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@libby_brooks: Not many women in invited audience of UKIP members. Maybe they're doing their drapes, like David Coburn suggested earlier #indyref #ukip
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CityCyclingEdinburgh was launched on the 27th of October 2009 as "an experiment".
IT’S TRUE!
CCE is 15years old!
Well done to ALL posters
It soon became useful and entertaining. There are regular posters, people who add useful info occasionally and plenty more who drop by to watch. That's fine. If you want to add news/comments it's easy to register and become a member.
RULES No personal insults. No swearing.
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@libby_brooks: Not many women in invited audience of UKIP members. Maybe they're doing their drapes, like David Coburn suggested earlier #indyref #ukip
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@Radical_Indy: Packed out Global Scotland event, for an internationalist, multicultural future. #peoplepower #anotherscotland http://t.co/yQJ8oqn7Nu
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Westminster's style of politics - what does that mean? Maybe they've never watched First Ministers Questions.
@crowriver:
Just pointing out that there are "extreme" views on both sides.
Some interesting points here on issues regarding polling:
re the 'bayonetting the wounded', I presumed Ian Davidson was speaking figuratively. But I see Tony Banks and his then colleagues have used it literally http://www.heraldscotland.com/mobile/politics/referendum-news/im-not-the-boy-who-went-to-the-falklands-wearing-a-uniform-and-carrying-a-g.24619513
@SRD
Some interesting points but he seems to have read a lot of stuff on the internet, which maybe qualifies as research these days. Turnout will not be unprecedented although we may not have seen it recently. It will be high by comparison with recent history but I'll be very surprised it gets to 80%. The people who say they are certain to vote are either kidding themselves or demonstrative of a fundamental bias where the engaged and opinionated are disproportionately willing to take part in surveys.
He misunderstands past vote weighting. I think it's a mistake but for reasons more related to misreporting and activists seeking to influence polling outcomes (yes, Survation, Panelbase and ICM, I'm looking at you). Past vote weighting isn't problematic if you actually know how people voted and why (and in that sense, Kellner was right to rip into Survation).
I don't buy the shy Tory argument for most of the surveys we've seen. No reason for it to exist in internet or telephone surveys and if it exists in face-to-face surveys, the problem is a methodological one that the pollsters should have fixed by now, especially as they collect the data on tablets.
I'm more convinced by Chris Dillow's idea that they should have had the referendum in the spring.
"idea that they should have had the referendum in the spring"
14th May 2015!
Jim sillars on R4 this morning and really coming over as a bit mad and very ranting. Whereas Gorgeous yesterday whilst equally mad and ranting made a very cogent point about Eammon De Valera being president of Ireland until he was 91. GG saying Vote Yes for thirty more years of Alex salmond
Gorgeous pulled off a tremendous coup in Hillhead during my student days by getting voters in Anderston to oust the liberals of Hillhead
Sillars was both hero and villain to an impressionable schoolboy in Ayrshire/Renfrewshire 1976-9
Both great orators who have lost their way. Sillars maybe not so used to being interviewed by R4 they ended up treating him like a crazy old grand dad.
"made a very cogent point about Eammon De Valera being president of Ireland until he was 91."
Fact
"GG saying Vote Yes for thirty more years of Alex salmond"
Fact
(That GG said it.)
No idea if GG believes it - no-one else should.
If Yes, AS won't be President or in politics for another 30 years (maybe 5).
If No, ditto.
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There will be exciting times ahead if we vote Yes. There’ll be challenges for us to overcome, but some pretty tantalising opportunities too, both for Scotland and for what I believe would become the world’s best capital city.
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Nationalism is not the answer to social injustice. For that fundamental reason, we urge Scots to vote no to independence next week
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http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/12/guardian-view-scottish-independence
I wonder how many Yes (intending) voters call themselves "nationalist".
Is there a poll??
Aye, Guardian too, quite incredible. Soon I will only be relying on twitter for news.
"I will only be relying on twitter for news."
Perhaps "relying" is a bit extreme!
Certainly 'opinion' on Twitter can be quite entertaining.
I'm curious about how Salmond would stay in power until 90 odd. Irish nationalism was very popular while at best the Yessers will have a slim majority. So come the next Holyrood election wouldn't the angry Unionsts give the SNP a hammering?
What I see in the first few years of an iScotland is a conservative government passing severe austerity policies in an attempt to pay for the new state and revive a tanking economy. Consequently those on the left who have worked so hard for an iScotland would find their social democratic dreams disappearing.
Also the social democratic Yessers - which party did they see implementing their policies in an iScotland?
(I complained about the existence of this thread but have to say it's one of the sanest and politest on the subject. And like everyone else now I'm forced to become involved - grrr).
I think it's a shame if people shut themselves off from opinions that reach a different conclusion from their own.
I've enjoyed lots of the writing from people explaining their decisions, whether it's Iain McWhirter, Andy Wightman or Moray McDonald explaining why they'll vote Yes or JK Rowling, Alex Massie or Carol Craig explaining their decision to vote No. The recent newspaper editorials from the Sunday Herald, the Scotsman, the Guardian and the FT have been really good reads.
This is the point where we're supposed to be making up our minds, not closing them.
"What I see in the first few years of an iScotland is a conservative government passing severe austerity policies in an attempt to pay for the new state and revive a tanking economy. Consequently those on the left who have worked so hard for an iScotland would find their social democratic dreams disappearing"
I think that is 'worst case scenario' - but not unrealistic.
It all depends on so many unknown unknowns!
There are people who believe/hope it will all be alright.
And believe that the UKGov will say 'we were bluffing, here's your currency union'.
Others assume 'the markets' will 'take their revenge' and 'wipe billions off the value of Scottish companies'.
If so that won't be because of any sound/reasonable/well weighed-up judgements of 'people who know best'.
It would be because people (or their trading computers) whose 'skill' is making (or losing!!!) money - with other people's money - have gained a disproportionate 'importance' in recent years.
A Yes vote could trigger all sorts of (financial) nasties. A No vote will just delay things - or at least remove an opportunity to take a rational look at things and, mebbe do some of them differently.
This isn't (just) about a 'new Scotland' or 'getting the Government we vote for' or 'kicking the Westminster establishment' or 'uniquely Scottish caring/sharing social democracy' or 'AS/SNP megalomania/Tartan Toryism' it really is (well could be) drawing the fabled 'line in the sand' and saying 'we're not really happy where we are and don't really like the direction of travel'.
Those with the most to lose won't like it (and I don't mean MPs with Scottish seats).
Almost everyone is 'part of the system' - mortgage, pension etc.
Maybe Yes will mean you move into "negative equity" - well that's happened in the UK before...
How is your pension? Does it look like giving you as much as you were 'promised' when you started 'paying in' (aka giving YOUR money - on trust - to someone who you might not even know where they keep their brass plate.) Will it be enough to 'retire' on?
Either we've 'all' bought too many houses, cars, iPods etc. or someone has creamed off a large 'share' as their "bonus". (Or both.)
There was a time when when 'City money' went into large houses in Stockbroker Belt Surrey - with Porsches for the upstarts.
Now it's circulating in offshore cyberspace.
Will a Yes bring it all crashing down? Perhaps. Useful scapegoat.
Will No bring security/stability/certainty/business as usual?
"This is the point where we're supposed to be making up our minds, not closing them"
Unsure if that was aimed at me (?), but - my mind and eyes are well and truly open.
My crack about twitter being the only reliable news channel was trite - but is it too much to expect a fair and decent MSM when circa 50% of the people here support independence, and only one (sunday) newspaper has come out in support?
While the media does not have to 100% reflect the populace - one would have expected that there would be some correlation between the wishes of the people and the editorial stance?
And as for the Guardian - they have alienated a lot of core readers over their stance - anything mildly pro - Yes is buried in the 'contributers' columns.
And dont even get me started on the BBC - lost cause.
I would have thought the role of the editorial is to reflect what the editor thinks. Not what the readers think, otherwise just write your own newspaper. It is odd that both the BBC & the Guardian are in on the conspiracy.
"I would have thought the role of the editorial is to reflect what the editor thinks."
Or the proprietor...
In the case of the Guardian editorial, it seems there is an element of 'point of view not based on a journalistic quest for the truth'.
The BBC is a different matter.
I don't want to think about conspiracies or even 'directed agendas'.
But there is a paradox here.
The BBC isn't meant to be the British Government Broadcasting Service - and over the years has (usually) gone out of its way to stress its independence.
Perhaps now as an institution - consciously or not - it has decided to 'stand up for Britain/UK'.
The paradox/irony is that Britain/ish/ness 'values' are supposed to be about 'fairness' and BBC/journalistic 'impartiality' etc.
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@iainmartin1: The BBC asks is there (shivers) a coordinated campaign by the UK to stop Salmond breaking up the UK? Well, yes, that's the general idea.
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My career to date? After Glasgow University I was a reporter for The Sunday Times Scotland, then covered the birth of devolution (don’t get me started) as Political Editor of Scotland on Sunday. From 2001-2004 I was editor of The Scotsman, and then from 2004-2006 editor of Scotland on Sunday. Fearing a Nationalist victory and a potential show trial I fled my homeland, landing at The Sunday Telegraph (where I was deputy editor and a columnist) before moving to the Daily Telegraph as Head of Comment. In 2009 I joined the Wall Street Journal, as deputy editor of the European edition and author of a blog on UK politics. After that I had a stint at the Daily Mail as a columnist.
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@lionelbarber: Martin Wolf on the perilous economics of a Yes vote #indyref #sterling #oil #debt #banks etc http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/67017a0a-390d-11e4-9526-00144feabdc0.html
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It was inspired by you or a response / rejoinder to you. It wasn't a punch or a bullet so wasn't aimed at all. On the whole, I find it a bit depressing that in many cases, in this debate and in others, the response to a dissenting voice is to find some way to silence it rather than to understand it - to not listen, to shout louder, to boycott and, in the extreme, to find a way to shut them up, even if that means promising a 'day of reckoning'. It means there's no real debate, just arguing. It means that no one learns anything and that people only hear echoes of their own voice.
Although I find it generally depressing, I suppose I find it more depressing coming from people advocating independence just because it is the opposite of the progressive independent, open-minded, nation-building, creative view the independence movement generally has of itself. If it can only stand to listen to people that say what it likes to hear, it can't really be described as independent.
In terms of the media, they make a judgement of what is in their interests and, where they have a set of beliefs or values, they make their editorial position within that framework. We can't be surprised at the stance any of them take - not the Sunday Herald or the Guardian, not Socialist Worker or the Daily Mail - or expect anything else of them. They are businesses.
The BBC is a little different in the sense that it is supposed to be impartial but it is, at the end of the day, the State broadcaster and ultimately serves the interests of the state. It's always good that people get their eyes opened to the BBC. My epiphany came during the miners' strike so after 30 years I can't be shocked by them. But like most things, if you think a Scottish Broadcasting Service would be different your eyes aren't yet open.
@chdot GG did not state fact: de Valera was Taoiseach (not president) from 1937-1959 & like Churchill he was out of power a few times in that period. From 59-74 his role as president was purely ceremonial as you would expect from a 91 year old. Actually de Valera had no parallels with Salmond, as in fact he opposed (with arms) the 1921 treaty and Michael Collins.
Totally irrelevant to the current plebiscite in Scotland, but then so is GG.
I think I was saying it's true that GG said it.
"Totally irrelevant to the current plebiscite in Scotland, but then so is GG."
True.
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Survation have this afternoonreleased the result of a poll it has conducted for the Better Together campaign. Just as yesterday ICM released the results of a poll that had been conducted by phone rather than, as the company had done previously, over the internet, so also today’s poll is a phone poll from a company that up to now has been conducting its polls over the internet.
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http://blog.whatscotlandthinks.org/2014/09/survation-phone-poll-gets-much-result
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@KatySurvation: .@Survation poll by phone using systematic random sample of landlines & mobs ordered to reflect age, gender, LA income, employment status
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http://survation.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Better-Together-Voting-Intention-Tables.pdf
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Parade of 15,000 unionists passes through Edinburgh without serious incident, hoping to make decisive contribution to next week's referendum result
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More analysis of the odds:
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