Anatomy Of A Lunatic
Honestly, folks, I don’t even want to do this because almost nothing is more tedious for anyone else to read than two people having an internet beef – a lesson that I learned, ironically, from reading the site this post concerns, which does little else – but as well as reacting on a basic human level to someone being THIS deranged by hatred of you, it’s worth marvelling, like an elegant Victorian gentleman or lady taking a guided tour of an asylum, at how much insanity they can squeeze into a small space as a result.
And to detail the madness we have to start with that headline.
Because it’s #1 of very many straightforward, barefaced lies in The Lunatic’s piece. Wings has offered no “tactical voting advice” to anybody, in Highlands or elsewhere. Tactical voting on the list is, as we noted many years ago, almost impossible to do.
Our position, however, is nothing whatsoever to do with “tactics”. Our stance is that the cause of independence requires the SNP to be destroyed, which means not voting for them at all on either the constituency or list ballots. No second-guessing is needed. Want no SNP seats? Then give no votes to the SNP, and you will have done everything in your power to bring about that which you desire. No backfires possible.
Now, we would of course prefer people to achieve that goal by voting for genuine independence candidates and parties, although in the majority of cases that will be simply impossible – in most constituencies, certainly, there will be none standing.
But – barring unforeseen events on the scale of a Russian/Chinese/Martian invasion – by any sane assessment independence isn’t going to be achieved in the next Scottish Parliament, so as far as the pursuit of that objective goes it would make very little practical difference if the 129 seats in Holyrood were occupied by the pro-indy likes of Alba, or by Labour, the Tories, Reform and the Lib Dems. The aim is the destruction of the SNP and either outcome achieves that.
(It’s also no longer credibly feasible to argue that a Unionist administration could be any worse at day-to-day governance than an SNP one, though there’s little evidence it’d be any better either. Holyrood is beset by numpties across the board.)
Again, we’d prefer the former of the two outcomes, and voting for parties who you know for certain won’t win constituency seats – because they’re not standing in them – maximises the value of your list vote, but it seems very unlikely on current polling that the small indy parties will make a breakthrough, so votes for either Unionist parties OR the SNP will have the same result: lots of Unionist MSPs.
FALSEHOOD #2. Wings has at no juncture “talked up” the likelihood of Fergus Ewing holding Inverness & Nairn. A few days ago we said it was unlikely.
Now that his candidacy has been officially confirmed, in truth we have no idea. Only two people have successfully won a constituency seat as an independent in the history of Holyrood, and most recently over two decades ago: the long-forgotten Jean Turner in 2003 (running as “Save Stobhill Hospital”), along with Dennis Canavan in both 1999 and 2003. Margo McDonald was a list member for her entire MSP history.
But let’s park that for a moment. We’ll come back to it.
FALSEHOOD #3. Wings has never said any such thing. We’ve said it’s not likely on current polling numbers, but we’re still the best part of a year away from the election and those could change. More to the point, though, the actual argument we’ve made is that they’ll win fewer list seats than would be won if their list vote was redirected to other indy parties – something The Lunatic has never actually attempted to refute.
FALSEHOOD #4. As noted above, Wings remains of the view that TACTICAL voting on the list is all but impossible. What we want is not voting SNP on the list, which is something very different. And the point about that is that it doesn’t change whether or not you care about how many pro-indy MSPs are elected on the list.
If you want the maximum number of “pro-indy” MSPs elected on the list, and if you consider the SNP “pro-indy” – which we don’t, a view probably shared by the 40% of their voters and 53% of members that they’ve lost since 2020, but that’s immaterial to the point here – then you’d be an idiot to give the SNP your list vote, because you’ll definitely get fewer pro-indy MSPs that way, whether it’s actually 0 or just close to 0.
(Because it’s as near to a 100% certainty as can be that Alba, the Greens, the ISP or whoever are going to get no constituency seats, so their list vote will not be reduced in any way in any region, whereas the SNP will definitely get SOME – probably dozens, and on current polling over 50 – and so their list vote WILL be divided significantly. Any and every SNP list vote will therefore, as a simple measurable empirical fact, be worth less – at least 50% less and up to 91% less, in fact – than a list vote for a party with no constituency seats. We’ll do a little table below for those who struggle with understanding words.)
If on the other hand you want a lot of Unionists elected instead, you’d again clearly be an idiot to give the SNP your list vote, because obviously in those circumstances you should give it to Unionists directly.
And if, like us, what you want is to see the SNP destroyed so that a real independence party (the current shape of which is unknown) can begin to rise, then equally obviously you’d be an idiot to vote for the SNP on the list, as that just helps keep them alive.
WHICHEVER outcome you want from next year’s election, then, and wherever in the country you live, if you vote for the SNP on the list – unless the ONLY thing you care about is getting the biggest number of SNP MSPs regardless of whether or not they do anything about independence, because they’re in essence your football team and you hate anyone who competes for votes with them – you’re basically an imbecile.
FALSEHOOD #5. Sigh. Once again, we have never – at no point anywhere ever – “guaranteed” any number of seats of any kind for anyone. A simple analysis of current polling suggests a certain range for the SNP, whether it’s us doing the analysing or people like Sir John Curtice, and that range is high 40s to mid/high 50s.
And it is EXTREMELY hard to get that many constituencies and still win list seats when your list vote is 28%. (In 2021 the SNP’s list vote was 40% and it still only got two.)
Curiously, there are not 102 articles on The Lunatic’s website furiously castigating Sir John for making these very straightforward calculations, even despite the absurdity of basing a prediction on a uniform swing mirroring the Hamilton by-election.
FALSEHOOD #6. Once again, Wings has simply never come even remotely close to saying that the SNP will “definitely” win zero list seats. We’ve said that on current polling 0 is the most likely number, but that in any event, beyond an atom of doubt, it’ll be far fewer than other indy parties would win if they got those votes instead.
FALSEHOOD #7. Our “sales pitch” is that the SNP being wiped out, or as close to it as possible, is the best way to advance the cause of independence. We don’t want them winning any seats at all, list or otherwise. Of course that’s not likely, but as far as we’re concerned every one they get is one too many.
Now, this isn’t a falsehood as such, but we need to digress for a second – what on Earth is going on with that screenshot? Both iOS and Android phones automatically offer you an image-cropping option when you take a pic. The Lunatic doesn’t appear to understand how to move a marker on a touchscreen. It looks mental.
But back to the action.
FALSEHOOD #8. Number of those three things we actually said: 0. What the tweet says (the first one, not the Still Game one) is merely that SNP voters in Inverness & Nairn might conclude that they could vote for Fergus Ewing on the constituency ballot and also get an SNP list MSP, and they might be right, or they might not. They also might, or might not, want that outcome.
(Do they? We don’t know. Ewing is pretty popular in the constituency, winning it by 20 points last time and having held it or its predecessor seat since the creation of the Parliament 26 years ago. Standing as an independent would also possibly remove the “stain” in SNP voters’ eyes that would attach to him if he joined Alba. But it might not – the SNP’s loyal-dipshit wing are already pouring their bile onto him – and as we’ve already said, indies winning constituencies are rarer than hen’s teeth. At this point we also don’t know if he’ll stand on both ballots, which would be a further complication.)
As we noted in our recent article, Highland region looks the SNP’s best chance of a list MSP, but that was based on the hypothetical assumption of the Lib Dems capturing Caithness, Sutherland & Ross and Labour taking the Western Isles, neither of which are certainties. Ewing could take Inverness & Nairn, which would undeniably improve the maths for an SNP list seat, but then one of the other two could stay SNP, in which case they’d be back where they started.
In any event, though, “and that’s a good thing” is definitely something that exists only in the fevered mind of The Lunatic. We didn’t say it, we didn’t imply it, and as we’ve been making painfully clear (to anyone sane) on this site for a number of years now, we don’t want it – we regard any SNP seat anywhere as a bad outcome.
FALSEHOOD #9. The tweet offers no “tactical voting advice”. Wings, we’re happy to state unambiguously, endorses Fergus Ewing as the best constituency candidate for Inverness & Nairn – because Emma Roddick is a cretin who should be nowhere near Holyrood no matter what – and we would also prefer voters to choose someone other than the SNP on the list, because we want the SNP destroyed.
It’s really not complicated, and we’re not sure we can dumb it down any further for The Lunatic, or explain why he finds it so difficult to grasp. Hey ho.
FALSEHOOD #10. Hoo boy. We’ve been over this. See above.
So that’s a tidy Top 10 of straight-up demonstrable lies in just 471 words – quite an impressive feat in some ways, although a complete detachment from reality and a dogged, deliberate refusal to even acknowledge what your opponent’s actual argument is does tend to make that sort of thing a bit easier to pull off.
And while this is evidently pointless, we’ll put it on the record in the plainest possible terms anyway for the non-deranged:
Wings Over Scotland’s advice for the 2026 Holyrood election is “readers, please do not vote SNP on the list ballot, or indeed on the constituency one, under ANY circumstances whatsoever, if you have any meaningful interest in achieving Scottish independence in the next 30 years”.
It’s not “tactics”. It’s not manipulation of the system. It’s a straightforward recognition of where we are, and what we have to do before we can even hope to start rebuilding a genuine independence movement: burn the corpse of the old one and bin the ashes.
Voting SNP on the list in the name of independence is still moronic if that ISN’T what you want, which is what our previous piece observed and demonstrated, but it’s what we want and we’ve made no secret of it for a very long time, to the point where you’d have to be deranged and certifiable not to notice.
We’d hope that was clear, but from experience we’re not holding our breath.
.
POSTSCRIPT:
Were there to be any doubt over whether any given person was a lunatic or not, we would tactfully suggest that their seeking to achieve independence by voting for Emma Roddick was conclusive proof in the matter.
But in fact The Lunatic’s description of Fergus Ewing’s comments is just a functionally accurate description of the SNP’s official current policy. The only real difference is that the SNP don’t put a deadline on it, with John Swinney merely saying “Oh, some time in the future when we’ve built support to an unspecified but astronomical level we might think about doing something but we can’t say what because it’s a secret”.
Indeed, the only rational interpretation of his most recent line is that that level would need to be in the vicinity of 75%, and at the current rate of progress that’s going to be somewhere after the year 3000. In that context, Fergus Ewing suggesting it might be a 10-year goal looks like both wild, uncontrolled optimism and rather indecent haste.
Thanks for clearing that up. Former SNP member here. Dear, Scot Goes Pop. I’ll be listening to Stuart Campbell. As I have done ever since the failed conspiracy, orchestrated by the SNP cabal to imprison Alex Salmond on false and disproven allegations. Woman H the perjurer. We’ve not forgotten!
Under no circumstances am I voting for the SNP. Fergus Ewing spoke the truth about Alex Salmond. He’s not in the SNP because they are a parcel of rogues.
Winnie Ewing is turning in her grave right now – she knows. And it’s liberate Scotland!
??
As my dear old granny would have said..
Aye! He’s no the full shillin, that yin !
Stu, we need a new party urgently to lead us out of the myre. Please consider it along with Robin. I’m sure , nope I’m positive there are a couple of arses keeping the Holyrood seats warm for you both and a few more good folks on here. You’ve done more for independance than the useless , spineless SNP have achieved in the past 11 years.
Speaking of lunatics, I see the arch contrarian and self-publicist George Galloway is now calling for a second referendum. Notwithstanding the contradictory nature of his selective unionism (staunch supporter of NI leaving the UK and joining a United Ireland, but aligns with the DUP in keeping Scotland in it, whilst cosying up to Farage to support Brexit) it’s hard to imagine him going the whole hog and coming out for YES and it’s likely a publicity stunt, now his voice has been drowned out during the Gaza situation.
Well, there you have it folks. Over the space of 2 WOSarticles what have we learned?
Firstly, We learn that John Swinney wants you to vote for his SNP and then after you’ve voted for them he might reveal what you’ve just voted for.
And secondly, we’ve had it confirmed yet again that ‘Pop Goes The Weasel’ is a habitual liar. That’s right, the liar who supports a party that deliberately deceives you about
“both votes SNP”.
And these utter clueless self-serving asylum residents wonder why we want to see their destruction?
Truth! #LiberateScotland Mon stand up and be counted Stu!..
Mr Kelly appears to be a bit of a dafty, so it’s safe to say that somewhere in Scotland a village is missing its idiot.
Independence for Scotland!
SNP Out!
I feel I know this Kelly boy quite well, even though I have never troubled to visit his site.
His dogged pursuit of pointless points scoring, his perennial twisting of words to suit his own warped agenda, and his deranged, vitriolic hatred for anybody who refuses to massage his ego by agreeing with every one of his nonsensical utterances puts me in mind of some of the regulars on here.
Rev Stu should investigate the true identity of some of the usual suspects posting BTL!
One of dear old Eric Morecambe’s regular methods of getting a cheap laugh was to turn to the camera, wiggle his spectacles and say – of whatever stooge (usually Ernie Wise) he was befuddling at the time: “This boy is a fool”.
I get that same feeling every time I see Master Kelly mentioned on Wings.
I had not read his haverings for some time, but, thanks to his current go at the Rev., I decided to have a gander.
He has long since broken through the bottom of the barrel, but, in defiance of all the advice – he is still digging.
The Morecambe opinion is definitely enhanced.
Scot Goes Flop though really is a lost cause:
Over the last 4 or 5 years – and especially in 2025 – he seems to have developed some weird kind of infatuation with Wings.
There seems to be a bit of the green eyed monster about him with respect to Wings which is perhaps not surprising when you compare their respective output. Maybe he also has the evangelical zeal of the re-convert (to the SNP) and feels he has to justify his new/old party credentials … and what better way than to slag off Wings, the bane of the SNP?
In addition it probably guarantees him a few extra pay days from The National publishing more of his articles and possibly a bit more traffic on his blog.
I any event he comes across as unhinged.
Not sure Stu lives in Bath in real life as he seems to live rent free in spacious accommodation inside the head of the pop goes the weasel blogger.
Reading Kelly’s rants over the last few months is a sad glimpse into an individual’s descent into madness. SGP is now just one epic poison pen letter about the Rev and, tragically, Kelly seems blissfully unaware of it – he even promises more of the same later today. I wish someone could have a word in his ear and put him and us out of his misery.
I’m sure there are lots of voices whispering in his ears.
Sometimes you have to do something which your conscience tells you is wrong. I have advocated voting since I could vote because a lot of people fought for your, and my, legal and constitutional privilege to vote.
However, if there is no one you can vote for either with a clear conscience or in all sanity, then it would be best to stay at home. I have reached the point now where I cannot vote SNP in any circumstances, and, if there is no real independence candidate standing in my constituency, I will stay at home because I will never vote for a Unionist candidate.
The SNP leadership has betrayed everything that I hold dear: they have betrayed me as a woman; as a former SNP supporter; and as an ordinary Scot who expected them to at least TRY to bring about independence. They also betrayed the only leader the party ever had who actually took us as close as we have ever come. Since Sturgeon came to power, the SNP has shrivelled to nothing. It is not even a shadow of its former self: it is nothing – zilch, nada, nights, rien – nothing at all.
If you are thinking that there is no-one to vote for please don’t stay home , go and spoil your ballot as they have to be counted and declared.
Obviously the young fella of the article failed comprehension at school and continues in adulthood to miss and misinterpret.
Yes, indeed, diablo, I will do that if I have to.
Lorn. The leaders of the SNP not only betrayed Alex Salmond, they actually hounded him to his death. I will always hold them responsible for what happened to him.
Don’t forget that there are other independence parties that you can vote for. Liberate Scotland. ISP, ALBA. Hopefully at least one of them will be standing in your area.
Yes, I am keeping my fingers crossed that there will be someone I can vote for because it does not sit well with me to not vote at all. I am in North-east Scotland, and the SNP lot up here I could never vote for, I’m afraid.
Go spoil your vote surely someone in your area Independent what area are you?.
My sentiments exactly Lorn. I loathe the SNP with every fibre of my being and I hope history will record its betrayal of the people of Scotland.
Stu,
I think you stated it rather well quite early on in you’re post,
Like an elegant victorian gentleman or lady taking a guided tour of an asylum,
You and we together are the gentlemen and ladies taking that tour around the asylum, and constantly come into contact with people whose thinking is out of context with the rest of society,
For instance this is what we have had to contend with here own you’re site just recently.
The treaty of union is old guff that is no longer applicable or valid,
Some people just have not been admitted to the asylum yet. But their headed that way pretty quick along with the woke, the trans-people, most of the inept politicians in london and the SNP in Scotland.
Research, Bi Polar cognitive dissonence.
We seem to have a lot of bi polar politicians this year,
Usual problem with sent post being delayed.
I voted SNP all my life until the last GE. No more. The goal was once independence but those days are past. My trouble is in finding someone to vote for: I won’t vote for any Unionist candidate and I doubt Alba will stand in my constituency.
The party top brass has destroyed a once-proud movement. The gravy train metaphor is only too true. The current crop of SNP politicians just want a long career in politics funded by Westminster. They certainly don’t want independence. I’ve felt uncomfortable with the party since the referendum, increasing so under Sturgeon and her successors.
I don’t know which is worse: ferry incompetence, A9 incompetence, identity politics incompetence, education policy incompetence, drug policy incompetence, business policy incompetence, and so on. The past 10 years have been dire. Who to vote for instead? A spoiled ballot paper beckons.
I really don’t get why anyone would send James a donation at this point.
Who’s looking forward to unhinged ramblings about Wings, Alba and just the occasional blogpost about polling? When was the last time he attempted to contribute anything positive to the discussion?
Since re-joining the SNP has he even said what efforts he’s doing to push for internal reform or outlined the reasons why others should follow his example and re-join the Party?
Hell he even seems to have given up on 2026 and has moved on to hypothetical scenarios about what the SNP could do following the 2029 General Election. It’s pathetic.
He doesn’t even allow any form of discussion/debate on his site now. What’s the point?
He’s been trying without success to raise funds, supposedly for polling, for the last year; all the while ‘threatening’ that SGP may have to shut down without financial support. Just another grifter in the proud tradition of WGD and nu-SNP.
If his blog did shutdown would anyone notice that we aren’t learning about what someone’s second cousin in Alba is supposedly doing or Wings being demanded to defend a position he never had in the first place?
Kelly was our LACU Political Officer or some such thing, and in his time in office he did the square root of f*ck all.
Perhaps the SNP are paying him to criticise their opposition and help them to get support.
Is it a coincidence that your stalker’s wee blog shares the same initials as the nutcase fringe in Parliament? They think they’re the only ones who can possibly be right, at least in their own minds. Then, when someone else comes along and patiently explains why the nutcase fringe’s view is wrong, said fringe explains that “someone else” didn’t really say what they said.
The trouble with James Kelly is that he is a deceitful wee (choose your own noun). I have personal experience of that. I commented on his blog and he was rather dismissive of my expertise in the subject matter. So I replied rather more forcefully, which he did not publish. What he did do was grossly misrepresent it. He is not to be trusted and, like PayPal Paul, has become a party hack.
I’d like for him to tell us, whats Scotland done to deserve his betrayal.
Our countrymen have so little for our birthplace they’d sell it all away just to be vindictive. FFS man stop licking your sausage its affecting you thought process.
What ever proposal we came up with to delivery Independence next year isn’t going to work as the SNP isn’t behind the idea now of Scotland being Independent, we can either destroy the SNP or let the SNP destroy Scotland.
The SNP has decided under John Swinney that Freeports which has a lifespan of 25yrs are their priority (not independence) taking their contract up to 2050, this is where the SNP loyalty lie. Therefore John Swinney has already won unless we can get rid of him before the next Holyrood election, cos hes prepared to sacrifice his MSP’s in order to do England’s bidding and keep Scotland in the Union.
I really need people to pay attention because John Swinney plan it to either destroy the SNP or to lose next years Holyrood election because if the SNP loses the election Scotland will be in the Union up until 2031, hence he’s telling the Indy movement straight don’t vote for the SNP because were not going to pursue Independence until 20250, he’s rubbing it in our faces.
It doesn’t matter what happen next year Scotland will be tied to this Union until 2031 unless we remove John Swinney now.
It doesn’t matter what plan anyone comes up with the leadership of the SNP is hell bent on the Union before Independence.
Make no mistakes if John Swinney, Kate Frobes, Steven Flynn or even Angus Robertson are in charge of the SNP next year, Scotland is the loser.
The SNP leadership has betrayed our country and our people but lets not let them get away with it we need unity and its the above individuals we need removing from Scottish politics, its that simple but time is not on our side Sturgeon seen to that.
It irks me that JK can’t even spell Stu’s contracted name accurately; instead, he calls him ‘Stew.’ 100 thicko points to JK. But since I can’t post on JK’s site – maybe because he’s too feart of nasty words people might say about him? – I’ll say it here: Just imagine the two of them locked in a room together for 10 years … mmm… delicious!
He thinks it annoys him and that everyone is laughing along at the joke.
But it’s just James, on his tod, making himself look pathetic.
Thanks for the post. Had to be done.
I think you’ve said all that needs to be said, Rev. Don’t spend any more time on it.
Turning to getting something out of the 2026 election, have you any project in mind that you can tell us about?
Are you in favour of the Liberate Scotland umbrella grouping? If so, can you use your influence with Alba to get them to join?
Should Liberate Scotland adopt the Manifesto for Independence? It seems that there is some misunderstanding on Barrhead Boy’s part at least, about the M4I, judging by Peter A Bell’s blog today. I can’t see why Liberate would object to adopting the M4I.
Tbh I don’t understand the approach Liberate are taking.
For any remote chance of success on the constituency ballot you need STRONG name recognition and even then it’s an uphill struggle. Stu has even pointed out how rare it’s been for an Independent to get elected, what chances do a bunch of unknowns under a organisational banner no one outside of pro-indy Twitter has ever heard off?
There’s not enough time to make the electorate aware that the organisation exists, never mind vote for it. Hell Alba have been going for 4 years now and they’re only just starting to register on polling.
I fear Liberate are repeating the same mistake ‘RISE – Scotland’s Left Alliance’ made in 2016: The assumption that a new coalition can make themselves known and win over mass support quickly. Also if they managed to cost the SNP a Constituency they’ll likely just pick up an MSP on the List instead (reducing the chances for a Party like Alba to win List seats).
“Tbh I don’t understand the approach Liberate are taking.”
RISE was a left wing political initiative offering a range of left wing policies, plus being in favour of independence.
The SNP offer a centre-right range of policies with a large woke flavour, plus being in favour of independence, sort of.
Liberate Scotland are offering only one policy – independence.
Being realistic though, Liberate aren’t going to come anywhere close to winning any Constituency.
Would even put money on most people still wondering who Liberate even are by the time they enter the polling station (which was also the issue with RISE: Nobody knew who they were outside of Twitter).
The only pro-indy challenge with a hope in hell of challenging the SNP anywhere on the Constituency ballot is Fergus Ewing based purely on his strong name recognition. Everywhere else you’d need to be joining James in the loony bin to believe there’s a chance. The only remote hope is the Regional List & that’s probably why Alba are trying to inform people about how the voting system actually works & they’ve got stronger name recognition.
A plague on BOTH your houses. Bye-bye.
Tioraidh…
So Stu is expected to ignore the deranged lies blatantly created by the warped weasel? Would you ignore someone making up a pack of unprovoked lies about yourself? Somehow i very much doubt it. Nobody would, especially in the field of politics where impression management and facts are everything.
Given the tone of his lies i think Stuart’s responses were measured, polite and factual. I know many folk who wouldn’t have been so polite in their responses to such deranged and blatantly false accusations, myself included.
Btw i’m getting a touch of deja vu with you saying “Bye-bye” on here. I really wish when certain folk say that sort of thing they truly mean it. Or are you just fishing for a
plea to stay? Do you happen to share the same padded cell postcode as the lying weasel?
Take care, Del. Bye-bye. LOL!
OT
meanwhile our useless minister for health is on a jolly to Japan
WHY!!!!!!,
Very healthy race, the Japanese.
Perhaps Mr Gray will be giving them some tips on how they could change that. With health comes longevity, and that costs the state, because it has to fork out for retirement benefits, late life health care, etc.
Maybe Japan wants to cut down on these overheads. These days, everywhere is feeling the pinch.
“meanwhile our useless minister for health is on a jolly to Japan
WHY!!!!!!,”
Troughers gonna trough!
Stu
I agree that Margo MacDonald was never elected as a Constituency MSP but nevertheless she was elected as an Independent Candidate on the list after she was put on the list in 6th place by the SNP and said I will stand as an Independent Candidate instead. And she won making her the 3rd Independent Candidate to be elected. I liked her a no nonsense approach. Also I make no distinction between Constituency MSPS and Regional MSPs if they are elected. The SNP do, somehow thinking that Regional MSPs are lesser MSPs than those elected via the Constituency vote. That’s not how the system was meant to work. A list vote for the SNP will strangle innovative and creative Candidates. We are in the grip of unchecked power with multiple unlawful and serial failures. What’s the solution? Stand in Bathgate and I will support you as a Wings activist but you will be lucky to get any MSM coverage at all. Your exposure will be a £500 deposit. You will probably retain your deposit. Something has to change soon, people and public services are dying up here. See the BMA comments today.
Well said Alf apart from the SNP’s sort of support which I am not buying. I don’t know why everyone is not getting behind the Independents initiative and Liberate. Time is running out.
How long was the Yes movement really active before the referendum?
Surely the mass activity didn’t really get going until 2014?
In which case, Liberate has got time to become known before the election IF enough supporters start to spread the word now.
Apparently if you stand in the constituency you get 4 times the number of list votes that you do if you only stand on the list. Perhaps someone could check this out by looking at the 2021 figures.
If true then this suggests that some candidates won’t expect to win constituency seats but hope to boost their list vote enough to get in on the list.
This is actually quite a cunning plan – 8 Liberate constituency candidates in a region would stand a better chance of accumulating enough list votes to achieve a list seat. Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!
“Surely the mass activity didn’t really get going until 2014?”
Yes Scotland launched in 2012, and the groundwork and effort behind the campaign took place over the following 2–3 years. We also had unity of purpose, mass coordination on an unprecedented scale, and the electorate was well aware of who Yes Scotland were and what their aim was.
“Apparently if you stand in the constituency you get four times the number of list votes than if you only stand on the list.”
Not sure where you read that — it sounds like nonsense.
If you’re not one of the mainstream political parties, history shows your best chance is to stand only on the list. That’s exactly how Margo MacDonald was elected as an Independent in 2003, 2007, and 2011.
@ Scott: “How long was the Yes movement really active?”
You say 2-3 years. George says that Alex Salmond says 1 MONTH before the vote. But what does he know, eh? 🙂
Joking apart, I know some folk were beavering away for a couple of years but the MASS activity from memory was in 2014.
@ George as well. As for the “nonsense” of getting more votes on the list if you stand for the constituency as well. Apparently you don’t get invited to hustings nor get a Public Service Broadcast if you are only on the list [though correct me if that is wrong], in which case it isn’t surprising that a constituency candidate’s name will get more support on the list.
Replying to Sarah at 12.03
When you said that “Apparently if you stand in the constituency you get 4 times the number of list votes that you do if you only stand on the list”, it looks as if you think this is a guaranteed multiple, which really is nonsense. (I know you mean really well, so I don’t like being as blunt as that, but it’s true.)
Now you’re saying that standing in the constituency leads to more exposure, which is true, but that isn’t the same.
“in which case it isn’t surprising that a constituency candidate’s name will get more support on the list” is also wrong, because the list ballot doesn’t doesn’t give candidates’ names, it merely shows the parties (unless they are non-party independents, which might be what you mean, of course, but the very people you are saying get more votes are members of parties). Candidates names are available, but only if you look for them.
Looking at the 2021 figures wouldn’t help; it is the larger parties that stand in both ballots, and are therefore likely to get more votes. No-one can know how many votes a party that didn’t do something would have got if it had done it. It is true that the Greens have increased their number of constituency candidates and their support has gone up over the same period, but this need not be cause and effect.
link to nitter.poast.org
This is absolutely shocking this video, the Permenant Secretary of the civil service facing two threats of legal again to get chicks with dicks I.e. men out the ladies…
And he still can’t bring himself to issue the guidance. What a tosser! And the Scottish tax payer will pay out the legal fees.
Just goes to show you how a cult and infected Scottish politics. And Mridul Whadawa – reframe your trauma – running for the Greens.
A plague on all our houses. Rise up and stand up ladies. 2 sexes. And send Satan back to fucking hell.
Holyrood the Tower of Babel.
Dear Stu. Can you do an article on the permenant secretary of Scotland refusing to get men out of women’s spaces. And Mridul Wadawa running for the Greens.
Absolutely disgraceful. Solidarity with my sisters. This is totally unacceptable. How did he pass vetting?
@Sarah 9:34pm
How long was the Independence movement active before the Independence vote, well according to Alex Salmond about a month beforehand. I noticed the increase in energy on the streets. I don’t understand your mathematics. A vote on the Constituency bears no relation to a list vote, if you are a double candidate. 4 times nought is still nought. I stand to be corrected. However I support every candidate on the list standing on an Independence platform. That’s more than the SNP.
@ George – it’s a question of exposure. A constituency candidate gets a PSB and gets invited to hustings, I believe – correct me if wrong – whereas a list-only person does not. So their name is more widely known. Just looking at Wikipedia voting figures in 2021, one minor party got c4000 total on the constituencies but 16000 on the list.
@Sarah 10:29 am
Thanks Sarah. I got it now. I agree with the exposure point. Wishing them well.
Totally off-topic (though a possible Scots language question).
I notice that it is very common for Scots to miss out verbs like ‘to be’ e.g. just heard a Scottish politician on the radio saying the phrase ‘everyone knows it needs improved’. This sounds odd to my ear, and don’t think it would ever be said in England – ‘to be improved’ would always be present.
Does this have anything to do with Scots, or something else? It seems unique to Scotland and is very normal, not slang or anything as I have seen it in written articles too, as well as numerous comments here.
ChatGPT came up with the following:
The phrase “it needs improved” is a regional grammatical construction known as the “needs + past participle” form. It is not standard in most varieties of English but is commonly used in **parts of the American Midwest and Appalachia**, especially in:
* Western Pennsylvania (including Pittsburgh)
* Ohio
* West Virginia
* Parts of Indiana and Kentucky
# Example Usage
* Standard English: “It needs to be improved.”
* Regional dialect: “It needs improved.”
# Origin and Linguistic Background
This construction likely stems from Scots-Irish English brought to the U.S. by immigrants in the 18th and 19th centuries. In Scots** and **Northern English dialects**, similar constructions have long been used, such as:
* “The car needs washed.”
* “The house wants painted.”
These dialects omit the “to be” part of the construction, a feature that carried over when Scots-Irish settlers moved to Appalachia and surrounding regions.
# Linguistic Term
Linguists call this a “statal passive” construction, meaning the phrase expresses a state or condition (needing improvement) rather than an ongoing action.
# Summary
*”It needs improved” is a regionalism.
* Rooted in Scots-Irish English.
* Common in parts of the **Midwestern and Appalachian U.S.
* Not considered standard English, but perfectly grammatical within those dialects.
So who’d a thunk it?
We Scots were colonising, ethnic cleansing sizzlers too.
Bet we gleefully joined in with the genocides as well.
You know what?
The occurrences of Scottish place names in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana and Kentucky wants catalogued.
See what I just did there? 🙂
Thanks Stuart, all makes perfect sense now and the link to Scots is clear. I have lived in northern England for decades but have never heard it here, so possibly died out (or I need to take more notice).
Why do Londoners sound as if they’ve got shit in their mouths when they talk?
they have shit in their brains
and a 500 word vocabulary which they mangle incessantly
then they object to other people “speaking foreign”
Craig Murray coming up on Judging Freedom in an hour and a half… 1pm or so for the live feed.
Pretty sure that has to be “our” Craig Murray…
link to youtube.com
“your” CM perhaps, never mine.
An apologist for the yellow, skulking, tunnel dwelling scum will only ever make me ashamed to be Scottish.
stop pretending to be Scottish you filth english dog
Hatred of dogs now, eh Confused?
What demographic is it that hates dogs, regarding them as unclean?
Anybody? Anybody at all?
it is the englishness which is objectionable, not the canine – I was referring to your endless desire to YAP
your slimy ooze across the BTL pollutes the entire forum
you refer to islam – I am so glad your country will be destroyed by it
– just think, the official figures look bad, but there was probably 6M people not registered on the census since they aren’t meant to be here; then we have the 10M of legal migration to come by the early 2030s, most of whom will not be doctors from Swissland. With the muslamics, at 20% density, the gloves come off. And you think nige is going to save you.
whenever I see an english in Scotland I think it would be better for – anyone else on earth to replace them
worse than muslims – the fucking ENGLISH
confused…
You don’t seem well today !
Not well at all !
Have you been skipping your medication again ?
Confused: do you know any English people?
Or any Muslims for that matter.
I find myself looking for Hatey’s reactions to the posts, even though I disagree completely about Israel, the “orcs”, the EU, and immigration. Which is a lot. I especially can’t see how he can support what Israel does to the Palestinians, but he has a different perspective on the ideas and claims in most posts, and that must be worth discussing.
“I find myself looking for Hatey’s reactions”
Then you must be on the wrong forum.
Because of the lack of moderation on here, it is well nigh impossible to ever debate anything. It nearly always descends to swapping playground insults so predictable that even most modern primary school kids would consider them lame.
BTW. You seem to have an inaccurate picture of what I support and don’t support.
Hatey – “BTW. You seem to have an inaccurate picture of what I support and don’t support.”
Sorry, huge apologies, I don’t know why I wrote it. Something about disagreement/different ideas being a good thing. But it’s po-faced and shouldn’t need to be said.
So will the Scottish government bail out all the Universities now that their “laser-like focus on international student recruitment to a new global strategy” has failed.
I think there needs to be a police investigation into their racketeering – how you fuck up a business that pays no tax, a “charity”, I do not know; it is even worse when you think about it – teaching is done by the postgrads and lectures are online, which should make it all cheaper.
some dude with a pink badger on his napper fucked over dundee yooni
link to archive.ph
check the para : “was the court chair qualified”
diversity hire.
too many white guys know money stuff, we need the pink badger hair community represented
@AndrewR
Have you?
– it doesn’t seem like it. I can add americans, jews, izzies, algerians, persians, french, german, spaniards, rushans, poles, and I have done the reading.
Are you basing your entire opinion on “my uncle Bobby is from Walsall and he’s alright … ” – it’s not a valid statistical sample, Uncle Bobby could be an outlier.
Anyone who gets to really know the english soon learns to hate them. There is something not right about them – call it “narcissism as national character”, it is quite real, and you live under the consequences of it.
People in general need to do some proper reading about islam – my other posts contain references.
There is a good reason why England destroyed by Islam on ISIS level savagery is a just karma –
They have done a great deal, more than anyone, to fuel “islamic nutterism” and now that shite torrent is splashing back on them, alarmingly.
Lawrence of Arabia, the Saud family and the world’s biggest natural prize, now used to fund terror hubs around the world, aka madrassas and mosques
The promotion of Wahhabism.
The “miraculous” appearance of ISIS, just when the war on Syria was fatally knocked-back.
– all that foreign office “cunning-plannery” – (twirls moustache) – let’s arm up these mohammedan whack-a-dans and unleash them on the fuzzy wottentots … yes, we use them as proxy warriors, then turn up once the dust has settled … pass the port … get chatham house to write up the times editorial and that’s that …
– pass me another boy will you … this one has split …
But now it’s all gone a bit pete tong, what with “welsh cunts” getting a bit stabby stabby.
– interesting rumours about that lad : one is his dad was a rwandan genocidaire and rwanda wanted him deported, but his lawyers kept in the UK; one of those lawyers was a young human rights fellow … Keir Starmer. So, he shouldnay have even been here. Also, the lad was a known nutter from previous schools but what can you say … “racism”. This may have been what Farage was “hinting at darkly” that time he was on the radio … he knew things, but he wasn’t allowed to say them. Nice little tactical political nuke to use just around election time, if Starmer has not buried Labour completely by then.
more from the UGLY ANGLO files : anti “tourist” protests
link to archive.ph
Will Barcelona experience its own Jagermeister-Shots-Nacht?
Anglos are trying to take on the jews for “world champion kicked out of places for their behaviour”
– they are down 109-65 but could yet make a late charge; does brexit count if it was self inflicted? And does it count as 1 or 24. Getting mighty close.
This contest will go down to the wire.
purest truth
link to youtube.com
this is why deGaulle tried to keep them out and predicted brexit 50 years before
I guess it’s not just me after all. Everyone wants them OUT.
It’s a grand day for digging yourself your own tunnel, Confused. Why don’t you put a shift in? You’ll feel better for doing a day’s honest graft.