deskthority

mr_a500 wrote: I'll trade you Ellesmere Island for Scotland. It's over twice the land area and plenty of offshore oil & gas. I'll have my government contact your government and we'll work out a deal.

(unfortunately, it's incredibly fucking cold there and you can forget sheep grazing unless they eat rocks & ice)

I remember "doing a project" on Baffin Island when I was in primary school. (I have one of those memories that's good for things like that, but not so often for phone numbers…) When I later found that most Canadians were in fact not Inuit (or whatever name is currently considered the least bad) I was righteously disappointed. The idea of a great northern Eskimo nation that America couldn't conquer was just so right… damn it!

The fact that William Shatner is Canadian and not Inuit should have told you something.
We are actively conspiring to take down the USA:

The only thing Shatner took down is his own career, a long time ago.

oh boy here we go...

i was being sarcastic, i had this british empire rubbish too that was years ago people need to get past it and stop thinking they still rule the world

ahm..I think that super dodgy stuff is allready going on regardless of the European Parliament.

it is but it would be even worse without them

I know I understood your post a little *later*

I'm just going to leave this one here:
"Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Scottish Independence"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YkLPxQp_y0

Ach!

I can guarantee you won't see "rich Texan" promoting Texas independence if that ever moves forward.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_secession_movements

A few pictures I shot about Edinburgh today while all the signs are out.
Most elections, all the action's over the lampposts, hung there by the well heeled parties. But this time everyone's showing their allegiances in their own homes. What an unusual taste of democracy!

It will be interesting to see how it will go. Will the Scottish be scared into submission? Or will those attempts have a reverse effect? We had something similar in the Netherlands, when we had to vote yes or no for a EU constitution. We voted No:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_Euro ... ndum,_2005
This was against what the politicians argued and campaigned for, mostly by trying to scare. So, a couple of years later they tried the same thing under a different name, and the politicians decided this time there would be no referendum and they would decide all by themselves, because they got the vote of the people. They voted Yes.

@Muirium: The abundance of bay windows reminds me of Boston or San Francisco. Of course, it also reminds me of Edinburgh! I spent some delightful days there a long time ago while on holiday from my one-year working stint in England.

Good luck with the vote.

With luck, it won't be close enough to argue about, whichever way it falls. But luck can be so fickle…

webwit wrote: It will be interesting to see how it will go. Will the Scottish be scared into submission? Or will those attempts have a reverse effect? We had something similar in the Netherlands, when we had to vote yes or no for a EU constitution. We voted No:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_Euro ... ndum,_2005
This was against what the politicians argued and campaigned for, mostly by trying to scare. So, a couple of years later they tried the same thing under a different name, and the politicians decided this time there would be no referendum and they would decide all by themselves, because they got the vote of the people. They voted Yes.

Tempting to see this in similar terms, but it's not just "the politicians" who're into scare tactics. I like these quotes from some letters to the editor at the Guardian, from its readers. It's meant to be a liberal paper…

The yes campaign will have to win by more than a percentage point or two if independence is to be justified against the terms of the Edinburgh agreement signed by the UK and Scottish governments in 2012 (Nine legal questions if Scotland votes yes, 11 September). The agreement reads: “The governments are agreed that the referendum should deliver .... a fair test and a decisive expression of the views of the people of Scotland and a result that everyone will respect.”. It is hard to see how victory by a few percentage points would constitute a “decisive expression of views”; nor how it could command the respect of “everyone” in Scotland, let alone the rest of the UK.
Tim Lankester
London

How come that the UK itself can stand to undergo a major constitutional change with only 50%+1 of votes? We call on Britain to apply to itself what it has to so many of our nation. No independence for Scotland without a 75% of votes. (Northern Ireland would have been a better candidate to independence, leading to a possible unification of Ireland.)
Dr Michael Atchia
Past programme director with the United Nations, Mauritius

Whichever way the vote goes on Thursday, Alex Salmond can bask in the glory of his achieving the acrimonious splitting of the Scottish people. If the result is yes, he will also have earned the animosity of the other residents of the UK who were given no opportunity to participate in a decision that affects all of us. I hope he feels proud.
Sam Sexton
Kenilworth, Warwickshire

Okay, so we should be trapped inside a union even if we vote against it? That sounds marvellous! As does the predicted Scottish civil war.

Something I noticed while taking pictures: No supporters seem to like living upstairs. Tactics come the armed struggle?

The best thing about this is that while I despise royalty, your queen seems to be the only party which says: no comment, let the Scottish decide.

She's a smart cookie. Comes with being on the job so long.

Maybe she's submissive to her job, which could be labelled with the Dutch expression Ribbon Scissor Cutter.

I noticed you refrain from clearly picking a side. Chiiiiicken.

I don't like royalty ether but she doe make us money, if that offsets the amount she costs us is up for debate.

No supporters seem to like living upstairs. Tactics come the armed struggle?

In their minds, they still have an empire. No matter how small it gets.

yes but the empire is crumbling, those pesky little scotts get to vote, what a nuisance.

Reading the news right now it looks really close, too close to call. This is an independence thriller of sorts, with a lot at stake in the long run. The Scottish seem like a belligerent self-assertive people to me, I think the vote will go for independence by a slight margin.This will be an eventful historic weekend for Scottland.

Are London´s promises going to tipp the undecided to vote against independence?

Seems that nerves are tense, Ed Miliband got "mobbed" off satge at an event.

All of this baseless scaremongering being done by some of the No side is disgraceful. How do they get away with this?

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/uk ... -1.1929626

That comment about Northern Ireland: what a load of bollocks! Next they'll be trying to auction off Wales or the Isle of Wight.

Yeah, these army guys are proper two faced politicians. As someone said in the article: that general axed a load of the regiments he's telling people to commemorate. You can tell that patriotism is dead when it's used to cynically. The absence of British flags in this debate is telling. I've seen a handful in people's windows around town, but there's a dozen Scottish ones on every street.

What's going on in that picture, Seebart? Ed Miliband always looks like something's just bitten him below frame anyway…

Oh, and to address Webwit: I did my duty and obeyed the clear 70:30 mandate of Deskthority's opinion and voted Yes. Then unfurled an old flag of my own.
Something tells me the real election's result won't be as clear as our little one here.

So that's your house? I just want to make sure to match it on Google street view so that I can come steal your "kishsaver".

What's going on in that picture, Seebart? Ed Miliband always looks like something's just bitten him below frame anyway…

well he wasn't quite the crowd pleaser it seems...

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/sc ... ns-4270221

I did my duty and obeyed the clear 70:30 mandate of Deskthority's opinion and voted Yes.

very respectful Sir!

So that's your house? I just want to make sure to match it on Google street view so that I can come steal your "kishsaver".

good thing we all now know who it was then.

Well, if you guys had voted No, I would have just mansplained my reason for doing the opposite. Hopefully this isn't foreshadowing what happens when the ball is returned to London after tomorrow night…

mr_a500 wrote: So that's your house? I just want to make sure to match it on Google street view so that I can come steal your "kishsaver".

You can take our pictures, but you'll never take our keyboards!

It's a bit of a cookie-cutter home, to be honest, and the neighbourhood's rougher than you'd think. You'd better wear a disguise. (Not a kilt, unless your disguise is "newly wed".)

I just read in reader comments on a (German) newspaper website that a civil war is going to break out in Scotland after tomorrow and RUK will be sending tanks.

Mu, better take more photos of houses to know where you can find shelter!

did you read that on bild.de Halvar?

Muirium wrote: You can take our pictures, but you'll never take our keyboards!

I can clearly hear Mel Gibson shouting that in a Scottish accent - but it needs a slight adjustment:
"You can take our pictures, but you'll never take.. our keyboards!" (needs a slight delay and final emphasis)

Muirium wrote: It's a bit of a cookie-cutter home, to be honest, and the neighbourhood's rougher than you'd think. You'd better wear a disguise. (Not a kilt, unless your disguise is "newly wed".)

I'll come like this:

Only people with weapons around here are the military, who are mostly Scots but are probably the most London loyal part of the population. We ain't "survivalists" with cellars full of munitions and ordnance, thank goodness!

The best thing that can happen is a good clear vote one way or the other, that the London government and the Edinburgh one both respect. The worst is when one of those two refuses to submit to the will of the people. But even then, we're not talking gunfire. Sorry to say, tabloids of the world…

in light of the current events I would rephrase that sentence:

"you can take our independence,you cannot take our keyboards..."

Scottish referendum poll tracker (BBC news):

http://www.bbc.com/news/events/scotland ... ll-tracker

seebart wrote: did you read that on bild.de Halvar?

Worse: faz.net. The newspaper is mostly ok (some of their commentary can be quite reactionist sometimes), but the reader comments on their website are often just stupefying, despite heavy moderation by the editors.

But bild is more entertaining than faz!

Less brain more fun should be their motto

Less brain, more service: Now FAZ is telling me to stock up on whisky because it might become more expensive as long as an independent scotland hasn't joined the EU yet. Thanks.

http://www.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/a ... 58823.html

Stocking up on whisky is always right, of course.