The diverging paths

Now that the dust has started to settle on the outcome of the Westminster election and the SNP’s not so shock defeat, it’s time to reflect on what the result holds for the future – not just in Scotland but across the rest of the UK as well. The first takeaway…

American Dystopia

When Margaret Thatcher escaped the IRA’s bombing of the Brighton hotel on 12 October 1984, she immediately used it as political capital. She decided to continue the Conservative conference as normal, and was given a standing ovation by delegates as she entered the stage just six and a half hours after the explosion. No doubt […] Source

Is independence possible without the SNP?

It’s a question that few of us have asked in the last decade or more. The assumption, however misplaced has been that the SNP were the vehicle to exert pressure on the British state to conceded constitutional change. That now seems far-fetched, for many it has for some time. As Jamie Maxwell writes in Politico: […] Source

A Great Nothing: Election 2024

“I am the nothing around which all this spins, I exist so that it can spin, I am a centre that exists only because everything circle has one… I am the centre of everything surrounded by a great nothing.” – Fernando Pesso, The Book of Disquiet IN 1997, a few weeks before Tony Blair’s New […] Source

Firebird and Phoebe Anna Traquair

Away from the general election in the UK, last week the governor of California declared a state of emergency. California is enduring a brutal drought and heatwave, with temperatures soaring above 40°C and multiple wildfires causing widespread destruction. In the north of the state, one fire has resulted in the evacuation of nearly 30,000 residents. […] Source

There’s little lipstick for this pig

We need to be honest with ourselves here, there is very little lipstick to be put on this pig. It was an unqualified disaster for the SNP. I knew that the SNP was going to perform poorly when John Swinney said that if the SNP won most seats in Scotland it…