Although we’re retired we already wrote this, so we may as well put it up for the 99.9% of Scots who don’t read the comments on David Leask‘s columns in the Herald.
It’s a claim he’s been banging on about since at least 2014, without ever providing a scrap of evidence to support it (his standard modus operandi), and yesterday was no exception. So let’s show Little Dave how proper big-boy journalists do it.
The First Minister released a short film this week.
While it has the character of a hostage video, with terrorists just off-camera pointing a gun at the unfortunate victim and forcing them to read out a pre-prepared text, sadly we doubt that was the case. We think this is really what she believes and intends.
Readers, we swear to you we are not making this up. What you’re about to read are genuine extracts from the SNP’s official new (probably illegal) Equalities Mechanism explanatory note, detailing what does and doesn’t count as a disability when it comes to jumping the queue for a regional list nomination.
And straight away it’s a real punch in the gut for firestarters, muggers, rapists, flashers and, in most cases, hay-fever sufferers. THIS BIGOTRY WILL NOT STAND.
Because 2020 is the maddest year in history, Ruth Davidson opened her contribution to Holyrood’s debate on the Brexit deal today with a lengthy quote from this website.
One of the dumber things we see regularly posted on social media is that Yes voices should stop criticising the First Minister because her leadership is the only reason Yes is now consistently ahead in the polls and we would have no chance of winning a new referendum with someone else in charge.
This is obviously nonsense, because Nicola Sturgeon was SNP leader and FM for five years in which support moved barely a single millimetre, until COVID-19 came along. Our current lead is due entirely to a tiny invisible virus and a giant Etonian buffoon.
When we first saw this video on Twitter through bleary half-asleep eyes this morning, we thought it was a well-done satire. But no. He actually put it out himself.
There can surely in history have never been anything that demeaned both the office of President and the USA as a nation more than the image halfway through that video of him prancing around in front of Air Force One.
Today America decides its future. And dear lord, what a choice it has.
Scotland’s media is still unable to contain its outpouring of bitter, resentful rage over Alex Salmond’s exoneration by a jury on trumped-up sexual assault charges.
Flailing blindly in all directions it’s achieving little other than to embarrass itself, such as last night when Scotland On Sunday had to change its front page in a late panic. But the media’s toxic fury at being denied Salmond’s head on a pole has also led it to do something far, far more serious and reckless.
And every one of them knows exactly what they’ve done.
There are now exactly two weeks remaining of the Scottish Government’s second fake “consultation” into its proposed reforms to gender law.
We say “fake” not out of cynicism or mad paranoia, but because the cabinet minister responsible for the reforms has already made it explicitly, publicly and repeatedly clear that she intends to press ahead with them regardless of the responses, and that the only purpose of the “consultation” is to try to persuade people to agree with them.
Shirley-Anne Somerville reiterated this position just days ago, telling Scotland Tonight that she was “absolutely determined” to enact the bill and only interested in silencing opposition and removing any “medicalisation” of the process of gender transition.
While the Scottish Government has met literally hundreds of times with transactivist groups with regard to the reforms, it has refused to meet women’s groups critical of them, and frequently lied about that refusal.
The consultation document and the draft bill leave enormous logical and legislative gaps which are likely to cause untold chaos if the reforms are implemented. The Scottish Government has apparently learned nothing from the shambolic fiascos around the Offensive Behaviour (Football) Act and Named Person legislation, both of which have collapsed despite widespread public support – something the proposed gender reforms emphatically do NOT enjoy.
We’re obliged for the sake of sanity to assume that at some point the First Minister, the Cabinet Secretary or both will have to undertake at least one proper interview on the subject of these extremely serious and potentially catastrophic proposals.
For the consideration of whoever may conduct these interviews, we submit below some questions which a very considerable number of people in Scotland – primarily but by no means exclusively women, and encompassing a majority of every political and social demographic – urgently want answered.
Young Lochinvar on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Could the lawyers on here cruising silently beneath the surface as opposed to those pretending to be lawyers comment on…” Aug 26, 00:11
Mark Beggan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “If Charles had fallen on the field and the ringleaders were hung the outcome for the rest may have been…” Aug 25, 22:56
agentx on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “” Transparency campaigner Benjamin Harrop wrote to the force seeking the written statement Ms Sturgeon made to officers after she…” Aug 25, 22:53
Mark Beggan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “The Geneva convention had not been written at that time. Without trying to be being contentious, what else did they…” Aug 25, 22:41
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “C’moan boys, let’s see a fight over who gets possession of the Baton Of Erudition. Twat H is ancient, but…” Aug 25, 22:40
GM on Before Action: “Burning the quangos to the ground, man I would love to be here to witness it.” Aug 25, 21:58
Dan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “So what to do on a site that purports to want Scotland to return to self-governance… Wait for days for…” Aug 25, 21:57
Mark Beggan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “” Journalism is now a middle class hobby which is subsidized by their parents”” Aug 25, 21:42
Mark Beggan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “‘Fucks’ 3. ‘Yoonies’ 2 in the same sentence. ‘pish’ 2. ‘fuckwit’ 2. ‘Wanker’ 1. Thank you for your contribution to…” Aug 25, 21:32
Dan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Whoopsie, forgot to clip off the https:// in previous post link making vid embed.” Aug 25, 21:26
GM on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Swinney was well warned, He kent fine. The Smith Commission was a sham, containment.” Aug 25, 21:04
Aidan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “@James – £1trn in oil extracted over 40 years produces an estimated tax revenue of £4-6bn per year, around 0.5%…” Aug 25, 20:53
Captain Caveman on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Get a Time Machine or a job, Fatso, preferably both. A shower would also be in order.” Aug 25, 20:09
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “It’s certainly near worthless when the current Scottish government at HR, the SNP and Green administration, has committed Scotland to…” Aug 25, 20:09
Aidan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “None of those studies suggest that the overall mortality rate increased between 2010 and 2019, or up to 2025 (we…” Aug 25, 20:02
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: ““we have known for decades (if not centuries) that increasing poverty, reducing public services and taking away social security benefits…” Aug 25, 19:47
James on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Ah. As expected. The unionists seasoned pish goes “naw it isnae” [that’s Scotch, Adrian] and “naw he didnae”. “….A country…” Aug 25, 19:30
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: ““austerity measures resulted in about 190,000 excess deaths, or a 3% increase in mortality rates, from 2010 to 2019, including…” Aug 25, 19:28
sam on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “https://www.transformingsociety.co.uk/2025/01/24/are-uk-austerity-policies-social-murder/ “We argue that the hundreds of thousands of extra deaths seen in the UK between 2012 and 2019 (with…” Aug 25, 19:16
sam on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “https://academic.oup.com/eurpub/article/35/2/235/8008562?login=false “Profound changes to mortality trends and inequalities were observed across both nations and all cities in the decade up…” Aug 25, 19:08
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “English version of a foody poem. Posted before, but a while since. “If you had seen this toast before it…” Aug 25, 19:02
sam on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/inequalities/2024/06/19/the-cost-of-austerity-how-spending-cuts-led-to-190000-excess-deaths/ “The austerity measures introduced by the UK government in 2010 had severe consequences for the British population. Yonatan Berman…” Aug 25, 19:00
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Your turn with the Baton Of Erudition is it?” Aug 25, 18:45
twathater on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Where the FUCK is engerlands barnet formula where the fuck is engerlands parliament, where the fuck is engerlands version of…” Aug 25, 18:10
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “Ah, c’moan noo Aidan! Div ye want Indy or nae? If ye dae, swear blind tae abody that WM is…” Aug 25, 18:06
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “An interesting take on things, sam. Some people would rather kill themselves than have a more equitable allocation of scarce…” Aug 25, 17:49
Aidan on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: “There has been no “extraordinary rise in mortality” across the UK, the mortality rate has decreased overall since 2010, and…” Aug 25, 17:41
Hatey McHateface on You’ll Have Had Your Supper: ““Typical factors: … Housing need and homelessness” Uh Oh. There’s 5.7 million UK households getting cash from the government to…” Aug 25, 17:34