Wednesday, 17 September 2014

JFK, Irish hats and aiming for The Moon

When President Kennedy announced in 1963 that America would place a man on the moon within 10 years there was no space program. They had not begun to look at how or if this might be done but he committed to it and they had no option but to follow. In doing so he referenced the story of the young Irish lad who, when stood next to a tall orchard wall, took off his cap and launched it over. A passer by witnessed this and asked "Are you mad, now you will have to climb the wall to get your cap back?!" "That's the idea" replied the lad.
Thursday's referendum is not about Alex Salmond or the policies of a particular party, it's not about the EU or currency or any of those matters which will undoubtedly be negotiated and resolved. It's not about the defence budget or the NHS or any of those things as Alex Salmond's first act after Independence will be to stand down and call a general election. After this we will get to choose a government who represent our views, our interests and our way of life. We are a socialist nation who have been ruled by a Conservative government for too long, even when Labour were in power they knew it was England and the rest of the UK who put them there so they had to move to the middle to avoid upsetting the electorate. If we choose to take this leap we will get what we have never had, a truly representative and democratically elected government who answer only to us. Don't get me wrong, all the details are important and there ARE answers to all of those questions if you do some reading but those aren't the questions you should be asking yourself. Those details are the day to day business of government, the minutiae that are always taken care of and in 10, 20, 100 years from now when our children and children's children look back on the 18th Sept 2014, those details will have faded into history. What they will look back upon is that we took the chance when we were offered. Without any bloodshed or a single bullet being fired we democratically took control of our nation in an adult and civilised manner. In a world that is becoming crueller, where it's every man for themselves and the rich get rich off of the blood and sweat of the poor we have the opportunity to be the country we always knew we could. We can do it differently, we have the chance to write a constitution and engrain the concepts of decency and fairness into it from day one. We can make Scotland the envy of the World and I genuinely believe it will be the start of better things for the rest of Britain, an Island to which we will always belong. So what do you want your part in history to be? If you say No there is no turning back, we won't get this chance again. We'll be permanently stuck with a government elected by the people of one part of this Union and we'll have given them our seal of approval to keep doing what they are doing.

I have been made redundant in the last few years and my partner has been made redundant 3 times in 4 years; and all this while we were apparently Better Together, protected by the strength and security of the UK! Of course you have to do what is right for you and it is a personal choice, just make sure you have the right information to hand when you make it.


If being part of the UK genuinely is the right choice for you then I wish you luck tomorrow. I suspect it will be a very close run thing and the No's will probably win it but when future generations look back, incredulous that we turned down self-determination in favour of a future of Tory rule, at least I'll can say that I tried.

So tomorrow I shall be throwing my cap over the wall and voting Yes. Who's with me?


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