Wednesday, May 11, 2005

It depends what the meaning of 'traditions' is

Fox News political contributor Michael Barone (WSJ Wednesday, free link) joins the Yank hack pack in London to divine the lessons of Tony Blair's victory for US politics. Along the way, readers learn that:

Mr. Blair has little use for British traditions -- he established a separate Scottish Parliament

Oh yeah? We head to the Internets and Google the Act of Union (or as we call it in Ireland, the other Act of Union):

Act of Union 1707
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
The Acts of Union were twin Acts of Parliament passed in 1707 (taking effect on 26 March) in the Scottish and the English Parliaments. The effect was twofold:

to create a new Kingdom of Great Britain, though the name had been used on occasion since 1604 when speaking of the Kingdoms of England and Scotland together ...

to dissolve both parliaments and replace them with a new Parliament of the Kingdom of Great Britain. (Although the new parliament was to be based in the former home of the English parliament.)


Mr Barone should have a chat about Scottish history with Mel Gibson at the next Vast Rightwing Conspiracy cocktail hour.

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