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This is your country, No voters 320

Posted on October 20, 2014 by

Preserved for posterity in case of sudden vanishing, but also because we just couldn’t face writing another post about “The Vow” today.

This is a real thing that you can buy on Amazon and iTunes. If you chose to be British last month, this is what “British” means in 2014. Enjoy it.

It’s England’s Oil 381

Posted on August 28, 2014 by

This is Polly Toynbee of the Guardian and Eddie Bone of the Campaign for an English Parliament in a remarkable nine minutes of “Good Morning Scotland” this morning.

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It’s the nearest to sounding like a Yes voter you’ll ever hear James Naughtie. Enjoy.

Alistair Darling Lie Bingo 138

Posted on August 25, 2014 by

We’ve been so busy with the Wee Blue Book for the past week or so that we only just got round to listening to last Tuesday’s interview with Alistair Darling on Good Morning Scotland in time, before it vanished from the iPlayer. The former Chancellor gets a quite uncomfortable ride from presenter Gary Robertson, and flaps angrily for much of the ten-and-a-half minutes trying to turn every question into one on currency.

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Mr Darling also makes some startlingly and empirically false statements throughout the interview, and we thought it’d be worth noting a few of them and seeing if they crop up on tonight’s BBC1 debate with the First Minister.

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Another mystery explained 135

Posted on August 07, 2014 by

It turns out that Jackie Baillie heard this and thought it was a referendum broadcast.

Silly old Jackie, eh readers?

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New frontiers in lying 140

Posted on August 07, 2014 by

Alert readers will be aware that even in a campaign characterised by dishonesty, the ever-smirking Labour MSP Jackie Baillie has carved a reputation for especially notable creativity with the truth. With our hands on our hearts, we don’t think we’ve ever heard her say anything that wasn’t a lie. However, on last night’s The World Tonight on BBC Radio 4, we believe she reached a spectacular personal best. Have a listen.

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If you can’t quite believe your ears, we’ll transcribe that for you.

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Nine little words 279

Posted on August 04, 2014 by

An alert reader was listening to the Today programme on Radio 4 this morning when they heard something unexpected that made them sit up and take notice. It came as part of a segment on Northern Irish people living in Scotland, 45 minutes into the show, and was stated in passing as an unremarkable statistic by BBC reporter Andy Martin.

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We’ve isolated it for you – click the image above to listen to the short 13-second clip. (The full six-minute piece can be found here for when it expires on iPlayer.)

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Reaching a consensus 107

Posted on July 28, 2014 by

In case you somehow carelessly missed it, here’s the nine-minute-or-so segment from last night’s “The Westminster Hour” on Radio 4, in which dear old Alan Cochrane of the Telegraph and I discussed the tone and tenor of the independence debate.

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The fascinating thing was how Cochrane started off essentially claiming that the entire thing was an intolerable horror, but but by the end was agreeing that it was actually surprisingly mild and civilised as these things go, and needed to continue in exactly the same manner it was now. Funny old cove.

Firebrand vs milksop 182

Posted on June 28, 2014 by

An angry Dennis Canavan gets stuck into Ian Murray, the Labour MP who calls the police when someone puts a sticker on his window, on “Good Morning Scotland”.

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For our money the most telling part is when Murray bleats about the SNP proposing a cut to Corporation Tax, and Canavan quite rightly points out the hypocrisy given that Labour reduced it twice when last in power and pledged to reduce it even further as soon as possible, Murray runs away from the issue without addressing it, but then has the brass neck to bring it up again at the end.

We are reasonable people 105

Posted on June 11, 2014 by

If you missed it, today’s John Beattie show featuring Hamish Macdonell and myself:

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Inaudible mumble amplified 489

Posted on June 10, 2014 by

The New Statesman has been doggedly ignoring all our polite requests to release the audio of its controversial interview with Alistair Darling for several days now, but today it very quietly released the full text of it on its website.

Where previously it had reported the “Better Together” leader as having made an “inaudible mumble” in response to a question about whether the SNP were guilty of “blood-and-soil nationalism”, apparently the mag had given its ears a good swabbing out with a cotton-bud and concluded that it HAD been able to hear him after all.

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The morning after the day before 153

Posted on June 06, 2014 by

For the sake of our blood pressure we don’t normally tune in to Radio Scotland’s weekday phone-in show, but as Lallands Peat Worrier was on it today we stayed with it for a few minutes, and found ourselves getting increasingly annoyed as presenter Kaye Adams asked caller after caller if they thought Barack Obama’s comments on independence yesterday (in so far as he actually made any) had been “off the cuff”.

We knew they hadn’t been, so we rang up just to keep the record straight.

soundwave2 We wanted to have Obama’s awkward, halting delivery on file anyway, so this’ll do.

Hacked off 115

Posted on May 30, 2014 by

The week-long media frenzy that would have surrounded the Scottish Government releasing a key set of figures about independence, only to have them immediately and pointedly disowned by their cited sources as gross distortions misrepresenting the reality by a factor of 12, doesn’t bear thinking about.

(Remind yourself of the 10 desperate days they dragged out of some spectacularly innocuous comments about Vladimir Putin and multiply that by about a thousand.)

The one-sided national embarrassment that is the Scottish media, however, has done its level best to completely bury the wholly-justified anger of Professors Patrick Dunleavy of the LSE and Robert Young of Western Ontario University.

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Neither of the country’s current-affairs TV shows gave the matter more than the most cursory passing mention, nor did most of its newspapers. You’ll search in vain for a story about it in the Guardian, and the Scotsman actually managed to hide its two paragraphs of coverage deep inside pieces attacking the SNP.

A promised interview with Professor Dunleavy on “Good Morning Scotland” never materialised, but the distinguished academic DID eventually surface on Wednesday’s edition of “Newsdrive”. If you click the image above you can listen to the seven-minute slot in its entirety, and wonder just how outrageously the defenders of the Union would have to act to make the front pages of a Scottish newspaper.

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    • Aidan on Mad caps: “Exactly Robert – it’s full of people who rant and rave like you do. Nobody wants to be associated with…Apr 7, 08:56
    • Robert Hughes on Mad caps: “” it’s also that the campaign is too closely associated with anti-Englishness, sympathy for the Kremlin sometimes and increasingly wild…Apr 7, 08:25
    • Hatey McHateface on Mad caps: “Don’t overlook the ingrained antisemitism which a close read of the clannish, self-congratulatory backslapping posts reveals. But yes, if they…Apr 7, 07:14
    • Hatey McHateface on Mad caps: ““We voters would be in the driving seat – that would be wonderful” Would it though, sarah? In all of…Apr 7, 07:05
    • Aidan on Mad caps: “@Ian – as someone who is around half the age of the average suggested above, it’s not just that many…Apr 7, 07:03
    • Ian Brotherhood on Mad caps: “@Sarah (9.16) – Thanks for that and aye, totally agree, there’s nothing like meeting folk in the flesh. Sometimes they’re…Apr 7, 00:09
    • diabloandco on Mad caps: “IanB, I do hope so , I am definitely in need of meeting up with the cheerful , positive folk…Apr 6, 22:10
    • sarah on Mad caps: “MaryB, it is encouraging that you read para (a) the same way that I do i.e. that it empowers People’s…Apr 6, 21:27
    • sarah on Mad caps: “I miss the way btl was. It was always relevant to independence, and pleasant on a personal level. OK Robert…Apr 6, 21:16
    • MaryB on Mad caps: “Sarah @ 4.48 & Duncx I tried to post this earlier today, but it didn’t appear. So here it is…Apr 6, 21:07
    • Ian Brotherhood on Mad caps: “Hi D, Yes, it was good. Not just because the atmosphere was relaxed (because the Eagle Inn is Robert Slavin’s…Apr 6, 20:18
    • Tinto Chiel on Mad caps: “Had forgotten all about that, Robert. No idea what we were discussing. Love, Samantha 🙂 .Apr 6, 19:44
    • Ian Brotherhood on Mad caps: “Hoots aplenty sah, you’ve got me off the hook as Tinto was fingering me for that one! 😉Apr 6, 19:41
    • Aidan on Mad caps: “@Hatey – you aren’t supposed to look into things, you’re supposed to sign the petition and possibly donate money regardless…Apr 6, 19:39
    • diabloandco on Mad caps: “Sorry I missed the night too – it sounds as though a good time was had by all. Next time!Apr 6, 19:27
    • Robert Hughes on Mad caps: “ha ! you told me your name when you emailed me a while back – including your surname – which…Apr 6, 18:51
    • Tinto Chiel on Mad caps: “@Robert Hughes 3.23: nae probs, Robert. See you next time. Had to head off early. Don’t know how you know…Apr 6, 18:26
    • Hatey McHateface on Mad caps: “Please tell us, sarah, that when you say you haven’t had a proper look at this thing you are enthusiastically…Apr 6, 17:46
    • Mark Beggan on Mad caps: “The First Minister in crucial trade talks confirms someone, no knows who, is very much interested in business.Apr 6, 16:54
    • sarah on Mad caps: “@ Dunx at 8.46 a.m. “..had a look at the blog. Article 25 of the ICCPR…nothing there about referendums..” Well…Apr 6, 16:48
    • Robert Hughes on Mad caps: “Ah ! likewise , T.C ( Peter ): I never realised you were there , if I had I would…Apr 6, 15:23
    • Tinto Chiel on Mad caps: “Sorry I couldn’t stay long, Ian, but thanks for all the effort you and your fellow insurgents put in to…Apr 6, 14:56
    • Andrew scott on Mad caps: “If dross geer is the answer What on earth is the questionApr 6, 12:56
    • GM on Mad caps: “Apologies Iain, I couldn’t make it. Glad you had a good meet up.Apr 6, 11:41
    • Captain Caveman on Mad caps: “@Hatey Agreed. Step 1: Less lawyers. Especially lefty lawyers….Apr 6, 10:54
    • Hatey McHateface on Mad caps: “Sure, Marie, we’re doomed. You’ve said this before. Weird, though, how other electorates, in other countries, aren’t doomed. The MAGA…Apr 6, 10:53
    • Captain Caveman on Mad caps: ““Whether potential candidates have ever had a proper job is neither here nor there.” That’s factually wrong in the case…Apr 6, 10:50
    • Hatey McHateface on Mad caps: ““How such a thing can be achieved, though (or the whole of the UK for that matter) is anyone’s guess.…Apr 6, 10:42
    • Marie on Mad caps: “Look it’s not just the Greens – every political party controls its members and potential candidates – national or local.…Apr 6, 10:31
    • Hatey McHateface on Mad caps: “I guess, Anthem, you’re blaming the German part of President Trump for the mayhem. Myself, I see the German part…Apr 6, 10:24
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