The faithful pet 390
Posted on
December 02, 2017 by
Chris Cairns
Archive for the ‘comment’
Return of the classics 337
Posted on
November 27, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
One letter too many 141
Posted on
November 26, 2017 by
Chris Cairns
(It’s nearly Christmas! Buy a cuddly Hamish The Lion toy here! Plus maybe some cartoon books.)
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The National FAQ 416
Posted on
November 24, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Back in the summer we sang the praises of one of Scotland’s tiny semi-handful of pro-independence print organs, the splendid iScot. So it seems only fair that we should offer the same courtesy to the other one we mentioned at the time, The National. It’s three years old today – how the time’s flown – and its editor Callum Baird wants your support. Over to him.
Led by donkeys 373
Posted on
November 20, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Yesterday’s edition of the Scottish Mail On Sunday devoted most of a page to a weird column from Ruth Davidson (in which she appeared to believe that Alex Salmond was still the First Minister), crowing about the great deal that Scotland’s 13 Tory MPs have supposedly won for Scotland in this week’s coming budget.
The first alleged fruits of the deal were revealed today.
That tweet is quite disturbing in itself, because what it unmistakeably implies is that if Scotland had voted for more SNP MPs in June and fewer Tories, the UK government would have retaliated by spitefully punishing innocent war veterans.
And Poppy Scotland weren’t too pleased about being weaponised either.
Critical Massie 275
Posted on
November 19, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
This is Spectator columnist Alex Massie reacting earlier this week to the news of Alex Salmond doing a show for Russian news channel RT.
Alex Salmond is these days a private individual with no responsibilities to anyone, and RT is a legal, Ofcom-licenced UK broadcaster whose output is beamed free into every home in the land.
The first episode of The Alex Salmond Show featured guests from both Labour and the Tories, opened with lengthy discussion and advocation of women’s and LGBT rights, followed by a 15-minute interview with deposed Catalan president Carles Puigdemont – something which has proven beyond the capabilities of mainstream UK news outlets despite the remarkable events currently engulfing an EU member state.
(BBC Scotland, we should perhaps note at this point, does not currently carry a single dedicated political TV show from a Scottish perspective at all and hasn’t done for more than a year.)
Massie used some slightly more measured language when it came to writing about the show in the Spectator, merely describing Salmond as an “idiot”, a “fool”, a “chump”, “pitiful”, “embarrassing” and “disgraceful”. But when it came to another former Scottish party leader, he was for some reason in a rather more forgiving mood.
Correcting the record 144
Posted on
November 13, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Since David Torrance shows no sign of being willing to retract the falsehood below that he tweeted earlier today despite our requests, we’ll have to address it here. Apologies for the indulgence.
We can find nowhere that we made any allegation of Torrance being “paid” by RT. We tweeted that he’d “worked for” them, and said he’d “simply appeared on” the channel. Neither of those statements claims that any money changed hands. If Torrance says that he worked for RT for nothing purely in order to get some free publicity for his book, we’re happy to accept that at face value.
(Although we’re not sure if that makes it better or worse, to be honest.)
But that’s not really the point of all the outrage over “The Alex Salmond Show”, is it?
The habit of lying 155
Posted on
November 12, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Yesterday’s Daily Record (which would increasingly be an accurate three-word name for the paper) ran an innocuous piece of page-filler fluff rubbish, and for once we’re not talking about a David Torrance column.
It featured the “psychic” predictions of a man who, the Record told us – no fewer than FIVE times in the opening few lines – previously predicted Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election, and who had a track record of “incredible accuracy”.
Sounds pretty spooky. Maybe he’s got the gift.
Russia’s greatest publicity machine 263
Posted on
November 11, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Mainstream and social media alike are now well into their second day of an absolutely epic meltdown at the news that Alex Salmond is to broadcast a chat show on RT, the Russian equivalent of the BBC.
It really is almost impossible to overstate the magnitude of the shrieking fit the decision has produced. Addled old Lords with criminal convictions for violently and drunkenly assaulting Her Majesty’s police have with an audacious lack of self-awareness decried the immorality of one of HM’s advisors going on TV to talk about stuff, and one Lib Dem MSP has even gone so far as to raise a Holyrood motion demanding that the state interferes with the lawful employment choices of a private citizen.
We imagine that RT will be beside itself with joy at the avalanche of publicity the UK press and political sphere is giving it. We’d be amazed if the hysterical brouhaha didn’t double or treble the audience figures that Salmond could otherwise have expected.
It’s just that it’s all a little, well, sudden.
Something we need to talk about 199
Posted on
November 10, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
