SO IT WAS UNION DAY...

And they held a rally in George Square

They look so happy that they won, don't they...all 8 of them

But they were subdued by comparison to their celebrations a year ago

I read in Stuart's interview in the National (and Wings) that this was one of the things that encouraged him to fight on.

I one hundred percent with that. 

After all, it's not unreasonable to be enthusiastic and excited when you win. And I'm not suggesting that this was the way that all unionists behaved or wanted to behave. Indeed many unionists decried this behaviour. I'm sure there were elderly ladies who had been warned of barbed wire fencing, and no pensions, starvation and, for all I know,  the black plague, who were just sitting at home grateful that they could continue to receive the most niggardly pension in the developed world, and that, if they could but afford the train fare, they would be free to visit their great nephew in Carlisle without passing through Miliband's Checkpoint jock!

Ray Bradshaw @comedyray

Important to remember that those in George Square don't represent the no vote, they're just mindless scumbags who would've done it anyway.

But when I read about, and watched videos of people who had told us over and again that they were proud Scots, burning Saltires, intimidating children, and making Nazi salutes, I decided that I'd never bend the knee to that kind of filth, no matter how many decent unionists there were who felt as disgusted by this as I was.

But after all their celebrations, you have to ask what exactly it was they won. They, it seems to me, gained a little time maybe? And that's all.

No matter how you look at it, it's not really worked out well for them. SNP membership has risen to 120,000; Labour lost 97% of its seats in Scotland including that of their new leader; Liberal Dems lost 90% of their seats and the Tories who had hoped to make gains, held on by 800 votes to their one rather pathetic little MP. The Minister of State at the Scotland Office has had to be appointed from the ranks of newly minted Aristocrats. Polls show that the SNP is on target to win a majority in the Holyrood General Election in May.

Why then, after they won so handsomely?

The politicians had started reneging on the Vow within 24 hours, and they went on doing it. 

The Vow (and associated assurances made by Gordon Brown because no one would believe Cameron or Miliband and hardly anyone knew who Clegg was) had the backing from the prime minister, the deputy prime minister and the leader of the opposition. It promised the devo max that had been so clearly denied to us by Cameron at the Edinburgh Agreement talks.

Perhaps some of us Scots had imagined real powers, like they have in little Gibraltar, The Malvinas/Falklands, The Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey, even tiny Sark with its 600 residents.

Fat chance.

The Smith Commission was a joke from minute one with 4 people from the Independence parties, and 6 from the Unionists. 

They weren't given time to read even 20% of the submissions from Scottish people. The listening exercise was a joke. It came down to what the panel proposed, and it seems that the Labour Party spent half their time on the phone to London getting instructions on what to think. 

Unbalanced and unacceptable.

And before it reported to the people (as was promised), it had to report to the Tory/Liberal Democrat Cabinet, who tore it to pieces and scrapped proposals that didn't accord with the whims of Theresa May and Iain Duncan Smith.

At its beginning it was a poor man's devo max, by the time it was finished it was a mess of a few extra powers, most of which were meaningless without Full Fiscal Autonomy.

Some of the powers that have been devolved are difficult if not impossible to use. 

We will have greater powers over income tax. Of course no one has dared to use the ones we already have, income tax being a sacred cow since the days of Thatcher. The only way we could ever change income tax is if we had power to alter VAT, or other big money earning taxes. But we don't!

We can't even alter one band of tax without altering another; we can't make new bands of tax; we can't alter thresholds. 

In short we can charge billionaires more if we want, but if we put up the higher rate of tax by 5%, we have to put it up 5% on the people who are half starving on minimum wage.

It's a joke.

It's an insult.

And even Gordon Brown, it's most enthusiastic supporter a year ago, says it hasn't been delivered. Despite the fact that he stood guarantor.

Westminster said what it needed to, in order to win. Then, having won, it swung the union flag in our faces and told us to sod off and Gordon with us.

Today in Freedom Square

Cameron is an idiot if he thinks that Scots take that kind of treatment lying down. But he can rest easy. We are a peaceful people (maybe one of the reasons we abhor his wars). We won't take to the streets. 

But we will win, of that he should have no doubt.

I don't know when it will be, but there will be another referendum and this time it will say YES!