It’s that story again!
No, we’re not referring to the Spectator’s awful reheated whine from super-Unionist composer Sir James Macmillan, Knight Commander Of The Most Excellent Order Of The British Empire, in which he takes the audacious step of accusing some OTHER artistes of cravenly kowtowing to the establishment.
(A complaint he’s been levelling for several years in any publication that’ll listen, and which today’s piece hasn’t bothered to update with any post-2014 examples.)
We’re actually talking about this:
Because this one’s even older.
Alert readers will recall that we’re no fans of the Gaelic language, but even less fond of cretinous newspaper stories hysterically inflating the supposed costs of “promoting” it. And we’re at a loss as to why the P&J – which also disgraced itself yesterday by carrying the “ferry chaos” story – has chosen to dredge the old chestnut up again today.
That’s some interesting language. “Are being forced” would suggest this was a new development. But in the next paragraph the reality becomes clear:
Because the law “forcing” the Labour-controlled council to act was passed 11 years ago, by a Labour-led administration at Holyrood under First Minister Jack McConnell, with the backing of the Conservatives. We know some Labour politicians in Scotland can be slow readers, but that’s taking it a bit far.
Our previous article demolished the idea of Gaelic signage and so on having a huge cost (normally the effective cost is zero, as Gaelic placenames are only added when signs are due for replacement anyway), so we wondered where the P&J’s headline blaring about “MILLIONS” had come from. We soon found out.
Oh. As it turned out, Labour councillor, finance convener and borderline halfwit Willie Young had pulled it out of his backside.
(In the interests of good taste we’re going to decline to specify which direction Young borders halfwit status from.)
In fact the report that’s referred to in the article, which can be read on the Aberdeen City Council website, was considerably less apocalyptic about the possible costs of implementing the measures:
With regard to being “forced”, the report also notes that nobody has in fact ever been sanctioned for non-compliance with the 2005 Act:
So in summary: these obligations on a Labour council are more than a decade old, they stem from an act introduced by Labour (even though a Conservative MSP describes them in the story as “an SNP obsession”), the suggestion that they could cost “MILLIONS” is complete and utter tosh, and even if the council completely failed to implement them it’s highly unlikely that anything would happen.
Front page lead material, for sure. We look forward to seeing it again the next time the P&J’s staff have been in the pub all night and can’t be bothered coming up with any actual news.
Still, on the paper’s list of the possible onerous requirements that would make up this terrible financial burden on the City Council, we note that “a bilingual logo for the authority” is included. In an attempt to be helpful, we’ve knocked one up ourselves.
We’re happy to let Willie Young have it for £2.50 and a signed photograph of Derek McInnes. He knows where to find us.
Where as the English signs are free!
To describe Willie Young as a “borderline halfwit” is inaccurate and gives the impression he might be right half the time. Take it from a citizens of Aberdeen, he’s no where close to that.
In summary , the SNP are fulfilling a legal obligation created by Labour, which apparently costs millions of something or other, or may well not cost anything at all.
I have come to the conclusion that getting ACTUAL FACTS from the Unionist media is akin to drinking 5 gallons of water using only chopsticks.
BLis, as bright as a 2w bulb. Trying SNP bad, from their (BLis) own policy; ffs.
I thought I was beyond being surprised my the idiocy and SNP Badness of the MSM and their unionist rentaquotes, but I find it’s not so.
What is so however, is that I have run out of adjectives and superlatives (strictu sensu) to describe them.
What else would you expect from Trump’s northern mouthpiece?
Eh . . .
Is your Logo no a wee bit Tri-lingual?
Aberdeen council, well known to work on behalf of the Aberdeen people !(cough) They are so bad in reality, they want Aberdeen stuck in a time warp. All the while bemoaning the SG. They need to be “outed” and thrown out in May, along with the rest of the corrupt labour councils across Scotland.
P&G = dung.
I’m going to learn Gaelic, just as soon as the over subscribed classes in my area of the Central Belt free up!!!
Learning a second language is the best way to keep my middle aged brain from mithering itself.
Meantime, the BBC and P&J have free rein to mither us, but thank you, Rev.
Just responded to BBC on Twitter. They are reporting that the escaped oil from the stranded rig has ‘evaporated’.
That would be the beeling sun of the W Isles that evaporated diesel oil?????
I’m no scientist, but I think Lewis needs to gird their loins for hordes of global Press wanting to report this phenomenon.
Why are there huge worries over environmental damage, when oil just evaporates in the freezing Scottish waters?
For the balance, socialist worker Wullie Young is a landlord millionaire lawyer, while socialist working as Slabour boss of Aberdeen cooncil, that’s not built any social housing for 4 decades. Kerching! UKOK style.
You want to see the latest SLab white elephant going up in Aberdeen right now though. On one UKOK hand, yoons rage there’s no oil left, on the other, ACC SLabour dudes like Wullie blow £100+ million on giant city centre office block eyesores, in a flat market, with no oil left.
Guess who Wullie’s finally leased some of the above white elephant to? Neo fascist Voice of The North Press and Journal. Again, kerching! UKOK style.
I take it Cooncillor Og approves of the untold millions spent and the rivers of blood and tears to rid us of the language?
You heard it here first, diesel evaporates in the Western Isles heat.
http://archive.is/zhaEB
P&J and Wullie, UKOK tub thumping together.
http://archive.is/2tGX1
“Doubts about the business case for the development have also been raised in light of the drop-off in hotel occupancy rates and demand for office space amid the oil and gas industry downturn.
But Muse previously insisted the complex will complement its surrounds, and said yesterday there has been no shortage of interest from prospective tenants.”
Yes, from the P&J. Wullie wont say how much P&J are actually paying for their lease either, shock. He just says that Aberdonians who don’t like his legacy horror show have to now move on.
Just one question, why do newspapers think they can lie without it affecting their revenue? If i was to read this then rant to someone who actually knows the truth I would feel quite foolish, then if I realised that most of the P&J output was utter lies, I wouldn’t trust them, then I wouldn’t buy the rag, lest I be embarrassed again, or are the P&J just saying all their readers are mentally subnormal?
I doubt if the P & J bothered to do any research. These papers are funded mostly by advertising. Perhaps some advertisers would get a better return from advertising on the internet rather than newspapers.
The press & journal play as vital resource in Scotlands papymashy industry.
The thing that surprises me most is that Labour politicians always seem to forget that it was Labour politicians who passed the law in the first place.
Too easy just to blame the SNP. That’s why the’re finished.
I’m glad to learn that signs in English don’t cost anything.
I think you are being very generous calling Young a halfwit. He is clearly 100% dimwitted.
“Too wee, too poor, too stupid.”
Only when you have a small mind.
Must be awful quiet on the news front.
Wullie Rennie coming out from under the rock he has been hiding under all summer and now this.
What next I wonder?
press and journal – pish an jaurnoch
Willie Young has wasted £Millions building grotesque projects, the majority do not want in Aberdeen. Then claiming there is not enough funding for essential services. The mess in the City centre. The road to nowhere in his constituency. Wasted £Millions. The intended £300Million for a ‘white elephant’ exhibition centre in Crocket’s constituency. They refused a Gift of £80Million to pedestrianised the City. They intend building another concrete jungle and causing traffic chaos. They are a public disgrace.
The Scottish Gov should stop giving them £Millions to waste.
Notice the use of the word “ancient” to describe Gaelic; as if it’s age automatically makes it obsolete.
I’m sure the pro-BritNat zoomers at the P&J will be printing another story tomorrow, reminding speakers of Hebrew to give it up for the Queen’s English, because it’s far too old for the glaikit half-wits in the editorial room to even attempt to translate.
Oh Jeez!
It seems the meeja are on a roll. 😀
I think you are being very generous calling Young a halfwit. He is clearly 100% dimwitted.
If he doesn’t actually speak, he can pull it off but…
He stood for Bridge of Don SLab MSP and it was a bit of a shock watching UKOK SLab jibberish pour out of him, especially in STV “debates” with Mark McDonald MSP. It was like watching verbal diarrhoea, as Wullie tried to make issues, making his constituents pay student fees like England, seem like a great idea. He lost badly but with that lovely angry entitled SLab thing going on as usual.
SLab dudes like Wullie are not going to quietly and without causing as much damage as possible.
The Press & Journal is owned by D.C. Thomson & Co.Ltd.—that’s the COURIER and EVENING TELEGRAPH stable.
Ignorance is BLiS
Apart from all the factual flaws in this whiney little article, I don’t get the logic of complaining that councils are being “forced to promote Gaelic despite hardly anybody speaking it.” Surely that’s the whole point of promoting it? If everybody was already chattering away in Gaelic they wouldn’t need to promote it in the first place.
Logic, it works.
Numpties.
Far better to write names in English which misspell the Gaelic ones.
What is gaelic for Numpty heid?
Doric?
Scots?
Parliamo Glesga?
Morningside?
Ahhh a yooonniiist trick
is it just “wullie young?”
now arse…
erse…
bahookie or bahooky? — do they mean the same thing?
…… Press and Journal -…
Not happy with just attacking the SNP/SG the rabid Brit Nat Yoons have to attack anything that is directly or indirectly Scottish.
I don’t view it as just anti Gaelic but pure out and out Yoon hatred of anything Scottish. The P&J disgraces itself daily. Cllr Young is as loved by them as much as the Trump is.
Oh and the white settler and part of the ruling Brit Nat Coalition in Moray, the Independent Cllr Tuke likes to spout off as well. I make no apology for this last remark as it happens to be true as he went as far as to write into the letters page of the Northern Scot some time ago expressing what I regard as anti Scottish sentiments.
The Petition against Blatant BBC Bias and Misreporting Scotland is just about to have its 90,720th signature!
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/independent-enquiry-into-bbc-bias-regards-scottish-independence-referendum
Apart from all the factual flaws in this whiney little article, I don’t get the logic of complaining that councils are being “forced to promote Gaelic despite hardly anybody speaking it.”
Aberdeen and the north east is populated by some of the most toryboy tories alive, mostly. P&J letters section is so UKOK ferocious you have to read it with a welders helmet. From wildly greedy and furious oil millionaires and billionaires, incomer tory votes from England and being educated to think they own their Scotland region by dint of being UK, nasty old military buffers, demented old landowners enraged at everything up start Scottish rubbish and Holyrood, and strange red tories demanding the closure of Scottish everything.
That’s just today’s. Its a big market for advertisers of adult nappies, stair lifts, rest homes, and ofcourse giant ACC ads.
With reference to Andrew McLean’s comment about ‘papers losing revenue when seen to lie; I suspect that they may be funded by Government as long as they run down Scotland. It is essential that the likes of the Scotsman and Herald do not fall into the hands of a Scottish owner. The Scotsman has lost 90% of its £150 million price of only a few years ago and STILL runs down Scotland at every opportunity. The Rev has the brains to look into this more fully, since it makes no economic sense.
@Headtracker
Oh I get it. They don’t want “their” money being spent on this pathetic little Scottish language that should have died out long ago. Never mind that Gaelic has a body of literature stretching back to Roman times, rich fat cats need tax cuts so they can afford a second yacht.
It’s a P&J story, which got me thinking: what’s the Gaelic for North East Man Drowned at Sea?
Valerie says: @ 3:04 pm
You heard it here first, diesel evaporates in the Western Isles heat.
http://archive.is/zhaEB
It’s like Whisky Galore all over again. Those Western Islanders and they’re crazy schemes!
What next!
And let’s remember that children were forced to speak English and were beaten for using Gaelic , in fact the languages of Scotland were forcibly discouraged – much like the native americans and the aborigines.
The arrogance of the conqueror visited many lands and languages.
Isn’t about time when the P&J comes up with such absolute rubbish that every home in Aberdeen should get the above article through their doors a couple of days later. If that was done a couple of times they’d becomes on objects of ridicule.
Ridicule and derision are the most powerful political tools
Well written critique by the Rev.He’ll grow to love Gaelic, one of our national languages, yet. It’s ‘s math sin (smashin’).
Another bunch of con-men exposed by Rev. Stu. They must hate you Rev. but you are the master of reminding us of their statements and actions which they would rather forget.
Fluffie strikes back with the Hootsman. Yesterday neo fascist Voice of the North Press and Journal headline, “Too popular” ferries in Scotland and today
http://archive.is/vlKtO
Hoostman toryboy’s are angry, grrrrr.
Pish & Jobbies
Agree with ” Graham Borthwick” comment at 0425pm. This should be investigated, as
I suspect that the ” print media cabal” pumping out ” unionist propaganda ” on a daily basis,
have ” close ties” with the ” Tory junta” government.Possibly any ” losses” sustained by these ” newspapers” are set against other corporate profits gained by the proprietors ( other business interests). Subsequently , the ( Scottish) taxpayer is quite possibly subsidising the deluge of propaganda directed at us on a daily basis.
Joannie says:
11 August, 2016 at 4:39 pm
@Headtracker
Oh I get it. They don’t want “their” money being spent on this pathetic little Scottish language that should have died out long ago.
If you’re from Aberdeen, you may actually know some of the red and blue tory roasters that vent their UKOK fury on the P&J letters page. Its a really odd crew too. Some are ofcourse very rich Britnats enraged with this “who the hell do you Scots think you are anyway” stuff, that’s often an old French medic, major general TuftonBuftons Project Fearing Scots military style, to uni of Aberdeen academics who get really angry if England’s backing of anything science in Aberdeen, is not acknowledge or given thanks for. You never see any one YES or SNP letter but no wonder. Thing is though, like I said, some you do know and know they are wealthy hucksters who’ve made a lot of money UKOK style, in a local democracy with very low turnouts, allowing all kinds of dis-functioning weirdos to get going.
If we don’t start voting locally it wont change either.
Aye heedtracker 4.24pm., they would never havegotten away with that sh**e in the valleys.the sons of glendowr would have kept a warm welcome in the hillsides forthem???
I have never been able to understand this outright hatred by unionists of one of Scotland’s languages. If you read these nutters, you would think the Gaelic Language act entailed infecting every new born with the black death.
Seriously, they are so vociferous about it. Why do they get so uppity over something which is relatively trivial and I think makes the country a better place, by encouraging more Scots to find out about Gaelic. My own interest started after visiting parts of the highlands, and not knowing how to pronounce some Gaelic place names.
It is an utter disgrace that so much effort has been used to force people not to use Gaelic in Scotland over the years (this was done in Highland schools – the same was true with Welsh, incidentally, in Wales), refusing to teach children in Gaelic speaking areas how to read the language (their are many older fluent Gaelic speakers who struggle to read/write the language). No other country would do such a thing to its own people.
To this day, I still cannot fathom the outright hatred unionists have/had for Gaelic. Of course some people see a place for it, and some do not, but the utter hatred about it, I just cannot fathom. Why are they so angry all the time??
Just wondered.
What will the Rabid Brit Nats do when we achieve a state of Independence?
Aimed at the Mundells, Birds, Davidsons, Adams, Rennies, Mountains, Youngs, Tukes, Rowlings who impose their Yoon rule on us.
Will they leave?
Aye heedtracker 4.24pm., they would never havegotten away with that sh**e in the valleys.the sons of glendowr would have kept a warm welcome in the hillsides forthem???
Aye heedtracker 4.24pm., they would never havegotten away with that sh**e in the valleys.the sons of glendowr would have kept a warm welcome in the hillsides forthem???
Aye heedtracker 4.24pm., they would never havegotten away with that sh**e in the valleys.the sons of glendowr would have kept a warm welcome in the hillsides forthem???
Ian more 4.18pm.arent they lucky we scots are so tolerant. Because these b******s would never have gotten away with these anti native comments if they lived in ireland.
Aye heedtracker 4.24pm., they would never havegotten away with that sh**e in the valleys.the sons of glendowr would have kept a warm welcome in the hillsides forthem???
Relax, it’s just more DC Thomson diatribe. An organisation that’s still in revultion at Dundee voting Yes!
I watched a good documentary recently about the native people of the North West Pacific coastal regions and was taken aback by the way the people were treated by the Canadian government who passed laws banning their cultural gatherings aswell as symbols of their culture.
The Canadian government apologised to those people for the suffering they endured, will Westminster ever apologise to Scotland for the despicable way they have treated this countries people and our culture?
I’m afraid I’m no help to you Headtracker, I’m not from Aberdeen or even Scotland. Just an interested observer from foreign parts.
@Robert Louis – Scottish Gaelic shouldn’t exist. It should be a dead language, gone the same way as Cornish and Manx. Its continued existence is an affront to people of a certain mentality, like a constant reminder of something they’d rather forget. Welsh no longer provokes the same reaction, but up until recently it used to.
As for Irish, that’s just bluntly hated as a “terrorist language.”
Dont know what happened there double posting.apologies.
All ye’d really need is a stencil kit n can or incentivise a talented graffiti artisté to do the necessary onto what’s already there. But in general, Yes, it’s a case of as and when required / replaced.
I bet you Chris Cairns could draw a Gaelic ferry 🙂
All my posts disappeared??.
Honestly love your work! Keep it up! Any fundraising required?
@Chic
“Is your Logo no a wee bit Tri-lingual?”
Or even quadrilingual? (Aber – Welsh – estuary)
Joannie, youre not missing much. All 37 Scottish haha newspapers are owned by right wing nutjobs, very rich right wing nut jobs more accurately. And they only hire the highest Pulitzer prize standards of journalists, who everyday fart out SNP bad, grovel to royals, SNP bad, war is good, nukes set you free, there’s been a cat stuck up a tree/murder, vote NO for Devo-Max, Federal UK, saving your EU citizenship, Rangers will win everything, SNP bad.
or, they’re all like
https://twitter.com/Torcuil
We’re just so lucky.
I lol’d at “there’s been a cat stuck up a tree/murder”. Our media’s bad enough in Ireland, yours sounds worse.
Greannach says:
11 August, 2016 at 3:21 pm
“I’m glad to learn that signs in English don’t cost anything.”
Hehehe. I liked that one. If Gaelic is so expensive, how much does it cost for a fancy French fantoosh Bon Accord?
People need to remember that Gaelic is in its parlous state because of severe measures to extirpate it, from the post-Culloden ethnic cleansing experiment to educational policy like the 1872 Education Act. The idea that it is a dying language is only true because it’s been stomped on for 250 years. The attempt to make it a Gaelic versus Scots face-off is a classic Establishment divide and rule tactic.
Yoonsters hate Gaelic because it reminds them of an identity they do not want to be part of: so alien, so foreign, and so Scottish. The Scots language probably revolts them too, but I’ve met many a revolting little Nawbag at Burns Suppers because Burns has been taken over by the revolting Scottish Bourgeoisie, ironically. You know, the type who try to tell you that Burns would have voted No.
Sheesh! (unknown linguistic origin).
In all the yoon madness today I see JKR has given Loki’s crowd funder £5000 to write his book on poverty.
Nothing wrong with that, giving money is what crowd funding is all about.
She could have given it anonymously though. By making her name public she knew exactly the reaction it would provoke.
She really is a piece of work.
Joannie, BBC World Service has some very aggressive UKOK unionists er, in it, who keep saying that Ireland would be far BetterTogether off being part of the UK again, should never have left the UK, and be better off run by Westminster presumably. Same crew keep saying a lot of Irish people want to be British again.
Is any of that true or is it predicable teamGB zealotry at the BBC, and BBC World Service has some of the most ferocious Britmats in broadcasting?
“She could have given it anonymously though. By making her name public she knew exactly the reaction it would provoke.”
Actually it was just credited to “jo”. I saw it, made the connections and Loki confirmed it. Wasn’t exactly Sherlock stuff.
“The newspaper was first published as a weekly title, Aberdeen’s Journal, on 29 December 1747. In 1748 it changed its name to the Aberdeen Journal. It was published on a weekly basis for 128 years until August 1876, when it became a daily newspaper.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Press_and_Journal_(Scotland)
Since it was first published in the year after Culloden, I think we can assume that extirpating Gaelic has always been its core mission.
Actually, that was one of ours. Sorry.
@Heedtracker
No its bollocks. I think every country that has ever been colonised has a weirdo element that pines for their former oppressors, Ireland is no exception. Apart from that weirdo element we’d rather starve, (again), than come back to the UK. We like looking at pictures of Wills and Kate but when push comes to shove, we’d rather elect our own head of state.
Fair enough.
I saw it via Loki who seemed happy to promote it.
I suppose there aren’t too many people sympathetic to his views named ‘Jo’ in the position to give that sort of money!
Just seen our new Shadow Scottish Secretary on Reproaching Scotland. Didn’t catch his name.
I think subtitles in English would be helpful.
Joannie says:
“we’d rather elect our own head of state.”
… so will we, in time. 🙂
Joannie says:
11 August, 2016 at 6:41 pm
@Heedtracker
Ok. We lived in Ireland, Dublin, Sandy Cove for two years and I never heard anyone say they wanted to be UK again. But BBC World Service is pretty adamant about it, so its a bit disorientating to say the least. Especially when we had Sir Bob Geldorf, from Black Rock of all places, going UKOK mental at us 2014.
Throughout the night before Scotland’s ref 18 Sept 2014, BBC World Service hourly covered what turned out to be virtually factious overblown terrorists attacks and beheadings pf shoppers in Australian cities like Sybdeny, with massive OZ police activity ordered by their PM, and followed by their miserable and somber BBC at war style, “Scotland goes to the polls this morning…” You’d have to go a long way to find any state broadcaster trying to terrorise an electorate, the way the BBC World Service attempted to Project Fear Scots that night.
But it was all for own good:D
Don’t know why am loling, they were really terrifying that night, lovely old aunty Beeb.
That article was ‘s math sin (pronounced smashing – in fact English took the word from gaelic).
Another important contribution of (Irish) gaelic to English is the term Tory, from toraidhe meaning an outlaw or robber. You see, gaelic is a language of wisdom!
@Heedtracker – the BBC are talking bollocks. Just ignore them, the chances of Ireland ever swapping neutrality for British defense policy and a President for an unelected foreign monarch are zilch.
As for Geldof, I was hoping you’d all forgotten about him. He’s become an embarrassment and a walking example of the weirdo element I mentioned above.
Ive also heard BBC guru’s talking about Ireland pulling out of the EU, and sending MPs back to Westminster and Finally accepting the Queen as head of state.
Don’t know what La La land these folk live in perhaps they need to google .. The Irish Holocaust and read all about why it wont happen.
heedtracker
Don’t know if you counted the Metro in your 37 papers. The “advantage” of this paper is that you can pick it up on a bus and read mostly English happenings, but also anti-SNP reports and it’s all FREE. Propaganda at no cost. Think it may be owned by the Daily Heil–nuff said.
Head tracker
You have professional detachment when dealing with mad right wing facist types, like Mundell, but please be assured the rest of us don’t, so please when putting up links to that complete arse of a man, a disgrace to his country, you at least give us fair warning! I was quite looking forward to reading your post, now I fear I will need to seek professional help after reading that madman’s pish.
Honestly if that man was a dog, I would not hesitate to have it humanly distoryed, don’t misunderstand me I would feel terrible, but know I was doing the best as I could not see a poor animal suffering. He must be a tortured individual, so perhaps pity would be more becoming, yes that’s it pity, poor damaged individual, probably not even aware of the absolute offence he causes ever time he opens his food caked mouth.
@G H Graham says: 11 August, 2016 at 3:33 pm:
“Notice the use of the word “ancient” to describe Gaelic; as if it’s age automatically makes it obsolete.”
There is a very
goodbad reason why both Gaelic and Lowland Scots language are both Anglicised and dying out – Westminster Establishment suppression. They proscribed all things Scottish since before the Treaty of Union. The wearing of Scottish Highland dress, the playing of Scottish Music, (mainly the pipes), and the use of Scotland’s own languages.Mind you the main tools used for suppression of the latter were our very own, mainly, Oxbridge educated Scots in the teaching profession. I only spoke The Lallans as a child. I was brought up on a farm that had no mains electricity so never really heard English spoken until I attended the local village school. From day one I was Lochgellied by tawse wielding Dominies for speaking Lallans in class.
Being always a rather independent wee lad, who was well accustomed to hard knocks, the Lochgelly tawse were no deterrent and I made a point of not only being competent at this new (foreign), English language but of deliberately using my Lallans leid at least once in every lesson.
To the point that I would use a Scots word or phrase, and without being requested, would walk to the teacher’s with my hand outstretched for the application of, “The Strap”. Incidentally the competence in English was intended to infuriate the teacher – and it never failed to do so.
So there’s the truth – both Gaelic and Scots, (as opposed to Scottish Standard English), were deliberately suppressed by the Establishment.
Make no mistake, at least in those days, the mainly Oxbridge educated Scottish teaching profession was an integral part of the Westminster Establishment. Little has changed in the intervening years. The only difference is the Lochgelly Tawse was banned as was the physical punishment of children by teachers.
In fact the real Scottish Lowlands language is only at least as old as Standard English as both have their roots in the same, Germanic, “Old English”, roots and that Old English would not be readable today by speakers of either Standard English or the Scottish Lallans leid.
Oh and heedy I didn’t spell the penultimate word wrong, look up the urban dictionary, it’s stunningly distasteful!
Joannie says:
11 August, 2016 at 7:15 pm
@Heedtracker – the BBC are talking bollocks
When we were in Ireland, there was a big ongoing anti nuke protest movement against UK nuke power stations like Sellafield and in Wales. I dont know if they were worried about a UK Chernobyl or more the nuke waste poisoning of the Irish sea but as soon we came back to the UK, the protest was never mention in any UK media anywhere. A example of state media’s work, like the BBC in particular. Or maybe they thought UK nuke power had absolutely nothing to do with Ireland. Either way, it was an eye opener on how British media is strictly controlled by our imperial masters.
“Ananurhing says:
11 August, 2016 at 6:55 pm
Just seen our new Shadow Scottish Secretary on Reproaching Scotland. Didn’t catch his name.
I think subtitles in English would be helpful.””
Thank God I was not the only one who thought that. At first I thought my hearing had gone.
Then I caught a glimpse of his tie – Angel of the North – bit of a clue so I was able to tune in a bit better the next time he spoke.
I wonder how they manage in Northern Ireland with him. He is Secretary of State for there as well I believe.
Your media is bad, but ours is no better really. They serve a different set of masters, that’s all. Just think though, if the BBC are that dishonest to you about the country right next door, what kind of nonsense are they spinning about countries further away where they’ve less chance of being caught out?
New shadow Scottish Secretary refuses to back down from his stance on a coalition with the SNP
Deputy Deadwood still way on a course so no comment from her then.
https://archive.is/DFF7L
@heedtracker 8.06. Yeah, yeah and thrice yeah.
Another example: I worked with a colleague who was in Austria at the time of the De Menezes Underground murder by Metropolitan Police. The TV channel carried eye-witness accounts of JCdM being shot without provocation or reason by the police.
Of course, all this was suppressed by all TV companies in the UK.
Post 18/9/14, I can believe anything of the BBC, but only because of my Nick Robinson Epiphany.
Somehow, we have to make more No voters undergo the same experience.
BTW: this should have been on the previous thread but it was short-lived. Willie Rennie: it’s been bothering we why I have always found him particularly irritating. Then I remembered the ventriloquists’s dummy with those tomb-stone in that film with Michael Redgrave.
The only problem is that the dummy probably has more up top than Kelty Boy.
Shoulda been “Tomb-stone teeth”.
Coulda been a contender!
Rev’s gonna kill me. “Use the live preview box.”
Is there a punishment below hammers?
Joannie, we got it straight between the eyes BBC style, over their Iraq invasion for starters. And then their Chilcot report into it all has now been buried, like so much of the horrors they get up to.
BBC led media focuses primarily on England and London and the foreign stuff is USA news and issues all the way. They also copy everything USA for their drama and comedy, satire especially, such as it is here.
Irony BBC style, costs of 4 billion euro a year aside, they totally rip off US tv and movies but the US has loads of mass market and ferocious tv satire, that tears into the same hard core conservative elites that own both America and the UK.
Everyone who cares knows who a satirist like Jon Stewart is but we will never see this kind of progressive liberal satire in teamGB. BBC will say there’s no market for it but and so, they’re now remaking their awful seventies comedies, from the epic era of the BBC anglophile paedophile too.
Gaelic signs: N.Whit? other countries have signs in their own languages but lots of them speak English too amazingly and with their very own regional dialects and they don’t cringe about it
Deisel fuel: The guy who said it evaporates should be made to pour it into his fish tank and wait ten minutes
Loki: Stain! That’s all I’ve got to say about that, as Forest Gump would say
I only had to use a couple of brain cells to work out that the Gaelic would only be added at the bottom of signs that needed putting up or replacing anyway. Maybe not quite true Rev to say the cost is zero, I suppose the extra paint must cost, oh, dozens of pounds. “Gaelic signs could cost you £50” isn’t quite as snappy a title though.
They must hold their readers in such contempt.
@Heedtracker
It was exactly Iraq I had in mind when I said imagine what they’re telling you about countries further away. I’m not convinced the situation in Russia/Ukraine is as straightforward as they make it out either. It seems like anytime they want a war they paint their intended enemy as Hitler.
I’m not saying my own country is any better, RTE are every bit as dishonest as the BBC but they just have a different agenda.
Andrew McLean says:
11 August, 2016 at 7:38 pm
Head tracker
Are you not battled hardened to that Hootsman style of monstering yet? They’re probably just attention seeking and showing off to Edinburgh Festival tourists, many from London, who also think Embro is London, in the north of their country.
Dr Jim: had a huge row with trendy Glasgow West End quinoa-eaters before the referendum re. Gaelic signs. Things got so bad I almost spilled my wine. Thought Mrs TC was going to deck someone.
Fast forward to next August. Same folks told me all about charming bi-lingual signs in Rousillon with Occitane and French.
What’s the French/Occitane/Catalan for Bite The Carpet?
Or even, Zut alors, ya bass?
I’m not saying my own country is any better, RTE are every bit as dishonest as the BBC but they just have a different agenda.
Really. Who do RTE bullshit for? Here the whole of the BBC led media is all the new tory Prime Minister Teresa May. BBC led pro May propaganda’s been ongoing for years now but its staggering how she’s now sold as the natural and rightful PM for the UK. She essentially got more or less ignored as Home Secretary, despite spectacular and banal tory fails, like telling us she’d end immigration to the UK. Brexit’s a spectacular catastrofuck for UK economy, May’s stuff was very weak Remain but now its all being sold as if only she can save Brexit UK from already happening recession. She had no Brexit plan. She still has no Brexit plan and yet she’s treated like a goddess.
And who gets the BBC led monstering for his poor Brexit campaign? Corbyn. Its a really dirty business tory UK propaganda and it means the UK will be under tory rule for as long as the like basically, or until they start WW3. They came close with their Iraq invasion, so they’ll be on their uppers.
Deary me not the hard won signs,the yoons will no be pleased if they lose their best of both worlds super outcome best devolved federalism the world has ever seen epic Smith debacle and Daily Record vow love bombing devo max road signs,man what a bummer.
Usual suspects up to their SNP bad rubbish its all rather tragic a bit like when a show you liked gets played to death it becomes a bore,thats it that is their master plan its to bore us all to death with unending streams of repeat pish.
Its will be the oil next or did we just have that one again its always the oil next.
‘They must hold their readers in such contempt.’
And they’d be right to.
Anyone who buys and reads these Britnat propaganda rags is worthy of contempt.
Guest post on WGD used the phrase ….
“The outcomes of both referendums however appear to be somewhat constitutionally incompatible”
… that just sums up the situation perfectly!
Bluddy gaelic signs, coming over here and stealing our roadsigns. We are far too soft, put up some real borders. I blame Nicla and Alicsammin and SNPbad. Vote UKIP and Brexit and keep them all out.
@Heedtracker
RTE – or Pravda as they are affectionately known – shill for whoever is the government of the day. Opposition leaders get the kind of treatment Jeremy Corbyn is currently getting and the government gets softball treatment.
At least they don’t try and make us into warmongers though, that’s something.
Heedy,
Oh I am battle hardened, just from different sort of battle, I can’t understand the unionist readers of the Scotsman who are so embarrassed by Nicola meeting any othe head of state, and obviously ignorant to the embarrassment of a Secretary of State for Scotland, eating the dried jiz from his beard in the House of Commons, his lovers little present all the more to remember him or them by.
I said that to a gay friend, apparently I am vile and obscene, moi? Surely not!
The Pish and Jobbers
Printing utter shite since 1747
Joannie says:
11 August, 2016 at 9:29 pm
@Heedtracker
Ok. Here they’re the king makers or queens ofcourse. Obviously UK media is profoundly right wing, with filthy rich hard core conservative owners, upper class elitist management, in front of the mikes and cameras too. Its a mocking nonsense of a democracy in effect but its always been like this.
Jeremy Corbyn’s currently being destroyed by the tory BBC in particular but its the centre right of the Labour party that piles in with them. Its excruciating watching two sides of the same tory arse monster Corbyn but on balance you can see why centre right Labour want Corbyn out, as there’s no way the tory BBC would allow him to win any UK general election. To rub salt in the progressive liberal wound, and its fucking huge, we also have to now listen to hard core Conservatives pretend to worry that a weak and unelectable Labour under Corbyn, would be so terribly bad for democracy.
This is the exact same tory creep show that bombed out of the EU for no actual reason or purpose, fights hard for the bizarre House of Lords farce, probably only won the last general election by mass breaking of election spending rules, all of which now neatly buried by the BBC in their endless campaign to keep an unelected minority of barking mad/useless/dangerous toryboys in power.
No wonder the Irish dont want back in to the UKOK freak out.
Jackie Baillie probably helped out with the “sums”.
@Heedtracker
They are awful, I know. We see enough of the BBC over here to get the measure of them, although I don’t remember really noticing it until your referendum campaign. I’m sorry you didn’t win, but to take the glass half full approach, at least its given you an insight into who you can trust and who you can’t.
Here’s hoping that comes in useful next time, forewarned is forearmed and all that.
Ye notice when Mundell’s being interviewed he shakes like some poor sowle wi delirium tremens. The man’s no right ah tell ye! no right at aa!
“I said that to a gay friend, apparently I am vile and obscene, moi? ”
Yup.
Rev Stu & Chic
That’s a quadrilingual logo. The name ‘Aberdeen’ is Brythonic.
It’s trilingual. “City” and ‘Council” are both french/latin.
I´m moved to use my wee bit o Gàidhlig to praise the P&J for bringing up this vitally important matter … but then why bother, it would be too much of a paean in the Erse 😉
(Gabh mo leisgeul, ´s iad na faclan as aosda na faclan a´s fheàrr)
@ Albert Herring
¨It’s trilingual. “City” and ‘Council” are both french/latin.¨
Or quadralingual (is that a word?) since Aberdeen is probably from Pictish or British (aber not inver).
Funny I live in a country where “our” bombs are falling tonight on innocents, and I am the obscene one? Our “free press” are extreme propagandists and its me that’s vile?
@heedtracker (8.34) –
‘Are We Being Served?’
Well, assuming that ‘served’ is a double-entendre? yes, actually, we are. Big time.
Makes ye wonder what else they’ve got up their tawdry sleeves. (Presumably, a post-modern ‘Love Thy Neighbour’ will be a shoo-in.)
🙂
Andrew
You are not obscene in a “children blown to pieces by bombs” sort of way, or vile in a “Jimmy Savile” sort of way…but I had just had my tea when you posted and I did think yuk! gross! The beard thing is not something I readily want brought to mind.
Just listening to Fluffy Muddle griping about the outrage of a pro-independence party wanting independence on the radio is bad enough. Visualising him is a step too far.
Andrew McLean says:
11 August, 2016 at 9:31 pm
Heedy,
Oh I am battle hardened,
Its not for you though, or me. Hootsman got its market and it knows how to sell lots of newspapers. Although it is going bust. One trick they’ve got is online independence polls, which is a really dirty trick, P&J especially, which is really sneaky, or just another day at the office for these guys.
Used to buy the Press and Journal only on Saturdays because it had a Gaelic Column. Have even given up on that now. Highland League Fans (the P&J is a sponsor) call it the Pig and Jam.
Ian Brotherhood says:
11 August, 2016 at 10:58 pm
@heedtracker (8.34) –
‘Are We Being Served?’
You are awful but I want to emigrate BBC tv is so shite, what’s next re heated It Ain’t Half Hot Mum, Black and White Minstrel show, Jim’ll Fix it. As long it gives work to the great UKOK upper middle class luvies classes that dont wont a proper job/are totally unemployable for anything else, bar the army.
Re. the cost of adding Gaelic names to road signs.
OFFS! Not to include Gaelic when replacing signs, would be a dereliction of the Scottish government’s duty of care towards Scotland’s cultural heritage.
Our cultural heritage (past and present), is the expression of Scottish-ness and plays a fundamental roll in shaping our environment and our perception of our environment and so helps form our values and judgement.
@Severin Carrell
One might say semiotics is the force that will help the separatist Jedi defeat the evil empire. What do you think?
Every sign should be changed to Gaelic just to annoy the Yoons.
Ian Brotherhood @ 10.58
Agree telly is shite. Think ‘Love thy Neighbour’ was on ITV.
We definitely need to get out of this disunited union.
@heedtracker –
‘Ant & Dec’ll Fix It’?
‘Jonathan Ross’s House Party’?
Surely these, or suchlike, are feasible?
Or ‘The Good Old Days’, with Piers Morgan (or Ian Hislop?) as a funky Leonard Sachs.
(Man, we should be getting paid for this…)
Man- seeing the sign at Lockerbie station that says “Locarbaidh” strikes me as pretty cool- this wee town rendered in a language probably never spoken there is fine by me.
You have to think about the tourists- it makes the place a wee bit more exotic, ethereal. I love it.
And if the press and journal have a problem with that they better get in touch with the EU who have a thing about official languages being displayed.
I don’t think anyone has the right to dictate what languages survive and which die. I’m on the side of the survivors in this one- England tried to subjugate Scotland for hundreds of years then they did. Then they tried to empty the highlands and lowlands and they did. Then they tried to destroy Scots, Gaelic and all Scottish culture and they tried hard. Then they tried to make everyone think everything Scottish was shite and the Scottish cringe was born.
Of late they have tried at every turn to destroy every effort to reawaken and reenergise this ancient Kingdom and they managed to convince enough well off folk and old people we were better ruled from London.
Now they want us to turn our back on our European friends.
The spell is over. This national myxomatosis has passed.
I was brought up to revere the Queen and Britain and respect our place in the empire. My kids are growing up thinking like we’re taking on Shelob.
Good luck to whoever is tasked with BT duties next time round – I will be hammering the benefits of staying in the EU and the risks of leaving… the uncertainty… and the massive opportunities for us.
In Edinburgh- the belly of the beast as it were, this pro EU riff will just play and play. International city of culture- world cultural centre…. and you, Ruth are going to campaign to bring us down to our fucking knees? Good luck with that
I am not there subject anymore- I am just Scottish and that is enough for me.
@Tam Jardine –
🙂
Hear hear indeed.
Aye it’s goodnight fae me. Catch all in the mornin’.
Last time this story ran I conducted a 5 minute research and discovered that dual lingo signage in the much smaller Cornwall cost a lot more than £0.
Yoons ran away at this news.
Yo.. Boaby G rockin’ it out in the bandstand le soir.. Primal Scream..
Go Glasgow!
Tam
Nice one.
The P&J is great. My neighbour gives me her old copies to light my fire with. She is disturbed that my life is so disorganised that I have no newspapers in the house to perform this useful function. I haven’t yet found a way of lighting the fire with internet news.
Suggestions on a postcard please.
Other than the book of the Dean of Lismore, the other most important “antient” text with annotations in Scots Gàidhlig is the Book of Deer (Leabhar Dhèir), from Auld Deer (arguably Allt Dhèir)
Ironically Aberdeenshire ( just sayin)
Luckily, we don’t have to worry about looking after it, it is safeguarded elsewhere far from our grubby little hands in the library of Cambridge University. Where it turned up in about 1715.(Funny that) Cos really important stuff is best preserved at the centre of the universe, really. Cos I mean god only knows what the Greeks would do with those Elgin marble thingies .
Heaven forfend that it should ever be returned to Aberdeenshire (you know they might have to put up signs,and issue guide books with Gàidhlig bits in them. Far too complex and costly!)
No best kept out of harm’s way. Just tell them they have no culture, no history, no worth, they’ll believe that,they always do!
I’m not much of a salesman but if anyone is still interested they will find the text of the Book of Deer here…..
http://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-II-00006-00032/1
It is also preserved by our friends and kin in Ireland at the Corpus of Electronic Texts CELT…..
http://www.ucc.ie/celt/published/G102007/
Ironic,is it not? That our most ancient histories,language and culture are available in the ancient Irish texts.
Tìr gun chànain, ‘s Tìr gun anam.
@Glasgow
We love you!
P.S. I think Doric and Lowland Scots should also be represented on road signs, where appropriate.
Nod to Tam. 😉
Outrage over a few thousand for new signs as they need replaced, but nothing to be said for the billions in inheritance tax avoided by the wealthiest in society.
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/aug/11/inheritance-tax-why-the-new-duke-of-westminster-will-not-pay-billions
“Money can stay in the trust and cascade down from generation to generation and nobody pays inheritance tax on it.”
Re the Gaelic signs.
Do they mean “millions” as in microns of paint?
Almost. 18th century ethics and morality are what Scotland is up against, IMHO.
Utilitarianism is the product of Anglican theologians* and places no intrinsic value on the individual person, only on that which produces the most ‘good’ among most people. As such, the ends justify the means.
Isn’t that right HMG Better Together?
* John Stuart Mill was educated along Bentham’s principles of utilitarianism. Jeremy Bentham attributed the origins of the theory to Joseph Priestley (Anglican theologian and clergyman), who believed there is no mind-body duality. He was a materialist who thought a materialist reality could be reconciled with his belief in determinism (a view that things are fated), by a belief in God.
That’s Better Together that is.
P.S. Materialism places value in things and gives no value to spiritual development, personal relationships, learning, peace of mind. . . .
https://theredphoenixapl.org/2011/12/25/on-communist-morality/
I smell shite.
Thought so. Godless utilitarian shite.
A people who lose their language lose everything. The past is recorded in the tribal language that denotes differentiation from others. When the past is lost with the extirpation of the old language, the future belongs to the implanted language of the conqueror or oppressor. And with that new language comes new world views, new concepts, new moralities, a different culture. And the old myths that told us who we were, or who we thought we were, expressed in the aboriginal language(s), slowly fade away like wraiths into the mist.
Language substitution is the most powerful tool of the oppressor, more poweful than bombs and bullets. Don’t let them succeed. Let our new generations learn the old tongues that have made us who we are, let them know why we are different from all other cultures, otherwise those who say that all we British Islanders are more or less the same will win the day.
test
Must have posted my name incorrectly. Duh.
I know lots of folk skip links.
Deontological ethics replace God in Communist morality.
OT again. Sorry but I thought this might produce a smile.
https://theredphoenixapl.org/2014/05/29/statement-on-the-20th-anniversary-of-the-international-conference-of-marxist-leninist-parties-and-organizations/
@ Better Together
Remind me again who the British Communist Party supported.
In fairness, the millions they are quoting might be using post-Brexit pounds sterling.
In a few years, £24 million sterling might only be €240 Euros.
@ dunx
Thanks for that. Although I’m not originally from that area, I live not too far from Deer and have passed the old abbey a few times.
“I worked with a colleague who was in Austria at the time of the De Menezes Underground murder by Metropolitan Police. The TV channel carried eye-witness accounts of JCdM being shot without provocation or reason by the police.”
The same police sent into Northern Ireland to identify IRA members to the Protestant hit men, went on to train Iraqi snipers. As an officially sanctioned hit man one of them assassinated Menezes and assumed he’d be protected by the state. He duly was protected.
@starlaw
I used to work with a very nice well educated well published scientist down in London who once apropos of not very much at all opined that subjugating the entirety of Ireland was justified on the basis that they used to raid the Welsh coast, way back when.
Which is why England invaded and colonised Barbary after they raided the Cornish coast for slaves, multiple times.
The default imperialist mindset, put in minds by the education system, finds justifications for anything.
The Maori wars in New Zealand were stimulated by Pakeha fears and Maori economic activity. Waikato Maori were exporting potatoes to Sydney and the Waikato river was threaded with Maori flax mills. Meanwhile property prices in central Auckland were higher than London because the boundaries agreed with local Maori were too small. Something had to be done, so Maori were attacked and dispossessed and all that economic activity not under white control was smashed.
The British only annexed NZ in the first place to stop the French having it. There is still the remnants of a French colony at Akaroa on Banks’ Peninsula near Christchurch. They don’t have streets or roads by rues and avenues. It was a dog in the manger move. Empire by beggar thy neighbour.
@Grouse Beater says: 12 August, 2016 at 8:57 am:
” … As an officially sanctioned hit man one of them assassinated Menezes and assumed he’d be protected by the state. He duly was protected.”
We need not look outside Scotland for such things, Grouse Beater. There are examples to be found right here in Scotland. For Example the still fully unexplained case of the death of Willie MacRae.
Why will they, both Westminster and the Scottish Police, still not publish the full details after all those years if they have nothing to hide?
@majestic12 3.34am
Well said, history is littered with horrible examples, around the world.
The Celts have a rich and varied history, and so much of it has been lost through forceful suppression. Real historians lament this loss of old stories, beliefs that were lost. Much of it lost at the point Christianity was imposed on the masses.
In 2007, when SNP came to power. One of the first thing they did was instruct that the name – Scottish Executive – was changed immediately to Scottish Government.
It was the start of trying to get Scots off their knees. The start of saying this is YOUR government. They have been upping their game ever since.
However, they have to start blowing their own trumpet, because too much of what is provided is taken for granted, or attributed to WM.
I see tweets about commentators talking about England at the Olympics.
Ouch, they are just practising for 2020.
@galamac – I think it was that odious little shit Inverdale who started the England thing, after interviewing Keith Robertson the other night. They just can’t help themselves.
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
Wonder how much that sign cost?
Alex Salmond is unmatched as a long term strategist in Scottish politics. As he realised a long time ago, before we can become a different country – we must FEEL like a different country. Gaelic signage and Police Scotland are two examples.
I am always amazed at Scottish people’s (lowlanders in particular) desire to grab certain parts of “Scottish” culture – tartan and bagpipes to name just two, but at the same time harbour a huge hostility to the Gaelic language which was spoken in he lowlands.
@Muscleguy
What a dreadful thing for an educated man to say about the Irish.
I’ve just finished reading a good history of Boycott which took place in the West of Ireland where my mother was born. However, I know more about Irish history than she does, and she seems happy to cringe about it.
Much of it took place around 1880s, involved Parnell and the Land League.
There are excerpts from The Times and other international newspapers. It’s dreadful seeing these reports, as the language is very clear. The Irish people were sub human to the English ruling classes, and language such as savage and a animal was used.
What was evident, was tenant farmers lived in abject poverty, but were bilingual, tried to reason with landlords, and tried to lead a peaceful boycott process. It worked in the end, but only after much subjugation and loss of life.
Don’t know about others, but 1880s, is recent history, but as we know, they don’t want to talk about it, but seem happy that practices are still continued.
I honestly cannot believe people in England do not have any where else to go, other than sticking with Labour.
Really is a sad state of affairs.
The language war is an ongoing one –
as this article, and the others referred to at the bottom of it, shows
http://archive.is/2gRvd
It’s just a pity that we don’t have any Grouse to eat in our towns and cities for all the Foxes and Stoats that have been driven out of the countryside in the name of “Land Management” that are the claims of the smiley gun nuts and farmers who say they don’t do it for fun but “For Jobs”
Indignous peoples throughout the world managed their land and widlife pretty well until the rich white man came along and created themselves “Jobs” by wiping out one species or another and then inventing a set of rules to justify the fun
If there’s no NEED to kill something then there’s no justification for it, it’s the Trident argument
How many more tourist jobs would be created if the country had MORE natural wildlife, these are the very people who are against the re introduction of predator species because it might ruin their wee murder spree and they come up with the farmers chickens argument when everybody who knows anything about wild animals knows they prefer to hunt their natural prey but these gun nutters keep interfering with the balance of nature, they don’t help it
Towny folk don’t understand, they say, well yes we do (refer to first paragraph) plus the fact that’s a rather insulting thing to say to most of the population who live in towns and have many Foxes and Buzzards and Stoats and the like in our back gardens raking around the bins for a living because the countryside is too flaming dangerous for them
We know who they are as well because one mention of the Scottish Government brings out the hostility on their faces so there’s a section of easily identifiable NO voters right there, the deniers of change, UK forever
Kill Kill Kill, Oh what glorious sport (It’s conservation really)…. MmHmn
The IndyRef2 battle has begun. Thought I’d just drop these here:
http://imgur.com/KR2mKXd
http://imgur.com/a/WlaAZ
I’ve wondered a couple of times on here about Owen Smith and EVEL.
I missed this.
http://archive.is/ZyjR1
“We’ve got more devolution, we are becoming a more federal system in England and Wales and Scotland. We are effectively now a federal country so simply saying you can’t be the prime minister if you’re anything other than English is completely the wrong direction for us to go in.
“Apart from anything else, wouldn’t it be a tragedy if we never had a Welsh man or woman or a Scottish man or woman able to be the prime minister of what is still Great Britain? I’m standing to say, ‘I’m a proud Welshman but I’m proudly British as well as being proudly Welsh and I absolutely want to be a leader for Wales and for every other part of the UK’.”
Question why is Dave Anderson MP, the shadow SSoS? I love it that he has kicked the Scottish branch into touch, but I fear that is just a lack of understanding that, no mater how good the SNP governance of Scotland is the branches policy is SNP bad, look I know its illogical, but that’s how the Scottish branch roll. Just maybe Dave actually is a better SSoS than Mundell. No surely someone who clearly hasn’t a clue, cant be better that our only Labour MP?
The Owen Smith quote from here.
http://archive.is/ZyjR1
typo “Murray” I honestly cant tell the cretins apart, Jiz beard, I forgot, one has a beard!
Not watching the Lympics, but was annoyed at the Team GB crest which is obviously based on the heraldic crest of the gov’t, but no unicorn.
Here is the mealy mouthed official explanation. Short story – kneel before your overlords.
http://www.college-of-arms.gov.uk/news-grants/news/item/127-the-team-gb-coat-of-arms
Andrew McLean
You wouldn’t be a fan of Bill Hicks would you? 😉
The Shooting Party available on Youtube. Good film for glorious 12th viewing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBUYXskGylI
@Andrew McLean
I try to care about BLis, but find it really hard to take any interest, especially since they have confirmed they want to remain British post chicken coup.
Last night, Ruth was baiting Dugdale on Twitter about this SNP pact, cue predictable childish exchanges, even James Kelly can work Twitter to diss SNP.
I’m at that weary stage with this shit. Gets us no where.
Honestly, if anyone in England has any plans or ambitions of starting a political party which puts creating a better society for people at the heart of it, now would be a good time.
Thought I’d add a little confusion to the whole signage debate. Firstly, I approve. Anything which makes Scotland different and unique is good.
Most default/common Scottish placenames aren’t Scots/English anyway. Most are Gaelic, Pictish, Welsh or Norse.
They have all been Anglicised, though. When Gaelic appears under the common name which is actually corrupted from Gaelic, the new addition is just the correct spelling. Fair enough.
During the period of Norse rule, Gaelic possibly stopped being used in the Hebrides altogether (at least on some islands eg. Tiree). The Norse appear to have renamed everything. Gaelic was reintroduced when the islands became Scottish.
So, the bilingual signs nust often show a Norse place name, Anglicised and Gaelicised.
Broadford is Skye is from the Norse ‘bred fjord’, broad fjord and not the obvious English.
Elsewhere Welsh and Pictish names add to the confusion. I may be wrong, but I have the suspicion that on some bilingual signs the Gaelic is a literal translation of what appears to be an English/Scots name, but the original meaning from another language is actually lost in translation!
@Valerie –
Don’t let the bastards get to ye.
It’s a good sign they ditched the unicorn – penny’s finally dropped that we’ll be going our own way. However grudgingly or unwittingly, they’re acknowledging the inevitable.
🙂
King James vi of Scotland, (1st of England), the first modern British monarch, was the main culprit in trying to assimilate his Scottish and Irish subjects into ‘Britons’. He drove the strategy by first using the English troops at his disposal from 1603 onwards to subjugate the powerful Border clans: Armstrongs, Johnstones, Maxwells etc. and ‘persuade ‘ them at the point of a sword to ‘plant’ the North of Ireland.
That part of Ireland, Ulster, was the bastion of resistance against English rule and had fought off the Saxons attempted conquest and previous ‘plantings’ However, in one swoop, Jamie the Saxt sorted out the recalcitrant Borderers and channeled their natural combativeness into taking Irish land and ‘planting’ the Union flag in this most Irish provincee culturally and linguistically of the Island.
The history of these Ulster Scots is significant as they were the first real vanguard of Scottish sacrifice on behalf of English Imperialism ( and its Scottish collaborators). Despite massive influxes of Scots, by the end of the 18th century, a significant element of these Presbyterian Ulster Scots united with their Irish Catholic brethren to fight the Anglo Ascendancy which made legally ‘Dissenters’ i.e Presbyterian Scots second class citizens. Whereas the indigenous Irish were an extremely distant third class.
The United Irishmen led by the likes of Wolfe Tone led a short and unsuccessful rebellion against the Ascendancy. It failed because of the play of the ‘Orange Card’ :divide and rule. A tactic Brittania employed subsequently in every other conquered state where they put a colonial sub group as an administrative/military presence , to keep down the indigenous population, with the Anglo ascendancy insulated from any threat.
Look at India, Africa etc.
The United Irishmen may have failed, but the hundreds of thousands of dissafected Ulster Scots emigrated to the embryonic U.S. They moved beyond the English controlled coastal states to the mountains of Apalachia and beyond. They brought the Celtic music, words, and pioneer qualities of both their original domiciles and they brought the combatative skills to bear on the Oppressive Brits imposing taxation without representation.
These people now self designating themselves ‘Scots-Irish’ became the backbone of the Revolutionary Army that drove the Brits out of the US. They finally got payback for being used as colonial mercenaries by breaking British Imperialism in the new colonies.
One last point about James the V1: He was responsible for effectively destroying any chance of Scots language remaining ascendant in its native country. His King James Bible was used to establish standard English useage and as it emanated from the monarchy became the preferred ‘lingua franc’ for the elites in Scotland over the next 150 years. His dynasty through their belief in the supremacy and sovereignty of the monarch led to the ultimate conflict with the English parliament which ended in his descendant Charles ist execution by the English and allowed the Cromwellian dictatorship. This allowed the authoritarian strain of the belief of sovereignty in parliament in English democracy to take root and is still in evidence to this day.
One_Scot says:
The incredibly sad thing is, many ordinary people down south believe they have a new party willing to put them at the heart of matters – UKIP. 🙁
In troubled times like these, the popularist extreme right can flourish too. The politics of the right can be beguilingly simplistic, as we have seen from the Brexit result.
I worry about England’s future, but most of all I worry that Scotland may be part of it if we don’t part company!
Latest figures from National Records of Scotland, show that for the year ending mid 2015, 85,000 people came to live in Scotland , of which 47,200 were from rest of UK. I believe that during the Indy Ref a large majority of people who had come to live here from England voted NO.
Channel 4 have recently broadcast “Eden” based in highland Scotland, BBC are about to broadcast a wild life programme commentary by Ewan MacGregor both programmes showcasing Scotland. ….. Is this a plan coming together?,
Obviously there are numerous factors influencing the vote. However to quote Brailsford the head of Team Sky and team GB ….victory is achieved by many small incremental gains……
Don’t take this as an anti English post, it is not.
Noticed on Wings twitter that British Labour in Scotland appear to be nailing their colours firmly on the anti-Corbyn camp.
Electoral pact? Why don’t BLiS just agree one in Scotland with their compatriots and allies, the Tories? Or, just merge into the Scottish Labour and Unionist Party?
@ majestic 12 3:34 am
Spot on.To really cut your ties with the past is a logical impossibility since it would mean denying your ancestry and your ancestors, the purest representatives of your past.
Colonialists dealt out immense and shocking cruelty and suffering to our ancestors in the Highland Clearances who were reduced to manageable numbers so they would never recover the lands that were once theirs. .Efforts to revive the Gaelic language irritates them immensely…why do these people go on and on about the past and about the wrongs done to them? The past is the past, so why don’t they buckle down and ” move on “? Never have and never will.A painful reminder for the descendants of the colonial conquerors and one which haunts them?
We must continue to celebrate our differences, a well deserved sense of pride in our achievements as a Scottish nation and a belief that we are destined to become independent again.
Here (I hope)is Ian Murray’s ‘feck Corbyn’ quote.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CppsfbjWYAAZTc5.jpg:large
Well worth saving this if you collect jpegs, quite unbelievable outburst
https://twitter.com/WingsScotland/status/764010723018027008
“Or, just merge into the Scottish Labour and Unionist Party?”
Likewise UKIP, BNP, EDL and Tory Brexiters could merge into the Tories in Middle England Unionist Party or TIMEUP for short. 🙂
BTW I had a Freudian typo on ‘middle’ there and spelled it ‘meddle’ before noticing.
Irvine West STV voting.
At Stage 4 with only 3 parties left, the votes stood at
SNP 1226
Lab 1118
Con 658
At Stage 5 the Con votes were reallocated as per preferences.
To SNP 51
To Lab 183
… Which gave Lab the seat.
Therein lies a warning for the council elections next year, the Unionist will mainly allocated their 2nd preferences etc to other Unionist parties.
Clydebuilt, your post at 11:51am is anything but “anti English.”
You are raising genuine concerns which need to be looked at.
Where did all the properties come from to house them all?
I firmly believe something extremely fishy is going on but can’t put my finger on it at the moment.
The boss and i have just received our 3rd eligibility to vote enquiry form in the space of a year from our local council.
They want all our details again in order to send out “separate registration forms to all” living at our address.
Prior to our Scottish independence referendum we also experienced questionable events when, on requesting postal votes, we were sent standard polling cards.
When we tried to make enquiries we ran up against a brick wall at every level in the council, not one single person could/would give us any answers.
We often ponder where those postal vote requests went. Needless to say, we now take absolutely nothing to do with postal votes.
You raise genuine concerns and i for one hope the SNP are on top of this and our whole electoral register and system should be forensically investigated inside and out.
Thanks for your post and the information contained within it.
Another really readable piece on Brexit trade issues.
Many of the commentators I’m reading, are saying they don’t disagree with the vote, but can see no way forward, no plans and no capacity.
The clever folk are saying the Emperor has no clothes.
https://flipchartfairytales.wordpress.com/2016/08/10/brexit-enough-david-brent-this-is-serious/
Andrew McLean, re last night’s topper..
..
have you forgotten to take your virtual tablets.?
To SNP 51
To Lab 183
… Which gave Lab the seat.
Therein lies a warning for the council elections next year, the Unionist will mainly allocated their 2nd preferences etc to other Unionist parties.
A timely warning indeed.
This is why next year we simply MUST get every single YES supporting person out to vote in the council elections. These elecions must see a turnout like never before. If we are to have IndyRef#2 we must control the councils.
galamcennalath” I see commentators talking about England at the Olympics.”
Spotted a few, now included in my ledger of infamy! (Last ones on the list.) Expect a lot more before England’s ‘Lympics are over.
http://wp.me/p4fd9j-iY
Valerie says:
“Many of the commentators I’m reading, are saying they don’t disagree with the vote, but can see no way forward, no plans and no capacity.”
Yes. Some even hinting at ‘impossible’.
Also, the Leave campaign left a lot of their voters with expectations which were always going to be impossible. The campaigns didn’t have the honesty to tell them “these will never happen”, and some voters didn’t have the knowledge/experience/understanding to realise that some proposals were impossible.
That makes WM’s job very difficult. No one will actually be happy with the outcome.
AND, that’s even before we add Scotland and Northern Ireland to the equation!
@Stoker and Clydebuilt
Had an increasingly nasty exchange with a unionist on Twitter. Usual stuff about too wee, too poor.
I told him he should put the effort into his own government down south. Promptly informed me that he was a Scot, living in England for business, and had a property outside Glasgow.
It might be rubbish, but I think not. I do believe there was some kind of influx, during the indyref using holiday homes or postal votes.
I don’t know if it made a difference in the end, but the point is so many of us have no Faith in the councils administering the voters roll, or the system.
There is far more security shopping on line, than there is voting just now.
It’s just not right.
@ galamcennalath – no wonder they’re confused. If you’ve been watching the excellent “Versailles”, you can visit the website and read the guide to historical accuracy from their historian, Greg Jenner. You will find that the Union of Crowns never took place.
“…the arranged marriage between the Dutch leader William of Orange and the young English princess, Mary – a scene we see after Henriette has succeeded in negotiating the treaty of Dover with her brother, Charles II of England. This Anglo-Dutch marriage occurred in 1677, not 1670, and famously resulted in the couple becoming the only co-monarchs in British history when they invaded during the so-called Glorious Revolution of 1688 to become William III and Mary II of England.
So much for TeamGB.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/5jPx75byxj2rptb50s5y5nC/versailles-a-guide-to-its-historical-accuracy
Yoan ‘The Celtic Place Names Of scotland’ – W.J. Watson, wull gee ye oorz ah fun.
Ah hink yull fin, thurr wiz Scoattish Gaelic doon tae thoan boardurr ett wan peiynt. Gaels among Galloway.
@ Proud Cybernat / galamcennelath
Re: Irvine by-election
Even worse, Labour has now become the largest party in North Ayrshire Council, though it seems to be expected that the SNP will carry on with a minority administration.
It’s going to be very, very difficult to remove Labour dominance at council level (although STV is better than FPTP, slightly – sometimes the second preferences change the result the other way).
The suggestion that Holyrood should be elected via STV really does not fill me with joy.
Re voting –
Remember, there were local election trials of all-postal voting in some English areas in 2004.
The evaluation of that declined to commit all the way because enough people wanted the option of a polling station vote.
Thank feck for that, I hear you cry!
There is a legal requirement to provide for the possibility of a postal vote at elections or referenda.
Bar a legislative change, not much can be done, I fear.
http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/faq/voting-and-registration/how-do-i-apply-for-a-postal-vote
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postal_voting
Valerie and Stoker……. The main point of my post is that every year there are nearly 50,000 people coming to Scotland from rest of Uk, a majority of them being Future NO voters. That will add up over time…….. Plus main UK broadcasters air programmes showcasing Scotland , encouraging folk from other parts of UK to move here.
Clydebuilt @ 11.51
At least some of those people moving to Scotland from the rest of the UK were YES voters and I can’t imagine we were in the minority. I am one of the 47,200 (returned home to Scotland August 2014) and hopefully one of those small incremental gains!.
I remember Alex saying in 2012, after it was announced that only those living in Scotland could vote, that if you wanted to vote in the Ref. you had to be living in Scotland and that two years was plenty of time to arrange that.
I must admit that it was very interesting to be living in London in the months before the Ref. as there was:-
a: genuine fear that we would vote YES
b: also absolute bafflement as to why we could even want to separate
c: definite increase in the BNF ‘in your face’ Imperial masters sh.t.
Glad to shake the London dust off my feet.
Genuinely shocked here at the number of older women (don’t socialise with older men much!) who say ‘Can’t stand the SNP/that Alicsammon/that Nicola whits-her-name and mostly think Ruthie is dog’s biscuit… This is where we need to do our hard work. They’re mostly ex-staunch-labour-from-cradle-to-grave types who’s ‘deid faither wid never forgive them if they didna vote labour’ and don’t know who to vote for now.
Yes, and they mostly read the Daily Heil!!!! Can’t we get some incremental gains against that paper?
Re the ‘Lympics – I wonder how many southern british people realise that ‘Katherine the Great’ is Scottish?
.
We’ve got to protect our nation from being destroyed from the inside by the cabal of current unionist councillors.
You know, the ones who said recently they’d prefer to spend counciltax increase cash as they please, (probably to function the privatisation/tendering of ‘cut’ services..instead of being ring-fence for school budgets.
SNP councillors are at risk from the achilles heel of heightened expectation not being matched by determination.
Yes voters Apathy + Labour 2nd vote for Tory = defeat.
There is a pattern, predictable, but still a pattern.
@Andrew McLean
What H&S says – too much information.
Scotland has an electoral system where the winner usually loses. The 2nd rate rejects win.
Can we just reflect that the Greatest Olympians Ever, in Team “GB” are Scots!
Sir Chris Hoy for the Men,
& Katherine Grainger for Women!
They have a greater number of medals than any other UK Citizen!
Andy Murray should be due a mention too.
Greatest ever “GB” Tennis Player.
England have never had a male Wimbledon Tennis Final in 80 years.
Andy Murray 3 Wimbledon Finals and 2 Victories!
& SCOTTISH YES VOTER!
Would some cretin from one of the Westminster Parties
remind me again of how Scots Cannot Succeed?
Team Scotland =
SNP / potential Yes voters.
Team Union =
Lab / Con / Lib/ potential No voters.
Local suitability of candidates is now being ignored by unionists with a stop SNP at any cost message.
So, any given local councillor who, say, now stands as an independent candidate..(instead of vote-losing Labour) needn’t have bothered as he now has dog-like loyalty from Tory/Libdems and stupidly other voters who don’t ‘get’ the system.
The spesh relationship that UK has with USA is very expensive too.
£449 billion!!!
http://archive.is/Sm7Xe
@Capella
Union of Crowns was before that when James VI took over the English throne in 1603 in what we’d call these days, a reverse takeover.
louis.b.argyll says:
“Yes voters Apathy + Labour 2nd vote for Tory = defeat.”
I have low expectations of the SNP making significant gains next year unless attitudes change.
There needs to be a really big campaign for councils, like never before. It should be part a wider strategy to defeat Unionism and move to Indy.
Council elections get treated like they are 4th in the pecking order. These up and coming ones matter. Ideally, they will be the last pre Indy!
clydebuilt
Completely agree with your post.
Its not Scottish dramas or documentaries that are being networked and shown in England its wildlife progs highlighting the beauty and space of the country and its deliberately designed to encourage migration from the south and therefor increasing the NO vote.
I was always bewildered that students, temporary workers and those who had been in the country ten minutes were given the right to vote on the destiny of my country, the vast majority who would have voted NO. A lot needs to be addressed before indy2.
Ken500 says:
“Scotland has an electoral system where the winner usually loses. The 2nd rate rejects win.”
STV is being abused when used for a single empty seat.
STV can give representative results when applied to multi seat constituencies. As at a full elections when all seats are up for grabs.
We need PR at all elections. I can’t see democracy without it. WM allows majorities for parties with only mid thirty percent votes. That is awful!
So which is best for Scotland? The additional list Holyrood system is largely proportional, but constituency losers can end up list winners.
After Indy we should have a review and apply the same system to EU, Holyrood, and council elections. At least then most people will understand whatever PR system we adopt!
I have friends, a couple about to be married, that are moving up to Scotland. I shall be having some hopefully fruitful conversations with them.
Agree with the comments about who should be allowed to vote in next indyref2.
The recent Brexit vote excluded Europeans but they got away with that because they control the media, which makes me think that the establishment wanted Brexit to succeed.
If we had tried the same in Scotland the howls of abuse from the media would have been horrendous.
If the SNP gain control of the councils and we use the new SRIT codes, it should be possible to make a case of only if you live, work, get a pension etc in Scotland should you be allowed to vote.
And I would suggest 5 years residency.
The Yoon press will scream & scream but they will do that anyway.
liz said at 2:29 pm:-
“………………If we had tried the same in Scotland the howls of abuse from the media would have been horrendous…………..”
I think it’s time for us to understand that the paper media is mainly a very rich Family or a small group of folk in a Boardroom.
These small groups are the Movers and Shakers in most countries and it’s a neverending situation.
Beats me why we buy their millionaire self-opinionated nonsense.
Another day, another round of BBC mad propaganda. Anon BBC gimps clearly agitated by some thing today though.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-37059649
O/T,but annoying.
My wife went with a friend to the Palce of Holyrood in Edinburgh the other day to see an exhibition.
Today I got a Bank Statement from RBS which indicated that her money (£11) had gone to “ADM, London”. The bastards had taken money to London which should have gone for spending in Scotland.
I suppose this means Balmoral etc are treated the same. Don’t go, you’re not helping your country.
Good old Dr NO! all the self awareness angry entitlement brings you:D
Scott Arthur ?@DrScottThinks 6h6 hours ago
This looks like the last straw for @IanMurrayMP. It is pretty clear that Corbyn & Co are out of touch with Scotland.
Jist sayin Von Ryan’s DAILY EXPRESS seems tae be hoggin the SNP baaaaad HEADLINES these days followed by DAILY BILE’S cohort the METRO free at every rail station etc.
Head tracker,
Could have been overheard in Westminster corridors “Any deal would be by the leader of the labour party, Ms Dugdale will have to do as she is told. Jesus they jocks do get airs and graces above their station don’t they! Its Westminster Parliamentary business not the shortbread sort, any more outbursts and that girl is for the chop!”
Last month in London, a passing acquaintance depressed by Brexit asked me, “Why don’t you go back to Scotland? And take me with you.”
True anecdote. Thinking of selling it as a gag to one of the many crap stand ups now dying in Edinburgh Festival.
Re: Irvine by-election
Council by elections can distort the local position and leave one party without any representation whilst the strongest party gets a clean sweep of local councillors which is against the spirit of the multi member council ward system.
Therefore there is a case in event of death /resignation for that party to nominate a replacement as effectively happens when list members depart Holyrood. (Accepting that can’t happen if there is an independent resignation or death in which case only independents can stand!)
In any event there is now a distinct trend for Tory / Labour voters to coalesce against the SNP leader on first preferences.
This needs to be taken inro account when deciding how many council candidates are put up in any given ward.
On Yoon tactical voting well worth reading Alyn Smith’s tweet on Ian Murray’s tribalism at 11.15 am.
https://twitter.com/AlynSmithMEP/status/764042380966232064.
Andrew McLean says:
12 August, 2016 at 2:55 pm
Head tracker,
I don’t think there is a deal being offered to Labour anyway. SLab have Ian Murray harrumphing away as if he wasn’t the only SLab MP left in Scotland.
Would England have voted Milliband last time, if he’d said he would do a coalition deal with the SNP? We’ll never know but the giant vote toryboy “Alex Salmond’s a thieving pickpocket” posters showed they were worried about it, red and blue tory.
And the ghastly fact is, if say a Lab/SNP coalition had won, the SNP would probably now being pushing UK.gov towards what they all promised all Scots for our NO vote, Devo-max and federal UK. Instead we got fuck all. Its worked short term but its only added even more UKOK pressure for our tory BBC Scotland freak show media and tory twits like Fluffie, Kez and ofcourse Ruthie babes.
Perfidious Albion rides again, for now.
@galamcennalath
On 1st preference votes total for the parties, the SNP gained 7% from Labour compared to 2012. Forget how these “swings” work, that 7% is 3.5% each way kind of thing.
I think the factor was local maybe when it came down to the Conservative 2nd preference. Lab lived in Irvine West, SNP didn’t. I’d not vote for a parachuter in normal times, not even sure what I’d do in these Indy times! Not for councillors anyway, you need a local.
Unconfirmed but seen elsewhere, Labour NEC have won their appeal against the previous High Court ruling allowing new members to vote in the leadership elections.
#corbynistoast anyone?
Who writes they Owen Smith scrips ie £2 hundred mil to invest in Corby. FFS ah waffles salesman.
@yesindyref2
Kind of agree, first thing I look at is the address of candidates. Bad form not to have a local, esp. for Council elections where under the counter deals can be hidden.
@Sinky
From Alyn Smyth’s timeline he tweeted this: “ach c’mon, he’s my MP, and have to say seems a decent sort, but tribalism to that degree just irks me.”
That’s what I think too. Misguided, but a bit of a laugh, a lad. Perhaps even a Legend!
Labour win appeal
Democracy is dead cruelly murdered by the labour party
@ yesindyref2
I read Capella’s post about the Anglo-Dutch monarchs as meaning that she knew that the Union of the Crowns pre-dated that, but the author whom she was quoting did not – or chose to ignore it (hence “Anglo-“).
http://www.thenational.scot/news/labour-nec-wins-appeal-againts-member-voting-rights.21099
@ yesindyref2 / frogesque
The identity of the parachuter might have been a factor too (suspicion of hubris, though the man himself is fine); turn-out of 21% pretty poor as well.
@ Jon Drummond
That’s another nice little earner for the Labour Party! The 5 members who brought the original case have to pay them £30k within 28 days.
I assume that’s total, not each, and I believe they’re crowd-funded, but adding that to the thousands of £25 fees the LP won’t be refunding to those who get screened out, that’s a lot of money for denying people their say.
@crazycat
Yes, I was confused, so I went back to default – post a fact and hope it somehow fits the situation 🙂
Aye the labours of ‘labour’
Hark the Herald’s take on it.
https://archive.is/pDXgz
Irvine West result after 20.9% turnout. Difficult to extrapolate much from that but scotgoespop does the job.
scotgoespop.blogspot.co.uk/
O/T Tom Harris on twitter seriously put up this tweet.
twitter.com/MrTCHarris/status/764098069248020481
When challenged specifically said I meant MPs
@crazycat
Yes, I’d say so. Dynasty, reverse nepotism or something.
Not the SNP’s “fault” as such, the candidate would have been voted on by members presumably, though perhaps other nominees would have been scared off and he was unopposed.
I did seriously think of trying to put myself forward as a nominee / candidate for Holyrood, as the MSP was unopposed and automatically selected. I wouldn’t have voted for myself as he’s a very good MSP, so would probably have had 0 votes, but it could have been a fun experience, hustings an’ that. In the end I didn’t have time.
Dan Huil says:
“Irvine West result after 20.9% turnout.”
We really need to get people to take every election seriously and get the turnout up for the councils next year.
Ideally, we triple just the pro Indy turnout! That should do the trick.
Labour’s leadership elections. I have now completely lost all understanding of what is going on!
I understand the progressive Corbynists versus the neo Tory Blairites in a power struggle for control of their party. Also, left over BLiS appears to in the Blairite camp since everyone on the left has departed. In a twisted way, an unelectable Labour at WM with never ending Tories might help the Indy case. OK. However ….
Different grades of members, eligibility to vote, court cases … Can anyone explain what this is all about in a few sentences!?
@Yesindyref2 says: 12 August, 2016 at 1:49 pm:
“Union of Crowns was before that when James VI took over the English throne in 1603 in what we’d call these days, a reverse takeover.”
Rubbish! Jamie Saxt certainly inherited the crown of England in 1603 but there was no legal way for him to unite the two kingdoms until after the English Kingdom became a, “Constitutional Monarchy”, in 1688.
Thus began the Jacobite uprisings that did not end until 1745. Simple – as The Kingdom of England’s law was Divine Right of Kings until 1688 but Scotland’s law was/is that the Scottish monarchy is, “Protector of the people’s sovereignty”, then James did not have the legal power to join with the English Kingdom under both English & Scottish Law.
Which was why it took a change in England to become a constitutional monarchy and a Treaty of Union in 1706/7 to form a United Kingdom. Thus there could be no Union of the Crowns until 1707.
Effijy @ 1.44
Andy Murray does not live in Scotland so did not have a vote in the independence referendum unless he attempted to use his hotel as an address for registration purposes.
Missed out the http cos I get easily confused.
https://twitter.com/MrTCHarris/status/764098069248020481
re that Council election.
20.9% turn out is pretty disgusting. If there is a low turn out next May then kiss another Indy Ref good bye because the Yoons will end up once again with control of the majority of Scotland’s Councils. There will be no point holding another Ref if that is what transpires.
Oh and Cllr Willie Young and the Yoon goons in Aberdeen will be back in charge there and I will be staring at another 5 years of Cllr Tuke and his closet Kipper pals in Moray with Labour Cllr Morton doing his great abstention act as well.
call me dave, when one clicks on that there is this
”
READ MORE: SNP chief warns Yes will lose again if Scots believe independence will make them poorer ”
Times three – very brain washing.
Whoever suggested that there should be a five year residency required prior to voting in Independence Referendum 2 – I’d have to agree.
OT I like watching track and field and cheering on anyone and everyone BUT please spare me Gaby and co pontificating ad nauseam while depriving the view of what is actually happening in the arena.
They do so like the sound of their own voices and have such a conceit of themselves.
Just a point. I see people talking of the ‘union of the crowns’ of 1603. All that happened in 1603, was a single monarch ascended to both the Scots and English thrones (James VI). Whilst James VI, who galloped off to London at the very first chance he got, never to return (he was no great Scottish king), did indeed WANT to unite both crowns, such a process never happened.
It very much suits the unionist historian narrative to talk of that period as the ‘union of the crowns’, but it is more akin to wishful thinking on the part of both James VI at the time, and more recently, by cringing Scottish Unionists.
It is a terrible sign of how utterly atrocious the teaching of Scottish history has been in Scotland since 1707, that many, many Scots talk freely of the union of the crowns of 1603. It didn’t happen, no such thing. James VI of Scotland held the Scottish crown AND the English crown, but he never achieved a single unitary crown.
The treaty of union of 1707, uniting both kingdoms did happen, but the so-called ‘union of the crowns’ of 1603 didn’t, it is mere hyperbole by England and unionists.
@ galamcennalath
What you are seeing is the establishment in panic,now a little uprising in Scotland can be easily ignored but when it is England it must be crushed the English can not be allowed to think for themselves they might start asking questions about those they elect to represent them or worse decide to vote outside the status quo presented to them as a choice.
Its not JC that scares them its what lurks behind him a grassroots movement hehe we know all about those.
@Robert Peffers
1603 was when the Crown singular was worn by the King of Scotland and the King of England – the same guy, hence the “Union of Crowns” as history has accepted it.
Constitutional monarchies had little do with real monarchial politics in those days. Depose a king and execute him, put one back up, kill off a pretender, murder princes, execute a cousin, that’s how the Crowns were done, that was the reality. It was who won battles or had the hidden knife and the bigger bribe that made the decisions.
The same King (JamesVI) had both crowns, but whilst James VI really did try to bring both crowns together, he actually failed. His desires to achieve such a union are well documented. That is historical FACT. The phrase ‘union of the crowns’ is just that, a phrase. No such union of crowns happened. I think you will find even that git Starkey would agree.
You may of course feel free to believe in whatever you choose.
@ Robert Peffers, Robert Louis et al: well that’s puzzling.
Whether or not there was a “Union of the Crowns”, I understood James VI was King of Scotland as well as England and that Charles I, William and Mary and Charles II were Kings/Queens of Scotland and England. How then can Mary be an English princess and Charlles II be King of England?
That’s the point I was making about the history of the Versailles drama website.
James VI was King of Scots, not King of Scotland if my history lessons are to be believed.
@ Macbeda – Fair enough. Doesn’t alter the fact that Charles II and Mary are called King and Princess of England on the history site.
@Macbeda
Yes, my mistake.
@Capella (and @Robert Louis)
The thing is that history is all about perspective and ownership, and in a lot of ways, there are no facts when it comes to any definitive interpretation. In a lot of ways Robert Louis is right:
“You may of course feel free to believe in whatever you choose.”
but there is another way of looking at it:
“You may of course feel free to believe in whatever best suits your purpose.”.
Macbeda @ 6.22 pm
Was having a thought about why we were taught that it was ‘King of Scots’ and ‘Queen of Scots’ instead of King or Queen of Scotland
But from an English perspective it would be King or Queen of Scots.
This theory is based on the idea that most outside Scotland didn’t like the idea of encouraging the use of ‘King or Queen of Scotland’ as that would infer that the person was the monarch of a nation.
You don’t get King or queen of the English, its King or Queen of England (and so on for every other European monarchy)
So I would suggest that the term was created by the English in order to play down the nationhood of Scotland and just have the title ‘of Scot’s ‘ inferring that the King or Queen is only of the people of Scotland and not Scotland as such
Apologies to any historians as I don’t claim to know one jot of history. My meandering thoughts are just that, as I have always been curious as to why monarchs of Scotland are always referred to in modern history books as ‘of Scot’s’ instead of ‘of Scotland’
Perhaps there is something written from the time of the declaration of Arbroath?
To add to that, there’s a bit of a paradox.
If there was a Union of Crowns in 1603, then there was no need for the Treaty of Union and Act of Union with England, but at least it was legal:
“That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England shall upon the first day of May next ensuing the date hereof and forever after be United into One Kingdom by the Name of Great Britain And that the Ensigns Armorial of the said United Kingdom be such as Her Majesty shall appoint and the Crosses of St Andrew and St George be conjoined in such manner as Her Majesty shall think fit and used in all Flags Banners Standards and Ensigns both at Sea and Land”
But there’s another argument that if there was no Union of Crowns in 1603, then there was no legal Monarch in Scotland at the time, so there could be no Treaty and Acts of Union that would unite the Kingdoms. How can you unite with a Kingdom that doesn’t exist?
Which would make the Act of Union with England, basically, illegal.
So where does that leave Scotland? An orphan?
Well, if there was no Union of Crowns, then neither Queen Anne nor Queensbery could have the authority to dissolve the Scottish Parliament by proclamation after it adjourned but didn’t reconvene.
Which makes the current parliament illegitimate as it was set up by the UK which doesn’t exist, though it was voted in by the People of Scotland which means it is legitimate.
As I say, pick whichever version is suitable at the time – and use it! Whichever way it works, Scotland exists as an entity, whether the UK Government and its legal papers like it, or not. Whether the UK actually exists and has existed for over 300 years is, really, up to the People of Scotland.
I didn’t “explain” that very well.
Basically if the King of Scotland – James VI – went down to London and eventually passed away, without a Union of Crowns the throne of Scotland became vacant, and had no monarch at the time of the Treaty of Union and the Acts of Union, therefore there was no King of Scots, therefore there was no Kingdom of Scotland to unite with the Kingdom of England, therefore the Treaty of Union and Act of Union with England just couldn’t happen, it didn’t exist, they were meaningless bits of fiction.
So basically while there are a Robert Peffers and a Robert Louis and 98 others like them, there was no Union of Crowns, and no Treaty of Union.
God save the King / Queen! Whenever he or she appears or is appointed by the People of Scotland, at our convenience.
Good explanation on wikipedia (I think!).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_of_the_Crowns
@ yesindyref2 – so what would you call Charles II and his brother James? Kings of England?
While we’re on the subject of lying UK media, just a short while ago, we had Clare Balding issue the following statement;
“He [Andy Murray] said it was the greatest honour of his life to carry the flag for team GB at the opening ceremony.”
So, according to the BBC, Andy Murray put carrying the Butcher’s Apron far and above winning any of his titles (including 3 majors and an Olympics), his engagement, his marriage, AND the birth of his child?
No, Clare, I believe you are a liar.
The ‘union’ of the crowns was merely a problem solving system acceptable with all factions at that time.
It’s effect, was to further unite and boost the aristocracy’s heraldic claim to ownership of ‘their’ ‘lands’.
While it ended embarrassing feudal elitism throughout the islands, it only lasted for a short while.
@ Robert Louis, James VI did return to Scotland for a visit. Charles II was certainly crowned at Scone & I assume that Charles I did also. William II wanted the Scottish crown sent down to London for a coronation but the Parliament refused to let it leave the country. The crown was never used again & bricked up in Edinburgh Castle until Walter Scott has the vault opened.
If James VI had died in infancy, the Scottish crown would have gone to the Hamilton’s who had no claim to the English throne so no Union of the Crowns. We owe the present dogs breakfast to Margaret Tudor, wife of James IV.
The wee duke of Hamilton carries the crown at the opening of the Parliament, bet he’s tried it on! the scamp! 🙂
James MacMillan- the self-loathing Scot. He berates a commentator for writing that James Joyce was ‘lucky enough to write baffling, unreadable prose during a period in which it was the vogue to elevate baffling, unreadable prose’,probably because MacMillan writes baffling unmusical ‘music’ – which has never been in vogue.
Hamish McCunn may or may not be better than Mahler – but he is way better than MacMillan. McCunn could write tunes that more than a century on are still memorable -and still played. MacMillan simply cannot write anything resembling music.
As for Gaelic music OR opera. Surely in Scotland we have room for Gaelic music AND opera.