The great unknown in the SNP leadership contest is an extremely significant one: who are the voters? Nobody but Peter Murrell really knows how many members the party has, but almost nobody believes the claimed number of over 100,000. (Our guess, based on pretty much nothing but a gut feeling, is 75,000 plus or minus 5000.)
But more to the point, nobody knows who they are. The average member age in most political parties is over 50, and according to figures published in 2019, more than 80% of SNP members are over 40, with half of those being over 60. There’s also an almost 3:2 bias in favour of men.
Humza Yousaf will not be the next First Minister of Scotland. We’re calling it now. His trainwreck of a performance on last night’s leadership election debate on STV dealt a blow to his chances that we can’t see him recovering from, and the SNP establishment is now under such intense scrutiny over the electoral process that the chances of a fix being orchestrated by Peter Murrell are receding fast.
In the debate Yousaf declared that Nicola Sturgeon was the best politician in the UK, that he wasn’t as good as her, and that she’d failed to find a successful strategy for independence and therefore he couldn’t either.
If you’re talking about “transwomen”, you’re almost always talking about people with a fully intact and functional penis. More than 95% of people who identify as trans have NOT undergone any genital surgery, and that’s a fact that’s still not widely understood.
We must admit it’s a shock – we were expecting the SNP President to remain neutral in the leadership election – but it’s hard to reasonably interpret this any other way.
(We’re not aware of Russell giving any media interviews last night so we assume from the timing that these comments were made at the regular meeting of the SNP Westminster Parliamentary group.)
Because both Humza Yousaf and Kate Forbes couldn’t have been any clearer that their indy strategies centre on getting Westminster to agree to another Section 30 order, and by pointing out that that’s never going to happen (which we all knew anyway), Mike Russell is admitting that a vote for anyone but Ash Regan is a vote to surrender any hope of independence for the foreseeable future.
We don’t often agree with him these days, but on this one he couldn’t be more right. For the sake of the SNP (and the Yes movement) we hope its members heed the sage, albeit coded, advice of their President.
Last month this site ran an article entitled “All The Nice Greens Love A Rapist”, and two days ago the Scottish version of the party officially confirmed it.
Let’s take a moment off, folks. In our latest Panelbase poll, we also threw in a question just for fun, with genuinely no agenda at all, simply because we were curious to know what the answer was. Here it is:
By now many of you will have seen last night’s article on Craig Murray’s site, in which a current SNP branch convener revealed how the party machine is setting fire to all its own rules in a desperate attempt to secure the succession of Humza Yousaf.
Yousaf is the party establishment’s last hope of keeping all of its misdeeds in the last few years under wraps, and realising the magnitude of what’s at stake if he loses to Ash Regan or Kate Forbes, they’re abandoning all pretence of neutrality or integrity and throwing everything they’ve got at getting him elected.
Last month Wings broke a story about a “survey” being conducted by dozens of primary schools in the Aberdeen area in which children as young as nine were being asked about their sexual orientation and “gender identity”.
The charity LGBT Youth Scotland is currently the subject of a live police investigation over its involvement in a second major child-abuse scandal in little over a decade.
So you’d expect Police Scotland to be taking that pretty seriously, right?
factchecker on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Some good news today. “…a spokesman for the Scottish government said: “Our economy is one of the best performing parts…” Jul 25, 18:41
Spartan 117 on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Few things worse in life than “Socialists” who at the slightest sniff of power dig in and engorge themselves at…” Jul 25, 18:23
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “@Alf Re your wish list at 4:08. Surely the most third-rate economist would understand that the feasibility and profitability of…” Jul 25, 18:11
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Some great comments today. There remains but for Wally W. Walrus to expectorate partly masticated rotting fish guts over it…” Jul 25, 17:50
Young Lochinvar on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “On a cheerier note. Listening to Smooth Radio the hourly newsreader had me smiling, for all the world her rendition…” Jul 25, 16:37
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““ By definition, it is surely a rhetorical question also, since I am hardly likely to have published work on…” Jul 25, 16:32
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “@Alf – firstly, that is a description of (in your own terms) how GDP growth could be delivered, it’s not…” Jul 25, 16:29
Alf Baird on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““Scotland’s output would double” Near neighbour high-GDP sovereign states with similar or far lesser resources illustrate that a major increase…” Jul 25, 16:08
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““So who do we believe?” 😀 😀 😀 And on that bombshell, time for a Negroni I think. Saluti! 🙂” Jul 25, 16:02
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Indeed Dan – it’s a case of: – the independently audited figures show one thing; – the (former) head of…” Jul 25, 15:51
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Indeed Dan – it’s a case of: – the independently audited figures show one thing; – the (former) head of…” Jul 25, 15:51
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “@Northy “First, questioning someone’s published work isn’t a demand for credentials; it’s very often a request for clarity about the…” Jul 25, 15:42
Dan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Waiting on new boys CC and AIdan pulling up Stu for posting this “shite” back in the day… https://wingsoverscotland.com/on-our-own-two-feet/” Jul 25, 15:33
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “@Alf – I’ve published work on a range of subjects, but my work, unlike yours, isn’t written starting with the…” Jul 25, 15:02
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “@Alf – Scotland’s GDP per capita is around the same as neighbouring countries like Finland and Belgium, and above almost…” Jul 25, 14:49
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “@Confused – comedy gold from someone who thinks that incorporating a network of companies makes any person or enterprise “tax…” Jul 25, 14:44
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““So that’s a big ‘naw’ then, ye’ve nivver published hee-haw aboot onythin.” Heh. Well, I’ve written countless landmark technical reports…” Jul 25, 14:35
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “@Alf What has per capita GDP got to do with being “rich”? Especially if comparing the UK (and by extension…” Jul 25, 14:32
Alf Baird on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “““the rich”” i.e. normal developed sovereign countries (GDP per capita, 2025, US$: Statista): Ireland – $130,650 Switzerland – $115,620 Singapore…” Jul 25, 14:08
sam on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Jim Cuthberts academic qualifications, his work experience in the Scottish office and elsewhere puts him head, shoulders, torso, pelvis, legs…” Jul 25, 14:06
sam on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “This is what I said above in my reply to Factchecker. “His point is not that more powers have been…” Jul 25, 13:38
Alf Baird on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““I never claimed to have my own work” So that’s a big ‘naw’ then, ye’ve nivver published hee-haw aboot onythin.…” Jul 25, 13:24
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Good points, eloquently raised. Well debated. 🙂 I’m walking the dog and have to do some shopping, but will come…” Jul 25, 13:06
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““More bullshit about tax from the resident fuckbrains. – the rich don’t pay taxes. They never did.” Well, the forum…” Jul 25, 12:40
Northcode on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “You’ve raised several points, but they rest on assumptions that don’t quite align with the structure of the discussion. “Ah,…” Jul 25, 12:38
Confused on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “More bullshit about tax from the resident fuckbrains. – the rich don’t pay taxes. They never did. (And the french…” Jul 25, 12:20
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Ah, the old “where’s your own work” deflection. How weak. I never claimed to have my own work (self published…” Jul 25, 11:39