Sorry we’ve deserted you today, readers. I’ve been dashing around the BBC Bath radio cupboard, the ITV West Country studio and BBC Broadcasting House in Bristol talking mainly about the Clare Lally business, which the No campaign is throwing everything at. You’re going to have a hard time avoiding my big stupid face on the telly tonight.
The three appearances were very different in nature. On BBC Radio Scotland I had a very civilised discussion with host John Beattie and fellow guest Hamish Macdonell (of various publications), where everyone got to say their piece without us interrupting each other, while at Broadcasting House for, I think, Scotland 2014, I got pretty aggressively grilled but in a perfectly proper and professional journalistic manner. No complaints there – pending, of course, what makes the edit.
The ITV gig for Scotland Tonight was something else.
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Category
comment, media, scottish politics
The New Statesman has been doggedly ignoring all our polite requests to release the audio of its controversial interview with Alistair Darling for several days now, but today it very quietly released the full text of it on its website.
Where previously it had reported the “Better Together” leader as having made an “inaudible mumble” in response to a question about whether the SNP were guilty of “blood-and-soil nationalism”, apparently the mag had given its ears a good swabbing out with a cotton-bud and concluded that it HAD been able to hear him after all.
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Tags: misinformation
Category
analysis, audio, comment, media, scottish politics
The Daily Record carries a story this evening about a man placing a £200,000 bet with William Hill on a No vote in the independence referendum.
“A punter is so sure of a No vote in the Independence referendum he has put a record £200,000 on the result.
The bet equalled the biggest sum wagered on politics in the UK. The revelation came yesterday from bookie William Hill, where the gambler made three hefty bets on the status quo being maintained.
The man, in his 50s, walked into a shop in Glasgow and put £30,000 on the counter, taking odds of 1/5 on a No vote. He then came back later that day and stuck on another £70,000.
And the next day he turned up with another £100,000 in cash, which he stuck on despite the odds shortening to 1/6. If Scots vote to stay in the Union he will win £36,000.”
And readers might be forgiven for finding it a bit familiar.
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Category
comment, media, scottish politics
Our ever-attentive readers will already have noticed that since the weekend there’s been a new link on the centre column, called “CAMPAIGN MATERIALS”. Over the next 100 days it’s going to be key to getting our message out to the people of Scotland, and it’s your chance to take it directly to your own neighbourhood.
Because even with quarter of a million readers, it’s no good just sitting here preaching to the already-converted. We need to go on the road.
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Category
admin, scottish politics
The top five most-read stories on Wings Over Scotland in the last seven days.
1. OBAMA INTERVENES IN REFERENDUM
All two words of it. We’re not sure how to feel about that.
2. It’s about democracy, stupid
A more eloquent response from American Scot Jean Muir.
3. What Alistair Darling said
We’re still waiting for the New Statesman to release the tapes.
4. Zombies walk the Earth
The reason Labour have shoved Anas Sarwar off onto a bus.
5. How times don’t change
You’d already forgotten the Strathclyde Commission happened, hadn’t you?
This week’s theme: spot the sensible.
Category
scottish politics, stats
The latest leaked poster from our spy in the No camp. “They’re pretty sure this one’s legally bulletproof“, was all it said on the note in the envelope.
“What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?”
– Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890)
Category
leaks, scottish politics
“Great Britain” began with the Union of the Crowns in 1603, when James the VI of Scotland ascended to the Throne of England and Ireland, but the “United Kingdom” didn’t come into existence until the Act of Union in 1707, which effectively dissolved the Scottish Parliament. The “British Empire” began with the Union with Scotland and, if those in support of a Yes vote have their way, it will end with Scottish independence.
But what’s any of that got to do with Barack Obama?
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Tags: Jean Muirperspectives
Category
comment, scottish politics, world
This is a story in today’s Scottish Daily Express:
Now that’s what we call some rapid inflation.
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Tags: arithmetic failheadline ferret
Category
comment, media, scottish politics
Launched amid much fanfare over a year ago, Scottish Labour’s ironically-named “2014 Truth Team” has been a source of great merriment to Yes supporters for many months. Having apparently run out of “truth” after just a few weeks of snarky tweets, the account had been silent since last summer, so imagine our surprise when it suddenly burst back into life today.
We say “back”, but in fact the Twitter account had been wiped clean as if it had never existed. All the old followers were still there, but now there were just four tweets, all of them advertising an exciting new feature on the Scottish Labour website entitled “The Top 20 Nationalist Assertions” and promising to “set out the facts” about them – the implication being, of course, that the assertions were untrue.
Fact-checking, eh? Well, that’s the sort of thing we just can’t resist.
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Tags: flat-out liesmisinformation
Category
analysis, idiots, reference, scottish politics
