Tom

What we need are journalists in the Scottish Parliament.

Someone with intelligence, sincerity, but most of all, a positive vision for their nation.

Not "boneheaded" or "third rate".

Hold on a minute Tom. Could you be the man to put your name forward? Are you prepared to make the sacrifice for your nation?

Ehm, no. I've read your articles. No vision, no ambition. Decidedly third rate.

Labour are losing, so it's a plague on all your houses from you - lets condemn the whole parliament.

Your article is embittered. There is a mixture of talent at Holyrood - it reflects Scotland, and hopefully the quality will improve as confidence and responsibilty develops.

Jobs for the boys and control freakery are the outgoing Labour's problems - they'll get their chance to reinvent themselves at leisure in opposition.

But the fresh start for the parliament will be with the outstanding First Minister Alex Salmond, who has the team, the ambition and the confidence to take Scotland forward.

Tom, the problem with Scotland is people like you. You have spent most of your life denigrating, despising and demeaning your own country. And YOU have the affrontery to condemn the msps? At least they have tried to improve the lot of the Scottish people. Tom Brown, you are not required in the new Scotland. Get thee to a numptery, to a numptery go!

Agree with the first two posts. Brown encapsulates that old negative Scottish political establishment mantra; 'Scotland is rubbish, vote Labour'.

I can just imagine all those voters thinking to themselves "what Scotland needs is change. What can we do to get it? I know - I'll vote Labour yet again!" As unconvincing arguments for extending Labour's term in office to FOURTEEN YEARS go, that's right up there with "that smug guy off Dragon's Den agrees with us (kind of)".

Is my MSP a numpty? Difficult to say.. She's invisible most of the time.

With the exception of Belorussia, a Russian Federation subsidy junky which Professor of History Niall Fergusson often compares to Scotland, there can be very few peoples on this earth who do not want to determine their own futures! Since 1945, according to the United Nations, over 143 new nations, large and small, have emerged as a result of political or military conflicts, amicable seccesion, or territorial disintegration! Former British, Belgian, Dutch and French colonies, previous "unitary states" like the former Czechoslovakia, the United Slavs: Yugoslavia, and the greatest post-Cold War example of the new Commonwealth of Independent States, all fall into these categories. (also, the reverse happened after the old Soviet Union collapsed, the East Germans did not seek to found their own state or remain within the C.I.S. but naturally sought reunification!) The vast majority of these new nations were previously held against their political or military will in straitjackets of artificial states! Ironically, Iraq with its diverse peoples, presently falls into one of these categories with the new autonomous Kurdish government in the North of the country free of the terrible sectarian violence and insurgency in the divided South! The likely outcome will be a sub-divided and more peaceful Iraq? Yet, the Scots still cannot bring themselves to discard their economic and political comfort blanket of England vis-a-vis Great Britain? However, it has completely escaped the Scots that even prior to Devolution, Scotland has always been a semi-autonomous nation! However, a half-way house is no longer suitable for the globalisation of the 21st Century! Whether or not the Scots vote for complete seccesion from the United Kingdom is still open to question but as one politician famously stated: "after Devolution, it will be impossible to put the genie back in the bottle"!
Lachie Todd

Tom Brown is so far up Gordon Brown's backside you can only see his shoes ( just )

It's always amazed me that so many people vote for Labour when all they do is denigrate our great country.

We're forever being attacked by the English press about subsidies etc. yet Blair, Brown, Reid et al (all Scottish) never stand up for us!

And yet people keep voting for them like sheep. Time to open your eyes people...

Tom,

Not a very constructive article. You don't say how to solve the problem.

Yes he does - he says vote for the best candidate.

I find this a useful article. As somebody expelled from the LibDems for writing to this paper calling for going for growth by the Irish method & the absolute necessity of new nuclear I can confirm that there is no place in that party for intelligence. Naill Walker, clearly very capable though a bit Green for my tastes, won his council seat for them, without either their expectation or assistance & has since quit in disgust. Since they have not been less ept than the other parties I assume the same applies elswhere.

Only thing I disagree with is his list of professions which should be represented in parliament. To my mind we have more than enough lawyers & teachers & a grave shortage of engineers, accountants & scientists. Everybody in China's polituburo is an engineer, among other things, & they seem to be surviving.

A nation deserves the consequences of the electoral choices it makes. I've been a daily reader of "The Scotsman" for more than a decade, and have followed the rise and fall of both Labour since devoloution. I agree with Bodach beag, but with one key difference. It matters not whether Tom's message is "a plague on all your houses." What matters is whether the Scottish voters send that message also.

Tom Brown says "If the SNP squeezes into power, we will be in uncharted territory. But if Labour beats the odds and is the biggest party with a reduced mandate, it should be seen as a vote for change and a new start for devolution."

DEAR TOM-THAT STATEMENT IS BEYOND RIDICULE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Devolution is not worth saving. Independence is the way ahead

What we need is normal powers for our country.

http://www.scottishindependence.com