. So basically old people on the way out felt like they had a reasonable handle on what to expect under the current regime, and didn’t want to rock the boat. It’s really as simple as that.
Again. Maybe you are right. If you are then allowing them to fail is the best method of dealing with it in my opinion. Let the Socialist fail.
You are confusing smaller government with a smaller population. Salmonds government already has its own parliament complete with tax raising powers, powers which interestingly he chose never to use. Rather he chose to take the money of the English he loathes.He was never for smaller government and his government employs the highest ratio of state employees in the UK. As I hve already pointed out Scotland has a more statist controlling government than elsewhere.
DeleteI also note that you gloss over my examples of the Scottish government powers on land ownership and children.
Tell me, would you let a teenager run the farm, or would you question his experience to make such decisions? In effect this is what the older people have done. They fuly realise the unworkable nature of the SNPs plans and the misery that this would bring to all. They also realise the truth that once independent the UK would not have them back and that the EU, even if Spain could be talked round to admitting them, would take years. Years in which their economy would crumble and die harming the most the young because those already retired pre independence would be having their pensions paid mostly by the rest if the UK as that is where their contributions went.
You also assume many of us would not like to let them go. But then again ask yourself would you want a failed state like Venezuela on your border. Any Scot born pre independence would be entitled to a UK passport. Do we want more economic migrants, we certainly don't in Wales.
Anon - Less people represented and removing an entire tier of government off the top equals less government and more importantly a more representative government. It also requires them to pay for themselves. My guess is there are many motivations for wanting to break away from GB and they run the entire spectrum of political values, however the smaller it gets the more responsive it will become.
DeleteAs for property rights in Scotland itself that has no bearing on the subject either. In fact not a lick of whatever socialist tendencies the Scots might have has any influence on my opinion that the Scots should govern themselves.
As for your failed neighbor argument why really would that matter. GB is already importing failed nation immigrants as fast as every other Western Nation. Besides the "failed neighbor" argument has been used to invade and control others since time began and is just another reason for forming an empire.
No I don't agree with 16 year old's voting, or any of the socialist moves you outline. I also don't agree with Romneycare in Mass. Gun control in Illinois, sanctuary cities in where ever etc. but I would still support those States right to remove themselves from the US. Perhaps it would save me on the tax bill and allow them to go under sooner. It might backfire and cause other problems too but if they are removed from the political structure they can be dealt with differently.
Plus it lowers the amount of government I would have to deal with.
They are Scots, Not Welsh. They should be allowed to do what they want in their own country but on their own dime.
So to sum up, you support the restriction of others rights, you support property theft, you support the removal of parental rights, you support poverty, you support socialism, you support draconian restrictions on guns and the right to self defense, you revel in the idea of yet another failed state so long as they leave the UK Union and declare independence.
DeleteYep reckon my first comment was spot on!
It's pretty obvious you have some type of huge chip on your shoulder and will refuse to listen. Not to mention seem to have a severe case of wanting to control other people's lives for their own good which is usually something only reserved for Liberal Progressives.
DeleteThe only thing I support is the Scottish right to be it's own sovereign nation which includes the right to pay for their own mistakes. If every Western nation had to pay for their social programs upfront those types of things would stop.
Now if Scotland had managed to leave and continued on the path you claim they are on then I would have gladly written about how stupid they were to try them. If land owners in Scotland rebelled against unjust laws I would support them, same with homeschoolers etc. No matter how mis-directed some maybe moving towards independent governing is a step in the right direction.
Anon you took it upon yourself to invoke my name several times.
DeleteLet it be understood that I support self determinance first and foremost. If the Scots had succeeded in separating themselves from the union, I would have supported it. If their new experiment had failed, then great. They were at least able to make their own decisions.
My secondary opinions for bring against it were personal and while Preppy and I disagree on somethings we agree on far more than not.
Smaller government and self determination are always the way to go.
PP while I am no fans of the current British government, it's understood that had they succession movement succeeded, it would have been an even more of a socialist government that what they have now. They lowered the voting age to have more brain dead teenagers vote and the result, had they won, would have been based on a simple majority democratic vote and while I love self determination, this appears more and more to me to be a situation which would have allowed a simple majority, AKA mob rule as you so often put it, to vote themselves some more socialism at the local tax payers expense. Far worse than what is going on now there, if that's possible...
ReplyDeleteI would have supported the result either way simply for the self determination aspect, but I was somewhat surprised at your post based on statements you've previously made in prior posts on related subjects.
oh and to further the point about the teenagers voting, it would have been another case of people with no skin in the game being allowed to vote and I remember you being a fan of only those who own property having voting rights.... which I am have become a fan of myself.
DeleteMatt - I simply do not know if land ownership is as important an aspect of Scottish voting rights that it is here honestly to have an opinion on it. I am for smaller more representative governments and people taking care of themselves. As a rule I am not a fan of Democracy over a representative Republic but I do find something very strange in the demographics of the Scottish exit polls.
DeleteVoters aged 16-17: YES: 71%; NO: 29%
Voters aged 65+: YES: 27%; NO: 73%
That tells me there is something going on here much different than the Socialist utopia some say is the motive. Or more to the point it shows me that the older generation is the one reaping the benefits while the younger ones are maybe NOT getting their due which is a real problem here in the US as well. Perhaps the pyramid scheme is not so rosy an outlook for the younger Scots as some are claiming or maybe it is benefiting certain subgroups over more traditional youths.
In the end I cannot really say as I am not close enough to observe first hand. I do know one thing though. The smaller the government the more representative it is and so I am all for them making their own decisions and being their own Sovereign nation.
It shows that 16 and 17 year olds who've never had a real job, never had to balance their finances were following their idealistic 'Braveheart' concept for 'Freedom'.
DeleteThe retired people were understandably afraid for what would happen to their UK pensions.
Pioneer: The older folks trying to hold onto their pension sounds an awful lot like the tea party folks who I have met in person. Just saying....
ReplyDeleteRuss - I have yet to meet a Teaparty member who had a Public Pension coming in. Just sayin. Most of them are protective of the SS they were promised though. They might get their SS payments too. Maybe.
DeleteIn fact now that I think about it around here all the Tea Party people I know came from the private sector so didn't have any pensions that would fall under the realm of government spending anyway.