It seems that it’s fine to farm important judgments out to mysterious shadowy figures who just make important chunks of them up out of thin air, and then issue them in your own name. Back in your boxes, plebs.
This clip was broadcast on ITV News Wales this week.
It’s a staggeringly obvious mess for a whole raft of reasons – a number of completely spurious, illogical and unsupported claims are accepted as facts without any sort of challenge or balancing voice (which has been standard practice on ITV News for a while now across almost any contentious political topic) – but it led us to somewhere magnitudes of crazier still.
My first ever real experience of politics was playing Dictator.
Originally written by Don Priestley for the Sinclair ZX81 in 1982, it was a simple text-based game which subsequently came to other formats including the Commodore 64, BBC Micro, Elan Enterprise and the ZX Spectrum, which is where I encountered it.
It’s almost – almost – worth voting SNP in May because of this:
Because it would be at least momentarily absolutely hilarious watching Swinney try to explain why his “100% guaranteed” second indyref didn’t happen if the SNP actually did get a majority on 30% of the vote (which is narrowly feasible on current polling).
This week The National published a poll it commissioned from Find Out Now for this May’s Scottish Parliament election, alongside a seat projection from Sir John Curtice. Here are the list-vote figures from the poll.
The seat projection calculated that the election would result in 59 SNP MSPs (six short of the number John Swinney says is the minimum needed to force a second indyref), 25 for Reform, 13 for the Greens, 12 each for Labour and the Tories and eight for the Lib Dems.
It didn’t specify how many of the seats were constituency ones and how many were list ones, so we dropped Sir John a line and asked him.
Yesterday we noted in passing that independence support now outstrips that of the SNP by more than 20 points, making the party into a gigantic liability as the vehicle for enabling Scots to leave the UK. Put simply, even when voters want independence (as most now do), they’re not willing to vote SNP to get it.
(Not, of course, that they WOULD get it if they voted SNP – the party still having no coherent or credible strategy to achieve it – but more than 40% of would-be Yes voters are no longer prepared to even try giving them the benefit of yet another mandate.)
And since what everyone loves most of all on New Year’s Day is a good old wade in some political stats, we thought we’d take a little more detail on that.
Alf Baird on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““I’m every bit as much a Sovereign Scot as you.” In a colonial society there are plenty of assimilated natives…” Jul 23, 22:41
Angus on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““Ain’t it funny how things change?” Ain’t it also funny how things never change? Labour has been promising to abolish…” Jul 23, 22:35
Captain Caveman on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Heh, oh really… Well, I’d “knock it on the head” and quit whilst you’re (self evidently) behind, Confused. 🙂” Jul 23, 22:23
Confused on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “EFTA came up, in the context of GDP/capita – the small, rich countries club – but you realise evil never…” Jul 23, 22:23
Xaracen on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “A, B, C, and E don’t mean anything to you, Aidan, and they don’t have to. They did mean something…” Jul 23, 22:10
Confused on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “you’re a bit of a pedant, and prone to miss the point (like some others round here, the reading age…” Jul 23, 22:05
Confused on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “sure www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5FbYBiJiuA caveman, you’re the kind of turnip a bash on the head might knock some sense into” Jul 23, 22:01
Confused on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Main – the mobile gas van is on route number 6 000 000 as any fule kno” Jul 23, 21:59
sam on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Auld enemy. Different language,they didnae ken. Deid Mum. Divine Right was right up their parliamentary noses. On the plus side…” Jul 23, 21:28
Aidan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “A, B and C don’t mean anything but E is interesting, what proportion of Scots had the vote in 1707…” Jul 23, 21:18
Cynicus on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Alf Baird says: 22 July, 2026 at 4:31 pm There is a long history of elite Scots selling out their…” Jul 23, 21:00
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““The people paid far less in taxes” Sure Xaracen. And not only did we get free cradle to grave benefits…” Jul 23, 20:55
Alf Baird on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Divide an rule is aye the colonizer’s tool. The colonized are made ‘bystanders’ in their own land; they are ‘out…” Jul 23, 20:53
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Assuming rounded populations of England at 50 million and Scotland at 5 million. The political will to address the issue…” Jul 23, 20:47
100%Yes on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “What John Swinney has just signed Scotland over to Manchester and he’d doesn’t even know what powers the Scottish parliament…” Jul 23, 20:45
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Oddly enough, that greater trust in Scottish governments peaked under Nicola Sturgeon during the Covid Years. Nowadays, the ex party…” Jul 23, 20:35
100%Yes on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Wings predicted on here and by people posting on here as well. But the SNP commitment to the union has…” Jul 23, 20:29
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““proselytising religions” Naw. A proselytising religion is one where its adherents chap your door, earnestly attempt to tell you the…” Jul 23, 20:24
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Havers, Mark. Check out the front lines (and the combat casualty lists) from the war in the east. You’ll find…” Jul 23, 20:09
Mark Beggan on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Why not. No one else wants the job. What about asking Jack McConnell to step in.” Jul 23, 20:06
sam on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-social-attitudes-survey-2025-core-module/pages/5/ Factchecker. Link above. Of interest to me, the steep decline in trust of the Scottish government since 2015. Signs…” Jul 23, 19:55
Xaracen on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““What made Scotland “much better” before 1707, Xaracen?” A, it was independent, B, it wasn’t a colony of England, C,…” Jul 23, 19:29
Hatey McHateface on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Sorry, Alf, but I’m every bit as much a Sovereign Scot as you. What have I already told you about…” Jul 23, 19:15
factchecker on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “sam, my comment on the uncontextualised use of survey data relates to the original post. Not the survey itself. Hence…” Jul 23, 18:18
factchecker on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Dan, regarding the much-quoted “Union of Equals” that I know is such a popular trope, I am unaware of any…” Jul 23, 18:12
sam on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “Don’t forget the colonisation of Ireland by the Scots and English. James granted confiscated land from Irish Catholics to Protestant…” Jul 23, 18:06
Young Lochinvar on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “FC Apology accepted. Always laugh when those who know their wordsmithery isn’t cutting it feel the need to conclude with…” Jul 23, 17:49
sam on Ain’t it funny how things change?: ““The original question and comment on the survey data still stand.” Why don’t you look it up for yourself and…” Jul 23, 17:42
factchecker on Ain’t it funny how things change?: “YL, the third person usage was simply because I don’t know you. As a literature graduate I am well aware…” Jul 23, 17:30
