The incredible persistence of stupidity
We saw this exchange on Twitter this morning, involving left-wing Labour activist Eoin Clarke, a reader, and Scottish Labour list MSP Elaine Smith.
Smith professed to find it “unbelievable” and “scary” that the reader thought he’d had Tory governments for most of his lifetime. (We asked him how old he was and he said 34, which means he’s had Tory governments for 62% of his life, so that checks out.)
But it’s a standard Scottish Labour line that there’s no real difference between Scottish and English voters in terms of favouring left-wing politics, so we thought we’d just quickly check the arithmetic on that. The results are unlikely to shock you.
Elaine Smith was born in 1963, which makes her the oldest of the people involved in the conversation. So starting from her birth, we added up how many Tory MPs had been elected in general elections in England and Scotland respectively, and also how many times the Tories had won the popular vote on each side of the border.
TORY MPs ELECTED IN ENGLAND: 51.7%
(3777 out of a possible 7304)
TORY MPs ELECTED IN SCOTLAND: 17.9%
(172 out of a possible 963)
TORY POPULAR VOTE VICTORIES IN ENGLAND: 64.3%
(9/14)
TORY POPULAR VOTE VICTORIES IN SCOTLAND: 0%
(0/14)
(Sources: 1963-2005 here, 2010 here and here, 2015 here and here.)
We’ll be honest, readers, those seem quite different to us. Perhaps Elaine Smith has a different understanding of how numbers work. But we predict she and her Scottish colleages are going to have quite a hard time selling their vision of alternative maths to the Scottish public for the forseeable future.
Yes again well argued the points of stupidity in Unionist outburst.
Keep up the work Rev.
Wings over Scotland – the top fact-checking app for questions relating to Scottish politics.
Stu, I feel really horrible doing this, honestly. But for the sake of truth I’m going to have to. I agree that she probably meant your second point, but technically she is right with regards your first. Davie actually said “almost my whole life” and sadly 62% is not a figure which supports that.
I should say that in my view Blairist Labour WERE tories so those 13 years could be counted as such, but Elaine is probably having a hard enough time at work…
Eugh, I feel really weird now, better have a cold shower.
SLAB and Scottish LIBDEMS prefer to be ruled by far right English Tories.
They are not socialists.
Their party comes before the people.
The Tories are corrupt, cheats and liars. They lied and cheated to have a majority. Committed electoral fraud in 31 constituencies. They are just dispicable and will ruin the world economy. They couldn’t make a bigger mess. A shambles.
Thank goodness for the SNP Gov. Roll on Independence.
Is this not just another example of the delusional ‘group speak’ which goes on in Labour’s Scottish branch office? They all talk amongst each other making such assertions, without one of them EVER ACTUALLY checking the FACTS.
They then foolishly go on twitter, effectively arguing black is white.
Even if Elaine Smith reads this, she will still not check the facts. Labour in Scotland (and England) are in complete denial of the harsh reality of dominance of English elected Tory Governments against the wishes of Scots.
It is the democratic deficit. It is why we NEED independence.
And the New Labour government of 1997-2010 implemented quite a few Tory like policies (PFI, privatisation, deregulation of finance cos and banks, etc.). So you could argue the tory policies we’ve laboured (pun?) under is even more than the basic figures show.
…that was not fair Rev.
Using publicly available numbers in a debate with Labour is not how it works They use their OWN numbers in such matters
Somebody, somewhere in Scottish Labour is going to have to sit their members down and let them know that their anger,sense of injustice,and hate have led them to the point of destruction.
They have become totally irrational because of what the electorate have “done ” to them over the last ten years. This is self delusion on a grand scale the likes of whichyou usually see in cult like organisations.
Reasonable criticism is dismissed out of hand. Every bad move or policy is rationalised so that it becomes the voters who are too stupid to understand. It is actually a form of madness.
If this persists there is only one outcome. Oblivion. I certainly would never vote again for a party who dismisses half the population as extremists and racists because they want to be in control of their own governance.
How the mighty have indeed fallen.
Martin at 9.52
“in my view Blairist Labour WERE tories”
“….ARE Tories” is perhaps a more apt statement
Labour in Scotland moved beyond facts, information, and truth some time ago.
It’s not even as if they inhabit a consistent altered reality – its chaotic with no discernible pattern.
Still, they are removing themselves from the real world constitutional debate, which is a good thing from an Indy perspective.
And tory councillors?
Just remember, at present, the Tory Government in England claims to be the Government of the entire UK, yet just 3.6% of Tory MP’s are from outside England. They have one MP in Scotland (1.6% of total Scots MP’s), 11 MP’s in Wales (27% of total Welsh MP’s), and none in N.Ireland (0% of N.Ireland MP’s).
It’s a bit like watching an old horse you once loved, trotting blindly into the knacker’s yard.
Martin,
If he’d said he’d said lived under ‘tory policies’ for most of his life, I think he’d be correct. The Blair/Brown era certainly had a few (but hardly enough) bright points but they were certainly congruent with the previous tory administrations economically and tactically.
I wonder if part of the “you really believe that?” part was a subtext that the writer has been living with SNP governments in Holyrood for the past ten years and it’s scary if he thinks the SNP is socialist? And following on from that, imagining that an independent Scotland would have an SNP government and she thinks it’s “scary” that anyone would therefore imagine that an independent Scotland would be socialist?
I’m just trying to make sense of that tweet because the idea that she thinks it’s scary that someone believes he’s had Tory governments most of his life when that’s objectively true is pretty weird.
I think she’s just expressing the deep-seated Labour belief that the SNP are right-wing without spelling out what she means. Well, it’s twitter.
Good exposition of the different voting patterns between England and Scotland though.
Smith doesn’t even know where her own constituency is, shoving her newsletter and other guff through my Glasgow letterbox. So it’s surely a stretch to expect much from her.
My father and mother voted Labour all their lives until Tony Blair arrived. At the age of 85, my father voted SNP and donated to them.
He always said that Tony Blair was more Tory than the Tories and that Gordon Brown was his lackey!
I have never voted for any party that gets elected and sits in Westminster, i have allways voted for political seperation from this so called United Kingdom ( an english term i believe )
So i am all for trading with anyone as long as they are decent people that allow human rights for all
I do not want a political union with the rest of Britain, and i certainly do not want a political union with the european union, that’s something the SNP will never get me to vote for, and i am a card carrying member of the party, people like me have stood by them all our lives because we wanted freedom to choose our own destiny, i am 65 now, but if the SNP go down the road of trying to get me into a european toxic union then i will vote against them and canvas against them with all my energy
So SNP, do not take me and others for granted, we got you where you are today, and we can send you back into the wilderness a lot quicker if you do not listen to us
But of course would you called New Labour socialists? if not, it is his whole life.
I think the problem is that Elaine sees Tory Governments and Labour Governments as interchangeable and that both are wonderful…not like those evil SNP types.
Unionism uber alles.
Elaine Smith and what’s left of the Branch Office are looking forward to the End of Days when the space ship arrives from the planet Zircon and transports The Faithful to Socialist Nirvana.
We, the Unbelievers, will be consigned to the Fire and Brimstone of perpetual suffering.
I repeat, when are they going to kick Dugdale out on her well superannuated ass?
Who would you vote for instead David Caledonia?
@David Caledonia,
Thanks for the demonstration of exactly what is going wrong in Scottish Labour.
David Caledonia
If there is a 2nd indy ref vote and you say you are for Scottish independence, then vote against it, you need to have a wee word wi’ yersel.
* Hums: Nuts whole hazel nuts!Cadbury take em an’ dey cover dem in choklit!*
Given ES’s first tweet will she be removing the footer from her profile image!
Not only that the poll shows the majority of people agree with Corbyn about individual ref 2. So Slabour are going to continue on this path they are pathologically mental. Scottish Labour leaders are more anti Scottish than their English leaders.
In all honesty, Red Tories,Blue Tories.I would be hard pushed to say who has been the worst.Is there a difference other than posturing?
In any event,at least in Scotland we have discovered the truth and largely voted accordingly.
Just the final step to self governance is required to consign these English Establishment con artists to the dustbin of Scottish history.
Martin @9.49am. If the MP had found fault with 62% being equated to “most ” I don’t think her reaction would have been “unbelievable that you actually think that”.
Strange reaction to the Twitter interaction.
Was she not questioning his belief that you can have socialism and seperstism? Still evidently wrong, in fact you might argue SLABs only chance of any type is socialism in government would be in an independent Scotland
Jack Collatin. Think the Dug will be put out to pasture after the Cooncil elections……. So she will carry the can for the result …… Then a new leader can step forward untarnished by the failure……. In SLAB minds that is.
Look how hard the EBC bletherers try to make a pretendy difference between Labour and Tories in Office.
Corbyn the Eunuch, escorted by Frank McAveety paraded down Byres Rd yesterday. Wonder of they were going for a copy of the Unionist Guardian?
Corban knows Scotland is lost. Labour in England will not be electable for at least a decade. Asking Scotland not to take the lifeboat in the event that Titanic might not sink. Is something that is fundamentally mental in the face of Brexit and the Tories.
For what it’s worth I agree with Morag that Elaine Smith was questioning his belief that SNP govt equates to socialism. Labour just can’t give up on the position that they are the only true left of centre party, conveniently ignoring all recent support for Tory strategy.
It can’t be long till Uncle Tom Sillars is invited to join Baroness Mone in yon £300 per day place by the Thames for Services Rendered To The Preservation of The Union.
Remember how hard the BBC pushed UKIP in Scotland in the EU elections. So we got David Coburn duly elected. The point was to prove that Scottish people are just as right wing BritNat as English people. Even though the stats contradict that.
Expect much more of this in the coming BREXIT weeks. We’re all going over the cliff edge together, singing “White Cliffs of Dover”.
Ms Smith:
I remember Tory rule from 1979 to 1997 as if it were only yesterday!
Most of my friends and were young and entering the workforce or going into further education.
Most couldn’t find a job or were thrown out of a job and many of including myself emigrated.
If Ms Smith sniffs socialism in the air, can she point to evidence that England wishes socialism, or even more to the point any one in the labour parliamentary party bar Corbyn and McDonnell who want socialism?
Ms Smith is an idiot living in the past who refuse to grasp reality, that’s the kindest words I have for her.
labour are beyond a joke, they are utterly useless!
Jim has always been a tad “my way or the highway” Heseltine does the same to the Tories and Labour have more than you can shake a stick at.
Mavericks can be interesting but they rarely set policy
David Caledonia
Reasonableeffort but must do better. Maybe change your moniker.
Its a well worn political narrative from labour to be claiming the Socialist mandate in spite of Labour still being dominated by right wing Tory Blairites.
They have been trying desperately for years to try and find a common link throughout the UK to justify a single State mentality. To try and pretend its Socialism only proves how utterly corrupt they are.
They have embraced and helped build up the patronised privileged ruling establishment elite in London and continue to create “Life” Peers which does nothing but undermine what little pretence Westminster has at claiming a Democratic mandate.
They as much as the Conservatives have systematically eroded the power and influence of the House of Commons while increased the power and influence of the House of Lords.
Socialism my arse. Whats growing South of the border is nothing short of Blood and soil Fascism.
Socialism can cover a wide spectrum of ideologies. I have always considered that true socialism means a society where all means of production is in collective rather than private ownership.
Social democracy, means for me, acceptance of capitalism but with government interventions to ensure social justice.
Labour has drifted from fairly socialist to right of social democracy. SNP are social democrats in a mainstream European sense.
That’s my opinion. It places me as a social democrat, erring to the left. I believe essential services should be in public hands (health, rail, roads, all energy, water) and carefully regulated private companies can look after the production of ‘consumer goods’.
Wiki …
” Socialism is a range of economic and social systems characterised by social ownership and democratic control of the means of production….Social ownership may refer to forms of public, collective, or cooperative ownership; to citizen ownership of equity; or to any combination of these.”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism
” Social democracy is a political, social and economic ideology that supports economic and social interventions to promote social justice within the framework of a capitalist economy; as well as a policy regime involving a commitment to representative democracy, measures for income redistribution, and regulation of the economy in the general interest and welfare state provisions.”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy
Labour, socialist? IMO, not since the 60/70s.
Scotland, socialist? Certainly well to the left of England as every measurement shows. Scots are a mix of socialists, social democrats, and a small actual right wing faction. (That faction in England is in the majority!)
Hilarious. Great job.
Labour claim to want ‘socialism’ but cannot admit that Scots are more left wing as that would expose the democratic deficit what demands independence. #scary
@ galamcennalath – well said. Blairite Labour is a right wing party protecting the Establishment from the social justice they deserve.
I believe Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell are left of centre and would promote socialist policies if they could get the rest of the Labour Party on board. But that is a forlorn hope until after Labour have sunk a bit lower and even the Blairites have to stop believing their own spin.
Richard Wolff says that Labour are committed to renationalising the railways and promoting workplace co-operatives with state aid. If so, the media are doing a great job of hiding those policies from the voting public.
I’ll tell you this for nothing, I really miss my WOS safety valve of being able to post comments unhindered, didn’t realise just how good for one’s health this wee site of ours is.
In a week where I’ve had to endure witnessing a cranked up flow of bitter bullshit and lies from Red Tories and their Jaundiced Tory sidekicks, without access to my WOS safety valve, it has been a real strain on me poor ticker.
Never mind, Stoker’s revamped bunker is nearing completion and will go fully operational, on a permanent war footing, and i’ll be taking the fight to the multi-coloured BritNat Tories, 24/7.
No more LibLabCons!
David Caledonia says:
“So SNP, do not take me and others for granted, we got you where you are today, and we can send you back into the wilderness a lot quicker if you do not listen to us”
I am also a card carrying member (66yrs old) I will allow you the “me” in your statement but “we” “others” and “us”.?
Are you in a fairground hall of mirrors?
Our SNP representatives sit in W/Minster and you say that you have never voted for any such party??
Peace Always
Willie Rennie floundering on Politics Show when asked about Lib Dem MPs voting against another Indy Ref
Isn’t BREXIT seperatism? Didn’t Labour support it?
The woman’s a twit.
Its always a problem when a hegemony like SLAB develops because you end up with “party members” who don’t believe a single thing Labour was supposed to stand for.
They’re simply in the party because it was the only way to access power/money/privilege in Scotland for decades.
Over time that number grows, and grows, and grows through nepotism & corruption.
A lot of supposedly “Labour” people were privately educated and come from a family background which historically voted tory & probably will/does again.
So when the gravy train starts coming off the tracks for the SLAB hegemony these people show their true colours. After all there’s no reason not to now, is there?
tl;dr I doubt there’s been any socialists elected for SLAB in 15 years+ because they don’t exist.
@Donald Anderson –
Have just been reading the following, which I assume is your work?
Great resource there. Using it for final dissertation. Posted link to O/T couple of nights ago, but putting it here as it may be useful for those who need a wee reminder of why Labour is long overdue being hounded from Glasgow once and for all. They were behaving like Red Tories thirty years ago.
http://www.workerscity.org/the_reckoning/donald_anderson.html
Id never vote tory or support them. I have a somewhat right-leaning view on economics but these people arent about ‘business’ and ‘free trade’, well not outside of what is necessary for their business friends to be happy. They are the party of the entrenched British establishment through and through.
As for David Caledonia – this speaks to what was posted here a few days ago: the SNP putting unnecessary caveats and ideology to the independence argument. Its nothing but a mistake. Independence should be as blank slate as possible.
Then we can all have the discussions we need to have.
Wee Willie using the fact that the Greens procured some of the SNP second votes in the Holyrood election as a rod to beat the SNP with.
I know Willie is mostly just a comedian, but let it be a lesson.
Don’t lend your votes to anyone. SNP 1,2 and 3 in council elections.
David Caledonia,
So you’ll be voting for Independence then lobbying to leave the EU once Scotland is independent then will you Dave?
I’m with Roboscot. Distinct smell of cold tea in the air.
Imagine a London politics show without a single Tory on it?
BBC Politics Scotland = no rep from the governing party.
O/T The Sunday Post today has a screaming headline that over 60s are 70/30 against Independence.
https://twitter.com/naebD/status/840704634599686144
James Kelly in Scot Goes Pop is baffled about where their figures have come from as the website doesn’t have a link. He casts some doubt on the genuineness of the sampling.
But on checking Lord Ashcroft’s Indyref figures for the day after the referendum in 2014, todays 30% YES could signal an INCREASE in the yes vote of 3%. The 65+ vote was only 27% YES in 2014.
Good news!
http://lordashcroftpolls.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Lord-Ashcroft-Polls-Referendum-day-poll-summary-1409191.pdf
I posted some of this on an earlier thread so apologies for repeating it but I see we have some ‘conditional’ supporters of independence here today.
If you support independence for Scotland, just visualise this scenario for a moment: a month after losing a second IndyRef, respected analysts of polling data tell us that the reason we lost narrowly was that Yessers in 2014 voted No in Indyref2 because they did not want to be in the EU.
In short, in this scenario we lose because there are Yes voters in 2014 who are not prepared to wait to argue their own case to be out of the EU within an independent Scotland’s own democratic system. Instead, they wanted to take advantage of a referendum vote and a Tory government within the present UK electoral system, even though it is this UK system that embeds a democratic deficit for Scotland.
Is the existing democratic deficit not a prime reason for independence? “Nah, only when it suits me – I know Scotland voted overwhelmingly to stay in the EU, but I’m going to ignore this, take advantage of being in the UK, and place at risk Scottish independence by voting No in Indyref2.” Now that would be some conditionality!
The front page of today’s Sunday Post is indeed about the stupidest front page I have ever seen. I don’t know exactly what the purpose of it is but if it is meant to help the union it is surely completely counter productive.
Which brings me to another point. Papers are written by journalists, not necessarily by clever or well informed people and I have met some that I wouldn’t send for the messages.
Surely in an age of casino capitalism and unbridled corporate power a bit of divisiveness is a good thing.
In an era of the super rich, any politicians who claim to be progressive yet derisively talk about “the politics of division” are not on the level.
What such politicians strive for is quiescence from the people.
The poll in the SP is not unexpected but not reflective of Scotland as a whole, just a segment of it. A segment of this demographic changes each year as dying is a fact of nature. More proportionally who have since died since September 2014 voted No to be replaced, if polls are to be believing, by more Yes friendly voters.
Perhaps the Rev might commission a poll that digs deeper into why they feel that way and what would those advocating Yes need to do to convince them not vote No.
The Labour party consciously positioned itself under Blair and Brown to take middle class votes from the Tories and there was some sense in that for them. The loose post-war consensus that had existed until Thatcherism had previously delivered a certain sense of social mobility to a certain demographic, particularly in England.
That demographic was principally the immediate post-war generation – that of those born during the war and the baby boomers. They enjoyed benefits that had not been available to their parents’ generation – a welfare state, many in a ‘job for life’ situation. Many could contemplate buying a house and taking on a mortgage. A new industry had been born.
The cunning of Thatcherism was to notice that house ownership had created a new perception of themselves in the former working class whose ideas of class had transitioned into a new interpretation of their place in society. ( My husband called it ‘the Mary Baker Cake Mix for making a Tory voter’ – first buy your council house…)
The Labour party now aligned themselves with this demographic and we then had them employing the same terminology as Tories such as ‘aspirational’ and a ‘home-owning democracy’. But it was the Labour party who invented terms such as ‘hard-working’ families and – the most divisive term of all – the ‘underclass’ to define in a truly malign way, this new fault line.
We then saw the evident contempt that Labour politicians had for those left behind in society and ruthlessly, they saw to the demise of the old consensus. That they are now suffering for those choices they made in the nineties and succeeding decades is simply karma.
@ galamcennalath at 11.26
Good summary on Scotland and it’s stance on politics i.e. Social Democrats. Totally agree majority of Scots are of this political persuasion. Worked in Norway and Scandanavia in general is very similar to Scotland in political thoughts and society.
Unfortunately rest of the UK, including the Labour Party, doesn’t think in this manner. They all embrace centre right to right policies which go against the mainstream political thoughts of the Scottish people. The SNP have captured this gap in Scottish politics and the Labour Party don’t know how to counteract this. But then again when as a party they have given up their left/ centre left agenda and vote on policies they should be opposing where does that leave them.
@David Caledonia says: 12 March, 2017 at 10:19 am:
” … I do not want a political union with the rest of Britain, and i certainly do not want a political union with the european union, that’s something the SNP will never get me to vote for,
Well David there isn’t any nice way to say this – but if you seriously imagine that the European Parliament in any way is akin to the UK parliament then you are seriously delusional.
The EU treats all their citizens as equals and all their member states as equals too. The presidency of the EU member states changers every 6 months. The current country providing the EU president is Malta.
During their 6-month period, the president chairs meetings at every level in the Council. Member states holding the presidency work together in groups of three, called ‘trios’ and this began with the Lisbon Treaty in 2009.
The, “Trio”, sets the EU long-term goals and it prepares the common agenda of topics and major issues to be addressed by the Council over an 18 month period. It is on the basis of this programme that each of the current three countries prepares its own more detailed 6-month programme.
The current trio is made up of the presidencies of the Netherlands, Slovakia and Malta and it is little Malta that provides the current EU President.
Furthermore, David, any country or state that has attempted to isolate itself and not co-operate with other countries or states has, ended up in total disaster.
It was the USA’s attempts to be isolationist that led to the Worldwide Great Depression and the country with the very worst record of poverty of its population is North Korea that also operates an isolationist policy.
There is absolutely nothing about the EU that even remotely resembles the UK.
Scotland in the EU would get their turn of being the country providing the president of the EU and Scotland in the EU would have the same power of vetoing as every other EU member state. The EU operates by consensus while the UP operates as a virtual dictatorship. We saw that when Tony Blair took the UK to war against the will of the people.
The UK is being run as the de facto parliament of the country of England and thus Westminster is imposing English parliamentary decisions upon the other three UK countries.
Furthermore the UK is now about to impose hard UK Exit upon us all and that is very like the policies of North Korea and will lead to exactly the same ends – A small very, very rich elite of rulers and a very, very poor population of all others.
May I suggest, if you wish to avoid, becoming part of the EU that you emigrate to England.
They are just trying to indicate that they re a major force in Scotland. Lies as always. Second party at Holyrood? Yes. But only because of PR and the list vote. First past the post they are nobody.
@Vestas says: 12 March, 2017 at 11:45 am:
“After all there’s no reason not to now, is there?
tl;dr I doubt there’s been any socialists elected for SLAB in 15 years+ because they don’t exist”.
Did not Labour in Scotland throw out the sitting, most honest and socialist, MP they had in Dennis Canavan?
Who promptly stood against them and won the seat from Labour. If ever there was great big black writing on the wall saying, “IHIS WAY OUT”, that was it.
The Labour party are definitely not socialists, look at how they vote with their tory pals. They condone austerity on the poor, sick, disabled, and vulnerable. They have not been socialists for a long time. Deluded in the extreme to think that is what they are when in fact they are tories, through and through.
I wonder how “socialist’ it was to send £1+ billion back to the greedy troughers down in london, (labour couldn’t ‘think of anything to spend it on’ in Scotland) 2006/7, when people in Scotland were stuggling to make ends meet! No doubt also at the time when the Scottish NHS was being run down and people really were lying on trolleys in corridors. Labour were too busy giving very lucrative private contracts out like sweeties, to build hospitals, schools etc, at great profit to themselves. We are still paying by the millions for that.
They did nothing for Scotland, and still don’t. How dare they call themselves socialist! They love the ermine, and are rewarded accordingly for sh*****g on Scotland from a height.
Re;David Caledonia, (interesting name)@10.19am
Er, you are in the ‘toxic’ EU now and have been for quite some time. On what grounds, will you be rabidly campaigning against the party to whom you subscribe,the SNP, at the moment?
Why bother, keep your money, the SNP don’t need people who would ‘campaign against them with all their energy’ while threatening them if they do not listen to you! So, you are a member of a political party, who, if they do not give you what you want, ie, out of the EU, will go out of your way to destroy them?
Goodbye and good riddance.
@ Artyhetty
Someone not taking the party line? How dare David Caledonia.
I disagree with him, but you should probably wipe the rabid foam from your lips and understand that independence wont be won only by the present SNP faithful;)
Must be a bit more than confusing for those who were once Labour supporters and there must be many on here , a party who are now drifting rudderless towards who knows what port or destination , a party who have lost sight of its natural enemy the Tory party and have turned total hatred on the one party who are trying to uphold once held Labour Principles of fairness and government for the good of all the people in this country , Where did it all go wrong , when did lying replace decency and fairness , the present Labour party is one i dont recognise , i was never a supporter but at least i had an idea of what they stood for , the current party as far as i can see will stand for anything , whose main objective seems to be crush the SNP that is their only reason for existence , to hell with trying to make things better for ordinary people , its party First .
My street was supposed to be cleaned today , all cars removed.
Instead we have been invaded by a bunch of Labour party ‘activists’ ,5 in all, leaflet dropping and hoping for a chat. Their leaflet proclaiming ‘ save local services ‘ – like street cleaning presumably.
I didn’t know they had so many willing foot soldiers.
Bob Mack 9.59am
Just been reading the herald article about online death threats to the FM and I discovered this gem.
When asked by the Herald reporter why he had done it, one of the vitriolic online abusers said:
I did it because Nicola Sturgeon caused the collapse of the Scottish Labour Party and i don’t like her for doing that. And no, I won’t retract what I said because I meant it.
Straight from the asses mouth!
I don’t care what they called themselves, the Blair/Brown incumbency was Tory!
Robert Peffers, well said reposte re. the EU to David ‘Caledonia’ (sic).
@Mike says
==============
I don’t think the HoL is much eroded. The HoC is still the more powerful and has the last say. The problem is that both Houses are institutionally corrupt. The HoL for obvious reasons: it’s non-elected and many are in there because of political favours or even just buying a lordship. The HoC: we’ve seen the expenses scandal but also Tory corrupt electioneering, the backing of both the Tories and New labour (when it was a force) by big business.
Government office including ministers and civil servant leadership is totally corrupt: old rules about having to wait years before you could move to a private company your government department have been discarded and acceptance of favours and well paid sinecures for “helping” big business get unfair advantages is positively encouraged rather as being seen as dishonest, as a normal person would see it. And on top of this the FPTP electoral system allows governments elected by small percentages of the electorate to act as if they had massive support from the public, an elected dictatorship almost.
EDIT to myself: “rules about having to wait years before you could move to a private company your government department HAD DEALINGS WITH have been discarded
@David
============
The Tories still call themselves Conservatives but haven’t been so for decades. Conservative means keeping things unchanged as much as possible and only changing when absolutely necsessary; since Thatcher they have been radical neo-liberal extremists whose policies may benefit the super-rich and some politicians’ friends but are completely hopeless for the ordinary medium and low level businessman not to mention the ordinary worker.
@Flower of Scotland
=============
It’s already been shown several times in this site that it’s OK to vote Green (and for others like Independents) in the local elections as that will not harm your SNP first choices. Other sites including Scot goes POP! have explained this. You can in fact use all your votes to reduce the chance of Labour getting in. The Holyrood PR system (where the problem was seen) is different from that used for local elections.
@ Robert Peffers: well said, a clutch of good reasons to be a EU citizen.
And there lies the problem.
Scotland doesn’t register with the Red Tories, never has never will, only used as a sort of “votes cow”. for decades.
Scottish Independence IS coming,( you can feel the Yoons ramping up the hysteria daily), embrace it or its cheerio Slab, and ye can tak yur dug wi ye.
Had a wee conversation with a Yoon friend last week, they spouted the BBC diatribe word for word, (a lost cause totally blinkered.)
I thought about engaging in a debate but it was a case of trying to shout over them, embarrassing, “their loss” as they no longer exist to me.
With apologies, the LibDem current theme tune:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGor7ZyCawI
Wrong thread and should ahve been about Rennie and Cole-Porter or whatever his name is.
I think I’ll go bury my head in a haystack.
@ Artyhetty. keep foamin hen!
Elaine Smith is clearly an honours graduate of the Willie Rennie school of psephology
The Scots electorate have always had a more left-wing tradition than the English electorate.
The Scottish Tories are fond of quoting the fact that they got more than 50% of the Scottish vote in 1955. They sometimes extrapolate from that to claim that Scotland used to be a Tory-voting country.
However 1955 and 1959 were isolated exceptions to the rule. In the whole 20th century Scotland only voted in three elections for the Tories – and never at all in the 21st.
This electoral history concurs with the Scottish community-based bias in other fields: encouraging the education of the poor with a school in every parish; setting up five (there were two in Aberdeen) relatively accessible universities when England only had two elitist and sectarian establishments; even setting up an early form of legal aid to help the poor argue their case in court.
If we were taught our own history we would be aware of all this.
I have never “got’ twitter, i get a headache trying to read it, however, i did see a brilliant description of it on Frankie Boyle last night…
“I prefer facebook to twitter”, says Frankie…”because, i would rather get wished a harmless birthday by someone who didnt mean it, than a death threat by someone who fucking did” !!!
Nicola Sturgeon is to call press conference tomorrow morning. Last chance for May to listen!
Should be interesting.
Mary McCabe @ 8.55 pm
I thought the Tories, or Unionist party as it then was, won over 50% of the vote in the election in 1931 and pretty well dominated things in Scotland until the mid to late 1950s.
My late grandfather was a high ranking mason and a tradesman, and he considered the tories his party, as the labour party was simply for the labourers.
Politics was never ever discussed, but everything about his life was queen, country and the way things had always been and shouldn’t change.
He should have said ‘…the majority of my life…’.
She surely would have understood then….