The issue with cruise line tourism

April 13, 2022  Quiet before the arrival of the cruise tourist hoard

Recent headlines regarding the negative impact of the massive industrial-scale tourist cruise ships heaving up quayside in Scotland prompted a quick search back into the blog.  I knew I had addressed it.  See: https://whitleyworldtravel.blogspot.com/2022/04/orkney-demographics-change-is-coming.html 

The original article dealt with Orkney's demographics, not cruise ships per se.  But, after witnessing the first of the annual exodus of massive cruise ships to dock in Kirkwall in 2022, I could not help but interject a  dismissive observation...namely, "A growing local debate is taking place as to whether the highly touted benefit of cruise ship visits to the local economy even offsets the costs." 

April 13, 2022  Polar exploration ship Spitsbergen opens the season at Kirkwall

Recent headlines reviewed the impact of the evermore massive cruise ships.  Last year, the report cited Carnival's fleet of 63 ships (the heavy weight in industrial-sized cruise lines) as being responsible for more sulfur oxide pollution in 2022 than all of the cars in Europe combined.  A billion cars.  That's a lot.  Carnival, the world's largest cruise line, was also responsible for producing more carbon dioxide than the entire city of Glasgow.  Startling data by any comparison.

But Miami-based Carnival is not by itself, of course.  There's also MSC Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Lines.  And there's also slightly more responsible cruise line companies like Hurtigruten and Disney Cruise.  There's profit in it no doubt; but to what effect?

Cruising is one of tourism's fastest growing sectors.  From a mere 21 vessels in the 1970s, the sector has exploded to 515 today...a 24-fold increase.  Ships themselves have more than doubled in size, and they're still growing.  Worse, the issue is not just air pollution; it's also sewage treatment and water quality, to say nothing of solid waste disposal.

Transport & Environment, Europe's leading advocate of clean energy, issued a damning report on the industry.  The cruise tourist system is stretched.  And it may be breaking in the not too distant future.  Venice, for example, has banned large cruise ships.  Several other ports are considering following suit.  The result, at least in Venice, was an 80% reduction in air born pollutants.  So it is possible to address the problems...if there is a will to do so.     

Personally, the market has all the appearance of being saturated.  Mature, in a word, to the point of being a routine boom-bust cycle.  In any case, what with 5,600 to 7,000 fellow tourists in tow, it's not exactly like "getting away from it all".  You sort of bring 'em with you.  Citing the earlier blog post, "It is becoming clear that "industrial scale tourism" is not all it has been cracked up to be." 

April 13, 2022  square wake leaving Kirkwall and the Spitsbergen on Earl Thorfinn

Lions House allotments

April 1, 2023--Lions House

Walking Berwick's Elizabethan walls, we came upon the Georgian mansion, Lions House c. 1807-1809.  Prominently placed in the Elizabethan fortifications (it is the highest ground in Berwick),  Lions House is a Grade II* listed property that has been restored. 

April 1, 2023--One of the lions

An "icon of the Berwick skyline" according to the Berwick Civic Society, the three story Lions House (or four if coming in from the rear) is a free standing neighbor of the Gunpowder Magazine.  It affords a wide ranging view of Tweed Estuary, and really the whole way down the Northumbrian Coast toward Lindisfarne.  The house is guarded by two 17th century Venetian lions at its front entrance, which give the name to the place.

April 1, 2023--Steel door to Gunpowder Magazine

 

April 1, 2023--Tweedmouth from the Walls

The renovated Georgian house is a holiday let, a self-catered accommodation (three bedrooms let out) at a relatively trendy £1435 pounds for a three night stay.  We pass along the link, if anyone is interested.  Currently managed by Crabtree & Crabtree: (https://www.crabtreeandcrabtree.com/properties/lions-house/).  For ourselves, accommodations at the newly opened Premier Inn were fine enough, and the Premier Inn was right next to the Walls at Sandgate anyhow.  

A note about listed properties in the UK.  Grade II* listed buildings are buildings of particular importance, or with a more-than-special interest.  Which means:  it may not be demolished, extended, or altered without permission from the local planning authority.  So, a preservation property essentially.

Not to wade too deep into ongoing urban planning disputes in the UK, but it is somewhat a stretch to claim that developers are unable to develop at all--and thus there should be fewer listed buildings.  In their entirety, listed buildings only comprise about 2% of British building stock, and they do reflect the architectural heritage of the UK.

April 1, 2023--The lions

If I had a voice in the ongoing arguments, it would be to err on the side of conservation.  After all, once it's gone, it's gone.  Now it is true, as far as Georgian buildings go, they're something of a dime a dozen in the UK--to risk being flippant.  They are not, in themselves, especially rare.  What makes Lions House specially interesting is that, as far as I can determine, it is remotely linked to L.S. Lowry, the acclaimed English painter from Manchester.  Remotely.  Or rather, tenuously.

April 1, 2023--Lions House

Often vacationing in Berwick, and smitten by the Lions House Georgian charms, Lowry considered buying Lions House in 1947.  He was dissuaded from doing so by an architect report of the house's alleged dampness.  Lowry was himself quite a character--an only child, a tyrannical mother, never married, never had a girlfriend...but had a strange relationship with an underage girl who grew up and to whom he bequeathed everything, including his paintings.  Another story for another time.

By 1971, Lions House stood neglected.  And consideration was given toward demolishing it.  Then it had a reprieve.  First, it was listed, and in 1972 (though some say 1976), Colonel JIM Smail stepped in and purchased the property.  In 1977 he presented it to the Berwick upon Tweed Preservation Trust which Smail chaired for 23 years, before passing in 1995.

April 1, 2023--One of the lions

Smail was a well known figure in the Borders for industrial development, but also for developing tourism and for his environmentalism.  But basically, the Smail family were newspapermen.  In 1947 (the same year L.S. Lowry considered buying Lions House), Smail inherited a small group of Borders newspapers called the "Tweeddale Trio"--namely, Berwick Advertiser, Berwickshire Advertiser and Kelso Chronicle.  In 1950, Smail bought the Southern Reporter and formed the Tweedsdale Press Group which was sold in 1999 to Johnston Press, and finally liquidated in 2020...victim of the economic and demographic times.  Lost to COVID we'll call it. 

April 1, 2023--The other one

On the lions, there are two "identical" (they really aren't, but hey) snarling recumbent stone lions with curled tails. They are flat at the back, which suggests they were once attached to the walls of a building.  The Victoria and Albert Museum (the V&A--world's largest museum of applied arts) identified them as likely being seventeenth-century Venetian.

For our interests, though, we were fascinated by the Lions House Allotments.  Allotments are a curious social construct mostly practiced in the UK, where gardening is a national pass time.  They take gardening seriously.

April 1, 2023--The allotments at Lions House

Ignoring serfs, crofters and tenancies from earlier ages, modern allotments can be traced to the industrial revolution in the 18th century.  As an inducement, workers in towns and cities across the country might be given a smallholding as part of their wages on which to grow their own food.  Keeping an allotment is now governed by "The Allotments Act 1922" and its subsequent revisions.  

The Act forms the basis of the rules of the Lions House Allotments Association, a private charity, which is overseen by the Town Council.  In addition to the Lions House Allotments, Berwick-upon-Tweed Town Council now manages allotments at Five Arches Recreation Ground, Blakewell Gardens, and those adjacent to the former Kelso railway line. 

In 2019, an architectural firm was approached by a private client to restore Lions House, which they recently purchased in the private market as the Berwick upon Tweed Preservation Trust sought to rationalize its holdings.  It had fallen into disrepair despite the earlier intervention of the Berwick Preservation Trust in the 1970s.  

The Allotments Association, which formed in 2018, helped open the door for the Preservation Trust.  The site was separated--Lions House and Lions House Allotments.  And the Association bought the Lions House Allotments site, comprised of 52 allotments.  

April 1, 2023--The allotments

Ownership of allotments was not really the purpose of the Preservation Trust.  Ensuring that the land was preserved as allotments, however, was.  So, through a clause in the sale contract that the site would remain in use as allotment gardens in perpetuity, the Trust was able to sell the allotments to this new charity.  And everyone went home happy.

Rent by the way is set by the plot size.  But it is very affordable.  A majority pay under £30 per year, plus all have agreed to pay a supplement to accumulate a maintenance pot for the future.  It is little wonder, therefore, that the waiting list for an allotment is longer than several lifetimes. 

April 1, 2023--The allotments

Ye Olde "diversionary amorous attentions"

 

April 9, 2023--Circular stair at Etal Castle's Tower

Previously mentioned, after spending Easter at Etal and Ford Estate, we took a direct route back to Galashiels on the secondary B6350 road on River Tweed's south bank from Cornhill, passing through Carham and then crossing the bridge southwest of Kelso.  

Historically, the B6350 route was not always a "less important" road.  To the contrary.  In the medieval age, the English Borders citadel of Wark Castle once stood along the route.  Wark was a key linchpin in the network of strongholds in England's fortified defense of the Borders.

Against the counsel of his court, King James IV of Scotland declared an ill-advised war against Henry VIII of England on July 26, 1513.  Allegedly, James IV was "entangled" in the Auld Alliance with France.  And over the centuries since, the Auld Alliance has been foisted as cause.  How much was "entanglement" and how much was opportunistic choice is debatable.

April 9, 2023--Etal Castle tower

In any case, James IV crossed into the English Borders on August 22, 1513 at Cornhill with a force estimated at 60,000 (estimates vary widely from 35,000 to 100,000).  Despite where sources may land in the arguments on the number of troops, this was still one of the largest Scottish forces ever to invade England.  Roughly speaking, the Scottish army marched over the present day B6350 route to lay siege and finally wreck the important English stronghold at Wark Castle.  Its ruins, now merely a tall mound, are only 1.6 miles east of Carham on B6350. 

April 7, 2023--The Black Bull in Etal; our evening meals over Easter

At least as practiced by James IV, chivalry is a thing that we don't do much of these days.  Fortunately or unfortunately depends on one's view.  Among other things, such as basic human foibles, it was chivalry that "did in" James IV.  It imposed impractical if not impossible rules on warfare...to the detriment of those who attempted to follow them.  It was folly for a nostalgia of something that never truly existed in the first place.  War is not, nor has it ever been, "gentlemanly".  

April 9, 2023--Ok, so we're tourists!  Heatherslaw Light Railway at Etal

The Scots did not strictly gain Wark Castle by force of arms.  The castle was betrayed by an Englishman who deserted its garrison.  With Wark fully invested by the Scots, the traitor hoped to curry favor with the Scottish King.  The Scots indeed made use of the Englishman's statements and identified the weakest points of Wark's defense.  As for any favors, though, Scottish King James IV hanged the Englishman--for committing treason against the enemy English.  Such was the age of chivalry. Odd ways.

April 8, 2023--Medieval Twizel Bridge, still standing!

In another example of chivalry, on the morning of 9 September 1513, the Scots watched English columns marching over Twizel bridge to form up.  Scot cannoneers were forbidden to shell these columns, as James IV chivalrously believed that the English were too vulnerable in the column movement.  Catching an enemy in such a vulnerable state, one would think, was the whole objective of the exercise.  Regardless, Scot cannons did not open.  This chivalric war-fighting cost the Scots a nation.  Many thousands of lives.

April 8, 2023--River Till from Twizel Bridge; castle on ridgeline

Twizel Bridge, with its distinctive fluted arches, was completed in 1511.  Though no longer bearing vehicular traffic, remarkably the bridge is still in decent shape.  We walked over it in our brief hike to Twizel Castle.  As the only dry crossing of lower River Till, the bridge was strategically important.  Both armies used it in the Battle of Flodden Field.

April 8, 2023--Twizel Castle above River Till

Bragging rights from razing Wark Castle were short lived.  Less than three weeks later,  James IV, King of Scotland, would be killed along with the better part of his army at Branxton Moor (Flodden Field) late afternoon September 9, 1513, thus earning James IV the dubious sobriquet of being the last British monarch killed in combat.

April 8, 2023--Ford Castle gate

Ostensibly, the casus belli for James IV declaring war was England's invasion of France...but there are notable sub-clauses.  James IV's counselors did not want a war.  And, had James IV been pragmatic, he would have reasoned that the Treaty of Perpetual Peace (enacted by James IV upon oath before the altar at Glasgow Cathedral on December 10, 1503) was more or less holding for the past decade.  So invasion was not a wise choice. 

Besides, as part of that peace deal, James IV married Margaret Tudor, sister of England's King Henry VIII.  The so-called "Marriage of the Thistle and the Rose" at Holyrood (Edinburgh), August 8, 1503.  A 30-year old Scottish King and a 13-year-old English bride. 

April 8, 2023--Walls at Ford Castle

The marriage began producing heirs, which meant that only the future King Henry VIII and his successors (if he was to have any) stood between James IV and succession to the crowns of both Scotland and England.  And Henry VIII was failing to produce heirs.  Patience alone would have yielded James IV or his progeny mastery over the whole of Britain.  So, contrary to heroic portrayals, James IV was not exactly an unwitting haplessly entangled victim bound by the Auld Alliance.  

That excuse does not exonerate James IV.  He had a number of options short of a large-scale invasion.  Foremost, he could have kept his oath made before the altar in Glasgow--maintain the peace.  Chivalrous behavior, it seems, is highly selective.  Instead, he foisted the Auld Alliance and war.  "Auld" was an understatement.  A mutual assistance treaty dating back to 1295, the alliance was built upon shared interests of France and Scotland...as they may have been in 1295.  Respective interests were not necessarily the same 220 years later, when James IV declared war.  Europe had changed.  So had Scotland. 

April 8, 2023--Saint Michael and All Angels; Ford Estate

If anything, James IV was an opportunist.  Looking for any pretext to exercise the Auld Alliance and an invasion, the Scots claimed they sought to revenge the murder of Robert Kerr, Warden of the Scottish East March.  Kerr had been killed by a Northumbrian (John 'the bastard' Heron) in 1508.  Invading five years after the fact was, at best, a suspect and very delayed revenge, considering Sir William Heron, Lord of Ford Castle and half-brother of 'the bastard', was being held hostage in Fast Castle (a coastal fortress in Berwickshire) for the deeds of his kinsman...as was common justice in that age.  If you can't find the fugitive, jail his next of kin.  Sir William's absence from Ford Castle would play a large role in James IV's defeat at Flodden Field.

  

April 7, 2023--Church of St. Paul at Branxton received body of King James IV

Casting about for excuses to invade, James IV next claimed revenge for English privateer seizures of Scottish merchant ships.  In that day, piracy was de rigueur.  They all did it.  Lastly, James IV alleged he only received partial payment of Margaret's marriage dowry.  Thin gruel to justify war...having remained married for the past 12 years.

April 7, 2023--Branxton church

An aside, but lessons on foreign entanglements were well studied by our American Founding Fathers.  In his farewell address (September 19, 1796), President George Washington admonished Americans "to steer clear of permanent alliance with any portion of the foreign world."  

This is not to say that Washington sought to dishonor all existing international treaties.  To the contrary.  Washington qualified his comments, adding:  "...so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements."  He made no call for isolation, as some now claim.  It was more an appeal to caution and wisdom.  

Following the sack of Wark and the chivalric hanging of the English deserter, the Scots made an about-face.  They marched back on the same B6350 route and laid siege, bombarding and finally capturing Norham Castle after five days.  

[Norham Castle will be discussed in a separate post.]

April 8, 2023--Norham Castle

After the prize of Norham was bagged on August 29, 1513, the Scots made another about-face and marched west to the River Till, seizing Twizel Castle (or what remained of it after it was wrecked in 1496 during Scotland's abortive support for a pretender to the English throne).  James IV next took Etal Castle and Ford Castle.  At this point, the invasion was more a large-scale border raid.  That is how the Scots may have perceived it...at their own peril.

When James IV arrived at Ford Castle, it was occupied only by Lady Elizabeth Heron and her daughter.  A fortuitous circumstance for James IV.  But not so much his army.  

James IV was a known womanizer.  Besides his legitimate children, he had numerous illegitimate with many mistresses.  Unlike nearby Etal, James IV did not sack Ford.  Without definitive proof, many have speculated that Lady Heron purposely engaged in "diversionary amorous attentions" with James IV...as did her daughter. 

Robert Lindsay of Pittscottie (Scottish chronicler, c. 1532-1580, about whom very little biographical information is known beyond his authorship of the Chronicles of Scotland) crudely called the dalliance between James IV and Lady Heron a "bout of stinking adultery and fornication".  Harsh words.  And also an opinion written perhaps 40 years or more after the events had unfolded.  Still, Lady Heron did have vested interests--she wanted to spare Ford Castle and get her hostage husband released.

April 7, 2023--View toward Scotland; St. Michael's; Ford Estate

Over the ensuing five centuries, many have speculated that Lady Heron was part of an elaborate English scheme to delay James IV.  If she was, it worked.  James did stay too long at Ford "dallying".   By the time he finally moved, the English had assembled their forces, were on the march and were nearly in position.   

Scottish accounts cast Lady Heron as a villainess and lay the defeat at Flodden Field entirely at her feet.  Yet, while she may have distracted or delayed James IV with "diversionary amorous attentions," she had far less to do with the outcome than did James IV himself.  Branxton Moor would have largely been avoided had James IV opened a cannonade upon Lord Surrey's English vanguard with its limbered artillery in tow as they crossed River Till on Twizel bridge the morning of September 9, 1513.  The English would have been caught dead to rights, one might say.

April 7, 2023--Farm at Flodden Field in burn where thousands of Scots perished

Instead, a misguided unrequited chivalry intervened and Scotland was lost with The Fluuers o the Forest.   

 

 

 

 

 

 

Houston, we have a problem

April 4, 2018--Sycamore Gap Hadrian's Wall

News from the U.K. reports a maddening and hateful act of vandalism.  The Sycamore Gap Tree (in a protected World Heritage site) was deliberately felled overnight, September 13th or early 14th.  Two suspects have been arrested for the act--one a 16-year old and one a man (so-called) in his 60s who should've known better.  The investigation is ongoing.

The Sycamore Gap Tree (informally called Robin Hood Tree after its cameo in the 1991 movie Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves staring Kevin Costner) was sent smashing into and over the top of the 1,900 year old Hadrian's Wall.  Damage to the wall too is inexplicable.  Hadrian's Wall is a world class archeological site, one that is visited daily by people from the world over.  The wall once marked the edge of Rome's Empire.  As to social development, it was instrumental in the evolution of both England and Scotland. 

Barbarians from without are not so reckless as those from within, it seems.  One could wax philosophically upon the senseless assault upon the symbolic life of Northumberia that the sycamore represented.  But words would change nothing.  And besides, we are daily besieged by similar cultural attacks and wanton environmental destruction replicated (or mutated) worldwide nowadays.  

April 4, 2018--Sycamore Gap Hadrian's Wall

That is certainly so in America.  No longer are we confined to mere spray painted graffiti and tagging.  We are hurtling toward a Taliban-like thuggery by malcontents through which extreme nazification is metamorphosing before our very eyes.  A transition from juvenile delinquency into full grown hate mongers who repeatedly demonstrated their willingness to mass slaughter, all for no real grievances at all beyond their own madness. 

April 4, 2018--an "interesting" weather day on our Hadrian's hike

Their only apparent goal is to rid this world of any life, any joy, any kindness or compassion whatsoever.  What a wretched empty existence they salivate after!  Crazed by demons themselves, and condemned to their own self-inflicted emptiness, the road they take certainly cannot be mistaken as one leading to the Promised Land; nor does such brutish vandalism lead to salvation.  Far from it.

April 4, 2018--Hadrian's Wall

We endure the cultural wreckage wrought by value sets such as the fundamentalist Taliban who destroyed the significant Salsal and Shahmama Buddhist sculptures in 1991 as being un-Islamic.  But this is not limited to one religion.  The Taliban are little different than were the iconoclasts who defaced ancient Christian monuments during Cromwell's day.  Senseless degradation has been taken up by such practices as "rolling coal" where diesels are deliberately converted (despite federal and state laws banning the practice) to create black smoke screens of unburnt fuel that dangerously clouds and obscures the roads (so called "Prius repellent") to say nothing of everyone else breathing the stuff.  Senseless, considering the price of fuel lately.      

April 4, 2018--Sycamore Gap Tree

On it goes.  Normally, rational beings analyze their actions or at least measure whether their return is worth their effort.  What return could there possibly be in walking over a mile off the B6318 road that traverses Hadrian's Wall, traipse across wet moorland that has been sectioned by barb wire while carrying a long bar chainsaw in the middle of the night...just to cut this 300 year old world renowned landmark down?

The only evident return from this act was to feed cruelty.  As if our world had need for any more.  

We are beyond what is called schadenfreude, the human psychological deformity that was metastasized by the Nazis, all the way from Blockleiter to Reichsinspekteur.  We again return to the realm of vicious sadism, a Reich that should've stayed buried 80 years ago.  We are in serious trouble as a society, as a civilization.  Infested by demons that cultivate cruelty, they feed like gluttons upon suffering.

The debris field is expanding.  Houston, we have a problem.

Resignation out of necessity

Some word is probably warranted at momentous turning points as this.  We live in historic times to be sure.  Though, it is often not so easy to tell that from our vantage in harried every day living.  Taking in the view (orienting the map so to speak) goes unnoticed in the clutter of cares.  

On occasion, it is rewarding just to pause awhile to appreciate the vista.  This we hope to do soon, to pull up and span the landscape of Eildon Hills from Scott's View.  Scott's View was a way stop for renowned Scottish writer Sir Walter Scott as he went about his business in the Scottish Borders.  It is said, so common was Sir Walter's brief pause at his favorite view that the horses pulling his hearse from his home at Abbotsford to his final resting place at Drybugh Abbey eerily stopped at Scott's View without command.  A last view, it is said.  

Since time immemorial the Eildon Hills have been the stuff of folklore.  Well before the arrival of the Romans by several thousand years, the Eildons were considered portals to the enchanted lands of the fairy folk.  In any case, following Sir Walter's lead, each of us should take more time to reflect...meditation instead of medication.        

As for reflecting upon Scotland's near term political future, the word "surprising" comes to mind.  No other word describes the recent resignation of Scotland's longest serving First Minister (FM) Nicola Sturgeon. After 8 years at the helm, FM Sturgeon's resignation was undeniably a surprise, a Valentine's massacre of a sort.  No one was prepared for it.  Nor is Scotland well prepared for the outcome of the constitutionally mandated election, currently ongoing, to replace FM Sturgeon.  Scotland has until March 27, 2023 to decide where it will stake its future.   

These observations should be tempered.  Native Scots may well bristle at comments from abroad about their parliamentary doings at Holyrood.  Still, we humor ourselves as having accumulated at least a small opinionated voice in regards to Scotland's political affairs, having been many times to Scotland on our Easter sojourns.  As an aside, Holyrood is a "metonym" for Scotland's government.  It is similar to using Washington when referring to America's government.

With that grammatical note made, my opinion of FM Sturgeon's tenure is less than genial.  Sturgeon's government (under her SNP--Scottish National Party) has made a horrible mess of just about everything they've had their hand in...including the latest constraints upon grammatical pronouns it seems.  It is inexplicable, almost bizarre really, that Sturgeon's tenure in office would end in ruin upon the senselessness of a reactionary New Age cultural war...the garbled straits of "transgenderism".  "Woke" gone amok.  

The sad part is, it is not as if Scotland has no other more pressing needs to attend.  But, reactionaries do what they do.  Reactionaries, whether American, or Scottish, or any other, seldom afford themselves much in the way of reflection or meditation.  That's why they seem to always end up in messes. 

As to messes, the CalMac ferry contract comes to mind.  Ignoring the highly questionable aroma of kickbacks and contract corruptions, the people of Scotland's isles rely upon ferry transportation.  In many cases it is a matter of dire need, sometimes life or death.  Comparatively then, the fanciful reconstructions of pronouns (or for that matter re-plumbed personal bodies) do not even make the list of noble pursuits or sensible governance. 

Meanwhile, the necessary construction of two CalMac ferries remains five years overdue and some £112 million overrun.  FM Sturgeon's young protege, Finance Secretary Kate Forbes, has continually shifted goalposts on the ferries.  No end in sight.  This debacle notwithstanding, Secretary Forbes (now on maternity leave) may be considered Sturgeon's most likely replacement come March 27.  SNP options are thin.  So it will either be Forbes or Deputy First Minister John Swinney.  For his part, Swinney promises a "rigorous approach" to the ferries that remain in the now nationalized Ferguson docks on the Clyde.  Taking on the role of Acting Finance Secretary (with Forbes out on maternity leave), "rigorous" Swinney permitted Ferguson shipyard to miss its deadline for filing its annual accounts.  And so it goes.

[Editor note:  On March 27, the less than competent minister Humza Yousaf was elected as FM for the SNP, Forbes placed second, and Mr. Swinney stepped down.]  

If it were only the ferries, maybe one could ignore.  But it's also bus lines, with routes being eliminated and possible strikes and protests over losing access to rural local public transportation.  Then, there's Scotrail, a rolling mismanagement that is now nationalized.  Its trains are vital to Scotland's economy.  They are also under rolling labor strikes.  Ditto the Highland airports.  To put it mildly, public transportation in Scotland is in disarray.  Then there are the teacher strikes, and the nursing strikes. 

 

FM Sturgeon could find nothing more pressing than to introduce transgenderism and continue to push an independence referendum despite the UK court's clear rejection of Holyrood's authority to do so?  Despite the 2014 vote (which rejected the SNP independence drive), it was understood that that would be a once in a generation vote.  Ah, but the SNP further shifts the goalposts.  Short generations in Scotland it seems...unless you're talking about the delivery of crucial ferries.

Bottom line, FM Sturgeon's resignation was the only way she could extricate herself and retain any dignity at all.  It's been 8 long years of nothing but a mess in the guise of forcing an ill-thought independence--one in which the SNP would of course remain in power.  Sensible or effective governance is apparently beyond the SNP's abilities.  It too should step down, en masse.  Roll up the banners. SNP clearly cannot handle basic governance over public transportation, public health, public education... 

So, what to do?  Paper over inadequacies and push an incomprehensible transgenderism bill.  That also failed, and so FM Sturgeon had no other way out, her resignation being too little too late.  It was illogical to push to be a new sovereign nation, not when so many of Scotland's basic needs have not been met by the very same political party seeking to manage Scotland's independence.  

By way of example, their latest independent plan calls for continuing use of the British pound until the SNP can come up with some sort of currency.  Maybe Bitcoin?  As if that's working well.  If CalMac ferries are any indication, an independent currency will take years upon years at an ever increasing cost.

Perhaps Holyrood should join us in our reflections at Scott's View.  Besides, tales of fairy folk in the Eildons are no less fanciful than depending upon the word of the SNP.   

“For he that does good, having the unlimited power to do evil, deserves praise not only for the good which he performs, but for the evil which he forbears.”--Sir Walter Scott.              

 

Birds

"Rommel, you magnificent bastard! I read your book!"--George C. Scott in the epic 1970 film Patton.

There's no use avoiding it.  A prefatory admission is necessary.  This post examines an uncouth  subject--politics.  And while not always completely unsullied by an occasional jaded jibe in previous commentaries still, in general, this blog avoids politics altogether.  That boorish subject is akin to a transmittable contagion, where intelligent discussion ends on life support once bitten.  

We prefer more enlightening genres like Scottish sojourns; archeological sites; historical subjects; and folk wisdom when it may be found.  And humor, it is hoped however vainly.

Politics is an uncomfortable subject best avoided around the table.  It is also true that one cannot always avoid it.  Thus, modesty compels me to request a fig-leaf to conceal undue embarrassment for even mentioning politics in polite company.  My fig leaf is requested in the ambition that perhaps something may be learned.  So with forlorn hope, an age-old axiom is sorely needed today--simply:  learn from your foes.

Exactly how long this axiom has counseled human kind is not knowable.  It's been around awhile, Patton notwithstanding.  Book of Proverbs alludes to it.  And its fullest expression is found as early as Aristophanes, the Ancient Greek playwright, in his 414 BC comedy "Birds":

“Men of sense often learn from their enemies. It is from their foes, not their friends, that cities learn the lesson of building high walls and ships of war; and this lesson saves their children, their homes, and their properties.”

Aristophanes' Birds took second place in the 414 BC festival at Dionysia in Athens.  Indeed, Aristophanes often took second place with his theatrical comedies--2nd place in 427 BC with The Banqueters; second place in 421 BC with Peace.  

Yet to paraphrase recently elected Speaker (in name only perhaps) Kevin McCarthy of California, "It's not how you start, but how you finish that counts."  True...if one can assume that it is indeed finished.  From the sounds of partisan factions, particularly those in McCarthy's own party, that forecast might be a tad too sunny.  

As for the perennial runner-up Aristophanes, he is now considered the greatest playwright of ancient Greek old comedy. His works (said to total 40 plays, of which 11 are essentially complete) are preserved in the greatest quantity.  So, the last laugh must belong to Aristophanes, the runner up.  His works testify to freely spoken political criticism, licentious humor, satire and even invective.  In other words, I may have gotten along well with the gentleman. 

Aristophanes' Birds begins with two middle-age Athenian men who are sojourning on a hillside wilderness, one of whom tells the audience that they are fed up with life in Athens where people do nothing other than argue over laws all day long.  The two Athenians, guided by a pet crow and a pet jackdaw, seek a mythical kingdom and a better life.  

The play then descends into burlesque and a fantasy bird kingdom "Cloudcuckooland".  [Irrespective of the recent (2021) novel of the same name by Pulitzer Prize winner Anthony Doerr, it was Aristophanes who coined the term in 414 BC.]

The cleverest of the two Athenians hatches an idea and gives a formal speech to the birds, telling them that birds were the original gods, not the Olympians.  He urges the birds to reclaim their lost powers and privileges.  (Which is to say, the 2020 "Big Lie" ala 414 BC.)  Naturally, the birds were won over.  They urge the two Athenians to lead them in war against the Olympian gods.  After a series of comedic encounters with the Olympians, the smartest Athenian is finally crowned king and presented with the scepter  of Zeus.  (Think:  a flashy Speaker's gavel.)  All's well that ends well, borrowing from another famous playwright, W. Shakespeare.   

Given the expanse of 2400 years, it is remarkable that so much of ancient Greece's literary works were preserved at all.  The inherent wisdom and evident buffoonery of these comedies are open and available to modern times if only contemporary humans would read.  But they won't. 

Similar to the burlesque of Birds, Speaker McCarthy gained the House gavel (or scepter) after an excruciating 15 votes.  The same exercise repeated over and over to the point of disturbing Einstein's spirit itself.  In fairness, a drawn out voting carousel for Speaker has happened in US history a time or two.  In 234 years of our democratic republic, to be exact, 14 such multiple Speaker ballots took place.  The last time being exactly 100 years ago in 1923.

That 1923 ballot took four days and nine ballots to reelect Frederick H. Gillett of Massachusetts as Speaker.  Then, as now, insurgent Republicans within a thin House majority deadlocked the balloting over disputes on rules, procedures and committee chairs.  Then, as now, the ultimate choice for Speaker was a party guy who only nominally lead his caucus, one who was in line for the job having been a dutiful long serving party establishment fellow.  

In the end, Gillett would be a weak figurehead, unable to contain inner-party strife.  Whether that will be Speaker McCarthy's fate too has yet to materialize.  But certainly, strong parallels exist.  As in 1923, today’s rebels want to weaken the speakership (in that they apparently succeeded) as well as weaken the Republican party’s governing structure.  They also seek a transfer of power to individual members, but only to some individuals--meaning themselves.

In the decade before the War Between the States tore this nation apart, three contentious nearly successive Speaker ballots occurred--63 ballots to elect Howell Cobb of Georgia (31st Congress, 1849); 133 ballots to elect Nathaniel Prentice Banks of Massachusetts (34th Congress, 1855); 44 ballots to elect William Pennington of New Jersey (36th Congress, 1859).       

 

The evidence indicates that it is a fool's game to encourage contentious balloting for Speaker.  It leads only to deepening divisions, hardened hatred.  And if experience is a guide, it leads to the dismantling of our nation.  Friends can be made of enemies, thus vanquishing the enemy...if we were men of sense.  Difficult work?  Yes.  But it is also the secret of Christian strength.  If we do not, then we should consider the consequences of further division.  These were eloquently stated by Andrew Oliver during the "Bleeding Kansas" debates in the 34th Congress after over two months of Speaker balloting.     

“The liberties of a nation may be struck down, without the loss of one drop of blood, by a contemptible body of disciplined troops in conjunction with a very inconsiderable body of the citizens, united together for the destruction of public liberty.”—Andrew Oliver of New York, August 30, 1856, in the House of Representatives.

There is a season, a time, and a purpose under Heaven.  We have broken much in the clamor for tearing down.  History as well as future indiscriminately torn asunder.  Yet somethings are load bearing walls that once removed will collapse society.  It is well past time to rebuild, to save, or all we will have left us is the inheritance of a ruin in Cloud Cuckooland.