There’s pretty much nothing about Labour’s latest fearmongering anti-independence leaflet (revealed exclusively by us on Tuesday night) that doesn’t make us facepalm.
The only difficult thing is deciding which aspect is the most idiotic.
Here’s the Labour First Minister of Wales, Carwyn Jones, one year ago:
Jones is all over the papers today with his bizarre delusions-of-influence assertion that he would have some sort of veto over a Sterling currency union between the rUK and an independent Scotland (“Wales could block efforts by an independent Scotland to join a pound-sharing pact”, reports the Scotsman).
For perspective, imagine Alex Salmond being given a veto over the result of a UK referendum to leave the EU. Stop laughing, the article’s not finished yet.
We’re busy watching the mostly-inspiring equal marriage debate at the moment (Ruth Davidson’s speech was especially good), so in the absence of a more substantial post here’s our Unionist Of The Day – the failed Labour candidate, and still a Labour councillor, for Aberdeen Donside, Willie Young.
Looks like you dodged a bullet there, Aberdeen. The rest of you we’re not even going to talk to any further, because you’re plainly not real.
Keen media watchers could have been forgiven for stifling a yawn this week as the Scottish press leapt eagerly on a think-tank report which bravely professed itself able to see no less than half a century into the future of the Scottish economy.
The Scotsman’s take was fairly typical. But it had a certain ring of deja vu.
We realise that while all the polls still have Alex Salmond’s party a long way in front, and the First Minister himself still enjoys record approval ratings for a leader midway through his second term of office, it’s a little early to be calling the result of the 2016 Scottish Parliament vote at this stage.
But then, we’re not the ones doing it. (And it’s not the SNP either.)
Even as a supporter of independence with little interest in their wellbeing, sometimes you just can’t help slumping face-first onto your desk in sheer helpless despair at the spectacular idiocy of the Scottish Parliament’s clownish, dim-witted opposition parties. Scotland, to coin a phrase, deserves better.
Today’s demonstration appears, as it so often does, in the Telegraph.
Earlier today, “Better Together” put out this bizarre graphic, before hastily deleting it.
At the time of writing it hasn’t reappeared on their Facebook page. We’re not sure why it was pulled – perhaps they were just embarrassed by the sheer absurdity of this latest “too wee, too poor, too stupid effort”, or the ease with which Yes supporters could mock it as a claim that an independent Scotland wouldn’t be able to afford buildings more than two storeys high.
Or maybe it was something a little more fundamental.
There is no technical fault. This is really happening.
Anas Sarwar, there, raging about people not voting to abolish the bedroom tax.
Yes, THAT Anas Sarwar.
Don’t pinch yourself. You’re not dreaming. He’s actually doing it. Go and see.
Yesterday, right-wing think-tank the Institute of Fiscal Studies issued a document entitled “Fiscal sustainability in an independent Scotland“. It’s rather less than glowing about the prospects of an independent Scottish economy.
For seekers of facts, the most important aspect of the report is not its findings but rather what data was used and from where it was gathered, which severely slanted the outcome of the report before it was even written. Because it doesn’t matter how diligent, honest and thorough an economic assessment is, if the input information that the economists are asked to work from is heavily skewed to begin with.
Remember how the No camp is conducting a positive campaign, and definitely NOT saying that Scotland is too wee, too poor and too stupid to thrive as an independent country, and that only evil cybernats ever suggest that they’re saying that?
Here’s Danny Alexander on Sky News this morning. We’re not sure he got the memo.
We weren’t going to bother even tackling the Institute for Fiscal Studies report from yesterday on the economics of an independent Scotland, because, y’know, our readers aren’t idiots and it’s all a bit “file under B for Bleeding Obvious”.
But we suppose we ought to at least outline a quick one-stop list of bullet points.
Sadly we don’t have the ability to capture video here. Or rather, we don’t have the technical knowhow, or the time to acquire it. That’s not usually a problem, because we can capture audio and often other people more savvy than us will archive video clips before they vanish into the inaccessible vaults of broadcasting forever.
Sometimes, though, sound alone just doesn’t properly convey the tone of something. And since we suspect the seven-minute interview Alistair Darling gave BBC News this lunchtime will never be seen in full again [EDIT: Yes it will!], as rolling news doesn’t usually appear on iPlayer, we thought we had to capture it some other way.
Wings Over Scotland is a thing that exists.
