Tsunami Sweeps Scotland
A great tsunami swept across Scotland yesterday, but thankfully this was an entirely political - rather than a natural - phenomenon.
The result is that the SNP have won a landslide victory in the elections to the Scottish Parliament - just reward to Alex Salmond and his party for running a positive, outward looking campaign.
The SNP have run riot in Labour's former heartlands - winning a majority of the constituency seats in both Glasgow and Edinburgh.
Even the former Glasgow Anniesland seat of Donald Dewar - Scotland's first First Minister - fell to the nationalists.
Alex Salmond has wasted no time in branding his party as the natural party of government in Scotland - which is an apt description of how things feel - the morning after the night before.
Labour have had a nightmare of an election - not only losing seats hand over fist, but also some of their most experienced campaigners.
Former Labour ministers like Andy Kerr, Tom McCabe and Frank McAveety went down like ninepins and the party - having braced itself for a poor result - is now in a state of complete shock.
The lessons of history are clear - don't make foolish assumptions - and don't put all your eggs in just one basket.
When the Japanese army invaded Singapore during World War II - the defenders of the city had all their heavy weapons pointing out to sea - from where they assumed the threat would come.
But it didn't - their big guns were all facing the wrong way.
The Japanese invasion came from the north - over land and not by sea - their army simply marched into the city taking everyone by surprise.
Scottish Labour now finds itself overrun in its own backyard and - by any yardstick - that is a quite extraordinary achievement by the SNP.
The result is that the SNP have won a landslide victory in the elections to the Scottish Parliament - just reward to Alex Salmond and his party for running a positive, outward looking campaign.
The SNP have run riot in Labour's former heartlands - winning a majority of the constituency seats in both Glasgow and Edinburgh.
Even the former Glasgow Anniesland seat of Donald Dewar - Scotland's first First Minister - fell to the nationalists.
Alex Salmond has wasted no time in branding his party as the natural party of government in Scotland - which is an apt description of how things feel - the morning after the night before.
Labour have had a nightmare of an election - not only losing seats hand over fist, but also some of their most experienced campaigners.
Former Labour ministers like Andy Kerr, Tom McCabe and Frank McAveety went down like ninepins and the party - having braced itself for a poor result - is now in a state of complete shock.
The lessons of history are clear - don't make foolish assumptions - and don't put all your eggs in just one basket.
When the Japanese army invaded Singapore during World War II - the defenders of the city had all their heavy weapons pointing out to sea - from where they assumed the threat would come.
But it didn't - their big guns were all facing the wrong way.
The Japanese invasion came from the north - over land and not by sea - their army simply marched into the city taking everyone by surprise.
Scottish Labour now finds itself overrun in its own backyard and - by any yardstick - that is a quite extraordinary achievement by the SNP.
