I’ve been struck again by the pointlessness of the current Scottish Independence debate: it’s like two flies arguing about who owns the turd on which they sit, while the owner of the whole dung heap looks on in amusement.

Whatever happens on Thursday (18th September is IN-D-Day) the fact remains that most of Scotland’s land, resources and physical wealth will still belong to the few rather than the many.  It is also true that many of those few will be absentees, domestic or foreign, and many of the domestic ‘lairds’ will have inherited, rather than earned, their lot.   Many of the most influential supporters of the YES campaign are also ex-patriat wealthy Scots for whom the idea of an independent Scotland is just that, an idea, as they will be very unlikely to return to Scotland and live with the consequences.  Whatever, when the dust has settled, most of the 5 million resident Scots (or neo-Scots) will still be in thrall to the robber barons, will still have mortgages and payday loans, will still slave away for a small part of what they create, all in pursuit of the illusion that what they do with their turd matters to the dungmeisters.

How we manage Globalisation, Climate Change, Rational and Sustainable use of Resources (including land), Water, Food and Security are all more important than where the boundaries lie.  If Scotland removes it’s instinctive, radical, left-leaning contribution from UK politics it will condemn the ordinary people of the rest of the UK to a generation, or more, of market driven, and increasingly isolationist Tory-led (centre-right Labour following) government.

In fact the single most distasteful, but curiously ironic, demonstation of the irrelevance of this vote was the sight of thousands of Orangemen marching through Edinburgh last week, with all their usual militaristic pomp and bluster, in support of the Union.  It brought the anachronistic tribalism of the campaign into sharp focus: two tribes locked in a 300 year old time warp.  Pitiful.  Time to move on guys.

I do get the gut desire for independence, especially in Scotland, but unless and until there is genuine democracy, and ‘community’ ownership of land and resources, it matters not a jot who is in power: in fact the idea of wielding power is illusiory in our globally interdependent context.  It may be that A. Salmond (a.k.a. wee Eck)  would really like to see a pluralistic  socialist republic, rather than a parliamentary monarchy but, even if he’d admit it, that’s never going to happen my lifetime or his.  Dream on wee Eck, dream on.  Wallace? “For Freedom”?  I’m afraid I think it’s Bollocks.