Sorry, folks. We haven’t quite managed to get going today. We’ve got a cold, the weather’s grey and miserable, and watching the TV feels like being stuck in a bad dream you can’t wake up from, as the Tories look for new ways to be evil and Labour’s response isn’t to condemn their grotesque, neo-feudal plans for the people of Britain, but to say “Hey, you’re stealing our ideas!”
(The ever-delightful Liam Byrne, there, apparently totally unashamed to say that “this announcement is little more than reheating of a Labour scheme – ‘Work for your Benefits’ – which the Tories scrapped when they came into power”.)

Beset by this avalanche of vile, spiteful idiocy (all of which was allowed to pass unchallenged by a subservient BBC), our germ-weakened mind has reeled like a punch-drunk boxer. But we’re not yet quite so addled and bewildered that the likes of Ruth Davidson can get anything past us.
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Tags: arithmetic failmisinformation
Category
analysis, scottish politics
This man only controls the finances of Scotland because Scotland is part of the UK.

Never forget that if you listen to Labour and vote No next September, there’s (at least) a 60% chance that he’ll control the finances of Scotland until 2020. Ready to risk it?
Category
comment, uk politics
Below is the text of a letter sent by Alex Salmond, the First Minister of Scotland, to the UK Prime Minister David Cameron today, setting out six reasons why the PM should take part in a live debate with the FM on the subject of Scottish independence.
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Tags: debates
Category
scottish politics, uk politics
The strain of keeping up a three-year campaign of fearmongering and bile is starting to tell on the stout media defenders of the Union. This week the Telegraph’s blustering “Scottish Editor” Alan Cochrane flopped out a particularly limp effort on the subject of the scare du jour, an independent Scotland’s defence.

Never one to shy away from the sort of hyperbole you’d normally associate with some anonymous Twitter loony, Cochrane leapt straight in by dismissing the SNP’s proposals for Scottish defence as “the most ludicrous of all” of their policies, rating them 11 out of 10 for madness. But it was his attempts to put some numerical meat on the bones of this bold assertion that showed up just how lazy the Unionist narrative of Scottish inadequacy has become.
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Tags: too wee too poor too stupid
Category
analysis, scottish politics
Nice of them to lay this on today.
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Tags: and finally
Category
pictures
As far back as I can recall, I haven’t believed in anything.
I’ve had no over-riding passion for change, I’ve felt jaded and disconnected from the establishment, from the institutions. Westminster and the political scene of the UK was framed by a “they’re all the same” mentality. All I saw was greed and corruption in people who didn’t represent my view of the world, but that’s just how it is, right? It’ll always be the same, we can’t change it.

But maybe we can.
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Tags: perspectives
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comment, media, scottish politics
One thing we noticed over the last week or so was the near-total lack of campaigning on the streets of Scotland’s cities and towns, from either side. So if you were inspired by the rally and fancy making a more active contribution, why not pop to your local printers, make a few copies of this excellent wee leaflet, and get busy?
You can get 1,000 A6 copies printed for £22 here (5,000 for £40). Hand ’em out or just leave them in strategic locations (with permission, of course). Let’s get the word out.

Right-click the image to get the full PDF version, ready for printing.
Category
admin, scottish politics
We’re genuinely baffled by Ed Miliband’s big conference showstopper announcement this week that a Labour government would freeze people’s utility bills for a year and a half. Channel 4’s Fact Check is extremely sceptical that it can be done at all. The energy companies are predictably furious and making all manner of dire threats.

But what we really don’t get is what the point of it is.
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Category
analysis, uk politics
I believe in representative government. I believe people should be able to vote for the person/party whose stated priorities and policies most closely reflect their own.
I believe a party that is elected on a manifesto should have a legal obligation to act in line with that manifesto. I believe that if politicians lie to the public or Parliament, they should face criminal prosecution.

I don’t believe any of those things are unreasonable. And they’re also the main reasons I’ve been convinced to vote Yes in the independence referendum.
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Tags: perspectives
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comment
ASSESSOR: Rev. S. Campbell
DATE: 19-25 September 2013
LOCATION: Scotland, various

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Tags: and finally
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comment
It’s amazing what a trip away can do: refresh, educate, put a new slant on an old debate. I was in the US recently. The first thing I learned was before departure, and I pass it on as a tip: if you’re going to the US, fly from Dublin, not a UK airport. Apart from being about half the price – presumably because they have control over their airport taxes, so can adjust them to compete with Heathrow – it makes life far easier.

When I last flew to the US from a UK airport, long before 9/11, we were held in a bleak corridor without any amenities for well over an hour before being processed through immigration, where we were interrogated about the purpose of our visit, what address we were staying at, and where we were going exactly. It put me off re-visiting the States for a long time.
Flying from Dublin is a different experience.
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Tags: Cath Ferguson
Category
comment, culture, world