Last week the BBC treated viewers to a Question Time hosted in Edinburgh, where a right-wing economics journalist from MoneyWeek magazine called Merryn Somerset Webb explained to a somewhat disgruntled Scottish audience why the government were right to bail out the bankers, but not steel workers.
The amateur blogger in question has been garnering a fair amount of attention lately from straw-clutching Unionist hacks for his “analysis” of the Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland (GERS) figures, in which he purports to show a sizeable deficit in the economy of an independent or “full fiscal autonomy” Scotland.
In essence, the analysis amounts to dumping all the GERS summary tables into a Microsoft Excel graph, adding the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) forecast for oil revenue, and pointing to a resulting £9.1bn gap between Scotland’s public spending and its total revenue.
This, he asserts, is in addition to Scotland’s share of the hefty deficit the UK currently runs. His conclusion, shouted loudly and often by every angry Unionist on Twitter, is that the government of an independent Scotland – which tellingly they always assume to be an SNP one – would either have to drastically cut public services or raise taxes to fill this “black hole”.
It’s an interesting piece of analysis. Or it would be, if it wasn’t total nonsense.
Alert readers will probably already be familiar with the philosophical proposition of Schrödinger’s cat. (The less alert can click the link for a short and easy primer.) The hypothetical experiment posited by 20th-century Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger has entered into popular culture. But increasingly and disturbingly, it’s also becoming the guiding principle of mainstream media journalism.
Certain viewers should steel themselves at this point, because we’re about to briefly talk about football before moving on to other things later in the article. You can consider that your trigger warning. We’ll let you know when it’s over.
The lines above were issued to the press yesterday by The Rangers International Football Club plc, a football club (the clue’s in the name) formed in 2012, yet which lays claim to the history and achievements of a previous club of a similar name which was liquidated for bankruptcy the same year, having been formed in 1872.
And eagle-eyed logic fans may have spotted something of a contradiction.
We had an interesting conversation last night with someone who was prepared, quite legitimately, to credit Scottish Labour with a little more good faith over their proposed plan to mitigate Tory tax credit cuts than we were. But we had a lot of trouble coming to an agreement over the arithmetic, and we tend to think that backs up our cynicism.
Labour have presented their supposed funding for the policy in an incredibly dishonest and disingenuous way, and it seems to have confused the media to the point where nobody in the print or broadcast media has challenged what appears to be a huge and (to us at least) incredibly obvious gaping hole in the finances.
Gordon Brown, last seen wailing that The Vow had been “betrayed”, appears to have jumped ship a little early when it came to changing his position on it for what by our count is the fourth or fifth time so far.
The video clip below is from Russia Today, which is in no way an impartial news outlet. However, it’s dangerous and unwise to reflexively dismiss any message purely because of the medium. Heck, even the Daily Mail tells the truth sometimes.
His views are expert and worth listening to. (The full interview is here.) Readers can, as ever, decide for themselves whether to believe him or David Cameron.
A convention of the world’s finest satirists pulling a 24-hour shift on Red Bull couldn’t come up with anything to beat Labour’s position on renewing the UK’s Trident nuclear weapons system. Following an overwhelming vote at the Scottish Labour conference this afternoon, these are the current cut-out-and-keep standings:
Hatey McHateface on Strike A Pose, There’s Nothing To It: “First, a majority of the voters have to care. This is where I think all the barking up the colonialism…” Jul 1, 13:26
Alf Baird on The Fast Track: ““‘Notes on Nationalism’” The colonized native only becomes a nationalist ‘to free his people’ (Fanon). National liberation cannot come about…” Jul 1, 13:08
AlMac on Strike A Pose, There’s Nothing To It: “Yes thank you for that Mr Angry – it was intended as a humorous response to Wing’s Twitter suggestion that…” Jul 1, 13:06
Hatey McHateface on The Fast Track: “Orwell defo an improvement over all those third-world racists, such as Fanon, etc. We could even make a half-decent case…” Jul 1, 13:01
Alice Timmons on Strike A Pose, There’s Nothing To It: “Stuart, I sincerely hope you are taking VERY good care of both your health and personal safety. It unfortunately seems…” Jul 1, 12:57
AlMac on Strike A Pose, There’s Nothing To It: “That question mark was a smiley face when typed – I’m not asking if the transcription is TLDR. However the…” Jul 1, 12:41
Spartan 117 on Strike A Pose, There’s Nothing To It: “It’s a transcript of an interview. If you don’t have the intelligence to read the article, don’t bother commenting.” Jul 1, 12:38
Campbell Clansman on Strike A Pose, There’s Nothing To It: “They decided there was no provable case of fraud on the part of the SNP. Let’s face it: as long…” Jul 1, 12:26
Spartan 117 on The Fast Track: “You have correctly identified the Professional Career Politician, the scourge of the current age.” Jul 1, 11:54
Spartan 117 on The Fast Track: “I’m sorry for your loss, NC. Condolences. I don’t think I could disagree with anything you’ve said there.” Jul 1, 11:52
Captain Caveman on The Fast Track: “I note you haven’t deigned to respond to my earlier critique as regards your misappropriation of Orwell despite his published…” Jul 1, 11:51
Iain Ross on The Fast Track: “The other significant issue is that, according to Mr Swinney, the two sums involved (c£460,000 embezzled by Murrell and c£660,000…” Jul 1, 11:50
Alf Baird on The Fast Track: ““Some of the reasons” We need only comprehend the root cause of all such events in a colonial society is…” Jul 1, 11:27
Northcode on The Fast Track: “Stop all the clocks… the stars are not wanted now; put out every one, pack up the moon and dismantle…” Jul 1, 11:18
Billie on The Fast Track: “Bumped in to an SNP councillor who I hadn’t seen for quote a while as I left the SNP about…” Jul 1, 10:55
Alf Baird on The Fast Track: “Yes James, Scots need to understand that “the devolved parliament to Scotland” is merely part of the machinery of colonial…” Jul 1, 10:52
James Che on The Fast Track: “Spartan 117. You are correct, Devolution had nothing to do with democracy in Scotland, it was about control that had…” Jul 1, 10:37
James Che on The Fast Track: “None of what I have posted is off topic of Stu’s post, or past posts, for the SNp corruption rests…” Jul 1, 10:04
Captain Caveman on The Fast Track: “@Hatey “Firm favourites of not a few Wingers!” Heh, indeed Hatey, the irony isn’t lost on me. 🙂” Jul 1, 10:01
Mark Beggan on The Fast Track: “You do know that you have to be actively seeking work. This doesn’t count.” Jul 1, 10:00
Captain Caveman on The Fast Track: ““Well hold on there Bald Eagle, have you been cut and pasting from AI again?” Well, duh, YL – that’ll…” Jul 1, 09:51
Captain Caveman on The Fast Track: ““… but do tell me how a people can begin to hold serious global power to account through political means…” Jul 1, 09:42
Spartan 117 on The Fast Track: “Correct. Devolution, as it was conceived, was nothing to do with improving democracy, it was about New Labour capitalising on…” Jul 1, 09:39
James Che on The Fast Track: “Three time this week the main stream news, after The outed keir Starmer the word and conversation on devolution has…” Jul 1, 09:22
sam on The Fast Track: “Nasty little fucker. You have contributed nothing to this site but abuse of others.” Jul 1, 09:19
Hatey McHateface on The Fast Track: “Don’t knock intersectional decolonised scissoring until you’ve read the time & motion studies that prove how it revilatises productivity in…” Jul 1, 09:01
James Che on Ping-Pong-Fiddle-Aye-No: “Stu, Those two entities of law certainly tried prosecution on Alex Salmond with less evidence and heresay including the evidence…” Jul 1, 08:57
Mark Beggan on The Fast Track: “A rock called Plymouth.” Jul 1, 08:56
