So, two weeks on and still the 'scandal' of where and with whom First Minister Jack McConnell took his New Year holidays looks like it might finally be fizzling out. His tactic of refusing to acknowledge misjudgements might have seen him through, but he has diminished both himself and his office in the process.

I don't know anyone who actually believed that any wrongdoing had taken place. However, I know plenty of people who were uncomfortable with the cosiness which exists in the Wark/ McConnell relationship. After all, it will now be very easy, rightly or wrongly, to call into question Wark's impartiality as a political broadcaster. But when you throw the number of public contracts which Wark's company has won from McConnell's Executive and its agencies in recent years, this exchange of hospitality, which would be perfectly innocent in other walks of life, starts to take on a more sinister hue.

Perception is everything in politics and to that end it is important not only that everything in this arrangement is above board, but also that it is seen to be above board and it is here that McConnell has let himself down badly. However, what I find distasteful is the view McConnell has sought to propagate - namely, that an attack on his behaviour is somehow an attack on Scotland and therefore on devolution. Its all a big conspiracy whipped up by anti-devolutionist elements in the press. In McConnellworld, it seems that 'a big boy done it and ran away' is still an acceptable explanation for personal misfortune.

Sadly, the hubris and arrogance which marked both McConnell's and Wark's response has left a whiff in the air that something is rotten in the state of Scotland. However, the very fact that neither protagonist can understand what they have done wrong shows how deep-rooted the problem of cronyism and small networks of friends really is in our country.

At the end of the day, whether they have actually done anything wrong is not currently the point at issue. That point is that although Wark and McConnell are long-standing personal friends, the interface between their respective business and political lives throws up myriad situations where conflict of interests could arise. This is why, in accordance with the rules of the Scottish Parliament, this holiday should have been declared in McConnell's register of interests. That way, this exchange of hospitality would have been a matter of public record and we could have judged for ourselves in a more sober manner whether there was anything untoward in the relationship or not.

As a final word on the matter, while I do not think that any politician should be forced from office over a matter like this, we need to remember that these rules governing member's interests are in place for a reason. For all the scorn it would provoke from those who have never reconciled themselves to Scottish home rule, I would rather see McConnell forced out of office than have 'stablity' under a First Minister whom sections of the political and media establishment appear to be conspiring to place above the law by playing down the significance of this sorry affair.

A separate, but related issue to the above is the often talked about 'small country syndrome', where everyone seems to know everyone else. While people talk about the six degrees of separation, in that you are only six handshakes away from meeting anyone in the world that you want to, in Scotland often it feels like you are closer to two degrees of separation.

While having an establishment where everyone knows everyone else in politics, media, business and the arts can be nurturing, it can also be stifling and incestuous. Although proportionately there is no less talent in smaller countries than there is in larger countries, there is often more competition for position in larger countries, which helps to drive out small town cliquishness. It is for this reason that small countries have to be more vigilant when it comes to personal relationships in public life and business.

The venerable Iain MacWhirter, a highly regarded Scottish political journalist, provides a prime example of small country syndrome in action. Perhaps a better adjective than venerable would be ubiquitous, since he writes columns for the Herald and the Sunday Herald, as well as finding time to present BBC Scotland's coverage of the Scottish Parliament and a round-up of the political stories of the week on 'Politics Scotland' of a Friday evening.

Good for him, you might say. MacWhirter is both a talented presenter and a print journalist. However, the qualities required for one role can often sit uncomfortably with those required for the other. Most obviously, the requirement for impartiality at the BBC sits uncomfortably with the need to be controversial and interesting in the Herald titles.

To see how problematic this is in practice, let's suppose that a Sunday newspaper were to break a story, which McWhirter found trivial, such as with his response to the current brouhaha surrounding Kirsty Wark and Jack McConnell.

MacWhirter could dismiss the whole thing in his Tuesday Herald column, as would be his right to do as a commentator. But let's further suppose that this story has legs and the matter is raised in the Scottish Parliament the following day. Despite his stance from the previous day's press, we are now supposed to see MacWhirter as impartial in his role as a BBC presenter for the 'Holyrood' programme.

Suppose he overcomes the temptation to declaim in the form of a question, as he is sometimes wont to do, that the whole story is a lot of nonsense and that no-one in the real world is really interested in such trivia. The story rumbles on to Friday evening and Politics Scotland, where he has yet another chance to demonstrate his scorn for the emerging story. By now in its second week, MacWhirter has yet another opportunity through the Sunday Herald to try and persuade us that this isn't something we should be interested in.

The multiple positions occupied by Iain MacWhirter are a symptom of a wider problem in Scottish public life. I should say I defend Iain MacWhirter's right to perform any of these roles - just not all of them. It is surely in the interests of a vibrant democracy to have greater diversity amongst those who cover our political affairs. That way, the public stand a much better chance of being able to see who to praise and who to blame when elections come, which would benefit everyone.
 

Last week saw another milestone in the history of the House of Windsor. Attending a 'colonials and natives' party held by some of his Wiltshire chums (what planet do these people live on?), Prince Harry decided it would be a lark to turn up dressed as a member of Rommell's Afrikakorps, with the addition of a Nazi swastika on his left arm for good measure.

If there was ever a good time to pull such a stunt, the run up to the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz certainly wasn't it. Belatedly realising the outrage he had caused, a palace press officer issued a statement from the Prince saying that he was very sorry if his actions had caused any offence or embarrassment to anyone.

I don't want to sound old before my time. Released from the restrictions of school and before the responsibilities of adulthood kick in, most normal teenagers throw themselves into a round of parties and misbehaviour - at least I know I did. However, a group of rich kids with too few responsibilities and too much time on their hands is always a recipe for trouble.

The Prince certainly hasn't had an easy upbringing, losing his mother at an early age. But even leaving this aside as far as is possible, should we be too surprised at the Prince's actions? After all, his grandfather, Prince Phillip, has a history of causing offence by making off-colour comments in public, while his father infamously had it revealed that he wanted to be a sanitary product for his mistress. With a family like that he was always unlikely to turn out with a sense of what is and is not acceptable.

Since the British public retains an almost irrational attachment to the idea of a Royal Family, it looks like we're stuck with them for the foreseeable future. This being the case, in common with most observers, I hope his planned spell in the army knocks some sense into the third in line to the throne before any chance to become mornarch comes his way.

But yet, the republican in me still comes to the fore. We don't have hereditary brain surgeons, any more than we have hereditary car mechanics.  If the Windsors want to carry on in this way then let them, but isn't it time we ditched the hereditary principal when it comes to appointing our head of state too?