Posted on 01/08/2007 10:30:49 AM PST by GMMAC
The Fianna Fail and Fine Gael parties represent the great majority of the Irish population, and they are ideologically the parties that agreed to the partition of Ireland - as opposed to the bomb-throwing Sinn Fein deadenders.
If the Protestants were to vote to join the Republic, Sinn Fein would lose all rhetorical justification for terrorism and 500,000 new Protestant voters in the Republic would obliterate Sinn Fein's representation in the Dail.
Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
"her first President, his entire Cabinet"
I don't think this is even technically true...but even if technically true, it is a huge exaggeration and very misleading.
Washington's ancestors on his father's side came over from England in the mid seventeenth century. I have never even heard it suggested that his mother was a Scot or or Scottish descent.
Jefferson was in Washington's cabinet - but his mother was born in London and his father was born in Virginia.
Hamilton was in Washington's cabinet - but Hamilton's mother was French, he was born in the West Indies. His father may well have been a Scot, but since he abandoned his son, and Hamilton's entire life was marked by him trying to overcome his illegitimacy, I don't think I would hold that up as an example.
Edmund Randolph was in Washington's cabinet - and though he was the son of a Scot, his father was a loyalist and returned to the homeland. Not exactly an American patriot. Don't think I would use that as an example, either.
Samuel Osgood was the final member of Washington's first cabinet. His father was English. Not sure where his mother was from, but to say he was a Scot or descended from a Scot is a real stretch.
Obviously John Adams (VP under Washington, not a cabinet member, but one of the most important architects of independence) descended from a long line of Englishmen. Franklin doesn't have any Scottish blood in him, either.
All that said, clearly the Scottish Enlightenment was enormously important for America and John Witherspoon was a true Scot and those are important facts. In fact, there are plenty of reasons to say why Scotland was important to American independence. That is true.
But to say that Washington and all of his cabinet were descendents of Scotland is simply false or so grossly exaggerated that has no meaning whatsoever.
Let 'em go.
The Scots would still be living in huts and sh*tting in holes if it weren't for the Brits.
Yeah but we keep the whisky and golf!
Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
Thanks Dad, I wont make the same mistakes as you.
I want the Scots to be independent of the brits. They are not at all brits. They should not be under the heel of the "Crown".
Has any country produced more first rate minds at least in proportion to size than England?
From a legal point of view Scotland was an independent nation identified as Scots most likely from the kingship of Giric in 878 until the Act of Union in 1707.
But from 1290-1357 there were dynastic conflicts in Scotland that resulted in English possession of some Scots territory and the existence of Scotland as an English client state.
That ended in 1357, making Scotland independent in both law and fact.
To accept the Union is voluntary one must obviously ignore the genocidal realities of little matters like the massacre that was Culloden and the Highland Clearances:
The Act of Union took place in 1707.
The Battle of Culloden took place in 1746.
The Highland Clearances began in 1725 or 1762 depending on your definition.
All this took place well after the Act of Union, not before it.
It is obvious that the Highlanders opposed Union. It is also obvious that they comprised less than 25% of the population.
The Union was voted on in the Scots Parliament and the Lowlanders, being three times as numerous as the Highlanders, carried the vote.
Perhaps Florence or Athens.
You have to go all the way back to the days of the city state!
Many, in fact. Look at the Greek city states. Samos produced Pythagoras, Aesop, Epicurus, Aristarchus, and Theodorus.
On an island that currently has 54k people.
The "days of the city-state" were not that long ago, historically speaking. Venice was until nearly 1800.
I think a perusal of ancient Greek history would answer that question for you.
I got into this conversation late. Sorry.
The contribution of the Greeks to what we are today should not be dismissed. The Scots are incredibly important to America, for sure...but the superlatives that are thrown around sometimes are not all that helpful. Scotland is not the most important. It's important. But it's not the mostest importantest of them all.
The present situation will change mightily in the subsequent generations due to the high Catholic birth rate in N.I. The present balance between Protestants and Catholics is about sixty-forty. It will be closer to fifty percent Catholic in twenty years or so at the present rate.
How did that slip past my radar? Links?
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