We’re only two-thirds of the way through Nicola Sturgeon’s evidence to the Fabiani inquiry, and there’s probably not much point in expressing our opinion on it because you could almost certainly have guessed what it was going to be. The First Minister has been disingenuous, evasive, defensive and at times outright dishonest.
But although we were expecting all of that, this truly shocked us:
That’s the First Minister flatly stating, under oath, that even now she doesn’t know who all the complainers are. And readers can make their own minds up about how credible a claim that is. But I can tell you this:
I know who they all are.
Craig Murray knows who they all are.
Every journalist who covered the trial knows who they all are.
(And we can reasonably assume their editors also know who they all are.)
In fact pretty much everyone who’s in any way connected to Scottish politics knows the identity of every single one of these women. If you’re willing to believe that we all do but Nicola Sturgeon doesn’t, well, fair enough. But also, I’m a Nigerian prince and I’d like to pass several million pounds through your bank account. Please get in touch.
We just put up a post, readers, but we’ve pulled it again because this has happened:
Because of this:
More as we get it, but this would seem to be an extraordinary move from the Tories if they weren’t pretty confident they had the backing of the other opposition parties. At a minimum it’s quite the scene-setter for tomorrow’s appearance of the First Minister in front of the Fabiani committee. We presume we don’t need to tell you to stay tuned.
We’ll say one thing for Police Scotland – when it comes to Freedom Of Information requests, dealing with them compared to the Scottish Government or Crown Office is a breath of fresh air. Responses tend to be reasonably swift and you actually get some straight answers, like these.
And in this case they’re pretty remarkable answers.
From 12.30 this afternoon, Alex Salmond will attempt to tell the people of Scotland the truth about what happened to him in the last two years – a grave injustice which saw an innocent man have his reputation dragged through the gutter, be placed under incredible personal stress, be left greatly impoverished by proving his innocence, and then have the jury’s verdict endlessly traduced by the media and a gang of criminal conspirators protected from the consequences of their lies by lifelong anonymity.
His job will be a difficult one. Every single person in the room will be bitterly hostile to him – the four Unionist committee members because he’s Alex Salmond, and the others because he represents a deadly threat to the First Minister.
The inquiry’s convener – a woman sacked by Salmond years ago – will attempt to prevent him from presenting large swathes of evidence, despite having made him swear to tell “the whole truth”. The SNP members will try to run down the four-hour session with questions designed to only deflect from the real issue – the actions and behaviour of the Scottish Government. Andy Wightman will probably just cry.
We’ll be extremely surprised if there aren’t some attempts to slyly re-try Mr Salmond and paint him as a guilty man who cheated justice, and to drag up salacious details of the allegations in an effort to smear him in front of the cameras.
We believe Alex Salmond will be more than equal to the task.
When the Faculty Of Advocates – the most senior body of lawyers/QCs in the country – is handing out barely-veiled smackdowns like this to the First Minister, then you know you’re in some pretty uncharted jungle.
I had hoped that Stewart Stevenson, the new National Secretary and convener of the Conferences Committee, would be similarly inclined.
In summary, my endeavours have been ignored.
In the three months since our election (supposedly more than halfway towards a spring conference), and despite repeated emails, documents and requests for meetings, the Conferences Committee has never been convened.
As a result I have resigned from both the committee and the SNP, and the reasons for my doing so are outlined below.
For the record, we thought you should see what the Scottish Parliament considers to be the appropriate treatment of an “Urgent Question”.
For a little over eight minutes, the Lord Advocate was allowed to ignore and avoid a series of questions put to him regarding the abjectly corrupt Crown Office’s recent interference with the work of the Fabiani inquiry by redacting evidence which in no way identified anyone as a complainer in the trial of Alex Salmond.
If we can somehow find the time amid the relentless blizzard of current Scottish political activity, we’re going to put together a list of all the legitimate and important questions that Alex Salmond’s lawyers have asked the Fabiani inquiry which haven’t even had the courtesy of a reply, let alone a satisfactory one.
We fully anticipate that the contents of the letter below, sent today, will be on that list.
It really can’t be overstated what extraordinary tweets these are.
That’s the editor of the conservative, ultra-establishment Spectator openly linking to a document that the Crown Office – the agent of the Queen herself – has threatened to prosecute the Scottish Parliament for publishing, and which has officially been deleted but is for some reason actually still available on the Parliament’s website.
The Spectator is giving the Queen the finger. And that’s not even the mad bit.
The Scottish Government and Nicola Sturgeon have tonight embarked on a last-ditch desperate throw of the dice to undermine and sabotage the already-compromised and endlessly-obstructed Fabiani inquiry in its impossible quest for the truth.
Having previously deployed her paid mouthpiece Rape Crisis Scotland last week, the First Minister – who’s spent the last six months insisting that she’d save her comments for her appearance at the inquiry – suddenly popped up on BBC and STV (but not, curiously, Sky News) to issue a challenge full of gunfighter bravado to her predecessor.
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “Fat Slag Wilma Flintstone @2.26 “paaaaal”” Apr 21, 15:29
TURABDIN on The Pit Of Vipers: “TUCKER CARLSON one of the US rights many paper messiahs opined re my country of birth, «Iraq is a crappy…” Apr 21, 14:26
Captain Caveman on The Pit Of Vipers: ““Werthers Original”” Apr 21, 14:26
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “Fat Slag Wilma Flintstone @ 1.56 “maaaaaate”..” Apr 21, 14:06
wullie on The Pit Of Vipers: “Marcus Tullius Cicero “A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within.…” Apr 21, 14:05
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “Geri I wonder how much longer the US superpower (empire) has got before it’s slid down to the has-beens league…” Apr 21, 13:57
Captain Caveman on The Pit Of Vipers: “Ah, Rambo “adding value” to the BTL chat with yet more fantasy as ever, I see (much like his non…” Apr 21, 13:56
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “AI dun @ 12.46 Stop clutching your pearls so tightly “old boy”, you’ll hurt yerself.” Apr 21, 13:37
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “Fat Slag Wilma Flintstone @ 6.54 “Maaaaate” Spellcheck that.” Apr 21, 13:31
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “Fearghas I thought we were talking about a mythical Tower of Babel timeline? Not a modern language imposition. Anyway apparently…” Apr 21, 13:26
Aidan on The Pit Of Vipers: “Why don’t all the normal people on Wings BTL piss off so that Geri and co can rant a rave…” Apr 21, 12:46
Marie on The Pit Of Vipers: “Thanks for this. I read Elkins “Britain’s Gulag” many years ago. Her research into the barbarity of British troops in…” Apr 21, 12:46
Ian McCubbin on The Narcissism Of No Differences: “I am sith those who say vote Alliance to Liberate Scotland. Like the English party manifestos I think the English…” Apr 21, 11:45
Geri on The Pit Of Vipers: “Typical Yoon. Always with the lies & drama. Truth is never a strong point. I’ve never been banned or silenced…” Apr 21, 11:42
Geri on The Pit Of Vipers: “Surprise, surprise that the new greater map includes all the oil & gas all over the region. The USA, who…” Apr 21, 11:35
Captain Caveman on The Pit Of Vipers: ““Years of working” 😀 😀 😀 Like AS IF pal.” Apr 21, 11:31
Captain Caveman on The Pit Of Vipers: “Well, if it’s any business of yours, “Geri”, I’m here for the interesting (and at times highly revelatory) blog pieces…” Apr 21, 11:27
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on The Pit Of Vipers: “Some sort of historical version of “devolution”? — « At times of war, the enemy city could be conquered and destroyed…” Apr 21, 11:01
Alf Baird on The Pit Of Vipers: “It always comes back to English ‘liberal imperialism’, where Churchill’s infamous Auxilliaries and Black & Tans who honed their ‘legalized…” Apr 21, 10:30
Geri on The Pit Of Vipers: “Begs the question of why yer still here eh? Only a complete loon hangs about a forum when they don’t…” Apr 21, 09:41
TURABDIN on The Pit Of Vipers: “NEVER offer a propaganda opportunity. https://archive.is/Cb73q” Apr 21, 09:13
Captain Caveman on The Pit Of Vipers: “It’s “take the piss out OF”, Rambo. Mind you, posting at a “mere” 10:30pm and reasonably succinct…? It’s almost “normal”…” Apr 21, 06:54
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on The Pit Of Vipers: “Young Lochinvar @ 20 April 9.41 pm: “Bottom line, a multiplicity of different languages are a barrier”. ——————— National borders…” Apr 20, 23:57
Geri on The Pit Of Vipers: “Defender of the faith LOL! A divorced adulterer… Possibly even murder in there too, definitely stealing & coveting too. They…” Apr 20, 23:54
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “A murrain on their parties, their houses, their incomes and their legacies.. They persecute an innocent and think it justice!…” Apr 20, 23:37
Geri on The Pit Of Vipers: “Aye, he’s king. Only by consent of the Scottish people. He could possibly remain Head of State in an Independent…” Apr 20, 23:36
Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “Did they seriously say “defender of the faith”? That’s a church of England thing. Sums up how we got into…” Apr 20, 23:21
Angus on The Pit Of Vipers: “Colin Alexander, do you think the Scottish independence referendum was a good thing or a bad thing? Do you have…” Apr 20, 23:03
Angus on The Pit Of Vipers: “Is there any possibility at all of ever bringing the conspirators to justice? Can no one in the whole world…” Apr 20, 22:58
Angus on The Pit Of Vipers: “Alex Salmond, the greatest leader in Scottish history. Succeeded by the biggest betrayer in Scottish history, who turned Scotland into…” Apr 20, 22:43
