Iron seas
The Scottish media has worked itself into an indignant froth over the last few days about the appearance of Sputnik News – an Edinburgh-based arm of a publicly-owned, state-run Russian news agency, fronted by (among others) former Dateline Scotland and NewsShaft stars Jack Foster and Carolyn Scott.
(Any resemblance to publicly-owned, state-run national news agencies of questionable impartiality in other countries is of course entirely coincidental and totally different.)
The Sunday Herald ran a bizarre smear piece yesterday on the pair’s past fundraising initiatives for their two previous projects (which were obviously completely unrelated to Sputnik), and today’s Times has an even weirder column by Melanie Reid in which Foster and Scott are directly and startlingly compared to the Cuban Missile Crisis:
We tried, for the purposes of satire, to think of another country that played host to nuclear missiles that were controversially imposed on it by an external government, but unfortunately we couldn’t come up with anything. Sorry about that.
If we don’t want WM’s weapons of mass destruction, why the hell would we want Russia’s?
I was flabbergasted (c’mon, not often I type that word) to see the comparison and the ugly irony.
Perhaps its a symptom of being pro-indy, but I tend do distrust everything now, but mostly the UK MSM.
I would say, “they’ve lost it”, but, it’s just another episode of the drip, drip propaganda by a dictatorial state.
Do you think Clements and Wark are happy living in such a country?
Propagandists are like paedophiles, they create a culture of fear, are protected by the state BUT WILL BE FOUND OUT IN THE END.
And if it’s only those who survive them that can be punished, for complicity and collusion, so be it.
Well, we all know the UK’s motto – “ Do as we say, not as we do ! “
Those who are special and exceptional can live by their own set of rules. It is they who believe they are entitled to set the rules for others.
Superb stuff. Radio Scotland were apoplectic the other night when it hit the 6 o’clock news.
They wheeled out a quote from a Westminster source, I can’t remember who but would like to think Hammond, who said they weren’t going to stand for this sort of thing. The very idea of a broadcaster being controlled by a state government was unthinkable, so he was going to increase the broadcast range of the BBC in the Balkan states.
I have neither seen this in print nor heard it repeated since. Maybe it was a step too far even for the Beeb.
They also mentioned how Sputnik had been accused of starting the rumour of fowl-play in Indy ref one. This was countered by the station simply by pointing out that Sputnik didn’t exist then.
I didn’t know whether to laugh, cry or swallow my tongue.
That Sunday Herald smear piece is quite something, even by Paul Hutcheon’s extremely low standards. I saw him tweeting Jack Foster to follow him on Twitter so he could send him a direct message, and knew straight away he was up to something. The guy’s a creep and would surely be more at home in the Daily Mail.
Plain old yappy little dog territoriality. Scotland’s our patch. BBC Scotland led media liggers and cringers detest just the thought a world power might be interested in their Scotland region.
Weapons imposed on a country by one nation while a third has the ability to launch… nope that’s just too bazzar!!
@Irma
Excellent point.
propaganda– is that similar to the bbc state broadcaster cutting the view of the absolute horrendous sight of a saltire at the Andy Murray match but happy to zoom on Brazil, Argentinian, Japanese and other flags from other nations of the world and of course the butchers apron. Sad to see Murray whispering the words of GStheQueenie as the cameras zoomed in. Beware of the ruk establishment Andy. They will spit you oot when your not needed
British WMDs good, Foreign WMDs bad,
That’s not the point though is it, it’s the arrogant ignorant irony of the statement in the first place in making the assumption that all people are stupid enough to swallow this shit, or if they keep saying the same crap over and over it’ll work,,,(it used to)
Thank God the SNP have brainwashed our kids with reedin and ritin and sums and now it disnae!
I atcually bought the book believing it would be an interesting fictional opportunity, it was, just not the book writen by Alan Clements which was very poor. Tom Clancy he ain’t.
Yet again we see that the Herald & Times Group cannot be trusted in any way, shape or form – I include The National in that assessment too.
YMMV of course but personally I cannot understand why anyone in favour of independence would be naive/stupid enough to give their money to the Herald & Times Group.
After independence..
Scotland will be a NUCLEAR FREE state.
We will have declared unilateral disarmament, allowing others to do likewise.
We need to save the planet, we need military budgets to be re-directed to save lives.
The wretched Paul Hutcheon strikes again. Par for the course.
Kinda convenient that state-funded Russia Today (RT UK) that has been based in London for years with an office overlooking the Mayor’s, is often forgotten about, but then it’s not Scotland so doesn’t warrant same criticism #SNPBAD
Russian soft power is global, like Chinese soft power and American soft power. The UK on the other hand is an also-ran with no future. Meet the new world order, just like the old world order… minus Britannia!
No coincidence that that pile of equine ordure was penned by someone with BBC/Britlab/Eatablishment connections…
Let’s hope Sputnik are the first of a new wave of foreign news agencies to set up here. The current lot have overstayed their welcome. The MSM controls the agenda and it’s time someone broke up that happy little old boys club. I’ve never seen so much snarling and bared teeth. Clearly one small step for Scotland is one step too far for team UKok.
Rather Sputnik than BBC SnpoutNick. Ticknik tocnik.
I’m not sure they do irony in oor meeja. 😀
Zinoviev Letter Nos. 12,006 and 12,007. Westminster is the Mother of Liars. Britnat media is its bastard child.
All of this is really too funny for words. A lying establishment media complaining about a rival establishment media being a tool for Propoganda. My sides are sore.
To cap it all we are going to accept missiles like Cuba for a wad of cash.
If we become members of NATO we will have to be aware that if Russia fires them off they will go straight up in the air ,do a 180 degree swivel and come down on the very spot they were fired from. After all, we would be an enemy.
Am I still sleeping?
I buy the National because of some terrific stuff in it. Kerevan’s article today is first class. Gordon McIntyre-Kemps on Friday was excellent and the continuous parade daily of pro independence writers is great. Who owns it is not as important. Who edits it and the freedom to edit is the important thing. Gannet USA (the owners) make money by publishing newspapers and stop publishing them when they make a loss. That’s all.
The Sunday Herald was fairly good for a couple of weeks there. Tom Gordon was on holiday.
Will Sputnik News be reporting the massive tax avoidance of the dukes of westminster?
I agree with the unionists1 If anybody is going to tell lies, it should be them.
I read a book recently that was written in the ’70s called ‘The Dollar Covenant’ by Michael Sinclair. Scotland had recently regained her independence and of course things weren’t going well. It always appeared to be raining and the water gushed from broken gutters.
It wasn’t the Russians that had come to dominate the Scottish Government however, but an American cartel called ‘The Bondi Corporation’.
Why is it that when anyone writes a book about Scotland achieving her independence we never seem to end up happy like one of the Scandinavian countries, but fall into the slough of despondency and the depths of misery, as evinced by Clement’s 2004 ‘trashy novelette’ (Dan McPhail: Para Handy) titled, ‘Rogue Nation?
Actually, I already know the answer to that one.
Regarding Andy Murray I may be wrong, but I think I can safely say that he has gone over and won’t be back anytime soon.
It was Alan Clements who told the Culture, Media and Sport Committee meeting in Glasgow that – the reason BBC don’t commission drama for Scotland is that “Scotland went out of fashion” in 2014. The committee members seemed quite genuinely stunned to find that Scotland has had no indigenous drama production for years.
Perhaps Sputnik will extend its content to provide drama, documentaries and current affairs.
Has the Daily Record managed to link the oil rig running aground & leaking oil in the Hebrides with the evil Sturgeon? Rig of Lies? Come on msm. You know you want to
Westminster propaganda,
Monarchist propaganda,
Russian propaganda,
US propaganda,
Israeli propaganda,
Jihadist propaganda,
British nationalist propaganda,
Christian propaganda,
Eurostate propaganda…
I am looking forward to the days we are fed some good plain Scottish propaganda!
Vestas says:
15 August, 2016 at 11:16 am
Yet again we see that the Herald & Times Group cannot be trusted in any way, shape or form – I include The National in that assessment too.
YMMV of course but personally I cannot understand why anyone in favour of independence would be naive/stupid enough to give their money to the Herald & Times Group.
—————
Because they are the only pro-indy newspapers that exist in the shops, and we would be worse off without them? (The Sun backs the SNP at election times though)
They aren’t perfect, but they keep independence in the public eye with regular hard hitting cover pages.
There will be times when they run pointless stories like this but they also run a lot of good stuff and employ a bunch of pro-indy columnists.
If you are unsure about them, do what I do.
Only buy the papers when there is a helpful pro-Scottish or pro-indy cover page.
Shite – just shite, complete shite. Shite shite shite.
I posted this link in another thread –
but well worth repeating as an example of the BBC celebrating being a government mouthpiece.
link to archive.is
And if you need some music while reading it –
link to youtube.com
If the yoons are so convinced that Sputnik is just a load of lies and propaganda, why don’t they set up a Wings Over Scotland type site to expose it?
Go on, yoons, I’ll even help crowdfund it.
Flagging up SNP very very naughty in Herald. 🙂 FGS!
SNP accused of Holyrood power grab as junior MSPs land key jobs
link to archive.is
@ClanDonald –
Part of the reason there is no Yoon equivalent of WOS could be that there’s no genuine grass roots demand for it.
The BTUKOK brigade made an arse of themselves with the ill-fated VNOB site – shot down, filleted, and left as a twitching heap of smelly bits within hours, largely by regulars from this place.
🙂
If you’re thinking of seeing the movie FBG – don’t. It will only irritate you with Dick van Dyke accents, Betty impersonators and lots of union flag waving.
An aside really, but Wark & Clements were next door neighbours to Donald Dewar on Cleveden Rd. They were all part of West End trendys/BBC/West of Scotland Labour cronies set.
Regarding state run propaganda, I wonder of any other country is giving such prominence to the Olympics and their national teams on their major news programmes. The BBC seem to have rolling 24 hour coverage ahead of anything else going on in the world with constant shots of supporters draped in union jacks and faces painted.
People used to slag of America for being so obsessed with flags and nationalism, but I think the UK is now even worse. Even looking at Fox News and CNN, they are leading with Trump/Clinton/flooding stories.
The athletes have done well, but is it any surprise when hundreds of millions have been invested in funding full time athletes, dedicated sport centres, coaches and improving technology in the last 4 years ?
I’m loving how the yoons have bunched up panties over this Sputnik thing, I needed cheering up.
Leask had a good old Twitter rant. I’m one of the few folk in Scotland that can see his account, due to his draconian ban policy, so I daren’t operate any freedom of speech on his timeline.
It’s never occurs to MSM that if they offered a quality item, they would be secure, and we would ignore Sputnik. Sputnik are clever, have looked at the market gaps, employed Scottish Indy talent, so I’m supporting them.
Just like RT UK, who gives us Max Keiser, and platforms for lots of others, we can decide what’s what.
The only thing in terms of propaganda you get, is an absence of analysis of any depth on Russia, but the whole world is engaged in Russian propaganda, so Russia obviously has invested in shining a light on countries that have propaganda machines, like BBC.
But if Sputnik gets a license to broadcast, then what is stop a pro Indy organisation?
Don’t worry folks. When Article 50 is triggered the British Government will be able to throw all these awful foreign Johnnies out of the country, and get back to controlling all the media in the land.
(Pity it will also decimate the playing staff in the English premier league but ho hum…)
Seems to me all they are really saying is the obvious in that Scotland and prior to that Ireland are in a strategic position that threatens Britain. Stripped of all the economic arguments it boils down to that just as it did as far back as Elizabethan times. It’ll be really interesting seeing how the arguments that NATO would have nothing to do with us an we’d have no chance of getting in pan out after the shock horror revelation that that novel included.
Nice of them to remind us, yet again, that our land and assets are important to them but the people within them and their opinion not so much. I suppose it’s the difference between the legal standing of the monarch in Scotland and the rUK. Here she is only the leader of the people. There she is the nominal head of the state.
‘Why is it that when anyone writes a book about Scotland achieving her independence we never seem to end up happy like one of the Scandinavian countries, but fall into the slough of despondency and the depths of misery, as evinced by Clement’s 2004 ‘trashy novelette’ (Dan McPhail: Para Handy) titled, ‘Rogue Nation?’
Scotland’s (shameful) love for ‘independence’ is the ‘Well of Loneliness’. A nation torn apart by one half’s love of ‘independence’, they achieve it anyway…by stealth…but are found out in the end to be useless at it…rejected and dejected they all blow themselves up wi another country’s wmd’s. Och the shame of it all…it could never end in any other way, because quite simply…it’s ‘wrong’ to ever believe let alone ‘want’ that forbidden love…’independence’.
Here endeth the tale.
Regarding Andy Murray I may be wrong, but I think I can safely say that he has gone over and won’t be back anytime soon.
If it wasn’t for just enough proud Scotbuts 2014, he’d be representing Scotland Rio 2016.
The Rough Bounds at 11.46
“Regarding Andy Murray I may be wrong, but I think I can safely say that he has gone over and won’t be back anytime soon.”
How to you work that out? So he shouldn’t go for Olympic medals?
Nonsense.
If the Russian state owned news agency, sputnik news is to broadcast propaganda from Edinburgh.
Then how is it going to manage compete with that of our so called impartial and unbiased professional Scottish Media and state owned BBC in the propaganda stakes?
Whit ah want tae know is Where diz Alan Clements buy hiz Crystal Baws fae.
“Why is it that when anyone writes a book about Scotland achieving her independence we never seem to end up happy like one of the Scandinavian countries…”
Seems, like the nine of diamonds, it is to be ‘Scotland’s curse’. Even Noah picked on us when he chucked the Unicorn off the Ark for laughing at him (according to some myths).
But Scotland’s day is coming.
How dare the Russians come to Scotland and spout propaganda! I thought that was our job?
Capella, thanks for reminding me of Clements’ cringing statement that “Scotland went out of fashion in 2014”.
The problem for Yoondom is that Scotland is more and more in fashion and the BBC is desperate to diminish it in any way it can. You can smell the panic.
I think their whole reaction to the Sputnik thing shows they are very worried. They know they are losing control and can feel some of the earth moving under them. Long may it continue.
NB: Capella, left a message for you on Off Topic re Thomas Muir stuff.
UK broadcaster with links to UK government broadcasts to other countries,including Russia.
link to en.wikipedia.org
link to en.wikipedia.org
Leask is getting so upset about this, it is really funny. I love the way he keeps trying to explain what propaganda really is!
Will Ofcom or whoever be scrutinizing Sputnik with the same rigour they apply to the BBC?
Will they cover the Rutherglen poltergeist, though, we need to know?
Eamonn O’Neill was furious about Sputnik on Thursday’s Media Show (John Beattie lunchtime R Scotland). His complaint was that Russia is a gangster state and murders journalists and so we should not listen to it, or work for it. It is Mr Putin’s personally financed state run propaganda station.
The BBC, on the other hand, is an impartial broadcaster funded by the licence fee payer.
He lectures on investigative journalism so his rage is understandable. But does he not know that the licence fee is paid directly to the Treasury then the state funds the BBC, controlling it via state appointed apparatchiks such as Rhona Fairhead (HSBC) and Rober Carr (BAE Systems.
Or am I mistaken about that?
A good article from Sputnik (fellow traveller/pilgrim/wanderer) news agency,
link to tinyurl.com
it is about how Russian past,present and future has been distorted and reported by the Brutish Government controlled media over the centuries,
Brutish journalists and newspapers have been providing misinformation and propaganda by the Brutish State for hundreds of years,
there was never a `golden age of journalism` they are paid to keep/protect the establishment status quo,
good to get a non `Western` view for a change,although does not mean i wholly trust their viewpoint.
Andy Murray has NOT gone over to the other side…….. There’s more to this man than you give him credit……. He was pro YES in 2914…… Carrying a flag isn’t going to alter his opinion.
Robert Burns was way ahead of his time. He certainly got many things right. Perhaps he had the Unionist cabal in mind when he wrote :-
“Oh! Wad some power the gift tae gie us
Tae see oorsels iz ithers see us.”
It really is laughable that, arguably, the longest lived political, “Establisgment”, in the World is so blind that it fails to see itself as the most prolific promulgator of propaganda known to the modern World,
There have been three Worldwide Radio Broadcasters going full belt for as long as I can remember. Radio Moscow, Voice of America and the BBC World Service.
Radio Moscow, correctly titled , “Radio Moscow World Service”, was the official international broadcasting station of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics until 1993.
It was then reorganized with a new name, “Voice of Russia”, but has since been reorganized and again renamed as, “Radio Sputnik”.
Voice of America (VOA) is the United States government-funded multimedia news source. It is the official external broadcasting institution of the United States of America and has nothing to do with the rest of the Americas – including, “The United States of Mexico”.
The BBC World Service is still the BBC Worldwide propaganda service of the United Kingdom. It is really just the Worldwide wing of the BBC which has always been the UK’s government officially funded propaganda wing.
The BBC, however, is the only one of the three big propaganda broadcasters that is arrogant enough to force their audiences to directly pay for the privilege of viewing, listening and reading the government’s propaganda.
I believe most of the Murray family are independence supporters.
The BBC and its shortbread versions in tv and radio up here are so untrustworthy basically britstate propagandising mouthpieces. Good to see them get a taste of their own medicine from the Russians. Eat that Bird/Adams/Campbell/Bradford/Fraser/Wark/Clements et al. Irony seems lost on these rogues.
Talking about the Olympics……. check out the coat of arms emblazoned across the front of team GB’s T-shirts it’s composed of 2 lions , they’ve removed the Scottish Unicorn…..
Sputnik? Ah remember them!
Sigue Sigue Sputnik – Love Missile F1-11 (1986)
link to youtube.com
Clydebuilt says:
15 August, 2016 at 1:13 pm
Andy Murray has NOT gone over to the other side…….. There’s more to this man than you give him credit……. He was pro YES in 2914…… Carrying a flag isn’t going to alter his opinion.
——-
He proves that you don’t have to be anti-British to support independence. All the unionists try to paint independence supporters in that category. It’s nonsense. People can have both identities to various degrees.
Tactically speaking, if we do get another referendum, imo we should have “Better Scotland, Better Britain” banners.
It’s those who have a part-British identity who need to be convinced to vote YES. Most people who feel 100% Scottish are going to vote Yes regardless.
It may just be me here but I strongly suspect that the EBC and its cohorts in the London controlled media, including their branch offices in Scotland, are getting rather worried these days. No longer can they spout out their continuous bile uncontested.
The voice of reason has been awoken. (in fairness it has been awake for a wee while but it has only recently managed to open it eyes enough to see clearly.) First up we had a rather small and insignificant wee web site that no one ever visits called Wings over something or other. 😉 Next up we had the National newspaper. Perhaps I should have included RT first but it has only in fairly recent times actually begun to be the “go to ” place for informed news for people. Now we have Sputnik News.
The grip the union has on what WE hear regarding what THEY consider news is slipping and slipping fast! Who knows it may only be a matter of time now before the unionist media starts to tell us the TRUTH. 🙂 Yeah O.K. I admit I may be stretching the bounds of reality a wee bit too far there. 🙂
Just as an aside, RT are the only channel consistently reporting on the horror of Yemen.
Guess what clip they use repeatedly? The one of Angus Robertson at PMQs, highlighting British bombs, British officers training and advice, on the ground in Yemen, advising the Saudi aggressors.
No one wants to talk about that at the Beeb, eh? Despite the fact its their favourite party raising the issue.
Andy Murray knows he’s Scottish first, that can never change.
Unfortunately though, we’re still in the UK.
Don’t confuse..
BEING PART OF THE ACTUAL TEAM GB..
(as many do) with
BOWING TO the ‘UK’.
It is self government we seek, until then we, and Murray, must make the best of it.
Otherwise we all lose our momentum, inspiration and sense of humour.
@Cappela
Eamonn O’Neill works for The BBC Establishment,
probably sees himself as moral,
but he is not going to bite the hand that feeds him,
when the Establishment whistles he comes to heel,
he also teaches and lectures on journalism in Scotland,
always wondered who was to blame for the gutter style and appalling state of Scottish journalism.
I for one am delighted at the arrival of this new station.
BBC propaganda needs challenged at every level.
They refuse to employ young journalists with enthusiasm and talent .
Instead we get the burd and all the other negative eejits.
Listened to a short tract from BBC Good morning Scotland put up by GA Ponsonby on his indyref2 blog.
The total contempt and anger from Gary Robertson when interviewing an SNP MSP was unbelievable.
link to indyref2.scot
As for James Kelly, why the good folk of Rutherglen are not cringing into their tea every time that non-entity opens his gob is beyond me
The crazy thing about the BBC is that they probably actually believe that they aren’t an instrument of propaganda themselves. There’s no reason at all why Sputnik should produce some watchable programmes every now and again. At any rate a bit of competition in the currently incestuous Scottish media can’t be a bad thing.
He who controls the media controls public opinion.
The unionists don’t want anyone giving another version of their “Truth”.
“The advancement and diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty”
James Madison
The puerile inferences about Andy Murray do this site no good The man had no option but to represent “Team GB”
Maybe one day though. Meantime it has to be ??
Speaking of the Hutcheon/ Foster twitter spat, Hutcheon was pretty selective about which Foster tweets he retweeted, avoided the one where Foster pointed out that he was definitely not the same type of journalist as Hutcheon.
Capwlla: “The committee members seemed quite genuinely stunned to find that Scotland has had no indigenous drama production for years. Since 2014.”
That’s because they’re lethally inept, and don’t think Scotland has the talent. They run a Strictly Ballroom-type elimination contest, and if you’re lucky enough to be the finalist it doesn’t mean you get your production financed.
If BBC London doesn’t want it – which is most of the time – or is doing something remotely similar, it’s thanks but no thanks.
It’s symbolised in this, published 2014: link to wp.me
A genuine question concerning this Team GB lot in Rio. Are athletes from Northern Ireland or the Channel Islands involved? Because none of them are actually part of the island of Great Britain.
“As for James Kelly, why the good folk of Rutherglen are not cringing into their tea every time that non-entity opens his gob is beyond me”
The thing is, Liz, they did their best. He lost his SP seat but got back in on the list to thrill us with his trenchant aperçus delivered in that beautifully-modulated baritone.
He just another British Labour in S______d zombie but they’re difficult to kill off completely because the BBC is their life-support system.
And so we come back again to the BBC and its baleful influence.
@ Arboath1320 We know you,ve been aff line fur a wee while but { a matter of time now before the unionist media starts to tell us the TRUTH. ? Yeah O.K. I admit I may be stretching the bounds of reality a wee bit too far there. }
Gled tae see yer finger wiznae aff the pulse during your absence lol.
And why would Scotland regret being independent?
Regretting being still in the ” greatest union anywhere ever”, more like.
@Clydebuilt
You missed the wee lion on the top making the total 3. And before anyone starts, leopard at the time was simply the term for lions passant, link to en.wikipedia.org
@ Scott Finlayson. Agree. Here’s the discussion from The Media Show about Sputnik with Stuart Cosgrove trying to balance the input by pointing out that even we have state agents in the media. Oops.
At 1hr 17 mins. for 10 mins.
But Eamonn O’Neill thinks Sputnik should go home and investigate their own country. I recall he criticised the presenters and warned them darkly, but that has been edited out. State interference or poor memory?
link to bbc.co.uk
@ Grouse Beater – that admission from Alan Clements should be clipped and circulated. Scotland “kinda went out of fashion” in 2014. Really!?
His point was that, because we might leave the UK, why would the BBC want to buy any drama we produced? Obviously, Danish, Swedish, French and even Iclandic drama is OK – even with sub titles. But Scotland would be a foreign country.
Paul Hutcheon wrote “Labour MSP James Kelly has called for “detailed accounts” of how the money was spent. Last week’s Scottish launch of Sputnik, a news agency whose motto is Telling The Untold, was met with derision by figures across the political divide.”
James Kelly MSP? Had Paul Hutcheon gone to a certain Michael Mouse for a quote he could not have much brought much more laughter on his risible article. ‘The political divide’? Did that range all the way from establishment figures to media lackeys? I think Mr. Hutcheon is probably conflating derision directed at Sputnik with that directed at himself for his pretence at being a journalist.
Regarding Sputnik, those of us who may go to it will be different from those who regularly go to the BBC for information. We know that Sputnik will contain propaganda.
Good to see that my initial thought has already been mentioned early on about the fact Russia Today have had an office in London for years.
Wonder how long the RT office in Edinburgh will last, remember the Brits got Irans Press TV taken off the satellites as it was deemed to be propaganda!
It was my default news channel, it did appear to actually inform people what was really happening in Afganistan and other Middle Eastern Countries , we can’t have that can we?
RT also provides a different perspective on the Russian “state doping” allegations. Banning a whole national team on such dodgy evidence looks very much like “cheating” in itself. Easy to win lots of medals if the competition is disqualified.
link to rt.com
Who to believe? Apart from Andy Murray and Usain Bolt, I can’t drum up any enthusiasm for the Olympics. Although the “dressage” is so silly it’s funny.
The Media show did have two journalists on last week criticising the whole hubristic pantomime that the Olympics has become – all about medals. Originally, when it was revived, they had drama and art. It was about peaceful co-existence. That’s gone right out of fashion, just like Scotland.
What Indyref1 did was reveal the stark horror of the British propaganda machine and the distaste hasn’t worn off.
Just followed a link to the herald and now I feel sooooo durty.
This Sputnik situation is very serious!
Westminster and the UK elite, such as Murdoch own the news
in the UK, and they don’t want anyone muscling in “their”
territory.
Have you any idea of the £Billions that is spent masking, distorting, and corrupting the truth here in Britain?
You can’t just have someone telling the truth and wasting this valuable weapon for bare minimal costs.
The big problem for the UK media is that I, like many millions, now know that their first and main priority is to suppress the masses and keep their BUMs on the gravy train. There is no money or power in the truth for them!
If I pick up the news from any UK Media outlet, I automatically assume that they are not telling the truth, or at least offering the full picture.
If I pick up news from another Non-UK Media Outlet, such as Sputnik, and it doesn’t tie in with the UKOK version, than I and many others, will assume that Sputnik will be closer to the truth.
I do genuinely have a source that can confirm Sputnik has been messed around by BT something terrible in trying to establish new Broadband and Telephone Systems.
There is trouble in trying to convince the Russians that BT Openreach offer the same monopoly standard pathetic service to all UK customers.
Solidarnosc.
When radio shortbread first reported this a week or two ago they also mentioned that the Government had increased funding to the BBC World Service to counter Russian broadcasting in the Baltic countries.
As others have said – the lack of self-awareness is laughable.
Sputnik will cover UK and Scottish stories that the BBC are less comfortable about. They are not here to critique the Kremlin. We know that. That is OK. I want to hear about the stories the BBC are not comfortable with. There is no lack of critique on the Kremlin in the West.
Ghastly and usual display of UKOK cringing from a very very toryboy. If it was an English athlete, they’d be hysterical with the joy of British world dominance, again, as god intended, but its a guy from Dunblane so
alexmassie ?@alexmassie 14h14 hours ago
alexmassie Retweeted Tom English
Absolutely. del Potro lost a game of tennis tonight but he won an awful lot of other things.alexmassie added,
Tom English @BBCTomEnglish
That final – and what Frazier said of Ali: I hit him with punches that would have brought down the walls of a city. Lawdy, lawdy, he’s great
As a long time follower of RT, I have watched some outstanding programmes, not just the likes of the Keiser Report, but also Watching the Hawks on the US and interviews of Alex Salmond.
The BBC is getting worried by the thought of more people learning what is really going on in Scotland in particular, and UKOKIA in general. About time!
Och Effigy, ah didn’t recognise you withoot yer petition! 😉
Re Andy Murray.
He is sportsman, a damned good one in all senses of the word. Just look how he behaved towards his opponent at the end of the match.
He’s been on the wrong end of that booing shit himself in the past, at fucking Wimbledon no less! He plays for team GB, its the ONLY way he could appear at the Olympics or the Davis Cup.
So he mouthed GSQ, does anyone know what actual words were in his head? There are good parodies that are not complimentary to Mrs. Windsor, he could even have been thinking the words to Flower of Scotland.
He’s sportsman, not a politician. He does what he needs to do to play the sport he loves and excels at. Give him a break, he won a gold medal, how many keyboard warriors have achieved anything like it?
Usual miserable “Murray beats someone” from rancid The Graun. Hope Sputnik go the other way and treat Murray like England treat Beckham say, or is that just too much for cringer proud Scotbuts.
link to archive.is
Clydebuilt @1.33
re the so-called ‘Coat of Arms’ on the UK athletes team strip. It was explained in an earlier thread that Stella Mc Cartney made it up.. sorry, decided to modernise it. I think it looks awful – far too busy and a peel-wally colour scheme.
Greannach @2.33
Why team GB and not Team UK?
Read this article link to bbc.co.uk
Explains really well – all to do with Olympic committee referring to GBR; Isle of Man and Channel Islands, Falklands and Gibraltar not part of UK; NI athletes can compete for Team Ireland 21 out of 29 this year have chosen to do so.
That is OK. I want to hear about the stories the BBC are not comfortable with. There is no lack of critique on the Kremlin in the West.
Sputnik could also tell Scots about Russia too. It doesn’t have to be Kremlin anti imperialist propaganda:D
But BBC ram the USA down our throats day in, day out, well the whole of teamGB media does that but it would great to hear about what Russian people are up to these days, what do they think of big stuff like Bomber Bliar’s Iraq war, the EU, beyond and across to the Pacific rim, what do they think about Scotland wise and so on. It’s all to play for Sputnik.
Bet none of Sputnik are on four hundred grand a year, plus expenses, your average BBC manager salary, staggering pay cheques for civil servants running a government propaganda unit.
I mean, do Russian’s like cake, or rather programs about cake, as much as England does, for example. Is there a Russia Eastenders, or a Russian Jacky Bird, a raddled old nutcase that can hardly conceal her anger at anyone that doesn’t vote how she tells them to, or even a Gordon Brewerski?
I haven’t tried R. Sputnik yet. I am however old enough to remember the original Sputnik.
It beeped and the whole world listened.
Went to a woman for Indy event in Dundee a few months ago and the day was all about the suffragettes. It was a great day but anyway watched the film ‘Suffragettes ‘ last night only to be reminded of something discussed at the event.
The use of surveillance ( considering photography was in its infancy) and suppression of news by the press.
In the film last night they were on about the great and the goods summer house being built by the wealthy newspaper proprietor and you just end up thinking , plus ça change etc.
Perhaps there is a bit of ‘mixing it up’ going on by opening Sputnik here but here’s hoping they do get a broadcasting licence, have brilliant advertising promoting things that all those principled folk can’t resist and really open up our msm.
Scotland has a long history with Russia including a University teaching Gaelic but hey get back in your box, who do you think you are?
As for Andy Murray, think the guys fantastic , can’t praise what the Murrays have all done for tennis ( behind the scenes) but if I had a son , who played at amateur level and his opponent was professional tennis player Nadal, Murray or Djokovic , I’d be questioning the ethos of the Olympics but then again maybe that’s why I no longer watch it- what next , golf? Oh yeah…
Here we have an interesting and relevant piece from Sputnik.
NI resident set to launch a legal case against the UK, due to peace monies from the EU being under threat of loss following Brexit.
link to archive.is
Will any UKOK yoonster cringer in the Scotland region even give this a mention let alone a tweet. Andy Murray and Nicola Sturgeon, on the same page of our newspaper, are you insane.
— Nicola Sturgeon (@NicolaSturgeon)
August 15, 2016
Yet another reason to love Andy Murray… link to t.co
Sorry for going O/T here and apologies if this has been linked to before. I just came across this over on Facebook. Could this be another example of non unionist controlled news sourcing? 😉
link to ukcolumn.org
Does anyone remember that 2014 indyref debate with Ruth and Harvie on the Panel?
There’s a bit in it where Ruth employs her best Am Dram voice and face to say Scotland would be vulnerable to attack if Independent. Patrick asks Ruth who is going to attack Scotland, and by this time Ruth’s eyes are glistening with tears, as she replies – Russia.
I was in hysterics, as was most of the audience. I can’t forget Patrick Harvies face, which was pure WTF?
There was a slew of very funny Russia themed memes on FB, with Ruth photoshopped in.
It was one of my favourite moments.
Hope Ruth is cleaning her tank this afternoon, just in case.
Yoons in a Balloon
Two tories ladies one in Blue,one in Red in a hot air balloon were lost.
They reduced their altitude and spotted the F.M. below,they descended a bit more and shouted “excuse us Nicola,we’re going to an important meeting with our constituents,we promised to meet them an hour ago but we don’t know where we are.”
The F.M. replied “your in a hot air balloon hovering approximately 30 feet above the ground,55.95 degrees north latitude,3.18 west longitude”
Bewildered the yoons replied “you are definitely SNP,everything you told us is probably technically correct,but we’ve no idea what to make of your information and that fact is,we’re still lost,frankly you’ve not been much help at all,if anything,you’ve delayed our trip with your talking.”
The F.M. responded “aye you two are definitely tories,you don’t know where you are or where you’re going,you have risen to where you are,due a large quantity of hot air.You have made more promises that you clearly cannot keep and you expect everybody beneath you to solve your problems.The fact is you are in exactly the same position you were in before we met,but now somehow,it’s my fukcing fault !”
SNP Bad News 😉
#windsoverscotland
🙂 carjamtic
ronnie anderson says:
15 August, 2016 at 2:36 pm
Gled tae see yer finger wiznae aff the pulse during your absence lol.
Well in all honesty Ronnie it was almost impossible no tae keep ma finger oan the pulse. Ah could only hae done that if ah had gone into a monastery up in the high mountains of Nepal! 🙂
K1 says:
15 August, 2016 at 3:37 pm
Och Effigy, ah didn’t recognise you withoot yer petition! ?
K10 for your comment. I like your Style! lol
Just for you, and the BBC calling Murray supporters English
link to you.38degrees.org.uk
I wonder if this goosing oil news will be told by the BBC?
Of course it will be bad news for Scotland because this is oil we are talking about.
We just cannae handle awe that munnie.
link to archive.is
Thanks to Sputnik News for this.
Are you sure that MI5 or MI6 didn’t write the book in the first place.
@ carjamtic 4:25
Love it, just love it.
When the orginal Sputnik was launched the US government set up NASA.
This time the UK government already has its NASA (Northern Anti Scottish Agency) in place having recently beefed up the Scotland Office propaganda unit.
link to prweek.com
Now that Scotland has the most powerful devolved parliament in the whole wide world why does the Scotland Office need more staff?
Has anyone checked up on the ongoing costs? Labour at least has costs saving ideas by having one shadow cabinet spokesperson covering the devolved nations.
All Soviet diplomats and media based in UK were spies.
No British diplomats nor media based in USSR were spies
It must have been true because every Westminster politician and every Brit media outlet told me so.
Even at a very young age I was never stupid enough to believe anything of the kind.
Concepts in Postcolonial Theory: Hybridity and Otherness
link to robertjcyoung.com
I wrote the following letter to the Herald when it went mental over this issue last week. I’ve had loads of letters published in the Herald, but for some reason they didn’t publish this one.
Sir,
I find today’s Herald Editorial (Launch of Sputnik) almost touching in its implications that the Brits are above the machinations of nasty Russia. In our present culture, the mass media, along with the public relations racket , fulfill the role of communicating the messages and symbols that support the ruling discourse to the general population.
This is done by amusing, entertaining and informing the public in a manner that inculcates values, beliefs and norms that accord with the views and class interests of concentrated wealth. ( See: Herman and Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent).
it has become ever more clear that the role of media, public and private is identical – as those of us who witnessed the BBC’s performance in support of the status quo during two recent referenda are now in no doubt.
The BBC, has always tried to portray itself as ‘above these things’, but the realty has been apparent since its utter capitulation to New Labour in the Gilligan debacle in the run cup to the Iraq war.
As David Edwards and David Cornwell have reported (Guardians of Power:The Myth of he Liberal Media, 2014):
“In the summer of 2003 the British government launched an awesome flak campaign against the BBC. A year later, BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan, chairman Gavyn Davies and director general Greg Dyke had all resigned or were sacked. The BBCs director of news, Richard Sambrook was moved sideways to a different post. All of this happened despite the fact that those opposing the war have been overwhelmingly vindicated by events in Iraq”.
The notion that only Sputnik has “clear state links” and that “strong governments such as Putin’s rarely favour a strong press” is frankly risible – it’s just that in the UK we tended in the past to do it slightly more subtly – although even that mask is no longer worn. Someone really should have told Alastair Campbell to toughen up.
Given that it is not yet 2 months since Chilcott, one might add amnesia to the the present patronising hypocritical fuss over Sputnik
Andy Murray?: You have to play the hand your given – Team GB and to wear those awful gaudy Team GB shirts.
And why so gaudy? other nations’ athletes , even the USA have simple coloured polo shirts or whatever, with a small symbol of their nation. Why so many Butcher’s aprons stitched on team kit? Why delete the Scottish unicorn for two big cats? Leopards or are they lions? Sign of identity insecurity?
And yeah, Putin is pure bogey man, so MSM tell us. Safer with Clinton, or Trump or May?
Finally, I agree with Dave McEwan Hill, the National provides us with excellent articles by independence minded politicians and academics. Ponder, pre Indy 2014, on newspapers available that forwarded a nationalist view. Yeah, zilch.
By my reckoning the Murray family are strong supporters of an independent Scotland. The tweet from Jamie on Andy winning the gold medal said it all. ‘Andy Murray, raised by a family from Dunblane in Scotland’. It would have been so easy for Jamie to miss that out but he was proud of his roots.
Broadcasting isn’t devolved, but what does that mean in reality ?
Does that only refer to traditional style broadcasting over the airwaves ?
Could the Scottish Government operate a commercial style news service on a website similar to this Sputnik news, employing real reporters etc. The gov.scot site exists, but is very dry and factual.
Unionists insist that the Scottish parliament is one of the most powerful in the world, and will be getting more powers after a Brexit.
So presumably there would be few complaints if one of the most powerful devolved parliaments in the world operated a better news service to communicate what is going on in Scotland and provide a platform for Scottish issues and discussion ?
Effigy 😉
I hope Mi5 and MI6 have more inportant thing to do then read gutter fiction but I am disappointed the a) Journalism at the times has degraded to the point the a piece of fiction is considered as a supporting text what passes as news article b) in a free market a new player is sources of fear could it be it not so free and new players coul? destabilise the cosy news understanding in the UK
ToKio jackie reporting MOD to sell of Land in Scotland.
Ah wee job for the Wings Internet Ferrets
When did they take the land over
And what was payed for it & to who.
SG should be getting on top of this,we know Westminster Gov will operate a slash & burn policy in Scotland as they have done in every other Country under their heel.
Fight them every step of the way to Independence.
I may be wrong, but at 4 gold, 3 silver and 4 bronze, Scotland may be be doing better by population size than any other country.
Four times better than rUK (on 11 gold).
When it comes to sport, clearly we have nothing to cringe about!
Robert Peffers at 1.19
You forgot to mention Radio Free Europe.
Phut!
Former Scottish Labour rising star Steven Purcell will not return to frontline politics
link to archive.is
Carjamtic
Superb 🙂
SNP should have that as their next party political broadcast.
Has the BBC become lazy??
Copy and Paste from Pie and Bovril
BBC online is no longer reporting on lower division Scottish football games.
Complaint to BBC ——
To whom it may concern,
I have noted the poor quality and reduction of coverage in Scottish football at the start of the new 2016/17 season and wish to make a formal complaint. Not only have the BBC essentially abandoned reporting on Scottish League 1 and Scottish League 2 but the coverage of the Scottish League Cup was also very poor, with many Championship or even Premiership level teams having no match report from their matches.
My own side, Motherwell, a Premiership level team, played a crucial final day group match in one of Scottish footballs major competitions and yet the BBC could not muster a reporter, either in radio coverage or for its website in the form of a match report. I find this to be unacceptable when every level of English league football receives full reported coverage of league and cup matches. I am further angered to see that on investigation, English non league football receive better coverage than Scottish Premiership level sides, never mind Scottish lower league sides. How can the BBC possibly justify this appalling bias in coverage that is apparent between its coverage of Scottish and English football?
By all means give Manchester Utd more coverage than Airdrieonians, there is more public interest but please explain why Forest Green or Boreham Wood are afforded better match reporting than even the top sides in Scotland, never mind our lower league clubs? This seems to be a totally unacceptable state of affairs and yet another failure, deliberate or otherwise, to treat Scottish license payers with anything approaching parity.
Great stuff. More news outlets the better. When is it on?
Hold the front page..
link to tinyurl.com
@Onwards says: 15 August, 2016 at 1:37 pm:
” … He proves that you don’t have to be anti-British to support independence.”
You have the right of it, Onward. The UK claim they are the British, and they certainly are British, but no more so than the Irish, (north and south), the Welsh and the Scots.
The problem is that the UK lot claim only they are the British and it defeats the argument for independence to go along with their arrogance. Why allow them to rob you of your right to be British when to be British only requires you to be a resident of the British Isles and vow loyalty to both whatever British country you belong to and to Britain.
In short it is the only the UK’s propaganda that they are the British and everyone else on these British Isles are thus non-British. I’m Scottish, British and a European and no one has the right to tell me I am not.
Arbroath 1320 @ 4.22pm
That alternative TV show you linked to….UK Column…
Is indeed anti government but it’s also anti everything else that’s not from the Christian Right.
It’s a bit like the UK’s version of The Alex Jones Show but a lot less entertaining.
O/T.
YesBikers for Scottish Independence
O/T…
I know Nana has received her gold Wings badge but I believe Robert Peffers and Pete the Camera were also nominated during this year’s fundraiser. Have all the gold badges been despatched? Pete hasn’t mentioned receipt…
Croompenstein says:
15 August, 2016 at 8:13 pm
Hold the front page..
He’s not saying much though is he Wishart. It must be horrible getting savaged by the whole of the yoonster hackdom but its the job. Whole UKOK media shebang’s worse than ever and it gets worse by the minute. There is stuff that can be done, like breaking up one man ownership of loads of newspapers, selling off the BBC for a quid and making it a private corp, tax them properly. Why is rancid The Graun allowed to be a tax dodge trust?
BBC r4 6pm news had long thing about how great teamGB in Rio’s doing and its all down to the lotto and UK.gov making lotto pay for athletes training. They ran through their list of medal winning sport, rowing, running etc, but they left off tennis, the day after a Scot won gold, for teamGB, at the tennis.
Its not by mistake.
Just nickin’ in and oot o’ rev’s twitter…that Tom Gordon is a richt wanker in’t ‘he?
It’s like they eat sleep and shit anti independence aw the live long day…it’s been a revelation these past few years coming across these dickheads in Scottish journalism…who knew they were pretty much tae a man a bunch of slimey thick wankers, the group term for them should be ‘circle jerks’ cause aw they ever dae is stroke each other’s UKOK wet dream whilst ejaculating their spent rhetoric aw o’er the people o’ Scotland.
Whit a time tae be alive!
Regarding Andy Murray – I think his Mum sends us a clue here
link to twitter.com
🙂
As an aside,a fascinating response on twitter. I put a comment about the SNHS and there were around 60 responses from the usual wee group of Tories. They are in a total panic, for them the English NHS is all well, the English Government all good.
These are ProudScots.
K1
Aye- but it’s been so long they’ve been beating it over UKOK nonsense it has become a joyless, sexless, loveless toil. It has gone from being their personal, zealous pleasuring of their egos to a mere automatic learned response.
They are truly lost.
Reading Tom Gordon’s tweets from the bookfest quoting Bell and Massie, then comparing that to Anthony Bourdain’s article on what Kissinger did to Cambodia, I remember there are real journalists out there in the wider world.
vestas
Agree completely. The SH and National are not pro independence newspapers and never have been.
Good old Empire failing to strike back.
Away for a few days, but spent last night in a hotel right across from Pathetic Quay.(The big glass one)
An Empire journo spotted at breakfast time, good to see the EBC licence getting used for expensive hotels, value for money?(you decide, if you are still stupid enough to pay it!!)
One of the many, many reasons I will never pay it again in my lifetime.
And yes I will go to jail for refusing to pay for it , no matter what rules they bring in.
First time for a while having live TV (in hotels for 4 days), shi*e every night.
Free yourselves from the Matrix.
Lotto money is a foolhardy gambit if intended as an argument against independence. Last regional figures showed that more was raised per capita in Scotland. Don’t think the same ratio was spent. If anything less than the average per capita.
Regarding the hoo has about RBS?
Do you want to live in a country where the economic future rests on the whims of bankers or in one where banks simply provide a service for the rest of the economy?
I cannot believe any self respecting believer in Scotland’s freedom wants to hang on to a toxic self description of ‘British’.
I would consign that particular adjective to that of the proper one of the geographical name for the islands that we reside on only.It would and should never have defined our nationality.
In Political or nationality terms I wish to define myself as Scottish only, and eventually to be a citizen of a Scottish Republic. So that all the historical and hysterical pish about whose monarchy is whose etc. is consigned to the dustbin of history where it belongs.
As for some so called Scots who want to cling on to a shared artificial political construct of ‘British’, well all I can feel is pity and consider them to be colonial cargo cultists. Ask any citizen of the Irish republic if they want to retain the designation of ‘British’ as part of their identity and you will be laughed at as a bloody fool. They’ve got enough of those deluded idiots occupying the amputated six counties in the north of the island of Ireland!
heedtracker
The Scott Trust is no more. No Trust, no editorial independence.
link to jonathan-cook.net
The breaking of colonial domination brings both joy and sorrow. This needs to be recognised and catered for.
Just nickin’ in and oot o’ rev’s twitter…that Tom Gordon is a richt wanker in’t ‘he?
Its the Bell guy that makes flesh crawl. End of day yoonster tweet read around, Dr NO says
Scott Arthur ?@DrScottThinks 4h4 hours ago
Pooling & sharing training resources appears to be delivering results for the #TeamGB home nations at #Rio2016
Its a blue and red tory world though, Oxfam record another red tory legacy world UKOK record, gold medal, god save our gracious queen, long live our noble queen etc etc. Actually she’s currently on her Scottish estates blasting small birds and animals to bits, for teamGB ofcourse.
OxfamVerified account
?@oxfamgb
The UK is on course to take the no1 spot for most unequal country in the developed world. RT to flag this unfairness!
@DrScottThinks
Ah, the old “Pooling & Sharing” ploy. A fan of Inspector Clouseau?
‘The UK is on course to take the no1 spot for most unequal country in the developed world. ‘
Whilst Team Eng..sorry Team GB self actualizes,we have food banks ,and ‘the erse is hingin’ oot the troosers’of the folk in the sink estates of Big Britain.
USSR and DDR revisited.
Not to worry,the Queen will have her subjects breeches patched will she not ?
‘Scott Arthur ?@DrScottThinks 4h4 hours ago
Pooling & sharing training resources appears to be delivering results for the #TeamGB home nations at #Rio2016’
Simpering arse licker.
Lochside says:
15 August, 2016 at 11:21 pm
I cannot believe any self respecting believer in Scotland’s freedom wants to hang on to a toxic self description of ‘British’.
———
I would always consider myself Scottish first. But there is still a part ‘British’ identity whether I want it or not.
If I was sitting in a bar in Rio right now, I would probably have more in common with the English and Welsh guys than the Brazilians or Italians or Spanish. Just by use of the English language and familiarity with common shared culture.
Point is that it is those with part-British identities we need to convince to vote for independence. If enough people see independence as something exclusive and unwelcoming then it won’t happen.
After independence, my guess is that the common meaning of ‘Britishness’ will change to something more neutral and friendly.
It doesn’t have to represent the UK union and London political rule, but at the moment it is often seen as one and the same, and is certainly exploited as such. It doesn’t help that the union jack flag is commonly used to represent Britain in all aspects.
I wonder if Alan, whilst having a jovial glass of, insert your own cringe here, with Jack McConnell, back in the day, as the watched Kirsty slip nymph like into her private pool, pontificated about what a future Scotland could be, and blind drunk, thought up this bag of crazy cats?
It would not be Kirsty’s idea, she is far to sensible for that, in any case literature, or at least the art of the scribe is not her forte.
Culture that is their bag, but where is culture and where is its abode? If you listen to onwards above you would say culture resides at home, where apparently you have things in common?
Being understood apparently is a good thing, however I once spent a week in the company of a group two Scots one Norwegian who could speak English and three others who could not understand a single word I said. But a deep friendship developed with one, although by all but the most rudimentary of signals, and thirty odd years later I still remember those days, campfire, laughing and a feeling of peace.
Onwards, quite honestly I can say I can feel more compassion and brotherhood with a man just arrived from Syria, looking for that peace and contentment, than I can with any average brexatering English or Welshman, and siting in a bar and having the company of those two, I would call my Rio trip a failure.
I’m with Lochside. The sooner we ditch Britishness the better. It is a toxic brand, worlwide, and has been ever since I started travelling abroad as a teenager. In cultures not attuned to the different accents of the British Isles, one is automatically assumed to be British/English which are interchangeable. In Africa and the Middle East, where I lived for many years, Britishness was treated with polite coolness or dowright hostility. As soon as one corrected this to Scottish, attitudes changed instantaneouly, as they still do with foreigners down here in London.
A few days ago I had occasion to chat with a young shop assistant who turned out to be from Algeria. He was very careful to inform me that he was not an Arab, but a true Berber who spoke Berber, French and a little Arabic. He then discussed the 30 year struggle they had to free themselves of French rule. I leaned over and said, “Mate, you may have had 30 years, we’ve had 300, but we’re getting our freedom soon”. He looked at me for a long, slightly puzzled moment and then it dawned on him. “Ah, you’re Scottish”. There then followed a hearty, warm handshake and wishes of “God be with you”, in Arabic as it’s the language of the Koran. I think he would have hugged me if it weren’t embarrassing in front of others.
A small story redolent of the sentiments I have felt everywhere I’ve gone. Yes we may be British in the sense that we live in the British Isles, but if you ask a Swede what is his nationality he’ll say Swedish not Scandinavian. If you ask a Serb where he comes from, he’ll say Serbia, not the Balkans, not Yugoslavia. Geography is one thing, political union is another, but the thing that stirs our hearts and souls is nationhood. We are Scottish.
That’s why I don’t do Twitter.
Ecstatic Transformation
Part of the series The New Middle Ages pp 1-7
Introduction: The Uses of Medieval Alterity
link to link.springer.com
link to amazon.com
Back on topic.
link to publishing.cdlib.org
@DrScottThinks
How you doing bud, finished polishing that utilitarian turd of yours? Must be pretty shinny by nos. Perhaps you could pass this link on to Mr. H @ the BBC? Btw, what are your thoughts on “the exceeding of the ontological by the ethical”?
link to amazon.com
Anyway one day, and really this happened, I was on the London eye or tube and a girl was wearing not a lot, and this man said something about what she was wearing and guess what, this old lady said something and shocked we all clapped! True story, anyway the Nigerian uncle I never had sadly passed away, but luck would have it he stole millions and apparently it’s all mine! Some
United Nations guys said if I only give them all my worldly goods I wifi be rich?
Anyway the anecdote was, 700 years, it was a myth then, but nice to see it revived.
My point is asking someone where they are from, won’t tell you where they are going, I can trace my family tree back over 1500 years, and I feel more affinity, more sence of purpose with those called immigrants, I call scots, than any other who don’t hold the peaceful advancement of our nation, in common purpose first.
There is no place for discrimination on race, class( whatever that is) gender, sexuality, pigmentation, hair colour, size of left toenail, which country you weren’t born in, what you were, who you pray too, who prays for you, what you want to be, what you achieve, where you fall, what school you went too, sorry, it never really mattered anyway, how much or how little you squirrelled away, how much you love and are loved, appearance, personally, lack off, abundance off, height, big or small, it’s worth not weight, large family, or none, disability, haven’t we all, not always visible, big car or shanksys pony, we live in Scotland, our national bard wrote this, because hundreds of years ago this’s how we were, and today that is how we will be remembered.
Then let us pray that come it may,
As come it will for a’ that
That sense and worth o’er a’ the earth
Shall bear the gree an a’ that
For a’ that, an a’ that
It’s comin yet for a’ that
That man to man the warld o’er
Shall brithers be for a’ that,
The honest man, though e’er sae poor
Is king o men for a’ that
To our new labour lords our bard had something for you!
Ye see yon birkie ca’d a lord
Wha struts, an stares, an a’ that
Tho’ hundreds worship at his word,
He’s but a coof for a’ that
For a’ that, an a’ that
His ribband, star, an a’ that
The man o’ independent mind,
He looks an laughs at a’ that
SNP 2017 for all Scotland.
Where’s that young lad I embarrassed by commenting on the high quality of his post? Looks like your not the only one collecting hammers. 😉
Would it help encourage you to post another if I promised not to comment on it? I feel so clumsy.
A couple of thoughts on… stuff. 🙂
link to weegingerdug.wordpress.com
How could the novel be described as ‘prescient’ by anyone? ‘Prescient’ means ‘showing knowledge of events before they take place’. As Scotland didn’t become independent in 2014 and therefore made no deal with Russia, the novel is not prescient.
At best it’s an alternate history.
Perhaps Melanie Reid might use a dictionary in the future. Possibly one funded by the Russians.
CameronB Brodie12.03am
That’s one of the most important posts since this site started.And so concise.Well done and many thanks.
mealer
I’ll no get out the door. 😉
I’m with Onwards re the British thing.I don’t feel it in any shape or form however to get over the line we need to recognise that we have to take a percentage of the people with varying degrees of Britishness with us.
In the end there will be those who will never be convinced but there are hefty numbers who could be persuaded..I’m sure the SNP recognise this hence the monarchy,the pound and the Council of the Isles strategy 2014.Whether it was a success in terms of converting huge numbers of soft no’s to Yes I know not but I personally am convinced that 3 entrenched No voting friends pre 2014 were persuaded to vote yes with this “comfort blanket” available.
IMHO anything else at this stage is mere navel gazing.(I’m not advocating the exact same strategy this time around BTW)
‘Onwards’…you’re entitled to feel your shared sense of ‘Britishness’. However, the scenario you’ve described of sitting in a bar in Rio and feeling more comfortable with English speakers is not one I share. I have travelled the world, like most people these days, and enjoyed sharing time and company more with non-Brits. I include fellow Scots in this. I do not mean I shun or have never had good times with fellow Scots or other ‘british’ types, it just that I have always felt that as a Scot I felt more at home with the wider world community than hobnobbing with Anglophones. I’ve always felt that our destiny as Scots was always to be part of the World community, not held back by our bigger neighbour like some simple sibling. For instance, when in Spain, I have always avoided ‘english’ bars and ‘cafes’…as I want to get away from the cloying colonialism associated with it.
By the way ,CameronB Brodie’s ‘The breaking of colonial domination brings both joy and sorrow. This needs to be recognised and catered for’..for me is true. I have experienced that a long time ago when the scales fell from my eyes and I recognised my nation’s true subjugation. But through that sorrow comes a spiritual release and sense of freedom. It is a necessary process for self realisation to occur. It is called enlightenment.
@call me dave, chortle, chortle, ‘rising star’????
Loved the comment by James Kelly, covers it exactly.
Andrew McLean: “I can trace my family tree back over 1500 years, and I feel more affinity, more sense of purpose with those called immigrants,”
In every glen, rock and boulder each breath of wind whispers stories of our forefathers, stories of struggle and triumph, of strain and fortitude, handed down generation to generation. Why let stories of lives vanished disappear, their meaning mean nothing, never passed to our children?
An extract from this: link to wp.me
Lochside
Hope you don’t think I was having a pop at you.
Brexit. Looks like the Tories are still arguing about themselves about responsibilities and are a long way from any plans about what they want to achieve!
Keep hear talk of Article 50 being delayed for years.
link to archive.is
The MoD shouldn’t actually OWN LAND, should they?
The UK parliament should have the right to suspend budgets using funds from asset stripping.
The Scottish Government could deny planning by restricting change of use (from public usage) offering leases only.
If they’d like to donate land management proceeds to community trusts, now that might work.
We could nationalise grouse shooting, push the posh estates out of the market, devalue the whole shebang.. Then sneak back and plant forests build hydro schemes, and agricultural projects.
“We could nationalise grouse shooting”
Oi!
@Scot Finlayson says: 15 August, 2016 at 1:50 pm:
“Eamonn O’Neill works for The BBC Establishment,
probably sees himself as moral … “.
Believe me he is not alone. Brian Taylor, BBC Scotland’s political editor, has given a series of lectures at the BBC College of Journalism.
Things may have changed now but The BBC College of Journalism used to be freely available on YouTube. A viewing of Big Brian’s series of lectures were eye openers and explain BBC Scotland, (so called), journalist’s anti-SNP & anti-independence stance.
Here is a wee link – it is somewhat misleading as it says the Lectures were secretly filmed. They may well have been but the truth was that the BBC College of Journalism’s entire output of lectures were all freely available in the public domain on YouTube and may well still be.
link to scottishtimes.com
I attempted to search for the links I once had to these lectures but found it extremely difficult. For starters there seems to be some confusion with the BBC College of Journalism and a BBC Academy of Journalism. I did find this link, though:-
link to newsnet.scot
Grousey, where we were are born is an accident of birth, yes you can say such and such a place has history, and you and to an vastly lesser extent I have shaped the life of others, but accidents of birth are one just that.
Scotland is beautiful, scenic and has history. I was just born here, that gives me rights of citizenship, a new Scot had the same rights. And the ability to make this land more to his idea of perfection.
I am not disrespectful of the past,but it’s the future that is important, the past is another country we can’t change, however the future is all of ours to shape as our will.
Trees, rocks and mountains are just inanimate objects, and were here long before you or I, and will be here long after we have left. But remember us they will not.
A country , this planet, is ours to shape to our will, despite despotic rulers and Kings and queens who claim the inherited right to rule, we can remove them and return them to the dust they sprung from. And build, yes, build even that Jerusalem our neighbors long for.
Blood and soil? Devine right of birth? That is for the birds, blood sweat and tears, that’s our lot, born naked and helpless into this world, live our allotted years and mercifully a good ending.
We hope for immortality, but in the end no rock or mountain stream will be singing our names.
CameronB Brodie…. not at all Brother. I was agreeing with you and only expanding my own take on your comment.
I think I’m going to do a David Torrance and pack in the online side of life.
I think the way we are going about Independence is insipid and weak, but I also recognise that’s a view the mast majority of you don’t share and very much don’t like to hear. That’s ok. More power to you.
But I cannot see past the cynical manupulation of our 2014 referendum, the lies, the distortion of reality, and the shameless misrepresentation of the really important issues. Many of you are saying we’ll be ready this time and have the answers to currency etc… but you just don’t see. Those issues were just diversions. You could remove every issue from the narrative and replace it with another and the result would have been the same. It seems to me here in Scotland we will tolerate the gross and cynical debasement of our democratic process, grumble a little, but respect the conclusion because hey-ho! we respect democracy. Yeah, well the Union we’re trying to leave does not.
My head is putting me outside the main camp; somewhere far off to the North West above the snow line, a good distance beyond Radicle but a long, long, long way short of militant.
See I don’t care if the BBC calls Andy Murray English. I don’t care if team GB hasn’t got a unicorn on its logo. Or the whole other endless list of petty grievances. Every country in the world uses a currency, but here in Scotland we take our eye off the ball to fret about keeping or losing the pound sterling? Get a grip. It wouldn’t have mattered.
There is one issue to Independence. Sovereignty.
If you have sovereignty, you can choose whichever currency you want.
If you have sovereignty, you can shut down the BBC propaganda.
If you have sovereignty, you can spend what you earn, or save it.
If you have sovereignty, only your laws and international laws have jurisdiction inside your borders.
If you have sovereignty, you determine your distribution of wealth.
If you have sovereignty, you decide whether to compromise or stand firm.
If you have sovereignty, you will address other states as equals, and they will address you the same way.
If you have sovereignty, you can choose democracy.
If you have sovereignty, your decision is final.
Before you ask me to respect a democratic result, like another Indy referendum, you will first have to show a democratic process that I can also respect, and in the UK with the BBC that is going to be quite a tall order.
For the third and last time I ask the question; From where will an Independendent Scotland draw its sovereign authority?
If it reverts to the popular civic sovereignty enshrined by the Declaration of Arbroath, then we must reconcile how “in perpetuity” was put on hold for 300 years by the fudged sovereignty of Westminster. The short version being Scotland has been independent throughout, but for 300 years of convenience just didn’t realise or has been living in denial. Bottom line is we already are independent, and properly defined as such by law. Cue the unionist revolt and Westminster led regime change.
On the other hand, If Scotland’s sovereignty has to be wrestled free from Westminster, is it now the same sovereignty which now comes from God through the Divine Right of Kings? If so, then be clear we have rejected England but kept their notion of a top down sovereignty which leaves all of us as subjects not citizens. But subjects of what?
The other option is some new fangled democratic sovereignty, with Europe being the closest example of that I can think of. That’s ok for some legislation where there is democratic agreement, but even the most liberal democracy requires sovereignty so it can arbitrate when there is no common democratic will or agreement. Sovereignty allows us to be the same by choice, but still different if we cannot agree.
In conclusion, it seems to me we have forsaken Scottish Sovereignty for Westminster’s fudged sovereignty, and we are now seeking to secure Scotland’s independence from a United Kingdom which will survive beyond the separation of its component Kingdoms, and the process we are using to overthrow the rule of Westminster is a devolved legislature which draws all its power from Westminster. That actually strikes me as a reasonable cause for Westminster to hamper international recognition of an emergent Scotland onto the world scene; an uppity grand committee exceeding its authority. Think about it.
To the Great Fudge add more fudge?
This is a dog’s breakfast.
I am sorry, but this is but a slave asking freedom from his legally recognised master. It is not the rejection of slavery in a world which assumes that all men are born equal.
Our respect for democratic procedure has all but crippled the most powerful gun in our armoury; the legal recognition of Scotland’s popular sovereignty.
You might note, I haven’t even mentioned Brexit, the crisis du jour we apparently need to kick start the wrong revolution.
@Inkall says: 15 August, 2016 at 3:02 pm:
“Good to see that my initial thought has already been mentioned early on about the fact Russia Today have had an office in London for years.”
As I pointed out already, “Sputnik”, “Russia Today”, and, “Radio Moscow”, are all one and the same broadcaster.
Radio Moscow changed its title when the USSR came to an end but the broadcast continued as, “Russia Today”, now RT is undergoing a new title change to, “Sputnik”.
Lochside
An enlightened, eloquent and moving expansion, IMHO. 😉
We hope for immortality, but in the end no rock or mountain stream will be singing our names.
Everyone needs a homeland, why not the Scots?
Just caught some of Dame Margaret Eve Hodge, Lady Hodge DBE MP is a British Labour politician, who has served as Member of Parliament for Barking, BBC r4 fluffing red tory style. She explains that Gordon Brown always wanted to be PM but when he got it, he didn’t know what to do with it and she voted for Iraq invasion because she trusted Bomber Bliar, who she thought must have had some secret info on Sadam and that’s why he was so up for war, war, war and on it goes.
Creepiest thing about the red tory party today? they keep saying the ended poverty with tax credits. And BBC liggers don’t ask them what’s actually happened teamGB wise, as Oxfam show.
Labour, crackpots on history’s down escalator but Scotland’s still got them, furious, entitled, trying to drag us all down with them.
Angus Robertson posted on Twitter.
Impeccable MOD source confirms talks with Aberdeen CC over sale of Kinloss.
Andrew McLean
Bravo! Well, I didn’t see why you should be left out. 🙂
Not read your yet Breeks.
Breeks,
What is sovereignty?
In my opinion it’s a bobble, a trinket, a construction of man.
I like your definition derived from the declaration of Arbroath, but would limit it to as long as one remains alive, that I feel gets closer to the truth.
In any case it’s history, and if I can take a parallel from our shared history on this summers day, we are in troubled waters, the storm clouds are gathering, events are in motion that we don’t want, but stop them we can’t. So enjoy the sunshine, but be ready for the winter, it’s closer than you think.
O/t.
Apparently the D. Mirror thinks it inappropriate to show a bald head on its front page incase someone is offended while taking their breakfast.
Has to be the year’s lamest excuse for cropping out a pic showing the gold medalists women’s cyclists.
The very same rag that made a feature of bumsntits for years trying to upstage that other rag, The Sun.
Fb is alive with indignation and I can see a protest outside Trinity Mirror (or whatever they call themselves these days). Many heads being shaved as I type!
Mirror/Redcoat’s demise cannot come quick enough!
@Brian Doonthetoon says: 15 August, 2016 at 9:26 pm:
“O/T…
I know Nana has received her gold Wings badge but I believe Robert Peffers and Pete the Camera were also nominated during this year’s fundraiser. Have all the gold badges been despatched? Pete hasn’t mentioned receipt…”
Oh! Now there’s a thing, Brian.
I’m in the toils just now with electrical rewiring and home improvements. My boiler broke down, here was an electrical wiring fault and my home network also went crazy. I thus had great trouble just getting back on-line.
Last week i had a friend in to do the last bit of electrical rewiring that my disability prevented me from doing myself.
He came up from under the floorboards with, an out of date, card from the Postie that said there was a package they couldn’t deliver as it did not have the correct postage stamp. The card must have dropped through the crack left in the floorboards after I had them up to investigate the faulty ring mains circuit.
I was not expecting a delivery from anyone and have not yet got round to checking with the Post Office. I hope there is no connection between the two events for I’ve no idea of how long the PO hang onto such packages.
I’m up to my ears in things just now as I cannot hear phone conversations, so as much of my communications gear is not yet connected and thus simple things others take for granted have me going out to deal with them personally. Things take forever.
The only good news is that I am close to getting the systems up and running again but I’ve been without hot running water and home heating since April when there was snow outside. Even now the electrics are rewired I still need a new boiler installation underway but that too is a problem as I cannot just phone round for estimates and on-line is a bit hit or miss as yet too.
It has been a very frustrating experiance.
Heady
You miss my point, yes we the living deserve to live in our land, never forgetting it’s just an accident of birth, homeland is just a home, make of it what you can, after all you can’t take it with you!
Those who come after will only redecorate it to their taste.
I am glad to be born Scottish, but know if I was born in any other country I would be just as proud their too.
This man made construct we call Scotland is ours to shape, to feel home in, to try and make it better than we found it, not just for Scots that will come after us, but also to other countries who may see ideas, or ideals that would encourage them to make their homelands better.
If you read the American declaration of independence, that stream of hope runs through it.
This doesn’t make an American Dream better than a Scots wish for his or vice versa, but makes the lot of mankind, the shared currency of man the better for its inception.
Scots at birth, international on outlook.
Breeks, I’m agreeable with much of your clear point but the ‘we’ you speak of/as is forever changing.
Democracy is used to somewhat define the political ‘we’.
Sovereignty has become the right of ‘all the people’ to make that relevant.
If s state is rotten to the core (or even just unconstitutional) the will of those NOT CORRUPTED takes a sovereign right to reconstitute the mechanisms of power.
Hang about for the restoration, it has started, parallel to independence.
An inner struggle (sometimes as quick as flash) has already taken place for many new independence supporters.
Those with no identity cannot be sovereign.
Breeks
Can’t stand the smell of fudge myself.
As Heidegger was possibly unable to get his dialect around dualism due to his reliance on western metaphysical tools*, it is not possible for a system to produce positive results if the environment the system operates within will no allow for such to happen.
* The time-space-Being thing wasn’t thunk up until folk had had time to think about what the hell Heidegger was saying. Human rights hadn’t been invented either, or at least were not yet codified into international law.
Breeks…don’t despair. I share a lot of your misgivings about the way things are going. I accept that NS and the SG have to ca’ canny with the Brexit thing, but like you, I despair of the complete inaction regarding ‘our’ media. G.A. Ponsonby wrote the book on how the BBC won the Referendum and Prof. John Robertson provide the academic evidence to back it up. However, it appears to me, as an S.N.P. member that there is an element within the leadership which is loathe to engage with the greater YES community and to move against the BBC’s stranglehold on dissemination of the truth.
I’m not talking about ‘RISE’ or the Greens, but about ‘Wings’ and the other groups that have sustained many of us on here in the struggle. The recent Council by-election in Irvine where the Unionist vote coalesced is not new. In Dumbarton at the Scottish Parly election Jackie Baillie survived because 3000 tories in Helensburgh switched their vote to Slab. This is directly because of Trident and the predominance of English and ex-service personnel in that town. However, we know that it has and will continue to be a facet of our politics. The reduction of the Scottish question to a binary one has finally arrived and all political contests in this country are now Independence versus Unionism whether electoral or referenda.
The sovereignty issue is actually straight forward. Yes the Declaration of Arbroath established sovereignty of the Scots people. But in the same way that Magna Carta is a marker for English law, they are both superceded by subsequent political events. When Cromwell assumed dictatorship of the UK state he crushed the Scottish Government army at Dunbar and wiped out the town guards in Edinburgh and Aberdeen. Between then until the Darien Scheme, the branch economy in Scotland limped on hobbled by English imperialism. Its dying ember was the Darien scheme and the subsequent bankrupcy of the Scottish aristocracy.
From the 1707 Union onwards our sovereignty supposedly shared at Westminster was subsumed and ultimately obliterated . The King Billy coup and the Act of succession outlawed Scotland’s last royal dynasty, the Stuarts, designated ‘Pretenders’. Since then a lineage of German interlopers have been foisted on us as ‘our’ monarchy.
The Scottish Parliament is devolved, meaning the power has been passed down on ‘loan’. It can be taken back. The Supreme Court has the power to over rule Scots law, illegally, but De facto is following in the footsteps of Scottish law and institutions being downgraded, over ruled and diminished. Often with the collaboration of its own administrators. So the Act of Union has been broken and is effectively at an end. Brexit if imposed on Scotland is the ultimate and complete denial of the Act of Union.
However, the only way this can be challenged is by a full blown plebiscite called by the Devolved parliament requesting the majority of our people to back dissolution of the Union. If sufficient numbers can be persuaded then the EU and others will be forced to recognise the legitimacy of that vote. The 1707 Union will be recognised as dissolved. This will take an effort of political will that I hope Nicola Sturgeon and her party will be prepared to take and is absolutely the last gasp for our country. Our young and skilled are still emigrating,with potentially more ‘NO’ voters still outnumbering and replacing them from RUK and time is against us. We need dissenting voices on here, not a complacent consensus, other than the main objective of Independence.
However History beckons:Scotland Free or a Desert? ..
Lochside says:
16 August, 2016 at 8:35 am
‘Onwards’…you’re entitled to feel your shared sense of ‘Britishness’. However, the scenario you’ve described of sitting in a bar in Rio and feeling more comfortable with English speakers is not one I share..
————–
Lochside, I wouldn’t necessarily be more comfortable. It would depend on the individuals. But there is no denying I would have probably more in common with the English and Welshmen in many ways.
I can’t stand the arrogant type of Britishness/Englishness that still thinks they rule the world. But it isn’t all like that. There are down to earth Geordies and scousers and those who like yourself can’t be doing with the Queen. I will watch BBC Autumnwatch and Jools Holland and read Viz magazine on the train, and moan about the weather… it’s not all bad if you can separate it from the political setup.
I would still be supporting Brazil if they were playing England at football though 🙂
But I suppose that rivalry could be seen as part of ‘Britishness’ too ?
The main point is that people who have a part-British identity need to feel they can safely keep that in an independent Scotland without feeling shunned or ridiculed. All they would be losing is Westminster rule.
It’s the political setup I hate. The unequal union. But as soon as you go down the road of shunning everything British, you get tarred with the brush of anti-Englishness and that is a vote loser.
There are good things about Britain and a lot of bad things.
But why should the pro UK union side get to claim it all ??
Independence for Scotland should be pushed as promoting a *better* Britain.
Even if you don’t feel the slightest bit British, then maybe you can see that tactically that is the only way to go – to be as inclusive as possible..
@Lochside says: 15 August, 2016 at 11:21 pm:
“I cannot believe any self respecting believer in Scotland’s freedom wants to hang on to a toxic self description of ‘British’.”
That lack of belief may be because you are wrong and brainwashed by the, UNITED KINGDOM Establishment.
Personally, and I’m not alone, I can understand why people, like you, cannot understand why people who are factually British wish to remain so. The fact is you need not help the Establishment out by your obviously mistaken attitude.
The fact is that, “The United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland”, is factually NOT Britain.
It is indeed, “British”, but no more so, and no less so, British than are the other residents of the entire British group of Islands.
That is the Non-UK Republic of Ireland, The Non-UK Bailiwick of Jersey, non-UK Bailiwick of Guernsey and the non-UK Isle of Man. If you are brain washed enough to think that Britain, Great Britain & The United Kingdom are all mutually interchangeable terms then one wonders how much more of the Establishment’s propaganda you have mindlessly absorbed.
By the way your idiotic claim of a, “… toxic self description of ‘British’, only highlights your total misunderstanding of what the term, “British”, actually is and it sure as hell does not mean either English or United Kingdom.
Why, if you recognise the term is, “a toxic self description of ‘British’”, does it not dawn upon you that the Unionist, “toxic self description of ‘British’”, is the error do you then castigate those who correctly use the term British as lacking self-respect? It is those who misuse the term British as meaning only the UK or England who are wrong.
I’m Scottish, British and a European, and no English or Unionist propagandist is going to get away with attempting to take that away from me and that includes YOU.
The thing to bear in mind is that shattering their, “British/English”, belief will be the shattering, (for them), result of the Kingdom of Scotland ending the United Kingdom.
Their English Nationalist Establishment World will end and they will forever feel the bitterness of shame.
Valerie says:
16 August, 2016 at 10:14 am
Angus Robertson posted on Twitter.
Impeccable MOD source confirms talks with Aberdeen CC over sale of Kinloss.
————
Wouldn’t surprise me at all.
That is prime seaside land for housing.
Wouldn’t surprise me at all.
That is prime seaside land for housing.
A special place, apparently link to findhorn.org
It is very upper middle class Englishy.
Lochside: “What is sovereignty? It’s a bobble, a trinket, a construction of man.”
Don’t get carried away with self-defeating notions.
Democracy is enshrined in the unassailable tenets of democracy. It belongs to the people. The rest is how it’s categorised in civil rights, and those we elect to represents us.
Democracy has lots of different dimensions.
I mean by that, basically the question is to what extent do the people have a meaningful way of developing and articulating their own ideas, and putting them forward in the political arena, and controlling decisions.
If democracy isn’t the ‘sovereignty of the people’ it isn’t democracy.
However, because we have been so consistently cheated, betrayed, (yes, betrayed by a politically venal elite) and general disenfranchised by our elected representatives, (corrupted by big business) we have lost faith in democracy as practised in Britain.
Independence has put the heart back into Scotland’s people.
The brains and excellence required to fulfil our potential, however, are still being drained away.
We’re educating people to further the economies of other nations with nothing being claimed in return. Odd.
@Lochside says: 6 August, 2016 at 8:35 am:
” … ‘Onwards’…you’re entitled to feel your shared sense of ‘Britishness’. However, the scenario you’ve described of sitting in a bar in Rio and feeling more comfortable with English speakers is not one I share.”
That is very, very obvious, Lochside.
However, you, in common with the Unionists, are in error. This is because you, and the unionists, share the very same erroneous belief. You both wrongly conflate the term, “British”, with, “The United Kingdom”, or even just England. This is plainly wrong as the UK, or England do not comprise Britain. They are, however, like the rest of us in Britain, British.
One wonders just how many more of their wrong beliefs you actually share with them.
The fact is that Britain is much more than just either England or the united Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland and both you and the English/Unionist/nationalist thus share beliefs but those, like me, do not share that belief and thus we, not you or the Unionists, are in the right.
I ask you again, Lochside, what are your real motives to so agree with the Unionists erroneous propaganda?
Grousey,
I suppose I should not belittle sovereignty, I just think the world has, well Scotland at least from raising arms in defending our sovereignty as a construct alone.
But you’re last post reminds me of something I read, you can’t have true democracy when you have 60 million, but 5 million can work? I maybe misremembered that, but you get my point?
Oh and Grousey it was me with the bobbles, lock side won’t like being mistaken for me, though my recommendation for cereal at breakfast stands. 🙂
Hi Breeks,
you’re not alone in your thinking and I personally have found agreement in your comments as far back as the old Newsnet Scotland before the tumbleweed arrived when they moderated the life out of it.
I have commented here and on various Indy sites about the need to discard Westminster’s yardstick and use our own. Upsetting Westminster and creating political friction at governmental level is all to the good as far as I can see.
Although we share common ground on many things, ( we share 50%DNA with a banana, more if you’re David Torrance ) it’s the differences that are important here.
Westminster believes we shouldn’t have another Indyref and I believe we should have one every time we vote an SNP government in.
Don’t go anywhere Breeks, you’re not alone and you’re not wrong.
Andrew McLean: “I should not belittle sovereignty, I just think the world has, well Scotland at least from raising arms in defending our sovereignty as a construct alone.”
We are defending accountability – even MSM journalists have discovered that!
Democracy means decisions ultimately reside with the people. For over thirty years that authority has been whittled away by elected governments. It suits England to praise Brexit as ‘democracy at work’ because it works only for big business and banks now freed of constraint.
Brexit suits Westminster’s prevailing doctrine because Tory, Labour, and Ukip are all business parties.
Here’s an example.
The IMF (and World Bank) is altering the world to fit its preconceived ideas of how to make vast profits and how to quell rebellion in populations (For recent example see Greece.) To understand how it is doing that you have to study what it is doing; you have to be a specialist in IMF affairs.
We, the people, hardly have time to notice if out local supermarket prices are creeping up let alone check IMF decisions each month. Most barely know of the IMF’s existence.
The IMF makes global impacting decisions without reference to existing governments.
As defined by democracy that in itself is illegitimate.
Ergo, we are fighting for controls to be placed back into people’s hands. We’ve had enough of contempt from those we elect.
We’re discovering it is easier to do that in small nation states than in large monumental nations keener to represent global corporate power.
@Andrew McLean says: 16 August, 2016 at 9:53 am:
” … Scotland is beautiful, scenic and has history. I was just born here, that gives me rights of citizenship, a new Scot had the same rights. And the ability to make this land more to his idea of perfection.”
Whoa! There! Andrew.
There is much truth in what you say but …
The fact is that it has always been a double edged sword.
Yes Scotland is beautiful but was it any less beautiful than before the historic decision by the then Kingdom of England government that had decided it had sovereignty over Scotland and set about changing it to suit themselves?
They proscribed all things Scottish and cleared, not just the Highlands but all Scotland to suit themselves.
There is hardly an inch of Scotland that is not man made. The Scottish natural landscape was The Great Caledonian Forest. Where is it now? The Highlands pre-1745 were well populated, where are the people now?
The Scots from the central belt left Scotland by the boatload to populate the British Empire. Some left by force but others from Westminster imposed poverty. Where are they now?
To my mind it is time to reverse the trends instigated by, “The Establishment”. In other words time for Scots to reclaim their heritage and, it is obvious, those who desire to do so include very many of, shall we call them, New Scots?
Robert Peffers
You have your fans, I’m afraid I find you confusing more often than not. Sorry.
Andrew McLean: It was me with the bobbles
Ah, the limitations of quoting on websites, and me multi-tasking! Apologies for the persona confusion.
A little O/T just to cheer you all up.
Our Scottish Olympians are doing our wee nation proud even although their success is subsumed by the british establishment. Here is how they are doing:
Andy Murray Medal: gold
Callum Skinner Medals: gold medal silver medal
Duncan Scott Medal: 2 x silver medal
Katie Archibald Medal: gold medal
Polly Swann Medal: silver medal
Karen Bennett Medal: silver medal
Heather Stanning Medal: gold medal
Mark Bennett Medal: silver medal
Mark Robertson Medal: silver medal
David Florence Medal: silver medal
Katherine Grainger Medal: silver medal
Sally Conway Medal: bronze medal
Daniel Wallace Medal: silver medal
Stephen Milne Medal: silver medal
Total 4 gold, 11 silver, 1 bronze
This would put an independent Scotland at number 13 on the medal table. Nae bad fur a wee country of 5million folk, eh?
Breeks
I sense and understand your frustration. Don’t think you alone are labouring under it.
I do find it interesting that you dismiss the team GB coat of arms as a petty grievance when surely it serves to illustrate the political dimension perfectly- the lie that Scottish sovereignty has been absorbed by English parliamentary sovereignty.
Nobody gives a fuck about t-shirts or commentators talking shite. What they care about is the same thing as you albeit without recourse to the underlying concepts and ideas of sovereignty these petty grievances are actually expressions of exactly the same issue.
From the Westminster point of view it reflects their thinking- we are not viewed as an equal member of the bipartite United kingdom but simply on a population basis. And viewed from THAT point of view their position makes perfect sense.
If Scotland is merely 8.5% of the UK, of a 4 country UK then talking about the English team makes sense. But as Scotland is a 50% partner in the UK and population is irrelevant the situation , language and the rest of it is ridiculous.
I’m not a fan of the National but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad newspaper it just means it’s not my taste
I think what the complaint from Yessers boils down to is frustration that there isn’t a mouthpiece for Independence in the same way as the Unionists have the rest of the entire media, but if the National were to go down that road it would be completely ridiculed by every other Yoon Media outlet till the end of time and have no future in a post referendum win or lose
As a newspaper it has to stick to the truth and facts as much as possible because it has no other media allies to back it up if it lied in the same way as The Daily Record, or the Mail, or the Guardian, or the Express, or the Mirror, or the Telegraph or……. you know the rest
As I say, not my taste but not a bad newspaper
Never knew about Sputnik until the Brits complained about it, thanks Brit media, I now have a channel where I can get international news and some truth about what is happening in the world
@ Valerie
Hi Valerie, It is Moray Council, not Aberdeen City Council who were apparently holding talks with the MOD over Kinloss.
For general info,
Kinloss is in Moray.
Moray Council is run mainly by “Independent” Councillors (read Unionist), with a smattering of full blown Tory Councillors (including a Tory List MSP – Douglas Ross) and a Brit Nat labour Councillor. They blocked a takeover bid by SNP Councillors by ganging up together (Tories together eh?).
Kinloss was turned into a barracks and is occupied by 39 Regiment, Royal Engineers (RAF support), who were formerly occupying a Barracks near Cambridge until 2012, when RAF Kinloss closed after Nimrod Maritime Patrol Aircraft were scrapped.
RAF Losiemouth is very close and houses Tornado and Typhoon fighter aircraft and is also planned (apparently) to house the new P8 Poseidon Maritime Patrol Aircraft when they are purchased from USA. Kinloss was apparently to be maintained as an emergency airfield for Lossiemouth (should something happen to the runway there).
I’m not sure what footprint the planned Scots MOD had in the White paper, but there were outline plans for military HQ and conventional Navy based at Faslane (post Trident). As for Scots Army and Air Force, I’m not sure.
Angus Robertson is taking flak from Unionists, who are quite rightly pointing out that UK MOD would withdraw from Lossie and Kinloss, as well as Fort George (currently an Army Barracks near Inverness – also under threat in the current defence review)and all other military bases in Scotland in an Independent Scotland.
Angus is however, simply trying to protect local commerce and jobs (in line with his role as the local MP) in the current political set up within the UK.
The barracks would (nominally) hold 500 soldiers (with married quarters for accompanied troops and their families). Most are single soldiers who head off home to England of a weekend, where their money would be spent. Their are local contractors who carry out work on the site, but from my frequent drives past, it never seems that busy – certainly not as busy as it was as an RAF base and nowhere near as busy as Lossiemouth is.
As I say, just for reference if the story grows.
Tam don’t you mean 25% ? 🙂
@scotspine, apologies, I’m sure I did misread Angus’ tweet in my haste.
Just thought it interesting, and would agree Angus will try and maintain the Kinloss presence, even under UK.
Interesting what Onwards says, prime housing land? Speculators getting cheap monies, and no doubt applying pressure to Moray? They will be tempted by a large capital receipt to make pre council election promises of spending money.
I always read the discussions on sovereignty, because it’s not something I’ve ever given a lot of thought to, I suppose I’m in a mindset constrained by laws etc., as that’s part of my background.
However, just to comment on something that I think is really important, and harks back to Craig Murray’s view. You become independent by getting other countries to recognise you.
Last week, Nicola was in Germany again, and separately she had a Q & A session with EU nationals on any concerns. These are really important moves. Visiting these EU countries, and showing concern for their citizens at the highest level, demonstrating respect. Of course, the yoons are raging at her.
Today and yesterday, Alyn Smith MEP is in Dublin, and reporting from there etc. Alyn is also saying we have to get out into the world, and sell ourselves.
As you know, Alyn is a Depute candidate, no way is he doing this without FM blessing.
Things are being done, not being reported, of course.
I’m frustrated too, but things are dragging at the moment due to UK inaction on Brexit.
One consequence of the slowness on Brexit, is EU countries becoming less than sympathetic to the UK, verging on hostile, so that works in our favour.
Robert Peffers
You might have guessed I’m off the meds. again. More often than not is an exaggeration, sorry. It’s just I find your detail can sometimes obscure the point you are making and worse, the truth that is often contained therein.
That’s not the way we’ll get over the line, I’m sure you’ll agree.
Robert Peffers
I don’t think we can blame the Union of 1707 and it’s aftermath for the disappearance of the Great Caledonian Forest. We Scots had pretty well managed that all on our own by 1600 or so. The few sites in existence today are pretty much the same sites that were left by the 1600s.
When James IV built up the Scottish Navy in the 16th century much of the wood was imported particularly the wood for the Great Michael.
The original Stirling heads in Stirling Castle were carved from Polish oak.
Many Barony courts in the 16th and 17th century prohibited the removal of roof timbers in houses when people moved because timber was in short supply.
@ Robert Peffers re your Gold badge contact Lindsay Bruce (ayeMail.com) he will let you know if its been dispached otherwise its in Nth Ireland if thats where they still send uncollected or lost post.
@ Cameron Brodie GET back on the fekin medication,your links are informative an its all hands on deck with the information exchange & we need everyone to be on the ball, fit n healthy.
Hugs Mr
OT. NHS England Waiting Times.
“NHS problems only going to get worse, says Patients Association.
Tens of thousands of people have to wait more than 18 weeks for routine surgery, report finds, and situation is deteriorating.”
It’s NHS England they are speaking about…
Guardian Archived: link to archive.is
@Andrew McLean says: 16 August, 2016 at 10:23 am:
” … What is sovereignty? …
In any case it’s history … “
Indeed it is history, Andrew but it is also the main tenet of the independent Scottish legal system and thus it is very much bang up to the minute as much of history always is.
It is not sovereignty, per se, that matters. It is the day-to-day perception of the Scot in the street of their factually legal sovereignty that will bring about the change we independence supporters all seek.
No matter what the SG, SNP or the broader independence movement thinks our Scottish sovereignty cannot be returned to us from a Westminster Establishment who have assumed, since long before the two crowns settling upon one monarchs head in 1603 and the subsequent Treaty of Union in 1706/7, that they, the Kingdom of England, held sovereignty over Scotland and thus over we Scots.
Only by the majority of the legally Sovereign people of Scotland demanding they alone are sovereign in Scotland will that Scottish people’s sovereignty again become a fact.
In the event no one, including the Scots themselves, can make a legal case to prevent it being a fact.
Every legal system on Earth supports legal sovereignty. This is obvious so as they would not be themselves sovereign if they did not. The rest of the World is either illegal dictatorships or still clings to the doctrine of Divine Right.
Thus, if the Scots vote for independence ,there is no legal government, nor any legal international organisation, that can deny the Scottish people’s right to regain their sovereignty without showing themselves to be utter hypocrites.
I don’t think we can blame the Union of 1707 and it’s aftermath for the disappearance of the Great Caledonian Forest. We Scots had pretty well managed that all on our own by 1600 or so. The few sites in existence today are pretty much the same sites that were left by the 1600s.
There’s nothing preventing the return of Scotland’s natural wild forests, other than landowners trying to make money from blood sports and plantation forestry.
Is Scotland’s wilderness worth more what landowners can make from it, as the Caledonian forest?
Is there sustainable and more importantly more money in tourism and hiking, like how Austria or Norway do for example?
Are there broader environmental and ecological benefits in allowing the return of native Scottish flora and fauna? There was once a rain forest right up Scotland’s west coast, much like the great pine forests still clinging on in the American Pacific coast. Rewind even 500 years and the current wasteland’s of Scotland’s Highlands today, would have teamed with life.
Pro blood sports and factory forestry is very toryboy cunning though, all is well and healthy in their wild Scotland region, explain the greatest liars of our time,
link to bbc.co.uk
All narrated by a great Scots cringer too. Funny that.
X Sticks@12.41,
This just shows we are in fact genetically programmed to win medals at the Olympics as an Independent Nation. The Yoons will soon think of something to counter this in no time, I’m sure.
What a miserable existence it must be to be a Yoon! Labour, Liberal, Tory, Orangeman, Unionist Settler from wherever, Businessmen, Newspaper Owners etc.
I wonder how they will appear in future history books? WTF is Archie McPherson and company doing peddling obvious lies? I forgot, Labour/Rangers/OO supporter. Scum.
ronnie anderson
I’m getting there but the situation is complicated by other obligations. Hugs back. 😉
Robert Peffers: You’re the one that’s brainwashed old boy. Brainwashed by your own half baked ideas about ‘Britain and Sovereignty’.
I’ve told you already on a previous thread to quit talking directly to me with your insulting and stupid insinuations. It’s tha last time I will respond to you.
See I disagree with some of those comments. Sovereignty isn’t abstract. It is real. Black and white. It is definitive. Its like energy. You cannot create it, you cannot destroy it, you can only change the state it is in. And there’s the rub; because Scot’s law decreed that our popular, civic sovereignty was ours, and ours in perpetuity. We can never change it and it can never be removed from us. For better or worse, we’re stuck with it.
Ok, so it is centuries old legislation, (so too is the Act of Union), but it isn’t defunked legislation because the UK’s Supreme Court acknowledged that it had no jurisdiction to overule the will of the Scottish Parliament as the voice of the sovereign people of Scotland. In perpetuity meant in perpetuity.
Without respect for an absolute condition, sovereignty, we have nothing except anarchy and the law of the jungle.
For example, say you inherited a gold pocket watch. You didn’t buy it. It came into your possession by fate. But you were careless one day. You left it in the pub. You rushed back to get it, just in time to see somebody picking up your watch. Hey! That’s my watch. But the bloke who picked it up says no it isn’t. It’s his watch. He may not have bought it, but it came into his possession by fate. Just as it came to you. Who’s pocket watch is it? It is yours of course, but only because legitimate ownership is a greater principle than mere possession.
So it is with sovereignty between nations. Sovereignty is the watershed between what is legitimate and what is not. Sovereignty determines who has power and who does not.
Democracy is not a substitute for sovereignty. Democracy might be the lightning rod, but sovereignty is the lightning.
So many years into this on going constitutional debate about Scotland, shouldn’t we be more than a little concerned that so many of us have conflicting opinions and no definitive understanding about what Scottish Independence actually means?
Just sayin’…..
Breeks: “Sovereignty isn’t abstract. It is real. Black and white. It is definitive. Its like energy…
…and it’s already been defined. Several times.
It doesn’t need boiled, blended with puerile analogy and syrup, and then dunked in glutinous repetition.
Thanks.
Then you’ll can answer the question then.
Our is that too far beneath a man of your supreme intellect?
Breeks: “Then you’ll can answer the question then.”
The trick is not only to read the post you publish, over and over again, but others too. The answer was published at 12.26pm.
Nevermind, I’ve just read your 11:52 comment – “Democracy is enshrined in the unassailable tenets of democracy”.
Err, …ok. If err, … if you say so.
But let me just point out, if you think democracy is unassailable, you obviously don’t understand how propaganda and media manipulation actually works.
And democracy without sovereignty is an opinion poll.
Breeks:“You obviously don’t understand how propaganda and media manipulation actually works.”
The problem you have is, half-the-time you don’t know what you’re talking about, but insist on making your mental wanderings public, imposing your notions on passers by, yet spurn help when given directions.
Wee whisper in your ear… It isn’t me who has the problem.
Breeks: It isn’t me who has the problem.
It never is, hence the problem.