Wings Over Scotland

Approximately 40,000 people have left the SNP in the last five years – among them hundreds (at least) of women who quit because of the party’s total lack of action against its abusive, misogynist transactivist wing.

Many of them had been members for decades and wrote pained letters explaining their reasons, only to be waved away with an automated form reply. But half a dozen of the party’s most obnoxious scumbags flounce off in a huff and this happens.

Kirsten Oswald is a brainless knife-and-fork operator and always has been. But Keith Brown must go home at night and drape towels over all the mirrors so he doesn’t have to look at himself after putting his name to that.

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If you were to poll us on which of the two signs below we preferred, we’d definitely vote for the one on the left. It’s a lot more eye-catching, it’s easier to read and the strong use of red makes it much clearer that a prohibition is in place.

But here’s the thing: we wouldn’t go to jail over the choice.

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All we can say is that the other nine points better be amazing.

Because this, readers, is ZZZ-grade donkey fodder.

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It’s hard to keep up with developments in Scottish politics these days, readers. We told you January 2021 was going to be a pivotal and explosive month but there’s been more going on than even we expected, and that’s despite the fact that Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon’s appearances before the Fabiani committee now both look like being pushed back to February.

So our apologies if we have to give some things rather more cursory coverage than they might ordinarily merit, or cram several stories into one post. For example, we’re just going to link you to solicitor advocate Gordon Dangerfield’s appearance yesterday on the Tommy Sheridan podcast, even though he said this non-trivial thing on it:

“There’s a very simple answer to [why Leslie Evans is still in a job]. She says it herself constantly to the inquiry – civil servants only represent ministers. They have no status other than as the servants of the government.

Who is Leslie Evans’ boss? Leslie Evans’ boss is Nicola Sturgeon. Nicola Sturgeon was behind this from the outset. Leslie Evans was carrying out Nicola Sturgeon’s instructions. And that’s why she’s still in a job. Because if she wasn’t still in a job, neither would Nicola Sturgeon be.”

The whole interview is pretty unmissable, so if you can find 24 spare minutes in your day try to give it a listen. But there’s more.

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Tonight’s poll data from Survation is really quite remarkable.

We can’t wait to hear what “Pension Pete” Wishart makes of it.

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For poor old Richmond Leinster, who shuffled off the political stage today, we solemnly offer this tribute from Novara Media pundit Aaron Bastani:

It’s a tragic loss to the Scottish political scene. The tweet, we mean.

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We’re sure you all read this story last night.

Via another source we’d known it was coming for a few hours and were all set to follow it up, but in fact Daniel Sanderson of the Telegraph did a pretty thorough job on it in a comprehensive piece, even listing all the times the “prepared” civil servants had had to go back and “clarify” “errors” in their evidence even after dozens of hours of practice and £55,000 worth of “training” in how to not quite tell the truth under pressure.

It was hard not to wonder how abysmal their performances would have been if they’d only had – say – £30,000 worth of coaching at your expense.

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We know we’ve given you quite a lot to digest already this year, readers. But spare a thought for us – trying to keep on top of all the fast-moving developments in Scottish politics in the first 11 days of 2021 has been rather like trying to tunnel our way out of an avalanche while it was still happening.

We’ve had a bit of job even finding a spare moment to squeeze the cartoons in. But today’s task looked like one of the most challenging of all.

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You know everything’s definitely going swimmingly for Nicola Sturgeon when the white knight riding heroically to her defence is… [checks notes twice] Duncan Hothersall.

We’re very excited to find out what our secret plan is.

(We must apologise to readers at this point for the late arrival of this week’s typically splendid Chris Cairns cartoon, which in fact arrived entirely on time from our hard-working crayonist but which we’ve put on hold for a bit while we cover last night’s major breaking story and its immediate aftermath. Now on with the show.)

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Just for old times’ sake, during last night’s attempted coup in America we took a little dip back into the Yoonstream, the very special place on social media where the most deranged of Scotland’s Unionists hang out.

It didn’t disappoint.

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We know that the 5th of January is unusually early to be giving out annual awards, but this is going to be pretty much impossible to beat, so God bless the P&J for giving us all a chuckle in these dark times.

Let’s just quickly check on that “expert”.

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