Dismayingly often, the thing that irritates us the most about the Unionist press lying to its readers isn’t the fact that they’re doing it, but the fact that they do it so insultingly badly. As an illustrative case in point, here’s the Sunday Times’ reliably dull-witted Scottish columnist Gillian Bowditch today:
Now, let’s be generous and ignore the honkingly stupid first paragraph, which paints a couple of exceptional bad years as a permanent status, and focus on the second one.
This is the demented, McCarthyite state of madness the Labour Party has reached:
This is a party now openly rejecting anyone as a member who has ever supported any other party. We’d take a minute to try to explain to them how the arithmetic of that one works out, but they’re a long, long way beyond the grasp of reason now.
So the official Westminster line is that Scotland will HAVE to become independent if it wants to remain in the EU. We’re sure the FM will be absolutely gutted to hear that.
Some of you will have missed this over the weekend:
Yes – Michelle Mone, of all the people on Earth, really did just go on TV and accuse Nicola Sturgeon of being all about ego. We’ll leave you to absorb that for a bit.
As we write there’s a protest going on outside the Scottish Parliament regarding the privatisation of ferry services to the Western Isles. It was formally announced almost three hours ago that there definitely wasn’t going to be any privatisation and that the service would remain in public hands, but the protest still went ahead.
The people conducting the protest, who’ve got the exact thing they wanted, are now doing their level best to lose it again. Welcome to Scottish politics.
In amongst a torrent of pretty mad analysis of the election result at the weekend, we noticed the most insane reason yet suggested for the loss of the SNP’s majority:
The co-founder of a much-lauded but little-read pro-independence website asserted that the SNP were cruising to victory until the Nats got the backing of the Scottish Sun and Nicola Sturgeon was pictured posing with the front cover endorsing her party.
The whole litany of gaping flaws in that argument is something the Yes movement has needed to talk about for some considerable time now. So let’s bite the bullet and do it.
We were having a quiet night in, readers. (Living in a cul-de-sac, it’s quite peaceful here in the evenings, unless we’re hosting a soirée.) We’d just made ourselves a late snack of a tasty baguette – preceded by a small apéritif, and a few canapés serving as hors d’oeuvre – as the au pair is on holiday in Paris this week with the chauffeur, taking in some haute couture.
As we relaxed on the chaise-longue, pondering an indulgent dessert of a chocolate eclair or some crème brûlée, we glanced at Twitter, in the hope of being amused by a few bon mots in the milieu of the internet. Sadly, the reality was a cliché.
Young Lochinvar on Before Action: “Happy anniversary today of the 1542 battle of Haddon Rig, where the superior invading English forces of Bowes were annihilated…” Aug 24, 00:00
Caledonia on Before Action: “If as a lot of people think the police or crown office/judges is corrupt or biased or incompetent how can…” Aug 23, 23:17
Hatey McHateface on Before Action: ““I knew you would reply” I honestly didn’t know you would make that claim. “Clearly you missed that” Perhaps I…” Aug 23, 22:49
Hatey McHateface on The Land Of Do-As-You-Please: ““expanding a department to include more varied voices, even if their credentials are lesser, at least to start with, is…” Aug 23, 22:35
WhorattledYourCage on Before Action: “I knew you would reply. Thank you for your kind, meaningless dismissal of what I wrote, with the confusion-inducing invitation…” Aug 23, 22:16
Mark Beggan on Before Action: “Copy Paste! Cambridge standard. You won’t be saying that when I get my scholarship.” Aug 23, 21:21
Southernbystander on The Land Of Do-As-You-Please: “Hatey, what interests me is what an EDI hire actually consists of. We know that positive discrimination as an official…” Aug 23, 21:07
Mark Beggan on Before Action: “Emojis were something your little sister put in her scrapbook.” Aug 23, 21:04
Willie on Before Action: “Those in the police and copfs who conspire to make false witness, or to cove up and conceal a crime…” Aug 23, 21:02
Mark Beggan on Before Action: “Generation X mate we used to just spray it on the walls.” Aug 23, 21:01
Hatey McHateface on Before Action: “An interesting boy, Cesaire. As that intercontinental hybrid, the Afro-Caribbean, he ended up a big political cheese in Martinique. All…” Aug 23, 20:36
Hatey McHateface on Before Action: “Coming up 3 years now in October, there’s been a concerted effort by the omnicause left to redefine the meaning…” Aug 23, 20:15
Mark Beggan on Before Action: “I don’t think that was Crankys idea. A bit to complex for her. The Marxists were responsible, The Better People…” Aug 23, 20:05
Alf Baird on Before Action: ““any civilised person” Perhaps we should not confuse civilization and colonialism. There are no human values in colonialism whose objective…” Aug 23, 20:01
Spartan 117 on Before Action: “All correct. I wouldn’t hold my breath for the Uniparty as they’re equally complicit in keeping the smelly dealings here…” Aug 23, 18:49
Spartan 117 on Before Action: “The correct answer from any civilised person is of course “any racism is bad”, regardless of its direction, intention or…” Aug 23, 18:42
Aidan on Before Action: “You feel you’re being subjected to a genocide do you Alf?” Aug 23, 18:36
gm on Before Action: “Cheers Andy. Yes, the appointment of the current Information Commissioner was against the tide. His office has my confidence now.…” Aug 23, 18:27
Alf Baird on Before Action: “Typical of colonialists to ignore the far more destructive even genocidal ‘aggressive racism’ of imperialism and focus only on the…” Aug 23, 18:19
twathater on Before Action: “The compiled segment of the youtube interviews “ME TO YOU” clearly shows the mendacity of both participants, the copper is…” Aug 23, 18:06
Young Lochinvar on Before Action: “HMcH Yer just being silly now..” Aug 23, 18:05
Spartan 117 on Before Action: “So, Racism is acceptable if it’s by the colonized. Do you agree with this, Alf?” Aug 23, 17:43
Hatey McHateface on Before Action: “With the help of a goddess – how primitive to believe in supernatural intervention! 🙂 In our more enlightened and…” Aug 23, 15:12
Andy Wiltshire on Before Action: “Express: https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk/news/politics/decision-not-charge-nicola-sturgeon-37583072 National Scot has it too – David Hamilton is saying the decision to to charge NS ‘merits scrutiny’,…” Aug 23, 15:12
Hatey McHateface on Before Action: “Good racism and bad racism, is it Alf? The kind you were posting about recently, originating in TA. Is that…” Aug 23, 15:00
Hatey McHateface on Before Action: “Scotland’s Mammie wanted us to have Baby Boxes. Dependence on the state starting from our first breath. But that was…” Aug 23, 14:52
Hatey McHateface on The Land Of Do-As-You-Please: “Nobody manages to push the idea that Indy will never, ever work quite like Confused. If/when Indy comes, its success…” Aug 23, 14:40
Alf Baird on Before Action: ““It’s the “right” form of racism, you see.” We discussed the racism of the colonizer and its effects, which Fanon…” Aug 23, 14:31
Mark Beggan on Before Action: “@Northy Thanks for expanding on that. Of course I got it from social media! Do you think I hang around…” Aug 23, 14:20
gm on Before Action: “I’m searching, Andy for information commissioner, David Hamilton, etc and can’t find anything more recent than a month or two…” Aug 23, 13:46
