The right way to go for Scotland 91
Posted on
May 27, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
No.13: James, Aberdeenshire.
Archive for the ‘comment’
A throw of the dice 127
Posted on
May 25, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The spanking new issue of Viz, which is totally still a thing, is out today at all good newsagents. The cover promises a “FANTASTIC FREE VOTING AID” inside, and we thought you’d be at least mildly and fleetingly amused by the Scottish aspect. Of it.
Pop out to the shops and buy a Viz*, readers. (Or subscribe to try three issues for a mere £1.) It’s just as funny as it used to be but much less popular, so it’s cool again.
.
*Wings Over Scotland has no connection to Viz or Dennis Publishing Ltd and has received no inducement for this endorsement. Although we’re open to offers.
Nursing a grievance 559
Posted on
May 23, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
(NB The media is understandably mostly occupied today with the horrific events in Manchester. But life goes on – music websites are still talking about music, football websites are still talking about football, videogames websites are still talking about videogames. Any rational observations about terrorism made here would be screamed down as making political capital from tragedy. So let’s get on with the day job.)
If you apply to go on a televised political debate and then submit a question to ask a national leader, it seems a reasonable deduction that you want that issue to be raised and discussed. If you also make it personal by describing your own circumstances, it seems logical that you’d want those circumstances to be widely publicised, and to be asked about them so you could say more and tell your story to the country.
So it’s a bit odd that Edinburgh nurse Claire Austin has suddenly gone off the radar.
A way of protecting people 66
Posted on
May 21, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
No.12: Sophie, Dundee.
A creeping feeling 100
Posted on
May 17, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
No.11: Kathi, from Bernburg, Germany.
Ruth’s fishy friends 378
Posted on
May 12, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
This week the Scottish media went in quite heavily with the news that Ruth Davidson had signed up “Scottish fishing industry leaders” to back the UK government over the Scottish Government, after the latter had warned that Westminster planned to sell out the industry again during Brexit negotiations.
To be honest we didn’t pay it a lot of heed, assuming that “Scottish fishing industry leaders” just meant Bertie Armstrong again – a longstanding ultra-staunch Unionist and Leave supporter with a track record as a reliable anti-independence rentaquote – and nothing in the coverage led us to believe otherwise.
But then we saw a picture:
Mr Armstrong is the white-haired and bearded chap standing immediately to the right of Davidson in the photo, with his hand on the top corner of her pledge. But who’s the fellow immediately to the left of her?
A stranger inside 187
Posted on
May 11, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Below is a clip from last night’s Reporting Scotland. It features regular election loser Christine Jardine, an ex-BBC journalist who the Lib Dems have tried unsuccessfully for years to crowbar into Parliamentary seats all over Scotland (like Aberdeenshire East in 2016, Gordon in 2015, the European Parliament in 2014, Aberdeen Donside in 2013 and Inverness and Nairn in 2011).
She’s currently contesting Edinburgh West, which the party has some credible hopes of winning, having held the seat for almost 20 years prior to 2015. And it seems that her former employer has decided to try to give her a helping hand.
And, y’know, they’re really not allowed to do that.
Here isn’t the news 163
Posted on
May 11, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Something really quite strange happened yesterday. The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom was caught red-handed in the act of telling a bare-faced, unarguable lie in the middle of a general election campaign, and nobody cared.
Reacting to the Crown Prosecution Service decision not to prosecute dozens of Tory MPs who’d broken the law in getting elected in 2015, the PM offered up a quote, which was reported in most of the newspapers:
Nice wee bit of snark on “all the major parties, and the Scottish nationalists” there. But there’s a slight problem with the statement, which is that it’s an absolute lie.
A little more certainty 198
Posted on
May 09, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The BBC has just published an article explaining its controversial claim that the SNP actually lost seats at last week’s council elections, despite going from 425 to 431. The analysis was carried out by Prof. David Denver of Lancaster University, and we’d asked him about it yesterday.
He’d very kindly sent us a copy of the same article he’d sent the Beeb. We attach it below. We’ve highlighted in bold the only bits that didn’t make it into the BBC piece.
Kezia Dugdale Fact Check, Part 681 418
Posted on
May 08, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
This one definitely looks dodgy.
We, um… we don’t think they DID show that, Kez.
