Thinking about it. I know next to nothing about the history of Mesoamerica. It is a major gap in my education. Can anyone recommend a good primer for the entire topic? Basic but comprehensive?
Perhaps best of all is "The Conquest of New Spain" written by Bernal Dias, who wrote his eyewitness account in retirement. He was a footsoldier for Hernando Cortes:
For a wider view "The Open Veins of Latin America" by Eduardo Galleano is very good, though ends in the Seventies. Sufficiently good to be banned in a number of countries, including his own Uruguay. The chapters on the colonial period are very good, but it does lose its way a little bit towards the end about the postwar period.
2017 saw a swing to Labour of just over 2%. A Tory lead in 2023/2024 of 2% would represent a pro-Labour swing of circa 5% and would see almost 50 gains from the Tories. Were the election to be that close, I would also expect Labour to make progress in Scotland.
Scotland has changed. progress would mean 6-12 seats rather than the 40 or so they'd need to get a majority. National polls are no longer reflective to outcomes in Scotland as the SNP have taken the 'progressive' vote and it's not going anywhere anytime soon.
That may be so - and 10 - 15 seats would be a substantial recovery. If Labour looks close to ousting the Tories across GB, I suspect that Scotland will wish to 'join the party' , and many who vote SNP for Holyrood are likely to switch back to Labour - something we saw there in 2017.
Wishful thinking.
Anas is doing even worse than Richard, who did worse than Kezia, who did worse than Iain, who did worse than Jim, who…. all the way back to Donald.
Spot a pattern?
Anas did not perform that badly at the Holyrood elections in May. Moreover for Westminster elections I suspect the GB leader is more important anyway.
Anas losing two MSPs, from a low base, was pretty lousy.
On your second sentence, you’re plain wrong. The big beasts have to be in Scotland, and seen to be in Scotland. Starmer and his Westminster team are very marginal characters in Scottish politics.
Well I suspect tht Harold Wilson mattered more than Willie Ross - and that Tony Blair mattered more than Donald Dewar.
"The complexity of cheating and simulation and all the rest can make the sports fan pine for the simplicity of cricket (only joking!). Cricket is, I would argue, the most intellectually complicated and satisfying of the world’s main ball sports – but there isn’t much room in it for simulating. What would you simulate? Batsmen who’ve been caught off fine nicks pretend not to have hit the ball, but that doesn’t feel like cheating, just like what you do, and in any case in pro cricket umpires and opponents have TV reviews to fall back on. The predominant form of cheating in cricket is the simple expedient of tampering with the ball to give some help to the bowler."
2017 saw a swing to Labour of just over 2%. A Tory lead in 2023/2024 of 2% would represent a pro-Labour swing of circa 5% and would see almost 50 gains from the Tories. Were the election to be that close, I would also expect Labour to make progress in Scotland.
Scotland has changed. progress would mean 6-12 seats rather than the 40 or so they'd need to get a majority. National polls are no longer reflective to outcomes in Scotland as the SNP have taken the 'progressive' vote and it's not going anywhere anytime soon.
That may be so - and 10 - 15 seats would be a substantial recovery. If Labour looks close to ousting the Tories across GB, I suspect that Scotland will wish to 'join the party' , and many who vote SNP for Holyrood are likely to switch back to Labour - something we saw there in 2017.
Wishful thinking.
Anas is doing even worse than Richard, who did worse than Kezia, who did worse than Iain, who did worse than Jim, who…. all the way back to Donald.
Spot a pattern?
Anas did not perform that badly at the Holyrood elections in May. Moreover for Westminster elections I suspect the GB leader is more important anyway.
Anas losing two MSPs, from a low base, was pretty lousy.
On your second sentence, you’re plain wrong. The big beasts have to be in Scotland, and seen to be in Scotland. Starmer and his Westminster team are very marginal characters in Scottish politics.
Well I suspect tht Harold Wilson mattered more than Willie Ross - and that Tony Blair mattered more than Donald Dewar.
Under Blair, Scottish Labour reached their high-water mark.
If that is true, why hasn't the SNP spent the last 14 years making Scotland lean and mean, so that the problems of independence melt away?
They've had the Irish model in front of them - a state that makes people pay for everything from calling out the fire brigade to going to see a GP. But the upside of that is that they run surpluses.
If Scotland had moved to becoming a lean, mean machine in the last 14 years, they'd easily shrug off concerns about budget deficits of 9% and so on. If you are in a surplus situation, not only do you not need subsidies from Westminster, but launching your own currency is not a problem either.
If you use Brexit as an analogy, Britain was a net contributor to the EU and thus felt confident about leaving, whereas Greece is a net recipient and was so terrified of losing their subsidy that they put up with a lot of abuse from the other member states.
Sturgeon hasn't made any attempt to make sure Scotland isn't financially dependent on largess from England. She's gone in the opposite direction - free tuition fees, baby boxes, council tax freezes and the like - all things designed to make Scotland's fiscal position weak and independence painful.
The SNP wouldn't have got elected on manifestos promising savage spending cuts.
There won't be another indyref this decade. It suits none of the main British parties. The Scots will never agitate hard enough
For the foreseeable future, Scotland is destined to become Quebec, forever poised at the threshold (and getting favours thereby) yet never actually crossing it
And TBF that is a very sensible solution for Scotland. They will benefit, significantly. Will the English tolerate it? Probably
The current stalemate suits the actual aims of both the SNP and the Conservatives pretty well. But how about this thought experiment?
Somehow, the 2024 GE leads to a Starmer minority government dependent on SNP votes. The price of that will presumably be Devomax with a thistle on top followed by a Sindyref in (say) 2028. Sturgeon can't push too hard, because what's the alternative? Let the Tories back in?
When referendum time rolls around, it doesn't look winnable. After all, it's 50:50 now, and some of the push factors will have gone- no Johnson, no JRM, softening of you-know-what.
Another no to Sindy really would kill it for a generation. What's an SNP leader to do?
There are two scenarios.
One, they go for the referendum anyway. You say that it doesn't look winnable, but we've seen with the referendum on the other topic that anything can happen, and frankly I think the politicians on the side of Independence are better at politics than those on the other side of the argument. In a campaign, I think they could surprise on the upside. Also, there is great potential for them to make Westminster look even more dysfunctional and problematic, even with the Tories gone. It's not like they will be that motivated to be co-operative partners in coalition.
Two, if they want to avoid the IndyRef then they always have the option of finding a pretext on which to collapse any coalition or confidence and supply agreement, in the hope that the hated Tories will come back. Who knows, they might be able to sort it so that a section 30 order is granted and they can force a UK general election before the date set for the referendum, which has all sorts of potential.
I don't know about anyone else, but my "lived experience" is large numbers of couples in my mid 50's cohort separating after decades of marriage. Pandemic revealing not causing imho.
RE the theory from earlier about people staying away from nightclubs. From an anecdotal point of view I'd disagree. Busier than ever in Leeds city centre tonight.
I don't know about anyone else, but my "lived experience" is large numbers of couples in my mid 50's cohort separating after decades of marriage. Pandemic revealing not causing imho.
What's wrong with just using the word experience? Surely all experience is lived.
Comments
https://chnm.gmu.edu/worldhistorysources/unpacking/travelanalysis.html
It's a gripping read.
For a wider view "The Open Veins of Latin America" by Eduardo Galleano is very good, though ends in the Seventies. Sufficiently good to be banned in a number of countries, including his own Uruguay. The chapters on the colonial period are very good, but it does lose its way a little bit towards the end about the postwar period.
"The complexity of cheating and simulation and all the rest can make the sports fan pine for the simplicity of cricket (only joking!). Cricket is, I would argue, the most intellectually complicated and satisfying of the world’s main ball sports – but there isn’t much room in it for simulating. What would you simulate? Batsmen who’ve been caught off fine nicks pretend not to have hit the ball, but that doesn’t feel like cheating, just like what you do, and in any case in pro cricket umpires and opponents have TV reviews to fall back on. The predominant form of cheating in cricket is the simple expedient of tampering with the ball to give some help to the bowler."
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/n15/john-lanchester/how-bad-can-it-be
One, they go for the referendum anyway. You say that it doesn't look winnable, but we've seen with the referendum on the other topic that anything can happen, and frankly I think the politicians on the side of Independence are better at politics than those on the other side of the argument. In a campaign, I think they could surprise on the upside. Also, there is great potential for them to make Westminster look even more dysfunctional and problematic, even with the Tories gone. It's not like they will be that motivated to be co-operative partners in coalition.
Two, if they want to avoid the IndyRef then they always have the option of finding a pretext on which to collapse any coalition or confidence and supply agreement, in the hope that the hated Tories will come back. Who knows, they might be able to sort it so that a section 30 order is granted and they can force a UK general election before the date set for the referendum, which has all sorts of potential.
https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2021/0728/1237823-court-service-report/
https://twitter.com/i/status/1421676734664036357
That is two gold medals for British women in BMX, which is why SPotY betting is not straightforward.