scottish independence isn't something i'm following closely or care much about. not my place to care or give advice.

but, i can't imagine how it would be really beneficial to anybody, except the people stepping in at the top of the tax chain. i'm sure there's problems with local governance - there are everywhere - but declaring independence is hardly a solution, and finding a solution doesn't require independence. this is a distraction.

i'd suspect scotland is more independent than quebec, but by how much i don't know. the argument against quebec nationalism is that they'll end up like mexico, a reality that the separatists largely acknowledge. they talk about multiple generations of sacrifice. it's a dumb idea, bluntly. i'd have to think scotland will take at least a small hit.

further, i don't know if part of this is about getting into the eurozone. that doesn't strike me as a good idea.

i think britain is better off outside the european union, and that the islands are better off working together. perhaps that means negotiating the union into an actual union, a confederation of sorts, where britain and scotland (and wales and ireland) are equals in joint government, and yet retain much sovereignty.

trying to disassociate too much is just going to harm everybody.

actually, you have to wonder how much of this goes back to scotland being aligned with the pope and whatnot...

judging from this moment in history, it seems as though the continent might finally have the island where it wants it. that's another empire that is on the cusp of entering the history books....

i mean, it makes sense. pull scotland out, bring them into the eurozone. ireland, too. it's ancient imperial policy.

or maybe britain and russia team up against those fucking germans one last time. i'm not going to like what political incarnation britain would require for this. but i don't get to pick.

crazy? a little poetic, but not crazy...

imperial pain in the ass #3 has always been sweden. i don't think they're much of a military threat right now. but those vikings are sneaky. they've never been conquered. strangely, that might be the centre of real digital resistance (in the guise of neutrality), as britain and russia both finally collapse. is the pirate bay more than it seems to be?

i've had this idea in the back of my mind that the ultimate motive underlying the attacks on libya is eu unification, from north africa through israel to turkey. the saudis won't like that. but it's decades from now.

the romans spent something like a thousand years trying to conquer iran. that ended in the mid 7th century, when the arabs conquered them both after a particularly rough round of fighting that left them both highly vulnerable. know what's funny? the story really does align well with the apocalypse. i think any educated person standing in the region would have seen it coming, this catastrophic conflict between iran and constantinople that would destroy the world - not unlike living through the cold war really. was the biblical apocalypse really something like an ancient kubrick film? probably.

but it was within that collapse of civilization that the arabs colonized the region, meeting minimal resistance 'cause everybody was already dead. there's a few other periods in history where colonization was the result of mass slaughter, not tied directly to it. it was one of the consequences of the invasions of genghis khan, for example. the apocalyptic narrative has real parallels, it's not all fantasy.

but the point is that these historical conflicts have roots that are more deeply rooted than the politics or populations of the regions. they recreate themselves as functions of the land. there's probably no real end to them. whether the eu ever succeeds in reconquering northern africa or not, it will always have a contingency plan in the background. and spain (let alone iran) will always be lost territory to whatever force governs in arabia, regardless of race or religion.

tactics regarding squeezing out the british will always include controlling scotland, whether you're the pope or the emperor or the fuhrer or the european central bank or some future continental entity...