We might have to make this a regular mirror strand to “Quoted for truth”. We’re struggling to get our heads round a particularly dim-witted piece in today’s Scotsman by Gregor Gall, a left-wing academic who the paper notes is “professor of industrial relations at the University of Bradford and lives in Edinburgh”. (Tough commute.)
It’s full of all manner of illogical cobblers (we have a feeling that we saw The Illogical Cobblers supporting Birdland at the Edinburgh Venue in about 1989, but that’s another story), from which one passage really leaps out with its underpants on its head.
Seasoned readers will recall that on occasion we’ve pondered the mystery that is the membership of the itself-enigmatic entity sometimes called “Scottish Labour”.
Establishing how many members the party actually has is a puzzle that has eluded the best and brightest in Scottish journalism for years, but thanks to a tip from an alert commenter Wings Over Scotland may be able to make the breakthrough today.
The longer this site goes on, the more we realise we could really do with some sort of proper indexing system, rather than relying on our bullet-riddled memory to be able to recall the details of something we wrote a year ago.
So in the week that the “Better Together” campaign celebrated its first birthday, and we learned that it refers to itself internally as “Project Fear”, we thought we’d collect a few of our favourite impressions of it from its own supporters (and the odd neutral) in one place where they might be easier to find.
Hang on – didn’t our “Project Fear” pals spend half of last year sobbing and wailing and raging that a certain tri-morpheme prefix was leading and unfair and beastly and a clear attempt at rigging the referendum by the dastardly, unprincipled Nats?
Maybe our memory’s playing tricks on us. We’re pretty old.
Oddly, despite much trailing of it before publication, we haven’t seen any major coverage of Alex Salmond’s lengthy interview with the New Statesman last week in the media. We kept forgetting to go to the shop for a copy, but today we downloaded the magazine’s iPad app, which contains the full interview among its free content.
That being the case, we’re comfortable with reprinting it for the purposes of discussion. We’ve tidied the formatting up for ease of reading – the NS’s sub-editor/style guide compiler needs shooting, frankly – and added our own commentary (in red) where appropriate. A few quibbles aside, it’s a fascinating and quoteable piece. Have a read.
It’s hard to know where to start on picking apart the torrent of misrepresentations, distortions and flat-out untruths that “Better Together” campaign director Blair McDougall was allowed to get away with in the space of a few short minutes during a rather powder-puff interview on last night’s Scotland Tonight.
So let’s just pick one at random and see how we get on.
Each bright new day brings a fresh game of Spot The Magnus Gardham Headline here at WingsLand Towers, but we were a bit thrown by this morning’s front page.
“Economists say indyref could drive investors away” is pure Magnus, but that four-word qualifier tacked on the end is a bit out of character. What could be going on?
Seasoned readers will be aware of our as-yet-undiscovered mole at “Better Together” campaign headquarters. This morning the intrepid fifth columnist has managed to scan us the cover of the group’s handbook for activists (and forthcoming YouTube movie).
We’re sure more pages will be on the way soon, most days in the papers.
Today’s editorial leader in Scotland on Sunday is really interesting, from a language nerd’s perspective (ie very much on our turf). Entitled “A warning to No campaign”, the column – nominally on the subject of pensions under devolution – purports to criticise said group, noting that “the Better Together campaign, by repeatedly presenting the idea of change as a threat, is doing Scotland no favours.”
Insider on The Modern Politician: “Alf ! Still waiting for an answer to my query yesterday concerning your fascinating comments about how “different animal species”…” Feb 11, 18:01
Chas on The Modern Politician: “As usual, I read the comments starting from the bottom up. I note 6 in a row from Cheyne, all…” Feb 11, 16:02
Alf Baird on The Modern Politician: ““Scottish politics is different” Indeed so, but we must understand why this is the case. Its because we are talking…” Feb 11, 15:04
PC Foster on The Modern Politician: “Ha . A woman ‘in a dress’ is code for ‘we are too scared to mention it was a trans.!” Feb 11, 14:24
James Cheyne on The Modern Politician: “The awful governance and policies of Tories, Labour, Greens, libdems and the SNP are the worst of the worst applied…” Feb 11, 13:42
James Cheyne on The Modern Politician: “Psyops and psychology worked on the democratic voters.” Feb 11, 13:08
James Cheyne on The Modern Politician: “Making your options so awful, they can guide you into making the choices they aways wanted you to make.” Feb 11, 12:37
Lorna Campbell on The Modern Politician: “Yes, exactly. The media twists itself out of shape to try and not hurt the feelz of this dangerous lobby.…” Feb 11, 12:31
James Cheyne on The Modern Politician: “The replication of reducing Scotland to a one party system is being done in England, Wales and Ireland, Nobody worth…” Feb 11, 12:31
James Cheyne on The Modern Politician: “Labour moved into the SNP for a reason, The next step is to reduce the ability people having the right…” Feb 11, 12:12
sam on The Modern Politician: “She, like every other leading politician, reacted to public pressure. She abolished the poll tax and did not introduce the…” Feb 11, 12:07
James Cheyne on The Modern Politician: “We do know what two tiers beliefs are, and he follows them to the letter. Reduce the success and workings…” Feb 11, 11:59
James Cheyne on The Modern Politician: “The Scottish experiment. Trick them into believing they are in a union treaty with England. Get rid of the Scottish…” Feb 11, 11:47
100%Yes on The Modern Politician: “AYE, YOUR WRONG he’s got his own mind and he’s no one lap dog. He’s a British politician who in…” Feb 11, 10:41
TURABDIN on The Modern Politician: “FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS… “The true interests and desires of a society are embodied in what Rousseau called its…” Feb 11, 10:30
Marie on The Modern Politician: “I wondered that when I saw media reports saying that the shooter was a woman “in a dress”. Immediately smelled…” Feb 11, 10:22
Ian Smith on The Modern Politician: “We cannot forever keep financially hitting the successful to keep the subsidised in business. I prefer the German/Austrian type model…” Feb 11, 09:35
Willie on The Modern Politician: “As an aside this Wednesday morning I’ve just read an article in the Telegraph reporting outrage at new government letter…” Feb 11, 09:31
Ian Smith on The Modern Politician: “Meanwhile in Canada, a coach and horses has been run through the argument that anyone is safe near transgender menwomen.…” Feb 11, 09:20
Willie on The Modern Politician: “You draw attention to a very concerning aspect Bilbo where a huge corporate business in the name of Tesco can…” Feb 11, 08:17
Bilbo on The Modern Politician: “O/T I saw this article about how increases in Business rates are affecting business in a part of Glasgow: https://archive.is/Th4cz…” Feb 11, 07:20
Bilbo on The Modern Politician: “While it it not right to gloat over the ‘Scottish’ Daily Record publishing plant loses, it is right to gloat…” Feb 11, 07:08
Bilbo on The Modern Politician: “I was going to mention about the ‘Scottish’ Daily Record publishing plant moving to England but it seems little point…” Feb 11, 07:02
DaveL on The Modern Politician: “Vows visions pledges and promises they’re really not worth a toss coming from the mouths of politicians. So Starmer and…” Feb 11, 03:57
Peter McAvoy on The Modern Politician: “On another topic will Sarwar and Starmer make a vow to ensure the Daily Record publishing plant in Glasgow stays…” Feb 11, 01:24
billie on The Modern Politician: “All smoke and mirrors. The corruption of Mandelson is now become clear. But it was clear before. Starmer must have…” Feb 10, 23:34
Lorna Campbell on The Modern Politician: “None of it, H McH. I agree that they will be re elected and I agree that they will never…” Feb 10, 22:51
holymacmoses on The Modern Politician: “I reckon it’s a set-up – Sarwar claiming Starmer should go does absolutely no harm to the PM and I…” Feb 10, 22:48
Lorna Campbell on The Modern Politician: “Sad to say, GM, some of us have never expected society to protect women and children because it never has.…” Feb 10, 22:44
Andy Wiltshire on The Modern Politician: “The thing you always have to bear in mind about Scottish politics is that Scottish politics is different.” Feb 10, 22:43
