Hi! I noticed, with very considerable amusement, your complaint last night that I hadn’t made a “substantive reply” to the [EDIT] EIGHT posts (totalling nearly 11,000 words) of semi-coherent ranting about me that you’ve made on your site in the last eight days.
(I’ll be absolutely honest, I’ve only skimmed the last few.)
We both know the reason that’s so tear-streamingly comical, of course.
In so far as it’s worth talking about Scottish constitutional politics at all these days, it’s worth taking a moment to analyse the bloodless, anodyne nothingness spouted by the First Minister on The Sunday Show at the weekend.
That clip is less than three minutes long, but it’s so soul-crushingly boring and full of content-free drone and waffle that it’s almost impossible to sit all the way through it, so we’re going to translate and summarise it for you.
Warning: despite the quite zingy title this is actually going to be a very dry stats post, readers. It is, on the other hand, based on a man having something disturbingly close to a complete psychotic mental breakdown, so there’s always that for a bit of colour.
Because the paragraph above, and in particular the highlighted part, is without a doubt the most dishonest, diametrically false and wildly extreme lie about Scottish politics that we’ve ever seen anyone tell in the 13.5 years of Wings Over Scotland’s existence.
And as a rule we don’t bother addressing them because they’re so demented you could spend 5,000 words pulling apart all the individual strands of lunacy every time, and lunatics thrive on attention, but this one does merit a very brief comment.
Because “Vote Labour, get indy” wasn’t our plan. It was John Swinney’s.
Even by the embarrassing standards of The National, the gulf between this morning’s blaring front-page splash and the weak, watery weasel words in the actual article is a chasm so wide and so yawning (in every sense of that word) that it would put the epic planetary scar of Mars’ Valles Marineris to shame.
Coupled with a feebly underwhelming Programme For Government (in which the main policy was the re-abolition of peak rail fares just months after the SNP insisted such a move was unaffordable, with no clue as to where the money had suddenly been found) and a pitiful list of candidates for next year’s Holyrood election featuring the likes of Sally “all aboard the gravy bus!” Donald, Kaukab “DECAPITATE TERFS” Stewart, Kirsten “DECAPITATE TERFS” Oswald, Alison “DECAPITATE TERFS” Thewliss and Alyn “throw anyone who doesn’t want to DECAPITATE TERFS out of the SNP” Smith, the story was an abject vision of a bleak future for independence.
On reflection, we feel we may have not taken this story seriously enough. After all, they don’t put just ANY old guff on the front page of the Sunday Mail.
The less said about the Scottish Government’s toe-curlingly embarrassing “summit” last week, the sooner we can all pretend it never happened. We’ve got little to add to the withering assessments of Robin McAlpine and Kevin McKenna and just about everyone else who’s bothered covering this pathetic waste of everyone involved’s time. (Not that the time of most of these worthless quangocrats was worth anything anyway.)
We take a moment only to note something remarkable: the closest Scottish Labour’s hapless branch manager Anas Sarwar has ever come to understanding anything.
Yesterday the Scottish media gave Scottish Greens MSP Maggie Chapman what she’s never willingly given anyone else – a platform on which to make her case.
Most did a very poor job challenging her on her outrageous comments about the Supreme Court, with BBC Radio Scotland’s Drivetime show being an especially wretched example of allowing the interviewee to ignore every question and then just ramble on endlessly about something else entirely, but LBC’s Gina Davidson was on top of her brief and put all the points that reasonable people wanted to be made, while giving Chapman ample time to answer uninterrupted.
Let’s break down how that went, with the help of our handy Bullshit Buzzer.
sarah on A different school: “Good question. Given that their candidate has made a public declaration about standing down to give Fergus a free run,…” Jun 23, 22:06
Lorn on A different school: “Hatey: I take your point about the minority forcing independence on the majority, which is why I have always accepted…” Jun 23, 22:00
McDuff on A different school: “Another great piece Rev where you once again expose the SNP for what they are, lying chancers drowning us in…” Jun 23, 22:00
Lorn on A different school: “Aidan: it has nothing to do with creating a new legal order. The law is the law is the law.…” Jun 23, 21:46
Xaracen on A different school: “You’ve never addressed the arguments I’ve made about the current legal order and its origin myths, Aidan; all you’ve ever…” Jun 23, 21:44
agent x on A different school: “Has anyone asked if Fergus Ewing will stand as a Liberate Scotland umbrella candidate?” Jun 23, 21:40
Lorn on A different school: “Which part of Eastern Europe are you talking about, Hatey? Ukraine? Was it inevitable that there would be war between…” Jun 23, 21:38
Lorn on A different school: “Actually, Aidan, you could not be more wrong. Modern law stems from earliest times in both Scotland and England. It…” Jun 23, 21:28
agent x on A different school: “@Mia Thankyou for listing the reasons why I have never voted SNP and never will.” Jun 23, 21:28
sarah on A different school: “The question we should be discussing is “How is the word to be spread to the voters about the need…” Jun 23, 21:20
Hatey McHateface on A different school: ““some may even reject their own liberation – i.e. Vote No” Some may develop schizophrenia. They will vote Yes for…” Jun 23, 21:16
Sue Varley on A different school: “Sounds great in theory but you say: “Best case, we begin negotiations for our independence” and here is the problem.…” Jun 23, 21:04
Hatey McHateface on A different school: ““L. A disgusting surrender to brexit” Brexit was a necessary step on the true road to genuine Independence. Your denial…” Jun 23, 21:01
sarah on A different school: “I enjoyed that, Rattled – thanks for posting! It brought back memories of bonfire nights when I was little -…” Jun 23, 20:54
Aidan on A different school: “You’re right, I don’t, but that’s because I don’t have dozens of people day after day trying to invent some…” Jun 23, 20:41
Chas on A different school: “Good for you Sarah. No plan, forecasts or projections on anything. ‘It will all be fine’. Scotland will simply plunder…” Jun 23, 20:39
WhoRattledYourCage on A different school: “Wee bit ay Scots poetry fir light relief: https://whorattledyourcage.blogspot.com/2025/06/darknight-lightshow.html” Jun 23, 20:35
James on A different school: “It’s Scots I’m mainly aiming at, Sven; we were regularly scolded and belted for speaking in oor ain tongue.” Jun 23, 20:14
Insider on A different school: “Watch out, Hatey ! “Puir auld Alf” has his ouija board out again to talk to his deid pals. More…” Jun 23, 20:12
Hatey McHateface on A different school: ““A language is a dialect with an army and navy” Uh oh! So that’s Scots fucked then. Or as we…” Jun 23, 20:11
Callum on A different school: “Party before Country has been SNP’s position for the last decade. Indy supporters who intend to vote SNP in 2026…” Jun 23, 20:09
Mia on A different school: ““The second group are those who want Scotland to be independent but do not vote. Some have never voted; some…” Jun 23, 19:53
Andy Ellis on A different school: “The Danes tried to suppress the Faroese language for centuries. Given current circumstances I reckon most Scots would take a…” Jun 23, 19:49
Hatey McHateface on A different school: ““world gone mad” Ah ken fit ye mean. I really struggle when Cooper, a politician I have detested since the…” Jun 23, 19:48
Xaracen on A different school: “It’s a constitution, Aidan, not a system of modern democracy, and it has sod all to do with running an…” Jun 23, 19:43
Sven on A different school: “James @ 19.16. Indeed they did not, James, and I share what I’m guessing is your entirely justified and righteous…” Jun 23, 19:40
Hatey McHateface on A different school: “This is powerful stuff, NC. Who knew that the Scots for “internalised oppression” is “internalised oppression”? Or that the Scots…” Jun 23, 19:30
James on A different school: “But Sven….did the Faroese parents and/or teachers ever belt their weans for speaking in their ain language though?” Jun 23, 19:16
Aidan on A different school: “@Twatselfhater – Can you find me a single example of a recent case where the outcome was determined based on…” Jun 23, 19:15
Hatey McHateface on A different school: “@ Lorn says: 23 June, 2025 at 4:27 pm “So you anticipate a breakdown of civilization as occurred in the…” Jun 23, 19:13
