Daily catch-up: more public art, and a ray of polling sunshine in Scotland
What we would have called a “sideways look” at the news if our cliché-basher hadn’t banned the phrase
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Your support makes all the difference.1. I asked for nominations for my Top 10 Works of Public Art, and several people suggested war memorials, including the Labour History Group, who nominated Edwin Lutyens' Thiepval Memorial (above).
It remembers 72,000 British and South African soldiers who died in the Battles of the Somme with no known grave, and was built in 1932.
I decided war memorials deserved a Top 10 of their own. I also had nominations for the Brooding Soldier, the Canadian memorial at Ypres Salient; forgotten World War II memorials of Yugoslavia; and Tom Piper's Poppies at the Tower of London. More nominations to me on Twitter, please.
2. Yesterday's Survation poll in Scotland lifted my melancholic pessimism that my country is about to be broken. It showed the Yes vote on 47 per cent and No on 53 per cent, barely changed (Yes up 0.5 points) since Survation's previous survey at the end of August.
My problem is that I do not understand why the Yes vote has gained ground in the past two weeks, so I cannot know why it should stop. But it would seem that the advance has been less spectacular than YouGov polls suggested. So there is hope. And Matt Hoffman drew my attention to this about the "momentum" myth in the Romney campaign of 2012 on the Washington Post blog. Its first paragraph could almost apply now, with the names changed thus:
"Nationalists have been pushing hard this week to convince people that Alex Salmond is wrapping up the referendum campaign. Since he’s not actually, well, leading, Yes partisans have relied on the idea that Yes has momentum: Even if it isn’t actually ahead yet, it is certain to take a commanding lead any minute now.
"But that 'momentum' appears to have been entirely an invention of Nationalist spinners."
Anthony Wells at UK Polling Report has a guide to the next few opinion polls.
3. Our editorial today says this:
"Yes, unionists are panicking. That is because they are desperate for the people of Scotland to think again over the next seven days about a case that seems 'not proven' to us."
The Financial Times has an equally strong plea:
"The path of separation is a fool’s errand, one fraught with danger and uncertainty."
4. In other news, my colleague Felicity Morse was unimpressed by yesterday's new product launch:
"Apple's new watch is a lot larger than I expected. Completely impractical."
__________
5. Thanks to Chris Heaton-Harris for this:
"Supposedly sales of steam irons are decreasing."
6. And finally to Tom Hamilton for this:
"Just read a picture book.
"There are no words."
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