Those in the know say you've really made it to the 'A list' when you appear on the front cover of Time magazine.

Since 1923 it has featured everyone who's been anyone from from Presidents John F Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev to Hollywood royalty Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, to real royalty in the shape of Princesses Diana and Grace.

Well, he's not quite there yet, but in this week's edition there is a rather regal looking portrait of First Minister Alex Salmond adorning page 24.

His public relations machine no doubt ecstatic that at last his profile is being raised beyond the confines of the Scottish media village.

It's not a bad coup really, Time nearly sells more copies around the world every week than there are people living in Scotland.

Suddenly from just blanket exposure around Holyrood with occasional bit parts in the London media, he's gone global. The demographic of Time's readership couldn't be better. Every decision maker who matters pays attention to what it says and who it says it about.

As they say you just can't buy publicity like this.

But what exactly were they saying?

Well the message will be music to his ears. They compare the Scottish predicament to that of pre revolutionary America, a country lining the pockets of a distant London treasury

They even quote the old Minuteman cry 'No taxation without representation.'

After years of the London establishment branding Scotland subsidy junkies, the Nats have at last broken through and persuaded international ears that it is in fact Scotland who is doing the subsidising.

Time lists off Scotland's stolen riches ; booming whisky industry, salmon packed rivers, tourism and oil and gas reserves a plenty, all filling the coffers of a southern government representing only a fraction of the Scots vote.

Described as a 'jovial' character by the magazine after reading what they written heprobably turned inot the Chesire Cat.

Even more illustrious than being on the cover of the magazine is being voted Time person of the year. After convincing a mainstay of international media opinion about the righteousness of Scottish independence, he must think he's in with a shout.  With an ego the size of Eck's what more incentive could there be to win the referendum.