CONTRARY to what Westminster would have you believe, the cause and solution to of all life’s problems is not war - it is alcohol! And it looks like we’re going to have to drink a lot of it to get us through to Scottish independence. Unfortunately, it seems that overseas military intervention and Britain go together like Tories and barnyard animals.

Ten years on from Iraq, we’re about to go into Syria. I thought Westminster were slow learners, but it turns out they just don’t learn!

It’s hard to believe we’re engaging in a war with Daesh without first establishing who is funding and arming the evil fudricks. Of course, some already suspect foul play by Western arms companies. It’s well documented that the USA has a long history of funding resistance fighters in the Middle East. Frankly, it seems duplicitous for the White House to speak of “terrorist sympathisers” when the CIA has practically made arming religious fanatics a hobby. I don’t even agree with President Obama letting weapons manufacturers arm American citizens to the teeth, never mind overseas extremists!

Thankfully, in an independent Scotland, we won’t export arms to Syria...largely because we won’t have any armaments. This might not be a bad thing when you consider that deliberate acts of war and thoughtless bloodshed are what got us into this mess in the first place. Westminster MPs in favour of such actions aren’t just barking up the wrong tree - they’re intent on blowing up the entire forest!

Not content with exacerbating the problem overseas, the Tories are intent on stirring the pot at home, with most demanding the public unconditionally surrender their privacy, and others wanting to place Muslim citizens under particular scrutiny. Sadly, I’m not sure browser history can protect us from human history. You can’t erase recently viewed war crimes like embarrassing porn sites. Not that this has stopped Tony Blair attempting to do so with his disingenuous apology for the Iraq war; a statement he only seems to have made in order to justify further conflict in Syria. According to Blair, “the terror threat is not going away”, no matter how many times we tell him to do exactly that!

Given that Terrible Tony was such a proponent of detention without trial, shouldn’t we be detaining him right now? I’m not suggesting that jailing Blair would completely solve the problem of extremism, but going on another bombing run before accounting for your own sins seems like a recipe for never-ending conflict – which is exactly what arms companies want. If this is the scenario we are looking at, I believe Scotland should consider it her duty to support refugees escaping the nightmare that both sides of this subterfuge have created. The worst thing we can do is let our society brand those fleeing terrorism as potential terrorists themselves. This mindset is a highly effective way to fuel zealotry, and is exactly what Daesh want. The radical mentality is founded upon the “us against them” outlook. This is something that fits all too well into the right-wing, pseudo-patriotic temperament of the west. The recent arson attack on the Bishopbriggs Community Centre near Glasgow, which had been used as a mosque, serves as a horrendous example of terrorism from self-styled “defenders of Scotland”. In other words, the lunatic fringe of the Scottish far-right. Their actions, just like those of Daesh, were not performed in the name of God or country, but sheer hatred and stupidity.

Comrades, right-wingers need to learn that Muslims and Klingons are not the same thing. In turn, Islamic communities ought to be vigilant of radicalisation, and make sure those at risk understand that members of the public aren’t to blame for bomb-bearing Blairites and gung-ho Tories.

What we need is for Scotland to fully embrace #SexySocialism and set an example to the rest of the world. So say ‘yes’ to inclusiveness, compassion and rationality and ‘no’ to hate, extremism and closed-mindedness - we will be all the better for it.