John Harris of The Guardian seems to understand the benefits of Scottish Independence - notably that a vote next year in favour of Scotland leaving the Union is the only opportunity that this country is likely to have of escaping the tyranny of the Tories, forever...
'To borrow a phrase from a politician he loathes, Alex Salmond feels the hand of history on his shoulder. On Tuesday [Nov 26 2013], his SNP government will launch its white paper on Scottish independence - to hear some people talk, the most significant political document in his country's history since 1320's Declaration of Arbroath. A day in 2016 has been set for formal secession from the UK: 24 March, the anniversary of both 1603's Union of the Crowns and the Act of Union of 1707. In its own way, news from the "no" campaign only underlines the sense of momentous times: on Saturday, like Banquo's ghost come to alert Salmond to his hubris, Gordon Brown materialised in the Daily Record, warning that an independent Scotland would be "worse placed, more vulnerable and less, not more, in control of key economic decisions".
'In England, the intensifying debate north of the border is still met with a great sigh of indifference. Perhaps our news discourse has become so trite that it can't cope with something of such importance. Or maybe this is more proof that London so dominates the supposed national agenda that anything that happens this far away will be overlooked – and that in any case, 14 years of devolution has left English and Scottish politics hopelessly estranged. In addition, large parts of the establishment seem to think that with polls showing less than a third of Scots supporting independence, the referendum can be thought of as a momentary tantrum on the Celtic fringe, and ignored. As evidenced by recent warnings from the new Scottish secretary, Alistair Carmichael (who last week tried to "put the fear of god" into the cabinet), such thinking is misplaced, but more of that in a moment.' (Guardian article & Scottish White Paper pdf download).
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