The Englishman who wades into Scottish politics on either side, especially if he lives in England, is probably taking a huge risk of being disagreed with vehemently, no matter what he says. Nevertheless, the explosion of interest into the so-called ‘Clypegate‘ list has a Data Protection angle that I cannot resist.
To summarise, it seems that the Scottish Labour Party have assembled a list of supporters of the Scottish National Party who have said things on Twitter and Facebook that the Scottish Labour Party do not like. The list – inevitably tagged a dossier – has been passed to the tabloids to stir up some kind of frenzy about the so-called ‘Cybernats’.
Some of the statements are fairly strong, but I don’t doubt worse things are spoken in the average pub conversation about politicians. I’m certain every term applied to Gordon Brown and Donald Dewar has also been said of Alex Salmond by Labour supporters. As someone who voted Labour in the recent election, I can think of a few more constructive things that the smouldering remnants of Labour in Scotland could be doing with their time, but this is what they decided to do, so we are where we are.
A casual observer might perhaps wonder if JK Rowling, no longer writing books about wizards for children, simply wants to be noticed.
Twice in the space of a few weeks she’s appeared on newspaper front pages bleating piously about the terrible hordes of cyber- and other-nats. Yesterday the Independent, Telegraph, Scotsman, Herald, Daily Record and more all ran dismal, whiny pieces about her (entirely evidence-free) claims that the SNP was infested with mad, bitter Anglophobes just waiting for a signal to invade Derby again or something.
No particular barrage of abuse appears to have been unleashed upon the former author to provoke the outburst, but seemingly for a lack of anything better to do with her time she had a good old moan anyway and the press lapped it up.
And the reason it’s all so very tedious is that the papers might as well run stories claiming that there’s a chance of rain tomorrow.
Yesterday we highlighted a quote from Labour MP Kate Hoey about how the party secretly expects their next leader, whoever it is, to be in opposition for the next 10 years, meaning the UK will have a Conservative-led government for at least 15 years. Kate Hoey is on the Labour fringes, but today one of the front-runners for the leadership job proved her right.
Michelle Mone, the titular head of a loss-making underwear company mostly owned by a shady Sri Lankan business group, who’s spent much of the last eight years trying to blackmail Scots by threatening to punish them with hundreds of job losses if they don’t vote the way she tells them to, has a 1400-word whine/house advert in the MoS today about how beastly cybernats have forced her to finally move to England.
Who wants to be the one to break it to her that they have Twitter in England too?
Many of you won’t have seen this quite extraordinary performance from the Guardian’s assistant editor Michael White on last night’s Scotland Tonight, and you really should.
“Just go on the radio, play it all with a dead bat, fob them off with some bland waffle and kill the story”, the Lib Dems will have said to Sir Malcolm Bruce this morning.
The general election 2015 has rounded the last bend and is heading down the final straight, with no clear winner in sight. Four days from now the UK electorate will go to the polls and deliver, if the numbers are to be believed, an unholy mess. Only one part of the country seems to know with clarity what it wants, and that’s “not Labour”.
The North British branch of the party has in truth been a political Easter egg for years – big and impressive-looking on the outside, but entirely hollow within – and this year it looks like the voters are finally going to shatter the shell and leave nothing but a small heap of fragments revealing just how little chocolate was ever there.
And the realisation has sent Labour completely out of its mind.
At today’s First Minister’s Questions, the Scottish Labour deputy leader Kezia Dugdale launched into an ill-advised attack over an SNP candidate who’d made some foolish (but not especially outrageous) comments on Twitter in 2012. Rather than simply issuing the standard generic condemnation of abusive remarks, Nicola Sturgeon did so but also drew Dugdale’s attention to the beam in her own eye.
Labour activist, blogger, lawyer and regular BBC pundit Ian Smart (he hasn’t been seen on STV since accusing them repeatedly, without any evidence, of letting the SNP pre-approve all interview questions some time ago) is well known to readers of this blog. Bizarrely, however, Dugdale feigned ignorance of his activity.
To help her, we’ve compiled some of Mr Smart’s greatest hits.
Geri on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Of course he isn’t anti immigration & of course he’ll do absolutely nothing to fix it. It’d upset his wealthy…” Mar 25, 18:10
Dan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “And an apology and admittance from Main that coal actually was a resource worth mentioning. https://wingsoverscotland.com/never-learned-to-shovel/#comment-2778577 And more so now…” Mar 25, 18:00
Dan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “@Chas I’ve previously proffered a suggestion on how a self-governing Scotland could be run, and it’s based on using the…” Mar 25, 17:56
Sven on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I so wish I believed you were mistaken, Red, unfortunately I believe you’re completely correct.” Mar 25, 17:54
Geri on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “A confabulator? Tho in her case I wouldn’t associate it to being in any way sincere. She’s just a psychopath…” Mar 25, 17:47
Chas on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I note that there have been a few replies to my original post. Unfortunately not one of them gives any…” Mar 25, 17:29
Red on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “The entire purpose of the SNP is to keep the gullible busy with useless displacement activities until it’s too late…” Mar 25, 17:20
Young Lochinvar on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Sturgeon was interviewed a day or 2 ago about, frankly, effing off. I read her cockamamie BS with growing disbelief…” Mar 25, 17:03
Geri on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Cappy Caveman, fck off back tae yer stall, del boy. You know nothing. I’ve never been banned, unlike you, &…” Mar 25, 16:53
James on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Working class hero Wilma Flintstone; “maaaaaaate” Can’t you just hear the annoying accent? Wish he/she/it would just f*ck off to…” Mar 25, 16:16
James on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Breastplate; brilliant – headshot! Another Yoon Troll put in their place.” Mar 25, 16:10
Mark Beggan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “@Sven When the going gets tough. The tough hide under the table.” Mar 25, 15:50
lothianlad on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “How can we be so close to achieving independence but so far away??? gravy train SNP subservients of course!!” Mar 25, 15:29
Insider on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Breastplate @ 2:10 pm Thank you for admitting you cannot understand even the most basic questions about Scottish Independence !…” Mar 25, 14:38
Mark Beggan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “The DuRan Dingdong Cult have been trying to fight this war like it’s 1979. Now all they have left is…” Mar 25, 14:37
Northcode on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: ““…nobody ever says who will form an honest, competent Government.” Nobody can until Scotland is liberated and she regains control…” Mar 25, 14:18
Mark Beggan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Your Party. A dirty old man and a rabid death cultist. Old Jeremy is all out of friends. They are…” Mar 25, 14:14
Mark Beggan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Just flexing your lefty muscles with an afternoon antisemitic black Live matter rant. Isn’t it time you kissed the ground…” Mar 25, 14:11
Breastplate on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Insider, you’ve got me. I don’t understand the question or the answer, could you tell me please, pretty please, with…” Mar 25, 14:10
Insider on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Breastplate @12:18 No amount of bluster and attempted diversions on your part can disguise your comprehension problems or the fact…” Mar 25, 13:48
Northcode on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Endlessly recounting Scotland’s ancient constitutional past will not persuade those unpersuaded Scots who support the Union to change their minds.…” Mar 25, 13:37
Captain Caveman on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: ““Are you dumb? Yer literally posting on an Independence blog” Heh!! Just when you think the irony-o-meter can’t be overloaded,…” Mar 25, 13:21
Dan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Civic nationalism was never going to work in Scotland, because Hondas rust like fuck at the best of times; And…” Mar 25, 12:55
Geri on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “I’m going to keep reminding you yoons what site yer actually posting on. Not only is it rude but it’s…” Mar 25, 12:32
Dan on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Damn it! Pity we’ve got the wrong sort of leccy up here… “The Grid cannae cope”… But Scotland is generating…” Mar 25, 12:27
Breastplate on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “Insider, I think there’s a bit of projection on your part, as you clearly have no idea what I’m talking…” Mar 25, 12:18
Confused on Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off: “blowing up ambulances is wrong – wherever it happens … https://archive.ph/M0H5A (who does this a LOT? and who started it?)…” Mar 25, 12:14
