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The magnifier 75

Posted on June 08, 2018 by

This Wings story from April about a wildly untrue Scottish Daily Mail front-page splash has been entirely vindicated by a correction in the paper today, conceding both of the key complaints we made in our piece.

The Mail has, as you’d imagine, printed the correction rather smaller than the original story, so we thought we’d blow it up a little here for easier reading.

Because we’re sure they wouldn’t want anyone to miss it.

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Logic in reverse 134

Posted on June 07, 2018 by

We’re having a lot of trouble with this one, to be honest.

The Record, along with Scottish Labour and a lot of the left of social media, are up in arms that a mystery benefactor has donated a £230,000 Rolls Royce to Glasgow City Council for the use of the Lord Provost. But nobody can quite manage to explain why they’re so angry about it.

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A whiff of something fishy 297

Posted on June 02, 2018 by

We must admit, folks, that our initial reaction to this Scotsman headline from a couple of days ago was simply a weary sigh of “Oh FFS, here we go again”.

Blaming the Scottish Government for a private company’s decision to close down its plant and make hundreds of Scottish workers redundant is just the sort of ludicrous negative spinning we’ve come to expect from the country’s press over the past seven years, so this latest example just seemed like nothing more than par for the course.

But there turned out to be a little more to it than that.

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Walking like a peasant 136

Posted on June 01, 2018 by

So this story is the front page of tonight’s Evening Times.

It’s a pretty slim piece deploying a Glasgow mother to attack the SNP-run city council over a recent increase in nursery fees, and it sounds like the new higher cost might be a pretty big deal to her.

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The news you didn’t hear about 67

Posted on May 21, 2018 by

It’s been a very sluggish few months in Scottish politics news, with only the significant but rather dry matter of the Brexit power grab to talk about, so you’d imagine that the publication earlier this month of some important new statistics concerning the Scottish economy would have raised some media attention.

Yet fully three weeks after the figures were released we can’t locate a single word of coverage from any newspapers or broadcasters, and that’s odd.

After all, whenever some economic figures pop up showing Scotland in a bad light – especially when some financial thinktank has also passed comment – the press isn’t usually slow to jump all over them, so oh wait we see what’s happened here.

Perhaps go and take a look for yourself. Because you’ll grow very old waiting for the Scottish press to tell you about it.

Burning bridge extinguished 2

Posted on May 21, 2018 by

I came by a little snippet of games-magazine history this week – via an unlikely route that needn't concern us here – and I just thought I'd share it for the historical record.

Atari ST Review was a magazine published by EMAP  in 1992 and 1993, when after just 12 issues it was suddenly sold to Europress, leading to this editorial column in a suspiciously large typeface:

But alert readers might have noticed (from the slightly off alignment of the red border) that the column actually took the form of a hastily-applied sticker. Because that wasn't the editor's original leader.

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Counting with the Daily Mail 57

Posted on May 21, 2018 by

After 27 unbroken pages of royal wedding “news” (following on from a full 46 in its Sunday edition), the Scottish Daily Mail finally gets down to reporting other stuff today.

“Union support rising”, eh? Do we have any numbers on that?

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The debut 198

Posted on May 20, 2018 by

To the best of our recollection, today’s Sunday Politics Scotland was the first time a representative from this site has ever been invited onto a BBC Scotland TV show to discuss the affairs of the day since Wings was founded back in 2011. So we thought we better capture it for posterity in case it’s another seven years until the next one.

The bits that didn’t make it to air are below.

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The Ballad Of The Chief Reporter 103

Posted on May 18, 2018 by

Well, the timing of this is rather unfortunate.

If only someone had said something, eh?

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The most popular policy in the world 84

Posted on May 16, 2018 by

Just before we (thankfully) stop talking about this insanity entirely, one last thing.

This month, just for fun and a bit of a change, we’ve commissioned a Panelbase poll NOT of voters in Scotland, but our neighbours to the south. English folk are always complaining that in a world of UK devolution nobody speaks for them and them alone – Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own Parliaments, but not England.

So we polled 1020 English people (and we do mean English – we restricted responses to people who were both resident in England and were born there) about all kinds of things. Many were related to England’s relationship with Scotland and the rest of the UK, but while we were there we figured we might as well ask some other stuff too.

And as the UK parliament hotly debates Leveson 2 and press freedom in general, it seemed a pertinent time to re-ask a question which in polling invariably unites people of every colour, creed, class and persuasion across the entire UK, and which might be the only political policy anywhere in the UK which comes even close to matching the mass popularity of Scotland’s now-repealed Offensive Behaviour (Football) Act.

It’s this one:

English people love the Queen, but not as much as they love this idea. Men, women, young, old, rich, poor, Tory, Labour, homeowner, tenant, worker, student, it makes no difference. Overwhelming majorities of every single demographic support putting an end to the ridiculous situation that newspapers can get away with blaring an untrue story all over the front page (and pages 2, 3, 4 and 5) in gigantic screaming type, and then print the correction in a microscopic corner of page 23 two months later.

It’s just about the only thing that totally unites Remain and Leave voters – our poll found identical responses (79% for, 5% against) among those who want Brexit and those who want to stay in the EU.

It’s simple, practical and costs nothing. We can’t for the life of us work out why nobody is prepared to offer it to the nation. If any party wants to actually win the next election, we’d suggest sticking it on the front of the manifesto and preparing for a landslide.

David Leask: a correction 113

Posted on May 16, 2018 by

It has come to our attention that the Newsquest journalist David Leask spent all day yesterday issuing a long series of angry and rather insulting tweets asserting that this website had misidentified the nature of his employment in a number of articles.

Naturally, we wish to eradicate any uncertainty or possible errors.

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The Angry Man 408

Posted on May 14, 2018 by

So it seems our article of earlier today rattled the Herald’s cage but good. Scottish political Twitter has been an absolute logjam of incandescent Herald Group hacks all afternoon, making all manner of wild accusations and threats. At the head of the fury, of course, was Chief Reporter And Witchfinder General Mr David Leask.

Unfamiliar with the Scottish media? God, how we wish THAT was true.

Leask issued a long (long) stream of invective on Twitter, while hiding behind a block that means we can’t post any responses to it that any of his Twitter followers will see. So for the record, we suppose we’ll have to address them here.

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    Wings Over Scotland is a (mainly) Scottish political media digest and monitor, which also offers its own commentary. (More)

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    • Xaracen on The shifting sands of memory: “A meaningless hypothetical question, Aidan, and one designed to confuse and deflect the unwary and the uncertain! You are constructing…May 24, 12:03
    • Captain Caveman on The shifting sands of memory: “You can bloody talk Park Bench Buckie Boy.May 24, 11:53
    • Mark Beggan on The shifting sands of memory: ““Imagine there’s no countries.”May 24, 11:27
    • Mark Beggan on The shifting sands of memory: ““time” “Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day. You fritter and waste the hours in an off-hand…May 24, 11:24
    • James on The shifting sands of memory: “*Sigh*…. Trolls gonna troll.May 24, 11:21
    • Captain Caveman on The shifting sands of memory: “A: Alf, with his faithful yet entirely imaginary ghostly cohorts of Memmi and Fannon ever present at his side will…May 24, 11:18
    • Mark Beggan on The shifting sands of memory: “There’s no flys on Mark.May 24, 11:14
    • Northcode on The shifting sands of memory: “For C see B.May 24, 11:11
    • Alf Baird on The shifting sands of memory: “The only fantasy here is the ‘UK’, which is and always has been a colonial hoax based on a mankit…May 24, 11:02
    • Michael Laing on The shifting sands of memory: “@ Mark Beggan: Howsabout YOU “take up fly catching or some other useful pastime” instead of wasting your own time…May 24, 10:56
    • Mia on The shifting sands of memory: “@ Xaracen I agree 100% with your comment (24 May 9:51). I also would add that if the first parliament…May 24, 10:49
    • Aidan on The shifting sands of memory: “@Northcode: what happens if c) Scotland is part of a single state, the United Kingdom?May 24, 10:27
    • Mia on The shifting sands of memory: ““some folk need to take up fly catching or some other useful pastime” How about you put to action your…May 24, 10:18
    • Mia on The shifting sands of memory: “Thank you Northcode. Yes, that is the main point I was trying to make. You have presented it much better…May 24, 10:16
    • Mark Beggan on The shifting sands of memory: “Reading all the fantasies on here about how ‘cleverly’ Scotland can be a ‘nation’. Ideas spread out like instructions to…May 24, 10:06
    • Xaracen on The shifting sands of memory: “The Treaty does not give succour to the dominance of England over Scotland, nor to the dominance of England’s MPs…May 24, 09:51
    • Lorn on The shifting sands of memory: “James: read all the speeches and workings around the Treaty. They make it very, very plain that the Union was…May 24, 09:49
    • Northcode on The shifting sands of memory: “Replying to: Mia 24th May @ 8:47 am I’ve quickly scanned your comment, Mia – I’ll read it with a…May 24, 09:43
    • Mia on The shifting sands of memory: ““Easily verifiable, public domain facts say: NO: 46% (as of May 2025) YES: 44%” By facts I guess you mean…May 24, 09:41
    • Lorn on The shifting sands of memory: “James, I am not saying that Scotland is not treated as a colony, just that the Treaty’s original INTENTION was…May 24, 09:30
    • Aidan on The shifting sands of memory: “Again, why write one paragraph when 10 will do. But again, you haven’t engaged with what I have just said.…May 24, 09:15
    • Lorn on The shifting sands of memory: “Captain Caveman: I agree that its is not a large majority. On the other hand, campaigning hasn’t actually started. Think…May 24, 09:13
    • James Cheyne on The shifting sands of memory: “Thanks to those that responded to my question yesterday. Surely on of the biggest changes to the ToU since its…May 24, 09:04
    • Mia on The shifting sands of memory: “@ Aidan You wrote “I was specifically referring to the prospect of Salvo’s success at the UN, which you described…May 24, 08:47
    • Aidan on The shifting sands of memory: “@Mia – I was specifically referring to the prospect of Salvo’s success at the UN, which you described as being…May 24, 07:03
    • James on The shifting sands of memory: ““The spirit of Britain”? Don’t make me laugh! That’s an Anglo fantasy – “Britain” = “Engerlaaaaand”…. Stale sandwiches, pish beer,…May 24, 01:10
    • James on The shifting sands of memory: “Trolls gonna troll.May 24, 00:48
    • gm on The shifting sands of memory: “DoneMay 24, 00:20
    • Mia on The shifting sands of memory: ““the ToU as envisaged has never even been implemented” I firmly believe the Scottish parliamentarians in 1706 genuinely thought they…May 23, 22:40
    • willie on The shifting sands of memory: “Andy, Britain is a hollowed out busted flush heading towards a potential Greek style debt crisis. And that is why…May 23, 22:15
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