Wings Over Scotland

Having done it for 22-and-a-half years now, we’re unable to recommend a career in journalism. While there are upsides, it’s a largely arduous and thankless task, and one where pay rates were on a downward slope long before the financial crisis.

However, if for some unfathomable reason you’re really determined that it’s the job for you, let us at least offer you a crash course in the modern art.

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Lord George “Devolution will kill nationalism stone dead” Robertson of Port Ellen is among several ennobled former Defence Secretaries who’ve been busying themselves with writing to the press this week. And for once, it’s not about dog dirt and potholes.

As well as being co-signatory with several other Conservative and Labour peers to a letter in the Telegraph urging the UK to commit to a like-for-like replacement of Trident, Robertson also bothered the Herald with a missive aiming to “nail some wild assertions and fallacies about Scottish public opinion on the subject”.

We could score a cheap point here by noting that the befuddled pensioner apparently thinks the SNP secured 45% of the vote “in the 2010 General Election” – rather than in the Holyrood one the following year – but instead we’ll point out the ermine-clad statesman’s rather more serious attempt to mislead.

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We’ve noted recently how the No camp likes to huffily deny that it ever portrays Scotland as incapable of thriving as an independent country. Here’s a fairly typical example from the Scotsman back in April (our emphasis):

“SNP Westminster leader Angus Robertson has claimed the ‘No’ campaign is based on the idea that Scots are “uniquely poor”, “stupid” and “incapable” of self-government.

Last night, Better Together rejected Mr Robertson’s claim. A spokesman said: ‘The only people who peddle this line are the Nationalists. No-one from Better Together thinks that Scotland couldn’t go it alone.’“

We know they’re not great at counting, but they might want to check that figure.

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The No campaign is fond of mocking the SNP’s insistence that an independent Scotland could be a member of NATO while still getting rid of Trident. The USA in particular, it’s frequently argued, would simply not stand for the Scots taking the strategic base at Faslane out of the North Atlantic picture while still seeking the benefits of the alliance’s military presence and protection.

If only there was some sort of precedent we could examine.

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Prolonged exposure to the unfamiliar phenomenon of sunshine appears to be getting to some on the Unionist side in Scotland today. Firstly, Johann Lamont’s spin doctor Paul Sinclair is having some sort of nervous collapse over on Twitter, seamlessly blending every piece of absurd smearing about Alex Salmond from the last couple of weeks into a single thread of tramp-in-a-bus-station lunacy.

(Summary: he’s fat, Saltires are bad, liking golf is bad, the FM is in some way similar to the popular footballing racist John Terry, and there’s even enough time to squeeze in a quick reprise of the classic “cybernat hordes forcing X off Twitter” routine.)

It’s not even today’s best breakdown, though.

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Dear “Better Together”,

Today I, a Scotsman, travelled from England to Wales to buy some Irish chocolate. This might not be possible if Scotland becomes independent. (Of course there isn’t any conceivable reason for that to be the case, but – as you know only too clearly – if you put the word “might” in front of scare stories nobody can say you’re actually lying.)

Feel free to use that one. DON’T LET ALEX SALMOND STEAL MY SWEETS.

We were passed this Scottish Government document through our sinister network of cyber-agents, from an operative who wished to remain anonynous. It’s a list of official complaints made about inaccurate and misleading articles in newspapers since the 2011 Holyrood election. As we’re talking about bias today, we offer it up for your perusal and interest. We’re only surprised it’s so short.

The Times got rather huffy with Alex Salmond this week, when in a speech at a Nigg engineering yard the First Minister made the not-entirely-controversial suggestion (or in the Times’ view, “an unprecedented attack”) that the Scottish and UK printed press was biased against the independence movement.

(Or, as the irony-bereft paper impartially put it, “him and his plans for separation”.)

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The Herald publishes a rather interesting story today, revealing that according to professional media analysts Brandwatch, almost three quarters of social media users in Scotland are planning to vote Yes in the referendum.

(For some reason the Herald chose to publish the piece under the headline “Davey doubts Scotland will reach green energy target”, which we’ll put down to the heat, and to emphasise the notion that the high level of support was “despite” the SNP.)

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Scottish nationalist style:

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Former Labour MEP Hugh Kerr in the Herald, 12 Jun 2013:

“I am on holiday in Denmark and independence is the topic all Danes want to discuss when they learn you are from Scotland. I have met no-one yet who is opposed to Scotland’s independence. One said to me yesterday: ‘Surely it is natural to want to run your own affairs, we certainly wouldn’t want to be run by Sweden.’

I have also discussed it with some former colleagues from the European Parliament who are certain Scotland would be warmly welcomed as members of all European institutions; as one put it: ‘After all, you have been members of the EU for 40 years, you are hardly going to be excluded now’.”

To be honest, readers, if Scotland votes No in 2014 our main life priority is going to be developing a convincing Welsh or Irish accent. It’d just be far too embarrassing and depressing to constantly have to try to explain it to the rest of the world otherwise.