One thing that really stuck me about the leaflets from Ukip and the BNP for the recent European Parliamentary election was the fact that they were stuffed full of cheesy patriotic symbols — Union Flags, Spitfires, Winston Churchills and so on. Any electorate in the world will have a certain contingent who are enticed by nationalistic rhetoric at the expense of good policies.

In England, Ukip and the BNP have cornered this market pretty well, with the English Democrats also doing a good job of it. One thing that these three parties have in common — aside from their narrow nationalism — is the fact that they are all pretty vile.

Here in Scotland the nationalist vote is completely mopped up by the SNP. We all know that the SNP uses national symbols which appeal to base instincts which may entice certain types of voters. This gets up some people’s noses, including mine.

But the SNP have done a grand job by keeping a lid on the nastier side of nationalism. For this we can be thankful. All though there is, without a doubt, a nastier side to some of their supporters — as we have seen with the Cybernats — you won’t find these types of views coming from the mainstream of the party.

Indeed, the party is at pains to promote a progressive type of nationalism. They embrace civic nationalism. They reject ideas of Scottishness defined in terms of ethnicity. They avoid anti-English approaches. And we can be especially thankful that violent methods do not form part of the nationalist agenda in Scotland.

This is combined with progressive policies, including an enlightened approach to immigration and a positive agenda towards Europe. While in many other parts of the world nationalism may be equated with right-wing or fascist concepts, the SNP combine a nationalist ideology with a broadly centrist agenda.

Whatever the motives of the voters, the SNP’s form of nationalism is a great deal more tolerant — and tolerable — than the forms of nationalism we see from the likes of Ukip, the BNP, the French National Front, the Movement for a Better Hungary, or any number of extreme parties across the world.

Richard Thomson recently described the SNP as being part of “unquestionably the best behaved nationalist movement in the world”. Looking at the European election results and seeing where nationalist votes seem to go, it’s easy to agree with him.

At work, we are given a choice between working on Boxing Day or working on the 2 January. I have always opted to take 2 January off, even though I tend not to drink much on Hogmanay — certainly not enough for me still to be hungover two days later. Sure enough, this year I have no plans to see in the new year with a bang.

(Even if I did, I probably wouldn’t be able to attend, as I’ve been hit by some winter disease that has taken it right out of me. Yesterday I was sent home from work, and when I got home I went straight to bed and accidentally fell asleep. This was at around 16:30. I stayed asleep more or less right through until 08:30 this morning. I feel better today, but still in no form to celebrate properly.)

Nonetheless, it feels right to work on Boxing Day rather than 2 January, even though I couldn’t articulate a reason why. I don’t know if this is some kind of subconscious Scottish patriotism, the day being recognised as a holiday in few other countries. Maybe it’s just because it’s later, and I want to save it up to enjoy (time discounting wouldn’t be much of a factor, as I filled in the form months ago). Or maybe it just indicates a preference for New Year as a holiday over Christmas.

It has to be said, Hogmanay is pretty naff. To be frank, we could do without the twee BBC Scotland fiddle-me-dee extravaganza. Only an Excuse? ceased to be funny about a decade ago, and lost all relevance to me as I lost interest in football. The other side is not much better, as if the BBC thought that making us suffer most Fridays of the year with Jools Holland on the box wasn’t enough.

But there is still something special about Hogmanay. I think it stems from my memories of it as a child. It was more or less the only day of the year when I was allowed to stay up late. For a nightowl like me, it was amazing. And sometimes I even got an extra special tipple with which to see in the new year: Irn Bru.

Mind you, it’s not as if childhood memories of Christmas are exactly dire. But I think it is easier to fall out of love with Christmas as you become an adult. Gleefully receiving presents makes way for having to give presents. Your eyes are opened to the stress everyone puts themselves under. People get hung up on creating the perfect Christmas, which I would have said rather ruins the mood, which is supposed to be cheerful.

Some people are forced to spend Christmas with family members that they don’t like, and possibly don’t even see for the rest of the year. For some, Christmas Day is a day of dreary, dreaded routine.

Perhaps most importantly, Christmas brings with it a whole suite of naffness. Tacky tinsel, Christmas cards with garish depictions of Santa Claus, and a list of terrible Christmas songs as long as your arm.

Despite the twee TV, our attitude towards New Year is much simpler. You go out with your pals, get blootered and take two days to recover. And perhaps most importantly, there are no bad Paul McCartney songs about New Year. Awesome.

So happy new year everyone! Thanks for sticking with the blog through the dry patches. I might make it my new year’s resolution to update more often. Then again, that was my resolution last year as well…

I don’t know whether or not the proposed bailout in the USA is a good idea. But it does amuse me that one of the more widely-quoted arguments against the bailout is Senator Jim Bunning’s view that it would be “un-American”.

It’s another aspect of American politics that I find to be a turn-off. That’s probably partly to do with my dislike of patriotism. But even the idea that some policies are inherently American and others are “un-American” is strange. And the idea that you would judge a policy on its American-ness is even weirder.

I mean, do these guys sit around the place reading policy proposals thinking things like, “Pah, that sounds like something a Canadian would support.” Or, “Only cheese-eating surrender monkeys believe that sort of thing!” I suspect that they actually do. What is wrong with, “Blimey, that doesn’t sound like a very good idea and it goes against my principles”?

This isn’t a one-off and you do hear from time to time people dismissing something-or-other for being un-American. I know the USA is a very patriotic country, and whether that is a good thing or not is a separate argument. But I doubt this kind of thing would wash in many other countries. Can you imagine some shadow cabinet spokesperson bemoaning a government’s policy for not being British enough?

The thing is that it just seems like such an arrogant thing to say. The only decent solutions come from America and no-one else in the world has a valid input to make? And they don’t understand it when some people have an iffy attitude towards the USA?

I don’t mean this as a dig towards the USA as a whole. I think it’s a wonderful country with some great people. I just find it amusing that being “un-American” is such a heinous crime according to some.

I have written before about how I struggle to understand how people feel ‘pride’ in their country at, say, sporting events. For me, being proud of your country is a bit like being proud of this week’s lottery numbers or something. I just don’t get it.

For whatever reason though, patriotism undoubtedly exists and it can be a major vote winner. Politicians know this and they take every opportunity to associate themselves with some kind of patriotic cause.

The Olympics is one of the worst instances of politicians engaging in this kind of blatant demagoguery. For instance, Kelly Holmes was given a gong a few years ago because it was felt that her achievements in Athens in 2004 should be “recognised”. Much the same sort of thing will happen this year — it has already been confirmed by Chief Nationalist Demagogue, Gordon Brown.

Mike Power put it best on Twitter: “Surely the achievments of the British Olympic medallists have already been ‘recognised’ ? They got f**cking medals! Jeez.”

A couple of weeks back Mike Smithson wrote about how dangerous it is for politicians to claim credit for the achievements of athletes:

But it’s dangerous stuff trying to claim credit in this way. Firstly it appears to detract from the performances of the athletes in Beijing themselves and secondly it raises the question – where did the money come from that has made this happen?

Obviously the SNP haven’t read this otherwise they wouldn’t have come out with this sort of claptrap. It is just a week or so ago that Alex Salmond was acting as though Chris Hoy was the only person ever to win a gold medal.

Chris Hoy’s dad was pretty quick off the mark, pointing out that a Scottish Olympics team would die on its arse because Scotland doesn’t have the same world-class facilities and funding that Team GB has. Want to decrease the amount of medals Scots get at the Olympics? Simple: rip them out of the GB squad.

Before any nats start jumping up and down and start accusing me of belittling Scotland or somesuch nonsense, let me just close that argument down straight away. What we are talking about here is a simple concept: economies of scale.

First of all Scotland would have to build three velodromes at £50m a time to match UK facilities. Then there’s world-class performance funding (£4m a year). And it takes eight years to get a medal. Multiply that across all sports, and Scotland would be facing a huge sports bill.

You had to have a heart of stone not to let out an almighty guffaw when Chris Hoy himself yesterday stated that a separate Scottish Olympics team would be disastrous (as noticed by Bill Cameron:

We don’t have an international facility for cycling and we don’t have the coaching structures in place. In fact, we don’t have anything in place, so the whole idea is ridiculous. I’ve not lived in Scotland for nine years because there is nowhere for me to train. I’m a Scottish athlete but I’m proud to perform in a British team.

That was added to by one of Scotland’s other most successful Olympic athletes, the canoeist David Florence:

It’s a non-starter and he should consult athletes first before he comments. Scotland would have to build a new slalom course first and they would have to build a velodrome.

I am very proud to be Scottish, to have been born in Aberdeen and have Edinburgh as my home town. But I am also very proud to represent Great Britain and everything that stands for, which is not just Scotland.

I’m as proud to wear the union jack as I am the saltire. I don’t have a problem separating my pride in being a Scot from being British at the same time.

This gets to the heart of one of the things that most irritates me about the SNP. While I am not a nationalist of any kind, it strikes me that one of Scotland’s special strengths is its ability to have a distinct identity of its own, and indeed a sense of national pride, without having to completely dissociate itself from a larger political entity, the United Kingdom.

One can say he feels equally Scottish and British without any sense of contradiction. Indeed, whenever the ‘Moreno question‘ is asked, the results show that the vast majority of Scots can feel at once part Scottish and part British. Now this approach is something that I can feel proud of. It is one that Scotland’s Olympic athletes exhibit, and it is very admirable. Unfortunately the SNP cannot be so admirable because it would undermine their very raison d’être.

Mr Eugenides has got it spot on. Using Chris Hoy for their own petty political ends was always going to be a risky game for the SNP to play. They tried to capitalise on his gold medal haul by saying that Chris Hoy’s success shows why Scotland should have its own Olympic team. Then Hoy himself bit them on the bum by pointing out that “I wouldn’t have three gold medals hanging round my neck if I wasn’t part of the British team.”

There is another aspect of the SNP’s argument that appears to be fundamentally flawed. Like I’ve said, I don’t think people should feel proud for other people’s achievements. But conceding that some people do, are people more likely to be proud of the team representing them winning 19 gold medals or 3 gold medals (all won by the same person)?

I don’t even have to be a big fan of the idea of nationalities measuring their penis sizes through the medium of sport to find it hilarious that Great Britain finished ahead of Australia in the medals table. Scotland couldn’t have achieved that. Splitting Scotland’s medals apart, they would be ranked 20th-or-so. That is admirable enough. But as Chris Hoy and David Florence pointed out, Scottish athletes relied on UK-sized facilities to get their medals.

Like Mike Smithson said, it’s dangerous for politicians to attach themselves to athletic achievements. The irony is that neither Labour nor the SNP could ever take credit for a sporting success. If anyone can take credit for Great Britain’s performance in Beijing this year, it appears to be John Major for setting up the National Lottery. The results have come through at just the right time. The first injection of lottery money will have come just at the time when most of the current batch of athletes were beginning to mature in their sporting development.

Whether you think that is a good thing that so much public money is ploughed into sport is another matter. Alex Massie says yes, Fraser Nelson says no.

I definitely lean closer to Fraser Nelson’s point of view. I don’t think public money should be spent on the arts or sport full stop. Of course you would expect schools to provide PE lessons, though having said that if one thing put me off becoming an athlete it was PE lessons. Beyond that, the athletes should be by themselves as far as I am concerned.

I just don’t see what advantage it is for a country to have lots of sporting success. If it’s a “feel good” thing, lottery and government cash would be better spent on cute bunny rabbits to be sent to every household.

Apparently Scotland did wonderfully well at the Commonwealth Games. Sixth in the medals table does indeed sound pretty impressive. But on the other hand, it probably just emphasises the inherent pointlessness of the Commonwealth Games.

Jonathan Calder has a good post about the fact that this success has led to politicians taking the credit. His Toneness was very modest by pointing out the hard work his colleagues in the Scottish Executive have done:

I think people worked hard before the games as well and I know that Jack McConnell, (Sports Minister) Patricia Ferguson, the Scottish Institute of Sport – they’ve all been putting their shoulder to the wheel and it’s paid off.

I doubt, though, that Jack McConnell had much influence on any of Scotland’s eleven gold medal winners. Indeed. I’ve never really understood why these individual successes should be celebrated as national successes (never mind state successes!). If I were an athlete who had won a major sporting event, I would probably be a bit upset if the entire nation tried to free-ride on my personal awesomeness. I swam backwards through my own arsehole in record-breaking time, not the neds kicking about outside Spar. Sitting on my bum did not cause Sheena Sharp to score a gold in the shooting. As Jonathan pointed out:

The people to be praised are the medalists themselves, their coaches and (I suspect most of all) the parents who gave up their spare time to ferry them from event to event when they were younger.

I have never understood why so much public money is spent on sport. I’ve just about thought of a vaguely justifiable reason for spending public money on most things, even the arts. But sport, I just cannot understand. Maybe they’ll build a nice new stadium every now and again, but it will always be in a place that doesn’t really need one.

And why spend so much time, money and effort into getting homegrown athletes to break some record which will only be broken by somebody else from another country a few years down the line anyway? I can’t think of any reason how this can add to the quality of anybody’s life, apart from people who manage sport organisations.

There were two subjects that I couldn’t understand at school. One of them was drama, which is teaching kids to lie in a convoluted way. Well, you can see how politicians’ influence comes into that one. But nothing could top PE. I absolutely detested it. It is a bit like slavery really.

People joke that you have to “jump through hoops” if something is made unnecessarily difficult. But in PE you are made to literally jump through hoops. And swim through hoops. And swim to the bottom of the pool to collect a brick. And play rounders. And dodgeball. Does anybody do any of this shit after they’ve left school? No, not even at the Commonwealth Games! As soon as I left school the doctor told me that the best exercise I could take was to go on a walk! So thanks, national curriculum, for keeping me fit!

As Iain said in the comments at Liberal England, “if the government claims credit for sporting achievements, should they not share the blame too?” I’ve not seen Englandandwales’ sports minister apologising for any of England’s embarassments. Failing to pass the baton is embarassing enough on school sports day, never mind at a major international event.

Formula 1 coverage used to be fairly light on the patriotism. But that was back when Britain’s only decent driver was a Scot. Now ITV spend their whole time prattling on about Jenson Button. “Meeeeeeeeeeeeh, when’s Jenson Button going to get his first win?” They seem to spend about half an hour every race talking him up and how he’s surely bound to win some time soon. His Englishness has blinded everybody to the fact that Button is nothing more than an enormous, smug prick and the sort of person who will sign a contract then do everything in his power to wriggle out of it — twice.