I want out of the EU.....do you ?

[Maggie]

It's ruined our fishing industry, it gives massive subsidies to our wealthy landowners while tieing up our ordinary farmers in bureaucracy and regulation.

It's corrupt, nepotist, and Byzantine.

It's accounts' have not been approved by auditors for sixteen consecutive years.

The majority of our laws are now made, not in Westminster or Edinburgh, in Strasbourg and Brussels by the snought in the trough gravy train they call The European Parliament.

It is vicious, malicious and uncaring towards those ordinary people in Spain, Italy, Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Cyprus who have found themselves with financial disasters not of their own making.

......and the ultimate objective of the European Project is to create a United States of Europe.

No thank you very much; I want OUT !

[Foxglove]

Me too!

[NickB]

.
If Scotland remains in the UK then it is beginning to look as though the pair of you will get your wish, As you both intend to vote NO it all ties in very nicely, so give yourselves a wee pat on the back.

For those of us who want to stay in Europe a YES vote is looking like the best bet.

[Pentlandpirate]

Nick, you disagree with Maggie's summary of the EU?

The EU needs to change. No member should be satisfied with the way it is. But I can't see the EU being revolutionised (unless things really blow up, which is a possibility if they can't keep a lid on Greece, Spain, Italy, Cyprus, and even France). If with the "Britain needs to get a new agreement" brigade, otherwise I'm out.

It would seem an independent Scotland would have little choice but to try to join the EU, but in it's current state you have to consider if that would be a wise choice. It is everything Maggie says it is. And yet the Yes Campaigners think the grass is greener in that European Union than they are in the United Kingdom. Nuts!

[Maggie]

.
If Scotland remains in the UK then it is beginning to look as though the pair of you will get your wish, As you both intend to vote NO it all ties in very nicely, so give yourselves a wee pat on the back.

For those of us who want to stay in Europe a YES vote is looking like the best bet.

All rather presumptuous if you don't mind me saying.

1. With over a year to go my vote is by no means cast in iron. At present I am still a "don't know" with a leaning towards No, but that could just as easily change to Yes. I'm not the kind of person who makes up my mind for certain before all the facts are known.

2. As no-one from the EU has confirmed that Scotland will automatically be a member of the EU without lengthy and hard negotiations anyone who says Scotland will remain in the EU is merely daydreaming.

3. You want to stay in the EU.....WHY ?
I gave many reasons (and could have given many more) why I want out. Can you give many reasons why you want Scotland to be largely controlled by the Brussels/Strasbourg (ie Berlin) eurocracy ?

It is clear that the endgame with the EU will be a German dominated United States of Europe. Like I said; No Thanks !

[NickB]

Nick, you disagree with Maggie's summary of the EU?

I'm not really all that interested in Maggie's views on the EU to be honest.

The evidence is that Scots by and large support continued membership of Europe - as evidenced by the failure of UKIP to gain even a toehold North of the border. As regards all the Unionist scare stories surrounding our EU membership as an independent nation, well there's plenty of qualified opinion that thinks that Scotland :

a) would be able to negotiate membership terms of the EU from within during the period between a YES vote and independence

b) would not be forced to join the Euro

c) would be able to negotiate an opt-out on Schengen and maintain a common travel area as Ireland does.

The EU has said that it would be prepared to discuss these issues with the UK government prior to the referendum - which could bring some clarity - but the UK government has refused to do so because it suits the NO campaign to create a climate of fear and uncertainty.

I was pleased to hear Nicola Sturgeon admit yesterday that exact answers might not be possible before the referendum on all issues, but I am not worried about an independent Scotland's continuing membership of the EU.

[Pentlandpirate]

Well isn't anyone going to argue that the EU isn't any of the things that Maggie says it is?

Does the socialist Yes Campaign that intends to make Scotland a fairer place to live approve of the abuse of power that the EU bureaucracy creates and tolerates? I might suggest, "Yes", given that their socialist ideals and ambitions will allow them to take even more control of individual lives than any other population structure. And now the most powerful leader of that clique, Angela Merkel, has been revealed as once being an East German Communist Propaganda worker. The balance has tilted. The EU is past it's sell by date and without a massive change to the recipe, it has already started to poison whole countries.

Scotland's socialist Yes Campaigners would appear to want to be part of that leftist elite irrespective of what it does to their peoples.

[Maggie]

Well isn't anyone going to argue that the EU isn't any of the things that Maggie says it is?

I honestly don't think anyone can because what I wrote is clearly the case.

What is much more telling, PP, is the fact that no-one here has made a positive case for Scotland being in/continuing in the EU.

Salmond had to fight a hard fight to convince the SNP that we should join NATO yet he has made no case for the EU.

mags
x

[Pentlandpirate]

I think Salmond is preparing for another U-turn to further split the Yes Campaign and confuse the electorate even more. 491 days left for many more U-turns and perhaps, who knows, by then he may have convinced himself he should vote, "No!"

[Maggie]

I think Salmond is preparing for another U-turn to further split the Yes Campaign and confuse the electorate even more. 491 days left for many more U-turns and perhaps, who knows, by then he may have convinced himself he should vote, "No!"

Interesting.

I see Alex Salmond, yesterday, pronounced that a Yes vote is the only way for Scotland to be in the EU.

Quite curious really. I'm starting to think that the EU may well be the achilles heel for the Yes movement.

Quite apart from the controversy as to whether we will be automatic members questions are now being asked as to why we should want to be part of the EU.

And what is interesting neither Salmond nor his faithful dare answer that question.

Why ?

Because anything he says to justify being in the EU can equally well apply to justify being in the UK.

I bet the No camp make a big play of that closer to the referendum.

Interesting times ahead.

mags
x

[NickB]

.
In an IPSOS-MORI poll conducted Feb 9th - 14th Scots were given the following choices:

An independent Scotland should be a member of the European Union - 61% agreed

An independent Scotland should not be a member of the European Union - 33% agreed

Don't Know - 6%

So nearly twice as many Scots think an independent Scotland should be in the EU as think the opposite. Doesn't look like much of an achilles heel to me.

[Pentlandpirate]

That poll was 3 months ago. Remember, a week in politics is a lifetime and The Yes Campaign has hit a wall of hard facts since then. I think you will see a big swing in an up to date poll.

But speaking of polls you forgot to mention one published today that says 51% of Scots are in favour of retaining a nuclear deterrent and only 34% want to get rid of it altogether. Given that the Yes Campaign says that Scots want to be nuclear free, it's another example of how out of touch they are with Scottish voters....or does it just mean that more and more Scots now know what they want and it isn't what the Yes Campaign is telling them they want?

[NickB]

.
mmmmmmm Lord Ashcroft, Tory life peer with an estimated fortune of £1.1 billion . . . .

I'm sure that is the right poll to believe.

[Pentlandpirate]

Has anyone disputed the results of the poll? Have the Yes Campaign rubbished it? What percentage of people believe Alex Salmond?

[Maggie]

But speaking of polls you forgot to mention one published today that says 51% of Scots are in favour of retaining a nuclear deterrent and only 34% want to get rid of it altogether. Given that the Yes Campaign says that Scots want to be nuclear free, it's another example of how out of touch they are with Scottish voters....or does it just mean that more and more Scots now know what they want and it isn't what the Yes Campaign is telling them they want?

An interesting poll of 1,236 Scots. It is totally irrelevant who commissioned it. It is relevant how the representative sample of our fellow countrymen answered.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... rrent.html

It is also interesting that not one of the SNP supporters here have been brave enough to come up with a positive case for being in the EU.

Closer to the time you can be sure that the "don't knows" will be targeted with this question by the No campaign because any answer given in justification for being in the EU can be rapidly turned into a justification for staying in the UK. The 66% of Scots who support the EU will be the Yes campaign's Achilles heel when questioned why.

mags
x

[Tony the Toad]

Ah, the (Charles) Kennedy manoeuvre: the attempt to strangle the Scottish referendum using the EU as a ligature. Much more of the same to follow.

[NickB]

That nice Mr. Farage got a good reception in Edinburgh yesterday.

[Pentlandpirate]

The debate starts about half way through this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTpKKlHEjyE

That nice Mr. Farage got a good reception in Edinburgh yesterday.

And you agree with the leftie activists that he is a "Nazi racist?" These people are clearly deluded. You watch, and fear, UKIP will make progress in Scotland and they will take votes from the Yes Campaign. That's why the activists were set up to ambush him in a most undemocratic way. What happened to the his freedom of speech and chance to enjoy a pint on the Royal Mile? It was disgraceful and showed the underside of Scottish Nationalism to be no better than the EDL (which UKIP has no connection with). Any how they say "all publicity is good publicity" and UKIP will be well pleased to have got things off to a flying start.

[Maggie]

That nice Mr. Farage got a good reception in Edinburgh yesterday.

And you agree with the leftie activists that he is a "Nazi racist?" These people are clearly deluded. You watch, and fear, UKIP will make progress in Scotland and they will take votes from the Yes Campaign. That's why the activists were set up to ambush him in a most undemocratic way. What happened to the his freedom of speech and chance to enjoy a pint on the Royal Mile? It was disgraceful and showed the underside of Scottish Nationalism to be no better than the EDL (which UKIP has no connection with). Any how they say "all publicity is good publicity" and UKIP will be well pleased to have got things off to a flying start.

Well it certainly goes to show that the SNP have also recognised their Achilles heel surrounding the EU question.

They are so desperate to keep silent on the positives of membership of a Union of countries that they set their thugs on a legitimate politician who is attempting to stimulate just such a debate.

Yesterday's disgrace in Edinburgh was a sad day for Nationalist politics.

[NickB]

Yesterday's disgrace in Edinburgh was a sad day for Nationalist politics.

Not as big a disgrace as your suggestion that the demonstrators were 'SNP thugs'. That is a particularly nasty smear - have you any justification whatsoever for it?

As far as I can see from reports I have read this was people of various political views and alliegances who want no part of Farrage and his revolting 'politics' in Scotland. Good on them!

Your suggestion that it was a mob organised by the SNP is frankly beneath contempt. Even PP's colourful description of them as 'leftie activists' is more accurate than your portrayal.