In its kneejerk “SNP BAD” reaction to the Alistair Carmichael affair, the Unionist establishment – politicians and media alike – has furiously tried to divert attention from Carmichael’s smear and attempted cover-up by harking back to an incident in 2012, when the press gave vast amounts of coverage to a claim that Alex Salmond had “lied” about legal advice regarding an independent Scotland’s EU membership.
Because we took a short break over the weekend, we sadly missed Labour’s solemn commemorations of the 1979 confidence vote, and as a result we don’t know whether anyone actually did don a black armband or lay a wreath to remember the miners that Labour didn’t support when they went on strike a few years later.
The categorical support of Andy Murray for Scottish independence, though only finally unambiguously revealed in today’s Sunday Times (the tennis star’s day-of-poll tweet backing Yes could by a strict semantic interpretation have been said to be somewhat equivocal), isn’t much of a surprise.
So it’s perhaps worth reminding ourselves what the media told us.
This week Scottish Labour quietly abandoned their “biggest party forms the government” election campaign after it was comprehensively debunked by this site and, belatedly, the mainstream media. An alert reader reminded us this evening of how the party wasn’t always so attached to the rules.
Because back in 2007, when Labour was neither the biggest party nor the incumbent administration, it had a damn good try at forming the government anyway.
Only a few diehards in the press are still clinging this morning to the Labour fiction we exposed yesterday, namely the flat-out empirical falsehood that “the biggest party gets to form a government” in the event of a hung Parliament.
By now we imagine most readers have already seen the alleged leak of the Ashcroft polling results which aren’t due to be officially released until 11am today [EDIT 00.47am: out now], and which suggest some jaw-dropping SNP gains.
We’re not going to go off half-cocked until those have been confirmed, so instead here’s something sent in by an alert reader. It’s an extract from the autobiography of former Radio 1 DJ Liz Kershaw, and describes events around the funeral of Princess Diana. We think you’ll find it enlightening.
Captain Caveman on Anything But That: “Given the gas was unburned, the CO2/greenhouse gas impact would have been horrendous. Roughly the same as driving an average…” Sep 9, 16:58
agentx on Anything But That: ““John Swinney nightmare as Westminster launches probe into Peter Murrell’s crimes and Lord Advocate’s role in Cabinet” For details read…” Sep 9, 16:39
sam on Anything But That: “sez the UK parlyment England which has about 90 % of UK surface water has problems, to put it mildly,…” Sep 9, 16:37
Captain Caveman on Anything But That: “OK we’re talking methane, not propane, therefore a lower calorific value and all that jazz, but fuck me, 700kg of…” Sep 9, 16:37
agentx on Anything But That: ““Stephen Flynn says he was unaware of ferry gas escape” ——————————————————- No surprise there then!” Sep 9, 15:57
agentx on Anything But That: “The Math Breakdown:Methane Volume: \(700 \text{ kg} \div 0.657 \text{ kg/m³} = \mathbf{1,065.4 \text{ m³}}\) Average UK 4-Bedroom House: A…” Sep 9, 15:54
Minceheid on Anything But That: “Hatey McHateface says: 9 September, 2026 at 2:54 pm Sounds like they were very lucky they didn’t have 82+ incinerated…” Sep 9, 15:10
Ian Smith on Anything But That: “700kg of methane could fill far more than the volume of a four bedroom house, unless it had a double…” Sep 9, 14:56
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Sounds like they were very lucky they didn’t have 82+ incinerated corpses bobbing in the ocean. I guess “lessons will…” Sep 9, 14:54
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Not a bad program for the myopic. Nothing specifically about G@za. I guess it comes under Foreign Policy, but I’m…” Sep 9, 14:47
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: ““which means the pipelines are back on” Good one! Biggest laugh of the day so far. Perhaps to be exceeded…” Sep 9, 14:28
Willie on Anything But That: “Oh dear, news just breaking of the appalling developing country engineering standards in Scotland has just emerged. Seems that in…” Sep 9, 14:23
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Michty! Is it breakfast time already?” Sep 9, 14:20
sam on Anything But That: “I guess you didn’t read this. “OUR MISSION The Scottish Sovereignty Research Group was formed in December 2020, when it…” Sep 9, 14:16
Confused on Anything But That: “leah has a good blog, connecting scottish nationalism into wider geo politics https://archive.ph/gM0JM – she is an american woman and…” Sep 9, 13:55
Confused on Anything But That: “SSRG is perfectly fine – if it was a middle class wankers circle wank setup there would be a whole…” Sep 9, 13:54
Confused on Anything But That: “beggan is a just a turd with an 85IQ, here to disrupt. He is reminiscent of another turd, Mark Boyle,…” Sep 9, 13:53
Confused on Anything But That: “everything is made in china (more or less) ya fucking tit; let’s all buy english flatscreen tellies and english computers…” Sep 9, 13:52
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “The EU is moving at its usual glacial pace towards shutting out Covid Spreader unfair competition within its markets: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/sep/09/eu-buy-european-public-procurement-rules-china-goods-services…” Sep 9, 13:15
James Che on Anything But That: “I do not vote so neither left or right. Or even in the middle. When politics and election improve from…” Sep 9, 12:33
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: “Mark, Measurements of length have always been relatively arbitrary and it has only been in recent times that it has…” Sep 9, 12:26
James Che on Anything But That: “Mark Beggan. I wll retain my politeness as I have done on wings for the sake of he host of…” Sep 9, 12:21
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: ““differed in some degree from their English equivalents.” Which system would be the more accurate? Was the transition to the…” Sep 9, 11:35
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: “Aye Northy never trust the French. A wee eighth of a Scottish inch or a baw hair ken.” Sep 9, 11:24
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: ““professors, authors, policy thinkers, a Labour peer, a broadcaster, and Salvo/Liberation Scotland” I wonder if they will be taking questions.…” Sep 9, 11:07
Hatey McHateface on Anything But That: ““move Scotland even a millimetre closer to independence” Sorry, Northy, but no True Sovereign Scot uses the metric system. Prior…” Sep 9, 10:53
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: “Just those who don’t agree with you.” Sep 9, 10:44
Hatey Mchateface on Anything But That: “An ideal opportunity for Burnham to promise a McLaren in every postcode.” Sep 9, 10:40
Mark Beggan on Anything But That: “Wrong city. The capital of the fascists was Rome. Germany was a National Socialist dictatorship. Benito Mussolini would have to…” Sep 9, 10:27
