"the Scottish folk in England are not getting a vote"
wtf not?
'but the English in Scotland are"
wtf?
It's the same stitch-up they did in the 70's.

Thomas Olai, evict implies that one earlier owned the property/territory, which, in this case, is not true. nwhothefruah?

@ Timur

It's the SNP's idea. They fear that the countless thousands (millions if you include people like myself who weren't born in Scotland but could claim citizenship if Scotland were to go it alone) of Scots living in the rest of the UK would vote overwhelmingly in favour of the Union as they have a better perspective of how great it is. I am personally appalled that a combination of little Scotlanders and politicians who simply want to create a new pond to be the big fish in have denied me my say. The only consolation is the knowledge that they will lose regardless because Scots aren't idiots.

Timur - I'm surprised you of all people weren't aware of this. All british citizens and citizens of the Republic of Ireland and other eu countries who are resident in Scotland can vote.

"who are resident in Scotland"
How many foreigners are now buying flats in Edinburgh or cottages in the Highlands?
I am.

I'll tell you what, Timur, before you buy your over-priced shack in the Highlands and I buy a small flat in the shitty part of Glasgow, let's agree that as we would both vote in opposite directions and cancel each other out we might as well form a pact to stay home, save our money, and spend election day on the beach.

It's too damned cold up there... Alec Sammond needs his head examined or malkied

As a Scottish person (by birth) now living in England I'm slightly grumpy about not getting a vote. However I have a strong feeling that the result will be "no".

Ok, Octavious, NAP. See you on the beach.

@Jamie: The result will be yes, unless they skew it like last time, which will probably lead to rebellion this time around.

As an Englishman, I wish I had a vote too, but I'm confident my cousins will achieve the right result.

I was interested to see that Salmond is promising a nuclear free Scotland. That could tip the balance to independence, i might just rent a room up there myself.

Suggest non-Scottish people get their collective asses south of the border asap. You all know where the border is, don't you? Sorry. Assumed a certain degree of geographical ability. It's the line between Scotland and the other place, which cannot be named..

So what you're suggesting, Timur, is some sort of clearance :p?

Aye. They did it before in the 1800's to put bloody sheep in, causing the Scottish diaspora.
Let's kick the f*ckers out and put the Scots back where they belong: In their cottages. On their crofts. In their homes.

You see the problem with those cleared out in the 1800s is that we ended up all over the place, and quite a lot of them settled in England. Now the thing about a family living in England for 100+ years is that they sort of become English, and whilst we descendants of the clearance still have Scottish surnames and a fondness for Scotland, the idea of Scotland cutting ties with England is quite repulsive.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdNqUW5wwTE

@ timur - maybe we could get the scots in ulster back their crofts to vote and get a domino effect, scotland for the scottish (welcome to it) and Ireland for the Irish?

@Js: Sorry, YouTube blocked in Chin@. (Keybo@rd won't render the first letter of the @lph@bet, which h@ppens to h@ve two of them.)
@ll for it. Celtic sp@ces for Celtic folks.

@Draug,

"Except Texas doesn't have the borrowing.power and would have to start printing it's own currency and set up administrations to handle these new functions. The cost of running a small country is significantly higher than running a state."

Yes, but you continue to make the completely irrelevant comparison. The cost of running a small country is only moderately larger (per capita) than the cost of running a large country, and would not be larger at all given Texas's much more conservative policies on spending. It would be easily covered in the money they wouldn't be paying to the feds and the 6% of that that they never get back.

And while they wouldn't have the borrowing power of the US (at least for awhile), they'd have plenty given their economy. Plenty of countries a lot smaller than Texas do just fine and offer more social services than the US. There are good arguments for why Texas shouldn't secede, but saying their people are abjectly dependent on the federal government in some way that couldn't be easily reproduced is a silly one.

Does your 6% the lose take into account the protection provided by arguably the greatest military on the planet? Does it take into account the disaster services provided recently by the federal government when a hurricane wiped even Texas' Gulf Coast? And does it include the services provided by INS agents at the borders and TSA at the airports as well as the ease and affordability of bringing goods into the state via federal laws passed under the Interstate Commerce clause? I suspect your estimate's sources only look at actual dollars returned and not all the soft dollars and emergency services or the intangibles like free trade between states and an national banking system with guarantees to keep banks and maior industries afloat in hard times.

@ Timur: What makes you so sure the result will be a "Yes" ?

Do you live in Scotland? If you do, where? Lots of Scots I know agree with me that it will be a "no" result. If Scots had been offered "devolution max", that is, a further extension of the current, successful, devolution arrangements, many would have been happy to vote for that. But with only "full independence" or "status quo" on offer, status quo will have the edge.

For reference, I'm not just someone with a tenuous, weak link to Scotland, spouting shite. I was directy involved with setting up a Scottish Youth Parliament to mirror the Scottish Parliament when it was established. I was present, in the chamber, at the first ever opening of the Scottish Parliament in 1999. I was an invited guest of Sir David Steel, the Parliament's first ever Presiding Officer.

So, yeah, I know whereof I speak, 'kay?

Yes, it counts defense. And actually, given that a ton of that money is spent in Texas (many defense contractors, military bases, etc.), that means that if you ignore those things, it would be even more egregiously off-balance.

Another point would be that if Texas seceded in any kind of equitable way, it would be leaving with a proportionate share of that capital. Given that it has spent a lot of the money for the military over the years, there is no reason it would not take its proportion of the equipment, etc. (Admittedly, the military of the rest of the nation would be vastly impoverished, as Texas provides 13% of military personel, far more than any other state, despite having just 8% of the US population).

I'm not aware that it counts FEMA. But Texas gets only tens of millions of dollars a year from FEMA ( http://www.publicintegrity.org/2011/09/29/6762/fema-funds-run-out-senators-states-most-disasters-oppose-funding-bill ). I think we'd be OK.

As for the rest of the things you mention, yes, it counts them.

Again, your whole logic here is so obviously bad that data would hardly even be necessary. The federal government is not some kind of magical money source. It gets its money from people in states. Texas has tons of people, yes, but it also has an economy that would make it the 14th biggest in the world or, by some calculations, as big as Russia's. Its per capita GDP is higher than Germany or France.

Yes, different states receive big benefits from the feds. The midwest gets farm subsidies, everybody gets social security, etc. But that money comes from somewhere. The only way your argument would work is if you showed that, somehow, Texas is taking a lot more out of the pie than it's putting in. In fact, the opposite is true.

As I say, there are plenty of good arguments for Texas not to secede. But magical thinking about the source of federal dollars is not one of the.

@Timur, it's either Nanjing or Namking. Nanking is a term used in history but it isn't actually pronounced like that. Nanking just sounds like a mix of two dialects.

I was only asking if your numbers had taken into account those values. Arguably, while it would get back its soldiers, it would not get the equipment that belongs to the US citizens. The confederates didn't get union equipment when they seceded and Texas would get US equipment. But that is a one time deal. The question would.come.down to if manufacturers would pull out of Texas to maintain their relationship with the US (answer: most would dump Texas in a heartbeat leaving Texas with massive unemployment at least until new deals.could be struck and trade negotiations made). So beyond the financial costs comes the downtime when the US would attempt to bankrupt Texas by not doing business with any company who did and banning businesses who wished to remain on the US stockmarkets from having facilities in Texas. In short an embargo worse than what any war would.potentially bring to Texas.

Wouldn't get US equipment...

Draug,

If you'll go look at the context of the thread, you'll see that it was about peacefull secession, by permission and vote. Yes, obviously trying to leave by force would economically devastate Texas. But if it did not leave by force, there is no reason the US would "attempt to bankrupt" Texas or would ban any companies from having facilities there.

This also points out the disanalogy when you use the Civil War to argue that Texas would not get any military equipment. That would really be up for negotiation. One obvious point would be that, in the civil war, there weren't huge standing military bases in different states, either. What there was, the south did indeed keep. Now, I'm guessing that the amount of military equipment in Texas is actually quite disproportionate, and Texas would have no right to claim all of it; but there is no reason it would give up the share of the military capital that it paid for any more than it would give up its roads.

All of this is a fairly absurd hypothetical scenario, admittedly, but it's the scenario we happened to be discussing.

Agreed, bt I somehow doubt there would be a peaceful secession. Scotland and Ireland were conquered oh so long ago so England, no longer the power it once was, would ratjer grant them.independence peacefully (unlike the fight it put up in the case of the American Revolution) but Texas was not conquered, instead asking to be part of the US and the US is not going to let it peacably secede.

I doubt there would be such a thing, as well, although I'm not sure that the past conquering is altogether the relevant standard. One could imagine a theory of self-determination that held that a state should be free to secede if it wants to now, just as it was free to join if it wanted to in the past.

Be all that as it may, it is both highly unlikely that it would be allowed (Texas is too important to the US) and highly unlikely that the people of Texas would choose to even request such a thing.