THE optimism of John Milne for our future (Letters, July 2), is commendable. However, as Milan Kundera wrote, “optimism is the opium of the people”. Mr Milne’s quote from Gordon Brown, “We’ve got to give people a message of hope. Tell them about the dream” is a good example. Perhaps part of the problem for the Labour Party in Scotland is that their previous hegemony perished on the rock that too many people, for a variety of reasons, stopped believing them any more – that the “dream” was just that, a dream. As I said in my earlier letter (June 30), a carefully constructed peace deal in Northern Ireland is unravelling, and the Labour First Minister in Wales holds that the UK “is over”. Optimism is fine but must be based on facts.