We had to be out most of yesterday, so we didn’t have time to cover a story which broke in the morning in several UK papers. 24 hours later, though, we can still find no mention of it in the Scottish media, which remains fully occupied in filling its pages with recycled wittering drivel about the pound.
This is a worrying state of affairs, because yesterday’s story is of direct concern to an awful lot more Scots than a hypothetical scaremongering fantasy about currency.
Weirdly, the front-page lead story of today’s Herald newspaper is (at the time of writing) completely absent from the online edition. We did a little digging and found that it had been somehow fused into a piece about three women and a baby being involved in a car crash, with no text.
Hopefully the Herald will fix the glitch soon, but in the meantime we’ve managed to get a hold of this low-resolution but (just barely) legible image.
Our survey of Scottish political website readership closed last night, and the results are in. And we must admit, we really didn’t see this one coming.
Remarkably, the winner of the poll – excellent news resource BBC Scotlandshire – was on 0 votes the day before voting closed, largely because we’d forgotten to include it. But to our surprise, in the small hours of the morning a whopping 1,011 votes arrived out of nowhere – or more specifically, according to our IP tracking, from a single building close to the Scottish Parliament in Holyrood.
When we checked, we found that it was the headquarters of a smaller and more amateurish news-reporting organisation, so we assume that lots of employees working the late shift had all decided to vote to express their admiration for a respected rival at once. (Curiously all from the same computer, and now we come to think about it, several hours after the poll had in fact closed.)
An alert reader pointed something interesting out to us this morning. STV News, the Telegraph and the Paisley Daily Express all carry an almost word-for-word-identical story (the only one with a byline is the Telegraph’s version, which credits it to the grumpy-looking Josie Ensor), all three of them headlined with slight variations on the phrase “Over 60 per cent unconvinced on Scottish independence”.
It refers to a poll conducted for the “Better Together” campaign, and reports its findings accurately. Or to be more precise, reports some of its findings.
We stumbled across this quite by accident yesterday. We think you’ll enjoy it.
The clip is from last year, and was aired on Canadian national news channel Sun News. Douglas Murray is a British writer who claims to be half-Scottish on account of unspecified links to Unionist breeding ground the Isle of Lewis, popular haunt of No-camp luminaries like Alistair Darling, virulent Labour anti-devolutionist Brian Wilson and controversial “Better Together” donor Ian Taylor.
Murray studied at Eton and Oxford and writes for august UK journals like the Spectator and Guardian, as well as appearing on numerous BBC political shows. For some reason, the Canadians consider him an expert on Scottish politics, qualified to inform and enlighten their viewers. See what you think.
The Scottish Co-operative Party’s 2011 manifesto is one full of co-operative and mutual solutions to the challenges faced in Scotland, issues of independence, devolution or the constitutional settlement did not feature. The annual Co-operative Party conference has passed motions which promote a view of Scotland playing a vital role in a United Kingdom.
We have noted the personal comments made by Mary Lockhart, a long serving Co-operative Party and Labour Party member. Mary has been a great advocate for co-operative and mutual solutions. Whilst we recognise that members of political parties hold differing, sometimes opposite, positions the views Mary has expressed are not shared by the Party. Mary has offered her resignation from the role of Chair of the Scottish Co-operative Party and the Scottish Executive committee has accepted this.“
The BBC’s flagship satirical programme “Have I Got News For You” is, of course, comedy. The tone of the opening minutes of last night’s episode was a little uglier and nastier than the usual friendly inter-regional jibes (normally delivered by the likes of Jeremy Clarkson and accompanied by rebukes from the rest of the panel), but it really wasn’t anything to get overly worked up about. Comedy isn’t always cuddly.
It must have been a little uncomfortable for the No camp, though.
Hang on. The heart of the latest No campaign/media scare story is that the enormous pension deficit currently looming over the UK like a great big multi-billion-pound fiscal sword of Damocles (but which everyone is feverishly avoiding looking at) will become much more urgent in the event of Scottish independence, because according to EU rules “cross-border” pensions can’t just boot the problem into the long grass for years, and have to ensure any shortfall is funded immediately.
EU rules? But haven’t the Unionists spent most of the last six months telling us that an independent Scotland wouldn’t be an EU member, and would have to wait years at the back of the queue to join as a new country? Phew! Problem solved!
We already know that the No camp has, shall we say, a bit of difficulty when it comes to basic arithmetic. But rarely do they demonstrate it so eagerly as they did last night.
We very much appreciate their helping to make our job easier.
Dalif on The Plague: “You must have some amazing blood pressure medication after all that. Anyway, that was a great read.” Aug 5, 00:00
Young Lochinvar on The Plague: “Mrs YL asked what skin moisturisers he’s using, as they clearly aren’t helping..” Aug 4, 23:59
Hatey McHateface on The Plague: “There’s always a silver lining, though. Nobody’s claiming Fanon has the answer to this one.” Aug 4, 23:30
Angus on The Plague: “Police harassment of innocent citizens only happens in a police state. Most of the freedoms hard gained in the last…” Aug 4, 22:51
Jay on The Plague: “Aidan at 9:30pm. No reply facility at your ‘MI5?’ comment. Who knows? The Watson nightmare saga almost beggars belief. It…” Aug 4, 22:44
Jay on The Plague: “Ian, yuou laft out part of the tweet, “….for all I care”. That omission is the act of either a…” Aug 4, 22:27
dearieme on The Plague: “I suppose the days are long gone when you could ask “Under which statute, officer?”. Well done to you for…” Aug 4, 22:10
Aidan on The Plague: “That this was coordinated by MI5?” Aug 4, 21:30
Ross on The Plague: “This is absolutely disgraceful. Whatever else the call at 1,30am is so unneccessary as to be vexatious in itself. Hope…” Aug 4, 21:14
David G on The Plague: “I dread to think what the police do to people who don’t say anything in response to the request that…” Aug 4, 21:05
Frank Waring on The Plague: “I remember reading, I think in Tom Driberg’s ‘Ruling Passions’, that in the 1930’s and 40’s ambitious young police constables…” Aug 4, 21:04
Jay on The Plague: “Aidan: it is necessary to know where Watson made his ‘input’ to the law enforcement system and which officer decided…” Aug 4, 21:00
Jay on The Plague: “Ian Morrison: it would be interesting to learn the basis upon which you think that the Lucy Connolly tweet called…” Aug 4, 20:49
A2 on The Plague: “Wait…. Joined the dots, He was Living in Dunfermline?” Aug 4, 20:49
Hatey McHateface on The Plague: “Plausible. There’s plenty of evidence too about the woke subversion of the police. From taking the knee about Floyd, to…” Aug 4, 20:21
Old Bill on The Plague: “Spot on, El President, you’d rightly consider locking up someone battering on doors in the middle of the night. General…” Aug 4, 20:17
Hatey McHateface on The Plague: “Sorry, Ian, but I can only assume you refer to a migrant as a hotel. Nobody else does. Must be…” Aug 4, 20:12
Hatey McHateface on The Nobodies: “Another surge in Indy support at 6:59 pm. Up another 5% since yesterday. I’m gonna lobby to get Scotland’s national…” Aug 4, 20:00
Ian Morrison on The Plague: ““Set fire to all the hotels full of the bastards”. Direct quote from the tweet. I now look forward to…” Aug 4, 19:57
Hatey McHateface on The Plague: “There can no longer be any doubt that in the U.K., ordinary law abiding people are now at the mercy…” Aug 4, 19:50
robertkknight on The Plague: “Somewhere in Avon and Somerset a village is missing its idiot. Clue…they were last seen wearing a Police uniform.” Aug 4, 19:40
Carol Neil on The Plague: “Jfc ,how much more !” Aug 4, 19:32
Aidan on The Plague: “The amazing thing here is that they’ve obviously read your blog posts and yet none of that appeared to ring…” Aug 4, 19:25
Wulls on The Plague: “I thought he was in the process of being tagged as a vexatious litigant ???” Aug 4, 19:14
Hatey McHateface on The Plague: “Sorry to be an irritant in Wokeland, Ian, but Connolly didn’t call for anybody to be burned alive. Why don’t…” Aug 4, 19:04
James on The Nobodies: “Ooh…concerted effort from the 3 Tenors/ sorry wankers. But the sad fact for these ****s is that Scotland still hates…” Aug 4, 18:59
Tinto Chiel on Off-topic: “Those who are interested in S. Salyers’ constitutional campaign might find this interesting: www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5jXpFrZgIU” Aug 4, 18:47
rouebadly on The Plague: “There is a question here to all his former colleagues: Why did you stay silent? The man is clearly a…” Aug 4, 18:39
Nicky T Naquetti on The Plague: “In pre-Communist China, the Imperial eunuchs were a protected clique, and to pour scorn upon them was treated like an…” Aug 4, 18:37
sarah on The Plague: “@ John Cleary – good on you for trying.” Aug 4, 18:34
