Um yeah, but surely with their Washington DC overlords like every other US state? How is that any more "acceptable" than London being overlords of Scotland?

I suspect the way things might go is like this - if there's a yes vote, the complications of cleaving the UK in two will soak up all spare Parliamentary time and political capacity for the next few years and push out an EU in/out referendum by some time. By this point the English will have realised that Scotland is desperately trying to get back in and being a part of the EU is a significant bargaining tool with the new iScotland. Seeing the effects of not being in the EU first hand will change a lot of minds, especially once the serious debates start going.

Then again, Scotland by that point will probably be in such a state that they would be a net recipient from the EU - meaning that unless the rUK pulls out, their EU contributions will be going to fund an independent Scotland that recently told the rUK to go fuck itself. Sounds like the best argument yet for leaving the EU. :-)

Tell that to Abraham Lincoln. He set the military on a bunch of US states that wanted self-determination. Or are the US schools painting Lincoln as an evil tyrant these days?

Which makes it all the more hilarious that the Scottish Greens are supporting independence. Scotland's #1 economic crutch is basically going to be "drill, baby, drill!" How exactly does that fit their agenda again...? I guess all the million and one wind turbines will make up for it.

Any voter should consider the probable situation twenty or fourty years from now, not whatever happens in a year or two.

What, you mean when they're on their deathbed? Yeah, that'll be really useful for them during the bulk of their lives.

The UK agreed to this vote.

Cameron ageed to this vote. Most UK citizens would not have. There was no good reason I can see for Cameron to have agreed to it.

And, on a more personal note: "Votez 'Oui', amis écossais ! Juste pour emmerder les Anglais !". The Auld Alliance shall rise again! ;-)

And, on another personal note, "Va te faire foutre, connard." Wait until Brittany is demanding to leave France because they have Parisiens so much. Wonder whether you'll be laughing so much then.

Firmly tongue in cheek. Of course.

What do they mean "no local banks"? There are no banks in Scotland?

Pretty much none Scottish-owned, no.

Or they have no currency all their own?

No. They use British pound sterling.

And why would leaving Great Britain curtail access to EU markets and freedom of movement?

Because they'd immediately be out of the EU and have to apply to rejoin, which would take at least several years.

Is Great Britain going to set up some sort of naval blockade around Scotland?

Could do, if they refused to pay their debts. Probably not though, as English politicians tend to be rather spineless. Wouldn't be surprised if they just gave Salmond half the British navy.

As a fellow European (Belgium, not UK) it's funny to see the arguments being used by the "better together" campaign. They are all typically the same arguments used by the rest of Europe for increased European integration

Scotland has a heck of a lot more in common with Britain than mainland Europe; linguistically, geographically, historically, and culturally, to name but a few. One union makes a lot more sense than the other.

Heh. John Oliver is about as English as George W. Bush. I wonder whether Jon Stewart would be quite so gung-ho about allowing those southern states to secede? Maybe a bit of patriotism would seep in all of a sudden...

A lot of "yes" campaigners seem to have been sold on the idea that any warning of economic doom upon a "yes" vote is scaremongering, bullying, or "undermining the Scottish democratic process." Bullshit. Many intelligent people looking at this from a rational perspective have concluded that the "sweet spot" for Scotland is staying in the union and having devo-max; basically getting it both ways, with lots of self-government combined with a net financial income from the rest of the UK, as well as obviously ease of trade.

However, the pro-independence SNP are 100% blinkered on independence, at any cost. They will therefore paint warnings like this as lies designed purely to scupper their frankly loony picture of a prosperous independent Scotland, and a lot of Scots buy into it. Shame, really.

Americans might look on with bemusement; I can understand that. I guess it's a bit like Florida choosing to break away from the US, having a pro-Florida political party endlessly demonizing "them" (the rest of the US) as causing pretty much every economic and political woe Florida has going for it. As an English guy, I think this whole situation really sucks. If the UK breaks up, the whole of Britain will be worse off for it, but I suspect Scotland will take the bigger brunt of the pain. And given that it will have made the decision, it will deserve to.

Yes TNG had poker. Riker was into jazz, but who else?

Sisko played baseball (at one point all of the DS9 crew did, worse episode ever in my opinion) and Bashir/O'Brien played racketball and tennis.

gets both larger, (higher BMI, greater average height), and older, (aging population). Something's gotta give.

Maybe ?

For a simple example that Writer is not fit for businesses: it cannot properly handle even basic tasks such as working with templates.

Don't foget macros. I've been switching over to LibreOffice and this is probably the single biggest issue i have. Word has a nice built-in IDE for creating VBA macros, and LibreOffice has fuck all. Its IDE has no IntellSense equivalent, and figuring out how to code in it is very difficult. As for coding in other languages, they all seem to require a Java Runtime Environment for some strange reason.

"Boys fall in love with computers as machines; girls see them as tools to do something else," said Barbara Ericson, a senior research scientist at the Georgia Institute of Technology who tracks the AP exam.

What does this have to do with self-confidence? This is women approaching computers from a different perspective (on average).

"Then girls think, Ãfmaybe I don't belong because I don't love them like the boys do.Ãf(TM)"

And they'd be right. Why do they belong at a company passionate about technology if they aren't passionate about technology? They don't belong there any more than I belong in a doctor's surgery as anything but a patient - I'm not passionate about healthcare and didn't take exams to become a qualified doctor.