From my Daily Record column after the Labour conference
To find out what's happening in the UK, Westminster politicians really ought to pay much closer attention to events in Scotland.
Everything the political class in London are wrestling with - the backlash of anti-politics, the explosion of nationalism clothed as patriotism, post-truth news, a vile online debate, the triumph of emotion over economics, the unresolved schism of a referendum that warps all policy debate in its wake, the very divided self - we own all that.
Welcome to Scotland, you guys, your lunch was our square sausage political breakfast.
All the signs are there that a Scottish lunch is now being served to British politics.
The Labour Party conference in Liverpool gave us a glimpse of the starter menu.
Delegates would have gone home with the impression that a general election campaign is kicking off next week and that a personal thank-you card from Prime Minister Jeremy Corbyn will be in the post before Christmas.
Yes, it might happen. A cold mid-November election to match the gloominess of the "when the lights went out" Britain of 1974 is possible. But the chances of it actually taking place are slim.
The Tory party wouldn't give Corbyn the opportunity. The Tory right will, by all means, rail against the Chequers Brexit plan. But lose a vote of confidence that would trigger a prime ministerial resignation? Not yet.
Labour strategists know this but they also know the transformed party that Corbynism has created demands permanent revolution.
The enthusiasm of the thousands of new and "old left" members has to be maintained by promising Heaven is just one more step away.
The same situation confronts Nicola Sturgeon on an annual basis.
Having been gifted one of the most energetic and motivated political mass movements in Europe, she now has to find new ways of telling them the same story - that independence is just around the corner.
The SNP leader is good at keeping the ball in the air, often with the help of opponents. And Corbyn will be looking, learning and hoping that no one remembers that he promised conference they would next year be gathering under a Labour government.
That said, the Scottish experience offers Labour few lessons in how to move politics beyond the dominant divide created by the referendum (either referendum - Brexit or independence).
Labour had some good, strong policies this week, selling socialism as a retail offer, making Karl Marx sound like Marks & Spencer.
Tories like Robert Halfon MP, who understand constituencies that are key to a Commons majority, are worried. So they should be when you see the slick video about "rebuilding Britain" that Labour released.
Labour's ideas for a rebalanced economy are popular and the Tories have no response to a change agenda that wins elections.
But that doesn't matter to the Tories. As long as they occupy themselves with Europe, nothing else will matter. And that's the Scottish-flavoured main course we'll see at their party conference in Birmingham. In Scotland, nothing matters except the constitution.
Michael Gove doesn't believe in a Chequers deal any more than Alex Salmond believed in a devolved Scottish parliament.
But like the SNP in the late 90s, the astute on the Tory right are willing to get any Brexit deal over the line and then start dismantling it later on.
Like the SNP on devolution, the Tory Brexiteers will take the Chequers deal for now, as a means to an end.
Like the SNP, they can then start a tug of war and keep pulling the constitutional cables until, they hope, connections with Europe, or the UK in the case of the SNP, are severed.
If they chew through the ropes, we'll bring the UK the dessert menu, too.
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