@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social
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HighlandLawyer

@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social

Law, IT, & other stuff.
North Scotland

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simonvarwell, to random Esperanto
@simonvarwell@mastodon.scot avatar

Overheard from a passer-by just now:

“There’s one in Dornoch. There was one in Tain, but it got vandalised.”

You can now join me in wondering what they were talking about.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@simonvarwell
Public toilets? The ones in Tain were vandalised last year. Total guess though, could be many things.

kaia, to random
@kaia@brotka.st avatar

weekly reminder what they took from us: sealable USB sticks :sadcat:

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@fzer0 @kaia @cstross But it needs a little well or indentations to hold the wax; on a smooth USB stick the whole seal can slide off cleanly.
Now you can put a USB stick in a paper envelope & apply the seal to the envelope, but that's using extra resources & isn't so elegant.

cstross, to random
@cstross@wandering.shop avatar

My current nightmare is that the Tories will be hammered so hard this Thursday that the back benches will run a leadership challenger against Sunak ...

… And the party rank and file will then vote Liz Truss in again as party leader.

She's had a year to lick her wounds and work out what she did wrong, and in her tiny mind it can only be that she didn't do everything fast enough and hard enough.

So we'll get a Liz Truss equivalent of the US Republicans' Project 2025.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@cstross
Plus it's actually 100% of current civil servants, because there's no place for civil service neutrality; those 20% of jobs will be given to sound political supporters of the govt in restoration of the "spoils" system.

simon_brooke, to random
@simon_brooke@mastodon.scot avatar

"this is why any government in Holyrood is destined not to deliver. It can't, because London created a system that was bound to fail as a way of securing continuous control whilst ensuring that blame would be directed inward in Scotland itself, as might well happen now" -- @RichardJMurphy

https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2024/04/26/scotlands-political-problem/

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@MadeyeTheCarnaptious @simon_brooke @iaruffell @RichardJMurphy
The "failure" of the SNP has been (understandably) to fail to accept that Westminster isn't going to follow democracy & rule of law any more, & develop extra-constitutional tactics to make progress eg civil disobedience or whatever.
OTOH should that task fall to the SNP, or is it the job of the wider independence movement?

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@MadeyeTheCarnaptious @simon_brooke @iaruffell @RichardJMurphy
I'm inclined to agree; it's generally unionists who claim the SNP is the entirety of the demand for independence, attempting to lead the general population astray. But I've also seen independence supporters who seem to think the SNP should be the entirety of the independence movement.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@simon_brooke @ferryoons @MadeyeTheCarnaptious @iaruffell @RichardJMurphy
We currently have the SNP & the Greens as indy parties, giving voters a choice of politics. Would splitting the SNP into a left & a right wing party really give better options AND progress to independence, or would it mean more factionalism & make it easier for the authoritarian and B&S types to infiltrate & come to dominate a "mainstream" indy party? I don't know.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@Shivviness @iaruffell @MadeyeTheCarnaptious @simon_brooke @ferryoons @RichardJMurphy More importantly it explicitly establishes whether the majority support independence, which is required as the moral basis of extra-constitutional action.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@Shivviness @iaruffell @MadeyeTheCarnaptious @simon_brooke @ferryoons @RichardJMurphy
Or to eg knock down the Anglo-Scottish electricity interconnector. Note this is purely an illustrative example of disruptive non-violent but illegal steps which could be used against a Westminster govt which refuses to accept the democratically expressed will of the Scottish people, and not a call to go do this next weekend.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@iaruffell @Shivviness @MadeyeTheCarnaptious @simon_brooke @ferryoons @RichardJMurphy
All of that is true. As is (& Catalonia is another example) that to obtain independence against opposition from central govt, at least 60% of the population must support it first.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@MadeyeTheCarnaptious @iaruffell @Shivviness @simon_brooke @ferryoons @RichardJMurphy
Also on a practical note, the UK currently does not have a force like the Spanish Guardia Civil which could control the whole of Scotland by force. That could of course change under a new administration, but it would cost a lot.

dgar, to random
@dgar@aus.social avatar

Where is “mid air” anyway?

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@dgar
In the town centre
https://maps.app.goo.gl/KWv1YMs1UzjSNHQ28

mondoweiss, to Palestine
@mondoweiss@social.mondoweiss.net avatar

Since October 7, many in the U.S have have grown to understand how our tax dollars fund the genocide in Gaza. This knowledge is inspiring a boom in an old form of resistance — tax resistance.

https://mondoweiss.net/2024/04/tax-resistance-movement-grows-in-response-to-u-s-support-for-gaza-genocide/


@palestine @israel

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@DrALJONES @peterbrown I think you're both looking at different ends of the same issues.
For internal spending, a country can issue its own money to pay for it; so long as it has the actual resources to achieve the goal, money is just a mechanism.
Where the resources do not exist internally, they have to be traded from abroad. A strong currency- issued by a country with lots of resources that other countries might want- can buy in using that currency. Otherwise they need to trade in resources.

DrALJONES, to random
@DrALJONES@mastodon.social avatar

Report

Emory University faculty members stand between student protesters & police.

The protesting students linked arms around a flagpole on campus as police prepared to move in on Friday night.

The day before, 30 people were arrested, including university professor Noelle McAfee, chair of the Emory Philosophy Department.

6.35 GMT Apr 27 AJ updates

..

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@DrALJONES I think the correct term there is "paramilitary force" rather than "police"

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@DrALJONES @wcbdata Balaclavas were so named due to being provided for soldiers to wear during the Crimean War. So the question is whether one considers soldiers "public servants".

OTOH a fascist state doesn't have "public servants" in the sense of those employed to serve the public; instead it only has "agents of the state" employed to serve the state.

When Robert Peel promoted his proposals for a police force, there was great concern they should be the former not the latter.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@wcbdata @DrALJONES
As stated in the Peelian principles "the police are the public and the public are the police", the idea being that citizens employed as police are simply being paid to do full time public duties required for community welfare which otherwise everyone would need to do anyway.

shoq, to random
@shoq@mastodon.social avatar

And now another cabal of white men, this time in the Tennessee legislature, pass a bill letting teachers pack sidearms in class.

Another Rubicon jumped like a damn shark.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/tennessee-passes-bill-let-teachers-carry-guns-schools-rcna149068

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@shoq The Silastic Armourfiends of... Tennessee?

dgar, to random
@dgar@aus.social avatar

Superhero Interviewer: Are you capable?

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@dgar

dgar, to random
@dgar@aus.social avatar

Arnold Schwarzenegger still runs Windows Vista.

People have tried to get him to upgrade, but he keeps saying:

“I still love Vista baby!”

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@dgar Thought he promotes it to other people: "Have ya the Vista, baby!"

dgar, (edited ) to random
@dgar@aus.social avatar
HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@dgar Well with audio only, there are two obvious possibilities...

ZachWeinersmith, to comics
@ZachWeinersmith@mastodon.social avatar

Bonus panel here: http://smbc-comics.com/comic/nice

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@ZachWeinersmith You can cowp your claim on "absolute midden"; there's a couple of centuries extensive prior use by Scottish mothers & grandmothers.

HighlandLawyer, to random
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

Duo's been to Eastgate...

_thegeoff, to random
@_thegeoff@mastodon.social avatar

Cooking some leftover tandoori lamb in a fairly standard onion/tomato curry sauce. This is generally fairly inauthentic in Indian terms, I believe, but is part of the origin story of British Indian Restaurant cooking. And damn it's good.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@_thegeoff BIR is now an established British cuisine in its own right, & evidence why more open borders is the right way to go.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@_thegeoff There should be a supplementary question for all potential immigrants after the "yes" of the standard questionnaire (attached). That is "What recipe do you bring from your old country for a deep fried food?"

dgar, to random
@dgar@aus.social avatar

I’m writing a song about tortillas - actually, it's more of a rap.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@dgar Presumably in B flat.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Soup seems like a breakfast food, I'm going to have some Breakfast Soup.

HighlandLawyer,
@HighlandLawyer@mastodon.social avatar

@RickiTarr Most soups* taste better after resting over-night. Ergo breakfast soup is the first opportunity to try it.

*Proper thick ones, not those watery consommé types

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