Scotland Wants Out

Will the Spirit of William Wallace be summoned once again?

Or should one say, MacBeth?

For the first metaphor to have any salience, one would have to assume that the Scottish are up in arms for independence, to the point of a military venture.

For the second parallel to apply, one would have to compare the Scottish Nationalist Party of Holyrood with the Weird Sisters of Shakespeare's Scottish play.

In all truth, the majority faction in Scotland wants to break away from Westminster, yet instead of shedding blood to do so, she wants to empower her youth to vote, to fight for the homeland, so to speak. Since the younger Scots are polled in favor of breaking away from the United Kingdom, Holyrood's move to extend the franchise to the youth may extend the franchise of national status back to Edinburgh.

If Queen Anne, the authority for the Act of Settlement of 1707 that dissolved the Scottish parliament, is rolling over in her grave, the tremors that would be shaking England from Bristol to Yorkshire should not trouble anyone south of Hadrian's Wall. If the financial records recount accurately Scotland's extensive subsidy-dependence on England, then Cameron's Conservative coalition -- desperate to defray costs and restore fiscal sanity to the country -- could save billions in one fell swoop without alienating a core constituency any further.

Therefore, let the Scots go Scot-free! (And let them start paying their own way for once. That's what every parent wants for his children!)