The world's most-read Scottish politics website

Wings Over Scotland

On holiday with foreigners 108

Posted on September 26, 2013 by

It’s amazing what a trip away can do: refresh, educate, put a new slant on an old debate. I was in the US recently. The first thing I learned was before departure, and I pass it on as a tip: if you’re going to the US, fly from Dublin, not a UK airport. Apart from being about half the price – presumably because they have control over their airport taxes, so can adjust them to compete with Heathrow – it makes life far easier.

customs

When I last flew to the US from a UK airport, long before 9/11, we were held in a bleak corridor without any amenities for well over an hour before being processed through immigration, where we were interrogated about the purpose of our visit, what address we were staying at, and where we were going exactly. It put me off re-visiting the States for a long time.

Flying from Dublin is a different experience.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags:
Category comment, culture, world

Quoted for proof 154

Posted on September 26, 2013 by

Because we keep telling you what a No vote really means:

“That is why I am talking quite passionately about getting English Labour MPs back up the road and for me, sitting down with Neil [Findlay] and Richard [Simpson] and Rhoda [Grant] and others and saying, let’s get health policies that can be consistent across England, Scotland and Wales.

Wouldn’t that be a good thing, pulling in the same direction as opposed to pulling our separate ways?

Devolution, in its early days, was about doing something different and it needs to enter a different phase where we start talking again more about a UK-wide policy because in the end, that helps everybody.”

That’s Labour’s shadow health secretary Andy Burnham talking to Holyrood Magazine this week, in comments strangely unpublicised in the rest of the Scottish media.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: , ,
Category analysis, comment, disturbing, scottish politics

The phoney war 193

Posted on September 26, 2013 by

One of the recurring themes we hear from people about the independence debate (from Yes, No and Don’t Know folks alike) is a bewilderment about the alleged amount of grassroots campaigning undertaken by the No camp. “Better Together” is fond of making extravagant claims on its website about its number of volunteers, events and leaflets, yet almost nobody we speak to has ever seen any of them.

So we were interested to receive an email from a reader this week.

Read the rest of this entry →

Category comment, scottish politics

The afterthought 274

Posted on September 25, 2013 by

Ed Miliband delivered just under 8,000 words to the Labour Party conference in Brighton yesterday. Of those, just 263 of them concerned Scotland. (The actual word “Scotland” was never uttered.) Here are all of them.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags:
Category analysis, comment, uk politics

Quoted for irony 419

Posted on September 24, 2013 by

In a piece entitled “Scottish Labour leader says nationalism is a virus”, the Courier yesterday reported that Johann Lamont’s speech to the Labour conference “appeared to allude to the European 20th century fascist movement”.

blondelamonte

And it did, although perhaps not in the way the Courier probably meant.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: , ,
Category disturbing, scottish politics

Throwing mud in glass houses 114

Posted on September 24, 2013 by

There’s been a certain amount of hoo-haa within the independence camp this morning about a Telegraph piece reporting comments by Labour’s shadow Scottish Secretary Margaret Curran in which she appears to cast doubt on whether devolution has been a good thing for Scotland at all.

curran

We’re not sure why, because they’re nothing we weren’t telling you almost a year ago.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags:
Category analysis, comment, scottish politics

Filling in the blanks 93

Posted on September 24, 2013 by

Daily Record hack Torcuil Crichton has had another curious memory lapse in the paper today, in a dramatic piece headlined “Labour will axe Atos if we return to power, vows shadow work and pensions minister Liam Byrne”. A Record insider leaked us this redacted image of the original draft version:

missing

Can you supply the missing words?

Read the rest of this entry →

Category analysis, uk politics

We’ve got five minutes spare 123

Posted on September 23, 2013 by

Arch-Unionist and BBC-favoured pundit (hey, what a freakish coincidence! What are the odds?) Professor Adam Tomkins of Glasgow University has a blog post up today. A reader asked us to go and tackle it, but Prof. Tomkins has one of those infinitely irritating twatblogs that won’t let you post comments unless you hand over all your personal details and give permission for spambots to assail your Facebook and Twitter accounts with annoying gibberish, so we’ll have to do it here instead.

uniontwat3

It won’t make any sense unless you read the post first. It’s here.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: , , ,
Category comment, idiots

A flavour of the day 153

Posted on September 23, 2013 by

Okay, one last thing. This is the best footage of Saturday we’ve seen:

(Oh, and the Scottish Police Federation are now tweeting a crowd figure of 20,000.)

Category scottish politics, video

Normal service coming soon 340

Posted on September 23, 2013 by

Okay, we’ve got a LOT of housekeeping-type stuff to get on with, so the next couple of days might be a wee bit quiet. We’ll need to be dealing with the ridiculous goings-on at the Labour conference this weekend at some point, but for now let’s just round up the last few issues regarding Saturday’s awesome independence march and rally and get it all out of the way.

Read the rest of this entry →

Category comment, scottish politics

Readers’ lives 437

Posted on September 22, 2013 by

We’ve already run a small collection of our own ham-fisted snapshots, but here are just a few of our favourite pics of yesterday’s rally in Edinburgh that were taken and sent to us by Wings Over Scotland readers.

flagsforth

Click all the pics for larger versions.

Read the rest of this entry →

Category pictures

And now over to the state broadcaster 67

Posted on September 22, 2013 by

1280

Tags: ,
Category media, pictures

← Previous Entries
Next Entries →

  • About

    Wings Over Scotland is a thing that exists.

    Stats: 6,897 Posts, 1,239,909 Comments

  • Recent Posts

  • Archives

  • Categories

  • Tags

    and finally and firstly arithmetic fail braveheart klaxon britnats captain darling cartoons Chris Cairns confused cringe crybabies dateline debates Devo Nano Federalists Unionists and Devolutionists flat-out lies foreigner watch from the archives fundraisers galleries Greg Moodie hamish hypocrisy liars light-hearted banter lizards memogate misinformation one nation perspectives poll project fear project feart qft Scott Minto smears snp accused soapbox the positive case for the union The Vow ticktock toldyouso too wee too poor too stupid unionist of the day vote no get nothing

  • Recent Comments

    • George Ferguson on The Pit Of Vipers: “@100%Yes I have always voted too but there comes a time when not voting is a victory. If less than…” Apr 19, 20:41
    • Alf Baird on The Pit Of Vipers: ““the poisonous, posing human trash on our quangoes, running our councils, topping our public bodies” Indeed, and according to Albert…” Apr 19, 20:31
    • Sally Hughes on The Pit Of Vipers: “Aye Alf, and timing is everything. Swinney has promised a second referendum if they get an SNP majority. Polls indicate…” Apr 19, 20:17
    • 100%Yes on The Pit Of Vipers: “Kezia Dugdale appointed new chair of LGBT+ charity Stonewall.” Apr 19, 20:01
    • George Ferguson on The Pit Of Vipers: “@Dan Well my only regret on the betting front is not backing Reform UK to get 20 MSPs at 8…” Apr 19, 19:53
    • holymacmoses on The Pit Of Vipers: “What saddens me most of all is that it was shiver of grubby-minded, meaningless mediocrity which created a stagnant pool…” Apr 19, 19:51
    • Dan on The Pit Of Vipers: “Well George, they do say Caveat Emptor and that fools and their money are easily parted… Plus you regularly state…” Apr 19, 19:37
    • George Ferguson on The Pit Of Vipers: “@Sarah Your positively optimistic I will give you that. Tommy Sheridan was found guilty of 5 out of 6 Perjury…” Apr 19, 19:37
    • sarah on The Pit Of Vipers: “@ George Ferguson: Congratulations on the grandchild – something cheerful to think about! As for not voting, in my constituency…” Apr 19, 19:21
    • 100%Yes on The Pit Of Vipers: “George Ferguson, I too constantly give donations to SNP and then the Alba Party and for what??? When Salvo started…” Apr 19, 19:20
    • Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “Dorian Grey One of the coven. Look after each other they do..” Apr 19, 19:04
    • Young Lochinvar on The Pit Of Vipers: “T I’m not sure if it’s exactly what you were referring to but it’s worth listening to the lyrics of…” Apr 19, 18:57
    • Joan Edington on The Pit Of Vipers: “Much as I agree with the article, it does seem a bit too co-incidental that the Mail should decide (or…” Apr 19, 18:55
    • George Ferguson on The Pit Of Vipers: “@Dan 6:33pm I have been criticised for my negativity on the Alliance for Scottish Independence. I was defrauded and robbed…” Apr 19, 18:55
    • Dan on The Pit Of Vipers: “Even just post Indyref the signs were there that the fledgling NuSNP wanted nothing to do with the grassroots Indy…” Apr 19, 18:33
    • 100%Yes on The Pit Of Vipers: “The Lesbian pack.” Apr 19, 18:01
    • twathater on The Pit Of Vipers: “Surely questions must be asked of the judge, Dorrian WHY all these Whatsapp messages and other messages were NOT allowed…” Apr 19, 18:01
    • Lorncal on The Narcissism Of No Differences: “Alf: spot on, sir. Nicky: aye, Tommy was a naughty boy, but if his wife can forgive him, so can…” Apr 19, 18:01
    • Ian on The Pit Of Vipers: “Margaret Thatcher’s government famously attempted to ban Spycatcher (1987), a memoir by former MI5 officer Peter Wright that alleged illegal…” Apr 19, 17:46
    • George Ferguson on The Pit Of Vipers: “@Sarah I was in Dundee at the time. I distributed the wee blue book during the Independence Campaign. Dundee delivered…” Apr 19, 17:39
    • GM on The Pit Of Vipers: “Starting with Sturgeon, dozens of these repulsive individuals should be facing charges and certain jail terms. It is obvious that…” Apr 19, 17:39
    • Confused on The Pit Of Vipers: “cultured Prime of Miss Jean Brodie reference …” Apr 19, 17:34
    • Morgatron on The Pit Of Vipers: “I can’t wait for the day everyone of these bastards are named and held accountable in a court of law.…” Apr 19, 17:32
    • Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on The Pit Of Vipers: “CHANNEL 4 NEWS Alex Salmond interview (26 Mar 2021) « But when are you going to apologise to the women???…” Apr 19, 17:27
    • willie on The Pit Of Vipers: “You make a very important point Alf Baird. The persecution against Salmond was aided and abetted by the Westminster deep…” Apr 19, 17:12
    • sarah on The Pit Of Vipers: “And was it in Dundee that the SNP made it difficult to distribute the Wee Blue Book? They wouldn’t have…” Apr 19, 17:00
    • TURABDIN on The Pit Of Vipers: “ASSASSINS!” Apr 19, 16:49
    • Lenny Hartley on The Pit Of Vipers: “The Late Alison Balharry who was the Yes Scotland Press Officer responsible for arranging Spokespeople to Radio and TV claime…” Apr 19, 16:20
    • Jeannie McCrimmon on The Pit Of Vipers: “We are governed by pathetic sickos.” Apr 19, 16:11
    • Sven on The Pit Of Vipers: “I make no comment upon any individual alleged to be connected with what appears to me to be a criminal…” Apr 19, 16:09

  • A tall tale



↑ Top