Another disaster for Scotland
As if it wasn’t enough that one small country had to cope with the terrible burden of hundreds of billions of pounds of volatile oil revenues, now we have to face the grim prospect that with fossil fuels being phased out across the world to protect the climate, Scotland also produces TOO MUCH cheap, clean, infinitely renewable energy.
No wonder the Unionists think we’re too wee and too poor to go it alone.
The background to the story (which you’ll find, in the traditional manner, buried many paragraphs down the article beneath the shock-horror headline and the SNP BAD quotes from opposition politicians) is that the payments are a result of the National Grid – which, of course, is NOT controlled by the Scottish Government or the SNP – having inadequate infrastructure to store/transfer the energy, because a project due to handle the problem is several years late.
However, the Western Link finally went operational just a couple of weeks ago and the issue should now be largely eradicated, which is why the Mail’s extracting as much screaming hysteria as possible out of it now while it still can.
Where would we be without the Scottish media, eh readers?
It almost makes you want to cry.
Where would we be without the Scottish media, eh readers?
Please sir! Please! I can answer that one!
An independent country in the North Atlantic?
Weren’t the Screaming Hysteria popular in the late 70’s 😀 😀
Yet again we are pampered. No!!…not pampered.. Hindered!! by media which just cannae understand how much our resources could benefit and a UK intent on same.
Plus another Tory eejit pretending reserved means devolved…
Independent?
Subsea cables from Peterhead to Norway and to the Wash area should have been built over 20 years ago on independent expert advice but hasn’t.
In fact the UK Government actually intervened to halt plans between the Scottish Government and Norway.
I did mention they need to watch their blood pressure. If they keep up the screaming hysteria thing they’ll pop something critical.
Although…. 😎
Thank the gods that there is no wind today, I cannae cope wi’ ony mair riches. Where are the broad shoulders, we need the broad shoulders.
This and this alone (well not alone, its so much more, but I diverge) illustrates the rank hypocrisy of the pathetic unionist media.
“Where would we be without the Scottish media”
A decent independent country and a member of the EU.
Oh, what a curse it is to be Scottish! The whole country is conspiring against us, with all that filthy oil, that accursed wind and as for the waves in the sea? Oh calamity!
Anything with an anti SNP headline, truthful or not will do.
What are the odds that the Nat Grid delay was due to UK Government fundinding delays?
Also absent from the Mail’s article is that £5m+ will be being paid to thermal generation in the South of England to increase generation to make up for the energy that cannot be supplied from the windfarms.
Windfarms are funded by national payments collected from consumers across Great Britain, underwritten by the Westminster Treasury, so hardly the result of an ‘SNP obsession’.
The new cabling is ready just in time for Scottish Independence, problem for WM however, is that Indy Scotland will be SELLING what goes down that cable to England and Wales pretty soon.
Oh Irma you forgot the tidal energy below the waves.
http://www.tidalenergy.eu/scottish-tidal-energy.html
We are doomed I tell ye!
In answer to the question “were would we be without the Scottish Media?”
I don’t know but we would be better informed.
We’re all doomed!
Imagine – generating surplus energy and having it available for export. Woe, woe and thrice woe!
Why among the nations of the world are we so cursed with wonderful resources that somehow contrive to make us stupid and impoverished?
Interestingly, I read about something last night that might go a long way towards solving the problem of energy storage.
Australian scientists have developed something they are calling an “ultra battery”. It’s basically a normal lead acid battery with a mat of activated carbon material over one electrode, which gives it some of the properties of a supercap. Much faster charging/discharging.
The extra carbon costs pennies. The manufacturing process remains essentially the same.
What’s interesting is how long they claim it extends the battery life. A normal lead acid battery will last 500 cycles. They say these new ones will last 15,000 cycles. That’s the difference between the battery lasting 4 years and 120 years.
Pretty standard, scream in the headline, put Yoon quotes first in the article then cover yourself with IPSO by printing the truth buried deep in the article. A classic case of the lie going around the world before the truth is even allowed to get its boots on.
In science conferencing you often have to prepare a poster about your work. You have to spend most time on the title as 90% of people will only read that. You spend the next most time on your abstract, a potted summary of the work because 7 or 8% will get that far. And only around 2% will ever look at the rest of it, the data. No matter how bling or interesting you can make your photos. If your data are graphs and tables you’re in trouble.
I fully expect it’s the same with journalism as both are dealing with attracting eyes.
I have a little sideline in getting people’s abstracts (you have to submit it when applying) within the word limit. It’s surprising how many definite articles you can do without and still maintain clarity and sense. Taking out ands and creating two short sentences instead is another one.
Re chick macgregor @10.45
I remember our lords and masters stopping this idea. As we could share and store green energy with Norway. This of course would have improved significantly Scotland’s energy sector.
I doubt you know this as their appears to be a media blackout in Scotland. Thanks BBC and STV.
https://www.northumberland.gov.uk/News/2016/Sep/New-electricity-link-between-Blyth-and-Norway.aspx
There is now a connecting cable between England and Norway costing many billions of pounds more to install than one between Scotland and Norway.
Shafted again – Thanks red tories and the rest.
Surely we could crowdfund something to sue a newspaper for their dishonest reporting ?
What is it about subset cables and connections to the Grid? This is not the only such project that has dragged on for years. There is the plan for a subset cable linking Lewis to the mainland so that electricity generated on Lewis from wind farms can be sent to the mainland.
This proposal has been dragging on for at least 10 years.
This from a report by the BBC in August 2018.
“””A final needs” case for a subsea cable linking renewable energy projects to the National Grid has been submitted to regulator Ofgem.
“”Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) has been planning the link for more than 10 years.
“”The company has proposed a single 600MW subsea circuit from Arnish in Lewis to Dundonnell in Wester Ross.
“”The cable would then be connected to SSEN’s Beauly substation, near Inverness, via underground cables.
“”If authorised by Ofgem, the Western Isles Radial Connector could be laid by 2023.
“”SSEN said it had presented a “comprehensive analysis” of the investment options available to meet “a range of credible future generation scenarios” on the Western Isles.
“”However, the project is dependent on two planned large-scale wind farm projects, Stornoway Wind Farm and Uisenis Wind Farm, securing subsidy support from the UK government’s Contracts for Difference next year.
“”SSEN has long argued that major renewable projects have to be constructed in the Western Isles for the subsea cable to viable.””
So maybe by 2023 it might, just might, maybe, perhaps, be operational.
Who was it said what happens when the renewable energy runs out?
It was Labours Ian Gray of course and he did in public in the Holyrood chamber
10 points to anyone who can find the clip, c’mon Rev put it up, oh puleassse put it up!
Ah, but yie see, our turbines, like our oil, is the wrong type.
Its only the start of the week We’re rich beyond our wildest dreams & by Friday we’ll be piss pot poor again Sun when the politico chatterers get to work we’ll be up to our armpits in debt, pass the Deodorant if am gonna be piss poor an in debt ah kin dey it smelling nice , nae sweaty Jock fur me lol.
@ronnie anderson
Aye but deodorant comes fae foreign places and the big Lundin isnae talkin tae them so we cannae get any
Soon be able tae gae yer armpits a wipe wae the chlorine aff thae American chickens though so every cloud eh
Does the Western Link Bootstrap come with a big switch?
I kinda hope it’s one of those Victorian type circuit breakers you see covered in cobwebs in Frankenstein movies, where the mad Professor throws the switch when the thunderstorm is at its highest… Moooohahahahaaaa!
Then again, maybe a great big National dimmer switch might be a lot more fun… Aye, see, it’s just a wee bit too windy today… We’ll just turn down the volume to err… 3 …I think. With all this wind fair whistling by, any more would just heat up your wires down there and cause a panic… We couldnae be havin’ that…
It’s the abundance of Scottish energy resources putting the wind up The daily Wail , again !
Rev Stu says
That makes the presumption that the Mail actually is “Scottish media” . 🙂
‘Scottish’ can clearly be used in some odd and diverse ways. Scottish media here is the same context as Scottish Labour. Both are active in Scotland, but do so on behalf of the London Establishment. Both stretching the meaning of Scottish to the limits.
A more pertinent question might be …. Where would we be if we had a genuine Scottish media?
The MSM just doing the regimes work.
Sadly the less well informed Scots will believe some of it.
Scotland possesses an embarrassing surplus of wealth.
Lucky we are not independent we wouldn’t know what to do with all that money.
The Scottish MSM is riddled with useful eejits and would-be useful eejits. I’ll desist here from mentioning the useful eejits who populate our universities, public bodies and civil service etc.
Always worth highlighting the National Grid tariffs on power generating companies. If you are based in the South of England you get PAID to connect to the grid. As you travel North it becomes a charge to connect to the grid. Guess which part of the grid has the highest charges – Scotland.
Another system designed to hamper our progress and to make stations like Longannet close earlier.
Greens please don’t give me another rant about fossil fuels. If Carbon capture and fair tariffs had been actioned then a lot of people would have kept their jobs AND we would have had greater flexibility in power generation without damage to the environment.
Genuine question – who pays out the £5m per day to the wind turbine operators? Is it SG, UKG, National Grid? (maybe it should be the Lottery!)
“We’re doomed”!
There no hope for Scotland until we dissolve this so called Union.
https://mobile.twitter.com/OFalafel/status/1056849295247400961
Fake news and cold porridge, such is the diet of commentary that Scotland’s democracy is expected to survive on. I’d much rather Scotland’s residents were encouraged to thrive, rather than being discouraged to engage with the world directly. British nationalism leaves no space for a Scottish identity and undermines the potential for inclusive, sustainable, development of Scotland’s national interests (see Brexit).
Emotion shapes the diffusion of moralized content in social networks
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5514704/
How to Spot Fake News
Can you tell the difference between fake and real news?
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/socially-relevant/201711/how-spot-fake-news
The Fake News Game
There’s a new game you can play to ‘vaccinate’ yourself against fake news.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/social-dilemmas/201802/the-fake-news-game
@Astonished says: 29 October, 2018 at 11:05 am;
” … Surely we could crowdfund something to sue a newspaper for their dishonest reporting?”
Do not even think about that idea, Astonished!
Apply a little logic.
Fact One – The independence movement is slowly increasing.
Fact two – The dead tree press, the on-line press and the TV licence fee income is plummeting throughout Scotland and far faster here than other parts of the United Kingdom.
That tells us that Scots are less and less believing the SMSM and Broadcasters. Yet those SMSM broadcasters are increasingly strident and increasingly less honest and increasingly more anti-SG/SNP.
Note the UK wide Trade Union, SMSM and Labour Party is now stirring up unrest with strikes and marches in Scotland. All supported heavily by the SMSM. Yet when the facts are properly analysed reveal the faults being protested against are factually caused by the UK Trade Unions and the unionist Labour party before the SNP became the Scottish Government.
I expect, in the near future, to see an increased reaction from the very people being miss-used by Labour and the trade unions as they strikers/protesters realise how they have been duped.
Yes there will be many die-hard unionists, (trade and otherwise), among the strikers/protesters but the majority of union members are not daft – just ignorant of the truth.
When the truth dawns upon them we will have another batch of Indy supporting Trade unionists coming over from the Dark Side.
Remember how Indyref1 was lost but then resulted in the largest swing to SNP membership in SNP history. The unionists are obviously overplaying their hand but are too far down that road to turn back.
I’d bet that instead of easing off with their lies and propaganda they will, as the always have, increase the propaganda and thus make it even more obvious than before what they are trying to do.
In fact that is exactly what we are seeing to be the case over the past few months. When they ramp it up the support for independence increases but when they attempt to calm it down few, if any, new indy supporters return to the unionist fold so the propaganda is again ramped up to even more ridiculous, and ever more obvious. levels.
Wounded feet are becoming ever more a problem in Scottish A&E departments and it isn’t by blisters caused by protest marches.
Note that Richard Leonard keeps bobbing up and down. It’s his way of trying to take the weight of his badly wounded feet when standing up to speak in Holyrood.
Rather confirms we are energy rich. As well as oil rich. As well as gas rich. As well as agriculture rich. Shall I go on?
These things seem rather important to any thriving country, but in Scotland they always somehow end up as a form of hinderence. Amazing.
On the discussion about “Scottish media” I note the Daily Record is giving Iain Blackford a page from next Monday.
Thanks for your response Robert.
I’m just glad you read my posts 🙂
@GrahmB – Its National Grid (via market operator Elexon) that pays out the £5m. They collect that money, ultimately, from consumers across Great Britain.
@Clootie – While its true that generators pay more to connect to the power network in the North compared to the South, it works the opposite way for consumption of power and for connections to the gas network. No great conspiracy, the system is designed to keep the overall costs of the transmission system down.
Yes, it did lead to the (slightly) early closure of Longannet (Scotland’s singe largest polluter when it operated) but that helped clear space on the grid for more renewables. If you think you want to avoid rants about fossil fuels then you probably need one – climate change denial is a form of delusion.
It’s the BritNat antidote to McCrone – it’s quite a contrived feat to keep managing somehow to convince enough people (well, anybody really) that all those environmental riches with which we are continually blessed is instead a vile curse.
It’s the BritNat prime weapon, but also their Achilles heel. If we could once break that evil spell and reveal the plain reality, we would be home free.
(Well apart from some softheads, I suppose, who would feel we were “letting England down”.)
£5 million per day, totalling £100 million per year?
Have we changed our calendar?
With the extra leccy produced, it should be used to pump water up the brae, then when there is no wind, the water is released to run back down the brae, to make hydro leccy, 100% green,
Speaking of Green, at the next SE we need to vote, SNP 1- Green 2,
at the last SE the SNP got just 4 list MSPs for almost a million 2nd votes, with a million 2nd votes the Greens would be the 2nd largest party.
Shall we talk about the cost of Hinckley point nuclear?
Wind is now UKs cheapest energy source per kWh generated…
They now know that Independent Scotland is inevitable.
What a disgusting little bunch of losers they are.
I’m opening a book on which of the Brit Nat Us owned Dead Tree Scrolls is next to downsize and rightsize on its spiral to extinction.
There is no doubt that Dark Money is propping up The Scotsman, and for what it’s worth, I wont be buying any goods services, or New Build homes advertised online in their evil Goebbel’s rags ever again.
I also boycott any food or goods in supermarkets with the Butcher’s apron emblazoned on it.
I see from twitter that the Ranjurs suporters had a ProudscotBut display at Hampbrox yesterday with a mock up of the Saltire and the Blood Soaked English rag side by side.
How this clearly ‘political’ display by the Brit Nats was allowed at a sporting event at a ‘neutral’ (aye, right) venue, beats me.
Perhaps the SFA can explain.
Imagine the furore if an SNP crowd collage appeared across a crowd of independence supporters.
Remember Salmond and the flag at Wimbers when Murray won?
This sad wee coven of hacks who will say anything for money, who don’t give a fuck about Scotland will find little work in Scotland when EngWaland leaves Europe and we return to a self Determining democracy within the EU.
They are the dogs’ foul I scrape from my shoe.
@Astonished.
I am well aware of that. Energy provision has been a particular interest of mine for 40 years.
The most logically sensible approach from a purely engineering aspect would have been to have a central hub in the North sea with cables of approximately similar lengths going to the Peterhead area (proximity to renewables generation), Norway (storage) and the Wash area (entry point closest to England’s main population concentration in the SE).
The problem is, from the Westminster mindset, Scottish electricity production, as with any Scottish resource, belongs to them and they will hold it fast. Allowing a direct connection for Scottish electricity to continental Europe would not only have opened up an alternative market for Scottish electricity but would have further encouraged ideas of Scottish independence.
Hence the intervention on the Peterhead-Norway link which got to the stage of the UK Government threatening Norway with a formal diplomatic incident if they had persisted.
Now that the England Norway link exists the Peterhead-Norway project has been resurrected (NorthConnect). This time Norway is funding and owning the whole shebang (apart form an EU grant of a few million euros). So hopefully this time it will get the political go ahead. It will certainly be a lot harder for Westminster to refuse now, especially since ofgem has also given approval for it.
Norway, because of its unique topography, means that it has a phenomenal amount of pumped storage capacity. It is sometimes called ‘the Battery of Europe’. Scotland has the highest concentration of potential renewable generation in Europe and renewable generation, because of its intermittent nature, requires large amounts of storage to optimise it commercially.
Not connecting the two at the first opportunity is, well it’s bonkers. But alas, not atypically so, where Westminster is concerned, especially if it involves Scotland.
O/T
My goodness Ian Blackford interviewed on BBC news, with no interruptions, in relation to Hammond’s forthcoming budget. Excellent, fairly long, interview with Ian managing to cram in a few facts about how bad the economy is under the Tories, and formerly Labour, plus pointing out how Scottish Councils and the Scottish Government are having to mitigate for the Tories Universal Credit disaster.
The Media trash. Rotten to the core. Daily nonsense. No wonder they are heading for a crash. Dacre gone. Another one gone, another one down. Less and less readers of the rubbish.
If the Tory unionists did not sanction and starve people. Less money would be needed for mental health problems. Worried, tired, hunger people get sick. The UK is the most massively unequal place in the world. The Westminster unionists make it so. Illegal, wars, financial fraud and tax evasion by the UK unionist Gov. Not fit for purpose.
Scotland exporting it and having to pay more to use it. It is colder. Despite being in surplus and nearer the source. Another scandal. The Westminster misuse of Scottish resources. If Scotland was Independent it could sell £9Billion+ a year? It has been recorded.
Westminster wastes £Billions on Hinkley Point and tax free fracking. A total waste of money. Not investing in tidal wave, solar and wind, ie renewables much cheaper and reliable. There is even coal with CCS. Gas. If the Tories did not ruin the industry with high Tory taxes. Oil & Gas sector taxed st 40% since Jan 2016. More before. Fracking Gas is the rest of the UK is tax free. Double standards as usual. The North/South divide. Tax the North to oblivion, destroy fuel and industry and renewable sector. Tax free breaks in the South for polluters and dirty dangerous nuclear. Waste being flown everywhere. Around the world. The ignorant Westminster incompetents destroying the world. To line their and their associates pockets. Rotten to the core.
Oh, but this isn’t the biggest blow to us Nats.
That would be the story being run by Torygraph etc., that William Wallace was ENGLISH!!!! Desperate to claim the Outlaw King as one of their own, or put us into a murderous frenzy (either would be a bonus, obvs) that’s actually the news.
THEN, there’s the proclamation Hammond will announce a special Brexit 50p coin, inscribed:
FRIENDSHIP TO ALL NATIONS
That does not apply to jocks, obvs. Some First Class trolling, you have to.admit.
Scotland could have even exported excess energy to Europe. If it was not for the Westminster unionist incompetents. Trying to ruin the Scotish economy at every turn for their benefit. The usual suspects. An economic drain. A strain on the Scottish economy since 1928 and before.
Thanks SandyW, so presumably Scotland only stumps up its usual population share rather than the misleading headline £100m. No surprise there from the ‘Scottish’ Daily Wail but no doubt it won’t be worth a complaint to IPSO, I don’t intend giving them click-bait to see if they have sneaked in somewhere that it is a UK wide cost.
O/t. The news is full of the news that the budget will contain£30 million from the road fund licence for the repair of English roads, are the Scottish vehicle owners now being forced into subsidising our neighbours once again? As well as supplying cheap electricity, water and oil.
I’ve just tapped into a forgotten source of knowledge, moral psychology. I hope David Torrance is reading. 🙂
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08900523.2001.9679608
https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/ethics-media-propaganda
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/3c71/68913dd3d5b7e505f6cd089cdd377623a521.pdf
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08900523.2001.9679608
@Dr Jim.
Couldn’t find Iain Gray saying it, but a Ukip candidate said it…to much hilarity.
No link to rag…but here is the relevent part
……
A Ukip parliamentary candidate made a public gaffe this week by asking a room full of business leaders “what happens when renewable energy runs out?”
Councillor Victoria Ayling, who is vying to become MP for Great Grimsby, made the query during a Question-Time style debate on Monday, and it was reportedly met with “guffaws” from attendees.
……..
Hi Chick McGregor at 12:23 pm
You typed,
“The most logically sensible approach from a purely engineering aspect would have been to have a central hub in the North sea with cables of approximately similar lengths going to the Peterhead area (proximity to renewables generation), Norway (storage) and the Wash area (entry point closest to England’s main population concentration in the SE).”
This quote is from the article linked to after it.
“They are convinced that this result will help pave the way for the development of new energy storage systems that could be used in electric cars, for the storage of renewable energy, and to develop electric-to-gas energy systems for when a fuel is required.
Professor Cronin said: “For future renewables to be effective high capacity and flexible energy storage systems are needed to smooth out the peaks and troughs in supply.
[snip]
This research is funded by the University of Glasgow complex chemistry initiative as well as the European Research Council and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.”
http://archive.is/I6YPc
Chick McGregor says:
The way things are developing in England, three cables from Peterhead, Norway, and the NE German coast might be a more economically sound setup.
Will Dark Ages II England, devoid of industry, need so much electricity?!
Thatcher wanted to take the Oil pipe line down to Newcastle instead of having the terminal at Peterhead. To claim the Oil. It got as far as near Grangemouth outside Edinburgh.
The Oil companies without Westminster high tax regime interference. They back to extracting the Oil to giant barges. Movable platforms, transferable because it is cheaper way of extracting and collecting. There will be less need for pipeline construction and maintenance. The rigs are being deconstructed. Decommissioned. Tax free. Another boast for Scottish economy if they can land the contracts without Westminster unionist interference.
The Oil companies are now using these massive barges worldwide. It is cheaper. It is going back to the way the Oil was originally collected in tankers. Merchant Nsvy tankers transported Oil worldwide. People from Scotland worked in the Merchant Navy. Seamen went all over the world. Like the Oil workers do now. Contracts all over the world. Additional to the NE. Bringing revenues into Scotland.
Gas is still landed at Peterhead. There was supposed to be a CCS plant but the Tories regneged. The companies are still trying to find a way to find the investment without UK Gov support which was withheld. It is possible their might have been EU funds forcoming. Without Brexit?
Alex Montrose Is that a real name?
Anyway, good luck with trying to sell the list vote to Greens again!
*Sleekit Greens sending out forward parties*:D 😀 😀
Vote SNP/SNP to get the majority. Do not vote second vote Green. That’s what happened the last time. It lost the SNP the majority. The Greens got more the SNP got less. Do not do it again. Then they try to discredit the SNP with their nonsense.
@ken500
Extracting the oil in that way can only be done if you flare the gas ( once done but no longer acceptable).
A number of FPSOs still collect the oil and transfer to shuttle tankers periodically. The still need a gas pipeline or gas reinvention into the reservoir.
For every formation barrel you produce yo will have flash off at the separator. High to low pressure from formation to surface conditions.
Above – gas reinjection spell checker!
@GrahamB says: 29 October, 2018 at 11:52 am:
” … Genuine question – who pays out the £5m per day to the wind turbine operators? Is it SG, UKG, National Grid?”
None of the above, Graham, it is the consumer – of course.
However, let’s knock another daft media myth on the head. The main reason that wind turbines and other renewable energy generators get paid to NOT generate is National Grid Load Balancing.
Now imagine an evening when one TV channel is broadcasting an England vs France football international and the other is broadcasting a couple of popular films either side on a popular soap opera and the football half-time coincides with the end of the first popular movie.
Almost every English household will watch the end of the film or the end of the first half international and will start to cook supper or at least make tea.
The load on the Grid will immediately shoot up and the power input has to be increased suddenly to cope with demand.
However, nuclear power stations do not turn of quickly nor do they restart quickly and neither do fossil fuel generators.
However, most renewable generators do and they turn on to balance the load. Only to required to by turned off again when the surge in the load goes down and folks settle back to watch TV.
So that the generating companies, (privatised), will provide their renewables the private companies are paid a reduced sum per unit to switch off when not needed. Also note this is the reason why the red/yellow/blue tory government favour gas, oil and nuclear power stations – as they go almost full blast all the time and they provide more profits for tory party backing rich folks.
But wait! There’s more. The renewable stuff is mainly situated on areas where the same rich tory backers have their big country estates and they invest in the renewables on those estates.
Not only do they get a return on their shares in the renewables companies but get paid for the use of their land – and who pays for those renewables when they switch off to balance the load?
The customer of course. So the story isn’t that there are too many renewables getting paid for doing nothing they are getting paid for balancing the load on the National Grid.
And there’s even more. Scotland has such changeable and varied renewables that Scotland has indeed often provide more than enough power that absolutely no nuclear or fossil fuelled power was required to power Scotland but has exported power while doing so.
This while Westminster acts against Scotland by the National Grid Connection Charges that pay generators in and around London for what they add to the grid but then charge a greater sum for each unit added depending upon the further distance from London.
A direct opposite of tory, “Free market economy”, that states an owner of a scarce commodity has the right to charge as high a fee for their product as the market will pay. Yet subsidies London area generators and handicaps those most in the north of Scotland.
But they don’t want you to know that.
Ah, metapsychology. I wonder what I’ll remember next? 🙂
http://metapsychology.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=book&id=7514
Propaganda and the Ethics of Persuasion – Second Edition
https://broadviewpress.com/product/propaganda-and-the-ethics-of-persuasion-second-edition/?ph=9aca224f1207703b2563bc35
Social Psychology: An Analysis of Social Behavior
Chapter 27: Propoganda: Positive Control of Public Opinion
https://brocku.ca/MeadProject/Young/1930/1930_27.html
The UK is already importing Gas from Norway at great cost putting up the price of energy. £Billion contracts. While taxing the Oil sector in Scotland at 40% reducing production. The Westminster unionists are complete useless incompetents, Taxing the Scottish sector to oblivion, Then importing Norwegian Gas at completely higher cost. Complete and utter,ridiculous. Ruining the UK economy. Paying more for what could be produced for profit here. Unbelievable.
@Astonished says: 29 October, 2018 at 12:00 pm:
” … Thanks for your response Robert.
I’m just glad you read my posts.”
Oh! I usually, (with very rare exceptions), read everyone’s posts. I even try to debate with as many as I can. Only to be accused of being a bully for disagreeing with some other people.
Thing is I don’t want them to go away but some do seem to want me to go away. I want them to debate and prove their views with evidence and/or logic. That way we all learn something.
The point being that if we all were to agree with each other Wings would die off very quickly. It is the debate and different views that gets Wings noticed and read. I don’t mind being disagreed with for that is how we learn to look at other people’s points of view and perhaps change our own.
Surley the best form of green energy would be tide power no need for sun or wind no one could claim the tide did not come in or out today no waste to get rid off or pollution and no one could complain that it spoils their view a win win solution ???
Alex Montrose says:
29 October, 2018 at 12:18 pm
With the extra leccy produced, it should be used to pump water up the brae, then when there is no wind, the water is released to run back down the brae, to make hydro leccy, 100% green,
Last week the Dutch announced plans to build Europe’s biggest hydrogen electrolysis plant it’s capacity will be 100000 megawatts, 5 times bigger than any current hydrogen project sin the EU.
Over the next 2 years a feasibility study covering technical issues, investment and finance. The final decision will be taken in 2021. The with new hydrogen plant completed and production up and running by 2023-2024.
Yet another way to utilize Scotland’s extra electricity production and another product to add to Scotland’s growing inventory list.
@Brian Doonthetoon
It is probably two or three years back where I pointed out on here that the nacient EV revolution will itself generate a huge new electricity storage potential.
If Scotland’s 2 million ICE cars all became EV’s then the potential storage would exceed our current pumped storage capacity and at zero capital cost.
The new Leaf we are getting in January already has the potential to feed stored electricity back into the grid, so it is not a point Nissan has been slow to recognise either.
Furthermore, I pointed out that it is possible that batteries which have fallen below the 75% capacity limit might be used for local domestic storage (for off grid solar cell or wind generation or for on grid surplus generation storage or just for power cut insurance). Even at 75% those batteries could supply the average domestic electricity requirement for several days.
For Scotland to become 100% EV we would need to generate approx 25-30% more electricity than we need for other purposes, which luckily, we do.
England, well it has been a net importer of electricity for decades. They will plug their electricity generation black hole but with off-shore wind generation and Hinkley Point (if it ever gets made) will be the highest generation cost electricity facilities in the World, which we will all have to pool and share if we are still in the UK. Little Englander NIMBYISM comes at a high cost.
The media must be stopped
They’re not content with manipulating the masses anymore they want total control without the responsibility of the consequences of that control
Take SKY news attempt to fool the masses into voting on line for weeks on end by telling them every twenty minutes they must have control of political debates on TV to make politicians more accountable, then they say it won’t be controlled by the media, well if it won’t why the urgency by the media to have it
So far after weeks of badgering the public Sky news are so far only able to get 54,000 signatures to this although I’m quite sure they’ll leave this vote open till the end of time to achieve the 100.000 they require to push this into the HOC then SKY news will demand that politicians pass this because the people have demanded it when no people demanded any such thing, Sky news did so they could tell you it was in your interests because of the demand they themselves created
The media is directly responsible for much of the unrest in these *British* Isles by their deliberate misinformation lying and ommissions of the facts of the news they pretend to report
Now whether you believe they work for the government of the day or not what you know is it’s the media that create the divisions in society then blame everybody else for it by saying it exists and they only report it, but that’s not true when you take into account the amount of times they are forced to retract *mistakes* or *innaccuracies* at the back end of newspapers months later where no one will ever see them or the late night apology from a TV broadcaster who did wrong which amounts to a twenty second piece or indeed very often a message on the text service by the BBC that lasts a couple of hours and is then removed and nobody read it anyway because the point is for the media *get the message out at all costs* job done
Many British nationalists or Unionists might not be those people if the news services told the truth as it is and not how they want it to appear
The British Isles is descending and declining into a dangerous state and most of it is being caused by the media in order to give itself the platform it desires, forget about politicians we can vote them out but we can’t vote out the media who put them there and control them once they are there
That’s why I believe the media must be stopped
Good grief if we ran our own country Nicola would be booting the arse of the chief executives of both companies.
I think each of them should pay the switch of costs out of their bonuses.
Scotland is being held back by the Britnat state, and that is putting it very, very lightly. It’s deliberate. They will not allow Scotland to keep their own resources for one single minute, to take the revenues due to Scotland.
Scotland is at the mercy of a British Nationalist state, devolution is feather light, the Scottish government, ie the SNP, can only tinker around the edges, to stem the destruction of such a beautiful country that Scotland is, a prosperous Scotland is definitely not on their bucket list, oh no.
Scotland is being robbed in broad daylight, the Britnats have started taking over already by ramping up major discontent among public sector workers, when the Scottish gov’s hands are tied, when they cannot really do much more to mitigate the terrible UK Britnats’ ‘austerity’. A massive Britnat daylight robbery going on right under the peoples’ noses.
Classic tactic, divide and rule, instill faux discontent where it could be resolved with talks. So, do not allow any kind of reasoned negotiation with the democratically elected government to avoid strikes etc. Job done.
The Britnats, keeping Scotland poor for decades if not in fact centuries, while siphoning away your hugely abundant and ever growing resources. The Britnat state throw crumbs back, be grateful Jocks, ha ha ha ha ha!
If people don’t wake up and see the plotting and ploys being used by the Britnat state to keep Scotland shackled and a ‘part’ of this disgusting UK, then expect ruin. There will be no public sector to strike for if people blindly follow the Britnat narrative. How terrifying.
Re;Breeks@11.38am
It’s more likely that big switch will be operated and flicked off against Scotland, like it was in 2014. Then there was two major power cuts, in Scotland, with absolutely no explanation as to why. I read that unless aliens did attack, it just could not be explained. Funny that.
Dr Jim 11.27 .Ah’ve chist made ah big pot of Chinese chicken curry ( Scottish chicken ) an ah didnae hiv tae go tae China tae get the ingredients Aldi other that the curry paste ( Young’s concentrated ) , same place ah git ma deodorant much cheapness . lol.
@James Barr Gardner
Thanks for the info re the Dutch Hydrogen plant. I’d love for similar to be done in Scotland. Hydrogen could become a very important commodity and vastly superior to oil and gas as a fuel in many respects.
Alex Montrose 12.18 Where hiv you been Hydro Power stations hiv been doing just that since they came online Pumping watter up hills . cheeseoh
Ken500 says:
29 October, 2018 at 12:42 pm
Thatcher wanted to take the Oil pipe line down to Newcastle instead of having the terminal at Peterhead. To claim the Oil. It got as far as near Grangemouth outside Edinburgh.
There is a 58 mile pipeline from Grangemouth Refinery to Finnart Ocean Terminal which has extensive oil storage tanks have been built into the hillside, on the eastern shore of Loch Long, Firth of Clyde. It was built in 1954 to transport crude oil to the refinery, a second pipeline was built to convey refined fuel from Grangemouth to Finnart for export just before completion of the world’s first nuclear submarine USS Nautilus.
Ineos own the terminal and the pipelines. I though it strange at the time when the american fracked oil tanker docked at Grangemouth when Finnart is a deep water berth for oil tankers up to 324,000 tonnes, perhaps yet another casualty of Faslane ?
Thepnr says:
29 October, 2018 at 1:36 info re the Dutch Hydrogen plant. I’d love for similar to be done in Scotland.
French company Alstom will convert a fleet of Class 321 electric trains in England by fitting hydrogen tanks and fuel cells to power them. The fuel cell on the trains will produce electricity through a combination of hydrogen and oxygen to create water.
Alstom will carry out the work at its site in Widnes, Cheshire and will also partner on the project Eversholt Rail.
James Barr Gardner @ 1.11pm
A Hydrogen Office opened in the Energy Park in Fife in 2011. It was a Research and Development facility in the first instance using wind power from a wind turbine to hydrolise water. The resultant hydrogen was then stored to be used to generate electricity when the wind was not blowing.
I don’t know how far it has been taken since then but it was still operational 3 years ago. I think there is now a similar scheme in Shetland.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-12215386
Neither scheme is on the scale you have mentioned but clearly even small scale such as these ones have potential
@ Valerie – I think you meant to say that Robert Bruce was English? The media are jumping on a story by Fiona Watson, historian, pointing out that the Bruce family was Norman French (therefore exactly NOT English).
Robert the Bruce would have been Robert de Brus (pronounced in Monty Python French accent), Brus being an area in northern France, or possibly now Belgium. So he might have been Belgian.
Desperate attempts to detract from the film which is out on Netflix next week.
@James Barr Gardner @Legerwood
Wings is a fantastic place for information that rarely would ever be mentioned elsewhere. Much appreciated.
In supermarket today noticed the giant headlines of Daily Express
SNP ROBS DOCTORS OF £600 MILLION.
A Tory Press release. So a GE definitely on the cards soon.
Regarding hydrogen:
“Hydrogen and fuel cells are not new technology to Scotland, back in 2005 it was host to the world’s first community owned renewable hydrogen production plant demonstration project (the PURE project), on the island of Unst. … The project was owned and run by the local community with the turbines providing power and heat to a neighbouring business estate and the fuel cell providing backup power. Excess electricity was used to produce hydrogen which fed the fuel cell and a fuel cell vehicle.”
Source: http://www.fuelcelltoday.com/analysis/analyst-views/2013/13-10-23-fuel-cells-and-hydrogen-in-scotland
What this, an achievement in Scotland of international significance? Really?
And then there’s this. Yes its another world first apparently. From June this year: “Port Glasgow-based Ferguson Marine Engineering Limited has successfully led a European consortium in a bid for EU funding support to pave the way for the building and launch of the world’s first sea-going car and passenger ferry fuelled by hydrogen. The supported development is expected to cost around €12.6 million.”
Source: https://news.st-andrews.ac.uk/archive/ferguson-marine-to-develop-renewables-powered-hydrogen-ferry-hyseas-iii/
How much worse can things get for this benighted country of ours?
If we had a bit more of this:
http://www.surfnturf.org.uk/page/introduction
Then throttling back the wind turbines would be less necessary. But don’t tell Englandshire how energy rich Scotland is or Englandshire might make life difficult and the media may tell lies. Oh!
Benighted indeed. The moral psychology of Britain is certainly not what it could be and Scotland’s shows signs of duress. Parliamentary sovereignty acts in opposition to the principle of universal human rights. British nationalism is not inclusive, sustainable, or progressive (see Brexit, history and stuff). Britain offers very little equity or hope to Scotland and her people.
Social Dominance Theory: Explorations in the Psychology
of Oppression
https://static1.squarespace.com/static/52522308e4b0bcf2bc4dab45/t/58c81a89a5790ada8f011561/1489509003452/Sidanius+et+al+2016-+Explorations+in+the+Psychology+of+Oppression.pdf
VIRTUE, OPPRESSION, AND RESISTANCE STRUGGLES
https://epublications.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1562&context=dissertations_mu
Remember 2014
We should have that year enshrined in the history books as one of the most vile betrayals and crimes perpetrated on the people of Scotland that has ever taken place
Every Tory Labour and Liberal Democrat involved should be named and shamed for all time not to mention the media who made it all possible
Just look at the stuff we’re all talking about every day and all of it forced upon Scotland based on LIES and a profit seeking Government we didn’t vote for in a country we don’t live in
The English dependency on Scotland maintaining a moderate attitude has worn so thin you could spit peas through it
@Dr Jim
Yes, who can forget 2014. In the past they used to give the natives baubles as they stole their resources, the Scots only received the promise of baubles which never materialised. Although some Scots did receive an ermine reward for their troubles, and look resplendent in their gowns. They are a good reminder of those who sold out Scotland for personal reward.
A list of Scottish unionist MP’s from 2014 that delivered isolation from the EU and the likelihood of Scottish businesses being severely damaged or destroyed in the near future should be available to everyone in Scotland.
‘re The Bruce,
Robert, the King, father was also Robert Bruce as was his Grandfather, also known as the competitor. There were lots of bastard Robert Bruce’s running about Scotland, I’ve no doubt that England had its share.
Bruce’s mother was the Celtic Countess( in her own right ) of Carrick. At worst the Bruce was at the very least 50% Celtic. Thomas Randolph (his nephew ) his mother’s sisters son was was the epitome of Celtic nobility. Now I find it difficult to believe that this book came out just in time to coincide with the release of Outlaw King as just pure coincidence.
Capella @ 2:21 pm.
You don’t need me to tell you what you already know about the Bruce not being an Essex Lad, nor that this is classic yoon misdirection from the forthcoming film – or indeed the growing YES Movement.
What I would just add is that the self-published [sic] Fiona Watson has also a book to plug and sell with her latest theory.
Would I be a little cynical in further suggesting that being self-published is an indication that no-one in academia agrees with her theories?
Yours,
When you get down to the guts of British politics, it’s really all about who’s moral psychology gets privileged. That’s no way to run a healthy nation, let alone a yoonyawn of nations. Parliamentary sovereignty provides inadequate, culturally prejudiced, ethical checks and balances, IMHO.
http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199794140.001.0001/acprof-9780199794140
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14767430.2018.1472409
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/264443222_The_psychology_of_forgiveness
Just catching up on this Robert the Bruce thingy. Heh. Strikes me they’ve simply made our point for us.
It’s not where you come from that matters. It’s where you choose to be. What you do while you’re there and the legacy you leave behind that counts.
Worth a thought.
So? Wherever would we be without those and the likes of Alexander Burnett trying yet again for “Fog-brain of The Month” award. Lucky the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party Member for Aberdeenshire West is on-hand when needed.
No sniggering at the back! The boy needs encouraging!
Energy is always the foundation of wealth which is why countries will kill for it. It’s why mrs May will kiss the feet of the Saudis.
@ Welsh Sion – there is no doubt that Fiona Watson is an academic historian who studied Medieval History at the University of St Andrews, has a PhD in Scottish History from Glasgow University, was Senior Lecturer in History and Director for the Centre of Environmental History at the University of Stirling, and has written many books on Scottish history such as “Macbeth”, which I have read.
Nevertheless, publishing a book in August 2018 called “Traitor, Outlaw, King” is fortuitous indeed. How many of us would have copious notes ready to cut and paste into a topical title. Lucky Fiona.
I have no idea what her politics is.
But the MSM is quite capable of spinning the most learned, driest text into an SNPBad and Scotlandzrubbish narrative. 🙂
Hammond on Mental health there will be more mental heath Ambulances whit the F is that a padded white van wie restraints .
@ Welsh Sion – if you go to Amazon and “”Look inside” Fiona Watson’s book on the Outlaw King, and go to the notes, you will find in note 61, page 210, the argument for the claim that Robert the Bruce was born in Writtle, Essex.
She says that the chronicler who claims Bruce was born in Essex knew nothing about Scottish succession and wrote “utter drivel” about it. She then says he actually used the work of another chronicler for this period. But that one doesn’t say anything about Bruce’s nationality.
She adds that Geoffrey Barrow says this Writtle birth refers to his father Robert (almost all of them for 7 generations were called Robert Bruce.)
So it is most likely rubbish.
Nevertheless, it is a well referenced book. I am tempted to buy it!
Also, what does it matter where Bruce was born. As Macart says upthread, it all rather makes our point.
Boycott all britnat media. Leave it to a real journalist like the Rev to expose britnat lowlife.
So austerity is over because of some additional spending in this particular budget. What about the root causes of Britain’s dysfunctional economy and unequal society? There will be no significant social gain unless neo-liberalism is replaced with something a bit more rational than free-market irrationality, as go-to arbiter of social morality. Trickle-down economics is 18th century pseudo-scientific quackery dressed up in 20th century language and procedural-ism, simples.
http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/79796/7/The%20Age%20of%20Austerity-contesting%20ethical%20basis%20and%20financial%20sustainability%20of%20WR%20in%20EU.pdf
Austerity psychology
https://thepsychologist.bps.org.uk/volume-26/edition-9/austerity-psychology
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2424697
ok, Capella, I leave that to your discretion.
But once you’re on Amazon, you could do no less than buy my pro-independence book, too! 😀
I note that my comment at 12.22 awaits moderation. Fame at last!
So the budget pretty much so far
The British legion are getting an upgrade for their buildings and more will be spent on celebrating, sorry I mean commemorating wars and some *Britishy* things oh and potholes are front and centre of all our concerns so some cash for that, eh and some more *Britishy* things, other than that it’s pretty much standstill measures for a standstill country
Oh nearly forgot, more war stuff money, so let’s all wave our *Britishy* flags and be grateful for the next 5 months till Brexit day when by his own admission everything the chancellor just said he might unsay
and that’ll be a shock to us all I’m sure
God, nearly dozed off there, it’s the excitement that does it
@ Welsh Sion – What’s it called?
Anither wee snippet fae hammond ( business rates ) Public toilets will be relieved of rates , thats because councils have shut Public toilets , he’s taking the piss is he not .
Budget – In my view election on the cards.
Personal allowance up and 50k higher band both a year early. That will keep the Tory faithful on side in the key seats.
After that Budget, we are on an election footing.
They will never admit it, but – we are.
Let’s hope the SNP has started planning.
Capella @ 5:04pm.
“Parables for the New Politics”
nascent not nacient. Seemed alright when I typed it but didn’t look right when I read it there just now.
Postmodernism, post-structuralism, constructavism and the concept of intersectionality, do all have a practical purpose. They help us remove “positivist” assumptions and logic from the study of social space, so help us to better understand and plan for social needs. This is all replaced by the market imperative, under a paradigm of neo-liberal government (see Westminster).
N.B. Never trust a neo-liberal to look out for social needs, their morality is cognitively and ideological bound. Subsequently, they are more than a little lacking in human empathy and spirit.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-018-0091-y
Ha! Ha! Radio shortbread presenter helping on Derek Mc on how to spend the consequentials…nay!…she’s demanding how he spends it.
🙂 Good old auntie with a kilt!
“Where would we be without the Scottish media, eh readers?”
Where would we be without one man and his ten year old computer?
Keep it up.
Good to see the Tories tee-ing up the EU to take the blame for continued austerity in the event that the Little Englanders get their long sought after no-deal Brexit.
They must think we button up the back of our heads.
F’wits, the lot of ’em!
Macart says:
Yes. And to which nation and society your primary allegiance lies.
Quite possibly Robert I was taking advantage of the opportunity to gain power and wealth. However, it wasn’t easy! Consider what happened to his kinfolk. Brother hung, drawn and quartered. Daughters held on public display suspended in cages for years!
Consider also those who stood beside him on battlefields against the odds. It seems doubtful they did this simply for the outside possibility of reward!
Given the task they all faced, and the tribulations of getting there, they were motivated by much more. The Declaration of Arbroath makes that clear.
So, no matter where Robert I was born (personally I believe Ayrshire) he was a Scot. Many born in Scotland can’t say that.
Commemorate Brexit … like f’ck.
What I would like to see is a campaign to fly all public flags in Scotland at half mast on Brexit day!
We didn’t ask for it, we don’t want it, and it will cause untold damage.
Unless, of course, it becomes the catalyst to dissolve this so called Union.
How many nuclear power stations are we paying for with no electricity being generated but the waste still needing to be cared and paid for?
O/T In the news
A report of a group of people dressed as Ku Klux Klan (KKK) members in Newtownards, County Down, is being treated by police as a hate crime.
A hate crime, glad the Police are taking it seriously but thats in Northern Ireland, is there not another bunch of haters who dress strangely and are protected by the Police over thar?
Anyway the good news from Westminster is following the chancellor’s excellent budget austerity is now over.
On the back of that good news I’m off to replace the bathroom and I’m getting a new car and possibly a holiday next year.
I have to wait till the huge pay rise comes through could take a month or two to be fair. Would be nice to hear from everyone on here what your spending plans are now that austerity is over.
Tilda Swinton ….“I don’t quite believe the word British. I feel like it’s sort of a strictly-for-export term. I don’t really know what it means. I think it has something to do with a sort of political attitude.”
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17186960.oscar-winning-star-says-scotland-is-a-naturally-independent-country/
Indeed. Other than the obvious ‘pertaining to the island of Britain’, I must confess to having great difficulty understanding it myself.
My best guess is ‘British’, in a political sense, means adherent to the Greater England Project. Why claim to be ‘British’? If you are English, then it means you covet your neighbours’ lands. If you are NI it means you are a lost soul on someone else’s turf. And if you are Scottish it means you want to sell out your fellow Scots.
@ Welsh Sion – OK bought the Kindle edition even after reading Scottie and John Bull – hope we’ll need a revised edition soon!
Jason Smoothpiece @ 17:47,
O/T You may then be deliriously happy, Jason, to learn that the Chancellor has ‘fessed-up (by implication if not in actual words) that PFI is a complete bust.
Imagine that, a Tory finally admitting that “socialist” predecessor El Gordo’s must-have policy (besides robbing people’s pensions) is – as it always has been – best avoided like the plague…
I think the reality of things is quickly become apparent to those living in Scotland, who aren’t plugged-in to the BBC in Scotland’s world view.
http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199272754.001.0001/acprof-9780199272754
http://www.appliedmetapsychology.org/about-applied-metapsychology/what-is-applied-metapsychology/
http://selfdeterminationtheory.org/
SKy News are only plugging Leaders debates because they want to have them in an effort to put up ratings. To try and make them money. They can plug adverts of a higher volume and charge more, it is just a con to make them money.
Another company has brought Sky News. The Murdoch can’t be so involved any more. Too much interest in the Press/MSM. They had to give up rights in Sky News. The Murdoch have sold out in the States? to Disney for £Billions. The sons might still be in a position within the take over. The daughter is involved (separately?) commissioning programmes from Sky TV. She might get another post within the organisation. Or have to work separately in another cojpany. Still commissioning programnes, drama’s etc.
They will be loaded in any case. Their mother is Scottish from Glasgow. Anne. British passports? Murdoch is a US citizen for US business interest. Although they might have met in Australia. She could have emigrated. Divorced. Chinese wife Then Jerry Hall. US citizen?
The Oil pipeline from Peterhead must go to Grangemouth. (70’s) The other terminal was build before.
Thatcher was doing all the dealings in secret. No one knew what was going on. The Oil companies were involved. BP etc. They were picking up the cost. The UK Gov never invested anything. While Thstcher toook the equivalent of £Billions in secret. Kept it off the books. Getting the equivalent of £10Billion+ a year For over thirty+ years till 2000 the funds poured in.
There even more Oil revenues after but people could find out more information. Scottish sccounts began to be published. Still not in full but people could work it out. The Westminster Gov always claimed it could not publish separate accounts. A click away?
Thatcher claimed Scotland was subsidised. She came to the Church of Scotland Assembly. The sermon on the Mound. Claimed ‘ ‘We the English people are generous to you Scots’. She was an absolute and utter liar. She cut the Block grant and kept it secret. She wrote on official papers. ‘This must be kept secret’.
Lang and Forsyth were her henchmen. (Lords) One of her ministers at the Scottish Office resigned. Lang formulated the Barnett Formula so they could take the Oil revenues and fund London S/E. ‘Loads of money’ bankers. They built Canary Wharf and Tilbury Docks. 26Miles. Closing many Docks all around Britain.
Thatcher had over 3Million unemployed on a lower population? Unemployment in NI was 20%. The ‘Troubles’. In Scotland it was 15%. The only place it was under 10% was London S/E. Inflstion was up to 25% and interest rates went to 17%. People forget or do not know the violence of the 80’s. It was a very violent period.
The Westminster unionists are sanction and starving people. Austerity was totally wrong. It cost more. The Tax revenues have gone up. They was absolutely no need to cutEducation/NHS/Welfare. It just cost more. Austerity was a total waste of time and money. Maintaining the services would have cost less.
Now Brexit. A total and utter shambles. The Westminster unionists just want to cause trouble. They would cause trouble in an empty room. EU matters took Thatcher down. The EU carry on will take May down.
First time I have actually listened to the budget ( ah the joys of retirement).
Listening to Funky Phil painting the rose tinted picture of Bwitania, my wife said wouldn’t it be great if the SNP politicians started humming the Dam Busters theme to go along with Phil’s kind words.
Snap Election “Defo”. bribe after bribe, but will the gullible buy into Phil’s sweetie jar.
Jam I hear you say!!
Chocks away.
Tick Tock.
@Alex Montrose
There are plans for more pumped hydro, I guess the problem is that it uses beauty spots popular with tourists at times, and some local disturbance. But there are new plans in hand:
http://www.hi-energy.org.uk/renewables/hydro-energy.htm
The other thing is a move to hydrogen storage and use, which is rapidly becoming economically viable, and can be put anywhere basically, perhaps brownland sites.
http://www.all-energy.co.uk/__novadocuments/30431?v=635060505159530000
We were in Aberdeen for over a week, the buses are very impressive.
stewartb says:
29 October, 2018 at 2:35 pm
Regarding hydrogen
Thanks for the info, I did not know about Unst Hydrogen, interesting but I forgot about the hydrogen fuel-cell powered ferry project at Fergusons – put it down to auld age.
Mmm, a better paper, with its own links, here:
http://www.h2aberdeen.com/home/H2-Aberdeen-hydrogen-bus.aspx
Welsh Sion @ 3.37 pm and Capella.
Fiona Watson and Robert the Bruce.
Fiona Watson was a Research Fellow at the University of Dundee from 2006-13 then she went to New Zealand but is now back in Scotland and self-employed.
The brouha about Robert the Bruce, Essex boy, and her new book would not be the first time that she, and her work, has been misrepresented in the media.
See this from Wings about remarks she did not make about Braveheart:
https://wingsoverscotland.com/we-paid-for-this/
She has had a fairly solid academic career and fronted a BBC series about Scotland in 2001 if I have remembered correctly. I remember it and enjoyed her style of presentation.
Capella, I take my hat off to you for finishing Macbeth. I was given it as a present but never finished it.
There’s also the Fife project which I never see mentioned apart from by me, been running for years:
https://www.brightgreenhydrogen.org.uk/levenmouth-community-energy-project/
I don’t think Scotland is behind, I think we have a few claims to be ahead. Even with the UK Gov’s betrayal of CCS in Scotland and its £1 billion withdrawn prize because it was likely to be won in Scotland.
Robert J. Sutherland @ 18.04
Yes Robert I heard the honourable Chancellor get into Gordon Brown’s PFI scandal.
In fairness to Gordon Brown he was making serious errors but was he not quite mad?
The ‘Consequentials?’ What these dumb broadcasters forget. It is still only Scottish money coming back (tax revenues) with £Billions lobbed off for the Westminster unionists to misappropriate and spend not in Scotland’s interest or how they want it spent. A great big con. These ‘reporters’ can’t do a bit of research on the internet. They are too lazy, ignorant or misguided, Labour placepeople. What a farce.
Scotland has to pay £Billions on loan repayments of money borrowed but not spent in Scotland. £4Billion.. Loses £3Billion on tax evasion. HMRC not fit for purpose. Tax Laws not enforced. Scotland can borrow very little. Westminster borrows and spends what it likes in the rest of UK. Scotland pays the debt but does not get the spending, (£10Billion? pro rata). Trident/Defence £1Billion could be saved. Oil tax 40% has lost Scotland revenues. £4Billion? a year. (For ten years £40Billion), It adds up to £20Billion. Scotland gets more investment from EU sources than it does from the Westminster/UK. They just take, take. Illegal wars, tax evasion and financial fraud has cost Scotland and the world. Brexit will be even worse for Scotland.
Austerity is over!!
Well if you listened to and watched STV news bigging up Phil Hammond’s budget you’d have certainly thought so.
However, STV news forgot to mention that years of cuts saw £2 billion pounds removed from the Scottish bloc grant, and that Phil Hammond’s one hundred million increase is virtually negligible in the scheme of things.
Of course it’s easy to promise this and that, when in reality an emergency budget next year will probably wipe out all todays money tree promises, due to a no deal Brexit.
But lets not forget the media in Scotland are pushing the news (inbetween inncessant WWI rememberance )that austerity is over.
@Phil
Alexander Burnett is a son (probably eldest) of the Burnett branch that renamed itself Burnett by deed poll in 196x or something, due to there being no direct male heir to the Lairdship. The Burnetts themselves got their land from the Bruce, and seem to have been Indy supporters way back, with one being very strongly against the Union back in 1707, and refusing to take his place as MP at Westminster afterwards. The MSP apparently lives in the grounds – in a huge very nice castle like place provided I think by NTS. All on the texts at Crathes Castle 🙂
Stuck in the past UK.
Elsewhere in Europe.
https://futurism.com/hydrogen-powered-trains-are-coming-to-germany-in-2021/
This is the dynamic new energy world to which Scotland belongs. Remaining in BritState will stymie that.
Where would we be without the Scottish media, eh readers?
Sane.
@ Legerwood – I have a particular interest in Macbeth, and also Gruoch. They seem to have been very well liked and internationally respected leaders. Certainly they were not as depicted in Shakespeare.
Macbeth was killed by Malcolm II at Lumphanan. After that the kingship seems to have been via primogeniture as was the Norman habit, very different to the Pictish tradition.
BTW Shakespeare may have written Macbeth to please James VI by depicting his ancestor Banquo in a good light and the rival Macbeth as a murderer. Nothing new here!
Sadly, Historic Scotland has little interest in the site of Macbeth’s murder nor his grave on a hillside near Lumphanan.
Also sadly, for me, I didn’t feel Fiona Watson really got to grips with the character of Macbeth.
The Aberdeen Hydro bus project was funded by the council taxpayers monies. £17Million.
First Bus one of the wealthier companies in the world.
The Council does not fund essential services properly. They wanted to put the homeless in prison. Wanted a special by Law created. 100 teschers short and class sizes too high.
Some Tories Landowners politicians get local Gov contacts and overcharges £Millions from the public purse. Despite repeated warnings. Was all the monies paid back? Some Tory Landowners councillors. Refuse to pay Council tax. Some Tory landowner ex Councillors – MSP use the position to solicitor public monies for their private projects, A conflict of interest. Many Tory politicians multimillionaires want the NE out of the EU. A disaster. To accomodate a few other multimillionaire Fishermen.
@Capella 6.54. I always understood that Banquo never existed and the character was invented by Shakey to spice up his new drama.
Can anyone shed any light?
I think Derek McKay should offer all people who wish to register as *British* to pay *British* taxes but on doing so pay the average council tax of England and of course that would exclude them from free prescriptions free university tuition and all the stuff that the rest of Scottish taxpayers contribute to that is particular to Scotland and then let’s just see how many of the nasty miserable British Nationalist breed actually sign up to that
I know it won’t happen, I’m venting
OT For those who haven’t seen the trailer. One bit in particular you will like Robert P.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=154&v=wHpO9AG_dkE
Might be helpful.
https://prezi.com/m/qv7iscbp3qpr/who-was-the-real-banquo/
What to do with that supposedly ‘wasted’ energy….Hydrogen fuel cells.
https://www.railengineer.uk/2016/11/04/and-now-hydrogen-power-alstoms-new-fuel-cell-powered-train/
I’d been to Aberdeen before, but only passing through so it was interesting having a few days (pet-sitting) to see its history. Free Tolbooth though in Aberdeen it was more about the Wardhouse, free Maritime museum, free Tolbooth in Stonehaven.
But having read all the stramash about the Union Terrace Gardesn that was interesting to make my own mind up. Took abut 10 seconds, wife was the same – it’s neglected and they should have snatched the hand off the £50 million donation. Nice to have a green bit in the centre of town all the same.
And then there’s Marischal College just seen from the outside and its quad. A magnificent building, compares with any in Europe or probably elsewhere. And its history and the Earl Marishcals’ history also interesting and largely nationalist I think.
I’ve been to a few of these castles, houses, museums, and what strikes me is the basically nationalist nature of the descriptions of exhibits and history. I guess it’s hard to avoid for some, and embraced with glee by others. But I think if all these texts were gathered together it would make a very different history to the one pumped into the masses by the propaganda outlets, both MSM and written.
Our biggest energy demand by far is for heat and there’s huge potential for that as shown in this episode of “fully charged”. The advantage of having shed loads of coastline, lochs etc..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWgkl7W9xU0
Oh Christ! Fluffy is on BBC Scotland, a budget special programme, waxing lyrical about how wonderful Hammond’s budget is for Scotland.
The man’s a disgrace to Scotland.
If anybody is interested in Mcbeth then I highly recommend Peter Berresford Ellis book on him. peters others books are also worth reading I have about a dozen or so, i used to find it unbelievable that an Englishman has a far better handle on our Culture and Traditions and History than any Scottish Historian I have ever read. Since coming across wings in the run up to the Referendum I now know why.
Capella @ 6.54pm
As I said, I could not finish the book. In part it may have been because I had read Dorothy Dunnet’s book ‘And King Hereafter’ Fiction but well researched and that research woven into the story without labouring the points but that was very much a feature of her books. As a result you learned things without being hit over the head with it.
So when it came to Fiona Watson’s book on Macbeth I was looking forward to finding out more about him in greater depth. Unfortunately could not stick with it. Doubly disappointed because I had enjoyed her TV series.
Shakespeare was a dramatist and wrote for dramatic effect rather than historic accuracy – bit like Plutarch who was his source material for some of his plays I believe, e.g. Anthony and Cleopatra
@Blair Paterson says: 29 October, 2018 at 1:09 pm:
” … Surley the best form of green energy would be tide power no need for sun or wind no one could claim the tide did not come in or out today no waste to get rid off or pollution and no one could complain that it spoils their view a win win solution ???”
No Blair, there isn’t a best form of green energy. What makes Green energy great is the mix of green energy sources. If the wind isn’t blowing then there is pumped storage Hydro that used wind power when demand was low to pump water uphill.
As well as tidal, there is wave motion but the daddy of them all is not tidal but sea currents.
When the North Sea formed it was when the rocky ridge that kept the cold polar waters out of what we now call Doggerland ruptured and what became the North Sea began filled up driving out those who lived there to the higher ground that was to become Britain.
Then the miracle began. The cold water began to warm up and that caused it to begin to rise and a current began to flow.
When the North Sea got large enough to join with what we now call the Atlantic that cold current flowing down from the polar region set off across the Atlantic to get warmed further across the World and when the colder water flows out something must flow in to replace it and that is the Gulf Stream.
So Scotland has a cold water current flowing 24/7/365 round her coast and a warmer Gulf Stream flowing in to replace it 24/7/365.. Tidal flows turn but sea currents don’t and the comparatively small sea current generator already running are massively successful.
But we need a mix that includes generators that can be quickly turned both off and on to balance load demands and the ideal green solution for that is hydro and wind.
However, tidal schemes could well include roads above the barrages to open up travel round our very rugged coastline and could also give an alternative path for power lines that would otherwise be either undersea or by pylon.
Wonder if Fiona Watson would do a book on the English King Edward I expelling all of the Jewish community in 1290 from England and confiscating/stealing all their property and cancelling all debt owed to them,
basically to pay for his wars in France,Wales,Ireland,Scotland,
Edict of Expulsion, https://tinyurl.com/hordgem
or a book on the English King Henry III in 1253 who issued the `Statute of Jewry`,
which had 13 articles,
Article Nine commanded that “every Jew wear his badge conspicuously on his breast”
https://tinyurl.com/y7wb5vt8
maybe she wants a job with the floppy haired one at the National Trust Against Scotland
The Bruce’s came to the fore in the death of the Maid of Norway. There are reports she was to be betrothed to Edward 11. The English/French/Scottish nobles often interchanged through marriage. Kept lands abd wealth together. (Weslthy people still do today. Mix in the same circles).
The nobles often interchange throughout each Court. They had lands in France (Normandy) England and Scotland. The Bruces had land in Northampton, Stirlingshire and Aberdeenshire. The Bruce the father? was one of the contenders to the Scottish Crown. There were three. He even wanted the lands in Scotland divided into three. 1/3 to each applicant. Edward 1 who was brought in to advise appointed Balliol to the Scottish Thone. Then used him as a puppet. Took him to London and held him there for ransom. That often happened. Edward 1 Hammer of the Scots. Died in Alnwick of ill health. On another campaign North.
Edward 1 imposed taxes on Scotland and conscription to fight his wars in Normandy France. Raggymans Roll the document recorded the taxes due. A tithe tax on household/property.Rate payers. A 10th. It used to go to the Church and Alexander 111 as King. The Scots revolted. First William Wallace.rebelled.. Then the younger Bruce lay clainss to the Scottish Crown. It didn’t really matter where he was born. He had a legitimate claim to the Scottish Crown through primogeniture. Ancestry,
Very rarely post links so here goes on Willie Macrae,
https://www.express.co.uk/783944/willie-mcrae-death-threat-letter-ex-cop-friend
Hmmmm https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/783944/willie-mcrae-death-threat–letter-ex-cop-friend
@Ken500
Scots children being held hostage down south was very common in Scottish History, it would make a book or TV series on its own.
@James Barr Gardner says: 29 October, 2018 at 1:11 pm:
” … Last week the Dutch announced plans to build Europe’s biggest hydrogen electrolysis plant it’s capacity will be 100000 megawatts, 5 times bigger than any current hydrogen project sin the EU.”
Yes James and wee Scotland is a leader and has had, “Bright Green Hydrogen”, set-up at Methil Docks for years:-
https://www.brightgreenhydrogen.org.uk/contact/
And guess who it was who officially opened, “The Hydrogen Office”, when he was FM?
https://www.energylivenews.com/tag/alex-salmond-the-hydrogen-office-scotland/
Scotlsnd has benefitted from Hydro since 1950’s. Water power dam schemes. Pitlochry etc,
Frack Gas finished 1960’s. Then Oil,& Gas,
France has had Tidal schemes since 1960’s. Rance Tidal scheme. They have them all over the world.
The Tories just cancelled a Tidal scheme for Swansea. They stopped the funding. £Billion. Would have paid for itself. Wales is underfunded by Westminster. £Billion.
Much as I prefer wind turbines to nuclear power, how many of the windfarms are owned by Scottish companies or Scots?
What percentage of profits goes to Scotland?
EDF is the name that seems to crop up a lot. French.
The owners of the land they are on would probably read like the spreadsheet of Scotland in Union donors.
Thatcher privatised utilities. Now international companies. Cheaper fuel and energy benefits every one. Creates jobs and corporate tax which comes back or should.
@Dr Jim says: 29 October, 2018 at 1:13 pm:
The media must be stopped
They’re not content with manipulating the masses anymore they want total control without the responsibility of the consequences of that control.
I wouldn’t worry over much about stopping the Media Dr Jim. The media is doing a great job of stopping itself. Once great newspapers are going bankrupt already and The BBC is losing licence payers at an ever increasing pace and the radio is getting to be just a host of pop song pushers that mainly all sound the same with newscasts getting harder to find.
They media is lying itself to death.
The 1745 rebellion? Scots in chains. prisons or deported. Lands and homes confiscated. Then the Clearances. Outlander. Black 47.
Does anybody else remember the ‘Dash for Gas’?
The rationale for gas generation of electricity was that it was cleaner than coal, but most importantly it was flexible. It could be turned quickly on or off to meet changed demand.
So we turn off the cheap off the cheaper, clean wind turbines, how does that make sense.
Simple…the gas generators are more expensive to turn off than the wind turbines because they have stronger contract terms. It’s cheaper to leave them running than turn them off.
Cynical? Me ?
Good job,Derek McKay on Politics Scotland at 7.30.
Sorted out Gordon Brewer!
And one more about the budget before getting some zzzzzs, so much for taking it easy for a 9 day break!
As a totally off the top of the head figure, a 3% deficit shouldn’t be the maximum target, it should be the regular annual target, falling below or being exceeded on a normal basis.
0% is stagnation in an “average” economy. 1% is far to low. Both mean falling behind competitors in a global economy.
@ronnie anderson says: 29 October, 2018 at 1:33 pm:
” … same place ah git ma deodorant much cheapness.”
Jings, Ronnie, wi aa yon curry yer qawn tae need a muckle puckle o yon deodorant.
Deficit targets! Arghhhh
Imagine buying an air conditioning unit and saying it’s target is 3kw when you own the power station!
No it’s target is to create the correct environment for the house..
O/T
For anyone who hasn’t watched, go to
goo.gl/e9Zhud
The Global Care Family Gathering
It gets more and more fascinating as it progresses and I am just half way through.
It is just brilliant, heart warming and heart breaking at the same time. So chuffed to see Nicola giving her time to my country’s future. To putting love at the heart of Scotland. A real antidote to the shite that the media spread about our people.
Fred, link doesn’t seem to work. I know there was a report a few days ago about what a nurse at Foresterhill saw when Willie Macrae was brought in but don’t know how much new light that sheds on his death. In particular I’m thinking about the Justice for Willie report that was published a couple of years back. The couple of ex detectives involved in that came to the conclusion that no one else was involved in his death.
Yesindyref2 @ 6.47 pm
You are not the only one who knows of the Hydrogen project in Fife nor are you the only one to have mentioned it. See my post at 2.00 pm.
There have been several name changes over the years that I have followed it but the one you mention is the same one I referenced in my earlier post.
Mr Salmond opened it in 2011.
“”
Bright Green Hydrogen Ltd (BGH), is part of the wider company The Business Partnership Ltd. The Business Partnership Ltd is also parent to Bright Green Business and the Mid and East Lothian Chamber of Commerce. BGH were, until April 2013, known as the Hydrogen Office Ltd. The Hydrogen Office Ltd moved from its Edinburgh base in to the Hydrogen Office building at the Methil demonstration site in November 2009. The energy system was installed stage by stage, and was completed in September 2010 with the installation of Poppy the wind turbine.
We are grateful for the grants provided by:
We are grateful for the grants provided by:
• European Regional Development Fund (ERDF),
• Scottish Enterprise (SE),
• The Scottish Government (through Natural Scotland),
• Alsherra Developments,
• The Energy Saving Trust (EST),
• The Business Partnership Ltd.
The project was officially launched by Alex Salmond (the First Minister of Scotland at the time) in January 2011. After this we started to take tours and most importantly begin our education programme. The education programme is designed to appeal to all ages and abilities.””
https://www.brightgreenhydrogen.org.uk/history/
Mr Peffers has also mentioned it in a recent post on this thread.
Sadly one of the recurring themes concerning renewable energy systems in Scotland is the number of times they, whether, marine, tidal, wind or whatever, are developed to the point where they are almost ready for full-scale roll out then the rug is pulled out from under them by some change to subsidies or connection charges. Just at the point when they would make a real contribution to energy generation, jobs etc the projects are lost. They are bought up, moved elsewhere, and other places reap the long term benefits.
It is scandalous the number of times this has happened usually because of short-sighted changes initiated by Westminster.
“Strikes me they’ve simply made our point for us.” @Macart says at 3:41 pm
Totally agree.
@Andy-B says: 29 October, 2018 at 7:41 pm:
” … Oh Christ! Fluffy is on BBC Scotland, a budget special programme, waxing lyrical about how wonderful Hammond’s budget is for Scotland.
The man’s a disgrace to Scotland.”
Nah! He is only a disgrace to himself. Most of Scotland wants him gone from Scotland.
Mundell:
Even the people who have to like him don’t like him
Regarding “Tilda Swinton ….“I don’t quite believe the word British. I feel like it’s sort of a strictly-for-export term.” @galamcennalath says at 5:53 pm
Swintons are proper old school Brits
Great-granddaughter of actress of Tory George Swinton.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Swinton
Her father was Major General Sir John Swinton of Kimmerghame, and was Lord Lieutenant of Berwickshire from 1989 to 2000.
The Swinton family is an ancient Anglo-Scots family that can trace its lineage to the Middle Ages.
The family is one of only three British families (along with the Ardens and the Berkeleys) that can trace their unbroken land ownership and lineage to before the Norman Conquest.
Her brother is Lieutenant Colonel William Henry Swinton, Scots Guards.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilda_Swinton
So if she say British is bollocks and she feels Scottish and that like many believes Scotland is a naturally independent country, what say the “Proud Scot, but…” cringers??
ot
Budget — did one of those budget calculator things wondering how much I will get back in 2019.– everyone says we would.
Guess what –worse off. The tory chancellor forgot to mention the huge rises in National Insurance.
Austerity continues.
@ Simon, the second Willie Macrae link works!
The budget give some relief to public lavvies, which will doubtless be welcomed by Colin from Largs!
Personality, politics and probity of moral sentiment are all strongly linked character traits. Weakness in one generally indicates weakness in other areas of an individual’s personality.
I don’t think it unreasonable to suggest the Fluffy one has certain, obvious, limitations to his personality. These tell you a lot about his character, in general, and are suggestive of unreliability and weakness of purpose. Not a man to be trusted, IMHO, rather he’s an aspiring toady, a wannabe-tinpot-Viceroy.
I’ll not charge my usual fee, that one’s pro bono. 😉
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/what-connects-brexit-the-dup-dark-money-and-a-saudi-prince-1.3083586
With Ruth Davidson’s Northern Ireland connections maybe when she is off, (not having constituency meetings!!) she could find out for us where all this money is coming from and going– and why?
Scottish politics – Budget special
Labour and LibDems doing a great job until Brewer pointed out that they were singing from th SNP song sheet and then the back flips started. A comical SNPbad tirade that was farsical given their previous comments 30 seconds earlier.
Jardine is one nasty piece of work. I run into her during a few NE campaigns ((((shiver))))
CameronB
…please don’t be offended but I don’t think you need any expertise to spot what he is!!!
Capella @ 6.02 pm.
I certainly hope so too, with regard to Scottie and John Bull. But remember, the fast majority (incl. that one) were actually written *before* Indy Ref 1.
Daring to be pushy – but in a good sense: If you find a parable useful to share, ‘in the real world’, you have my permission to do so – just giving a little nod in my direction as you do so. Many thanks.
Legerwood @ 6.40 pm
Thanks for the info on the academic. Sometimes it’s not always easy to identify the good guys. (And I live in exile from both Scotland and my homeland.)
@Hamish100 says: 29 October, 2018 at 8:58 pm:
” … Guess what –worse off. The tory chancellor forgot to mention the huge rises in National Insurance.
Austerity continues.”
I was on my way to a medical appointment and listening to the budget on the van radio. By chance I had put the window down to reverse into a bay in the car park, just as Hammond said, “Austerity is over”.
Forgetting the window was down I yelled, “Pish!”, and an old couple in the next car cheered. The lady waved and man gave me a waved clenched fist. Seems they were also listening to Radio Jockland and Phil the liar.
vast* majority.
(GRRRRRRRR! Shoot the parabalist!)
Re the CRC @Hamish100 says at 9:17 pm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitutional_Research_Council
“The Constitutional Research Council (CRC) is a Unionist funding organisation, chaired by Scottish Conservative Richard Cook.
It helped to fund the anti-independence Better Together campaign during the Scottish independence referendum in 2014
and
the DUP’s Leave campaign in Northern Ireland, and in mainland Britain, during the Brexit referendum in 2016.
The CRC has also funded the European Research Group and its chairman, the Brexit minister Steve Baker.
The CRC has no website, publishes no accounts and does not reveal the names of its donors.
The only office-holder to be made public is the chairman Richard Cook, a former vice-chairman of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party, parliamentary candidate in Glasgow Cathcart in 2003 and at the 2005 by-election, and a supporter of the Freedom Association.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Freedom_Association
Cook has had business connections with Prince Nawwaf bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the former Saudi minister for finance, government spokesman, diplomat and head of intelligence
and
the Danish arms dealer Peter Haestrup who has been linked to a gun running case in West Bengal described by Indian authorities as “the biggest crime in the country’s history”.
According to Cook, the CRC are prepared to help fund the anti-independence campaign during the proposed second Scottish independence referendum.”
The name Stefan Koch/Stephan Kock has been suggested in relation to the death of Willie Macrae, Koch was apparently a government hit-man, as if HM’s Government employed hit-men? Koch is also dead now anyhow!
Apparently the Chancellor has announced the end of PFI contracts. A new model will be found. I wonder where they could look for inspiration?
Article on the issue in the Guardian online details some of the horrors of PFI including Scottish Schools
http://archive.is/n5bSw
Radio 4 –Andrew Marr speaking as an independent interviewer on how “British” we are and our “belief in justice”.
How the Britnats praise themselves. Now we have Helena Kennedy and her weirdly morningside type upper ruling middleclass and darling of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. The anglo scots brits. Heaven help us.
The curtailment payments come from National Grid. So if the windfarm getting the payment is Scottish owned, the payment is a transfer from GB to Scotland. Sounds quite good to me. [GB ‘cos National Grid is GB not UK – it doesn’t include Northern Ireland.]
I get my electricity and gas from our power they say they are a not for profit company but have just increased my monthly fuel cost be about 20% they say all my power will be produced in Scotland .What I find strange is that they supply several areas in England and all get their fuel at a cheaper price than I do and I live in Dundee not far from where so much of the gas and wind power is sourced, the most expensive charges are to people in the Hebrides which I find even more surprising.
It’s clear to me that just because your country or area produces the stuff doesn’t mean you will get a fair price.
Roll on Scottish independence so we can all benefit from cheaper fuel.
Apparently next year there’s another film about Robert The Bruce being released. It’s called “Robert The Bruce” 🙂 true.
@ScottieDog
LOL. Problem is, in a neoconlibwhatever world, you have to speak some ncl first to get somewhere near where you want to get to, before you can find your own way to reality.
@Legerwood
Sorry about that, I must have skipped past a few postings including yours, after posting about an earlier one and paging up again. I should probably use two tabs for the one thread when catching up!
And yes, Westminster seems to have messed up a lot of these projects. It’s clearly very messy. We’re going to need a lot of biodegradeable detergent when we get Indy and have to clear up after them.
O/T but very much on topic
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/783944/willie-mcrae-death-threat–letter-ex-cop-friend
Robert says: 29 October, 2018 at 9:55 pm
“The curtailment payments come from National Grid. So if the windfarm getting the payment is Scottish owned, the payment is a transfer from GB to Scotland. Sounds quite good to me. [GB ‘cos National Grid is GB not UK – it doesn’t include Northern Ireland.]”
It is rather an accepted fact from interacting with several windfarm developers / financiers that ultimate ownership is often non-Scottish, often German or Continental, often American. Therefore the major likelihood is that global hedge funds or engineering conglomerates are the beneficial owners and hence recipients of windfarm revenues, profits and constraints payments. Eg., Siemens, or Iberdrola, or Berkshire Hathaway. An exception, I think – SSE.
This is no longer a cuddly home industry for the local farmers’ benefit.
@AlexMontrose
Having driven along Loch Awe many times (on the road between Oban and Glasgow) I finally called in to the Loch Awe Hydro visitors centre on a wet Sunday – hoping to divert a rather hung over assemblage of offspring. To say that I was both shocked and impressed at this engineering feat is an understatement. It also created a major source of employment for many islanders working at ‘The Hydro’
Sharp demand at peak times – nationally – can be addressed in seconds by the release of “head” water. There are similar Hydro-Electric schemes dotted around Scotland. We haveTom Johnson to thank for this broad vision.
Well worth a visit – and the tea in the visitors centre is excellent.
Point being – already made many times on this site – is that Scotland has an abundance of natural resources which can go a very long way in securing a stable future.
Clootie 🙂
Thepnr says
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8000908/
@galamcennalath
Yeah that’ll be the one. Wonder what’s brought this on?
@Thepnr says: 29 October, 2018 at 10:08 pm:
” … Apparently next year there’s another film about Robert The Bruce being released. It’s called “Robert The Bruce” ? true.”
You just have to admire that title is really, really original!!
;-))
This just comes from another thread, an advatage of having a tame Unionist where you can think at leisure, worth repeating here.
Techincally speaking by the way, Scotland did NOT vote “to stay in the UK in 2014”, that was NOT the question asked. The question was:
Should Scotland be an independent country?
The answer, at that time, was NO, with promises of further devolution, whether delivered or not. The NO was a self-determination to keep the status quo (with further powers), a status quo which included staying in the EU.
That is now not the case, and we have seen in the UKSC appeal, the importance of wording, in referendum questions as well.
Unionists are on a sticky wicket with their assertions about “voted to stay in the UK” which would not hold water in a court of law. I think the courts would call that a googly.
That is a way, by the way, we’re being subtly indoctrinated to believe we “voted to stay in the UK”.
We did not, even those that voted NO.
Thought I’d better check that, memory being what it is. There were indeed no explanatory notes about what the YES / NO meant, so would not be part of the ballot itself. Schedule 1 of the Act has an image of the ballot paper.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2013/14/enacted
The front is the question with YES NO and their boxes, the back about unique ID no, and council name. Here just the image of the prototype:
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2013/14/images/asp_20130014_en_001
I think the NO voters in 2014 voted to stay in the EU.
Everybody who voted NO in 2014 was a turkey and here comes Christmas
Gobble gobble
Scotland should have all its wealth on a balance sheet- separated out from UKOK finances. As an equal partner it is very important that Scotland’s wealth specifically its assets are accessible and visible. Scotland is an asset rich country saddled with another country’s debt– that is not an acceptable nor viable future for Scotland.
‘Your government has often lost track of its finances too. While it keeps close tabs on debt, it is less clear on how much it owns: the assets…Natural resource reserves in the ground are also part of assets, something that is particularly important for natural resource-rich countries like Nigeria and Norway. But assets also include state-owned enterprises such as public banks and, in many countries, utilities such as public electricity and water companies…More generally, the research illustrates that public sector assets could act as a buffer that allows governments with high public wealth to weather recessions better than those with low public wealth. Stronger balance sheets—a statement of what you owe and own at a given point in time—allow governments to boost spending in a downturn…All governments can better manage their resources. They should start by bringing data together to come up with a rough estimate of public sector assets, liabilities, and wealth. Over time, better accounting and statistical collections can improve the accuracy of these estimates. Governments can use them to do basic balance sheet risk and policy analysis, using the framework presented in this report’
https://blogs.imf.org/2018/10/23/chart-of-the-week-government-debt-is-not-the-whole-story-look-at-the-assets/
A Manual for the destruction of state assets – did the citizens of UKOK vote for this? Buried deep in the document the NHS will be dismantled within 5 years- but advice to focus on ‘other fields’ initially to ‘test the water’ & presumably keep the electorate docile and from understanding the agenda underlying the agenda. A pretence about ‘free trade’ improving labour rights & environmental protections – doublespeak for minimal work rights, widespread environmental degradation and rampant inequality in keeping with US standards.
‘But by the same token, the prospect of extending membership to countries that have—or are perceived to have—weaker commitments to labor rights, environmental protections, competition rules, or intellectual property standards will undoubtedly prompt louder calls in the United States and the United Kingdom for strict provisions in these areas…
As for other services areas, health services are an area where both sides would benefit from openness to foreign competition, although we recognize any changes to existing regulations will be extremely controversial. Perhaps, then, for other areas the initial focus should be on other fields such as education or legal services, where negotiators can test the waters and see what is possible. That said, we would envisage a swift, time-tabled implementation of recognition across all areas within 5 years’
https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/wtpapers/ideal-us-uk-free-trade-agreement-update.pdf
@Phronesis
Indeed. And a full analysis of assets versus liabilities could improve borrowing power and rates – plus as ScottieDog might tell us, allow the country to issue new currency for new public spending with certainty – the magic money tree actually exists. All it would be doing is issuing promissory notes on its existing, usually positive, balance sheet.
Hopefully iScotland will start off such a project from Day 1 of Independence.
O/T – a wee reflection on how politicians mature over time!
https://eurofree3.wordpress.com/2018/10/30/gerry-adams-the-way-we-were/
a wee reflection on how politicians mature over time!
https://eurofree3.wordpress.com/2018/10/30/gerry-adams-the-way-we-were/
Dr Jim
Is this the Ian Gray clip you were thinking of? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uC4hwVd47FE&feature=youtu.be “What happens when renewable energy runs out?” was from Victoria Ayling – UKIP
@msdidi
I don’t think that was the clip Dr Jim referred to but thanks for posting it, what a laugh.
Iain Gray “where is the money for an oil fund going to come from” 🙂
@msdidi
Oops I missed your reference to the Kipper that might have been what Dr Jim was referring to. Well found, the Iain Gray clip was a classic though.
@~msdidi
Just wakened up from my slumbers, no that’s not the clip but still good fun to remember the masterful stand up that is Ian Gray, he really could have done well round the clubs at one time
Even though he didnae mean it
‘Budget 2018: ‘No end to Tory austerity in Scotland’ warns SNP’s Mackay.’
…”Derek Mackay has dismissed Tory claims of a billion pound budget windfall for Scotland, and says the Chancellor has left the Scottish Government with £2 billion less to spend…”
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17187284.budget-2018-no-end-to-tory-austerity-in-scotland-warns-snps-mackay/
…………………………….
‘Or see below the merciful other reality of employment in modern Scotland?’
https://thoughtcontrolscotland.com/2018/10/29/or-see-below-the-merciful-other-reality-of-employment-in-modern-scotland/
…………………………..
‘Why YouGov/Times poll suggesting SNP success may be more reliable than Survation/Daily Record poll.’
https://thoughtcontrolscotland.com/2018/10/28/why-yougov-times-poll-suggesting-snp-success-may-be-more-reliable-than-survation-daily-record-poll/
……………………..
Great WW1 myth busting article by George Kerevan.
‘First World War only ended because ordinary folk said ‘no more’.’
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17185056.first-world-war-only-ended-because-ordinary-folk-said-no-more/?ref=mr&lp=4
Thepnr @10 08 pm
A new film called ‘Robert the Bruce’ ?
As opposed to ‘Richard the Bruce’ 🙂 ?!
FYI film-makers, there is ALOT of Scottish history still to explore!
What with Scottish history having been suppressed for a very very long time…
There a few folk here on Wings could point you interesting directions =)
Everyone needs a good laugh
The German view of brexit
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BFU6ig6giwc
Well worth a read.
From the Sunday National ‘Seven Days’ supplement:
Susan Aitken: ‘We may not have created the equal pay mess but we WILL solve it.’
…”Make no mistake, the decision and adherence to a discriminatory pay scheme by Labour comes at a massive cost. This is where the discrimination lay and it will cost the city hundreds of millions of pounds to resolve.”…
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17100084.we-may-not-have-created-the-equal-pay-mess-but-we-will-solve-it/
…………………………………..
‘Oscar-winning star says Scotland is a ‘naturally independent country’.’
…“I have never felt English, and I have never felt British, politically. I am happy to describe myself as Scottish and I feel, like many people, that Scotland is a naturally independent country.”…
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17186960.oscar-winning-star-says-scotland-is-a-naturally-independent-country/?ref=mr&lp=2
………………………..
‘Budget 2018: Looking at Philip Hammond’s vision at a glance.’
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17187302.budget-2018-looking-at-philip-hammonds-vision-at-a-glance/
…………………………
From Sunday National Scottish Life magazine:
‘A-Z of Outlander: Everything you need to know about the hit TV show.’
..”Newbies – New Scottish faces to look out for include Paisley’s Craig McGinlay, known for playing Sir Percival in King Arthur: Legend Of The Sword, and Glaswegian actor Ainsley Jordan as Judith Wylie, a character who is set to become a rival of Claire’s.”…
…’Patriotism – The “importance” of Outlander to the political atmosphere of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum was highlighted by key TV executives before a meeting with former Prime Minister David Cameron.
In a cache of leaked memos from the Sony organisation obtained by WikiLeaks, an email written by Keith E Weaver, executive vice president at Sony Pictures Entertainment, discussed a meeting with Cameron in the summer of 2014.
The email fuelled speculation that the UK Government did not want the show broadcast before the independence vote in September that same year. It specifically referred to Outlander and “the political issues in the UK as Scotland contemplates detachment this Fall”…….
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17009969.a-z-of-outlander-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-hit-tv-show/
@Ghillie
Thomas Muir, might be a good start, Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, Montrose, Alexander Stewart bastard son of the Wolf of Badenoch. To many in Scotland have never heard of these people.
Links
https://news.gov.scot/news/uk-budget-does-not-end-austerity
https://www.snp.org/snp-reaction-to-the-uk-budget-statement/
https://spice-spotlight.scot/2018/10/29/guest-blog-after-brexit-migration-advisory-committee-proposals-on-future-eu-migration-to-the-uk/
https://macalbasite.wordpress.com/2018/10/29/example-1-how-they-lie-via-gers/
http://www.barrheadboy.com/scottish-prism-tom-arthur-msp-29th-oct-2018/
http://scotgoespop.blogspot.com/2018/10/are-online-polls-superior-to-telephone.html
.@OBR_UK pushes up North Sea revenue prediction by £1.2bn
http://archive.is/LKXeA
https://weegingerdug.wordpress.com/2018/10/29/buttons-up-the-back/
http://www.businessforscotland.com/new-economic-strategy-for-scotland/
The news that Scottish MSM doesn’t give you. This is how the Tory WM Govt treats its Civil Servants. Long read but note the TU’s positive comments about Scottish Govt’s approach to pay.
https://prospecttradeunion.cmail20.com/t/ViewEmail/d/9A408F8BAC32BA922540EF23F30FEDED
For those who missed this point of order following the @theSNP leader of the third party’s reply to #Budget2018 earlier it can be summarised as follows “Mr Deputy Speaker, how can it be that some jock’s voice is more important than mine?”
https://twitter.com/joannaccherry/status/1056977387596976128
https://www.joanmcalpine.com/weekly_update_29th_october_2018
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-how-scotch-became-a-symbol-of-scotlands-opposition-to-brexit/
https://www.centreonconstitutionalchange.ac.uk/blog/facing-strain-intergovernmental-relations-between-cardiff-and-westminster
http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2018/10/29/budget-day-blues-2/
A Conservative MP’s expenses form for his general election campaign may have been forged
http://archive.is/e2Kdt
I think we have known this for some time
http://archive.is/I0AEE
Tory budget came to you via the most corrupt bank- HSBC
https://twitter.com/nw_nicholas/status/1056868610206064640
The BBC is the biggest media company in the world. It was headed by an HSBC director. It’s avoids tax through it’s Dutch Royalty Conduit, it’s pension fund is handled by HSBC.
https://twitter.com/nw_nicholas/status/1056998974308184064
https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/abroad/english-ignorance-about-ireland-just-isn-t-funny-anymore-1.3677267
Brexit: engage panic mode
http://eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=87039
Britain’s fiscal watchdog has warned of the “severe implications” for the economy in the event of a no deal Brexit, adding that the vote to quit the EU has already weakened growth.
http://archive.is/oOqI9
Who gains most from the Chancellor’s income tax cuts next year? The richest tenth of households are overwhelmingly the biggest winners
https://twitter.com/resfoundation/status/1056969156741029889
https://www.thecanary.co/trending/2018/10/29/a-fascist-victory-in-one-of-the-worlds-biggest-democracies-should-worry-us-all/
https://www.politico.eu/article/voters-skeptical-of-uk-promises-of-brexit-upside/
End Saudi Arms Sales
https://secure.avaaz.org/en/khashoggi_loc_fr_pa/?wMIyAbb
I’ve not had time to watch, thought it best to link to it for anyone who does
Two parts to this
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/watch-how-facebook-built-a-surveillance-machine
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-29/trump-approval-rating-plunges-amid-violence-as-midterms-approach
Anent Stephan Kock & the Willie Macrae business, the stuff online which linked the assassination of Gerald Bull in Brussels, (architect of Project Babylon, Iraq’s Super Gun), to Kock, appears to have vanished. His trips to Northern Ireland during The Troubles ditto! Kock’s court appearance in Oban after firing shots at two guys who stopped to offer assistance when paranoid Kock’s vehicle broke down at a remote spot, is still online. Nothing done about it of course! all a misunderstanding!
As somebody said recently “Scotland’s a Village” & Kock was its late unlamented villain, few attended his funeral. When Lady Diana was killed, Mrs Shand-Kydd who was absent in the south attending the funeral,had her house at its remote island location broken into, the jewellery was stolen but Diana’s letters, infinitely more valuable, were apparently left untouched??? On an island where strangers are noticed, nobody noticed anything. Kock was a near neighbour!
Who went through his stuff when he died, one wonders?
@Nana
Cheers Nana. 🙂
No. That budget doesn’t end austerity. In fact it reeks of bribe, if anything. Normally you’d expect that sort of bung to be thrown pre an election. How and ever, given the amount of issues May needs to deal with and the factions within those issues? It might simply be a bung to keep her core demographic sweet in the off chance as it were. Don’t rock the boat with what I’m going to do next, kinda thing. (shrugs)
Regardless. It’s a bung and it tells you quite a lot about situation they find themselves in.
Morning Macart
From comments I’ve read on my travels round various sites, I’d say there is a GE coming soon. Hammond is one sleekit, disrespectful, corrupt, lying ________
Last links for now
Still don’t know why the Scots Tories think that freezing duty on Scotch Whisky is anything to do with them
https://twitter.com/PeteWishart/status/1057044335794028544
https://peterabell.blog/2018/10/30/crying-wolfson/
Humanity has wiped out 60% of animals since 1970, major report finds
http://archive.is/Vnq66
Bit scary to watch at this exact minute:
https://twitter.com/thoughtland/status/1057040971286937600
Nana says
“Liberals and city-dwellers are told that they have ignored or disparaged the worries of more conservative voters for too long and are now paying the price. What’s mentioned less often is that these views are often wrong. “
In other words, a great many voters believe absolute bullshit and make stupid voting decisions based on that. Thing is, the situation was reached not randomly, it was engineered by dark forces. A far right agenda has been normalised intentionally.
Alan Sugar made an excellent point the other day – if senior officers in companies lied to and deceived shareholders the way politicians deceive voters, they would be jailed.
Similarly, if a company markets a product making outrageous claims which soon prove to be false, they are in big legal trouble.
However, with politicians and media we just shrug shoulders and accept it all.
Newspapers can’t lie in their adverts, but they can with impunity in their articles.
And the courts told us politicians can lie as long as it’s for political reasons.
Let’s hope iScotland can do better.
oops forgot these
For anyone in Kirkaldy, this is happening today
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/an-afternoon-with-roger-mullin-tickets-51709858579
“I don’t see any good news for independence in Brexit”, Alyn Smith MEP.
https://twitter.com/RobDunsmore/status/1056624026544685058
This a long read
How the Irish border became Brexit’s defining issue
http://archive.is/C1ISR
All I see in the budget is a Government playing games and pretending that everything is normal. It is classic English “Keep Calm and Carry On” syndrome. Brexit? What Brexit?
Look at the tone in the German clip posted above, and look at the video’s likes vs dislikes. Through Brexit, the UK has made an absolute fool of itself, and I mean ABSOLUTE. It’s not just ridicule, it is scathing contempt.
Meanwhile, we Scots suffer boldly on with our dreadful National curse, our tremendous stoicism to put up with anything, no matter how unfair or demeaning.
Robert the Bruce was an Essex boy don’t ya know? No doubt his fictional leprosy will be making a resurgence before long, together with his wooden leg, dreadful halitosis, and shocking rudeness to his mother in law. Murderer don’t forget…
I am so utterly sick and tired of this Nation being permanently “on hold”.
We have waited decades for the truth about Wullie Macrae. Even as recently as 2015, the Scotsman and Scotland on Sunday were triumphantly claiming to have solved the 30 year old “mystery”. Aye, move along you Scotch people. Nothing to see here. Stifled again by Unionist propaganda, and we succumb yet again, press snooze, and roll back into the ether.
It is not about renewables. Correction, not JUST about renewables, because we stand on the threshold of a whole new revolution concerning our energy and fuel. Cheap and endless environmentally sound electricity is just the tip of the ice berg. Scotland has a lead here, but Scotland also has complacency.
European nations will need energy, but if they have no access to wind or wave power, they will look elsewhere for solutions. Perhaps they will fuel their vehicles and homes from algae, or solar, or Nuclear fusion. Battery technology is already making our existing energy go so much further. Scotland’s energy may be limitless, but the window of opportunity to exploit it is not.
But Scotland, oh Bonnie Scotland, we have the wonderful blank canvas of land denuded of its native wilderness, where we can regenerate our Nation’s true globally unique ecology, and marry that ancient genius with the unseen infrastructure of our future genius, and create a touchstone example of a modern, educated and industrial nation which can live in absolute harmony with its indigenous wildlife and flora, on land, air and sea.
We need vision to lift us out of this “miasma”, – this bad air that stifles our Nation. We can do it all. Just get off our fkn knees.
The Tories are operating one of the biggest PPI rackets in the world, Hinkley Point and HS2. One of the biggest scandals wasting £Billions of public money for absolutely no value. The Tory slush fund. All the Tories and their associates have their noses in the trough. Including Cameron getting £Millions. Appalling grotesque monstrosities of no value.
‘The British Chinese Consortium’. A PPl racket like no other. Draining £Billions from Scotland in loan repayments and damage to the Scottish (NE) /UK economy. Wanton vandalism in repayments. A total waste of time and money, with far better cheaper alternatives. The monies should be invested in the UK not going into Chinese Gov pockets.
Oil sector is taxed at 40%. The highest tax of any Industry in the UK (when Oil prices are lower) Tory high taxes have ruined the Oil & Gas sector. While they import £Billions of Oil & Gas from others. £Billions from Norway. Fracked Gss from the US. Fracked Gas in the rest of the UK is tax free. Tax free in the rest of the UK. 40% tax in Scotland.
Whisky produced in Scotland is taxed at 80%? . The highest tax in the UK. Some Whisky companies make vast profits and pay no tax. They tax evade Diageo etc. They tax evade and pay no tax on revenues gained from Scottish resources.
There is an increase in tax revenues. £628Billion (+ £92 revenues from other sources, Is that included?). 2016/2017. Increased from £533Billion 2015/16. (Plus revenues from other sources?) UK/Scottish Gov accounts.
Scotland (pro rata) always raises more than the rest of the UK. . £54Billion – £60Billion 2016/2017 (without Oil revenues)
The UK Gov takes £Billions in loans repayments on loan repayments not borrowed or spent in Scotland. Scotland loses tax revenues from tax evasion. £3Billion?
Scottish industry are affected by unfair, illegal and high Tory taxes Oil sector etc, Cost £4Billion?
Scotland can borrow very little. While Westminster borrows and spends what it like in the rest of the UK. Scotland has to make repayments on the debt. £6Billion lost pro rata on growth. (£4Billion on the debt). This could have grown the Scottish economy.
All those Scottish administration jobs in London. Losing Scotland revenues. Scottish profits going to London HQ or elsewhere. Tax evaded.
Added up what Scotland loses to Westminster unionist mismanagement. It comes on average to approx £20Billion. Scotland would be better off.
There was no need for ‘austerity’ in the UK. It costs more. There was never any need to sanction and starve people. Making people ill. Causing mental health problems.
Cutting NHS/Education/Welfare £13Billion a year. There was absolutely no need. The tax revenues were increasing by more. The £Billions wasted on Hinkley Point HS2 would have covered it. The Tory and the rest useless. Ignorant, incompetent liars are still at it. Trident/Defence cost £Billion more,
Westminster unionist gross mismanagement has lost Scotland revenues in the Oil & Gas, fishing, farming, whisky and renewable sectors. A total trail of chronic mismanagement and lost revenues.
Years of lost revenues, since 1928 and before. An absolute scandal. Kept secret under the Official Secrets Act. To damage the Scottish economy. Now Brexit one of the worse disasters to ever unfold. It will damage the Scottish economy even more. The most pro rata . The EU costs Scotland nothing and only brings benefit. It is a criminal act of devastation. Totally undemicratic and unfair in fiscal policies. Just as the promises made in the IndyRef1. Total and utter lies. That is why there has to be another one.
Add in illegal wars, the worst migrant crisis since 11WW, gross financial fraud and tax evasion. Losing Scotland even more. The unionist sychophants and failures.
Iraq, Lockerbie and Dunblane kept secret for 100 years.
Scotland are losing out from investment in renewables (Westminster policies). The wave Tidal companies are pulling out of Scotland going elsewhere to be based in other countries, Welcomed with open arms. Scotland once again loses out on initiatives to drive the world forward in energy matters. Westminster usual intransigence and mismanagement. Ignorant, incompetent and useless.
Nana says:
Thanks for the links Nana.
………………
Someone should think of making a film of the life and death of Willie MacRae. What a fascinating guy. A Scot to be proud of.
One of the first people on the scene of the Willie MacRae murder backs the nurse’s claim, that is, that there was no gunshot wound to the temple. I wonder what the doctors, who treated him, have to say about this? They have been / continue to be, if still alive, strangely quiet on the matter.
And does anyone know if Willie was buried or cremated?
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17187239.call-for-police-to-re-open-willie-mcrae-death-inquiry/?c=uf0jtc
…………………….
Willie MacRae case videos.
http://www.oilofscotland.org/scottish_murders.html
I think our politicians should move beyond ‘discussing’ the effects of Tory policies and come up with some fighting tactics. If you want people to follow you they have to know you’re there.
GE coming, It looks like May can be brought down trying to get Brexit Legislation through the Commons. If Labour get their act together. (doubtful). The former reneged Hoey and Fields etc have been deselected. A warning to others. The Tories could have been defeated in September 2017 EVEL vote but Labour abstained. Reneged on their duty. Two LibDems failed to appear and another did not turn up. Ridiculously useless. Unbelievable.
Not long now?
@Breeks,
Yes fascinating stuff re Willie Macrae. I always wondered why an ex military man would only possess an antique .22 volcanic Smith and Wesson pistol, which was the one apparently found in the burn. He would know that it was unreliable and because it had only a light load of powder would most likely fail to go off ,or indeed kill even at short range.
I am sure he could have if he wished, gain a more certain implement for that job.
The gun was not discovered till the next day, and I believe his home was broken into prior to the gun being found.
What always amazed me though ,is that his Volvo apparently rolled as it left the road, and in spite of him wearing no seat belt, he was found in his seat with his hands crossed on his lap. Having attended many rolled cars in a past existence ,I can tell you that is very unusual, if not unique.
Nana.
Fine ending to that article on the Irish border.
“Did the UK subliminally think that small Ireland would not retain the support?” asks Brigid Laffan, a professor at the European University Institute in Florence. “We’re bigger, we’re more important — that does not wash if you are a country leaving. You need to mind your manners on the way out.”
http://archive.is/C1ISR
Macrae’s car was removed from the location then it was returned later to the scene but not quite to the same spot.
https://www.scotsman.com/news/the-truth-about-activist-willie-mcrae-s-tragic-death-1-3738745
Did anyone hear Ian Blackford on BBC R4 this morning about 8.50 – he was absolute genius! I only managed to catch the last 5 minutes but he was brilliant.
The interviewer kept trying to insert the party line and repeat the same old Greek Chorus statements — so will you be spending the extra money on the NHS in Scotland because it is performing so poorly?… Cue Ian Blackford to wipe the floor with truthful statistics about our performance – OUR A&E is the best in the country..
So, now you are receiving £900 million pounds extra will you be…IB: IN REAL TERMS Derek Mc Kay has already pointed out that Scotland is actually receiving a cut of ..
oh you’re talking about the Barnett Formula NOW..IB: NO, WE’RE TALKING REAL TERM CUTS HERE of ….. and Derek Mc Kay will set out his budget for Scotland in December…..
and so on
She retired from ‘the dual’ with a very subdued voice- def. BBC 0 : SNP 10
He was polite, measured and informative whilst standing NO nonsense. I think debating at WM has honed his method of dealing with propaganda merchants.
Def worth a listen for anyone able to access the Registered BBC archives
@ Meg … “Ian Blackford.”
He was interviewed by the BBC yesterday Meg and he was absolutely brilliant then too managing to pack in loads of facts.
Bob Mack says:
Did the gun match the bullet? Fundamental foresic procedures.
Prominent and controversial politician was found dead. Ok, so they initially assumed a car crash. But once it was discovered he had been shot, surely an exhaustive investigation was begun?
At the most basic level, surely it must raise suspicions that there was shooting AND a car crash.
Morning Petra, thanks for your kind words last Friday.
@Mike Cassidy, I enjoyed that article very much, especially that last paragraph 🙂
A few more links while I’m here
BP profits double on higher prices and new oil fields
http://archive.is/uFJHB
https://www.insider.co.uk/news/floating-offshore-wind-scotland-economy-13500788?
Mark Carney’s speech on “Tragedy of the Horizon” is a classic – how underpricing carbon emissions cheats future generations. Conservatives should embrace it- remember Burke’s famous reminder of our social contract with the past and the future.
https://www.bis.org/review/r151009a.pdf
Herald attempting to smear Grousebeater
http://archive.is/M1QXl
Date for your diaries,
Airdrie Thurs 22nd November
https://airdrieforindependence.wordpress.com/2018/10/30/andrew-tickell-scotlands-law-and-constitution-after-brexit/
I don’t think Ian Blackford is in the mood for taking any prisoners. I saw the Beeb during the night, and there was a Tory on about Ian Blackford not being a crofter, and something about his city banking. Blackford had a face like thunder, not amused.
It’s gloves off, I think, and he’s just the guy to do it.
The Herald and Grousebeater should’ve read
Man who writes blog has an opinion
The unpleasantness is the Heralds desperate need to use it as a selective smear tactic for anyone else who might have read a blog when clearly the people who complained read the blog also
So if you’re SNP and read something you’re guilty of what you read but if you’re anti SNP you’re an exposer of bad people who read
Some top smearing there from the Herald
@Galamcennalath,
Perhaps the question we have to ask is why Mccrae felt the need to carry a gun with him at all? The whole thing including the supression of medical records, the investigation, including lack of forensic evidence or pictorial recording even after he was found to be shot, was amateurish at best, or devious at worst.
This man was considered dangerous enough to have been monitored by Special Branch and other security services, but when found severely injured, nothing happens, Why?
I cannot prove it of course, but every indicator points to murder. State murder. Mccrae was no ordinary individual. Aide de camp to Louis Mountbatten and Lt Commander in the Indian navy, who actively campaigned for Indian independence.
The picture of this guy to the British State is one of a subversive. He was no stranger to State secrets of course and we all know the rumours of the Westminster ring. Mccrae himself was homosexual I believe , and may well have been attemptedly groomed by this group to join. Such knowledge in the hands of one who declined would be disastrous to the UK.
One thing is certain. He was under close State supervision,with all the risks that entails.
I have also never been able to fathom why he was found to have a large amount of Chinese money on his person Odd.
It’s gruesome, and I thoroughly apologise, but a small caliber bullet can be the more deadly. A larger bullet might pass through the skull, and leave some admittedly slim chance of survival, whereas a small caliber bullet has enough momentum to penetrate a skull, but not to exit, and ricochets inside, completely destroying the brain.
It’s not a morbid curiosity I have, but a program on JFK’s assassination examined the effects.
But don’t be suspicious about the small caliber. All guns are designed to kill. Even the little ones.
Thanks for the additional links Nana in particular the one about Grousebeater.
An exclusive by Tom Gordon. Is he still hanging around like a bad smell?
Grousebeater points out that he’s not a member of the SNP, doesn’t knock on doors or attend marches etc, etc, but Mr Gordon ends the article by stating, “The SNP has been asked for comments.”
What’s it got to do with them?
@ Bob Mack ….. “Willie MacRae.”
Was there ever any proof to the effect that it was actually Willie MacRae’s gun?
@Breeks,
Yes I see your point, but Mccrae was a military man. Ex Seaforth, ADC , Ly Commander Indian Navy. He knew this gun may not actually kill him because of its age and unreliability. The autopsy never indicated the calibre or type of bullet, and subsequent access to that information has been declined by a Scottish solicitor General no less. Lady with Italian name. AGOS——.
If everything was okay dokay, then why refuse legitimate requests for simple facts to be revealed.
Like Dunblane and it’s 100 year bar on documents, something stinks.
@Nana
‘Herald attempting to smear Grousebeater’
That reeks a bit of don’t look over here, look over there.
Macrae’s pistol was a 120 year old antique. It must have been one of the earliest Smith and Wesson revolvers. Sounds like an interesting collector’s item but a strange choice as a practical weapon.
@Petraeus,
It was Willies antique gun It was unusual because it was a model that was manufactured by Smith and Wesson just after they had acquired another company and was called a “volcanic” This model however was more of a prototype or workshop piece, because it was short barrelled. Normal production was for a longer barrel.It was never produced en masses, The thing is that apparently it was thrown from the car along with the ammunition, but Willie was found in the seat with his hands crossed in his lap..
Clearly the gun was dumped in the burn where they thought the car had come to a halt, but whoever judged that got the wrong location when depositing the pistol and ammo. Remember the car was removed and subsequently relaced also at the wrong location.
@Macart
Most definitely, and I agree 100% with this statement from indyref2
https://twitter.com/IndyrefTWO/status/1057244520293769217
The Bruce family has lands in England and Scotland. Nobody disputes that. It was a Norman family. (de Brus like de Mandiville – Mundell). Like most of those ruling England at that point they were not”English” They spoke French which was the language of the Norman French who ruled what we now call England.
Me too Nana/ Macart.
Hair-trigger suspension strikes again.
Re Grousebeater`:
So the smearing and lying and denigrating continues – anyone who has decided to back Independence is now an essential target for the sewage minded opponents of Independence.
We have said many times they will stop at nothing an no-one to try and damage our way to freedom. It should be a badge of honour that you are targeted but it must feel pretty scary and confusing when it happens- especially when the facts are being twisted out of all recognition – Why? Because those doing the twisting know that most of their readers are gullible.
This is bad.
Nana @ 07:50,
Thanks as always for the links, Nana. Saw a posting on SGP that seemed particularly salient to me:
Yes, the curse of mitigation. Absolutely necessary of course, but not in itself sufficient. A flak magnet and too little thanks & recognition from a sadly ignorant and misinformed public.
McCrone Reports- Top secret- Scotland not allowed access to information relating to their own economy and their Future.
6,000 Square Miles of Scottish Waters stolen by Labour to gift England. Scotland not consulted informed or actions justified.
Dunblane Massacre connected to Labour MP’s and Police therefore made top secret for 100 years.
Thatcher’s son’s employer given £Multi Million contract on a plate by Westminster dressed as aid to 3rd world countries.
Details made Top secret. I think its obvious why!
Willie McCrae obviously murdered by Westminster and covered up by their Key Stone Cops- Top Secret and Scots shouldn’t know about it.
How about all those Paedo’s in Westminster having their files going missing? I really don’t think anything went “missing”.
Scotland’s accepted in-put for Brexit completely ignored by Westminster. You get what England tells you. Shut Up.
Scotland are tied to the most corrupt “democratic” government in the world and who excel in the abuse of this nation.
@ Bob …..”Willie’s antique gun.”
Thanks for the reply Bob, however I’m still trying to find some reference to this gun. For example, who said it was Willie’s gun? Family members? Had some of his friend’s seen it previously? Did Willie mention having such an antique gun or was it just reported by the “authorities” as being his gun?
…………………
@ Nana at 12:24pm ……..
Grousebeater was quoted in the Herald as saying that he wasn’t a member of the SNP (have to reread that). So what’s going on?
Has anyone actually read Grousebeater’s article? Was it anti-Semitic / offensive? IF so, note the word “IF”, the SNP have done the right thing, imo. It couldn’t come at a worse time either with Nicola Sturgeon visiting Auschwitz this week with schoolchildren.
http://www.shropshirestar.com/news/uk-news/2018/10/28/sturgeon-warns-of-horrific-consequences-of-anti-semitism-after-us-shooting/
Bob Mack says:
30 October, 2018 at 12:14 pm.
…If everything was okay dokay, then why refuse legitimate requests for simple facts to be revealed.
Like Dunblane and it’s 100 year bar on documents, something stinks…
Correct.
But actually, in real terms, how would the truth avail us? Proof that Westminster is a monster? We need only look a Syria to know that. Proof that Westminster lies through its teeth? Look at the McCrone Report, look at Iraq, even just look at Brexit! Does anybody actually believe the Skripal’s story?
We are the Rip Van Winkle of Nations. Scotland fell asleep over 300 years ago. It isn’t a democratic majority we need, it is merely our awakening to the reality, and to evict the usurpers and shameless opportunists who have occupied our house and entertained themselves at our expense while we slept. We are King Theodin who has to shake off the spell of false infirmity and throw our own Grima Wormtongues out on their ears.
Would the murder of Willie MacRae wake us up? It should, but will it? The McCrone report should see us rioting in the streets, but years after the truth is out, Westminster happily still plunders our oil and gives us nothing.
We need to get to the essence of whatever it is which keeps our Nation demure and subservient before this endless provocation. We need to find that mechanism and render it dysfunctional. We won’t find the answer in Westminster or on the BBC, but in our own heads. We are the victim in an abusive relationship still waiting on the revelation that we must find the strength to help ourselves from within.
Now that they’ve got the smear going in the press we’ll all be brushed by the same invented tar
The Labour party must win at any cost, or the Tories, the press really don’t care which as long as whoever wins isn’t leading to Scotland being a country
All the words we say are Baad and if they’re not the press will rewrite them to make them sound Baad then they’ll blame the SNP for all the Baadness the press invented, then they’ll demand denials and condemnations and resignations and if that’s not enough to wind up the lunatics they’ll demand Police Scotland be involved
Arrests must be made of everybody who’s not us, the press will demand Nicola Sturgeon must reign in her *Jackbooted Stormtroopers*
Then the press will prove the very thing they claim and smear Independence supporters with is actually what the British Nationalists are themselves, insert word here (…..)
*They’re taking back control* and we’re the Baad guys?
Right this is the article. Let’s have a look.
https://grousebeater.wordpress.com/2018/10/28/gmb-a-cockney-clique/
I’m enraged about that article in the Herald about Grouse Beater. It’s totally ludicrous and shows how empty their coffers are with anything to attack the Independence movement.
There was nothing whatsoever anti-Semitic in the article, he’s from a Jewish family himself FFS.
The lows are getting lower, everyone who writes a blog should be on their toes for these slanderous attacks. I’d even say that everyone that posts here should be on their guard.
If your words can be twisted in any way to suit their agenda then be certain that they will. This is serious stuff now.
The Grousebeater fiasco needs a robust response. If he wishes to respond to being called anti-semitic with a defamation case then he can be assured of necessary crowdfunding I have no doubt.
As for the SNP’s response. Piss poor. Go away and think again.
IMHO, British nationalists are “positivist” thinkers, where as vile separatists are “post-positivist” thinkers. British nationalists seek to retain the social power structures of the past, and the positions of privilege it bestows. We seek social emancipation through structural change and a respect for the principle of universal human rights. Simples. 🙂
Positivist vs Post-positivist IR theory
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCJ52tpjG_Y
It would appear Scotland is still too stupid to offer up a native for Edinburgh festival high heidyinship.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-46022205
OBE, Olympics … One of them, Again.
Growing anger over suspension of Grouse Beater from SNP.
Please get on Twitter, FB, whatever you have access to, and make it clear that you won’t accept this – the man is being smeared and targetted and has every right to expect the SNP to defend him, not join in the attacks.
Fuckin ragin about this.
🙁
FFS – this anti-semitism BS strikes again. I didn’t care when it was the Labour Party getting battered. So it turns out one of the main shit-stirrers in the recent politically motivated, coordinated, strikes was Rhea Wolfson, who is jewish … and immediately under criticism, she plays the AS card.
This needs a strong counter-attack straight out. Let me supply the ammunition.
Try this –
https://www.amazon.co.uk/51-Documents-Lenni-Brenner/dp/1569804338/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1540907196&sr=8-1&keywords=51+documents
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beyond-Chutzpah-Misuse-Anti-semitism-History/dp/1844671496/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1540907182&sr=8-1&keywords=beyond+chutzpah
– both written by jews, to be on the safe side. This “new anti semitism” has been a tried on since the 1970s, except these days the definition is so broad, written by the Jewish Lobby, that anything goes.
Well done Peter Bell
https://twitter.com/BerthanPete/status/1057266344268349440
Lots of anger on out there at the poor response from the SNP and no bloody wonder.
There’s more chance of new rangers paying off old rangers’ creditors than me thinking about how the Herald might misinterpret anything I post on here.
Once political party and union have been rumbled for using women as pawns trying to discredit another party for their own failings they fall back on using anti-Semitism to try and turn the tables.
I suspect next to nobody in Scotland knew this person was Jewish, I certainly didn’t until she used it as an attack mechanism. It’s her operating mode that I find objectionable, her religion is incidental and not relevant.
I’ve read the grousebeater article, I can’t see the anti-Semitism but it is always better to avoid mentioning Hitler and Nazis in your writings, it is just asking to be misquoted.
All independence blog writers need to double check their wording of articles, the unionist parties and MSM are on high alert to jump on anything to discredit the independence movement.
Petra @ 13:29,
Read it yesterday, and it didn’t strike me then as evidently anti-semitic. Anti-Cockney, maybe! =laugh=
I have sparred with grousebeater at times here on WoS, but his analysis in this article is perfectly correct. He could have left out the section in defence of unions against fascism and any mention of Hitler, since it was a distraction from the main thrust of his article, but I guess he didn’t want his argument to be seen as an attack on the principle of trade unionism itself.
A neophyte would-be rabble-rouser is publicly exposed in her machinations, it has backfired badly for her, and she is now attempting to retrieve the situation through smear-slinging with the always-ready assistance of the BritNat media. Not a good look.
Yesindyref2 on the twatterstream points to Auntie dislodging an article proclaiming murrrder at a record low in Scotia from the headline after less than an hour.
The ‘news’ that a Union is making a stink about shite on the railtracks is obviously much more newsworthy.
Union. BBC. Where SLAB here ?
In the immortal words of Rolf. ‘can you see what it is yet?’
😉
I guess this / these are the excerpts that have supposedly caused offence.
Well I don’t see it, an impression of ‘anti-Semitism’, at all or am I missing some underlying, obscure meaning? …
”Wolfson’s voice is the stuff of fascist demagoguery.’’
Linking her to Hitlerite ideology, which was anti-Semitic?
In fact if anything it’s just another example of one of Grousebeater’s excellent articles.
What about Tom Gordon publishing this article, in full, to demonstrate that he isn’t biased? That he hasn’t just dug out some anti-Semitic garbage to embarrass Nicola Sturgeon. It would be a real eye-opener for the Herald’s readership, lol.
Looks as though the SNP has jumped the gun and if Grousebeater wants to take anyone to Court I’ll back a crowdfunder.
……………………………..
Grousebeater: ..”Trade unions are a source of cooperation and community. They exist to achieve wage equality. Their function is to protect workers against economic vicissitude. According to fascist policy – which we see arising everywhere in the UK and abroad – unions must be smashed to render workers isolated, prepared to accept whatever is offered.
In Part 1 of Mein Kampf Hitler attacks unions over an over again. Unions are fascism’s Public Enemy Number 1. He went further. He accused ‘The Jew’ of gradually assuming leadership of the trade union movement. Hitler wanted a blindly obedient fighting force loyal only to the national leader of government.
Whether or not Wolfson is intellectually aware of Hitler’s outlook is unknown but she is certainly commendably assiduous in condemning anti-Semitism in the Labour Party, however, Labour’s travails over its alleged anti-Semitism isn’t for this essay.”…
..”Without a conscience, she left many young and old vulnerable for the length of the strike. She lied when she and her colleagues said they had no choice, two months away from the first payments to the women involved. I am sad to say, in her contorted way, Wolfson’s voice is the stuff of fascist demagoguery.”..
https://grousebeater.wordpress.com/2018/10/28/gmb-a-cockney-clique/
……………………………..
Grousebeater: A fulsome defence of the essay’s thesis is here.:
https://peterabell.blog/2018/10/30/crying-wolfson/
Peter Bell’s article is spot on – the GMB union and Ms Rhea used the women of Glasgow to their own political ends otherwise why were N Lanarkshire and Ayrshire not also on strike (they happen to be labour councils and glasgow is snp) had that anything to do with it?
It was the unions and the labour party that stopped the women of Glasgow getting equal pay back in 2006 and tricky dicky’s hands are dirty too, labour spent £2.5m taking them through every court in the land and then to add insult to injury have now cost them 2 days pay. Everyone knows this and yet the unions and labour mps and msps still cost these women more money while grinning and shouting snp baaad.
These women are the salt of the earth and the GMB and the Labour party are shamefaced liars using people for their own political ends. Utterly utterly disgusting.
It’s a tale of two parties.
An elected Labour councillor tries to conduct, in my opinion, a racist orientated poll, no action taken. Not even sure it was reported outside The National.
An unelected possible member of the SNP writes a blog condemning union manipulation, makes newspaper headlines on numerous MSM outlets reporting his suspension.
The same party that found nothing wrong with the racist poll is up in arms about a blogger and working furiously to attach it to SNP with willing co-operation of the media.
The Screaming of The Lambs
The crack shot sniper takes out the tame goat….
The elderly passenger is violently man handled off the plane….
The black woman is sitting in the wrong bus seat….
The blogger calls out ‘Tammany Hall’ politicians/union officials…..
The noisey truth, is not at all deafening….but first it’s twisted,then it’s spun,then it’s dragged into their remote,gravitational media centres,kicked the fuck out of and then they get what they want…the final death rattle and the sound of silence.
Yes, it’s you next,then me,then everyone on their ‘list’.
From the politics of the gutter where these barstards live,they’re snarling at us,to shut the fuck up and then to fuck off…….no,no,no,I say,it would better for Scotland,if they all got back together and nice,if they all just fucked off (remembering to clean their dirty bowls on the way out).
#GetBackInTheSeaYouFinnedCunts
(p.s. if required,my hard earned,is available)
Petra.
Read GB article this morning, I couldn’t find anything anti-Semitic in it. The die-hard Labour news rag the Glasgow Evening Times, saw something that isn’t there.
Their bias headline :Union Organiser Subjected to Online anti-Semitic Attack.
Says it all really about the Scottish media.
@ jfngw says at 2:26 pm ….. ”It’s a tale of two parties. An elected Labour councillor tries to conduct, in my opinion, a racist orientated poll, no action taken. Not even sure it was reported outside The National. An unelected possible member of the SNP writes a blog condemning union manipulation, makes newspaper headlines on numerous MSM outlets reporting his suspension. The same party that found nothing wrong with the racist poll is up in arms about a blogger and working furiously to attach it to SNP with willing co-operation of the media.”
……………………..
Spot on jfngw. What did / does Tom Gordon of the Herald have to say about that? Bl**dy wee, biased hypocrite.
Just waiting to see if the BBC / STV run with this SNP Baad story now? If so, the SNP have erred (well) on the side of caution, and nipped the story in the bud. Not helpful for Grousebeater of course. Far from it.
On a positive note Grousebeater may get to broadcast his story far and wide and if that’s the case it’s thanks to Tom Gordon. The man who won’t spell out the truth about Equal pay cases, Unison or the GMB. The Cockney clique right enough.
……………..
I was having a look through the latest Unison magazine at the weekend and came across their (brilliant) plans / negotiations for NHS workers in England and Wales. At the end of the article, which I can’t find online, they stated that Scottish negotiations are separate from those of England and Wales and that they were advising Scottish NHS employees, via their Scottish lackey’s no doubt, to knock back any offers.
Unison Head office: Office location, 130 Euston Road, London NW1 2AY.
Another Cockney Clique determined to bring Scotland to it’s knees?!
Forgot to add Unison’s online article on the Glasgow Equal pay cases. What they say:
http://www.unison.org.uk/news/article/2018/10/glasgow-equal-pay/
What Susan Aitken has to say:
‘We may not have created the equal pay mess but we WILL solve it.’
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17100084.we-may-not-have-created-the-equal-pay-mess-but-we-will-solve-it/
Not at all happy with suspension of Grousebeater. Anyone who can read, clearly knows it is most definitely not anti semitic nor applying to Wolfson. Class action reqd.
I will reconsider my SNP membership should they screw this up.
Well done Rev in your summation of this tripe.
Off Topic.
Scottish Parliament TV.
Earlier this afternoon.
Derek Mackay,Scottish Government Cabinet Secretary for Finance responds to questions regarding yesterday’s Statement by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
https://tinyurl.com/yajrg9nj
WTF next?
Are SNP MSPs going to have to become “Friends of Israel” like Labour/Tories where that has been a pre-requisite for anyone seeking “high office” for more than 20 years!
SNP have lost the plot on this AND the National’s reporting is abysmal – which is rapidly becoming the norm 🙁
What happens then when any newspaper makes any allegation against say Nicola Sturgeon, John Swinney, Humza Yousaf or any senior member of the SNP?
Should they be immediately suspended because of an allegation? In the case of Grousebeater the allegation of anti-Semitism is categorically untrue to anyone who bothers to read the article.
In this case why the rush to suspension? I just don’t get it, as far as i know from what I’ve read today he is a member of the SNP but holds no office, he is not even an activist out knocking on doors. No doubt he’s like many who joined the party in order to help support them financially/
I think the SNP have jumped the gun before at least having some kind of enquiry if one was felt necessary. He’s a pro-indy blogger, nothing more but it seems that is enough to convict you in the eyes of the media.
The SNP need to be careful how they react to these smears as there could be many more to come in the future. Even a tweet could have you crucified in some eyes it seem.
The administrative types in the SNP who take these knee jerk reactions in my view, are dancing to the tune of the British Nationalist press in this case and that is a mistake.
@ Vestas says at 3:03 pm … ”SNP have lost the plot on this AND the National’s reporting is abysmal – which is rapidly becoming the norm.”
What’s wrong with that article Vestas? Abysmal? As I see it it’s covering all of the facts, who said what, from all sides of the divide. Or would you rather it was one sided like the Herald et al?
Rapidly becoming the norm? It’s the only newspaper that offers key independence supporters a voice, a platform to have their say. Maybe you’d rather we didn’t have it at all, eh?
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17188624.snp-councillor-apologises-for-sharing-controversial-blog/
It would seem that Labour are being reported as going to support the budget, the one that gives £860 for the higher tax payer and £130 to lower tax payers and nothing if you don’t earn enough to pay tax. Truly the party of redistribution.
Is this the same party that in Scotland is demanding higher tax for everyone and an increase in the top rate of tax. Hypocrisy much!
The Scottish budget will be interesting. I would probably support a small increase to the upper rate (£45k) as there is a discrepancy here. This is two people working and having an income of £30k each will pay less tax in that household than if just one works and has a £60k income, looks unfair to me. Just in case anyone thinks I’m feathering my own nest my income is nowhere near £45k.
So….it finally happened huh?
In the world of Yookayyy media, being CRITICAL of Hitler is now considered as being ‘Anti – Semitic’…..!!
The world has finally went completely mad.
re. “British nationalists are “positivist” thinkers”. That’s your academics who support British nationalism, of course, not your Queen’s eleven and associated loyalist bigots. Come to think of it, British nationalism is something of an arcane and illiberal philosophical position, so it’s really only of interest to the more extreme elements of Scottish and English society. Yet the BBC in Scotland swear by the positive virtues of a British nationalism that has never respected democratic pluralism among it’s constituent member nations. That’s progressive positivism for you and it sucks.
Good to see that the English for Yes seems to date back to at least 1314 and possibly Robert the Bruce was the first member, good on him.
Petra @ 15:19,
The article quoted Wolfson supporter and fellow-traveller Neil Findlay MSP as calling it a “vile anti-Semitic blog”, and it doesn’t seem he was in Parliament when he said it.
So are we wearily back in Kezmearland yet again…?
Ms Wolfson is a card carrying Labour party member and as such a unionist. Quite enough to be going on with.
In certain sections of the Israeli media, Scottish nationalism is perceived as unquestioningly pro-Palestinian, similarly the UK Labour party. Tricky waters, demanding expert navigational skills.
Racism and prejudice are in the eye of the beholder and may be used to kill serious discussion.
On occasion I read intemperate remarks about my Catholic faith. Like water off a duck’s back, I have learned to shake it off. My rather mixed Levantine origin ancestry has taught me to be wary of over reaction. Never stick your hand where their might be scorpions.
Donald Anderson has the excellent “Long Letter!” in today’s National!
@ Grouse beater. All the support you need. If you need a fund raiser donation. Just set one up. It seems the only to stop them lying is to sue them. They are just tying to stop people blogging and telling the truth. Labour unionists attempts to hide the truth. The will lie and say anything to hide it. They always get found out. Malicious and dangerous, They are despicable. Sactioning and starving people. Unbelievable.
Record low murrrder rate slipping further down Aunties Scotchland news page.
It’ll be gone tout de suite, unlike the Eck Badman story, which hung around like a nasty smell for weeks.
Framing the bleeding narrative ?
This is another example of political diversion.
I read this article and did not think that it was an anti-semitic attack at all. It referenced at one point, the way in which the Nazis set out to destroy trade unions and at the same time had used their demonization of Jewish people to accuse them of being part of these organizations in an entirely invented conspiracy, allowing them to conflate two imagined enemies as one common danger. Classic black propaganda.
Unfortunately, Rhea Wolfson was mentioned in the article and since she is Jewish and a leading light in a trade union she chose to see it is an attack on her as Jewish, whereas the article was clearly citing this kind of sinister linking as being a Nazi propaganda technique in order to pretend that there was a dark conspiracy in which Jewish people were intrinsically involved. I thought by now everyone knew how this wicked nonsense was used by Hitler and his followers. The article was not endorsing it but condemning it.
Like others, I had no idea that Rhea Wolfson was Jewish until she claimed this criticism of the dishonesty of her GMB union was an anti-semitic slur on her personally. It is of no relevance whether Rhea Wolson is Jewish or not. Those in the GMB hierarchy who misled the women in their equal pay dispute over the years are to blame for this present situation and I don’t think any of them were Jewish, as it wouldn’t have even entered anyone’s head to enquire, since – to repeat – it is IRRELEVANT.
Like many others, I find Jeremy Corbyn a considerable disappointment as leader of the Labour party but I don’t believe for one moment that he is guilty of anti-semitism. These attempts to shut down criticism of an individual because they happen to be Jewish is becoming quite ridiculous and troubling in its own way. It looks as though Ms Wolfson was combing the internet looking for offence, especially if it connected to SNP supporters.
I really don’t know anything about Rhea Wolfson apart from her public profile as a representative of her union and it is the combined actions of those leaders of the GMB past and present, such as Richard Leonard, on which the GMB should be judged. This is just a diversionary smokescreen in which the ever compliant media can be relied on, if the SNP can be accused.
The media obviously think that their reading public can’t actually comprehend what they read.
Bit worrying the Rev has bought a new computer under the branding ‘Deep Silence’, hope he didn’t purchase it from a unionist outlet as it may be a prophecy rather than a selling point.
I no longer read Grousebeater’s stuff, so won’t comment on it.
My comment is to point out a person can discriminate against their own race or creed or whatever.
Just ask Mr Mundell MP, if you don’t believe me.
@Colin Alexander says:
I no longer read Grousebeater’s stuff, so won’t comment on it.
My comment is to point out a person can discriminate against their own race or creed or whatever.
What does that mean?
He never “discriminated” against anyone, he was critical of the GMB in his article. That’s criticism and not discrimination.
Your posts are becoming more deranged by the week.
go to youtube and search for
“its a trick we always use it”
Does anyone see a pattern here?
– Lexo, sex case allegations
– Grousebeater, anti-semitism
– the Rev, homophobe
– nationalists in general, anti-english racism
Our opponents are playing Identity Politics Whack a Mole BINGO – and it works because all the Bella types and BBC Guardian liberals ONLY care about this shit. They know no one reads “in the long” anymore – it’s all soundbite and tweet.
The worst thing about GrouseBoys article is that its a bit puffed up – “make your point and fuck off”. But he said the J-word, which is enough. It is highly effective for the enemy, for with such accusations the target has to flail helplessly, trying to “prove a negative” usually in the process being forced to abase themselves in some humiliating fashion. This is witch-trial and kafka-level stuff.
GrouseBeater – book the tickets to Auschwitz and Yad Vashem now, and submit any future articles to the Board of Deputies for approval.
Mud sticks, and our opponents know it. They also know the SNP operates a “moral high ground” policy which disallows any retaliatory “shit flinging”.
Lets make up plausible shit –
Rhea Wolfson is
an ANTI SCOTTISH RACIST
a LONDON IMPERIALIST
a CLEARANCES-DENIER
a TERF (these days, this is DA-BOMB)
a HOMOPHOBE (GrouseBoy is gay, is he not)
– not saying its true, but can she prove otherwise? Gotcha!
– they can sling utter bollocks, with no consequence, at least immediately. We cannot.
The REVS lawsuit was in retrospect, a brilliant move – “shit got real”, real-fast and now it looks like keza-girl is up shit creek, paddle-less, with no friends. Trouble is for GrouseB, the jewish lobby is not exactly short of lawyers, or money. The SNP, purely on numbers, must have a good few jews around – time for them to step up and rebut these allegations about GrouseBeater (cf a man in the divorce courts should have a FEMALE LAWYER) – it also would not hurt if the jewish members of the nationalist movement spread around the idea that an independent Scotland would be “good for the jews” esp. in New York or LA.
Political debate these days is just a virtue signalling race to the bottom.
Why is everyone so upset about offending the Jews I mean they are killing Palastinian people and stealing their land that is facts that no one can deny so it seems you are not allowed to tell the truth because it may offend the culprits ??? And is Nicola going to visit Palastine with the school children???
Excuse me but *The Jews* aren’t killing anybody, the Israeli government is deciding it’s policies in that regard, the *Jews* don’t decide this, that’s like saying the *British* kill people in wars, well no they don’t, governments decide these things Mr and Mrs Average don’t get a say whatever their religion creed or colour
Re the Grousebeater blog.
I read it and I understand the sentiment.
It most certainly, 100% is not anti Semitic.
However I think it could have been written a bit better and with more awareness about the current feverish climate.
All of us must be thinking ahead of the opposition. There must be some simple rules when engaging in blogs or similar resources.
We must be clever.
Mention Hitler and jews in a piece and you are setting yourself up for being targeted by the Britnat baying hordes.
I believe that part of the piece could have been summarised thus – Simply put, the British State is manipulative, anti democratic and elitist. It is bordering on fascist.
The GMB union overtly supports the British state. The Labour Party overtly supports the British state. Both organisations are guilty of supporting a state that is bordering on fascist.
If you are a member of the GMB or the Labour Party then I would strongly suggest that you closely examine your moral compass, because your are most definitely indulging in behaviour that is most immoral.
ThePNR said: “There was nothing whatsoever anti-Semitic in the article, he’s from a Jewish family himself FFS”.
You could be right that nothing he said is anti-Semitic. But, I wouldn’t know, as I don’t read anything he writes.
But, I take issue with your assertion implying that someone can’t be biased against others of the same persuasion. If someone is Scottish, for example, does not mean that that person cannot be biased against Scots.
A certain Scottish comedian made a career out of doing that very thing.
In England Labours John McDonnell defends and supports Hammonds for the rich budget saying we will not take money out of peoples pockets
Meanwhile here in the colony of Scotland Labours *Sit down Mr Kelly* demands the SNP do the exact opposite
Tories lie and decieve and everybody knows it and they know we know it, but the hypocrisy of the Labour party in its denials of the same practices are jaw droppingly staggering
@ Robert J. Sutherland says at 3:55 pm … ”Petra – ”The article quoted Wolfson supporter and fellow-traveller Neil Findlay MSP as calling it a “vile anti-Semitic blog”, and it doesn’t seem he was in Parliament when he said it. So are we wearily back in Kezmearland yet again…?”
Well maybe Grousebeater should save himself some money and go after Neil Findlay. Take him to Court for defamation of character. I doubt the Labour Party or the Daily Rag will support HIM financially, lol.
“But, I take issue with your assertion implying that someone can’t be biased against others of the same persuasion.”
“MY assertion” what are you on about you fruitloop?
As I said, your posts are becoming more deranged by the hour now.
Dr jim, macart,jack collatin, love your absolutely spot on posts.
With regards to the latest ‘anti-semitic scandal’ the SNP are no different from any other centre-left party inasmuch as they are petrified of the toxic power of zionist influence to the point of suspending members for saying ‘jew’.
The independence movement will be easily fractured if this contagion continues.
Latest SNP bad: private enterprise fails to deliver upgraded Scotrail trains on time – all the SNP’s fault. US owned WABTEC have only managed to fit toilet tank to one train required for December timetable upgrade. “We don’t wish to comment ” says incompetent private sector WABTEC. RMT union says “Scots Govt must act” – presumeably by cancelling timetable upgrade. This becomes the next SNP bad.
The private sector favoured by Tory loons has a track record of incompetence. Curved windows were an issue in 1960’s for Clacton electric trains – had to be changed – Hitachi totally unaware it might be an issue – again all the SNP’s fault.
It is certainly a pity that the Zionist lobby have become so skilled at manipulating western society’s collective guilt about the Holocaust. Otherwise, the Palestinian people might be able to look forwards to a day when their human rights are respected by an Israeli state that shames the Jewish faith.
DEALING WITH COLLECTIVE SHAME AND GUILT
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/689c/f7c2e80c7dc0d874ca7c96d290a22828455b.pdf
Blair Paterson
Loose talk causes defamation lawyers to smile
Dr Jim @ 16:39,
Giving Goose @ 16:43,
Both very well said there.
If the holes in your cunning plans are showing and you have nothing better to offer, there’s always mud-slinging, so best not to give the Labourites any openings on that front.
(Unless you intend to entrap them with their own words, a’course… =grin=)
First they came for the bloggers – and I did not speak out because I was not a blogger….
@Colin Alexander
You don’t bother to read them either but comment on them anyway.
Bit wound up today, should know better. Signing off for now.
http://archive.is/rpJ7M The linked article was doing the rounds at the weekend, pretty much about the young c=Corbynista stars of momentum, Rhea Wolfson was one of those interviewed
Social media is an absolute minefield between the insanity of the debate over gender identity, the hijacking of the equal pay dispute and this recent accusation of antisemitism.
Now it appears that to be an SNP member you have to be absolutely pure of thought, word and deed. I’m not sure many of us can aspire to such standards as decreed by the Daily Record for one. I wish the SNP hierarchy would start defending its members, or at least listening to their side of things, instead of throwing them under the bus every time a political opponent says so.
I have wondered why ex-spin doctors and members acted like spurned lovers after they left the SNP and maybe this is why. The ruthlessness by which they throw people to the wolves – no pun intended – indicates loyalty goes one way only. I wonder how long that will be tolerated by newer members? I understand the desire to be better than your opponents and to go high when they go low etc but it is becoming ridiculous. McCarthyism is taking hold in political discourse.
How can debate take place under these claustrophobic and restrictive conditions?
Petra says:
30 October, 2018 at 1:23 pm
@ Bob …..”Willie’s antique gun.”
Thanks for the reply Bob, however I’m still trying to find some reference to this gun. For example, who said it was Willie’s gun? Family members? Had some of his friend’s seen it previously? Did Willie mention having such an antique gun or was it just reported by the “authorities” as being his gun?
His ow brother mentioned that he had a .22 revolver of this kind, but that doesnt mean he had it on him at the time, a good balanced blog regarding Willie Macrae is here, I have yet to finish it all but will give you the link http://calumcarr.blogspot.com/2014/12/willie-macrae-part-1-introduction.html
Netenyahu is one of the most radical leaders Israel has ever had. How did he get eldcted? The answer is of course that enough Israeli citizens picked him to lead the country.
They know as well as we do what is happening in Gaza and the West Bank. That is just not right, unless you approve of it.
It seems a funny thing to claim that condemning such abuse and intolerance of a people, by stealing their ever shrinking land and killing their demonstrators indiscriminately is anti semitic, but that’s where we’re heading.
Did we let that happen in Rwanda or the Baltic? Why are we sitting here doing nothing about a genocide by an ally?
Israel can be criticised. Israeli politicians can be criticised Those who vote to enable it can be criticised. Those who watch it on their TV screens and do nothing can be criticised. Just not in the Western Press!!!!
Hypocrisy stinks. So do the bodies of dead Palestinians, who are doing nothing more than to try and keep their land and families going whilst repressed by a military state. Palestine is no direct threat to Israel. Ask yourselves what you would do if you were in their shoes.
I too sign off for the night. Very angry indeed.
Dave Robb @ 17:09,
Well, it’s a truism that any government in power, no matter how astute, eventually accrues damage due to “sh*t happening” and decisions taken for the greater good that impinge on someone or other’s interest.
Until some point is reached when voters turn to someone else in the hope that “a change is better than a rest”.
It is a measure of the high quality of the SG that they have largely managed to resist this inevitable decay process, despite the BritNat coalition’s increasingly feverish and utterly cynical attempts to hasten the damage. (Not least in part because there’s enough sensible people around who can recognise the truly pathetic alternative on offer.)
Nevertheless, good governance is a depreciating asset. That is the fundamental problem with a strategy that is too heavily dependent on it and its wan handmaid, “mitigation”.
Which is why time isn’t necessarily entirely on our side.
It’s only possible to be bamboozled if you are uncertain of the topic of debate.
Sex is not the same as gender. It is not possible to change sex but it is possible to choose gender.
Zionism is not the same as Judaism. The contemporary political form of Zionism is illiberal in nature and makes use of religious essentialism to further it’s aims.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/constructive-controversy/201602/assessing-the-constructiveness-political-discourse
Methodological Approaches in Political Psychology: Discourse and Narrative
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-137-29118-9_5
“Emotion and cognition in political communication”
https://www.uio.no/english/research/interfaculty-research-areas/democracy/news-and-events/events/conferences/2012/papers-2012/Jamtoey.-wshop1pdf.pdf
ScottishPsyche
Some people are more concerned with looking concerned to notice they’re being played like a Stradivarius.
The Grousebeater/Wolfson issue is just another example of the madness that says
I am Jewish.
By definition, any criticism of anything I do is an example of anti-Semitism.
To which the only sensible reply is to say
Feck off!
Otherwise Son Of Sam would still be out there having conversations with his dog
http://archive.is/1IOxQ
Read the article don’t see anything wrong with it.
You have to proceed with caution as the Regime and its agents in the MSM and the unions are ready to pounce on any pro independence folk regardless if the pounce is justified.
I would try to avoid using references to Adolf when making a point for the reasons above.
Was the article anti Semitic? No.
The SNP should not lie down to these sort of attacks they should be big enough to defend their supporters in such circumstances especially when the complaint is clearly nonsense.
However hats off to the British Nationalist unionists for creating a little split in the Scottish patriots ranks someone will be well rewarded for that one.
The attack also nicely takes the focus away from the conduct of the unions and British Nationalist Labour towards the Glasgow City Council staff.
We must expect further attacks on us along the same lines as they slowly lose their thieving grip on Scotland.
Despite many being disappointed at the SNP reaction, myself included, talk of leaving the party plays into the hands of only one group of anti Scottish types, the Westminster regime.
I read the Grousebeater article yesterday. I thought the references to Hitler and the Jews were unnecessary. He made the point very well without any need for it i.e. that fascists hate Trade Unions or any power structure that they don’t control. However, I did not think his article was anti-semitic. Quite the opposite in fact.
The SNP has no choice but suspend a member who has so publicly been accused of anti-semitism. Once they have investigated this, I would expect Grousebeater to be reinstated and supported if he chooses to sue the people who have defamed him.
Until some clarity prevails, the less we discuss an individual case the better IMO.
we have to be really careful here…
Divide and rule is afoot.
We have made and read many postings suggesting that the women of Glasgow and Teachers have been used as an anti SNP bashing tool.
That may or may to be true but how we handle it is crucial.
If the women of Glasgow have been duped they will feel angry but also sheepish, especially if they are SNP supporting YES voters and they won’t thank us for rubbing their noses in it and calling them ignoramuses.
If the teachers have been used to ostensibly political reasons they too will be angry.
so GCC female workers and teachers add up to 70,000 + people who are angry and may not vote for SNP at the next election.
Somehow we have to get the truth out and inform them of the facts as apolitically as possible and turn this away from SNP Baad – but the bottom line is this:
The Glasgow women have been waiting a long time for their money – They are frustrated.
How can we ensure that money gets to them asap and that they know who is providing it; likewise can’t imagine teachers will get 10% of a pay rise but they also need to know the truth.
This attack now on Grousebeater is a rerun of the accusations against the Rev and Craig Murray and is an hysterical attempt to silence them.
Anyway, back to the serious business noo:
When’s the final Brexit settlement / no settlement?
When’s indyref?
If a GE is called will the SNP yet again run away from independence, preferring to run the Westminster / devolution scam for another 5 years or more?
FFS Misreporting Scotland incredolous that Scotrail is temporary planning to drop shite directly onto the Track. No mention that this is standard operating procedure in many places including England. Remember watching a documentary about East Coast a couple of years ago , when the trains went into the Maint depot in Edinburgh first job was to power wash the thick encrusted crap from underneath every carriage. Thats why you see signs not to flush toilets in stations. As an aside once I was travelling first class from Budapest in Hungary to Oradia in Northern Romania. In the first class toilets was the standard seat which we have in our homes but there was a straight through pipe exiting towards the track which you could see passing underneath, I thought I would check what the facilities were like in 2nd Class , well that was just a hole in the carriage floor ? so just another attemptbat Scotrail bad with no context.
I see Severin Carroll jumping to Labour’s defence online. I actually had forgotten he existed. It must be the most overpaid job in the industry, Guardian Scottish Editor, how many hundreds/thousands of pounds does he receive per reader. If I was the Guardian owner and wanted to save money, cut the Scottish content as hardly anybody reads it anymore.
I used to frequent the site and bought the Observer for around 40 years, Mr Carroll soon put a stop to that. Also it had become quite a poor publication, overpriced for the content, most of the decent contributors left some time ago.
Christ on a bike somebody mentions the word Jew and the usual suspects pile in with nonsense
Did we not deal with this pretty clearly on a worldwide basis every person who has a religion or a belief or a creed does not in any shape or form represent the governments of countries they might not even live in otherwise let’s be fair we should be wiping out the whole bloody white race who did most of the damage to everybody round the world at one time or another in the name of christianity
Everywhere the white man has ever gone he kills everybody then says it was all a mistake and we’re really sorry we did such terrible things, where’s the oil? the land? the gold? the diamonds? Ooops!
Are we responsible for Tony Blair Margaret Thatcher or anybody else deciding their power madness required them to annihilate people
Of course we’re not, leave this stuff to the Tories and Labour ideology of the Great Powerdom of the we are right mob
@Capella
Your response demonstrates it is possible to criticise the article without hysteria.
I fear we are living in times where lessons of the past are being ignored for fear of offending people who should know better.
I have never known a time where rational people are so reluctant to speak out. For example, I have colleagues in the medical profession who are genuinely afraid to speak about the gender debate in case they are labelled transphobes and their lives are ruined. Psychiatry, in particular, is subject to the sociological trends and politics of the day and the past shows us it can be used for some very dark purposes.
Clear heads and open, honest discussion is essential to avoid distortion and manipulation of the facts. If any party is afraid of this then they deserve to lose support.
@ Wullie at 5:45pm …. “Willie MacRae.”
Thanks for your reply and the link Wullie. I’ll take a look at it later.
…………………..
@ Capella at 6:20pm …… “Grousebeater.”
Spot on Capella and I didn’t think that the article was anti-Semitic either, far from it, however there seems to be some inference that she, Wolfson, may be / is a fascist. Did that not bother her? Not good enough to make a hoo-ha about?
Don’t worry folks we’ll be out of this h*llhole before we know it.
I’ve just come away from Twitter. It’s fuckin pandemonium.
It seems to have missed the attention of many that BBC Radio Scotland ‘named’ Grouse Beater on their 5.30 news. As many of us know, he has maintained his anonymity for years, and with good reason. That has now gone.
(We should also remember that he was once a senior BBC executive.)
🙁
Interesting quote from Rev on his twit thing, which I totally endorse (and the couple below earlier):
“I care about what people say and think and do, not who or what they are. And that position is becoming unsustainable.”
Too many taking offence where none was intended, or at least, in the case of GB, not in that way!
Not a good day for the SNP, some of their elected members tweets are verging on the unacceptable. One basically inferring that if those that don’t find the grousebeater blog anti-Semitic and anti-English then they are basically anti-Semitic or anti-English (possibly both) and should not be in the party.
There is a difference between discipline and thought control.
David Daiches, whose father was a Rabbi in Edinburgh, maintained that Scotland was the only country in Europe where the Jews were never persecuted. Good writer, read his stuff!
From the Telegraph …. “Brexit will free the UK to intensify its crackdown on dirty money sloshing through the City of London because the authorities will no longer have to win the approval of the rest of the EU. “ … most of the rest behind the paywall.
Perhaps the plan is to funnel more into dodgy political campaigns promoting the far right agenda.
@ Ian at 7:31pm ….. “GB.”
Tom Gordon, of the Herald, “named” GB too and his wife. Also included a photograph of GB and some data on his wife.
I cannot believe for the life of me that all this anti-semite pish has taken root in Scotland. No coincidence that a group of 15 Scottish Tories or so went touring “Occupied Palestine” a couple of years ago – I wonder had they any to do with the push to take action. Get the SNP at all costs seems to be the mantra.
Am I anti-semitic? No, not by any means but I do struggle to understand just how a country of 8.5 million can have so much influence over the USA.
I do struggle to understand how a “religion” that has around 14.5 million followers has managed to accumulate so much wealth and power. Tv, media, banking, diamonds, gold – all controlled by members of this small community. Murdoch, Maxwell, Goldman Sachs, Goldstein all spring to mind.
I do struggle to understand just how we have a situation where a foreign country can have some 240 blue tory MPs and 60 red Tory MPs as members of their “xxxx Friends of israel”. 50% of MP’S in Westminster are actually members of a fricking Lobby group on behalf of a terrorist state ! They actively have been trying to infiltrate the youth wing of the Red Tories for some years now.
And this self same minor religious group and their buddies in the MSM seem to be behind a well co-ordinated plan to keep the Tories and their rich pals in power by repeatedly attacking Corbyn about anti-semitism every time he creeps ahead in the polls.
@Petra –
Thanks, I didn’t know that.
Don’t know if you’re on Twitter but I’ve never seen it like this before – huge support for a crowdfunder for GB to sue abody and some real nasty stuff getting flung around (I daren’t even name some of the culprits for fear of inflaming it further).
So far I haven’t seen a recognisable WOS name having a go at GB and I hope to god it doesn’t spill over here.
Nothing to struggle about al (dossary). Its as you said,all about the MONEY.
Ian Brotherhood wrote on 30 October, 2018 at 7:31 pm:
“It seems to have missed the attention of many that BBC Radio Scotland ‘named’ Grouse Beater on their 5.30 news. As many of us know, he has maintained his anonymity for years, and with good reason. That has now gone.(We should also remember that he was once a senior BBC executive.)”
And just for the record the BBC in Scotland teletext service has also named him. I came on here to make that very point and seen IB’s post.
Also see several people referring to contributing to a crowdfunder if Grouse wants to take legal action. Count me in on that too if it happens.
Stoker. Same as.
@Ian Brotherhood “So far I haven’t seen a recognisable WOS name having a go at GB and I hope to god it doesn’t spill over here.”
Ian, Wingers can read and make our own minds up. Unlike much of the rest of the world.
I read it last night, read the comments, re-read it and took my time. I agree with another comment, Capella I think, it wasn’t really needed and didn’t tie up too well, but it wasn’t anti-semitic in the slightest.
I suspect those in the SNP who condemn it need remedial reading lessons.
I feel very angry today, especially since just the other night I listened to an old man describe his miserable life in a Ghetto in Poland prior to deportation to a death camp.
He described people being enclosed by force and cut off from medical and food supplies. If they tried to leave or smuggle food or medecines they would be shot on sight. Their possessions were removed on a whim, and their old houses occupied by German families. He described the utter inhumanity of it all. Yet, the same rules the Israeli government now apply to Palestinians and nobody is taking any notice.
I will defend any Israeli who condemns these practices. I will condemn those who do not.
Grousey was posting a warning from history, but this time the victims have become the perpetrators.
What a world.
@Al Dossary says: 30 October, 2018 at 8:15 pm:
” … Am I anti-semitic? No, not by any means but I do struggle to understand just how a country of 8.5 million can have so much influence over the USA.”
Then you really need to read up on your post WWII History and discover how Israel was created and by who. Pre-WWII the Jews were known as, “The Wandering Jews”. They were a religion, and a people without a country of their own. Also refer to the Bible that claims to describe the reason they were stateless.
The winners of WWII decided that there would be a country called Israel but to create it someone else had to be driven out. They are still fighting to get their land back today.
Go figure who it was that financed the ships and funded the infrastructure to create the new land of Israel?
Exciting finale tonight. The Great British Rake Off.
The winner, surprisingly (not), as leaked on many occasions over the past 10 years, was the grasping, corrupt ruling elite who caused the financial crisis in the first place, but who profited from it at the expense of the stupid (read, honest) people.
Neil Findlay is an odious twat, I would chip in for that!
Thank my lucky stars I don’t “do” Twitter. That echo chamber doesn’t seem to get us anywhere, it just generates lots of heat without much light.
I mean, does anyone – GB included – give a toss about the supposed religion – even if she has one – of Rhea Wolfson?
But we do give a hell of a toss about the politics and deliberate troublemaking of her and her chums in NorthBritLab and the GMB. The hypocrites who are not only exploiting these women workers but are the former preachers, in tune with Rude Gal, of all those high-minded warnings about “divisiveness”.
We had better though not turn this into a debate on the unrighteous politics of the State of Israel. That will not help.
@Robert J Sutherland,
Who the devil do you think is persecuting the Palestinians?
Has Israel imported Lithuanian troops and navy and air force to shoot Palestinians?
Are Israeli politicians now Belgian?
Are Israeli police now French?
If you criticise any of the above,you are indeed expressing anti semitic views, but that is inevitable in this case,because they are Israelis.
During WW2, Eisenhauer ordered every German citizen to walk in the death camps next to their town and to remove bodies. He refused to believe they did not know what was happening just down the road.
He knew you cannot separate State from people, because the State cannot exist without the will of the people.
To criticise the government chosen by the people can only be anti semitic.
Ken500 says:
29 October, 2018 at 8:04 pm
“Thatcher privatised utilities.”
Thatcher managed to do the harm she did only because of your beloved First Past The Post system which you are hell bent on bringing to the Scottish parliament.
The Tories never had much more than 40% of the vote but Thatcher was able to run riot because of the undemocratic First Past The Post system.
Colin Alexander says:
30 October, 2018 at 6:33 pm
“When’s indyref?”
In 622 years’ time.
I wonder if any of the clueless pompous armchair pundits posting here has the guts to suggest an earlier date.
The trouble with feeding the Labour monster with suspensions is that it is insatiable, they will demand another suspension for anyone who doesn’t fall into line with their agenda. It is no different from the 1950’s McCathyism, a form of exclusion for those that oppose their thoughts.
In Scotland the majority of the media will fall into line with whatever the latest Labour party outing will be. I have lost count of the number of SNP people outed by the unbiased Scottish media, often taken to task on our screens having committed no offence, beyond a belief in an independent Scotland.
Palestine/Israel debate.
It is like discussing Northern Ireland. Do you ignore the role of the British Empire. Do you start at a particular outrage ( who did what to who first).
I do not think it as simple as some posters suggest.
Had I suffered the the events of the final solution would it have shaped my politics – Yes. Had I faced the attack by six Arab nations on the day my nation was announced would it have shaped my politics – Yes.
Had I endured the isolation and attacks on my nation as a Palestinian would it have shaped my politics – Yes.
….and on and on!
We need practical politics and not to pick sides and throw rocks. I know a lot of people will not agree with me but I am not defending Israel just suggesting we look at history.
In comparison I detest the DUP but I cannot ignore the plantation or the rights of those descendants to live there. I cannot ignore the attempt to solve “the Irish problem” but does that justify bombing civilians….or do we go back to the period of the Black and Tans.
Do you know where the term “beyond the pale” comes from. Have you read about Cromwell and Ireland?
I chose not to wave the flag of Palestine but I do not wave the flag of Israel either.
Now you can abuse me!
@Robert J. Sutherland says: 30 October, 2018 at 8:51 pm:
” … We had better though not turn this into a debate on the unrighteous politics of the State of Israel. That will not help.”
That is about the right of it, Robert. You do not calm a storm in a teacup by stirring the tea, you simply set the cup down and the storm calms down and the tea cools.
We all know that this is a trumped up story and is best ignored. However, after the several other trumped up charges the unionists and their tame propagandists have stirred up and caused trouble for the SG/SNP I can see why they do not attempt to get involved in a cat-fight.
In any case, when the story fails to prove the person guilty of anything, the public see the unionist mob for what they are and the movement for indy gains a few more supporters.[
The Labour unionists cause the trouble and then play the victim. They will suffer at the Ballot Box. How low can they go. Trouble stirrers.
Imagine Grouse Beater bring suspended that is disgusting, A total miscarriage of justice. He had better be re instated soon. Along with Alex Salmond.
Everyone is raging.
@Clootie, How can you put forward a practical solution when you cannot be allowed to debate the actions of one side of the problem?
How do you separate State from people?
Last year in Tel Aviv (population 427,000), 300 Israelis took to the streets to protest about their governments treatment of Palestinians. They were heckled and abused all the way by their fellow Israelis. Israel is expanding and a majority of Israelis agree with that expansion no matter what the cost.
Is it anti semitic to criticise that majority? Yes it is.
Breaking News from Holyrood:-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbxeaaORCx4
O/T
Interesting article in the Guardian. The police in England and Wales are upset by funding cuts and the effect on their pensions and the effects they are having on their ability to do the job.
http://archive.is/Bsigv
Re ‘Friends’ of Israel
Is accepting $$$ for favour really friendship?
I’m fairly sure a few of all those ‘friends’ have been shown the incriminating evidence.
Facing tangible existential threats isn’t a get out of jail free card btwb
@Bob Mack
I’ll try again!
It is not wrong to criticise. It is wrong to ignore the fear that created the mindset that shaped Israel.
Try to picture a survival after WW11 and the escape to a “save place” only to find that every nation surrounding you promised to wipe you off the face off theEarth and a British Government who prevented any weapons coming in to protect your people.
I can picture the outrage of the Palestinians treated as outcasts in their own country and effectively contained in a concentration camp.
I repeat – I do not attempt to justify the behaviour if the Israeli Government. I merely suggested that we need to understand what shaped it in order to move forward.
#Rock @ 9:37pm
In 2013 when this was written the UK was in the EU,
https://www.gov.scot/Publications/2013/11/5894/14
“Scotland in the European Union”
“Annex 5 – Scotland’s transition to EU membership”
says
“Article 49 TEU provides the legal basis, and defines the procedure, for a conventional enlargement where the candidate country is seeking membership from outside the EU. By virtue of having joined the EU in 1973 this is not the starting position from which the Scottish Government will be pursuing independent EU membership. In that sense, Article 49 does not appear to be the appropriate legal base on which to facilitate Scotland’s transition to full EU membership. Accordingly, and insofar as the applicability of Article 49 is restricted to countries seeking EU membership from outside the EU, the Scottish Government does not regard this to be the appropriate Treaty provision to address Scotland’s prospective circumstances.”
When the UK leaves all of its EU treaties at the end of March 2019 there will be a ‘transitional arrangement’ that will keep the UK in the EU until the end of December 2020′
Article 50 part 5 says
“5. If a State which has withdrawn from the Union asks to rejoin, its request shall be subject to the procedure referred to in Article 49.”
It will take until 2020 for all the powers under the Scotland Act to be implemented. It will make Holyrood responsible for raising around 52% of what it spends.
Coming out of the EU VAT regime and devolving VAT to Scotland will raise that to 60%.
The date of the Scottish referendum on independence will be in 2019.
I am never (or have never been) critical of the SNP on public platforms (united front and all that) but, they have disappointed me today. It’s one thing to be nice but, another thing entirely to be walked all over.
This reactionary behaviour regarding the suspension of GB is becoming an all too recurrent theme. The British MSM say jump and the SNP appear to say – how high? AS and GB are the latest casualties but, I fear that the tactic will be used again and again as it appears to be producing results.
You don’t see the Tories or Labour suspending their members despite the repugnant nature of some their behaviour and actions. They get sent on awareness courses or their behaviour is largely overlooked until the heat dies down.
The SNP are obviously held to different standards in UK politics but, they should stop capitulating so easily to media pressure in order to preserve this “squeaky clean” image. They need to roll up their sleeves, take the gloves off, get in amongst it and fight back.
At the very least stop suspending members until a basic preliminary investigation has taken place that gives a broader overview of the realities of the situation. This knee jerk response to Britnat hysteria makes the SNP look weak and they would command more respect by standing up for their members and tackling it head on.
They will always get my vote until we are an independent nation and it troubles me to even have to be critical of them over this as they do an otherwise excellent job of governing Scotland.
They have got to be prepared to start fighting dirty now though. The media are going to be hostile no matter what so there is nothing to lose by taking a “gloves off” approach and fighting back.
I think, there are too many divisive distractions around.
It’s Independence, Independence, Independence!
Won’t be long now.
Yay!
William Wallace, @10,45 very well said my thoughts entirely.
Ken500 says:
30 October, 2018 at 10:01 pm
“Imagine Grouse Beater bring suspended that is disgusting, A total miscarriage of justice. He had better be re instated soon. Along with Alex Salmond.”
Who has suspended Grouse Beater? The SNP.
Are you suggesting that the SNP has carried out “a total miscarriage of justice”?
Surely according to you and Robert Peffers, the SNP never ever do anything wrong?
When is the gutless Nicola, who stood “shoulder to shoulder” with “Tory scum” Saint Theresa and the “ghastly” Boris Johnson as they declared war on Russia after a false flag operation, going to call an independence referendum?
@Clootie,
There again we have the problem. You actually can’t differentiate between government and people. The people chose the government knowing what they represented. They voted for Netenyahu and his ultra right policies. So again I ask what is the dividing line?
mr thms says:
30 October, 2018 at 10:36 pm
“The date of the Scottish referendum on independence will be in 2019.”
Thank you for posting your opinion, unlike the gutless clueless pompous armchair pundits posting here.
Do you believe Nicola should hold an independence referendum before Brexit has been completed (March 2019) or should she wait until Brexit has been completed and the UK is out of the EU?
William Wallace @ 10.45
My thoughts exactly.
Can anyone find a link to today’s Drivetime on Radio Scotland?
Have just checked the site and can’t find it. I want to check the actual broadcast of the 5.30 news.
Humanitarian problems require political solutions. The world isn’t doing enough to support those who can bring about a peaceful solution to this conflict. Which reflects a dearth of gifted world leaders.
‘UK aid programmes should always be developed in meaningful consultation with the Palestinian communities they seek to serve. British Parliamentarians should be supported to enter Gaza to assess the situation for themselves and provide democratic oversight of the UK’s aid spending.
Ultimately there are no humanitarian solutions to political problems. The UK’s aid programmes are not matched by adequate political will to address the root causes of the needs they seek to address. The unlawful closure is just one symptom of a chronic, global failure to ensure adherence to international humanitarian and human rights law in Israel’s 51-year military occupation of Palestinian territory.
When an opportunity to pursue accountability was presented in May this year – in the form of a UN Human Rights Council vote to establish an independent Commission of Inquiry to investigate violations of international law in the context of the protests since 30 March – the UK abstained’
https://www.map.org.uk/news/archive/post/921-new-map-fact-sheet-addressing-gazas-humanitarian-emergency?
Some thoughts on the matter from Jeff Halper and ICAHD, who advocate and lead by example for an achievable peace.
‘The issue is really not anti-semitism at all (in fact, anti-semitism has always been endemic in the Conservative, not the Labour Party). It has to do with a world-wide Israeli campaign to get governments to adopt a definition of anti-semitism that define it as any criticism of Israel’
https://icahd.org/2018/08/30/a-focused-well-financed-global-campaign-of-subterfuge-and-subversion-of-liberal-forces/
‘Attempting to suffocate criticism of Israel at a time when Netanyahu’s Government celebrates the passing of the notorious and overtly racist Nationality Law – and launches an unprecedented attack against its own Palestinian citizens and Jewish human right activists in and outside Israel – is no less than dangerous. It is dangerous to Israelis, to Palestinians, and in fact to Jews in the UK, and in Europe’
https://icahd.org/2018/08/29/icahd-uks-statement-regarding-rabbi-jonathan-sacks-attack-on-labour-leader-jeremy-corbyn/
‘After three days of building in the Jordan Valley, the ICAHD camp has moved on to help Palestinians with olive picking, which we are doing with the Israeli organization Torat Tzedek and our Palestinian partners. This is harvest time, it is crucial to get the olives in before the rains, but Palestinian farmers face shortages in hands to pick the olives plus severe harassment and violence on the part of settlers and the Israeli army as one.
But we did hard and major work on the community center, making the bricks, setting the foundation, and building about half the enclosing wall. The Jordan Valley Solidarity group will continue the building, funded by ICAHD.
Starting tomorrow the group begins their study tour, four days of traveling throughout the country, from Bethlehem to Jaffa, Ramallah to the Negev/Naqab, Hebron to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, in which they will be meeting with a wide variety of Palestinian and Israeli activists’
https://www.facebook.com/ICAHDUK/posts/2026107477449735
@ Ian Brotherhood – do you mean Newsdrive on R Scotland?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0000wy0
Grouse Beater has been caught out spreading fake news in the past:
Grouse Beater (2nd July 2016 – “All things are relative”):
“An EC commissioner states:
“Discussions on transitional arrangements for an indy Scotland to remain in the EU after the UK leaves – are indeed taking place in Brussels.””
Rock (2nd July 2016 – “All things are relative”):
“Any idea which EU commissioner STATED that?
And the media in which the quoted statement was reported?”
Grouse Beater (2nd July 2016 – “All things are relative”):
“Yes. But you can do your own homework.”
Rock (2nd July 2016 – “All things are relative”):
“Do I do a google search on “unnamed source “STATED” something” in unnamed media”?”
Rock (2nd July 2016 – “All things are relative”):
“There is absolutely no way a NAMED EU commissioner would have STATED that.
Prove me wrong by naming the Commissioner who said it and in which media it was reported.
Your credibility is stake.”
Grouse Beater (2nd July 2016 – “All things are relative”):
“No one here is answerable to you, a discredited troll. You know what you can do with your trolling and bullying. Only check first for a dead squirrel blocking it.”
Rock (2nd July 2016 – “All things are relative”):
“You have been caught out LYING, so you resort to personal abuse.”
William Wallace says:
30 October, 2018 at 10:45 pm
“They will always get my vote until we are an independent nation and it troubles me to even have to be critical of them over this as they do an otherwise excellent job of governing Scotland.”
Their “excellent job” in protecting the British Nationalist elderly, the selfish middle classes and English settlers from Tory austerity gives the latter the best of both worlds, making them even less likely to vote for independence.
In my opinion, the winnable are the working class and the poor. Those are the ones who should be treated with care and respect by Yes campaigners as well as the SNP government, in word and in action.
@Capella –
That’s the one, many thanks.
Unfortunately, I can’t access it because it wants me to register etc and as a non-licence holder I daren’t.
It’s just the 5.30 news I want to check. That’s when, I think, they revealed Grouse Beater’s real name, but the report itself managed to work in a qoute from Mein Kampf and a casual listener may have surmised that the words were GB’s own. I want to check the context, get a transcription if possible. Is anyone able to do that? Or at least listen to it to see if it was a fair representation of what he actually wrote?
@Bob Mack
…so why do people elect a Tory a Government knowing what they stand for?
Why did people elect Trump knowing what he stands for?
I could go on!
If fear drives you then you become isolationist.
Your judgement appears to be based on NOW. I am suggesting that you cannot ignore what shaped that behaviour – people and government.
I have never seen a political settlement come from digging in on the arguement. If we apply the logic of your outline then all the people of this island are fully responsible for every atrocity in Ireland.
@William Wallace
This is one reason I didn’t renew my SNP membership last year, I’m non-aligned, I’m outisde the SNP, if I do anything it doesn’t reflect on the SNP. If I launch into a tirade against the SNP or any high heidyin, it’s not a split in the SNP ranks. And if I accidentally went homophobic, sexist, racist, sectarian, there’s so many these days I lose count, it can’t reflect on the SNP because I am not a member.
The other thing it means is that as a non-cultist I can actually defend the SNP better, and strangely enough, though GB is “one of ours”, I do defend them on this. Same as Alex Salmond, and I bunged ten quid of hard-earned into his fund.
The corollary of that is if I was involved in any controversy as a member, I would beg the SNP to suspend me immediately, without any need of explanation. What they are doing is way more important than little old me.
The SNP can not afford any distractions at the moment, anything could happen any time. And in answer to Rock upstream there, I’m still sticking, in spite of the Brexit messing around and date sliding and all that stuff, with 14th March 2019 for Indy Ref 2.
It’s a Thursday 🙂
William Wallace says:
30 October, 2018 at 10:45 pm
“They need to roll up their sleeves, take the gloves off, get in amongst it and fight back.”
That should have happened the day after the Brexit result was known. Now it is too late.
Rock (27th August 2017 – “Underneath the Goodyear blimp”):
“Scotland was on the verge of independence immediately after the Brexit vote.
The unionist parties were without leaders and completely lost, the SNP had 56 out of 59 MPs and 50% of the vote, the EU’s eyes were (favourably) on Scotland.
But Nicola squandered a once in a 1000 years golden opportunity by wasting more than a year flogging a dead horse – a separate deal for Scotland which was never going to happen.
The result: Nicola outsmarted by the collusion between Saints Theresa and Ruth on one hand, and Corbyn on the other, fall in SNP support from 50% to 37%.
It is my prediction that there will be a “snap” Brexit and the SNP will be caught napping and unable to hold a second independence referendum.
Or another “snap” Westminster election with the SNP again losing support.
Despite the pretendy “sovereignty” and boasting of the clueless pompous armchair pundits posting here, Scotland is again as far away from independence as ever.
If they succeed in neutralising the Rev. Stuart Campbell and WOS, independence will be “stone dead” for at least 620 years.”
@Ian Brotherhood
Is it no called NEWSDRIVE?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0000wy0 login and listen for those that are registered.
@ Ian Brotherhood – understood. I registered though I’m not a licence payer. It is just a matter of giving an email address if I remember correctly. It is quite legal to listen to radio without a licence. They know where we all are anyway!
But I’ll take a listen about the 5.30 mark and see what is said and post back. Unfortunately, I can’t do clips.
yesindyref2 says:
30 October, 2018 at 11:37 pm
“And in answer to Rock upstream there, I’m still sticking, in spite of the Brexit messing around and date sliding and all that stuff, with 14th March 2019 for Indy Ref 2.”
Still sticking?
You have never had the guts to state that before.
Prove me wrong by giving reference to the WOS article comments in which you first stated 14th March 2019 as a possible date for Indy Ref 2.
As for the rest of your comment, what a load of waffle.
@Rock “Thank you for posting your opinion, unlike the gutless clueless pompous armchair pundits posting here.”
This is one of the most ignorant and uninformed and uneducated posting I’ve seen in my puff.
1). Armchair couch potatoes would love to be gutless, rather than having it hanging over their pants for lack of exercise.
2). Some of the pundits actually m ake up crosswords so are hardly clueless!
3). There is nothing wrong with not wearing a uniform.
4). Pompous – we ARE all grand, solemn, and importantant, and since we know ourselves well, that makes us self-important.
and finally, have you ever tried posting from scratch rather than your database generated repetitive nonsense, long interesting postings from – the depths of an armchair? Really? The only sensible way to do it is at a desk or table, with a stool, chair or swivel chair.
Such ignorance of effective digit manipulation knows no bounds.
@Clootie,
Would you like to take a poll in Ireland today to see who they blame for everything they suffered? I would lay you odds the answer would be “The Brits”, without the distinction of the British Government.
Black and tans were Brits to them as we’re all the military who inflicted death to their population. Yet today we still trade and function as neighbours.
The referendum should be held anytime after the end of March 2019 after the UK leaves all of its EU treaties because it makes no sense to sign new EU treaties with the UK when there is the strong likelihood of the dissolution of the UK during the ‘transitional arrangements’ and its two successor states rejoining the EU under Article 49 in January 2021.
@ Ian Brotherhood – transcript of the short report on R Scotland for reference. 1 hr 33 mins and 45 secs into Newsdrive
I wouldny worry about the Rock, it canny make up its mind if it’s 620 or 622 years. Perhaps it could take its own advice and trawl its own posts and come up with a definitive figure.
Bob Mack @ 21:09,
It’s probably too late in the evening now, but just to make it clear, my use of the word “unrighteous” in my previous posting wasn’t intended to be read in virtual quotation marks.
RP read me right, I think. It is proper not to ignore such weighty matters, it just doesn’t help discussing them in the context of Scottish independence. We already have enough “stuff” to contend with at home, so why confound things by adding ever more unnecessary distractions to the case?
We need to focus. We don’t have to have an answer to every single one of the world’s problems in order to achieve independence. Far from it. Every superfluous issue is a distraction and a potential source of unnecessary division. (As we seem to be seeing today.) It does no good whatever.
First things first. Not cart before the horse. First we get our country back, then we can together work out what kind of foreign policy we should have about everything.
@Rock “You have never had the guts to state that before.”
Proof positive of two things.
1). You never read The National, though you slate it. I;ve stated that there a lot of times.
2). You really are unobservant or don’t actually read, try this in google:
yesindyref2 “14th March 2019” site:wingsoverscotland.com
and then admit you’re what you are, a splitter, A splitter in the sides right enough hahahahahahahahaha
Capella @ 12.03
Wow, even by BBC standards that is an incredibly tendentious summary of the issue.
The night stalker has arrived, out of the bellrock. People and candidates vote in elections. Elementary.
Being twa faced is not an asset. One opinion in the Herald. Slagging off the SNP. Then sleekit comments here. A eee bit more wary.
Like people do not sometimes look at the Herald. To see Groundhog Day disillusionment, every day. They should just print the same comments everyday. It would not make much difference. The once good website gone. They deleted and banned Indy supporters. Left the Labour unionists to destroy it. They destroy their own paper.
One of the Labiur unionist party always got first post in. They supported Brown. Until it turned out he did agree with the release of a prisoner.Suddenly silence for three days. Gies some pease.
It wouldn’t be long before the National takes over from the Herald. Tanking every day.It certainly surpasses it.
Imagine doing that to Grouse beater. His writing and memoirs are superb. So enlightening. Better than any ‘journalist’. They print rubbish in comparison.
I’ve just been on Amazon looking for books for my granddaughter and guess who I found reviewing a book on Scottish Independence, our old troll friend Will Podmore who takes the time to write a trolling review of a book he’s obviously never read by launching himself into a load of hatred and lies in the same vein as he used to do right here on WOS
It’s quite telling the lengths the trolls are prepared to go to in order to do all they can to prevent the sale of a book and it shows clearly the allegiances of the type of people who attempt to deny others the right to read BOOKS
Will Podmore must be so angry because he could’nt BURN it and yet according to them we’re the bad guys
I of course reported him to Amazon for abuse
Seems to me as if the Labour Party and their biggest trade union buddies in London were so completely pissed off with the “leaders” of their Scottish branch Lamont, Murphy, Dugdale who were utter failures and have been shedding members in huge numbers, that they’ve decided to do something about it themselves.
First they got one of the Union buddies in, the really, really talented the “Dick” Leonard (who’s that..?). No more of these softies from the backbenches.
Then the trade unions look around for suitable topics, top them up with lies, whip up the members, all with the help of the totally frustrated “churnalists” who are screeching for revenge.
With all that in place it’s turn up the pressure, scream blue murder an wallop the SNP/SG/YES Movement with all they’ve got.
There’s not much time left before Brexit and a possible Indy2 so they’re trying to beat the people of Scotland into submission and retrieve their “rightful” seat as Scotland’s governing party.
————
Sue the ba*****s Grousbeater, sue ’em.
@Capella
The BBC actually read out this live on the Radio Scotland, really?
“It refers to Hitler accusing the Jew of gradually assuming leadership of the Trade Union movement.”
That’s a fecking disgrace how they’ve distorted the actual words in the article. They should be sued, I’ll back any action against them.
Welcome to the reality of 1984 and Ministry of Truth broadcasting. Sometimes I feel in despair and then I remember that is exactly how they want me to feel and is their reason for doing it in the first place.
The way the truth can be bent and manipulated is simply astonishing and no wonder the majority fall for it.
I’ll always keep the faith though as they are on the run, their lies are turned up to maximum volume but having little effect, hence the panic that becomes more and more obvious.
We’re doing something right and it has them shitting their pants.
@Craig Murray says: 31 October, 2018 at 12:10 am:
” … Wow, even by BBC standards that is an incredibly tendentious summary of the issue.”
It is maybe just my own impression but I get the feeling this Grousebeater thing is the dark side’s attempts to divert attention from the fact that Richard Leonard was the T.U. guy involved along with Glasgow Council in fighting the undepaid women in Glasgow.
Just by chance, and before I knew about the Grousebeater matter, I got into conversation with a female employee in a well known supermsrket. She had commented upon my large Yes Badge worn on my hat and the conversation got round to the Glasgow protest march.
The lady obviously hadn’t given it much though for she admitted, that while knowing the SNP were not the Glasgow Council until the last election it had not really registered with her that it was Labour which had operated the discrimination for over 12 years.
At this I pointed out the not only was it Labour but the women’s T.U. that took them out on strike were complicit in fighting against the women with the Labour Council and the council had spent millions fighting the case.
What really shocked her, though, was that the T.U. guy in charge at the time was Richard Leonard. The lady was visibly shocked.
If that is a reaction in even a small potion of the public then it isn’t any wonder that Labour, The Trade Unions, (and their propaganda wing), are so desperate to dig up any claptrap as a diversion.
The slanging match is becoming the story rather than the truth of the original story and that’s probably why the SNP wanted to shut it down quickly lest they allow the media to distort the facts out of proportion just as they do with everything else
The media will never attack the *British* parties in the same depth as they’ll go after the SNP, some people might say they did it to Corbyn without justification but throughout Corbyns history he has a grain of form for what the press used to chew on the subject, with the SNP they’ll just invent it over and over again, remember we are the enemies of the *British* state
Nationalists, Separatists, Breakers of R precious Union and all things Baad to all people
This from the country who’s been eating Scotland alive for centuries but keeping the corpse breathing to continue the feeding, you don’t kill the cow you just keep milking it till it runs out of milk and on that day you despatch it as a kindness, because our masters are kind, Mrs Thatcher told us that
@ Craig Murray @ Thepnr – yes it’s accurate but you can go to the iPlayer and listen – 1 hr 33 mins 45 secs into Newsdrive.
Ruthless smear of a blog article which in no way was anti semitic but was very critical of the GMB Union and the Labour Party as represented by Rhea Wolfson.
I would defend GBs right to post his analysis of the Glasgow City Council strike. If he chooses to sue for defamation I would support him. Since the BBC and Tom Gordon have publicised his name and his wife’s name and their occupations, there is every chance that there could be negative consequences from those false allegations.
The mainstream foreign owned media in Scotland are baaad. Very very baad.
The propaganda writers who churn out their lies and misrepresentation are very very baaad people.
The people who buy the propaganda pamphlets masquerading as newspapers need to get their heads out of the sand and engage their brains. You cannot all be stupid – can you.
Shit has hit the fan. I’m backing him, I hope we all do.
https://twitter.com/Grouse_Beater/status/1057450776358981633
I think it’s safe to say my morale has never been lower than it is now.
In 5 months, my country will be stripped of its European Citizenship against the will of its Constitutionally sovereign people, the plundering and cynical exploitation of my Nation’s rich resources will continue unabated, the qualities and excellence of my Countries produce will be denigrated and sold out by an alien Governments criminal treachery and abandonment of standards and regulation. My country will be isolated from the likeminded progressive philosophies we share with Europe, and become the silent victim of a narrow minded xenophobic proto-fascist State intent on dismantling and reinventing the history and culture of my Country until it is indistinguishable from a unitary Britishness which has never felt so alien, evil and malevolent.
The bombing of Shia Muslims and the sucking up to murderous Wahabbi Sunni regimes, all treacherous in itself against a deeper malignant collusion with Israel, will continue to be done in the name of my country despite the fact it leaves me nauseous, disgusted and humiliated.
My TV, radio, and local newsagent will continue to be deluged with inane propaganda and bass disinformation which thankfully I myself can recognise and enjoy some immunity, but fear that far too many of my compatriots take to be literal truth.
While not disloyal to the SNP, since I have never been a member, I myself draw criticism for seeking clarity and exactitude over some grave reservations I have about the manner in which Holyrood regards the Constitutional Sovereignty of the people, and subjugated those principles beneath the lesser principles of democracy. The absolute is subject to the ephemeral – we are through the looking glass.
I am left profoundly disillusioned, and while perhaps arrogant to believe I have a commendable wit and perception to understand what is going on, I simply cannot reconcile the enigma of the SNP’s strategic thinking.
The soul of the YES movement was always directly accessible online, yet these days it’s seems repetitive and stale. It’s a merry-go-round. We bemoan the inconstancy and incompetence of Labour, we despair at the sociopathic callous greed of the Tories, we rail at the BBC but do nothing to change it, and speculate whether we need to round up YES Mavericks and coral them into a second pro Independence Party to provide a second choice on the ballot…
What ballot? What fkn ballot? The ballot we know will soon be upon us while we are still imprisoned in this Union? Are we truly admitting defeat already? How many victories and mandates do you want??? Oh we know you would deliver, but the question is whether you can.
What is so fkn complicated about supporting a party which is clear and unapologetic in its pursuit of my country’s emancipation from this dog’s breakfast of a Union? How can we ever gather momentum to make that happen when the people are abandoned to the Propagandists, while the political party we elected to lead us simply refuses to do it?
So we need to know the precise detail of Brexit? Really? Why? WHY? Is a convenient soft Brexit with access to the Single Market any less of an unconstitutional subjugation than a blood and guts Tory BritNat car crash Brexit? Why are
weyou so sanguine about our unconstitutional subjugation??? Our timely Sovereign emancipation from the UK kills our Brexit stone dead. No hard Brexit, no soft Brexit, NO BREXIT.The tectonic plate of Conservative Unionism/sectarianism/bigotry has failed to break the back of our pro Independence solidarity, and now it would seem the other tectonic plate of British Unionism is agitating subversive strikes and disruption. The “yin and yang” of British colonial government are each as impotent, transparent and pedestrian as the other, but our party of deliverance, our liberators, our rebels with a cause were sent to Westminster in absolute majority… and achieved nothing. We punched alright, but we hit fresh air.
Something has to change people. How can we be so close to the catastrophe of Brexit yet not even see any mention of Scotland on Michel Barnier’s minuted agenda? Just how the fk is that possible?
Let us build a shrine and pray to Scotland’s Court of Session.
I’ve just found out from that link Thepnr, who it was in the SNP joined in, referencing the Herald article which specifically names GB. Words fail me, considering his position in government. Least said, soonest mended.
I’m forced reluctantly to rescind what I posted at 11.37pm.
@yesindyref2
You aught to read this tweet but more importantly the reactions.
https://twitter.com/HumzaYousaf/status/1057240098394255360
With the SNP having over 100,000 members that’s an awful lot of potential people to smear for anything they might do in their everyday lives.
Suspending an ordinary member because of an allegation of anything at all is a slippery slope that can only end in you falling on your arse. All they had to say was “we will look into this”.
Then and only then should they make a decision.
@Thepnr
That’s the problem. I did read it, and wished I hadn’t 🙁
I think politicians should be banned by their parties from Twitter, except to give details of their surgeries, meetings, engagements.
Some of them are stark staring bonkers, like kids in a china shop.
@yesindyref2
Agreed, if I was a politician I would keep well away from twitter.
@Thepnr
I remember a year or two back, senior members apparently talking about disciplining ordinary members. It’s themselves they need to discipline, maybe put together a tweet and wait a minute before sending it. Like many of us Ciffers do. And they need training, their skills are often non-existent. The likes of Macart could give them the handbook. They’re bloody amateurs, dangerous ones too.
But I appreciate the argument it’s the only way the SNP can get the message out with a hostile media, but all too often it’s the wrong message they’re sending because they have no social media sense, in fact I wonder if some of them have any sense at all.
Anyway, I’ve had enough for the night, should have been in my pit giving it zeds long ago. Another crisis in the Indy camp, but this one’s for real. And we’re so close as well.
It is truely amazing how the unions and labour can turn anything around to meet their own ends especially when you see some of the people sitting on their benches either in WM or Holyrood – all offences being swept under the carpet, ignored or witnesses silenced by technicalities.
Labour in Scotland obviously not playing dirty enough so they send in the big hitters. They get away with dirty politics every day but the snp has to be like Caesars wife or the msm are ready to pounce. I thought the snp were to have a rebuttal service – where is this? I fear they have jumped on the bandwagon just to silence the media.
As for the bbc I hope GB does sue them – they seem to think they can do what they like and get away with it.
Grousebeater Git yer hinerend in gear & get your Crowdfunder up and take these bastards all the way .
C’mon folks, focus, focus, focus, we’re nearly THERE. We all know what the biased Unionist media is like. They are on the look out constantly for absolutely anything, any little snippet, that they can get their claws into to weaken our case for Independence, diminish support for the SNP, undermine, depress and divide us.
We all know that Grousebeaters article wasn’t anti-Semitic. He even states, ”whether or not Wolfson is intellectually aware of Hitler’s outlook is unknown but she is certainly commendably assiduous in condemning anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.”. Note the word ”commendably”.
Let’s not take our eye off of the ball however. Let’s move on today, close ranks, don’t castigate the SNP, don’t discuss the GB case (support him on the side), rather get back to using all of our time and energy to (truthfully) lambaste the Unionists in this country. In other words don’t fall into their trap.
……………………………..
https://thoughtcontrolscotland.com/2018/10/30/why-is-long-term-pay-growth-highest-in-scotland/
………………………………….
‘I’m no anti-Semite says Labourite under inquiry.’
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17189782.im-no-anti-semite-says-labourite-under-inquiry/
‘Senior Scottish Labour MSP left embarrassed after email gaffe.’
…”then, instead of sending the email out to his own party, Findlay accidentally sent the request out to all of Scotland’s MSPs.”..
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17188822.senior-scottish-labour-msp-left-embarrassed-after-email-gaffe/?ref=mr&lp=2
…………………………
Video: ‘The Health Secretary just tried to attack the SNP – but got the wrong MP.’
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17188976.the-health-secretary-just-tried-to-attack-the-snp-but-got-the-wrong-mp/?ref=mr&lp=1?c=qxctar
………………………….
‘Irish president’s speech hit the right note in dark times.’
http://www.thenational.scot/politics/17189786.irish-presidents-speech-hit-the-right-note-in-dark-times/
‘UK Government accused of ‘buying DUP votes’ and ignoring Glasgow.’
”SNP MPs have accused the UK Government of “buying DUP votes” by allocating cash to help Belfast following a major city blaze while failing to provide funding for Glasgow, also hit by fires this year.”..
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17189693.uk-government-accused-of-buying-dup-votes-and-ignoring-glasgow/?ref=mr&lp=9
…………………………….
The Long Letter in the National by Ronnie Anderson, Glasgow.
‘Labour are cosily at home playing party political games.’
”Whilst Caroline Leckie is correct to say that opposition to a woman’s right is not the sole preserve of Unionism (Equal pay fight is about justice not Unionism, The National, October 29) she also makes the case to say Unionism and injustice are inextricably linked both historically and in the foreseeable future, till we can get out of their clutches.
Labour’s role in the last 100 years has been to act as footstools and part of the furniture in Parliament and the City of London. They are part of the state spy and administrative system and are cosily at home on TV and radio chat shows playing the party games, to be laughed at behind their backs by their betters.
The British wing of the Labour movement has been more easily bribed into becoming a wing of the establishment. Feminism has just been another phoney opposition game to them, to be sold out as soon as it is their turn for office.
Caroline can draw on her own experience in the health and caring service under Labour, as many independence women, men, oppressed, betrayed mass and minority struggles do. As a shop steward in the 1960s I tried to raise the issue of equal rights for female colleagues only to be telt by Union officials and some workers, always Labour Unionists, that the wimmen can aye get themselves a man. Arguing that wimmen had to pay the same for rents food and clothing, etc, was just as heidbanging as arguing with Unionist Labourites for a Scottish Socialist Republic and equality for all. We both found that out as former members of the SSP, heid banging against Labourite mentalities.
That the trade unions worked against equal pay may be a matter of fact and public record is useless when overwhelmed by the lies to the contrary peddled by a the Unionist mass media. Neglect of women’s basic rights, teachers pay, homelessness and even the sabotage of the People’s Palace is current common propaganda against the SNP as though these issues have suddenly appeared from nowhere. The Scottish devolved government has no control over our stolen resources
As a young shop steward I expected to fight the bosses, but it was harder to fight against their full-time footstools and lickspittles in the trade unions who enforced Labour pay freezes from the shop floor to the House of Lords and any other racket to line their own pockets, male and female alike. Treason knows no gender, class or country.
We have no Scottish trade unions. They were all closed, along with Scottish Trades Union Congress in 1974, along with the SCWS. The EIS remains Scottish only because we still have a separate education system. In common with most working-class kids, I left school at 15 with no qualifications and had to study later in life. I was a history and modern studies teacher during the last 15 years of my working life and spent it fighting Labour governments against one sell-out after another.
I am sure many of today’s striking teachers are well aware that Labour is playing their old game in opposition.
Like Caroline my wife worked the NHS, on low wages, as an auxiliary nurse, against Labour austerity cuts and Union sell-outs. Like many in the same position still today, we all know who to blame. Incidentally, congratulations to the female nurse who had the guts to raise suspicions about the death of Willie McRae (Nurse who treated Willie McRae: It wasn’t suicide, he was shot, Sunday National, October 28).
Question: How many Labourites does it take to change a light bulb?
Answer: None. Labour never changes anything.”
http://www.thenational.scot/news/17186903.letters-labour-are-cosily-at-home-playing-party-political-games/
a bit unsettled by whats happening with GB
we know that as indy supporters we dont, and wont ever get a fair hearing in the msm. fact.
the snp realise this and have decided that the best policy when such allegations arise is to suspend the membership of those involved, this includes everyone, michelle thompson, alex salmond etc.
i’m not sure this is the best policy but i understand it is done so that nicola and other snp politicians are not dragged into conversations about racsism/sexism etc within the snp by the uk media.
and no, it isnt fair but the uk media do it to paint us in a bad light, they used to target ordinary members on the doorstep, ie those least able to defend themselves.
however, when they attack high profile indy supporters, like alex and stu, they dont and cant do this with impunity.
i think gb is in this catagory. we shouldnt look for fairness but revenge. im pretty certain that a crowd funder for gb would raise the required funds to hit the msm media where it hurts. in their pockets.
it is sad that this is the only route we have for fairness, but this is the nature of the playing field we are on
i will support gb’s fund raiser should he chose to go down that route.
Links
https://news.gov.scot/news/emergency-funding-helps-over-300-000-households
Chancellor’s “unexpected windfall” came mainly from oil & gas revenues. It delivered more than £350m per week extra. Scotland gets less than 3 weeks worth of that. The other 49 weeks? That goes to rUK
https://twitter.com/alyciahayes/status/1057048890292224000
http://www.barrheadboy.com/false-history/
Read this
https://m.facebook.com/groups/215556435841901?view=permalink&id=316896332374577
Scottish Constitution special.
https://www.facebook.com/indycargordonross/videos/303208530513441/?t=22
https://itisintruthnotforglory.wordpress.com/2018/10/30/sweeping-our-past-under-the-carpet/
Pharmaceutical sector ‘worth £1.7bn to Scottish economy’
http://archive.is/DuHdW
https://rbs.postach.io/post/a-modern-scot
http://thirdforcenews.org.uk/tfn-news/more-scots-forced-to-ask-for-emergency-handouts
https://grumpyscottishman.wordpress.com/2018/10/30/the-wrong-headline-it-should-have-read-poor-folk-of-britain-thanks/
Merkel’s Toxic Legacy
https://www.scer.scot/database/ident-8934
“Next year, Scottish farmers and crofters will receive the lowest level of support per hectare than any other part of the EU. I think that’s shocking”, says Fergus Ewing. Scot Tory MP John Lamont laughs.
video
https://twitter.com/RobDunsmore/status/1057334063240040448
https://www.centreonconstitutionalchange.ac.uk/blog/governing-northern-ireland-without-executive-quick-fix-or-constitutional-minefield
A Cornwall council gave a homeless 17-year-old boy with mental health problems a tent to live in for five weeks
http://archive.is/Z7UwB
MPs squirm as lame-duck chancellor falls to the occasion
http://archive.is/niV4u
https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/foreign-affairs/brexit/news/99496/minister-admits-it-will-be-almost-impossible-check-status
Noakes is one arrogant Tory _____
https://twitter.com/KristiinaCooper/status/1057296770470961152
@YvetteCooperMP has furious exchange with officials over what no-deal #Brexit would mean for border security
https://twitter.com/BBCPolitics/status/1057324386959716352
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/dup-budget-2018-vote-philip-hammond-brexit-northern-ireland-border-sammy-wilson-statement-a8608406.html
“There will be no second referendum” the PM tells a Finnish MP at Nordic Council in the Norwegian Parliament who suggested a “final say” for “the people” on exit negotiations
https://twitter.com/faisalislam/status/1057281424733167616
http://www.bioworld.com/content/plan-all-contingencies-industry-urged-no-deal-brexit-looks-likely-0
https://www.rte.ie/news/newslens/2018/1030/1007471-brexit-border-in-the-caribbean/
So I’m visiting Manchester and am trying to give some money to an extremely polite homeless man
Read on
https://twitter.com/singtopsee/status/1056976301041614849
https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/top-stories/wages-down-11-pounds-a-week-because-of-brexit-vote-1-5757844
https://www.irishtimes.com/business/financial-services/barclays-seeking-to-move-250bn-business-to-republic-ahead-of-brexit-1.3680943
Brexit: expecting the worst
http://eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=87040
https://www.fairobserver.com/region/europe/conservative-party-remainers-theresa-may-eu-negotiations-will-brexit-happen-uk-news-18871/
https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/opinion/brexit-has-turned-into-an-abusive-relationship/30/10/
Thanks @Petra – some good timely advice, we all know who our enemy is & we must not lose focus on the goal. Hopefully the right people are getting the message on the need to back, not sack, Grousebeater & others like him.
Any news on a crowdfunder, anyone ?
schrodingerscat@07.45
I am unsure. Certainly, the “we have to maintain discipline to avoid MSM attack” line is how the repeated amplification of attacks on individual members before they can defend themselves (Alex, Michelle, GB) are justified.
But I am genuinely sorry to say I am not sure that is the real motivation. Nicola tweeted a commendation of an article by Kissinger. She supports Clinton. She gave a lecture to the Council for Foreign Relations in Washington saying that an Independent Scotland’s foreign policy would not be different to Westminster foreign policy. She is dead keen on identity politics, all women shortlists etc.
I suspect that she simply agrees with the attacks on GB and that is the instruction given out to Humza etc.
The Lablour/unionists will suffer st the Ballot Box. Lying hypocrites. Another Labour fail. Attacking freedom of speech.
Attacking Grouse beater like this is just counter productive, He is one of the best writers. Ever.
Great letters in the National.
Maybe Grouse beater will get a few columns. In the Press.
People are totally behind Grouse Beater. Keep on blogging and posting. Your contribution is amazing. Great experience and knowledge.
Another Labour/Unionists own goal. They are despicable. They have no shame. Ever.
@Nana
Mornin’ Nana
You are a jewel. Some quiet reading time is sooooo needed. It’s a two cup morning for sure.
Just posted my final piece before mine host gets back and short of a GE being called or indy declared by Friday? I’m taking twenty fours bed time and some paracetamol. I’ll be off on my own travels in the next couple of days. No rest for the wossiname. 🙂
Morning Macart
Missed your blog this morning, I’m in a bit of a spin what with all the upset over GB, I may well have posted links twice or done it all wrong.
Take care Sam, enjoy the rest 🙂
https://weegingerdug.wordpress.com/2018/10/31/stronger-than-fear-part-2/
https://spice-spotlight.scot/2018/10/30/uk-budget-2018-spending-increases-with-tax-choices-to-come/
Budget
I hope Derek MacKay doesnt react to quickly to the budget. Any changes may be compounded by brexit and you know who will be blamed. Also most people I know have forgotten about the proposed NI increases next year.less money in your wages indy will be hampered.Neutral budget needed.
@Nana
You didn’t miss it. It’s literally just up this morning. 😀
Doing lots of last minute rushing around meself right now and had intended to put it up overnight. Thanks for the help Nana.
@Macart
Thank goodness for that, I was beginning to think I was losing the wee bit of sanity I have left!
Take care, you deserve a rest. Hope Paul brings you back a lovely BIG pressie 🙂
@Capella –
Many thanks for doing that. It’s a reversal of the order I remember but that just shows how unreliable memory can be.
It looks shocking, even on paper: ‘The Jew’. It’s probably the use of the definite article which makes it so sickening, as if he’s referring to a household pest. But you can’t ‘see’ parentheses or speech-marks on radio and the way it’s worded leaves it all ambiguous i.e. is Wolfson meant to be ‘the Jew’ GB was referring to?
I’m glad that Craig Murray saw your transcription and I hope John Robertson sees it too – we need to hold this one as an example, very similar to the Hitler-tash on John Swinney, and make sure it isn’t just fired down the memory-hole as soon as they feel GB has been suitable ‘punished’. Also going to copy your transcription to Twitter so that some waving their hands in horror over perceived offence can read for themselves how the BBC has decided to handle this one.
An astonishing episode altogether and it probably has some way to run yet.
The Scottish zgov have to support Westminster Foreign/Defence policy to a certain extent because it is reserved. Although it can seem naive, They are forced into it because people voted NO. There can’t be a great deal of confrontation in these matters. They are privy councillors on these matters and are sworn to secrecy. They take an oath to that affect even as Scottish parly ministers. Ie they have a foot in both camps, in a way. Different duties in some capacities. The Holyrood ministers have in certain aspects to concur in reserved matters. Or they are not holding a brief as given by the electorate. Upholding a Code of Conduct. That is why sometimes they can’t speak out as some folk would want.
Alex Salmond was really good on Defence/Foreign policies. He had great experience. MP’s can say what they want in Westminster. Parliamentary privilege. That is why he is needed back urgently. Other office bearers or reps can be put in different positions. It is more difficult in matters which are reserved. In a way Holyrood has to tie the line because people voted NO. If people had voted YES it would be another matter.
Opposing Trident etc is legitimate because it is SNP policy in a manifesto for which people voted. Out and out official opposition is more difficult, There is enough to be going in with because of the Westminster appalling behaviour in any case. That is why people just have to read between the lines.
Other people or affiliated groups or just members can point out the anomalies within the system. Or the imposed electoral chaos and lack of democracy. No leader is infallible or irreplaceable. May is going to find that out. The barney is just starting. About to kick off. The Tories/unionists wil, do anything to try and keep,office. Cheat, lie commit electoral frraud. Mismanagement and misappropriate Scottish funds etc.
Cameron in the trough of creaming off public money. Chinese consortium. Trying to set up a £Billions fund to milk the UK taxpayers. Hinkley Point abd HS2 the biggest PPl scandals on the planet. A total waste of £Billions of taxpayers money. A monstrosity of plunder by the Tory/unionists.
Along with Brexit and sanctioning and starving people. Just criminal behaviour. Most of them should be in jail.
Excellent links Nana, you are still doing a great job.
As a matter of interest when does the “Supreme” court give it’s verdict on the Scottish EU situation? They said October but I am not aware of anything happening yet?
So, this is 1984 and what can the Yes movement do?
After the Labour party got embroiled and side-tracked itself for years in the conflated public discussion about criticism of Israel and the accusation of being anti-semitic, yes I can understand why the SNP dropped GB soon as. I can also understand the criticism of the SNP. But, if they had not done so, anything and everything ensuing thereafter by the MSM would have been well out of their control. After all the endless machinations didn’t work out for Ken Livingstone, did it? It’s called politics i’m afraid.
I did read GB’s excellent blog highlighting the politicking of the GMBu and just thought when I came to that heading, what? Why did he go there at all? It just didn’t seem to fit. As many others have said, just don’t mention the H word or the J for that matter.
But notwithstanding this nitpicking petty criticism of a blogger, I do think that the way for the Yes movement to proceed would be to undoubtedly crowdfund a court challenge of a libellous individual.
This appropriation and conflation of language has reached the levels of the historic Scopes trial in the American South and so is well worth fighting for, otherwise it is language itself that is the victim of the MSM.
Of course, as many others have pointed out, the hypocrisy of the MSM and other parties in these matters knows no bounds. For example, to vote for to do away with legislation aimed at those who would sing, ‘We are up to our necks in Fenian blood, surrender or you’ll die’, is of course alright, but to obliquely mention the H word in relation to a very young careerist is not, then you can see where this is heading.
So, I’d say yes, take them to court, and I’ll give my donation, after all it may make them think twice. I believe that Crowd funding as a practical, sustainable idea and response/tactic is well worth considering to the true evils that we are faced with.
Good article on Tax by Iain Macwhirter in the Herald.
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/17190367.iain-macwhirter-tartan-tax-wont-be-causing-high-earning-scots-to-pack-up-and-head-south/
Meanwhile Call Kaye going big on Daily Mail Scots Tax disaster
Phone 0500 92 95 00
Sms 80295
Email morningcallscotland@bbc.co.uk
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/bbcradioscotland
Twitter @bbcradioscot
I know anti-semitism, anti-arabism, anti-catholicism when I meet them but rather than exclaim ‘gotcha, you biggot’ I rationally subvert it. Reasoned argument may not kill the beast but it often draws the fangs. The sentimental, ‘we must all be nice to one another’ approach rarely does.
Sticks and stones …
First guy on Call Kaye advocates tax structures which the Scottish government doesn’t have control over
Morning Les,
I understand the ‘verdict’ was due this month but we are into the last day of October and still no news.
Perhaps no news is good news for us and Westminster don’t want us to know??
If I see anything I will of course post on here.
Craig Murray 8.12
re the First Minister.
I suspect that she simply agrees with the attacks on GB and that is the instruction given out to Humza etc.
Feck me!
That’s a bold statement.
Cos if its true, that indicates a pretty clear divide between the SNP and the general Yes movement.
And, no, I am not a member of the SNP
Craig Murray says:
31 October, 2018 at 8:12 am
schrodingerscat@07.45
“….I suspect that she simply agrees with the attacks on GB and that is the instruction given out to Humza etc.”
I wouldn’t presume to disagree with your intuition or connections Craig, but perhaps the SNP is standing back to appreciate the wider picture. I commented earlier about the stalled reinvention of the Conservative Party, their mighty initiative running aground over Dark money, sectarianism and bigotry. Forget the up front puppets like Davidson and Murdo Fraser, there was a darker coordination behind the facade actually pulling the strings.
It isn’t difficult to see a similar malevolent coordination behind British Labour’s orchestration of strikes and unrest through its Union machinery. Labour of course is just the other cheek to the British Unionist arse, but as I said in my earlier comment, the Holyrood Government is being squeezed by the two traditional tectonic plates of the Union. Glasgow is not about the women, it’s not about the Unions, it’s an orchestrated anti SNP “offensive of convenience” by the dark Establishment.
If the SNP party faithful suddenly want to grasp the
nettlethistle and demand the SNP publicly backs Grouse Beater, it frankly tastes a little lukewarm after abandoning our much bigger and more dangerous fish Mr Alex Salmond to his own devices.I make no comment on Grouse Beater. There is no love lost between us, and I certainly don’t read his essays. But I suspect the recent strikes in Glasgow are borne of Scottish Labour’s duplicitous skullduggery orchestrated from the Governing Establishment of the UK, and how we end up in 1930’s Germany frankly stretches to that unnecessary bridge too far.
My own metaphor for what ails us is an army that is static becomes a sitting duck. We NEED momentum, we NEED the initiative, and we NEED leadership. The longer the SNP remains stubbornly deaf to all three, the greater the risk of our fragmentation and disintegration.
If the troops want to go over the top for Grouse Beater, then so be it, but might we at least backdate that initiative and rehabilitate our Alex Salmond.
In fact Craig Murray, maybe now is the time to politicise the YES movement and create our second pro-Independence Party to augment the Independence share of the votes in PR elections, and simultaneously provide the mainstream SNP with a formalised sounding board to animate the discussion over Independence, and deny the British Establishment it’s current monopoly on the narrative.
Here’s that fellow the bbc are desperately trying to promote.
Nae mates Bannon
https://twitter.com/WestWingReport/status/1057435107194220544
Nana says
Good piece of investigative journalism. Makes, what must be, very valid points.
Basically Brexit will paralyse roll on roll off ferry transport, so government and business plan to use containers and alternative container ports. However, all is not well with the container handling industry in the UK. It may have little spare capacity!
So, with no deal, expect the worst.
I will support GB’s fundraiser if he decides to go for it. By the way whatever has happened to Natalie McGarry (ex SNP MP)?
@ Craig Murray at 8:12am ……. “Nicola Sturgeon is very, very Baad.”
Hell hath no fury like a (wo) man scorned, right enough. I wondered how long it would take for the usual suspects to jump on the GB bandwagon. Let’s all ensure that the collective desire for Independence is first and foremost, our priority, rather than the focus being on individuals “using” the cause in an attempt to get their damaged egos massaged.
… and of course, back our EU Membership to the hilt, and demand immediate recognition for Scotland as a sovereign interlocutor.
@Thepnr says: 31 October, 2018 at 3:56 am:
” … Suspending an ordinary member because of an allegation of anything at all is a slippery slope that can only end in you falling on your arse. All they had to say was “we will look into this”.
Then and only then should they make a decision.”
Whoa There!
What on Earth do you imagine the word, “suspend”, means in this context, Thepnr?
The member under, “suspension”, is not being expelled but is, “suspended”, while the matter is under investigation.
After the investigation there will be a decision to either reinstate the member or expel the member.
However, I do think that Humza was far too swift to act in this case. I can understand his tendency to be rather sensitive on matters of discrimination but factually, “a suspension”, simply means the matter is under consideration of the circumstances.
I’ve no idea why so many do not understand what suspension means but it doesn’t mean thrown out.
Now, as to the matter of Grousebeater’s defence against the MSM. The defence is against the accusers not against the SNP who have, in spite of the very many accusations, are acting correctly and have suspended a member being accused by the MSM while the matter is under consideration. They have not thrown the member out.
You are falling into the unionist trap that they set up to get you to do just that.
You, and the usual suspects, are only too ready to accuse the SNP and often more ready that the unionists.
Morning Nana you have been busy this morning as is your usual.Get your feet up and take it easy, or just do things that you enjoy doing. While there is doubting your fan club, and that includes me, will miss your postings, if that occured. But hey, just take things a little slower and make more time for yourself.
Curiously, I think the Supreme court judges have a quandry in their hands. Not helped by the forth coming EU court ruling on the validity of Brexit. Which, I hope they find the case for us.
If that does happen Brexit will go out the window and May and her clan will need oxygen masks fitted.
Hopefully they will want rid of troublesome Scotland by english demand.Yay!
Just spotted a headline on Google from the Express … “No-deal Brexit threat: Police boss warns criminals could wreak havoc “
Now, Express headlines often seem both outrageous and nonsense, so on my first reading I thought some legal action against the dark money campaigners and swivel eyed advocates of a hard Brexit might actually be on the offing.
Alas no 😉
We`ve had,
Homophobism smeared at Stu,
Misogynism smeared at Alex,
Anitsemitism smeared at Grousebeater,
Profiteerism smeared at Michelle,
Coordinated by someone/something and fed through British Labour,British Broadcasting Corporation and the British Daily Record.
Breeks,
No, I think we should all continue to support the SNP as the only currently viable political expression of the desire for Independence. Those of us who fear the leadership is rather too keen on being seen as a respectable part of the neoliberal political elite, and not keen enough on scrapping for Indy, are quite entitled to their view and to express it – and in my anecdotal experience it is a worry that is increasingly shared.
“I’ve no idea why so many do not understand what suspension means but it doesn’t mean thrown out.”
Most of us know that. The SNP have been way too quick to SUSPEND this party member. A quick read of the article GB wrote would have been all that was needed for the SNP to realise there was the cubed-root of hee-haw to this accusation against GB. Now, by being too quick to suspend, what they have done is given the rabid MSM fuel for their fire. Unlike Thomson & McGarry, all the pertinent facts of GB’s situatin were readily available so the decision to suspend was totally unmerited.
SNP need to be smarter – they are too quick to dampen the flames of any perceived fire. They need to realise that sometimes the fire you see isn’t your own house burning down but that of your opponents’.
“I’ve no idea why so many do not understand what suspension means but it doesn’t mean thrown out.”
Most of us know that. The SNP have been way too quick to SUSPEND this party member. A quick read of the article GB wrote would have been all that was needed for the SNP to realise there was the cubed-root of hee-haw to this accusation against GB. Now, by being too quick to suspend, what they have done is given the rabid MSM fuel for their fire. Unlike Thomson & McGarry, all the pertinent facts of GB’s situation were readily available so the decision to suspend was total overkill and wholly unmerited.
SNP need to be smarter – they are far too quick to dampen the flames of any perceived fire. They need to realise that sometimes the fire you see isn’t your own house burning but rather that of your opponents’.
No better example of the grousebeater blog about the British state supporters congealing together to round on independence support and democracy. A Unionist party and the MSM (notably the BBC again), all controlled from outwith Scotland, has turned this into an attack on independence supporting individual, outing his family in the process.
They have deliberately misrepresented what was written, they are part of the mechanism to maintain the British state and suppress any desire for democracy in Scotland, they are the type described in the blog.
I’m listening to BBC Jockland and I’m amazed at the callers sheer ignorance. The usual misconceptions about tax is all too obvious.
The utter claptrap blethered about income tax and tax on wealth is much in evidence. To listen to the propaganda merchants you would think that direct taxation was the main taxation – it isn’t.
The main taxation, (thanks Labour), has long been indirect taxation but to look at either taxation in isolation is the trap the propaganda wing of the unionist set for the people long ago.
Everyone, earner or not, pays tax indirectly as VAT, road fuel duty, alcohol duty, betting tax and VAT on services is levied upon almost everything. As is even such other indirect tax as the TV licence fee.
For example if you fill up your vehicle’s fuel tank on your way to have a wee drink at the pub before placing a bet at the betting shop you have paid indirect taxation twice on the filling station as you paid Road fuel duty and VAT, then Alcohol duty and VAT at the pub and betting tax and VAT at betting shop.
Thing is the guy in the brand new Bentley that pulled into the filling station behind your 10 year old Mini on his way to the Casino to play the wheel is paying the same per pound as you are.
and indirect taxation raises a great deal more than income tax and tax upon wealth. The change from direct to indirect taxation exactly mirrors the beginning of the widening of the gap between the rich & the poor in the United Kingdom. It was by design – not by chance.
No-deal Brexit will make Britain less safe, police chiefs warn MPs
http://archive.is/KGqRl
https://tompride.wordpress.com/2018/10/31/tories-reveal-plans-to-sell-off-nhs-hospitals-to-us-firms-after-brexit/
S&P global ratings
Countdown to Brexit: No-deal moving into sight? The risk of a no-deal has increased sufficiently to become a relevant rating consideration. Read our latest report now
https://www.capitaliq.com/CIQDotNet/CreditResearch/RenderArticle.aspx?
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/bobby-mcdonagh-decent-britain-has-not-gone-away-1.3680611
That’s all for now
@ Ian Brotherhood – thx. Can you correct the typo in line 3.
Should read on the Grousbeater blog.
It isn’t clear whether the BBC are quoting Grouse Beater referring to Rhea Wolfson, or quoting Hitler. The BBC should have made that clear. An apology and correction would be the least they could do.
Morning everybody. First of all if Grousey needs funding I am in.
Yesterday annoyed me so much, because the SNP acted too quickly over that lie that appeared in the Record and on the BBC.
Scotlands history in relation to sheltering members of the Jewish community is a proud one. They fled here when Edward 1 banished them from England. That persecution in England went on till the time of Disraeli the prime Minister, who had to convert to the Church of England at age 12 to ensure his future. They were denied rights of citizenship up until the late 1800s.
England has a bad history of its treatment of Jewish people, and probably a bad conscience as well.
I remain defiantly indy. This I may add is not virtue signalling. It is just a matter of history.
Self censorship is the most effective form of taming. The hint of something and slight point in the direction you want someone to go, and they go there, is a low energy expenditure form of control.
The anti-Independence establishment can’t be satisfied, it has to have power removed, and jumping every time they sigh disapprovingly isn’t doing that.
@ Craig Murray at 9:44am …. “No, I think we should all continue to support the SNP.”
Support? Really? Strange one then, don’t you think, that every solitary article / comment that you trumpet on your site is used to run them, Nicola Sturgeon / SNP, down to the ground. So not really surprising that, “your view … is increasingly shared”, when you use your site, your influence, to promote it big time. What’s your game?
@Robert Peffers
Wrt to tax Robert totally agree. There is deliberate misinformation about the role of tax and that is quite deliberate.
Tax is just returning govt issued tokens back to govt. It’s a means of controlling inflation, not a means of funding (provided you are the currency issuer)
Couple of mistakes in my post yesterday, Government hit-man Stephan Kock’s car didn’t break down, it was a couple of guys near his house who were trying to fix their broken-down car when Kock appeared & fired shots at them, he was subsequently fined £600 plus at Oban Sheriff Court, pleading that his work for HM’s government made him a target for certain people.
Anent the burglary at Mrs Shand-Kydd’s on Seil, it was when she was in London, a witness at the trial of Diana’s butler, when it happened, not Diana’s funeral. Her house was turned upside-down, £100,000 of jewellery taken & Diana’s letters apparently left untouched. Very distinctive jewellery, Diana wore a copy of her mothers bracelet at her wedding. None of this stuff has ever re-surfaced. A blind for a break-in which was carried out to photograph the letters?
A stallinger at Glasgow’s Barras subsequently received a visit (visitation) from officers of the Met & Strathclyde one night, acting on a malicious? tip-off, with a warrant to search the premises for the missing jewellery. They turned his house upside-down & found nothing. In the attic they pulled pipes from the wall which flooded the attic & brought the ceilings down. This wrecked his house, his life & his health, living in a damp house. His attempts at compensation have come to nothing, lawyers warned off the case & journalists & politicians strung him along. A TV documentary was eventually dropped. An artist with a sense of humour he could bee seen at the Barras working at his easel wearing a Tiara! His house near Celtic Park had large placards outside for years, railing at the iniquities of the Law & the Polis! (maybe still does?)
Further to the story regarding the Grouse Beater blog.
Can I ask that Rhea Wolfson confirms that she is pro-Scottish, please.
Rhea can do this easily by coming clean on the appalling machinations carried out by the GMB and the Labour Party.
In my opinion, that is the actual core of the issue around the Grouse Beater blog.
By engineering the recent strike and deliberately creating the pay issue in the first place, the GMB and the Labour party are blatantly supporting a London based British Nationalist government which is clearly on a journey towards fascism. This London government continues to ignore democratic Scottish opinion on the EU, amongst numerous other issues.
Rhea Wolfson, the GMB and the Labour party are anti-Scottish. Prove this statement is wrong by denouncing the GMB actions around the pay issue at Glasgow Council. In addition denounce the actions of the Labour Party in Scotland.
Petra
“Strange one then, don’t you think, that every solitary article / comment that you trumpet on your site is used to run them, Nicola Sturgeon / SNP, down to the ground.”
That is simply untrue, Petra.
@Bob Mack says: 31 October, 2018 at 10:04 am:
” … Yesterday annoyed me so much, because the SNP acted too quickly over that lie that appeared in the Record and on the BBC.”
Oh! Get real. The unionists are laughing at you for they set a trap for you and you walked right into it.
The SNP, “Suspended”, the member. A suspension is exactly what you are claiming they should have done. It means the member is suspended – not expelled.
Suspended means the matter is under consideration and while being considered is suspended which is exactly what you are claiming the SNP should have done.
Furthermore, there is a big difference between the SG and the SNP as respectively a party in government and a political party.
To make that quite clear – Nicola has two jobs that could potentially clash with each other. Nicola, as the FM, leads the Holyrood parliament and is chosen by the entire number of MSPs from all parties. As leader of the SNP she is leader of the political party of the SNP and is chosen by the membership.
However, in this instance there is no clash for the member is suspended pending the matter being considered and will, depending upon the considerations, either be reinstated if judged to be guilty or expelled if found guilty.
BTW: The former suspended members, such as Alex Salmond, volunteered to resign from the party and were not thrown out. They did so for, in their opinion, the good of the party.
Please do not fall for the unionist propaganda which is what they want you to do. Grousebeater is NOT expelled he is suspended. If you really want to help him then tell the Party you see no anti-Semitism in the article he wrote and do NOT express tour obvious misunderstanding of what suspended means on an open form that the unionist propagandist read and see their plans are working.
Nothing like a lawyers letter for loosening the bowels! “Lagopus Scoticus Ya Bass!”
Fred says:
The significance of this event was it showed that Kock was a spy. Allegedly, it’s trade craft. If you want to hang around somewhere for a while and appear innocent, you jack up your car and pretend to work on it. Kock almost certainly thought the two hapless guys weren’t innocent and went OTT.
There are several entries in Hansard where MPs ask ministers what capacity Kock was employed. The official answer was always none.
It is alleged that on his final journey Macrae stopped to ‘change a tyre’ and that this was an indication of ‘field craft’ while he waited to meet someone. Thus indicting he also was a spy.
A vast amount of conspiracy theory among these stories. I suspect that will be intentional and somewhere among it all will be a few snippets of fact.
The online conspiracy web is vast! Picking reality out from among it is very difficult. By design, no doubt.
@Robert Peffers,
It is you who needs to get real Robert. Over the past few years we have seen the likes of Michelle Thomson Alex Salmond and now Grousebeater.
Removal of membership in all these cases was totally unwarranted. I believe the phrase is “innocent until proven guilty” It is a basic concept of justice in this country you know. Removal of my membership clearly indicates the need to answer for something, and that preference has been given to the accuser. That is wrong in every sense.
What we are seeing in all these cases is done to head off bad publicity. Nothing more. It is nothing to do with right or wrong.
Nana says:
31 October, 2018 at 9:23 am
Here’s that fellow the bbc are desperately trying to promote.
Nae mates Bannon
https://twitter.com/WestWingReport/status/1057435107194220544
Yes but if the BBC were filming, the 17 would be herded into crowd formation and the room made to look as though it was full…
Ian McWhirter starts off his piece by calling Scotlands taxation a *Tartan* tax now if he had said Englands *Morris dancer* tax there would have been complaints of anti Englishness
The English parliament control the bulk of Scotlands taxations so can manipulate the system any way they choose to undermine anything the Scottish parliament does and that was the trap that was set by the Myth commission and was always going to happen sooner or later
Not so long ago in America before Independence for that country the slogan used was *No taxation without representation* and history shows how that worked out
There are still some people being faux offended by the use of the term *English parliament* but when EVEL was introduced that was a clear demonstration of two parliaments in one where the devolved nations (which are only partially devolved) are excluded from purely English matters yet English MPs and their government set policy for the devolved nations without interference and because of the democratic deficit in numbers Scotland can never have enough representation to do anything about it
Why people in Scotland who in all of my lifetime have never liked the Governments elected by England choose to decide that somehow in this modern age Scotland shouldn’t have control of its own destiny totally befuddles me
(except for the unsavable no brain head cases of course)
I mean you would’nt even give your own favourite brother or sister all of the power to decide your finances so why do these people in Scotland settle quite happily for people in another country with a whole different aspect of life control their money
It’s no wonder the rest of the world gasped in disbelief when Scotland rejected the gift of running its own country and for the people who rejected that gift why would you ever expect to have those of us who did want our own country autonomous to ever respect those who didn’t ever again
I don’t and won’t, so as Theresa May says *We’re at an Impasse* ………..but this one won’t ever go away because the NO people don’t negotiate, they demand total control of their dependency to another country’s control
A strange bunch the NO people
By suspending Grouse Beater immediately, the SNP has spiked the Unionists guns and forced them to shut up about the “natsis”, as their more unsavoury spokespersons refer to us.
When the unionists control every mainstream avenue of communication and are rapidly moving to shut down the online avenues then there is no option but to quarantine targets as a first line of defence IMO.
It is up to us, the grassroots, to speak out in support of anyone wrongly accused or smeared by the Unionists via MSM, and assist financially if necessary. Grouse Beater won’t be the last.
Bob Mack
Playing the Devil’s Adovcate (and not being close to the decision making process), I can see why the SNP suspended Grouse Beater – they might take the view that there is a bigger prize i.e. Independence.
However, I do take the view that the SNP need to take a stand at some point. By taking a stand they would force the MSM/Labour/British Nationalists (they are all the same organisation after all) to force the issue.
At that point they, the BritNats, will find themselves on shakey ground IMO.
MSPs call for solution to devolution row ‘impasse’
http://archive.is/I6U1w
Nicola speaking from Auschwitz-Birkenau
https://twitter.com/Political_AlanS/status/1057534167884484608
Will Westminster follow?
Yemen war: Mattis and Pompeo urge swift ceasefire
http://archive.is/EyA2X
Interesting development
Joint UK/Canada committee requesting Zuckerberg appear to give evidence
https://twitter.com/DamianCollins/status/1057574609908891650
Caught a bit of Kaye – there were a lot of people supportive of a SNP stance on tax breaks for the rich…Kaye sounded slightly surprised by how much support. I also caught the tail end of her cutting off some guy ranting about the Scottish tax regime. Doesn’t sound like SiU got their ducks in a row this morning.
As for Grousebreater, if his family background is Jewish then I can’t see the anti-Semitism thing sticking and perhaps the actual issues raised can be discussed.
What is more worrying is the way that debate is shut down with some snowflake or other claiming offence where none was intended and thus distracting from the actual issues with yet another soap opera of self indulgent victimhood. Political discourse in this country is becoming a farce, meanwhile around the world genuinely awful people are tightening their grip on power.
Keep the heid folks =)
Nana says:
Comments are disgusting. No sewer is too deep for some BritNats.
@ Nana – thx for link of Nicola speaking from Auschwitz-Birkenau
https://twitter.com/Political_AlanS/status/1057534167884484608
This may also be the reason for the sudden hysteria in Labour/DR ranks and smears of anti semitism.
BTW – I watched a good film on Holocaust denial based on the book by Deborah Lipstadt, an American professor of Holocaust studies. It’s a drama doc about her trial in London when accused by David Stirling of libel.
The tactics of her solicitor Anthony Julius and barrister Richard Rampton are very interesting, and ultimately successful. Great cast and good story. It’s called “Denial” and is on Netflix.
The burden of proof in English libel cases is on the accused.
Curiously, the film depicts the barrister, Richard Rampton, as Scottish but there is no biographical indication that he is Scottish on Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_(2016_film)
Craig Murray says:
I suspect that she simply agrees with the attacks on GB and that is the instruction given out to Humza etc.
—————
I think that anyone who reads gb’s article and then the media attack on him would have to agree that the attack is completely unwarrented, unfair and a deliberate twisting of gb’s words.
I’m pretty sure that is obvious to everyone, including nicola and humza. to that end, i would avoid such conspiracy theories you put forward and put down the snp’s reaction to their existing policy of suspension of snp membership.
it could be argued that this is perhaps not the best policy and maybe they should change and come out in defence of members for a change? I’m not sure. that could just create a long running story which would be a distraction welcomed by the unionists, a story, i might add, where it is very unlikely that any of us are likely to get a fair hearing from the msm.
perhaps suspension and legal action is the way to go. however, as you know craig, legal action can be very stressful for the complainants, so i will support gb in whatever course of action he choses
It’s not the grousebeater suspension that I find so bad, as long as it is a proper analysis of his blog and does not lead to some virtue signalling expulsion. It is the tweeting of some of the elected members that needs reigned in, they have already declared him guilty.
Plus the ‘you either with us or against us’ underlying inference that is unacceptable, it’s in the George W Bush mold. Some elected members need to step back from twitter, there tweeting is not helping them, in fact it could lead to more leaving than joining.
Anent Grousebeater and his current travails.
In this instance, the SNP is damned if it does, damned if it doesn’t. I, and I think any reasonable person would say the same, can see nothing wrong with what Grousey wrote.
That said, it is NEVER a good idea to mentionn Adolf Hitler in any blog. but, what he (Grousey, not Hitler), wrote was not anti-semetic.
However, we are dealing with the Unionist media here. They will seize on any potential morsel of SNP Badness, and, had the party not suspended Grousey, then you can bet the papers would have been all over the story like a rash.
As it stands, they cannot link it to SNP Bad, since the party has taken action. I feel, the wrong action, but, they have headed the bad guys off at the pass.
@galamcennalath
Yes. Read a few beneath the vid and sad to say? No surprises.
They are what they are. Neither empathy or humility in evidence. Only projection.
They hate, therefore the target of their ire must hate too. That person must have ulterior motives. A hidden agenda. Otherwise? Otherwise they are victimising a human being without cause or evidence. Otherwise they are simply abusing someone they know nothing about. Otherwise they are behaving like thugs themselves.
Better togetherness. 🙄
@Gala
Anything tweeted by or about our FM attracts the venomous britnats.
@Capella
Appreciate that info and I’ve added ‘Denial’ to my ever growing list of ‘must watch’ films etc
Someday I will get round to putting my feet up as Les advised upthread 🙂
GMB & Wolfson were being utterly and thoroughly deservedly crucified on SocMed for their part in the manipulated strike of GCC female staff of equality. They were pilloried for it and rightly so. So what do they do? They try to turn the whole thing around with an exercise in total deflection, painting themselves as the puir wee victims (of an alleged anti-semitic attack).
They’re not. They are manipulative so-and-sos and we see right thru you. Your despicable actions in the GCC strike will not go away and will not be forgotten.
@Bob Mack says: 31 October, 2018 at 10:43 am:
” … It is you who needs to get real Robert. Over the past few years we have seen the likes of Michelle Thomson Alex Salmond and now Grousebeater.”
Indeed we have but your comment makes my case for me.
You have been duped and not only duped you do not see the truth when it is explained to you. In both of the instances you quote here the high profile members both resigned their membership for the good of the party. Neither of them was thrown out.
Grousebeater is suspended and he is not expelled. You are still either being gulled by the propaganda or are deliberately doing the unionists work for them. I’m not judging you just stating the facts but you will know the truth and the truth is that a suspension is not an expulsion.
It is totally illogical to claim that the SNP has suspended Grousebeater and then to claim they should consider his case before suspending him. I have not checked the exact wording of the Humza statement so do not know if the statement said something like, “suspended pending consideration”, or simple that he was suspended, (which, by implication, does not state he is guilty or innocent but expelled until it is settled).
“… Removal of membership in all these cases was totally unwarranted.”
Balderdash! Both the examples you quote resigned their membership and were not thrown out. In both cases the high profile members stated they did so for the good of the party. Neither were thrown out.
” … I believe the phrase is “innocent until proven guilty” It is a basic concept of justice in this country you know.”
Yes! Exactly, and that is exactly what a, “suspension”, is. The member is presumed to be innocent and is, “suspended”, pending proof of either guilt or innocence by the proper people and they are not that proper authority.
” … Removal of my membership clearly indicates the need to answer for something, and that preference has been given to the accuser. That is wrong in every sense”.
Rubbish! It simply means the members guilt or innocence is being considered. I say yet again that a suspension is not an expulsion.
What you are advocating is that the party should accept the, “accused”, is innocent before and proof one way or another.
That is not what the phrase, “Innocent until found guilty”, means. It means no judgement should be made either way before the matter is judged.
Put another way – no judgement should be made until guilt or innocence is established and might just as well be expressed as, “Guilty until proved Innocent”.
A suspension neither presumes guilt nor of innocence. It is simply a pause while guilt OR innocence is established. In this case a accusation has been made by the media and YOU are presuming on YOUR reading that the accusation is unwarranted. It isn’t your judgement to make on behalf on anyone else’s any more than it is mine or that of the SNP.
The party has made no accusations of guilt nor of innocence – which is exactly what a suspension is – the member is NOT expelled pending the matter being considered he is suspended until either guilt or innocence is proved. In other words it is NOT the parties place to judge either way until guilt or innocence is established.
” … What we are seeing in all these cases is done to head off bad publicity. Nothing more. It is nothing to do with right or wrong.”
You are wrong as to why it is being done. It simple is not the party’s place to judge in a dispute between a member and another party.
That is, first of all, a matter for the accusers and the accused to sort out – by the legal system if necessary, it is not the party’s place to assume guilt or to assume innocence. They are not the accuser, not the accused and not the legal system.
In fact, as your attitude indicates, they are, by implication, also being accused by the accusers of being anti-Semitic by the accusers. Exactly the same is being implied against the Labour Party by the Tory party who accuse the Labour leader of being antiemetic.
It is pure propaganda and you are either falling for it or are deliberately propagating it – only you will know which of those is true.
A suspension is definitely not an expulsion as you would have us believe. Now consider this. If the accused was to crowd fund a claim of defamation in a court of law, and was to lose it, then the Party that judged the accused innocent would, rightly so, be hung out to dry by the unionist propaganda machine.
Is that what you actually want to happen?
The matter of crowd funding in support of a fellow indy supporter is quite a different matter and could not be used as propaganda by the Westminster Establishment – though I have no doubt they would try hard to do so if the matter goes that far.
Meanwhile the brexit bourach burps along and British nationalists continue to undermine their so-called united kingdom.[And best of all I’ve still got a bottle of Headspace in the fridge].
On the FMs twitter British Nationalists want the FM *Put in the oven* ref: the holocaust that they claim was a hoax
Yet we’re the bad guys
Why on earth do some independence supporters still buy the foreign owned Britnat propaganda pamphlets masquerading as newspapers.
The media in Scotland is a disgrace and the so called journalists are also a disgrace.
How low can the foreign owned media in Scotland go. It now seems you cannot even mention Hitler without being called ………… take your pick. What a way to earn a living. These journalists are the lowest of the low.
Please remember the Britnats are the problem not the SNP.
Why the UK’s Brexit negotiation tactics drew a blank
Claus Grube, a former Danish ambassador to the UK and EU. …. The UK debate is “based on ideology and emotions”, for the EU “it is based on taking care of our real interests”
Philippe Lamberts, a Belgian Green MEP on the European parliament’s Brexit steering group … “If a choice has to be made between colder UK-EU relations and weakening of the single market, I think [leaders] will choose the former. Don’t forget Brexit is the creation of the United Kingdom.”
A good article on the mistakes made by the UK with Brexit. A reasonable observer could deduce the UK has totally screwed up.
What it doesn’t spell out is that IMO they can all be put down to ingrained exceptionalism and entitlement.
http://archive.is/36hva
@Cubby 12:15pm
Well said.
Capella says:
31 October, 2018 at 10:59 am
Agree 100% with what you have said especially about the grassroots speaking out. We have access via the comments sections of the online editions of the newspapers to set the record straight on their twisted version of events and their omissions. For example, yesterday the online Herald version of the Grousebeater story included much of the section of the blog dealing with Hitler and the Unions but omitted the part where GB mentioned the commendable action of Ms Watson in fighting against anti-semitism.
An important omission. However, someone had posted the entire section including the missing paragraph commending Ms Watson.
This whole incident was an attempt at distraction from what should really have been front and centre in yesterday’s papers.
e.g. Police Scotland’s clear up rate in homicide cases and the lowest homicide rate since 1976.
The budget unravelling
Labour supporting tax cuts for the rich
Police in England and Wales having their budgets cut again
etc etc
i would ask stu campbell, if grouse beater does launch a crowd funder for his action, would you post a link to it on this blog?
tx in advance
Robert Peffers @ 12:03,
You are basically right on this one, RP, and one can appreciate the SNP leadership not wanting any distraction from the very real issue of Rhea Wolfson and the GMB’s political machinations, or for “anti-Semitism” to become an albatross round the neck as it (ironically) has developed to some extent for Labour down south.
One can’t help but compare with mixed feelings the swift SNP reaction to a member’s alleged offence on the slenderest of grounds with the Tory Party’s reaction to several of its own members’ fairly real and egregious offences.
Not to forget the media’s very differential handling of the two situations. “Ruth Davidson can’t be found” so no story, really. Move on, nothing to see. Duh.
Don’t you just love the silence of the faux righteous indignation of the Neil Findlays of this world in their condemnation of the thug deniers on the twittersphere in relation to the FMs visit?
His outrage is truly deafening. He probably thinks Primo levi plays for Lazio.
I’m done with this nonsense.
Thanks for the links this morning Nana, especially Barrheadboy’s at 7:34am and of course the video of Nicola at Auschwitz-Birkenau. I’ve been there too taking the train on the same route as Nazi victims. Sitting gazing out of the window wondering if any of them had the chance to do so and pondering on their thoughts, especially those with babies and children. On arrival it was really eerie, so quiet that you could hear a pin drop, and standing there with the knowledge of all of the suffering that had taken place in that area was too overwhelming to bear. I was crying before I had even entered any of the buildings and viewed the “exhibits.” And yet what lessons have been learned when such suffering continues all over the World, with Fascism on the rise again and with people focused on destroying the EU? It’s enough to make you go mad.
…………………..
@ Capella at 10:59am …. “The SNP have spiked the Unionist guns and forced them to shut up about the “”natsis”.”
Spot on Capella and of course it suited them to run with that line in the week that Nicola Sturgeon was visiting Auschwitz. SNP action has also suppressed the follow up of GB being accused of inferring that Wolfson was / is a fascist. He’s suspended now so that puts paid to that. No leverage now.
…….
I’ve watched Denial too and picked up on, during the film, that Richard Rampton was Scottish. Further investigations however highlights that this information has been quashed, such as in Wikipedia, which seems to be par for the course with people like Mr Cross editing out renowned Scots. If he’d been a stinker there would have been a great spiel about him no doubt. The distortion of Scottish history continues unabated.
So, if the SNP are correct in this one, it would mean that a crowdfunder for Grousebeater could lead to membership suspension for his backers, because we are acting in a manner which supports him and his statements, contrary to SNP policy.
You see how stupid this gets. Too early in the morning for some on here.
@ Socrates
Agree with everything you say. I suppose SNP always assess a case as first and foremost – will we be damaged, and is it worth it, if we defend.
I can also see members, like me, who think, the basic accusation is anti semitism, and that is false, so defend that member, tell all comers to fck off, and ride the shitstorm out.
I think what really pisses me off is I read that part of the essay as a kind of “warning” A warning like that could be argued as perfectly legitimate, as we are in the era of a rise in far Right narrative.
My Twitter feed is full of pics of Yaxley arsehole, in Germany, using, I’m told the flag German fascists use, because they are banned there from using a swastika. That thug has been invited to Washington to speak, been on Newsnight twice, and seems darling of the Beeb right now.
What is wrong with this picture, ffs?
Like others, I will happily give what I can to GB, if required.
@ Bob Mack – it may be too early in the day for you but I certainly have no qualms about contributing to a crowdfunder.
If the SNP suspend all 500 or so who contribute they are still the second biggest party in the UK and by far the biggest in Scotland, which is what matters.
And we will still campaign for independence and vote SNP. 🙂
Old OKay UK on Radio Shortbread loving the distortion of the truth from well selected slobbering maniacs.
The £100,000 year Australian working in the Scottish Oil industry
is up in arms at not getting a tax cut.
Claims he has to pay next years tax as though he earned £100k
even when he may not?
So with tax allowance and partial tax at 40%, will he still have
£62,500 less his low Nat Insurance being self employed?
Kay is worried at how he will get by?
Not worried about those using food banks or on minimum wage having to miss meals.
If this guy was over taxed, you guessed it, he gets a rebate.
If he moves to England, pays more for his house, more in council tax, greater travelling expenses and time going to work, badly performing NHS, pay for prescriptions, road tolls, etc.
This is Westminster’s plan to wipe out anyone who needs some support at times in their life.
People like Kaye the £Millionaire living in a Million pound plus home don’t give a damn about society or community, just more money for the wealthy like her pals at Propaganda Quay.
@Capella,
Yes still vote SNP. Yes still vote for indy.
I support Grousebeater. I am an SNP member. This is nothing to do with the size of the SNP. It is more to do with the cowardice and timerity shown on behalf of their membership.
Simple basic knowledge of English interpretation and conjugation skills demonstrate emphatically that the article in question is above reproach.
Do SNP politicians not possess these basic skills?
Good publicity first. Membership a distant second.
I see no benefit in bending the knee to a media that pillories you every minute of every day . What is gained.
On here we see every day how a story is turned on its head to make something good look bad, yet still we play their game by their rules to suit them. Won’t work.
@ Effijy, spot on! Letters excellent in todays National also.
@ Bob Mack – When Stalin was informed that the Pope disapproved of his handling of some issue his response was, “How many divisions has the Pope?”
Unless you have some superior force then it is better to retreat and feint. The SNP does not own the media. So they have devised a strategy to neutralise the obvious advantage that the unionists have.
The SNP does have overewhelming support in Scotland. They clearly think that avoiding bear traps is the best way of growing and maintaining that support.
Most Daily Record readers have no idea who this chap Grouse Beater is. A week long smear fest in the media would be too high a price to pay for appearing to approve unreservedly.
i don’t usually read GBs blog. I have often disagreed with his views. I believe this article could have been better written. BUT it is not anti-semitic. I may not agree with everything he says BUT I defend hos right to say it.
Finally, the SNP is a political party and must act like one. I’m a private individual free to do and say whatever I want. I trust the leadership’s handling of these very difficult issues – so far.
@Bob Mack says: 31 October, 2018 at 12:42 pm:
” … So, if the SNP are correct in this one, it would mean that a crowdfunder for Grousebeater could lead to membership suspension for his backers, because we are acting in a manner which supports him and his statements, contrary to SNP policy.”
Absolute and utter claptrap, Bob Mack. Not a grain of truth or basic logic in the entire load of crap.
The SNP has simply suspended, not expelled Grousebeater.
Here is a dictionary cut & paste definition in that context of, “Suspension”:-
” … You see how stupid this gets. Too early in the morning for some on here.”
Nah! What I see is a person who cannot understand simple basic English language who may, or may not, be attempting to convince others that the SNP are somehow guilty of imagined wrongdoing.
They suspended, not expelled, a member who was accused, (but has not been proven guilty of anything and a suspension is 100% the appropriate action for the party to take as they are not either the accused nor are they the accuser but most of all not in any position to be the judge, jury, or prosecutor of an accused person.
The term, “suspended”, simply means they cannot, and will not, judge their member as either innocent or guilty.
Furthermore, your utterly idiotic claims they would have any reason to interfere in a crowd-funder for the accused to seek legal redress for defamation of character is a gross attempt to claim the SNP are guilty of something or other – Oops! Best strike that out or I might be accused of anti-something or other by the unionist though police.
@Robert Peffers,
Nice try Robert, but it shows your obvious limitations in the discussion. If a BNP member holds a collection can up to me and I deposit £10 in it, then I am expressing a form of tacit support for that organisation and it’s views.
Crowdfunding for Grousebeater is no less. I support his article unreservedly and will contribute if required. SNP doesn’t like it ,too bad.
As an aside you have to brush up on your people skills. You resort to abuse too frequently without justification to be palatable .
@Bob Mack says: 31 October, 2018 at 1:09 pm:
” … Do SNP politicians not possess these basic skills?
Good publicity first. Membership a distant second.”
Are you for real?
” … I see no benefit in bending the knee to a media that pillories you every minute of every day . What is gained.”
What the hell has any of that got to do with the SNP’s 100% correct reaction to the current Grousebeater accusations?
The accusers and the accused in Grousebeater’s current dispute with each other have absolutely nothing to do with the SNP.
In fact, by implication the accusers are attempting to connect the SNP with anti-Semitism but besides the fact that Grousebeater is an SNP member it is nothing whatsoever to do with the party. If Grousebeater just happened to be a member of his local hockey teams supporters club would they also be, by implication accused of antisematism?
It is utter nonsense you are gibbering. The SNP are not accusing Grousebeater of anything whatsoever. They are not throwing him out, not claiming him guilty or not guilty of anything. Nor even judging him. They are simply suspending him while considering the matter.
It is not their fight and would not only damage the SNP and Grousebeater’s case but the whole independence movement if they did allow themselves to be drawn into the matter.
Anyone with a reasonable command of the English language can read the Grousebeater article and the accuser’s accusations and decide for themselves which is correct. The matter of who they then support and, if it goes to a court case, who they choose to help fund has nothing to do with the SNP’s correct decision to not become involved.
@Robert Peffers,
Every employment law case over the past two years state the same thing, which totally goes against your posting.
They declare that employers or Directors of organisations should think very carefully before suspending an employee or member, because suspension “is not a neutral act”.
Tribunals now have to be convinced that a suspension is justified on evidence rather than an immediate reaction. That is the current law. Over to you.
@Robert Peffers “ I have not checked the exact wording of the Humza statement so do not know if the statement said something like, “suspended pending consideration””
Robert, you would have been advised to do some investigation yourself first, and probably bearing in mind your usual postiion, refrained from posting on this issue.
Here’s what Yousaf tweeted, and bear in mind he is the Cabinet Secretary for Justice – that’s the guy who should be protecting Law in Scotland and the presumed right of innocence until proven guilty:
https://twitter.com/HumzaYousaf/status/1057240098394255360
It’s not WHAT he said, no problem with that, it’s the context he pinned that tweet to – the Herald article about GB.
I should have said “no problem with that on its own, with no context”. It’s generally a good thing to say. But not directly related to an unproven individual case – anti-semitism is a hate crome, and people could get convicted of it. In other circumstances, Yousaf’s tweet could be considerd contempt of court.
My concern is over instant suspension of an SNP member on the basis of what an newspaper article says they have done and not on what they have actually done.
Does this policy of instant suspension apply for every member all the way up to the top? If so then all that is needed to get anyone a suspension is to print an article against that person whether it has any merit or not and the job is done.
There has to be a better way of handling this than instant suspension, as we all know the papers are often “bending the truth” to suit their own agenda.
What is so wrong with issuing a statement that the matter will be investigated fully and appropriate action taken if the allegation is found to have merit?
@Bob Mack says: 31 October, 2018 at 2:36 pm:
” … Every employment law case over the past two years state the same thing, which totally goes against your posting.
They declare that employers or Directors of organisations should think very carefully before suspending an employee or member, because suspension “is not a neutral act”.
For starters Grousebeater is not an employee of the SNP.
Furthermore, suspension of a member pending a matter not in any way levelled at the SNP, except perhaps by strange implication is indeed a neutral act for to do otherwise in this circumstance would be an admission of the SNP’s support for anti-Semitism. That is if the case were to arrive in a court whether criminal or civil. he only chance of that happening is if Grousebeater is crowdfunded and brings a case for defamation.
You are still blethering ant-SNP claptrap. As to, “immediate reaction”, the immediate reaction by the SNP in the face of an out of the blue claim of antisemitism was, “Hang on, we need to find out what this is all about, and must not get dragged into this. Which, if they supported their member, they would certainly have been.
The SNP is a big party and attending any branch meeting will introduce you to a broad-church set of views.
The SNP, though, depends upon democratic votes of grass roots membership for policies. These policies are not set by the party hierarchy but by party member’s delegates at national conference.
@yesindyref2
Aye the statement from humza’s statement on its own is fine. Just wish they had chosen to investigate first without pulling the trigger.
P.s suspension is not a neutral act. If I get suspended from work, my jobby output would soar. It implies I have done something very wrong.
Re Tilda Swinton’s statement:-
I have often wondered why there is no noun to describe a British person – other than Brit which as I recall was a word of derision used by the IRA.
We Have Norwegians, Swedes, Danes Dutchmen, Belgians, Frenchmen, Germans, Italians, Spaniards, Russians, Americans, Canadians not forgetting Scotsmen, Englishmen, Welshmen, Irishmen but no word for somebody British.