In 2014, Scots voted by 55% to 45% to continue to be part of the United Kingdom. Scots were, if not wildly enthusiastic about Westminster rule, at least broadly content with it. And that's how things would probably have remained, had not Westminster shown their true feelings for us so clearly.
The day after the 2014 referendum, Prime Minister David Cameron announced "English votes for English laws", meaning that English MPs would have more powers in parliament than other MPs. This was not a good way to resolve the issue around asymmetric devolution -- a better way would have been to create devolved English assemblies for those parts of England that wanted them. Cameron no doubt waited until the referendum was over to make this announcement, because he knew it would be taken badly by Scots.
The next year, there was a general election. Cameron campaigned on a scare that Labour would govern in coalition with the SNP. This demonstrated that when unionists said we're "Better Together", what they really meant was we're better together so long as Scotland doesn't have its grubby fingers anywhere near the levers of power.
A year after that, Cameron called a referendum on leaving the European Union. He ignored calls from the SNP and others for separate votes in each of the four constituent nations of the UK. Scotland voted by 62% to 38% to remain in the EU, but was nevertheless forced to leave the EU against its will by Westminster. According to the Westminster establishment, we can have English votes for English laws, but we must never under any circumstances have Scottish votes for Scottish EU membership.
Westminster have made their feelings for us obvious. They will continue to treat us with contempt for as long as we let them. We must therefore rid ourselves of Westminster's dominance and rule ourselves.
So if you have a vote in ther Scottish parliamentary election on May 6th, I'm asking you to vote for a party that supports Scottish independence.
Which party to vote for?
I'm not going to tell you which party to vote for. The three biggest pro-independence parties are:
the Scottish National Party, led by Nicola Sturgeon
the Scottish Green Party, led by Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater
the Alba Party, led by Alex Salmond
I know that many independence supporters have misgivings about one or more of those parties. That's natural as no politicians are perfect. If you don't like one of them, I'm not going to tell you to vote for a party you don't like -- you should instead vote for another pro-independence party. If you don't like any of them, vote for the one you least dislike. But vote, and vote indy.
Who do I vote for to maximise indy MSPs?
Assuming you don't have strong preferences within the pro-indy parties, and you just want to maximise the number of indy MSPs, I can suggest to you who to vote for.
Under the Additional Member System used to elect the Scottish parliament, you have 2 votes. Your 1st vote elects your constituency MSP in one of the 73 Scottish parliament constituencies. Your 1st vote should go to the Scottish National Party candidate, as the SNP are the only indy party likely to win any constituency seats.
Your 2nd (list) vote
As well as your constituency vote, you have a 2nd vote, that elects the 7 top-up seats in your region.
AMS allocates top-up seats to make the result more proportional, taking into account the number of constituency seats a party has already won.
Because the SNP will win lots of constituency seats, they will be at a disadvantage in winning top-up seats. For example, in 2016 the SNP won 41.7% of list votes, but only one 4 list seats (7% of them); this was because the SNP had already won 59 of the 73 constituency seats. Therefore, giving your 2nd (list) vote to the SNP is not the most efficient way of electing indy MSPs.
Instead -- and again, this advice holds true if you don't care which indy party to vote for, and you just want to maximise the number of indy MSPs elected -- you should give your 2nd vote to whichever of the Green and Alba parties looks likely to do best in your region. The best way to assess how many votes each of these parties will get is to look at opinion polls close to the day of the election.
(Again, I’m not going to tell you who to vote for. If you don’t like the Greens, you can always vote Alba. If you don’t like Alba, you can always vote Green. If you don’t like the Greens or Alba, there’s always the SNP — but bear in mind my proviso that an SNP list vote is a less efficient way of electing list MSPs.)
Remember, every indy MSP you elect is another unionist politician out of a job. If every indy supporter voted 1st vote SNP and 2nd vote Green or Alba, then about 30 unionist politicians would be kicked out of the Scottish parliament.