It’s nice to see the British media (and perhaps, if we might be allowed to dream for a moment, the law) catching up with Michelle Mone.
It’s such a shame nobody did any proper investigative journalism into what a crooked, venal chancer she is before now – seven years ago or even four years ago, say – or the country might have been saved a few billion quid. Ah well, you live and learn, eh?
While this site remains mothballed, it’s nice to keep a steady trickle of traffic going just in case it ever needs to spring back to life, eg if someone actually interested in independence suddenly somehow becomes leader of the SNP again.
So we thought it might be fun to just briefly link to some old articles as and when they became topical once more, and as luck would have it tomorrow is such an occasion.
Because that’s when the SNP will launch the first of a series of new papers outlining the First Minister’s “vision” of independence by waffling on about how it would be a jolly good thing, in the unlikely event that she ever got off her extremely well-paid arse and achieved it.
15 years ago this week (today if you’re counting strictly by date, Thursday if you want to go with election days) the SNP came to power in Scotland for the first time ever. The media operating in Scotland is full of retrospectives and polls on the period, but as usual they’ve missed the real story, as a reader pointed out to us a few days ago.
So for old times’ sake, let’s do their job properly for them one more time.
We’ve observed that over the last few days a number of Unionists, led by tuba-honking dunderhead Blair McDougall (the man who turned a 30-point No lead into a 10-point one, who lost Labour 5000 votes when he stood in East Renfrewshire in 2017 on the basis of being the guy who saved the UK – trailing in an embarrassing 3rd in a seat where Jim Murphy had once won over 50% of the vote – and who is probably more responsible than any other individual for the utter destruction of Scottish Labour as a political force), have revived the ancient “Better Together” scare story about pensions in an independent Scotland.
When the Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts died last month, the first of their songs that popped into my head, for no particular reason, was “Under My Thumb”, a mildly controversial 1966 album track the band never released as a single in the West.
Its most infamous place in history, though, is this.
Until Watts’ death I was only very broadly aware of the events at Altamont Speedway in 1969, a free festival at a racetrack near San Francisco at which four people died in scenes of malevolent chaos and which is widely regarded as the grim headstone of the hippy era.
But on seeing the extraordinary footage above for the first time on the day of Watts’ death – taken from “Gimme Shelter”, notionally the official movie of the show, although the first two-thirds of it are actually a mundane travelogue of the preceding tour dates – I did some proper reading up on it.
And as I did, a horribly familiar feeling started to unfold.
Although we’re retired we already wrote this, so we may as well put it up for the 99.9% of Scots who don’t read the comments on David Leask‘s columns in the Herald.
It’s a claim he’s been banging on about since at least 2014, without ever providing a scrap of evidence to support it (his standard modus operandi), and yesterday was no exception. So let’s show Little Dave how proper big-boy journalists do it.
twathater on Irony you can’t buy: “Geri, Joanna is another one who sat on her arse and said fuck all about what was going on under…” Mar 22, 03:30
twathater on Irony you can’t buy: ““Thatcher was a necessary evil, presumably you didnt live in pre-Thatcher times” There speaks a good old tory with his…” Mar 22, 03:18
Mark Beggan on Irony you can’t buy: “That comment. Or was it a rant. No one knows. I never read it but it proves that AI is…” Mar 21, 23:16
robertkknight on Irony you can’t buy: “Truth is to Sturgeon what intelligence is to Trump.” Mar 21, 22:55
William G Walker on Irony you can’t buy: “Does Nicola Sturgeon Tell “Frankly” Fibs About Three Political “Casualties”? I have now read Nicola Sturgeon’s Memoir, “Frankly”, and am…” Mar 21, 22:45
willie on Irony you can’t buy: “Bad management got bad unions. Two cheeks of the same arse. A bit like saying free enterprise good, state ownership…” Mar 21, 21:56
Mark Beggan on Irony you can’t buy: “Baby Mark says I love life. Thankyou IDF.” Mar 21, 21:22
Mark Beggan on Irony you can’t buy: “No. whoever you are. I’m on Freedom.” Mar 21, 21:19
Young Lochinvar on Irony you can’t buy: “Angus Yes that just seems to have been forgotten about in the unearthing of sneaky Pete (allegedly) getting his hand…” Mar 21, 20:56
Young Lochinvar on Irony you can’t buy: “Beggars You’ve been on Baby Trump again haven’t you? 🙂” Mar 21, 20:43
Mark Beggan on Irony you can’t buy: “The story so far….. Big beautiful Lefty meltdown. I knew they would. Everybody knows this. They tried to play poker…” Mar 21, 20:36
Young Lochinvar on Looking up at the stars: “Asian Superspreader. I will be honest, if not Canterbury, but at least Kent was originally said a bit tongue in…” Mar 21, 20:04
Angus on Irony you can’t buy: “Has the £600,000 stolen by high ranking SNP officials when Sturgeon was SNP leader been found and recovered? Have the…” Mar 21, 20:02
sarah on Irony you can’t buy: “But don’t forget, 100%Yes, that the Claim of Right DOES still exist and is legally enforceable. We just need to…” Mar 21, 19:50
Young Lochinvar on Irony you can’t buy: “Happy anniversary tomorrow of the 1421 Battle of Bauge. Called to assist their French allies reeling under English occupation and…” Mar 21, 19:47
viscount ennui on Irony you can’t buy: “Politicians from across the gender spectrum came together to defeat a law aimed to legitimise the killing of terminally-ill policies.…” Mar 21, 19:37
Aidan on Looking up at the stars: “I’m just not supporting a wartime crisis that will be close to a national lockdown to prevent the spread of…” Mar 21, 19:22
Mark Beggan on Irony you can’t buy: “Did I forget to mention the Tranny’s. Well shame on me.” Mar 21, 19:10
Mark Beggan on Irony you can’t buy: “The Iranian regime has spent 47 years perfecting the art of lies. It’s what they do. Remember Baghdad Bob? During…” Mar 21, 18:54
Mark Beggan on Irony you can’t buy: “Edinburgh today. The only people waving saltires these days are the ‘Right wing’ the Left have abandoned the Scottish flag…” Mar 21, 18:42
Young Lochinvar on Looking up at the stars: “Asian Well you are just determined to be a superspreader aren’t you? Doing something about it? – “noooo, it’s just…” Mar 21, 18:36
DWARDMAC on Irony you can’t buy: “Yes well I was there as well so let’s not ignore the hundreds and hundreds of billions of pounds siphoned…” Mar 21, 17:30
100%Yes on Irony you can’t buy: “I was looking at YouTube today and came across a video from The Independence Forum, here is the video link…” Mar 21, 17:13
Geri on Irony you can’t buy: “Craig should follow Brian Berletic. YouTube: The New Atlas. He’s been banging on for years about US foreign policy “continuity…” Mar 21, 16:57
Knuckle Heid on Irony you can’t buy: “**First time post** Scotland definitely better off without her. If only Alex hadn’t been quite so swift to step down…” Mar 21, 16:53
Geri on Irony you can’t buy: “Sounds like a false flag to me. If Iran was going to hit anything that far I’d have thought navy…” Mar 21, 16:03
Aidan on Irony you can’t buy: “Does that sound like a plausible set of events?” Mar 21, 15:52
Alf Baird on Irony you can’t buy: “Scotland is ‘free of Scots’, if the oppressor ships oot 3-4 million (as they did between 1707-1970) and makes those…” Mar 21, 15:38
sarah on Irony you can’t buy: “From one midget [comparatively] horror to a vast, global one. Read Craig Murray’s blog today “Seeing Trump Clearly”. Having read…” Mar 21, 15:18
