Wings Over Scotland

Good old murdo, getting the door slammed in his face again…

Excellent!

Chris while quite brilliant as usual, however I think that this is far too sophisticated for even the average right winger???

Chris, BRILLIANT.
Nice one.

Just to refresh the memories of Wingers :-

In the ancient Roman, pre-Christian religion Janus is/was the god of beginnings, gates, transitions, time, duality, doorways, passages, and endings. He is shown with two faces, because he always looks both ways – both to the future and to the past.

Chris is indeed the expert at hitting nails on the head whine Murdo is the expert of – well nothing really.

Whenever Murdo hears the word “culture” he reaches for his Daily Mail.

Oh and is NOT nearly Christmas, we are in full on Birthday season. I’ve just had mine, next is a wee boy of our fond acquaintance then my wife followed by the wee boy’s mother.

Traditionally in our house Xmas is removed on Jan 30. Hogmanay doesn’t start until the evening, because that is our eldest’s birthday.

Xmas is a distracting side show in all this birthday stuff.

Muscleguy says:

If only we had voted Yes back in 2014 . . .

Indeed {sighing deeply}

But hey, IndyRef2 is on the horizon and we can get it right this time!

Our new state will need to set up the currently missing apparatus of statehood. Umpteen ministries covering the the reserved powers which will transfer to Scotland, IMO we need to de-centralise from the word go and places like Dundee, Ayrshire, Fort William, and Moray should get new government ministries. With that comes jobs, communication, services , and of course wider cultural investment.

Brexit still hasn’t happened. Wait until it does. A culture bid is nothing to what is in store. Just the start.

Unless the Tories do their usual. Less rights and decision making for more money. What a mess. It is just horrendous, Every day more problems created. ‘Stong and stable’? Slight exaggeration!

Murdo Fraser!! How can folk vote for that?

Is that Hugh Janus?

An overview of contemporary high culture in the context of the continent of Europe might struggle to find anything worthwhile ‘to rate’. What Hitler’s evil gang didn’t destroy in Europe anglo-american Sky ‘entertainment’, google, twitter, facebook, snapchat and instagram and other narcissistic ephemera are drowning in a mentally stultifying sea of triviality. Great culture needs more than a couple of seconds of attention. It needs intellectual challenge and strife not safety-first, political correctness. The insipid, comfort seeking mindset of latter-day Europe might find the reproduction of the cuckoo clock an effort.

Nice rendering of the MF Chris. You really captured his glaikitness.

Some biased broadcasters. Do not seem to understand the Police/judiciary are supported to be separate from the Legislatory. Some Police authorities have been corrupt for years. Labour – unionist control. Historical, Fifty years of Labour. Masonic.

All the political Parties supported Police Scotland formation. There were controlled by local authority, often political bias. House in Glasgow. Sectarianism supported in the central belt by Police under illegal political authority. Divide and rule. Same with the Media. Controlled by Labour/unionists. Needs flushed out.

The bad apples in the Police are being flushed out.

The barrow boys of er Barrow voted for Brexit and now we will all experience the delights of living in a nation of barrowboys.

Personally I prefer a kipper to Janus!

O/T: I see that Yahoo!News has just republished “Digital Minister: I’m fed up with SNP botching broadband so millions will go directly to Scottish councils” from yesterday’s Torygraph. (Usually the question with Yahoo journalism is whether the “news” is 3 days, 3 weeks or 3 months old.) I suppose it highlights the messy division of responsibilities in this area. You’d think that The Most Powerful Devolved Wee Parliament In The World would have complete control, wouldn’t you?
And I see that one commenter suggests that, in any event, the bottleneck has been caused by OpenReach failing to upgrade their boxes in time to allow connection.

Re above comment – Praetorian Guard NOT Pretorian.

Having recorded it earlier I have just watched our rotund Hon. Lt Col on Marr.

Typical powder puff interview allowing her to spout her usual load of Jackie Baillie.

Interestingly the interview was totally devoted to the National UK Tory Govt.and its alleged triumphs – not a mention of Scotland.

One would be mistaken in thinking that she is a major National (UK) politician and not just leader of one of the minority opposition parties at Holyrood.

Brexit, the turd that just won’t flush away ….

– Brexit will cost Britain £72 billion in lost economic activity annually, according to an analysis of government figures.

– The UK is now growing more slowly than Japan or Italy.

link to archive.is

‘Floating vote’ Scots need to open their eyes, commit to Yes, and let’s get out of this fiasco.

The Scottish Gov can re adjust Council’s funding allocation. Westminster administration, illegal interference re broadband funding can be countered in this case. Not always.

Westminster give the £2Billion broadband extension contract exclusive to BT. How was it administrated and allocated?. BT was fined on numerous occasions for bad workmanship and malpractice etc. BT was losing £2Billion on an illegal Italian subsidy. The Chairman did not resign but lost the extravagant bonus. For fees and donations? To a political Party. Political influenced board appointments.

The Scottish Gov allocated £400Million more, additional, to extend broadband cover. Now 95% Rest difficult landscape but being done.

Broadband cover will increase Independence support as more people come on board.

harry
“You missed a trick there, Chris. Back page could have said “Queen’s Eleven humped again!””

Or

‘Thirldom Thirteen’ to be renamed ‘Baker’s Dozen’. 🙂

I would have thought the rear face should have resembled a horses arse tbh.

Another janus face. Future UK PM Colonel Ruth’s really something right enough, if you’re the beeb gimp network.

Herald
12 hrs ago
Ruth Davidson in ‘hypocrisy’ row over donation from climate change sceptic
Exclusive by Paul Hutcheon
THE Scottish Tories have been accused of “shameless” hypocrisy over their support for the environment after a senior MP benefited from a donation from a climate change sceptic.

MP John Lamont’s local party received £2,000 from currency expert Neil Record, who has helped fund the controversial Global Warming Policy Foundation.Investigations Editor

Hawd on a wee minute there!

The 2023 European Capital of Culture contenders are Dundee, Nottingham, Leeds, Milton Keynes and Belfast.

I for one most certainly hope, expect even, that at least one of those cities will be in the EU or EEA in 2023! 🙂

I am wondering if someone at Tory Central Office set-up Colonel Yadaftie on the Andrew Marr Show this morning.

It was certainly the usual generally soft Marr interview of a Tory, but, on the few occasions he turned-up the heat, the Colonel was floundering somewhat.

Maybe a case of some top Tory reminding her fans in England: “Really, as you can see, she’s not that good – leave her with Jocks, but we don’t think she could handle the important English stuff.”

British nationalist bigot, Murdo Fraser, is an ignoramus. [Ignoranus?]

He thinks culture is something you see in Burton’s windae.

Meanwhile Westminster looks set to betray Fraser’s OO friends in the north of Ireland. Disnae metter where he looks the so-called united kingdom continues to self-destruct.

Another planet toryboy triumph. My works were bought over by a global FTSE corp a while back, with CEO pay at 386 times more than workers on national living wage’

What Graun toryboy’s leave out, that there are literally hundreds more CEO wannabees, just below the CEO’s, all also earning only 286 times the average living wage.

link to independent.co.uk

Only in teamGB, do we keep voting in toryboys who exist simply to enrich themselves and their class.

British nationalism should be considered as being similar to an Anglophile cult (see BLiS___d). Scottish independence would emasculate the Conservative and Unionist party’s identity, which has been constructed around the notion of England’s yoonion with a submissive Scotland. This would be a blessing to the world, IMHO.

@BLiS___d
Enough’s enough!

The Values of Europe: family, work, society, politics and religion

History – combining elements of Antiquity, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, the Renaissance and the Enlightenment – has created an array of indisputable values, to which the European Union pays lip service, but which it often regards simply as pretty packaging for the things that really matter. But aren’t these values what really matter, and are not they, on the contrary, what give direction to all the rest?” – Vaclav Havel, European Parliament, 2009

link to europeanmission.redcliffe.ac.uk

“…. discussing Labour’s position on Brexit with Dugdale. “Whatever that is,” murmured the absentee MSP for Lothian …. “

Ouch!

Has anyone a scooby what Labour’s position is?

” If Corbyn has concluded that Brexit (even a soft one) will impoverish Britain, render it globally irrelevant, narrow the life chances not just of today’s children but of their future children, weaken its commitment to human rights, permanently damage the jobs market, threaten the long term viability of the NHS, and generally launch Britain on an irreversible downward spiral… if he genuinely thinks that, he needs to say so out loud.”

Will he, won’t he?

link to archive.is
[text only, some of the article at bottom after comments]

Davidson is the patsy. Other Tories from the South will not appear. Or they will get slated for the mess. She appears being a wee big further North. Can’t be held to account? Bumps up her self importance. Most of them in Scotland unelected 3rd rates rejects. On an electoral system not mentioned. Another unionist fraud. Marr and the galloping regimental sergeant major.

From Chris Johns [Irish Times]

“I’d heard of Michael Collins before I moved to Ireland through my (Irish) grandmother who, with a father from Clonakilty, was convinced she was related to someone who played a major role in the formation of modern Ireland. Hence, I was amused to learn of a family legend that claimed we were linked to a long-dead figure from Ireland’s revolutionary past. It’s only through living here for the last three decades that I began to know anything of the reality of Collins in particular and Ireland in general. One of the many things I learned is that Irish interest in Britain is not reciprocated. I was ignorant before I came here and most of my countrymen remain so today.

It is to the discredit of the British government that they continue a baleful tradition of assuming things about foreigners that have few roots in fact. It’s partly about history. The fiction that Britain joined an economic union in 1973 and was subsequently shocked by the discovery of a political heart beating at Europe’s core is maintained in every discussion of Brexit. There is no awareness either of history or the deeply held continental view that politics comes first. It’s not a belief in politics versus economics but more that unless the politics are right prosperity is always under threat. The political primacy of ever closer union has always been visible and readily apparent to anyone who has ever read the first chapter of any European history book.

Every British negotiator in the run-up to 1973 knew about Europe’s politics. They were confronted with reality every time they met their counterparts at the negotiating table. And they were properly briefed by the British Civil Service. Many high-profile British politicians like (Tory) Prime Minister Ted Heath and (Labour, ex-communist) Chancellor Denis Healy had distinguished second World War records and experiences that meant they had views wholly aligned with Europe’s federalists. But too many of them, aware of the visceral hostility to Europe running through many members of the two main political parties, played down the political truth and spoke only of the economics.
Left also ignore facts

The British public was told, repeatedly, that Europe in practice meant only a free trade zone. All the rest, it was asserted, was continental waffling. The Tory right has campaigned against Europe for the subsequent 40-plus years, sinking ever deeper into a Empire-centric nostalgia as rooted in historical fact as my grandmother’ blood links to Michael Collins. Parts of the Labour Party have been as deluded but from a different perspective: the EU is a capitalist conspiracy against workers. This thinking leads directly to the sight, this week, of Jeremy Corbyn voting alongside David Davis for departure from the customs union. The left also ignore facts: workers rights enshrined in EU law and the awesome gift of freedom of movement (not least to where the jobs are).

An awareness of Irish history – even a nodding acquaintance – would appreciate what happened to Collins, the first and last Irish politician to sign up to a hard border. The idea that Leo Varadkar, or anybody else in this Republic, would, under any circumstances, sign up to another border displays so much ignorance, so much arrogance, so much stupidity that I am left wondering about all those stereotypes of my fellow Brits. Stereotypes that I have wearily tried to reject and counter over the last 30 years.

Brexit has poisoned British political life and it now threatens something similar for relations between the UK and Ireland. Being a Brit in Ireland has mostly been a smooth experience for this immigrant. The cultural differences between the two islands run deeper than many of us care to admit but Ireland does a terrific job of assimilation. It may be coincidence but I was, for the first time ever, the other day told to ‘f**** off back to where you come from’ (I never lost the accent). Was this a small Brexit effect?
Ignorance of history

Ignorance of history and zero appetite for the details of European law have combined to produce the current chaos. How can the British not realise that a customs union logically and legally necessitates a hard border between those inside and outside that union? It really is as simple as that. And how can they not realise what the reemergence of a Border actually means?

There is a solution involving recognition of the economic union that currently exists between North and South. There already are regulatory differences between the North and Britain. This logic could be extended to include the North in a sort-of customs union with the Republic. Imagination and goodwill are, however, needed.

We have heard so much in recent days about how the British have been taken by surprise the supposed hard line taken by the Irish. Similar expressions of astonishment and disbelief are heard whenever the EU reiterates it’s negotiating principles. Somebody should explain to UK politicians about EU law and Irish history. There is no other option open to Varadkar other than the line he is taking. Explain to Davis and May what happened after Collins signed up to a hard border. This isn’t going to end well.”

O/T
Big hoo haa about the Senior service taking over the guarding duties at Buck Hoose the next big change will be the Scots Guards urnae guarding Buck Hoose , canny hiv they rebellious Scots Regiment guarding Betty .

I like the two-headed bust, Chris, symbolic of the Tories not knowing which way to go. I’d prefer they just go!

Your weekend reading:

Scotland the English Colony: link to wp.me
Car predictions: link to wp.me

CameronB Brodie says:
26 November, 2017 at 3:01 pm
British nationalism should be considered as being similar to an Anglophile cult (see BLiS___d). Scottish independence would emasculate the Conservative and Unionist party’s identity,

Tis true CameronB. From March, Teresa kicks arse but strong and stable tory catastrofuck GE is only months away

link to archive.is

Theresa May: I will not allow Scotland and England to ‘drift apart’ after Brexit

The speech came after Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Tory leader, told the Telegraph that the Unionists would win another vote by an even larger margin but hinted that Mrs May would not allow a rerun of the 2014 vote until after Brexit.

Mrs May told the Glasgow conference: “As Britain leaves the European Union and we forge a new role for ourselves in the world, the strength and stability of our Union will become even more important.”

It is the torygraph but its the tories all right, a minority, in both Scotland and England, dictating what the majority will do, because they are tories.

Dan Hull @ 5.07
Very interesting post Dan.
If they don’t know the situation… They should have!
I suspect that they did and that they either don’t care or, they a actually do want rid of Northern Ireland.

Hanging on to the North never made any sense to me.
I always assumed that it was designed to hold the republic back where ever they could.
Now because Ireland is under the umbrella of Europe,the North only has value to Westminster.
In that it could be a potential headache for Dublin on a reunification that Westminster gets to interfere in.
Westminster doesn’t give a shit about Northern Ireland and never did.
If they cared about the people at all they would never have dreamed about an EU referendum until Northern Ireland was settled.
My auld Da used to say “if what was happening in Northern Ireland was happening just outside London it would have been sorted out in a fortnight”.

I say, how frightfully planet toryboy. Brexit bill very enraging for youre average Leaver apparently, solution? dont tell em Teresa. Whatever they say about Westminster, there aint no shyster like a tory shyster.

link to archive.is

Theresa May has agreed with Brussels that Britain will hand over more than £40bn when the UK leaves the EU — but keep the final bill secret from the public even when the final deal is done in 2019.

The Republic of Ireland must stay committed to their course Westminster can’t be trusted on anything whether written down or not

The Irish are far more powerful than the UK today simply by European Union being an actual democracy and that the Irish can veto any deal Teresa tries to make, any deal.

Its the other end of the BBC vote tory spin machine, like how beeb r4 news gimps try to make Liam Fox look EU/Brexit sane tonight, and how he has the whip hand over Ireland’s border with this shithead union.

O/T and Stop Press, A mate in Australia has just told me that Kezia has been voted out the Jungle, she is to be replaced with Zoko Ono who has amazing survival skills, apparently she has lived off a dead beetle for thirty years!

But then the UK (English) political establishment has a long tradition of what is either a lack of awareness or (more likely) a lack of concern for issues of equity across all parts of the UK & NI.”

Great satire, look at him run:D

link to thepoke.co.uk

Some stats about Northern Ireland

2017 General Election
DUP 36.0%
Sinn Féin 29.4%
SDLP 11.7%
UUP 10.3%
Alliance 7.9%

From 2011 Census….

Religion
Roman Catholic 40.8%
Presbyterian Church in Ireland 19.1%
Church of Ireland 13.7%
Methodist Church in Ireland 3.0%
Other Christian 5.8%
No religion and Religion not stated. 16.9%

National Identity
British 48.4%
Irish 28.4%
Northern Irish 29.4%

Passport
No passport 18.9%
United Kingdom 59.1%
Republic of Ireland 20.8%

Know some here don’t think much of BellaC but this is worth a look.

link to bellacaledonia.org.uk

Brian Doonthetoon says:
26 November, 2017 at 9:30 pm

As in Scotland, it just needs enough people with the guts to vote for it.

It doesn’t take guts to vote for Indy it just takes common sense and anyone with common sense would need guts not to vote for it

Hi Graeme at 9:40 pm.

You typed,
“It doesn’t take guts to vote for Indy it just takes common sense and anyone with common sense would need guts not to vote for it”

You have to remember that there is a substational section of voters who don’t read Wings, or other pro-indy media. They get their input from the (largely) pro-unionist TV, radio and press.

Thus, they have to take cognitive dissonance by the horns – and, I feel, that takes guts. To be able to recognise that one has been duped over the years must hurt.

Tinto Chiel

link to en.wikipedia.org

Here’s the explanation of Janus – a Roman god who looks in both directions… i.e. forward and back at the same time.

Also seen this on Rev twitter timeline

Nicola’s No1 Comrade?
@ChrisMcCusker67
Nov 25

Today is the 97th anniversary of when England invaded Scotland as Churchill sent the tanks in to stop a “socialist revolution” in Glasgow, with Scottish soldiers locked in barracks and all they wanted was fairness & equality. Same was done in Wales in 1910 with the miners.”

Extremely English Channel 4’s got another war history thing with Guy Martin? about the invention of that WW1 tank that rolled into Glasgow.

Its not that great a show but Martin explains how the UK war gov went round the country raising war bond funding for their new tank invention. Martin’s very bamboozled, that it was Glasgow that raised the highest amount for this tank, £14 million and he seems to want to say that the Scots are mean aren’t they, but settles for sensible.

Yet within a few years, same tanks are rolling into Glasgow city centre, presumably ready to open fire, on the people that paid for them.

Just listened to the (t)Ruthless Davidson interview with Andrew Marr this morning.
She’s got one answer only and keeps repeating that, expanding where necessary to fill time.

But I thought she was vicious about 1min 30 seconds in –
Marr talks about a toddler wanting to change the TV channel to CBCC ( not CBBC as he meant to say).
Andrew Marr has had a stroke and can get muddled – I think he has done astonishingly well to return to TV and what does our Ruth do?… she mocks him for his verbal slip!!!

‘Turn over to where Andrew?’ with a big cheesy grin, forcing him to repeat it and thankfullly he got it correct the second time. What a horrible thing to do on live TV.

I bet she pulled the legs off spiders and the legs and wings off Dragon flies when she was younger.

Nasty woman. True Tory

The great thing about Murdo is that he is a ready made caricature. If he didn’t exist we would have to invent him.

error correction:

…pre-empt the break up of the Union, NOT Scottish Indy.

Because I am a great fan of “QI”, I know that the three lions are actually three heraldic leopards.

From,
link to en.wikipedia.org

“Although in England the official blazon refers to “lions”, French heralds historically used the term “leopard” to represent the lion passant guardant, and hence the arms of England, no doubt, are more correctly blazoned, “leopards”.”

No wonder Murdo does not like European culture.

Norway and their 1 trillion dollars wealth fund have voted NO to executive pay rises of 4 companies that they are invested with.
They have about 9,000 stocks bonds etc good for 1.5% of the total stock market, so when they speak companies better listen.
That Oil fund looks like an even better idea than before.

Graeme @ 9.40pm

BDTT

To explain , I have Been 100% for iScotland since the 60s.

After casting my vote on Sept 18th 2014 , I walked down the hall & out the door with mixed feelings

YES , happy with excitement, it could just be it about to happen in my lifetime BUT inside there was that little “niggle” almost like a wee voice saying “Feck , hope it’s the right thing”

Why would I feel that after nearly 5 decades of wanting iScotland ?

IMHO , simply the subconcience effect on listening as I did then to the MSM !

I suggest we need to try not to be too hard on anyone who voted NO and are open minded to discuss.

The converse to this to ignore the ignorant who still think the YooK is uber brilliant etc They are too blinkered.

I engage occasionally with a few on FB ….. The spout JB all the time!

Their latest is arranging a van to England-shire as a bottle o whiskey in Tesco will be £20 by next year …… Nippy’s idea o min price alcy!

I would verymuch like to see George Square in Glasgow become John Maclean Square or just Maclean Square

link to scotgoespop.blogspot.co.uk

link to autonomyscotland.org

link to opendemocracy.net

link to uk.businessinsider.com

Brexit: aspirations
link to eureferendum.com

link to opendemocracy.net

EXCLUSIVE POLL: Unionist supporters content with East West post #Brexit border controls…
link to archive.is

Key European Agencies Move to Continent, Signs of Brexit’s Toll
link to archive.is

The Ulster Unionists are content with their bribes and to hell with everyone else.

O/T BBC on GMS had a so called academic just spouting that police Scotland was put in place without the proper control and oversight structures. What happened to the Scottish police Authority? The neighborrs of BBC on Pacific Quay also are very powerful and that is HM Chief Inspectorate of Constabulary for Scotland. Back in the day they and their back up Civil Service examined and reexamined every expenditure ,all protocols AND every Senior appointment. They are all still in post. Perhaps we are now overreacting to the sensitivities of those who feel hurt or insult.

We should examine whether a good public service has been damaged by demanding unobtainable standards.I feel angry that the real problems and concerns that every public service suffers from time to time may be overlooked.

From The Independent – “UK financial sector needs favourable Brexit banking deal after paying record amounts of tax, says City of London

The financial services sector contributed record tax revenues of £72.1bn in the past year, prompting fresh calls for a separate Brexit deal for Britain’s banks “

This smells of ‘cherry picking’ and ‘cake and eat it fantasies’ again!

The only way to get a deal which is comprehensive enough to cover financial services is to stay in the single market.

Otherwise, IMO, it seems highly unlikely there will be any deal for banks, one way or another.

The spectrum of likely outcomes stretched from ‘no deal’ through to a Canada type deal. More complex ‘cherry picked’ arrangements are fantasy. A Canada type deal will cover goods trade, not services.

Perhaps it goes wider, from an EU perspective. The UK has always been a bit of a financial buccaneer, laundering money and providing off shore tax havens. Why would the EU want to continue to facilitate this after Brexit?

link to archive.is (Text only)

Thanks Nana, @ Dan Huil, good post! There is no UK version of the UK arms, it’s English or Scottish, take your pick! & having a harp stuck on either is an insult to the peeps in Ireland, there hasn’t been a king of Ireland for quite some time!

Another tax payer funded wedding on the horizon, makes me physically sick.

We will be enduring months of isn’t it great to be British wedding bonanza – BOKE! The tin foiled hat wearer in me suspects there is some planning that has gone into this, right when the establishment needs a distraction & when the butchers apron needs a bit of PR.

Abolish the Monarchy & f**k the UK.

Actually ragin’.

Oh and some BREAKING news to distract us all from the Wonky Westminster Wasters and Botchup Brexit.

To add to the many Royal Family celebrations and commiserations, over the last 70 years or so, constantly being shown on the TV right now they’ve just added a new one:

Harry’s to Marry Meghan.

That will be followed by Harry and Meghan’s freebie honeymoon, Harry and Meghan’s freebie palace, Harry and Megan’s weans, Harry and Megan’s freebie holidays, Meghan’s latest freebie £2 grand dress and maybe even another Royal scandal or ten.

……………………

And some great news. Six Brits to be released from their Indian jail after four years. Scot, Billy Irving’s coming home.

Belter Chris.

Murdo, has more faces than the clock at Glasgow’s Royal Infirmary hospital.

It is of course, Come On Eileen! Maybe no longer being EU citizens wont be so bad, under UKOK planet toryboy rule, their bootboy beeb gimp network, DUP nutters…for the rest of our Scottish lives:-(

link to youtube.com

Oh Shite! between the Brexit negotiations, the ongoing quarrel over theIrish border and England losing the First cricket Test, I fear the UK is in deeper doo-dah than we thought.

I base this view on the need to rush out Prince Harry’s engagement. There is no bigger squirrel than a Royal romance, marriage, death or divorce.

We are all doomed, doomed Ah tell ye, if they have to play this deflectionary card at this time.

” If, as seems increasingly likely, the European Union summit on 15 December does not give the go-ahead for talks on a post-Brexit trade deal, we already know who’s going to get the blame.

It will be all Ireland’s fault. “

link to archive.is

In the Westminster great scheme of things, the UK would withdraw from EU. following which the EU would collapse leaving Ireland stranded. Ireland would see sense and accept the authority of the crown and rejoin the UK leaving no need for an Irish border.
This was the great plan from day one and could still work if the Irish are as stupid as Westminster believes them to be.

Sadly for Westminster none of this is likely to happen, perhaps the border issue could be decided by the people of NI.

The royal wedding is more like ah trade agreement noo we hiv ah mair special relationship wie America . Mug manufacturers will be in overdrive producing MUGS for MUGS ( whits ah gathering of Squirrels cawed again ) .

That royal wedding announcement has given me ah bit of ah dilemma I dont know whither tae watch it on bbc ( licence free ) or hingoot the bunting aw fekit any you’s wumming goat any auld issues of the Bunty ah kin read tae occupy my time for that week lol.

Re. the housing crisis and right-to-buy. IMHO, it is an unsustainable policy that goes against the principle of international development law, in that is reduces the ability of many to meet their basic human needs.

The Right to Buy: History and Prospect

Executive Summary

Following its election in 2015, the Conservative government has announced proposals to extend the Right to Buy (RTB) to housing association tenants.

The new proposals are to sell high value council housing to finance replacement dwellings.

As with the Right to Buy in previous years better off tenants living in more desirable properties and places are most likely to gain.

Proposals were greeted with alarm by housing associations, but under a subsequent agreement housing associations have agreed to a voluntary Right to Buy scheme still financed by high value council properties.

Proposals to extend the Right to Buy revive questions debated earlier in the history of public housing, over the loss of relets, the long term costs of dismantling the public and social rented sector, the expansion of private renting and the costs associated with this and the effect in increasing housing stress and segregation.

The extraordinary levels of discount associated with the Right to Buy are brought into increased focus because public funds will be required to finance their extension to housing associations.

link to historyandpolicy.org

HandandShrimp
That got my spidey senses tingling. Was any indication given of this other chap’s political affiliation?

Conservatism

1.3 Tradition and gradual reform: conservatism vs. reaction

As we have seen, it is generally recognised that conservatism is not dogmatic reaction. It advocates piecemeal, moderate reform, which follows from its scepticism concerning reason, and its valuing of experience concerning human affairs. Burke argued that “a state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation”. But change must be cautious, because knowledge is imperfect and consequences can be unintended. According to conservatives, institutions and morals evolve, their weaknesses become apparent and obvious political abuses are corrected; but ancient institutions embody a tacit wisdom that deserves respect. Conservatives are sceptical of large-scale constitutional, economic or cultural planning, because behaviour and institutions have evolved through the wisdom of generations, which cannot easily be articulated.

The notion of tradition is central to conservatism, and its self-conscious, contrastive use arises only in modernity. In the later 18th century, the mobilisation of “the past” as an explicit political resource became especially important, and a contrast between “traditional” and “modern”—as opposed to “ancient” and “modern”—was stressed. Burke’s political philosophy was an early instance of this process. This mobilisation has been associated with “the invention of tradition” (Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983), in which mass-produced “traditional” artefacts established a fictional organic relation between past and present, as in Sir Walter Scott’s re-invention of the kilt and other “traditional” artefacts for King George IV’s visit to Edinburgh in 1822.

For conservatives, vital political relations are organic. Unlike reactionary thinkers, they regard traditions not as static, but as in a gentle and gradual flux, encouraged by the astute reformer. For Burke, the English revolutionaries of 1688 achieved restoration as opposed to “innovation”. Reform corrects the inadequacies of ancient institutions in light of contemporary needs—conservatives such as Disraeli might want to create a broader suffrage, for instance—but one must disdain “the blind and furious spirit of innovation”. Reform must be practically and not theoretically-based:

I must see with my own eyes…touch with my own hands not only the fixed but the momentary circumstances, before I could venture to suggest any political project whatsoever…I must see the means of correcting the plan…I must see the things; I must see the men. (Burke, WS III: 326)

For Kekes, conservatism adopts a stance of scepticism between extremes of rationalism and fideism (belief based on faith), and steers a middle course of pessimism between claims of perfectibility and corruptibility (1998: 54, 89, 60). Conservatives aim to

conserve the political arrangements that have historically shown themselves to be conducive to good lives thus understood (1998: 27);

they regard

history [as] the best guide to understanding the present and planning for the future. (Kekes 1997: 352)

Conservatism’s “organic” social vision is inherently sceptical of the state, and puts faith instead in the family, private property and religion; it does not involve the rich organicism of the British Idealists Bradley and Bosanquet, that yields “a mystical union with the superior unity of the state”—a German philosophical rather than British conservative conception (Sweet 1999). As Cobban writes, Locke’s influence ensured that the “historic idea in Burke’s mind [did not] pass into the full organic theory of society” (Cobban 1960: 89). It is reaction and not conservatism that is inherently authoritarian. For conservatives, individuals and local communities are better assessors of their own needs and problems than distant bureaucrats. Free from utopian planning, conservatives hold, society finds its own, largely beneficial, shape.

Conservatism proceeds via the tried and tested, relying not on pure reason, but on what Burke called the “latent wisdom” of prejudice, instinct and custom, which accumulates across generations. For Kirk, “prejudice is not bigotry or superstition”, though it may degenerate into these; it is

pre-judgment, the answer…which intuition and ancestral consensus of opinion supply…when [one] lacks either time or knowledge to arrive at a decision predicated upon pure reason. (1954: 34)

For conservatives, custom is immemorial but not thereby static; it is “constantly being subjected to the test of experience” (Pocock 1989: 213). But to change the state in response to “floating fancies or fashions” is to break the “whole chain and continuity of the commonwealth” (Burke, WS III: 145).

link to plato.stanford.edu

Bread and Circuses, like Divide and Rule, is an old establishment trick to fool the gullible and keep the establishment in charge.

Today we have Harry and his new girlfriend. The British nationalist establishment must be hoping their engagement will, once again, fool the gullible and take their mind off the disaster that is brexit. It might work in England and britnat bits of the north of Ireland but it won’t fool the rest of Ireland and it won’t fool Scotland.

I wonder if harry will be wearing his Nazi armband during the wedding ceremony?

Though an organic view of society might appear attractive, it does not deal well with the march-of-time or real-world events, such as technological progress and changing social values.

Conservatism

Conservatism does not ask ultimate questions and hence does not give final answers. But it does remind men of
the institutional prerequisites of social order.
(Huntington 1957: 473)

Conservatism and change

Whether conservatism is understood as the ideological
articulation of a reactionary tendency to defend establishment and social privilege or merely a prudent manifestation of risk aversion and scepticism towards grand schemes for improving society, it has coalesced into a body of thought inseparable from the question of how to manage change. As emphasised in a recent study by O’Hara (2011), conservatives do not simply reject and resist all forms of change in social, political and economic arrangements of any given society. Instead they accept that change is inevitable and have articulated a distinct approach to identifying and understanding circumstances in which change might contribute to resolving contradictions and discord inexisting arrangements. In doing so, conservatives aim to aid in the preservation of institutions and practices, rather than rendering them unviable and thus tearing them asunderby rejecting any changeat all. As O’Sullivan (1976: 9) puts it in his introduction to the ‘philosophy of imperfection’:

[c]onservatism as an ideology, then, is characterized in the first instance, by opposition to the idea of total or radical change, and not by the absurd idea of opposition to change as such, or by any commitment to preserving all existing institutions.

Willingness on the part of conservatives to accept change where necessary must however be distinguished from accepting any change, or generously promoting it. Neither the radical reactionary nor progressive mind-sets capture
the conservatives’ outlook on social change. In making any decisions to alter, for instance, the basis for a monarch’s authority, the scope of participation by citizens in parliamentary affairs or the extent to which private property can be taxed to provide public goods, a careful balance must be struck between a need to adjust disequilibrium in existing social arrangements and the importance of not overestimating the degree to which the status quo might be improved upon, as opposed to create worse problems than the ones already at hand: from the French to the Russian and Chinese revolutions, history provides ample evidence of radical change to existing social arrangements producing evils in some in stances far surpassing those they succeeded.

From this point of view, conservatism is not a mere negative reaction to social change, brought on in the modern era by the ideational and socio-economic transformations of, respectively, Enlightenment and industrial revolution. Burke, for instance, supported the claims of American colonists against King George III and argued for the easing of the Penal Laws against Catholics in Ireland partly for the purpose of maintaining the British Empire. By compromise and accepting the necessity of some significant change to existing arrangements, he aimed to protect an established order against further disruption (O’Brien
1992).

On this view, conservatism constitutes a positive engagement with change to mitigate its destructive potential and to preserve established ways of societies as they actually exist and wherein, in Burke’s words, the living bear responsibilities not only to their own generation, and not merely contractual ones, but to those of generations past and those still to come. In this emphasis on obligations transcending the individuals immediately involved in societal interactions we can perceive an early divergence within the otherwise intertwined origins of conservatism and liberalism in Britain: key conservative concepts such as social discipline, deference and corporate solidarity were ones that, according to Wolin (2001: 55), ‘liberal thinkers beginning with Hobbes and Locke and continuing in the English Utilitarians were unable to generate from liberal assumptions about free, equal and consciously consenting individuals’. The idea, then, is to conserve to the extent possible, but not absolutely….

link to pure.qub.ac.uk

Edmund Burke: The Organic Theory of Society

….You will observe, that from Magna Charta to the Declaration of Right, it has been the uniform policy of our constitution to claim and assert our liberties, as an entailed inheritance derived to us from our forefathers, and to be transmitted to our posterity; as an estate specially belonging to the people of this kingdom without any reference whatever to any other more general or prior right. By this means our constitution preserves a unity in so great a diversity of its parts. We have an inheritable crown; an inheritable peerage; and a House of Commons and a people inheriting privileges, franchises, and liberties, from a long line of ancestors.

This policy appears to me to be the result of profound reflection; or rather the happy effect of following nature, which is wisdom without reflection, and above it. A spirit of innovation is generally the results of a selfish temper and confined views. People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors. Besides, the people of England well know, that the idea of inheritance furnishes a sure principle of conservatism, and a sure principle of transmission; without at all excluding a principle of improvement. It leaves acquisition free; but it secures what it acquires. Whatever advantages are obtained by a state proceeding on these maxims, are locked fast as in a sort of family settlement; grasped as in a kind of mortmain for ever. By a constitutional policy, working after the pattern of nature, we receive, we hold, we transmit our government and our privileges, in the same manner in which we enjoy and transmit our property and our lives.

The institutions of policy, the goods of fortune, the gifts of Providence, are handed down, to use and from us, in the same course and order. Our political system is placed in a just correspondence and symmetry with the order of the world, and with the mode of existence decreed to a permanent body composed of transitory parts; wherein, by the disposition of a stupendous wisdom, moulding together the great mysterious incorporation of the human race, the whole, at one time, is never old, or middle-aged, or young, but in a condition of unchangeable constancy, moves on through the varied tenour of perpetual decay, fall renovation, and progression. Thus, by preserving the method of nature in the conduct of the state, in what we improve we are never wholly new, in what we retain we are never wholly obsolete. By adhering in this manner and one those principles to our forefathers, we are guided not by the superstition of antiquarians, but by the spirit of philosophic analogy.

In this choice of inheritance we have given to our frame of polity the image of a relation in blood; binding up the constitution of our country with our dearest domestic ties; adopting our fundamental laws into the bosom of our family affections; keeping inseparable, and cherishing with the warmth of all their combined and mutually reflected charities, our state, our hearths, our sepulchres, and our altars. Through the same plan of a conformity to nature in our artificial institutions, and by calling in the aid of her unerring and powerful instincts, to fortify the fallible and feeble contrivances of our reason, we have derived several other, and those no small benefits, from considering our liberties in the light of an inheritance. Always acting as if in the presence of canonized forefathers, the spirit of freedom, leading in itself to misrule and excess, is termed with an awful gravity. This idea of a liberal descent inspires us with a sense of habitual native dignity, which prevents that upstart insolence almost inevitably adhering to and disgracing those who are the first acquirers of any distinction. By this means our liberty becomes a noble freedom. It carries an imposing and majestic aspect. It has a pedigree and illustrating ancestors….

link to traditionalbritain.org

UKCP set out their vision at the Conservative Party Conference

UKCP Vice Chair Patricia Hunt opened the debate by declaring psychotherapists as the new and vital social innovators working from the grassroots, citing the recent report by UN Special Rapporteur Dainius P?ras calling on Governments to shift from a biomedical model in favour of cultivating ‘rights-based societies’….

link to psychotherapy.org.uk

For the lot Cameron?

Here’s one for folk who don’t click through. An academic insight into “common sense”/”populist reactionary” politics.

Peter King’s recorded talk – ‘Disdain of the Past’ – at the ‘Another Country – is there a future for Tradition?’ Conference – organised by the Traditional Britain Group and the Quarterly Review (2012).
link to traditionalbritain.org