“I WOULD not lead you into the promised land if I could, because if I led you in, some one else would lead you out” – Eugene Debs, International Workers of the World.

Independence shot ahead in the polls during the rigarendum. Yes, rigged for all to see on social media. Yet, the campaign was lost in the last 48 hours.

Alex Salmond, formerly a real live economist for the Royal Bank of Scotland, lost a TV debate to Lord Darling, of all people, a former supporter of John Maclean’s workers’ republic who was pictured with that banner as a radical student. Scottish banks and trade unions and most former Scottish institutions no longer exist. Great Britain has become greater, at Scotland’s expense.

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Not a country in the world bottled independence on currency. Ireland just used England’s pound till they were ready to punt it. Alex should have argued that paper money is not real wealth. It is merely a yardstick for measuring wealth. Real wealth lies in a county’s resources and the education and skills of its people, which we have in abundance.

Alex’s throwaway “once in a lifetime” remark has been used time and time again to say that we don’t want independence and can’t have a referendum, or a mandate, or have this and that. Alex resigned and tried to split the movement by relentlessly attacking the SNP, to the delight of the Unionist media.

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As Shona Craven pointed out in Tuesday's National, the whole of the externally controlled media in Scotland is anti-SNP and anti-independence. At the time of the rigarendum and for a good while after, all we had to rely on was social media, as pointed out by another correspondent, who wanted to know what happened to that. Social media is now a vile space to inhabit, with pop up “independence” parties each more full of invective towards the SNP and anyone who dares question them. It makes the mistake of trying discuss the matter, or reason with them, impossible. Such is their hatred.

No wonder the English nationalist media, who used to loathe Alex Salmond, suddenly uses him and his supporters as a weapon to split the independence movement asunder. The person that can lead you into the promised land can just as easily lead you out of it.

Donald Anderson
Glasgow

MY word for today, for the week – and indeed for the “UK” Conservative and Labour parties, including their branches in Scotland – is SELECTIVE.

In the Unionist press and mainstream media it is there for all to see that just about everything they stand for, both at home and internationally, is selective rather than inclusive – selective ethics, selective morality, selective rights, selective humanity, selective respect, selective depravity, selective compassion and selective DEMOCRACY.

I’m sure that this list is not comprehensive so please feel free to add to it.

I really believe that most people in Scotland do not share this way of thinking and behaving.

We could do so much better here with independence.

James Dippie
Dalry

OUR new FM has announced that he will “dedicate every fibre to driving economic growth” (FM: We will drive economic growth across Scotland, May 13).

Here’s what he should do:

1) follow the Welsh in revaluing properties for council tax;

2) correspondingly reduce Scottish Government support for the now richer councils;

3) use that saving to slash income tax for the low-paid.

Will this happen? No, because too many MSPs have valuable properties and would lose out big time.

George Morton
Rosyth