Sometimes we can hardly stand it 173
Posted on
January 17, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Search Results
The Ballad Of The Glyph 167
Posted on
January 17, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We listened to an interesting chat on Good Morning Scotland earlier today (it’s right at the start, just after the news) featuring Gerry Hassan and the sharp New Statesman reporter Stephen Bush, which briefly discussed a curious political phenomenon of the 2000s where people said they liked certain policies until they were told they were Tory policies, at which point their opinions changed.
It put us rather in mind of a classic 2000AD comic strip called The Ballad Of Halo Jones, and in particular a short episode from it about a character called The Glyph, which seemed to us to sum up the current dilemma facing the Labour Party on both sides of the border – but especially in Scotland, as was rather strikingly illustrated by a revealing interview with Kezia Dugdale on Friday.
So we thought we’d share it with you, because sometimes pictures say a thousand words. Especially if there are several of them and they also have words on them.
The Eye Of Reality 200
Posted on
January 16, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
With little in the way of news to chew on, the Scottish political blogosphere has begun to eat itself of late, with an exhausting number of articles on popular sites about how an SNP list vote is a wasted vote and anyone thinking of voting for the Nats in both constituency and region is a deluded cultist/simple-witted idiot (mostly written by candidates/supporters of other parties who are often not identified as such), and now some angry pieces from disgruntled SNP supporters making the opposite point.
All are based, from one perspective or another, on opinion polls and seat predictions based on those polls, some of which appear to be based on very shaky premises.
We’ve already broken down the mechanics of the Scottish electoral system at very considerable length, so readers will be relieved that we’re not going to get into that again. Instead, we thought we’d take a very specific region-by-region look at the scale of the task facing the fringe parties.
Polls Comments Off on Polls
Posted on
January 15, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
A hard rain falls 257
Posted on
January 12, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Joan McAlpine, SNP MSP for the South of Scotland, extensively documented at the weekend the obstructiveness of Labour councillors in Dumfries and Galloway, who in an attempt to score some SNP BAD points were refusing to inform their constituents about the Scottish Government’s £1500-per-household flood relief grants to help people cope after recent storms.
The councillors eventually backed down and informed hard-pressed householders and businesses of the help available, but today the issue was debated on the floor of the Holyrood chamber, and when Labour once again tried to make the issue party political, the Deputy First Minister ran out of patience.
We had a lot of requests for the footage, so there it is.
The ambulance chasers 302
Posted on
January 11, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The art of the filibuster 249
Posted on
January 10, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
This is what a man who REALLY doesn’t want to answer a question looks like.
The shifting foundations 201
Posted on
January 08, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
As we noted on Tuesday, Scottish Labour’s opening election salvo for 2016 has been to blame the Scottish Government for unaffordable house prices.
Of the 450 most obvious flaws in that argument, not least the extraordinary efforts a 13-year Labour government went to to keep the housing bubble inflated, the one that caught our eye was that in the past three years we were regularly told of one thing that definitely WOULD bring prices down dramatically, but which Labour pathologically fought every step of the way.
The judgement of silence 220
Posted on
January 06, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
We suppose we shouldn’t technically be surprised that today’s newspapers carry no analysis whatsoever of Kezia Dugdale’s big speech yesterday detailing Scottish Labour’s first big election pledge – a £6000 handout to first-time home buyers.
After all, current polling suggests Scottish Labour have about as much chance of exerting any influence in the next Scottish Parliament as Lemmy has of posthumously winning the Eurovision Song Contest, so it doesn’t really matter if Kezia Dugdale promises every voter a free unicorn made of diamonds and glitter.
Still, if only for the mental exercise, it’s worth taking a look in detail.
Kezia For Independence 149
Posted on
January 05, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
The tweets below are all genuine, and taken from the Scottish Labour Twitter account earlier today during its live-tweeting of Kezia Dugdale’s speech. We’ve rarely heard a more compelling and concise argument for a Yes vote. We take our hats off to her.
Clickbait corner 68
Posted on
January 05, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
It’s always good to see someone take a strong moral stand.
When indeed, eh?
The sewer press 261
Posted on
January 05, 2016 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
So, this appeared in the Herald today:
And that’s a problem, because it’s a complete and utter lie.
