Even though I’ve lived in the US for the last 26 years, I’ve never gone through the process of acquiring US citizenship; I’m still a “resident alien”. When I’m filling out application forms, or checking in at hotels, I enter “United Kingdom” for the country that issues my passport. And for the most part I think of myself as British, not English. But according to this article in the Expat Telegraph, my position seems to be increasingly unfashionable. It’s unclear whether the Union between England and Scotland will survive – or whether it should.
It would be nice to think that this is the kind of issue that is clarified by a little distance. From over here in Seattle, undisturbed by the day-to-day bustle of British politics and media, surely I should be able to view the matter more clearly, more dispassionately. Unfortunately not. “On the one hand… on the other hand…”, and I rapidly run out of hands. For example: what do the Scots really want? The author makes a good point: “The dilemma for many Scots is that because the Conservatives are so weak there, those who want to get rid of Labour have nowhere to go but the SNP. The protest vote, by default, becomes an expression of nationalism.”
His conclusion: put the whole thing to a vote. If the majority of Scots really believe that they’d be better off on their own, so be it. But hopefully they won’t.