The fall of Sturgeon

I don’t specially want Sir Keir Starmer to be prime minister, but if that is the eventual price of Nicola Sturgeon’s resignation, so be it. Although Ms Sturgeon’s political skills deserve respect, her rule in Scotland has been rigidly ideological and thus – by an apparent paradox – corrupt. If you believe you are the political version of Calvin’s elect, you can do no wrong. You therefore create a one-party state, police force, civil service etc staffed by your own supporters, and crush any dissenters. As a result, your country becomes divided and badly governed. Eventually, your righteousness traps you in extremist insanity – in this case, maintaining that a dangerous male rapist is a safe woman. You thought you were an angel, so you fall like Lucifer. Of course, it remains possible that an SNP government run by a more moderate person (Kate Forbes?) might stay on top, but it seems likelier that the spell has been broken. Polls, including Lord Ashcroft’s latest study, suggest that voters have gradually come to realise that the SNP was really only interested in an independence referendum and its associated anti-English racism, rather than improving the lot of Scotland. Staying in the Union, perhaps under a Labour government beholden to Scottish votes, feels safer.

Keeping abreast as best I can – information leaks out in small drips – of coronation plans, I find anxiety. It is not really about the main elements. The King will be properly crowned after all, in a traditional service which is specifically, deeply religious rather than merely nominally so. The military elements are also in order. The anxiety is of the ‘What’s going on?’, ‘Who’s in charge?’ variety. The head man for state occasions is the Earl Marshal, the Duke of Norfolk, whose grandfather did it so brilliantly for the coronation of Elizabeth II, but the present Duke seems downbeat.