The morality of nationalism 118
Posted on
February 26, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
No.5: Tom Morton, former BBC broadcaster and No campaigner.
Archive for the ‘video’
The Weasel 139
Posted on
February 26, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
It’s important to note, firstly, that the version of Sadiq Khan’s speech to the Scottish Labour conference he tweeted on Saturday morning simply flat-out said that Scottish nationalists were the same as racists and sectarian bigots. Its meaning was as clear as crystal to the Daily Record, a newspaper which is hardly hostile to Khan’s party.
“No difference” is a stark and unambiguous phrase. The speech did not contain the hastily-added qualifiers about “in this respect” and “of course I’m not saying the SNP are racist” which suddenly appeared when he read it out onstage that afternoon.
But which version did he really mean?
A completely different situation 57
Posted on
February 24, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
No.4: file under “Hell actually froze over”.
Before you vote 100
Posted on
February 18, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
No.3 in the series: Caroline, originally from Hastings in Sussex, now Edinburgh.
A grown-up decision 88
Posted on
February 14, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Real-life stories. The first two of many.
A very long time in politics 116
Posted on
February 05, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Five minutes and 51 seconds, to be precise, is how long David Mundell, Secretary of State for Scotland, spent frantically quacking out meaningless noise on this morning’s Sunday Politics Scotland in order to avoid answering a simple Yes/No question until the interview ran out of airtime.
We could quibble with presenter Gordon Brewer making the assertion that a Section 30 order would in fact be necessary for a second referendum (something which has never been established in law or conceded by the Scottish Government, with strong and genuine legal opinion on both sides of the argument), and with him letting Mundell get away with the blatant falsehood that an overwhelming majority of Scots don’t want another referendum – in fact, 50% want one within the next two years.
But sometimes you have to let some smaller things slide to avoid distraction and stay focused on your main point, and in our view this was one of those occasions.
In the dead of the night 335
Posted on
February 01, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
This is Conservative MP Dominic Raab, a member of the Brexit Select Committee, speaking on the BBC News Channel’s “Hard Talk” programme at 00.45 this morning. Perhaps imagining that nobody would be watching at such an ungodly hour, it seems he felt able to be unusually candid.
We left the last bit on in order to demonstrate that he was still talking about Scotland as well as Ireland. (He went on to recite the usual boilerplate about all leaving together as the UK etc etc, you can watch the whole show for yourself on iPlayer.)
But let’s just get that key early exchange down in writing for the record.
Call the experts 850
Posted on
January 26, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Because when you really want people with their finger on the pulse of Scottish politics to analyse the implications of the Supreme Court decision on Brexit, where else would you go but to Channel 5’s The Wright Stuff, to hear from um, former rugby league star and haircut pioneer Martin Offiah?
While the truth gets its boots on 367
Posted on
January 25, 2017 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Here’s Alex Salmond on last night’s Newsnight:
Let’s just quickly fact-check that claim.
At the top of the dial 299
Posted on
December 09, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We’ll be honest, there are some bits of this that make us wince, and unfortunately most of them come in the first two minutes where they’ll do the most damage in terms of getting a persuadeable voter to watch the rest of it. But it’s an important piece of work, containing stuff even we didn’t know about, and it should be seen.
If you want to show it to people who aren’t already Yes, though, we’d suggest giving them a link that starts 123 seconds in.
Kezia Dugdale Fact Check, Part 677 383
Posted on
December 01, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Here’s Kezia Dugdale at FMQs today.
Just for fun, let’s do the sums again, shall we?
The passing of sentence 200
Posted on
November 30, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The Prime Minister of the UK, whose party has one MP in Scotland, officially tells the Commons that she doesn’t believe people on benefits should be able to survive.
Happy St Andrews’ Day, readers.
