Member Since: 10/14/2011
Posts: 15,451
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Emeli Sandé to SAVE the UK being "torn apart"-Prime Minister
Source
Scottish independence: Seven months to save UK, Cameron says
Quote:
David Cameron has urged the rest of the UK to tell Scottish voters to reject independence saying he could not bear to see the country "torn apart".
In an emotional speech, he spoke about his Scottish ancestry and said the referendum was "personal" to him.
But SNP leader Alex Salmond branded Mr Cameron a "big feartie" for not agreeing to a debate with him.
Mr Salmond repeated his challenge to the prime minister to go head-to-head with him on TV ahead of September's independence referendum, instead of lecturing Scottish voters in a "sermon from Mount Olympus".
But Mr Cameron, who chose to make his biggest intervention in the referendum debate so far at the Olympic Park in East London, said he planned to make his argument in Scotland too.
It underscores Mr Cameron's problem with this September's referendum. He does not want to go down in history as the leader who presided over the break-up of the United Kingdom.
People close to the prime minister say he is genuinely passionate about Scotland remaining within the UK. He cannot resist the temptation of making this case to the public. He said he had chosen the Olympic Park as a venue for his speech because he wanted to send a message to people living in the rest of the UK, adding "all 63 million of us are profoundly affected" by the referendum.
Some people had advised him not to take part in the debate, said Mr Cameron, "but frankly, I care far too much to stay out of it. This is personal."
The PM invoked the spirit of the Great Britain Olympic team, which won 65 medals in 2012, in his speech. He said: "For me, the best thing about the Olympics wasn't the winning. It was the red, the white, the blue. "It was the summer that patriotism came out of the shadows and into the sun, everyone cheering as one for Team GB."
Listing UK-wide institutions such as the BBC, the NHS and the armed forces and the country's place in the UN Security Council, Nato and the G8, as well as cultural icons like Sherlock Holmes, Emeli Sandé and Scotch whisky, the prime minister said: "We come as a brand - a powerful brand.
"Our reach is about much more than military might – it's about our music, film, TV, fashion. The UK is the soft power superpower: you get teenagers in Tokyo and Sydney listening to Emeli Sandé; people in Kazakhstan and Taiwan watching BBC exports like Sherlock, written by a Scot a hundred years ago, played by an Englishman today, and created for TV by a Scotsman."
"Separating Scotland out of that brand would be like separating the waters of the River Tweed and the North Sea.
"If we lost Scotland, if the UK changed, we would rip the rug from under our own reputation. The plain fact is we matter more in the world together."
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Emeli Sandé single-handedly shaping the formation of a new country in the world? Omg. It's a mild day.
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