Voices of the people 157
Posted on
August 26, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Things you’ll never hear a Scottish interviewer say.
Safe in their hands 375
Posted on
August 25, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Alistair Darling was angry last week, as he was awake. In a tetchy interview with the BBC’s Good Morning Scotland he insisted that “there is no political party in the United Kingdom at the moment that could get away with destroying the NHS”.
He went on to rubbish the idea that the English service was being privatised by the Conservative-led government, and accused the SNP of scaremongering over the issue for opportunistic political gain. So we thought we’d see if we could find anyone else who thought the NHS was in danger of privatisation and destruction.
Alistair Darling Lie Bingo 138
Posted on
August 25, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We’ve been so busy with the Wee Blue Book for the past week or so that we only just got round to listening to last Tuesday’s interview with Alistair Darling on Good Morning Scotland in time, before it vanished from the iPlayer. The former Chancellor gets a quite uncomfortable ride from presenter Gary Robertson, and flaps angrily for much of the ten-and-a-half minutes trying to turn every question into one on currency.
Mr Darling also makes some startlingly and empirically false statements throughout the interview, and we thought it’d be worth noting a few of them and seeing if they crop up on tonight’s BBC1 debate with the First Minister.
Kezia Dugdale is a liar 147
Posted on
August 25, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
There’s some interesting footage circulating today of a referendum debate for women that took place last week. Many people have focused on No-campaign representative Cat Headley admitting that a “Better Together” leaflet made some highly misleading claims about an independent Scotland’s ranking among the world’s wealthiest countries, but we covered that back in May so we won’t go over it again.
The bit of the meeting that caught our eye is at 1m 36 in the clip above.
The wrong direction 183
Posted on
August 24, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Stand by, readers. We’re about to post some porn for stat nerds.
Yeah, you like that, don’t you? What’s a bit less sexy, though, is what the table above means for the “safety and security” of the UK, and the cost of your mortgage.
Why Ed Balls is an idiot 115
Posted on
August 24, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Labour’s shadow Chancellor quoted in today’s Observer:
This won’t take very long at all.
The NHS and the TTIP trap 116
Posted on
August 24, 2014 by
Scott Minto
As part of his Apocalypse Of Doom Revue this week, Gordon Brown provided the Daily Record with a no-questions puff-piece the paper summarised as, “we must continue to share costs of health care and welfare with rest of the union – or pay the price”.
So that’s nice and positive.
The ordinary people 390
Posted on
August 23, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The startling lack of “grassroots” support in the No campaign has been a recurring theme on this site. Time and again, people presented as typical members of the public turn out to be dedicated political activists with a vested interest in the status quo.
The “Better Together” website has a long-running series of blog posts under the banner “Why I’m saying No Thanks”. All of the people featured in it are introduced with no mention of any involvment in politics. Out of idle curiosity we thought we’d see if we could find out a little more about them.
The story of a soldier boy 101
Posted on
August 23, 2014 by
Rory Gemmill
“Soldier boy” was an affectionate nickname given to me by my father before he passed away. It was both said with pride and his way of calling me a dunderheid.
Dad was an intelligent, cerebral, well-read man, anti-war and pro-independence. He tried to convince me in a variety of ways not to “sign your life away”, including leaving a collection of DVDs for me like “Beneath Hill 60”, “Cross Of Iron” and “My Boy Jack”, as well as many war poems. He also highlighted my distaste for authority. But he failed to stop me. I signed up.
Scottish independence was a different story.
Strong medicine 237
Posted on
August 22, 2014 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
When we came up with this flyer idea last January, we decided that on balance it was perhaps edging a wee bit on the aggressive side. But in the light of today’s comments from Eddie Bone and the deputy leader of UKIP, and the findings of the recent Future Of England survey, it seems suddenly more appropriate. What do we think, folks?
