The Dish – Page 361

Threat Inflation And The Case For War, Ctd

Beinart takes the MSM to task for swallowing the government’s line on the ISIS threat:

Many publications have uncritically accepted Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel’s claim about the number of Americans who have gone to fight with ISIS—a figure that New America Foundation terrorism expert Peter Bergen argues is dramatically exaggerated. Other media commentary simply assumes that if Westerners go to fight with ISIS in Iraq or Syria, they’re destined to attack Europe or the United States. But that’s not true. Bergen notes, for instance, that of the 29 Americans who have gone to fight with the Somali jihadist group al-Shabab, none have tried to commit terrorism against the United States. One reason is that many of them ended up dead.

Press coverage of ISIS often ignores the fact that, in the past, the group has not targeted the American homeland. Jihadist groups, even monstrous ones, don’t inevitably go after the United States. Al-Qaeda began doing so as part of a specific strategy.

Keating stresses that for the most part, “the much-discussed threat of ISIS’s international fighters returning to their home countries to carry out attacks has been theoretical”:

As David Sterman pointed out in an analysis for the New America Foundation this week, “no one returning from or seeking to join a Syrian jihadist group has even been charged with plotting an attack inside the United States.”

Moner Mohammad Abu-Salha, the Florida man who returned to the U.S. for a time after training in Syria in 2012 and was under surveillance by the FBI, tried but failed to recruit friends to the cause, and eventually returned to Syria where he carried out a suicide bombing. If anything, greater U.S. involvement in the conflict will make ISIS—a group that until recently was most concerned with local territorial gains—more rather than less likely to target U.S. interests and citizens.

That’s what makes Yglesias uncomfortable with the way Obama talked up the threat on Wednesday night:

Public opinion always matters in politics and therefore in policymaking, but the fact of the matter is that the American people have this a bit mixed up. The beheadings are not the most alarming thing ISIS did this summer (try taking Mosul or genocidal violence against religious minority groups) and the rise of ISIS isn’t even the summer’s most alarming foreign policy crisis (try Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and apparent probing of Estonian and Finnish borders). There is no good reason for the United States to take maximal action against ISIS, not least because none of our potential partners in the region are going to.

Alarmist rhetoric and a policy of wise restraint make odd bedfellows. If the US catches some lucky breaks (or ISIS some bad ones) it may all work out for the best. But Obama’s speeches are writing checks his policy can’t necessarily cash. And eliminating ISIS’ ability to occasional kidnap westerners who travel into the conflict zone is much more difficult than eliminating its ability to capture new Iraqi cities or threaten major oil fields. If another shoe drops in a bad way, there is enormous risk that the president has set the country up for a cycle of unwise escalation.

The Scottish Vote Is Neck-And-Neck

No has regained a slight lead:

YouGov’s latest survey has No, on 52%, narrowly ahead of Yes, 48%, after excluding don’t knows. This is the first time No has gained ground since early August. Three previous polls over the past month had recorded successive four point increases in backing for independence. In early August Yes support stood at 39%; by last weekend it had climbed to 51%. …

A key reason for the renewed fears of independence is what might happen to people’s bank accounts. The biggest single advantage of the union cited by No voters is that the UK would have the resources to step in if Scotland faced another crisis of the kind that erupted in 2008.

Fraser Nelson focuses on the decline in support among the youngest voters:

You need to treat all Scottish polls with caution, due to the sample size and the fact that the turnout may be high enough to include people who polling companies don’t know exist. But YouGov found that the under-25s (the ones more likely to vote on the day, rather than by post) have switched form a 20-point lead for ‘yes’ to a 6-point lead for ‘no’ in under a week.

Now, 20pc of people born in Scotland have concluded that their future lies outside of Scotland. Being fully plugged into the network of the rest of the UK is an advantage: as a Scot in London I feel (and am treated) like a fellow countryman, not an immigrant. I have to say: it’s a good feeling, and one I’d certainly want to protect if I were a teenager mulling my future options.

Examining the coalitions for and against independence, Tom O’Grady argues that “the referendum has arguably ceased to be about independence at all”:

[T]he pro-independence coalition looks much like the types of groups that are rejecting conventional politics in Europe today more broadly. Younger and poorer voters show lower turnout in elections, are more likely to vote for anti-establishment fringe parties, and are scornful of traditional political elites. Overall, the Scottish National Party’s success has come partly from framing independence as a form of anti-establishment protest, as well as the sheer luck of holding a referendum that coincides with a Conservative government in the United Kingdom.

This means, though, that support for independence could ultimately prove fragile.

Adam Taylor profiles Alex Salmond, the leader of Scotland’s independence movement:

Salmond seems to divide opinion like few other politicians. He has substantial support, enough to be elected as first minister of Scotland, yet polls show almost as many are dissatisfied as satisfied with him. Strangely, women seem to have a particular problem with him: One recent poll from the Scottish paper Daily Record found that half of women surveyed saying his role makes them want to vote against independence. Salmond was described as “arrogant,” “ambitious” and “dishonest” by those polled.

Perhaps it’s logical that a man who espouses a radical plan would elicit both love and hate. But there’s an even bigger factor here: Salmond doesn’t just espouse a radical plan – he also promotes it very, very well.

Eric Posner approves of independence:

[W]hile it’s true that Scottish nationalists often make mystical arguments (as nationalists always do), the case for independence is based on serious policy considerations. Some Scots believe that independence would give Scotland sole ownership of valuable oil deposits off its coast in the North Sea. Although those resources may well be almost depleted, it is possible that advances in oil-extraction technology would enable Scotland to create an oil-financed welfare state like Norway’s.

More importantly, if Scotland were independent, Scots would control the whole array of policy instruments that Scotland now shares with the rest of the U.K.—above all, taxing and spending. The Scots would be able to govern themselves however they want—and that includes putting into place the more generous welfare state that the more right-leaning English public has denied them.

Though not against independence in principle, Megan McArdle has misgivings:

My basic position on this sort of thing is that if places want to be independent, they should be independent, unless the reason that they’re seeking independence is so they can have more freedom to oppress minority populations. Yet I can’t say this seems like a good idea, for reasons that my friend Alex Massie has ably outlined. Scotland is a net recipient of transfers from the U.K. government, so going it alone will probably require some belt tightening. The process of separating all the intertwined institutions, from banking to education, will be daunting.

But Justin Fox outlines how breaking off could be economically beneficial for Scotland:

What has made small countries so economically successful over the past few decades is less their smallness than the ways they’ve taken advantage of it. David Skilling, a former New Zealand government official and McKinsey consultant who now advises small-country governments and companies from a base in Singapore, has spent as much time thinking and writing about the strengths and weaknesses of small states as anybody. In a 2012 paper that should be required reading in Scotland, he lists two main characteristics of successful small states:

1. They’re cohesive, and thus able to make policy decisions quickly and stick with them.

2. They tend to make good policy decisions, in part because they’re very aware of the world around them and what it takes to compete in it.

Ilya Somin searches for historical parallels:

One relevant precedent is the experience of the “Velvet Divorce” between Slovakia and the Czech Republic, whose success is sometimes cited by Scottish independence advocates as a possible model for their own breakup with Britain. Like many Scottish nationalists, advocates of Slovak independence wanted to break away from their larger, richer, partner, in part so they could pursue more interventionist economic policies. But, with the loss of Czech subsidies, independent Slovakia ended up having to pursue much more free market-oriented policies than before, which led to impressive growth. The Czech Republic, freed from having to pay the subsidies, also pursued relatively free market policies, and both nations are among the great success stories of Eastern Europe.

Like Slovakia, an independent Scotland might adopt more free market policies out of necessity. And the rump UK (like the Czechs before it), might move in the same direction. The secession of Scotland would deprive the more interventionist Labor Party of 41 seats in the House of Commons, while costing the Conservatives only one. The center of gravity of British politics would, at least to some extent, move in a more pro-market direction, just as the Czech Republic’s did relative to those of united Czechoslovakia.

Jason Sorens watches the markets:

So far capital markets seem to be telling us that the economic costs of independence to Scotland would be significant but not catastrophic, and that they would be virtually nil to the rest of Britain. How much of those costs are due to the policies Scotland would implement after independence, rather than secession as such? It is difficult to know, but the differential returns to particular firms give us a clue. Transportation companies have closer links to the state, so a more statist policy regime might not hurt them. Financial companies might lose because of the lender of last resort issue (Scotland might not have a credible one). Energy and engineering companies might lose because nationalists want to tax oil heavily to fund social programs. Also, stricter environmental laws may hurt the electric utility SSE, which lost heavily on Monday.

Speculatively, then, capital markets seem to be telling us that the costs of secession as such are modest, but that the costs of dramatically different economic policies are substantial.

And Simon Lester doesn’t see what all the fuss is about:

In terms of war and peace, there have been no Mel Gibson sightings that I’m aware of. On trade, there may be some bureaucratic challenges, but it seems clear the goal is for Scotland to join the EU and be part of its large, single market. As for trade with the rest of the world, Scotland will take on the EU’s trade policy–which is not perfect of course–but has followed the trend toward liberalization that the rest of the world has pursued over the past few decades. In all likelihood, Scotland will continue to search for export markets for its whisky and allow the free flow of imports.

If Scottish independence meant it would become like North Korea, I’d be concerned. But it doesn’t seem like that’s the path it is on. With the exception of a few regions, we live in a highly integrated, peaceful world. Scottish independence would not change that.

Previous Dish on Scottish independence here.

Abuse In The Public Eye, Ctd

A reader broadens the conversation on domestic violence:

I watched with full video of the Ray Rice incident, and one of the first things I noticed is that outside the elevator, when Ray is waiting for his fiancée (now wife) Janay, she walks by and hits him in the face. She definitely did not connect hard, but it is clear she did connect. Then inside the elevator, she attempts to elbow and punch him in the head, and when he retreats, she comes at him with her fists up in a fighting stance. It is only at this point that Ray punches her. You can see the full video here. [Update: Another notes, “It has been reported (ESPN etc.) that Rice spit in Janay’s face twice – before they entered the elevator and right after they entered the elevator, and her physical movements were reactions to both events.”]

I am a man and I was once the victim of domestic violence from a woman. She would hit me and take advantage of the fact that I would never hit back.

It is likely that this was not the first time Janay hit Ray, and based on the fact that she had no hesitation to square off with him, she may have done it many times before and he never hit her back. He may have gotten tired of this and warned her he would start hitting back.

It is certainly wrong of Ray to punch Janay. It is also wrong for Janay to punch Ray. It is certainly wrong to blame the victim, and at the moment Ray hit Janay, she was the victim. But every other time she hit him, including just moments before he hit her, he was the victim, and being the victim of
repeated domestic violence can make someone stop thinking clearly.

It seems we all want to talk about Ray punching Janay, but no one wants to talk about the punches Janay directed at Ray. Until we do that, we aren’t really talking about the truth of what happened there and what happens all the time in our society. We are only talking about a made-up narrative that does not match reality. So let’s start talking about reality. We need to talk about how men can avoid being the victims of violence from women, and what they can do to protect themselves without striking back.

Update from a reader, who elaborates on the first update:

I have no idea what video your reader watched, but it doesn’t appear to be the same one the rest of the world did. While, yes, Janay Rice lightly taps Ray Rice on the chest before they get in the elevator, I don’t think you could even call that a “hit”. It’s somewhere between a light brush and a tap, and it doesn’t look particularly malicious – let alone violent. Also, when the two are in the elevator, Ray Rice is closing in on her, and it looks like he’s trying to intimidate her when she sort of pushes him away. He spits on her, etc. Then, she clearly loses her temper and moves toward him, and he knocks her the hell out.

This statement, from your reader, gives the game away: “We need to talk about how men can avoid being the victims of violence from women, and what they can do to protect themselves without striking back.”

Yes, men certainly can be the victims of domestic violence – I’ve been one myself. But treating the issue as if it’s even remotely an equal problem is the trademark of a men’s rights advocate, who sees the plight of poor, oppressed men as equal to the violence propagated toward women – this would be laughable, if it weren’t so tragic. Men are far, far more likely to injure, abuse and murder their partner than women are; it’s not a remotely equal situation, and treating it as such undermines the very real danger millions of American women are facing every single day.

Who Ted Cruz Won’t Stand With

Cruz got booed off stage at a Christian event:

Peter Grier provides background:

On Wednesday night, the Texas GOP senator gave a keynote address at a gala sponsored by a group named In Defense of Christians. The organization’s objective is to focus public attention on the plight of persecuted Middle East Christian groups. Near the end of his speech, Senator Cruz said, “Christians have no greater ally than Israel.” At this point, some in the audience started to boo, according to eyewitness accounts and video of the incident. Cruz continued with, “Those who hate Israel hate America. Those who hate Jews hate Christians.” At that point, the boos got louder and things began to get out of hand. Eventually, Cruz decided he could not continue.

Elizabeth Dias determines that “Cruz’s problem was one of context”:

First, he pinned his remarks to the conflict between Israel and Hamas when one of the group’s primary agenda points was actually the plight of Iraqi Christians. Second, Christians are far from a monolithic group, especially when it comes to views on policy on Israel and the Middle East. The American evangelicals Cruz typically addresses tend to be worlds apart historically, culturally, theologically, and politically from the Christian leaders in attendance.

Larison feels that “Cruz was completely out of line to set some kind of ideological litmus test for the attendees that requires them to endorse the ‘pro-Israel’ views that Cruz happens to hold”:

Cruz is free to hold those views, and many of his voters agree with him, but it is obnoxious to demand that others, including many Arab Christian clergy in attendance, subscribe to those views in order to obtain Cruz’s sympathy for their plight. Not only is “standing with Israel” irrelevant to the reason for the summit, but as this incident has proven it is a completely unnecessary distraction from the work of the organization that sponsored the event.

Jonathan Tobin sees the story differently:

Today, Christians find themselves under tremendous pressure in a region where true freedom of religion only really exists in Israel. Yet some who claim to represent Christians are once again outspoken in their hate for Israel and even absurdly blaming the Jews for their plight at the hands of hostile Palestinian Islamists. Instead of making common cause with Jews who are also targeted because of their faith, some Christian groups have become among the most outspoken advocates of hate against Israel.

But Dreher doesn’t think that is the issue at hand:

Anti-Semitism among Christians, Arab and otherwise, is appalling, but it doesn’t sound like that’s what was at issue here. Ted Cruz came to this event apparently seeking to score points with a domestic US political constituencies at the expense of the desperate need for international Christian solidarity in the face of horrendous persecution by ISIS and other radical Islamic groups. To add to the insult, now Breitbart, a leading website of movement conservatism, questions the Christianity of these Arab men and women in that Washington room.

This is beyond infuriating. Arab Christians in the Middle East face persecution and death every day, simply because they are Christian. And this Dr. Susan Berry person on Breitbart distorts the truth — saying that Cruz was booed because he supported Israel, when in fact he was booed because he turned his speech into a pro-Israel lecture to a hostile audience — and then writes as if the only thing worth knowing about the Christians in that audience is that some of them had met with Hezbollah.

Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry, who calls himself “a full-throated supporter of Israel,” was disgusted by Cruz’s antics. He contends that Cruz was “using one of the world’s most beleaguered minorities as a prop for his own self-aggrandizement”:

Cruz tarred and attacked one of the most powerless and beleaguered minorities in the world, solely for personal political gain. He was speaking truth to the powerless. He was strong against the weak.

In the end, what was most striking about Cruz’s tirade was the last phrase: “If you will not stand with Israel and the Jews, then I will not stand with you.” Cruz was literally standing in a room with his fellow Christians. In the Bible, the idea of the fellowship of Christian believers is a very important one, and to break fellowship is to put oneself outside the community. What Cruz was saying was that agreeing to his views on Israel was more important as a badge of fellowship than believing in Jesus Christ.

Omar Baddar calls out Cruz for conflating “Israel” with “Jews”:

When the crowd booed Cruz for praising Israel as an ally of Christians, he responded by saying “those who hate Jews hate Christians.” That would be an interesting argument, except no one in the crowd was booing Jews. In fact, the transcript and audio recording of the speech clearly show that when Cruz said, “Tonight we are all united in defense of Jews,” the crowd was united in applause. And Cruz’s ending statement of “if you will not stand with Israel and the Jews” demonstrates an inexcusable conflation of the Jewish people, on the one hand, and Israel on the other. The former is an ethno-religious group, and hostility toward them is indeed hateful bigotry, which should be opposed by all people of conscience. The latter, however, is a state with an egregious record of violations of human rights and international law.

And Jonathan Bernstein hopes that we’re “not really going to pretend that Ted Cruz had a ‘Sister Souljah Moment’ when he stormed off”:

A true Republican Sister Souljah moment wouldn’t involve taking on opponents of Israel. Rather, it could be a smackdown of Republican-aligned fans of Israel who use extreme language. Or it could involve going to some mainstream conservative event hosted by opponents of comprehensive immigration reform and bashing someone who had used extreme anti-immigrant language. Or (as Rand Paul did) questioning Republican efforts to raise hurdles to voting.

You know what would be a real Sister Souljah moment for Cruz? Denouncing his own father’s comments.

But He Defends Your Right To Drink It

Joseph Stromberg questions the safety and value of raw milk:

Raw milk might be more dangerous and no more nutritious than pasteurized milk. But this issue isn’t entirely black-and-white. For a few reasons, it’s unfair to paint raw milk proponents as recklessly anti-science, like those who oppose vaccination. For one, even though raw milk may be riskier than pasteurized milk, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the riskiest food out there. Milk is a relatively low-risk food to begin with, and some researchers estimate that the risk of getting sick from drinking raw milk is still lower than from eating home-cooked chicken or hamburgers.

The CDC provides detailed data on disease outbreaks caused by contaminated food going back to 1998, and during that time, raw milk or cheese have been involved in 149 different incidents (that doesn’t mean it’s the contaminated ingredient in each instance, just that it was suspected). It’s tough to find a good comparison, because raw milk is an uncommonly-consumed food. But raw oysters, for instance, were involved in 144 incidents.

A Growing Industry In Colorado

Colorado’s recreational marijuana sales have now surpassed medical marijuana sales:

Many legalization proponents welcomed the latest sales figures. But they don’t necessarily mean the imminent demise of Colorado’s black market. “I don’t think the increase in sales necessarily reflects a decrease in the black market, although it may,” Brookings’ [John] Hudak said in an interview. The sales increase could be due to “increases in marijuana tourism – an industry growing pretty rapidly in the state.”

A cultural shift is also likely under way, as more residents dip their feet in the recreational market. “It might reflect a relaxation of state residents where people are coming around and saying ‘Ok, this is real, this is legit and I’m not going to get arrested for it.’”

Katy Steinmetz keeps an eye on marijuana tax revenue:

During the month of July, the state received $838,711 from a 2.9% tax on medical marijuana, meaning that patients spent an estimated $28.9 million at dispensaries. The state meanwhile raked in $2.97 million from a 10% sales tax on retail marijuana, putting those sales at about $29.7 million, according to calculations by theCannabist.

Though that amounts to a less than $1 million gap between retail and medical sales, this is a small victory for champions of legalization who have argued that the experiment will be profitable for the state, as revenues have lagged behind some expectations.

Early this week, Jon Walker passed along a poll finding that Coloradans have no regrets – 55 percent support the legalization law:

Although a sizable minority still doesn’t like the new law there is little active opposition to it. Only 8 percent of adults say they are trying to have the law overturned. On the other hand, roughly half of the people who favor the new law say they are actively supporting it. Both the raw numbers and the intensity of support are with the pro-legalization side.

If voters and politicians in other states are “waiting to see” how legalization goes in Colorado the general consensus seems to be that it has gone pretty well. Most Coloradans are happy with legalization and would do it all over again.

Pregnant With Depression, Ctd

Andrew Solomon has a fascinating piece on the subject:

While the drugs are risky, depression during pregnancy is at least as problematical. Animal studies show that stressed mammalian mothers are likely to have offspring with poor neurodevelopment. Pregnant women experiencing depression or anxiety are under greater stress and may have altered neurobiology themselves, which could affect fetal development via changes in the uterine environment. Indeed, untreated depression during pregnancy is associated with increased miscarriage rates, preterm birth, and low birth weight—some of the very risks associated with maternal use of S.S.R.I.s. Depressed mothers are at increased risk for preeclampsia. Recent research has shown that the fetus of a depressed, expectant mother has alterations in the microstructure of the right amygdala. There is even some evidence that mothers who are extremely stressed during their first trimesters may be more likely to have children who later develop schizophrenia. …

At the same time, it is important not to blame mothers for their children’s neurological challenges. The shadow of the “refrigerator mother,” who was said to cause autism, falls long across this research. It may be counterproductive to tell women under stresses they cannot avoid that they are damaging their children by being unhappy—or by being treated for their distress. Blaming some women for injuring their children by taking antidepressants and others for injuring their children because they are depressed creates a no-win situation that is itself depressing.

There is no universal right answer here, and, under those circumstances, quoting the studies may seem counterproductive. But women need the leeway to make their own choices—to look, as one does in many areas of health care, at two unsatisfactory options and select between them, and to do so with as much information as possible.

Previous Dish on the subject here.

What Will Happen To The Wilderness?

Fifty years ago last week, Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Wilderness Act. David Biello assesses what’s happened since:

[M]ost wilderness in the continental U.S. is not untrammeled land. Wilderness areas are often former working landscapes—the Orwellian phrase created by the logging industry to explain away clear cuts—whether they were cleared for logging or farming over the course of the 19th century and early 20th centuries in places like the Adirondacks. The great forest that once covered the eastern U.S. has been re-growing for the last 50 years, even if its primeval quality may be illusory, given the exotic animals and plants that now live there. And, in this era of global warming, even the Artic and other remote spots show signs of human trammeling—whether the leavings are plastic detritus or a changed climate.

How he thinks about the future of the wild:

Wilderness poses this fundamental question at least: what kind of place do we want for our home? Will our terrestrial abode retain an abundance of plants, animals, microbes and fungi like the world Homo sapiens was first born into? Or will the Earth become a vast monoculture, a grim subset of nominally wild species that co-exist in symbiosis with modern human civilization, like rats and seagulls? “Is being an asteroid the great purpose of our species—to steal the lives and homes of millions of species and billions of creatures?” asks political scientist David Johns of Portland State University, in his essay in “Keeping the Wild.”

In the end, wilderness is a state of mind. The natural world can only persist now as a deliberate act of human will. That will require firm human purpose as a gesture of humility, yes, but also a form of self-protection. “This is not really an ‘environmental problem.’ It’s a human problem,” writes environmental historian Roderick Frazier Nash of the University of California, Santa Barbara. “What needs to be conquered now is not the wilderness, but ourselves.”

Update from a reader:

In David Biello’s article, the word “untrammeled” is misused. To be trammeled means to be restricted, such as a trammel used on a horse. To be untrammeled means to be not restricted or hampered. (I learned what “untrammeled” meant in 1972, in my first weeks of Park Ranger training at Grand Canyon National Park.)

The Wilderness Act says that wilderness is an area that is “untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.” So wilderness is a place that is unrestricted by mankind, or as noted in Wikipedia, “meaning the forces of nature operate unrestrained and unaltered.”

In this article, “untrammeled” is confused with a word like “untrampled.” (It’s a frequent mistake.) For example, the author writes: “And, in this era of global warming, even the Artic [sic] and other remote spots show signs of human trammeling—whether the leavings are plastic detritus or a changed climate.” This is a clear misuse of the word “trammeling.” Biello should be informed of this mistake and a clarification from you might be in order.

(Photo by Jocelyn Kinghorn)

The Quality Of Britishness, Ctd

A reader quotes a previous one:

“Separation of Scotland has more than political implications. For many of us who do not have any vote in the matter, it carries profound implications about our identity, and what our nationality means.” Yeah, I feel this pain. I’m as Scottish as it gets, and I don’t have a vote in the matter either. I was born in Scotland, hold (only) a UK passport, have lived in England and the US, and now live in Canada. If independence happens, my life is turned upside down. The practical and emotional effects would be unimaginable. Every little page of immigration paperwork, my right to travel freely, my relationship to “home” – whatever that is – all in limbo. If I’m reading the propaganda – sorry, the White Paper – correctly, we will be forcibly repatriated to a new state while living abroad! God help us all.

Expat Scots will suffer as much disruption from this independence experiment as anyone, maybe more. But we do not get a vote. That makes me furious. I mean, 16 and 17 year olds living in Scotland have been franchised especially for this occasion, but I don’t get to play? Am I supposed to hope that they have my best interests at heart?

So I have to sit here, watch, and stew, while the future of my home, my nation and my identity is decided for me. Forgive me, but fuck the whole thing.

Another view:

I’m puzzled by your readers who worry about being unable to feel British if the Scots vote to secede. If, say, France were to leave the EU, does that mean I could no longer feel European?

Of course not. Europe is more than its political institutions. The concept of Britishness is not defined by the scope of the Westminster parliament.

I hope the Scots vote for independence, because I think they will create a kinder, fairer and happier society than the UK has become. Perhaps one day they’ll invite those of us in north-east England to join them: my roots are English not Scottish, but culturally, politically and geographically I feel closer to Scotland than I do to London.

Another draws a distinction:

To get a bit technical about it, Scotland cannot separate from Britain – at least not without employing a tremendous amount of earth-moving equipment. “Britain” is a geographic term, not a political one. It is, of course, short for “Great Britain,” the name of an island called such because it is the largest of the many British Isles. Scotland can leave the UK, but it is stuck in Britain forever. The Scottish will always be British. If sharing an island with the English and the Welsh is part of the Scottish identity, then separating from the UK will not take that part away.

Another reader:

The letter you posted from the descendant of the Jacobite veteran of Culloden at first surprised me. How can an American, whose family has been in the USA since before the USA existed, be thrilled that “we” might be out from the English thumb? You and your ancestors have been free of the English thumb for more than 250 years!

This is an example of how ancient political issues in Europe find a long echo in America. My own family is immigrant Irish, and like so many others, my ancestors came to America to escape the civil unrest in Ireland during the late 1800s and early 1900s. They were devoutly Catholic, adamantly anti-British, and staunchly Republican.

I visited Ireland for the first time in the weeks after the Omagh bombing, and I was surprised to find that the locals I met were quite cool to me, and rather keen to have me on my way. After awhile I realized that this was because they did not particularly trust Irish-Americans like me. My – and so many others like me – views on Northern Ireland came to me almost unchanged from Grandpa’s views in 1916. I think that is why there was such support for Irish republicanism (i.e. terrorism) from the succeeding generations of Irish Americans. The locals were in no mood for another American’s nostalgia for Grandpa’s stories and how Grandma sang Republican songs as a lullaby.

In short, it caused me to realize that Ireland didn’t stop when Grandpa stepped on the boat at Westport. Obviously this phenomenon is not confined to the Irish-American experience, and can last far longer than the few generations of my family’s experience.

Another shifts focus:

As a Canadian, I’m fascinated by the parallels between England/Scotland and Canada/Quebec. Consider the following rewrite of your original post:

It’s a prickly country, bristling often at [Canada], its exports to [Ottawa] often having more than a bit of a chip on their shoulders. … It’s politically well to the left of [the rest of Canada], and is a big net beneficiary of [Canada’s] Treasury. After a while, if you’re [an anglophone Canadian], and right-of-center, and taxed to the hilt, endlessly subsidizing the [Quebecois] in return for their thinly veiled disdain, you get a bit irritated. Deep, deep down in my [Canadian] soul, there’s a “fuck ‘em” urging to come out.

This, I think, accurately captures some of the feeling in anglophone Canada around the time of the last referendum on sovereignty in 1995. The interesting thing to note is the way Quebecois separatist sentiment has ebbed and flowed over the years. When times are good, the separatists seem to lose sight of the real economic difficulties that an independent Quebec would face: concerns related to a separate currency or monetary union, how to divide up things like the national debt, what’s going to happen to growth and investment after the split, etc. – in short, many of the same issues facing Scotland. When times are not so good, the citizens of Quebec seem to recognize the benefits that they receive from remaining part of Canada and talk of separation largely disappears. This suggests to me that support for Scottish independence may move in the same way – greater support in good times and less when times are tough.

There is an important difference, however, between Canada and Britain: the division of powers between the provinces and the federal government in Canada is much more clearly defined than in Britain. The responsibilities of the federal government and the province of Quebec, while they have been tweaked over the years, are largely fixed by the constitution and other legislation; the situation in Britain seems much less well defined and, as a result, it seems like the politicians and citizens of Britain are more likely to misunderstand or misrepresent the relationship.

What I mean by this is that Scots who feel that Scotland should be independent have more latitude to feel that they’re getting a raw deal, since the deal they have is not really all that well defined. Similarly, the English who want to say “fuck ’em” to the Scots have more latitude to feel that the Scots are getting more than their fair share, again because the terms of the deal are not well defined.

One solution to this would be for Britain to hold a “constitutional conference” with the goal of spelling out, exactly, what exactly is the status of Scotland, England, Wales, and Northern Ireland – are they states in the American sense? Are they provinces in the Canadian sense? Are they something else? Removal of the uncertainty around this relationship might go some way toward resolving Scottish complaints about the union.

Another also looks at the Quebec parallel:

The aftermath of Quebec’s “no” vote was ugly – the reason the referendum lost was because the non-francophone minorities voted nearly unanimously against succession (many Native Americans – or First Nations as is the term up there – swore they would never be part of an independent Quebec given the ugly history with the Catholic church/Provincial government). After the defeat the leader of the successionists basically said they lost because of “money and foreigners” (many read money as “Jews” and foreigners was easy enough to understand). There was also more uncertainty surrounding that vote – nobody knew how Canada would have reacted to a “yes” vote. After the defeat, the Canadian Supreme Court issued a ruling that set out future ground rules for succession, but at the time of the 1994 vote there was no agreement re: potential currencies, etc. so the economic uncertainty was even greater.

And yet, it was 49-51%

My view from afar: If Scotland can’t even stay a part of the U.K., the Middle East is doomed to unravel into goodness knows how many tribal mini-states.

Update from a reader:

I just got a little taste of your life! A reader responded to my comment by saying:

How can an American, whose family has been in the USA since before the USA existed, be thrilled that “we” might be out from the English thumb? You and your ancestors have been free of the English thumb for more than 250 years!

I didn’t mean our family in America is under the English thumb. I meant we would be thrilled the Scots in Scotland were finally free of the English!

How you do this day in and day out, with people parsing every word you write, is beyond me.

The Best Of The Dish Today

So we now discover that Turkey will not participate in the coalition against ISIS. Turkey will not go to war against an Islamist insurgent group that controls territory on Turkey’s own border. They are scared of what ISIS will do to 49 hostages seized in Mosul:

Ankara is therefore reluctant to take a stronger role in the coalition against ISIS militants in apparent fear of aggravating the hostage situation. “Our hands and arms are tied because of the hostages,” the official told AFP. Turkey can open Incirlik Air Base in the south for logistical and humanitarian operations in any US-led operation, according to the official who stressed that the base would not be used for lethal air strikes. “Turkey will not take part in any combat mission, nor supply weapons,” he said.

So the only Muslim country in the coalition assembled in Wales is just doing humanitarian stuff. That’s how dire they believe the threat from ISIS is – and they live next door! Without Turkey, we are left with the Saudis on one side and the Iranians on the other. In other words, a Shiite-Sunni alliance against extremist Sunnis. That sounds like a strategy that won’t end in tears, doesn’t it? And notice who’s really on the hook now: the US, as always. The Brits too – for all their harrumphing – also won’t conduct air-strikes.

The Congress, under these circumstances, should demand a vote and tell the president no. If you agree, call your representative.

On another note – and because you are Dishheads and because the great Joe McGinniss is dead, I feel obliged to link to this story on the latest reality show brawl involving the entire Palin clan (except for Trig who, you might have noticed, has disappeared from the public eye the moment he wasn’t politically useful to bolster Palin’s pro-life credentials). This blog-post about the ill-fated party is priceless:

Just about the time when some people might have had one too many, a Track Palin stumbles out of a stretch Hummer, and immediately spots an ex-boyfriend of Willow’s. Track isn’t happy with this guy, the story goes. There’s words, and more. The owner of the house gets involved, and he probably wished he hadn’t. At this point, he’s up against nearly the whole Palin tribe: Palin women screaming. Palin men thumping their chests. Word is that Bristol has a particularly strong right hook, which she employed repeatedly, and it’s something to hear when Sarah screams, “Don’t you know who I am!” …

As people were leaving in a cab, Track was seen on the street, shirtless, flipping people off, with Sarah right behind him, and Todd somewhere in the foreground, tending to his bloody nose.

And, for some reason, we’re still listening to that crackpot John McCain on foreign policy. Seriously, after Palin and Iraq, does he have no shame left? Do TV’s bookers?

Today, I broke ranks with a president I still want to support and I still admire – because I sincerely believe this latest pragmatic pirouette is dangerous to our national security, and terribly damaging for the process to slowly move away from anti-terror over-reach. We aired the bullshit legal rationale for the war; and demanded a simple answer to why we are doing this again – and expanding its scope to Syria. Readers had their say about last night’s speech here.

Plus: a classic beard of the week; a defense of Britishness as an inclusive nationality; and continued our thread on domestic violence and #whyistayed. The most popular post of the day were my live-blog of the speech last night and A Pragmatism Too Far? Many of today’s posts were updated with your emails – read them all here. You can always leave your unfiltered comments at our Facebook page and @sullydish. 20 more readers became subscribers today. You can join them here – and get access to all the readons and Deep Dish – for a little as $1.99 month. Gift subscriptions are available here. Dish t-shirts and polos are for sale here. A reader writes:

After six months of reading your site, the frustration of not being able to read below the fold got to me and I finally subscribed. I read The Economist for the hard news and you for the unique insights you bring to current news. I consider myself a Terry Pratchett humanist and I often find myself in both agreement and vehement disagreement with you, often within the same story. Please keep up the good work.

The Dish team will as well. I’m on my way to Portland, Oregon, to speak at the International Cannabis Business Association at the Oregon Convention Center. I’ll be speaking at 9.30 am PST on Saturday, if you want to say hi.

I gotta rush for the plane now … so see you in the morning.

(Photo: A woman places flowers in the inscribed names along the edge of the North Pool Memorial site during observances at the site of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2014 in New York City. By Justin Lane-Pool/Getty Images)