@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet The issue of whether #indyref2 happens before or after the 2021 Holyrood election is a tricky one. @RLMcAlpine in 'How to start a new country' makes a strong case for not having a Holyrood election between winning #indyref2 and independence. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine Consequently we don't have time before and we don't really have much time after; my feeling is the best thing would be to hold it on the same day (6 May 2021). >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine You can't avoid geopolitical context in this.
1. There is a strong risk that the UK will diverge sharply from EU over the few months after December 2020;
2. There is a strong risk that the #ClimateEmergency is running substantially faster than IPCC have allowed for;
>>>
1. There is a strong risk that the UK will diverge sharply from EU over the few months after December 2020;
2. There is a strong risk that the #ClimateEmergency is running substantially faster than IPCC have allowed for;
>>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine 3. The new digital propaganda tools by which well-funded actors can manipulate elections are rapidly maturing, and consequently
4. There is a strong risk that the English-speaking world is sliding towards something resembling real fascism or at least oligarchy.
>>>
4. There is a strong risk that the English-speaking world is sliding towards something resembling real fascism or at least oligarchy.
>>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine Both Scotland and the UK are bit-players in all this; we don't move the tides of history, we have to ride them. The attack by Russia on electoral processes in the UK is not primarily aimed at the UK so much as at creating chaos and turmoil across the West. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine In that sense the UK's only geopolitical significance is as a keystone in the defences of the European area of stable peace against chaos, and it's a keystone which no longer has any structural integrity. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine To say 'but we can't resist these forces' is probably true, but that way leads simply to despair. If human life on earth is to continue, people (including Scotland as a bit-player) must resist these forces, now. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine It isn't sufficient to go on playing the Westminster game, and, in particular, there isn't time to think about the long game. As John Maynard Keynes said, but with particular force now, in the long run we're all dead. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine (Clarification: in saying 'the attack by Russia' I'm not saying that the attack is made solely by Russia, nor that the attack is in the long term interests of the Russian people or state. Rather, it's an attack by an emerging oligarchy, which currently controls Russia). >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine Pulling focus back to Scotland, what worries me is that the SNP's analysis is as shallow as your own. Like you, they believe that the future will be much like the past; like you, they ignore the turbulent geopolitical forces which mean it won't be. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine Salmond was a risk-taker; Sturgeon is not. She will play it safe. As the tides of history tear our society and our economy apart, she will wait irresolute for a 'perfect moment' which will never come. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine The merit of @AngusMacNeilSNP's #PlanB was not primarily that it was a strategy (Sturgeon's wishful thinking that she can get a #Section30 is not), but that it gave us a fresh bite at the cherry with each successive Westminster election. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine @AngusMacNeilSNP But there (probably) isn't time. Measurements in Greenland and the Antarctic show that #ClimateEmergency is moving much faster than predicted, and meantime 'the oligarchy' (which is a fairly loose collection of forces) is honing its anti-democratic toolkit. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine @AngusMacNeilSNP Scotland alone cannot swing the UK back to a path of sanity. We're structurally weak, and, as Johnson gerrymanders the electoral system to lock in Tory majorities, we'll remain structurally weak. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine @AngusMacNeilSNP Our escape route is to bind ourselves to the European bloc (EFTA or EU), and then to work to strengthen (and radicalise) that bloc) but we cannot do that without independence. We don't have, for reasons I've given above, much time. >>>
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine @AngusMacNeilSNP You would not have been wise, in 1935, to make any political plan for three electoral cycles hence: the tides of history would have washed it away. 2020 will be 1935 on steroids.
/ENDS
/ENDS
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine @AngusMacNeilSNP P.S. In answer to your second question, the Westminster government will not agree to a #Section30 order, ever; and building an independence strategy around the wishful thinking that they might is irresponsible at best and dishonest at worst.
@PolGaloreScot @ScotParl @10DowningStreet @RLMcAlpine @AngusMacNeilSNP @threadreaderapp , do a quick unroll for me please, there's a good (ch)app.
