Squealing for fame
The National has an “EXCLUSIVE” story today.
We think you’re meant to be outraged.
We’ve got 60 seconds to spare, so let’s do the sums.
– Measuring by the most generous possible criterion available (counting Holyrood list votes, rather than constituency ones, hybrid totals or Westminster ones), the Scottish Greens are supported by 8.1% of the Scottish population.
– Scotland has 8.2% of the population of the UK.
– That means the Scottish Greens are supported by [0.81 x 0.82 =] 0.66% of the UK electorate, (Question Time is specifically a UK politics show. Scotland has its own separate and additional political debate show, Debate Night).
– There are on average just under 39 episodes of Question Time a year.
This means that to be represented in proportion to their support, which is the show’s stated principle, the Scottish Greens should be on once every 151.52 episodes, which at 38.8 episodes a year means once every 3.91 years.
So if they were on the 22 April 2021 episode, which they were, the BBC won’t be overdue looking out Patrick Harvie’s special booster cushion for another appearance until 17 March 2025.
The National is currently offering prospective readers a full year’s subscription for less than 2p a week. Frankly, folks, anyone taking up the deal is being robbed.
It is an injustice………………….said no one!
So The BBC has finally done us all a favour? LOL!
“The National is currently offering prospective readers a full year’s subscription for less than 2p a week. Frankly, folks, anyone taking up the deal is being robbed.”
Hear! Hear!
You’re good at maths, I’m not!
So thanks for this
C
Do you remember that when the Lib Dems where the 3rd largest party they had a representative on Question just most weeks.
Since SNP became third? Maybe 1 in 10?
Just seen this-
https://nursingnotes.co.uk/news/nurses-can-leave-if-they-want-to-they-have-already-had-a-pay-rise-says-therese-coffey/
Tory minister coffee says if nurses want to leave because they can’t afford to stay then leave.
Already short of 50,000 nurses mainly due to Tory policies they don’t mind if you are dying and can’t be nurses because they are loaded. They can buy nursing anywhere.
Is this the cunning plan to finally sell off the NHS to the American companies rich Tories can invest in?
Since Tory austerity kicked in nurses seen inflation give them a 15% pay cut.
New proposals put forward another 7% cut.
Why would the hero’s, some of whom died thru lack of PPE and who saved Boris after years of staff shortages and underinvestment deserve not to continue being worse off and have greater workloads?
We still have filthy rich Tories in the country who are not yet stinking filthy rich.
Get you priorities right nurses.
Harvey. Seen less times than a pooka.
Reminds me of a film I think!! Xmas must be coming.
As the Rev mentioned,,, The National are offering a years subscription for £1.
Sign up and tell wee ginger dug exactly what you think of his undying support for Sturgeon.
Or tell the SNP flock, who fill the comments pages, where they are going wrong.
Basically, sign up and upset the cosy SNP/Sturgeon love-in.
Tell them that life will go on (for the better), if Sturgeon resigns.
£1 a year to talk to the very people who are keeping Sturgeon in power, and maybe convince them that ditching Sturgeon is the only way out of this nightmare.
The front page of McPrävda this morning talks of “fresh doubts” regarding the impartiality of BBC Question Time. FFS! There are nae doots. That ship sailed with the Arc.
NuSNP continues to collaborate with this unionist propaganda exercise. They ken weal whit their daein’.
We’ve got the Irish Parliamentary Party when we need Sinn Féin.
Scottish Greens are the Remora fish of Scottish politics… three decades swimming in the SNP’s slipstream hoping to pick up a few votes.
Don’t know why they bother TBH… Sturgeon’s SNP has morphed into the Greens, just a more Woke version! I take it nobody has bothered to tell Harvie etc.
O/T
I can’t get my head around the decision by the Tories to RAISE Corporation Tax from 19% to 25%.
I would have thought that the Tories are meant to be the Party for small businesses and would want to do all they can to help them out in these difficult times.
So why the big fight within the Party to RAISE it.
I’m not getting that one.
Dear oh dear oh dear. The Rev’s counting has revealed just how inconsequential Patrick Harvie and the Scottish Greens are.
Mind you, the SNP are pretty inconsequential too when you come to think about.
They say a country gets the politicians it deserves…not sure about that when Scotland has the current open-ended list system.
Thon pair o’ dunderheids look like FE college admin types and yet they are in govt…sort of.
Perhaps the National’s indignation about bias by omission would be a little less hypocritical if they didn’t do they same with news about Alba, ISP, salvo.scot, SSRG, Hope over Fear, etc, etc.
Willie.
Talking of the swings and roundabouts on political parties in the whole of Britain is inconsequental.
They all appear to be working for themselves and are quite happy to take it in turns whom wins as long as it retains the status quo and system of yo yo politics.
We did not vote the Greens in in Scotland, nor have we voted in Tories, but here they are running Scotland along with the SNP.
In England the people voted in BJ ,
but here they are with Liz Truss. With whispers in the wind of changing the leader again in Westminstir.
Why do people on either side of the border believe that voting in this country is democratic, I begin to wonder,
Our votes are minipulated and discarded,
Think to get the sums right, you need to divide the time difference between appearances by the number of representatives on each show. All that does show is that they might have deserved one appearance in the time. Nothing to get excited about (unless you compare with farage).
Look at these two – imagine the babies they would make!
– warped, twisted, abominations, island of dr moreau meets hieronymous bosch; would make the pope “pro choice”
Every time I see these two I think someone has fucked with the aspect ratio on my monitor – she too tall, he too small – but together you realise this is correct; it is really sad when an actual woman looks like a tranny and he the offspring of gollum and mr potato-head; politics is showbiz for ugly people, right enough.
Rab Davis,
The Tories Collapsing economy synchronised with the rest of europe and other western countries.
It not just in America that your food source is being reduced by impoverising farmers through fuel and climate change policies, to make farmers unable to produce food, it is happening in sweden, holland, germany and Britain,
Then the governments and the wealthy are buying the farm land up,
Politics is bigger than Scotland or Britain, it has gone global,
Where will your food be coming from in the future?
If farmers are outed around the world, who will have the sole source of control over food supplies?
Who will have ultimate control of food prices?
Carbon foot print of cattle is false information,
Cattle and deer, moose, etc have roamed this earth for millions of years, think of the millions buffalo on the American plains that used to lived happily without damaging the climate,
This is what has happened with energy and fuel prices being deliberately maintained at high levels has little to do with the proxy war, but the decision of global climate Change policy on farmers.
This manipulation change can also be observed in the housing market bubble globally, Only a few at the top are mortgage free while owning a number of properties, plus second holiday houses, for instance like Stanley johnstone properties, here and in Greece.
While the average man are struggling with mortgage payments and or high rents.
This will happen with those whom are able to afford a car soon, besides fuel pricing and availibility of fuel, there are a number af changes and new restrictions taken place in licencing authority departments of governments.
The global climate change policy for reducing your carbon foot print by changing to electric vehicles does not make sense if the prices of electric are then hiked up by corporations and allowed by governments.
So you’re food price are rising,
So you’re electric bill is rising.
So your vehicle fuel prices are rising.
So you’re mortgage prices are rising.
Across the europe and the western world.
The price of travel is rising in general for us all.
You do normally have two or three politicians on a show, so would that be once every 1.3 – 2 years?
One world policies are destroying the western world and europe.
Kraftykris.
The politicians are the entertainment show. It keeps you in the bubble.
‘The markets have taken back control: so much for the delusions of Brexit’
“We haven’t seen this kind of trade deficit since 1955, since national account records began.” It was odd, because I too had been thinking about the mid-1950s, specifically the Suez crisis of 1956. The failure of that military adventure is now seen as the moment when a bucket of cold reality was thrown into Britain’s face, a humiliation that stripped the country of its imperial delusions, forcing it to accept that it was no longer a global superpower that could act alone. For a while, Britain learned that lesson: just five years after Suez, the country was knocking on Europe’s door, asking to join the club.”
“But some, especially in the Conservative party, never shook off the old delusion. By 2016, it was back, the Tories high on Brexit talk of a global Britain once again sailing the world’s oceans, free of the constraining hand of the EU, ready to return to its rightful grandeur. The Tories have been breathing those fumes for six years, and the Truss-Kwarteng mini-budget was the result: the Suez of economic policy, a disastrous act of imagined imperial sovereignty.”
https://archive.ph/WNday
I’d love to be invited onto Question Time myself, just for the divine pleasure of telling them to Xxxx off!
@Breeks
Self identify as a yoon rather than a WoS moonhowler and you’ll be a shoe-in mate. It worked for yon britnat that appeared on several shows in the past.
Mind you if using expletives was all that it took, Ruby would be more of a fixture on there than that bam Farage used to be!
As I posted t’other day when you look at these clowns when the TV cameras do a pan of the holyrude chamber I honestly have to ask myself , do people vote for these morons seriously to govern our country or are they just having a laugh , ripping the pish out of voters who CAN see the truth
It is bad enough being Scottish and trying to forgive your fellow Scots for being stupid enough to vote for these scum , but it is another thing realising that this is how the world perceives Scots to be
I am so not giving a fuck for those Wokists.
The Scottish Greens conference is this weekend, Patrick Harvie MSP was appointed as the Minister for Zero Carbon Buildings, Active Travel and Tenants’ Rights in September 2021.
I couldn’t care less if the Scottish Greens, don’t appear on the Britnat QT show that is regularly stuffed with unionists orange jacket man being a prime example, I don’t even bother watching it now.
AS for Harvey and his party, they’re ultra woke, and spew the same carrot dangling shit about Scottish independence as the SNP.
Here’s one for those who have been following developments during the week re Pfizer.
I was just about to write to my MEP to ask that they support their colleagues on this, then I remembered… (facepalm)
Ach well, at least we’re lucky that so many MEPs have such a good command of English. As well as balls.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jTgDj7uiX8
I posted what follows below on the btl comments to the previous article, on ‘The Totally Normal Country’, not realising that a new article had been added and everyone had, naturally enough, moved there. Since it’s mainly about ‘the normal’ it fitted better there, but I think it also fits to some extent here, at least with some of the comments.
Please feel entirely free – I know everyone does anyway – to scroll past and ignore. But do have a look at what Andy Ellis said at 3.55 on the previous post: it is indeed interesting.
Here is what I said at 6.04 pm today on the previous post:
Thank you for that post, Andy Ellis, at 3.55 pm. I don’t always find myself in agreement with you when I read what you say, and I have to admit I often skim past (you are entitled to do the same with me, and no doubt do so – which is fair play, absolutely), but that quote is very interesting indeed. I hope others take note. Thank you again.
Someone above (Gregor maybe?) noted that Wee Nic said the following: ‘…a return to normal as we knew it is not on the cards in the near future…” This makes me wonder what wee Nic means by ‘a return to normal as we know it’. It also makes me wonder who is meant by ‘we’ in that quote. Is it the ‘royal WE’ (‘we Nic’)?
So, question to wee / we Nic, albeit with a change of pronoun (if that is not yet against the law of the land (in Nic’s NewLand): How can you (or anyone) ‘return to normal’ if you have never been ‘normal’ in the first place? Surely you can only return to somewhere you have been before.
The new-norms in NewScotland seem almost entirely abnormal to me. I suspect to many, even most others as well.
The ‘normal as we knew it’seems like some hazy memory left over from a distant past.
Even if in fact it was only a few short years ago.
Sorry about that.
But it’ll happen to you too, hen.
Hence, SAY ‘BYE BYE’ TO THE NORMAL
The ‘normal as we knew it won’t be back’ –
The global forums, as we know ’em, had it hacked!
‘They can’t have that!’ they said, ‘It’s really gor-ra go!
For what’s most normal is the deadly foe
Of what they’re gonna get,
From our big-worrld re-set,
Which you, We(e) Nic – for them – accept.
‘For, in our giant Spider-web,
They’re all, wee flies, as good as dead.
And so are you, Twee Nic: To us you’re wed,
For us, you led, … and hold them fast,
You tied and lashed them to your mast…
Which is ours, in fact. Where truth and freedom die,
As does the normal, … passing by.
I also suggested an alternative last line, which might be better, as follows:
As does the normal, … Swallowed up … by our Big Lie!’
“MHAIRI BLack has challenged the Scottish Conservatives to “grow a backbone” and join mounting calls for Liz Truss to resign.”
Yet here we are eight years after the indyref with all that’s went on notably Brexit, and we’re not one step closer to dissolving this putrid union with Sturgeon the betrayer at the helm, and not ONE SNP MSP or MP has had a backbone to call for Sturgeon to go, instead the spineless and gutless SNP MSPs MPs (including Black) have kept their heads down and their snout pressed firmly into the taxpayers trough.
Black has the preposterous title at Westminster of The SNP shadow secretary for Scotland, of course she can organise for drag queens to enter primary schools in Scotland, but she can’t confront the betrayer on why she hasn’t gotten us out of this rancid union.
Even more astonishing is the SNP MSPs that stood down at the last Holyrood elections, not one, has opened up on what the hell has happened to this once Scottish independence party, they’ve all kept quiet, as Scotland circles the plughole under Sturgeon.
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fnews%2F23051816.snp-mp-mhairi-black-challenges-scottish-tories-back-liz-truss-resignation-calls%2F
@wull (6.36) –
Thanks for reposting your comment. As you say, many of us would have missed it.
‘…a return to normal as we knew it is not on the cards in the near future…”
Do you know where that comment is from? Could it have been her conference speech? She did raise the spectre of ‘the bug’ coming back and took the opportunity to tell us all to get our booster, so it may have been from the same segment.
It would be useful to see the original context because that quote, if accurate, is pretty sinister stuff.
😉
Holy Crap the Labour Party really are the UK branch of the Democratic Party of the USA – AKA, The War Party,
Labour’s defence plan would show it is the true party of Nato, says John Healey, https://archive.ph/3zIfO
Sturgeon better be quick and deal herself back in by being the first to ask for preemptive strikes against Russia – oh, wait, Zelensky asked for that last week.
@James Che – good to see that you realise there can be no movement on independence until the current “rulz-based order” is put out of everyone else’s misery.
Want action on climate change? Vote to ban private jets then stand back and watch the fireworks.
@wull
I don’t always find myself in agreement with you when I read what you say, and I have to admit I often skim past (you are entitled to do the same with me, and no doubt do so – which is fair play, absolutely), but that quote is very interesting indeed. I hope others take note. Thank you again.
You’re right it is fair play. There are a fair few I scroll past, some I will read more often than not, some I’ll only interact with if they say something particularly egregious. Dunno which category you fit in to, but TBH I don’t particularly recognise the moniker, so who knows?
As to whether those who could do with being educated take note, I’d say the jury is still out. The experience of the past few years is hardly encouraging given the frankly abysmal standard of some of the output some feel free to scatter gun this place with. As a wise man once observed if you can make people believe absurdities…..
@ Ian B
There’s plenty hits on google for the phrase on 23rd April 2020
They Live:
“They Live is a 1988 American satirical science fiction action film…
…the film follows an unnamed drifter who discovers through special sunglasses that the ruling class are aliens concealing their appearance and manipulating people to consume, breed, and conform to the status quo via subliminal messages in mass media…”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Live
World Economic Forum (2016): Agenda:
Think globally, act locally to meet development goals:
https://archive.ph/V0s7y
Scottish Green Party: The Scottish Greens Local Election Manifesto 2022:
Think Global, Act Local:
https://archive.ph/GDvyp
World Economic Forum (2020): Building Back Better: Action Plan: White Paper:
https://archive.ph/AcOaU
Scottish Green Party: Build Back Better campaign:
“…To inform the next phase of this campaign, Patrick wants to hear from people..”:
https://archive.ph/8H0Yc
@Stuart MacKay 6.58 pm
I’m genuinely interested, how many votes do you think there are amongst the Scots electorate in general and the pro-independence camp in particular in a non-NATO stance as a platform?
I mean, I know fluffing for Vlad has it’s hard core supporters BTL here, but I’ve seen zero evidence that the bulk of Scots aren’t overwhelmingly behind a broadly Atlanticist foreign and security policy, however hard some people wish it was otherwise.
Irish style neutrality is going to be a pretty hard sell given the decision of Sweden and Finland to abandon their long established neutral stances and join NATO.
@gregor (7.35) –
As chance would have it I watched They Live a couple of weeks ago. It hasn’t aged that well tbh, but it’s typical John Carpenter stuff, some great actors, set-pieces, and weirdly effective music.
It was filmed around the time when Reaganomics was really hitting the US working class and some of the cityscapes are genuinely grim. (Looks like it’s all happening again.)
On a more positive note, it has one of the best fistfights of all time!
🙂
Politicians behave like celebrities because it suits the media to promote them as such, and it endorses the ‘class system’; Deference to ‘your betters’ is as much the English way as hanging on in quiet desperation.
Guest spots in the papers and touring TV/radio studios on a daily basis promotes them way above their authority – so-called Parliamentary sovereignty only exists within that place. Words spoken outwith are meaningless in law, but can and influence the markets, electorate etc. It’s no way to run the business of government or business in general. Media influence is malignant.
Shows like Question Time should have the public on the panel and politicians in the audience…not that I care, I stopped watching TV in 2005.
Anyhoo, this squirrel from Newsquest is there to divert attention away from the SNP…something’s brewing.
@Scott (7.59) –
‘Anyhoo, this squirrel from Newsquest is there to divert attention away from the SNP…something’s brewing.’
Can’t remember where I saw this (probs Twitter) but there are murmurings that Sturgeon has been caught lying to the parliament – again – this time over something to do with Fergus Ewing.
It struck me when reading the Jonathan Friedland piece in the Guardian linked to by Stoker above @ 4.49 (which is a total banger of a piece by the way) that those punting the WEF/Great Reset/Davos conspiracy theory nonsense might like to think a little on the potential upsides of the “grown ups” actually intervening to throw “a bucket of cold reality” in the face of a government over-reaching itself.
The quote (different from Stokers above) is also worth contemplating:
The three weeks since Kwarteng delivered his mini-budget have seen the shattering of that delusion. For Truss and her now ex-chancellor were given the rudest of reminders that in our interdependent world there is no such thing as pure, untrammelled sovereignty. No government can do what the hell it likes, heedless of others. In this case, the restraint on sovereignty was not the EU: it was the money markets. But their verdict was as binding as any Brussels edict; in fact it was more so. They ordered the removal of a chancellor after just 38 days in office and the cancellation of the government’s economic strategy. It is the financial markets that have taken back control. [……]
She is finished, a hollow husk of a prime minister. But this is bigger than that. The Brexit bubble has burst. The country has seen that the Tory hallucination of an island able to command the tides was no more than a fever dream, and a dangerous one at that. We can pronounce Trussonomics dead. Bring on the day we can say the same of the delusion that spawned it.
So, for those giving up hope on independence, or removing / changing the SNP, remember where the Tories were after brexit, and where they are now. Oh..and also, remember sometimes the financial markets and “the man” you keep telling us are such a danger sometimes have their uses.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707252
wull says:
Please feel entirely free – I know everyone does anyway – to scroll past and ignore. But do have a look at what Andy Ellis said at 3.55 on the previous post: it is indeed interesting.
I looked at that. Andy Ellis didn’t say anything he just posted a couple of links.
Here they are for the many who do scroll past Andy Ellis’ post
https://archive.ph/zHRjD
A Second Scottish Independence Referendum in the UK Supreme Court
Dated 14 Oktober 2022
This is something new! That really would be something if they did.
Was the UK Government’s conduct unconstitutional?
A recent argument has been made that, even if the Scottish Parliament is found to lack the competence to pass a referendum Bill, there is still a strong case that the Supreme Court could find the UK Government’s conduct to be unconstitutional (if not illegal), in preventing the implementation of previous SNP manifesto commitments to instigate an independence referendum.
https://archive.ph/JPKmd
The UK government and a second Scottish independence referendum: an unsustainable paradox?
Dated 8th June 2021
if there is no way to exercise a right, then it is no right at all: ubi jus ibi remedium. However, if the UK government continues to reject any negotiation with Scotland, or to countenance any further independence referendum, then, as Ciaran Martin has written, ‘you have to give up the pretence that this is a voluntary union, that Scotland is allowed to leave’. This reduces Scotland to the status of a colony, or a region with no history of independent statehood, which flies in the face of history, and also undermines any claims for the exceptional, voluntary, ‘family’, nature of the UK Union.
A Second Scottish Independence Referendum in the UK Supreme Court
However, if the UK government continues to reject any negotiation with Scotland, or to countenance any further independence referendum, then, ….
So…”if” that happens, we can then point at the yoons and say, “they’re treating us like a colony, therefore we can behave as other colonies have and declare UDI and/or demand the UN include us on the list of non self governing territories”?
Glad we cleared up that all those insisting Scotland is a colony now are talking bollocks. YW/HTH. 🙂
“Irish style neutrality is going to be a pretty hard sell given the decision of Sweden and Finland to abandon their long established neutral stances and join NATO.” – Ellis
Your bias is showing again.
Ireland aren’t members of NATO, only 30 countries are, so what style of neutrality do they have?
Scotland could copy Iceland or Denmark or Norway if it chose membership, not forgetting the Vienna Convention on the Succession of States in Respect of Treaties, which would technically allow us to claim continuing protection.
http://legal.un.org/ilc/texts/instruments/english/conventions/3_2_1978.pdf
USA has nothing to sell we can’t get closer to home and at better prices. The people are crackpots, best ignored.
When NATO bombed Yugoslavia there was no ‘social media’ culture as such. Certainly no significant alternative news outlets or influential bloggers.
More than two decades have passed. People graduating from university right now have never known a time when such alternative voices were not available. Establishment outlets are seen – and accepted – for what they are.
That’s why NATO cannot assume support – many peoples are wide awake to its real agenda and want nothing to do with it. Hopefully, an independent Scotland would be similarly leery of any involvement.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707277
Andy Ellis says:
15 October, 2022 at 8:31 pm
However, if the UK government continues to reject any negotiation with Scotland, or to countenance any further independence referendum, then, ….
Glad we cleared up that all those insisting Scotland is a colony now are talking bollocks. YW/HTH.
The UK Gov have been rejecting Scotland’s right to a referendum since 2016. How long do we give them before claiming Scotland is a colony?
There is probably a different argument for Scotland being a colony prior to 2016 but since we are talking about the UK Gov denying Scotland a referendum then Scotland has been a colony since 2016.
Someone from Alba must – as a matter of urgency – clarify WTF happened today with Sara Salyers.
Why are Salmond and Macaskill so upset by what she’s saying?
FFS, get it sorted – ‘Alba’ cannot survive schisms.
@”Scott” 8.32 pm
Why is it just “my bias”? I’ve made no secret that my preference would be for Scotland to join with its Scandinavian neighbours in an independent security organisation, but recent events and Finland and Sweden’s decisions to join NATO have made that even less likely than it was, and it was never really more than a pipe dream. Norway, Denmark and Iceland have never shown any desire to “go it alone”.
There are indeed plenty of “things” we can get from sources other than the USA, but they’re often more expensive rather than less given the economies of scale.
Some people are indeed crackpots as this place testifies only too well. It doesn’t change the fact that post independence Scots are about as likely to reject NATO as Truss is to go down as the longest serving UK PM.
Ian Brotherhood says:
15 October, 2022 at 9:01 pm
“When NATO bombed Yugoslavia there was no ‘social media’ culture as such. Certainly no significant alternative news outlets or influential bloggers.”
As I recall, he called the bombing of Belgrade “an act of unpardonable folly”, for which he took a huge amount of flak at the time.
Obviously, Sturgeon and Swinney would have hated AS’s return, since he had done so before to take control of the SNP reins at their expense but I also feel that the British Establishment and NATO never forgot his words and vindictively wanted to finish him off, over and above his obvious threat to this damned union.
Likewise, I feel Craig Murray is still paying for his refusal to look the other way in his diplomatic posting and rejecting the diplomatic “norms”, such as a gong from the monarch for playing the game with a safe pair of hands.
The National supports Sturgeon and the SNP who in turn support the Union, not in word but in deed.
@Tinto Chiel –
Aye, Alex stuck his neck out at the time and was castigated. But who would now dare assert that he was wrong?
That’s why it was dispiriting for many members to see the blue & yellow flag draped across the table at a recent Alba press conference.
If Sara Salyers has sparked discontent with her contribution today, so be it. And if Alba turns out to be nothing more than another political escapade which is incapable of demonstrating genuine resistance to ideological conformity, fair enough – the fight for independence will go on all the same, whether or not we have anyone to mark a cross for.
The National supports Sturgeon and the SNP who in turn support the Union, not in word but in deed.
It is the highlight of the day when you post rev.
Aye, Alex stuck his neck out at the time and was castigated. But who would now dare assert that he was wrong?
Lots of people. He was wrong then. He remains wrong on that issue. I doubt many would support his view of NATO’s actions then if you polled them. Just because a handful of anti-NATO types and Vlad fluffers in here still think the people of county 404 “had it coming” doesn’t mean such views have any traction generally.
That’s why it was dispiriting for many members to see the blue & yellow flag draped across the table at a recent Alba press conference.
The party and its leadership have made it pretty clear what their stance on Vlad’s aggression is, where its sympathy lies, and how it views those voicing their support for Vlad and his nice bunch of lads. Those arguing against it are a tiny minority in the party, just as they are in the country. Good.
If Sara Salyers has sparked discontent with her contribution today, so be it. And if Alba turns out to be nothing more than another political escapade which is incapable of demonstrating genuine resistance to ideological conformity, fair enough – the fight for independence will go on all the same, whether or not we have anyone to mark a cross for.
Sara Salyers, SALVO and SSRG aren’t Alba. If they want to push extra parliamentary cunning plans for indy let them have at it. Alex, the party leadership and the majority of the membership don’t accept that there are shortcuts to indy.
If Sara and her supporters don’t like it, let them set out there stand for achieving independence and make it so either by convincing the majority in Alba to support them, or doing it alone via their own organisation without dirtying their hands in grubby politics. I wish them luck: I reckon they’re going to need it.
@Ian Brotherhood: re. “…On a more positive note, it has one of the best fistfights of all time!”
Your positivity at this hellish time is valued.
I’ve every faith and confidence in the public, in overcoming the existential battle we all face…
Ellis.
Nobody is suggesting country 404 had it coming. And actually, those who are against pumping arms in to prolong the war would seem to be the ones that care more genuinely about the people of country 404. What you’re advocating guarantees their country and many of its inhabitants will be turned to dust.
What is being suggested very specifically is that the US, by meddling in country 404, sponsoring coups, supporting right wing neo-nazi types, building bio-weapons labs, intentionally provoked a response from Vlad.
The Minsk agreements were ignored just as the promise not to expand NATO one inch to the east was ignored. Actions like that have consequences.
The independence movement should be opposed to war and aggression. All good people should. Blowing up gas pipelines and pumping arms into a situation like this isn’t going to help anyone except the US arms and gas suppliers.
As for public opinion, what value does it have when all people have to go on is an uninterrupted stream of lies and propaganda? Nobody alive in Scotland today has ever seen propaganda like this.
If you and the UK government are so confident about your position, why the strictest censorship any of us has ever seen on alternative views?
@Hatuey
On the contrary, the piece of work posting as “Republic of Scotland” has consistently said so, and doubled down on it when challenged. Others who are less forthright still indulge in whataboutery and victim shaming on the basis of what happened in the Donbas, or with reference to the CIA plot, Azov battalion, “Vlad had a point” narrative. You know this. It was spurious before the invasion, it’s even worse now.
I won’t even engage with the rest of your woo-woo conspiracy theorising bullshit. Nobody reasonable person accepts your Vlad fluffing take on events: they represent the worldview of a small fringe of contrarians that just about everyone else scorns. It’s not censorship, it’s the kind of derision folk had for the likes of Lord Haw Haw and Tokyo Rose in our parents and grandparents days.
Andy Ellis says:
15 October, 2022 at 5:39 pm
Mind you if using expletives was all that it took, Ruby would be more of a fixture on there than that bam Farage used to be!
Grow up Andy you are being pathetic & very childish!
Ellis, the truth will come out as it always does and when it does you’ll quietly change your position. I bet you supported invading Iraq at the time.
It’s worth pointing out that Vlad isn’t without support in the world — stop making out your cowardly repetition of what the US and British governments say represents some sort of objective reality. Far from it.
Regardless, country 404 can’t win and everybody knows it. Pumping arms in just guarantees prolonged misery and destruction. Your best case scenario is years of needless suffering.
“The global climate change policy for reducing your carbon foot print by changing to electric vehicles does not make sense if the prices of electric are then hiked up by corporations and allowed by governments.”
There’s the rub; “by changing to electric vehicles”. I saw some figures (I don’t have a source; sorry) that suggested that an electic vehicle doesn’t break even in terms of the energy expended in its manufacture and use until around 70k miles. Add to that the environmental/energy cost of scrapping perfectly good vehicles to allow them a place and you’ve other cans of worms.
I’ll declare an interest; none of my motor vehicles were manufactured in this century. Motorbike (1994) has just passed 44444; car (1986) has done 110,000-odd, van (1997) is just over 70k. I cycle and use the bus a fair amount. My issue with low emission zones isn’t so much during the bus lane times as otherwise; why should I scrap something extant because it’s old? That’s against all the wisdom; shouldn’t we be stopping the sale of new petrol and diesel cars now?
Ian Brotherhood says on 15 October, 2022 at 8:05 pm:
‘Anyhoo, this squirrel from Newsquest is there to divert attention away from the SNP…something’s brewing.’
“Can’t remember where I saw this (probs Twitter) but there are murmurings that Sturgeon has been caught lying to the parliament – again – this time over something to do with Fergus Ewing.”
This, Ian? (Other sources are available)
“Nicola Sturgeon accused of ‘lying’ to parliament over Fergus Ewing bullying complaint” Nicola Sturgeon accused of ‘lying’ to parliament over Fergus Ewing bullying complaint” https://archive.ph/xOzLT
Ian Brotherhood @ 6.50 pm. I don’t know where exactly the Sturgeon quote about the ‘return to normal as we knew it’ not being on the cards came from. It was Gregor who posted it. on the previous article’s btl comments. Maybe he can help.
Confused
‘Every time I see these two I think someone has fucked with the aspect ratio on my monitor’
LMAO!
I wouldn’t be in any rush to sign up to NATO.
It’s America’s army in Europe with a revolving tyrant in charge who runs it as a protection racket – pay up & throw in some real estate & were nuke daft too. (Bush, Trump)
A repeated breaker of international laws & is invaded, not peacekeeper.
Scotland should have its own defence army & alliances like normal independent countries do. Jeez, it seems some can’t move past that empire, world domination shite.
Two things we know.
1. Scotland wants rid of nukes. Only one Muppet has ever used them & that should serve as a warning of who not to choose.
2. Can you imagine a disagreement in the future? ‘Umm, NATO, I’d like you & your weapons to fck off out of our country now -ta for all the fish’
NATO: ‘Naw! What you gonna do about it? We own all yer weapons’
Imagine trying to get out of that clusterfk! I suspect that’s why there isn’t a stampede of countries doing it.
wull says:
16 October, 2022 at 12:47 am
Ian Brotherhood @ 6.50 pm. I don’t know where exactly the Sturgeon quote about the ‘return to normal as we knew it’ not being on the cards came from. It was Gregor who posted it. on the previous article’s btl comments. Maybe he can help.
Who talks about a return to the new normal when it’s the old normal they’re supposed to bringing to an end? The only “normal” of interest to me is Independence. What else is there to return to?
Sturgeon gets more and more transparent every time she opens her gob.
Hatuey.
There’s already been documents released. Plenty of them. Various presidents all planning the total destruction of that particular union & the double crossing that went with it since WW2 regards various treaties. Various professor’s even giving lectures from Harvard to Yale on the topic freely available outside the BBC bubble.
I suspect they’ve a massive chip on thier shoulder they didn’t reach Berlin 1st.
It always amazes me how quick the Brits & the yanks are at forgetting who paid the highest price in that particular conflict. ie..it wasn’t them.
You’re correct, they can’t win this, but the yanks moto is world domination, keep selling & supplying – collateral damage doesn’t compute. Refugees don’t compute. Fk, even the ones from thier own side don’t compute! *Urgent memo’ Rescue the dogs first!
If the weapons ceased they’d maybe think twice at prodding the bear from its slumber at mouth almighty request.
‘return to normal as we know it’
I took that to mean things are different now since COVID.
Example being ppl not returning to thier office but working from home. There was a discussion about this on the radio a few weeks ago. People have discovered they’re saving a fortune. No costs for commute, no lunches, coffees, office suits, childcare, grooming etc.
GPs – no need for face to face appointments for idiot’s who’ve broken a nail.
Torys renting out prime office space are going daft that they’re mainly empty. LOL
Why do those barstewards own eeeeeeverything?!?
https://www.thenational.scot/news/23052076.activist-took-scottish-independence-bid-uk-supreme-court-sounds-warning/
Posting this deliberately not archived because the comments make better reading than the article.
Andy Ellis @7:56pm
I don’t really care how many votes are in an anti-NATO stance. For me it’s a moral issue. It’s up to others whether they support an aggressive military alliance.
BTW lay off the indirect personal attack. I’ve never taken that stance with you, until now, you self-aggrandising twat.
@Hatuey 11.14 pm
Ellis, the truth will come out as it always does and when it does you’ll quietly change your position. I bet you supported invading Iraq at the time.
If facts prove me wrong about something I would freely admit it Hatuey, yes. That’s somewhat different from people with faith based positions who insist black is white. As you well know there are people in here who insist (just as an example) that it was not the Donbas separatists who shot down the Malaysian Airline flight, but the forces of Country 404. Only one of these things can be true, but you can bet your bottom dollar that even if it was comprehensively proven beyond all doubt that Russian backed separatists were responsible, you’d still get a hard core of conspiracy theorists insisting it was a set up.
I was a vocal opponent of the invasion of Iraq. Mystic Meg you ain’t.
It’s worth pointing out that Vlad isn’t without support in the world — stop making out your cowardly repetition of what the US and British governments say represents some sort of objective reality. Far from it.
Please try to interact with what I said, not what you *wished* I said. There are just shy of 200 states in the UN. Many of them have appalling human rights records, are repressive, authoritarian or totalitarian. Many others have multiple problems with poverty, environmental change, social cohesion. The fact authoritarian regimes can rustle up hauners from other similar (or worse) regimes is hardly a surprise. Having the support of North Korea, Eritrea, China and sundry African despots probably isn’t the slam dunk defence you think it is.
Whatever the (manifest) faults of western liberal democracy as a system, and its policy failures in the past and present, averring as you and others do that “we” are no better or worse than regimes like China and Russia just makes you look ill educated and lacking in all perspective. Objective reality doesn’t permit of that kind of false equivalence, sorry.
Regardless, country 404 can’t win and everybody knows it. Pumping arms in just guarantees prolonged misery and destruction. Your best case scenario is years of needless suffering.
Given the rest of your output, I wouldn’t set much…in fact any….store by your confident predictions. Russia can and will be defeated: all that remains to be seen is how badly, and what the post defeat scenario looks like for them. Hopefully it involves Vlad’s removal and a thorough-going change in the Russian Federation, including freedom for many of the subject nationalities it currently oppresses. All good nationalists should be able to support that, right Hatuey? 🙂
Arming the wronged party, and ensuring they are victorious, is preventing the enslavement of a country of > 40 million people who are never going to consent to live under occupation, or to surrender 20% of their territory to a regime guilty of war crimes, and nor should they. Luckily, as already noted, your argument for appeasement of the wrong doer in this situation is about as popular as Trussonomics, and has about as much future.
Doubtless when the truth comes out, Vlad falls and the Ukrainians join the EU and NATO you’ll quietly change your position. The difference of course is that you and most of the shills for Vlad in here are very careful to remain anonymous, so we’ll never be able to rub your noses in your error down the line. Intellectual coward is as intellectual coward does, huh?
@wull and Stoker (12.47 both!) –
Thanks.
re. ‘new normal’ source:
Scottish Government(2020): Looking beyond lockdown: First Minister opens discussion on “new normal”:
https://www.gov.scot/news/looking-beyond-lockdown/
@Andy Ellis 8:59
Great response.
I noted Hatuey earlier getting in his stock whines about Nazis, biolabs, etc.
Shorn of the lies, all of his parked breakfasts amount to one, endless, inchoate screech of rage that a free, sovereign, independent nation should ever dare to fight in its own defence.
Nobody will ever be converted to the cause of Scottish Indy by the likes of Hatuey.
@Stuart Mackay 8.43 am
I don’t really care how many votes are in an anti-NATO stance. For me it’s a moral issue. It’s up to others whether they support an aggressive military alliance.
Ideological purity as a route to indy. That’ll definitely work. Another faith based pedant not open to reason even when it would cost us votes then? Top work champ.
BTW lay off the indirect personal attack. I’ve never taken that stance with you, until now, you self-aggrandising twat.
It wasn’t indirect if you are a fluffer for Vlad (I hadn’t thought you were amongst them, maybe I was wrong?) If the cap fits however, you ought to be proud to wear it. Perhaps you should just learn to be less of a wee pearl clutcher?
They might not get on tv but at least they get a bit coverage in the online comics. All I could find on ALBA was a piece in the national suggesting they were now singing from same hymn sheet as SNP vis a vis bums on London seats, ie:
« Salmond’s speech will come just a day after Alba members agreed that a pro-independence majority at the next UK General Election should be a mandate for indyref2 negotiations with Westminster. «
Which is a crying shame because it looked as though there was considerably more to it than the vented spleen of some English lady who’d moved to Scotland because she detested tories and was full of diarrhoea from period pain or some such
ie according to someone on Iain Lawson’s twitter twice removed the vilification of Sarah Salyers was based on a refusal to change wording somewhere from a transfer of sovereignty to a loan of sovereignty which, if true, sounds disturbingly short sighted given the lockdown gaslighting and fact ALBA was set up to honour the principle of no friends left behind (leastwise that was my understanding) in apparent absence of same from SNP.
Still cant find anything to excuse vilification of the brilliant Lord Advocate though (there having been no such hubristic friendly fire directed at the previous one despite the agatha christie element) so inclined to put that down to professional jealousy (rather than residual misogyny) until more coherent explanation forthcoming.
I hope to see many folk walking about the streets with this top on.
“Manchester United icon Eric Cantona has just introduced the Palestinian Football Shirt, saying the proceeds of its sales will be entirely donated to the Palestinian refugee camps.”
https://twitter.com/QudsNen/status/1581283664893071360?cxt=HHwWgMCi8a_H7PErAAAA
@Geri 1:55 am
There’s good reasons why rational posters don’t stagger in after a heavy sesh, fire up the laptop, then unleash an incontinent stream of self-pitying self consciousness onto Wings BTL.
When you finally drag yourself from your pit this morning and stop seeing double, you will appreciate my words of advice.
Ellis shouting again about anonymity and calling people cowards…
1) how do we know you don’t have other handles in here which you use anonymously? If I was willing to be you did have other anonymous accounts, how could I provide it?
2) anonymity is actually a central facet of democracy (i.e. secret ballots, etc.) and for good reason, which I will happily discuss if you’re that bored.
The focus when it comes to free expression and discussion should be on the ideas being exchanged but yet again you reveal that you want it to be personal and want to play the man rather than the ball. I don’t blame you — your arguments are usually hollow and crap.
Provide should be prove… anyway, I’ve got better things to do.
Have a nice day everybody.
Haha
Man U icon keeps his dosh while trying to persuade poor people to part with theirs.
Should be easy to spot the mugs though, good idea to get them to wear some sort of uniform.
This lot should be standing in the dock at the Hague, oh that’s right its only African dictators, and lantern jacked Eastern European warlords that find themselves there.
https://twitter.com/sahouraxo/status/1580936937170698241?cxt=HHwWgoDUhZXxzvArAAAA
So now we are supporting anonymity as key to democracy?
Hardly any time at all since the usual suspects were supporting referendums with identification of the voters and filling in if the forms at gunpoint. Claiming that a figure of 99.8% in favour was entirely credible!
It’s not individuals with multiple online identities that intrigue me.
It’s single online identities representing people with multiple personality disorders, evidenced by their ability to simultaneously hold directly contradictory views on everything under the sun.
But, Occam’s razor and that. Lying weasels explains everything adequately enough.
https://archive.ph/BlkQY
I’m not seeing self-id as being the main problem in all of this.
2004 ‘Gender Recognition Act’ requires a medical diagnosis which would be easy enough to obtain if ‘people with trauma, depression or other conditions could be pushed down the route of irreversible medical transitioning from an early age when counselling about their needs would be better.’ How can you medically diagnose ‘being born in the wrong body?’
Self-id takes the burden off the medical profession.
In the same way as chemists prescription antibiotics
https://archive.ph/KlrAu#selection-837.0-837.58
2004 ‘Gender Recognition Act’ requires applicants to live in their ‘acquired gender for two years’ self-id requires a period of three months.
Remarkably, nobody seems able to explain what living in an acquired gender actually means
Wouldn’t it be strange if you were supposed to be living as a woman and yet you were still using the mens toilet and serving your sentence in a male prison. To live in an acquired gender means you would need access to women’ spaces.
How much does it matter if it’s for 2 years or 3 months?
Self-id or the 2004 GRA Act we still have the same problems.
The problem is the claim that ‘trans women are women’
You really do have to laugh with it now being revealed that in April the taxpayer paid £622 for a flight to London and £1,020 for two nights in a hotel so that Nicola Sturgeon could appear on the chat show Loose Women.
The wee woman certainly knows how to piss all over the taxpayer with grotesque expenditure like this. Tip of the iceberg without a doubt. The woman is a lush, like her party.
Grousebeater giving a short but excellent speech at the Alba party conference in Stirling, good to see that he looking well.
https://twitter.com/zulfikar_sheikh/status/1581366490787258368
A good night for those who seek justice for Julian Assange, a true hero of our times.
“Standing ovation for IthakaMoviewhich opened hrfilmfestival
in Berlin last night.
Festival Director
Anna_Apublic
: “In five years this is a first. That’s a really outstanding reaction to a truly wonderful film””
https://twitter.com/StellaMoris1/status/1580887831894900736?cxt=HHwWgICqne7GuPArAAAA
Hatuey says:
16 October, 2022 at 10:15 am
Ellis shouting again about anonymity and calling people cowards…
The big problem with Ellis it’s the same stuff being regurgitated over and over and over again. Any complaints today about ‘cunt-calling’?
In terms of the public purse shelling out £1.6k for Sturgeon to appear on a commercial chat show is there not a case for Sturgeon being surcharged for the cost of the flight and two nights hotel accommodation.
Moreover, should the individual, or individuals, who sanctioned this public spending not be reprimanded. Or is it just accepted practice that the public purse just pays for whatever the First Minister wants.
Stuart MacKay says:
16 October, 2022 at 8:43 am
I don’t really care how many votes are in an anti-NATO stance. For me it’s a moral issue. It’s up to others whether they support an aggressive military alliance.
Ditto that.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Houa_N7wfk
It’s only 20 minutes, but there’s more sense in it than you’re going to hear on the BBC.
Some of it is a bit uncomfortable towards the end with regards Germany and Turkey, given I like the EU, and that the EU was designed to keep nations trading, talking and at peace.
If there hadn’t been the EU, Europe post WW2 might easily have returned to the myriad of pacts, alliances and treaties, which kicked off like a pinball machine, and launched us into WW1.
I think there are too many villians in this whole piece; the USA / NATO and Mr Put and Mr Z; (in that order), but the EU has played it’s hand abominably… Big strategic miscalculations.
The conduct of the villians is predictable to a degree, (that’s not excusing it), but Europe has been a massive disappointment, and for that we might all suffer. I expected a much better response.
If there is deep seated anger in Germany to follow on, it will be interesting to see where it’s pointed, and whether there are ramifications for NATO and indeed the EU…
Alex Salmond will give a rousing speech at the Alba party conference today, and if this is anything to go by, he won’t be pulling his punches.
“ALEX Salmond will today tell the Alba Party’s second annual conference that an Independence Referendum Bill should be tabled right now in the Scottish Parliament.
Addressing the Alba conference in Stirling this afternoon, Mr Salmond is expected to underline that a point from the Supreme Court hearing that the Lord Advocate has no veto on the tabling of an independence referendum bill.”
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.heraldscotland.com%2Fpolitics%2F23052579.scottish-independence-salmond-demand-bill-vote-tabled-holyrood-now%2F
Hey Ruby
Lead from the front. Develop some original and catchy personal insults. Your current best shots are looking a bit tired.
Could be the secret weapon that moves the needle on the dial.
Soft No #1: I dinna ken aboot Indy. They jist bang oan and oan aboot 1707 an that.
Soft No #2: Bit tak a look at this! See fit insults they use! Ane o them jist ca’d the ither a [ ]!
Soft No #1: It’s the future richt enough! Ah’m convinced noo, it’s Indy all the way from noo oan fir me!
Soft No #2: An me!
Over to you Ruby. Give us some ideas for [ ].
Breeks
“Europe has been a massive disappointment.”
You don’t say.
On the assumption you really mean the EU, perhaps you should detail how on joining, an iScotland will reform it from within.
Haha, I crack me up.
Just another political party with idealogical beliefs put before independence of Scotland.
That kind of political party is oozing out the woodwork in Scotland,
Tories first in get rich quick schemes and austerity for everyone else, and scandals galore,
Labour next with no support for workers or women, and red tories into the bargain when it come to opposition benches.
Following hot on their heels neck and neck in Scotland is Sturgeon and the snp with Trans issues and brain washing you’re kids.
And the Greens with climate change wrecking the world economies.
Scotland has had its fill of such nonsense fake political parties with ideologies beyond reason..
If you cant look after your own people first in Scotland , why interfere in the running of other peoples counties as a flag waver.
The last thing we need is the growth of one more mirror image political party following ideologies
Alba if I recall also encouraged us to vote for the Sturgeon and the Snp not so long ago. Which a lot of people on here questioned.
If they show some individual grit as a party for the people of Scotland first then they have a chance of survival,
If not, they will go down the tubes pretty quick, as people have little faith in global world political parties while suffering the repercussions of such global politics in Scotland.
@Breeks (10.43) –
Thanks for that link, very interesting.
😉
Old political ideology idiots cannot run a new political Scotland,
@republicofscotland
Seems to me from the apparent lack of support for Kwasi Kwarteng (whose can carrying arguably merits far more righteous indignation than that which was choreographed to coincide with the ending of lockdown1) that UKG is gearing itself up to dissolve itself rather than help the supreme court mitigate its indyref2 dilemma.
Accordingly, knowing any Bill encroaching on reserved matters can be can be submitted by backbench msps, I’d humbly suggest that a more urgent and McHiavellian approach would be to provide full support to any Scottish labour Msps willing to table a bill demanding immediate release/ transfer of said Julian Assange to a safe house in Edinburgh whereupon he can be granted keys to the city, etc.
John Main says:
16 October, 2022 at 10:58 am
Hey Ruby
Lead from the front. Develop some original and catchy personal insults. Your current best shots are looking a bit tired.
Could be the secret weapon that moves the needle on the dial.
Soft No #1: I dinna ken aboot Indy. They jist bang oan and oan aboot 1707 an that.
Soft No #2: Bit tak a look at this! See fit insults they use! Ane o them jist ca’d the ither a [ ]!
Soft No #1: It’s the future richt enough! Ah’m convinced noo, it’s Indy all the way from noo oan fir me!
Soft No #2: An me!
Over to you Ruby. Give us some ideas for [ ].
It took me a minute to figure out WTF John Main was on about.
Then I realised it was just another complaint about ‘cunt calling’.
It seems the truth really does hurt.
In the case of Ellis & Main it never stops hurting. Air punch!
Boo hoo! Mummy! mummy she thinks we are a pair of cunts! It’s just not fair she’s not allowed to think that about us. Why is she saying that Mummy? Mummy! Mummy! Mummy! where’s my dummy?
Ideas you want ideas? I have one for both you and your BFF Andy Pandy!
Get over yourselves and bloody well grow up! Some folk think you are a pair of cunts.
That’s life in the adult world. People are alllowed to think what they like.
Ian Brotherhood says:
16 October, 2022 at 11:13 am
@Breeks (10.43) –
Thanks for that link, very interesting.
Yes it was very interesting but the question is did I make a mistake of accepting what was said as the truth?
If Alba ever shows signs or a hint of following global trends in politics, they will have lost my support.
The people of Scotland must come first in the economy, NhS system, re energising the original family unit and local communities, and fighting for our resources to be retained for Scotlands people, and a fairer system of taxation.
And to remove us from the mythical union.
I will vote for any party, that has these priorities first,
The people or name of the party is secondary in importance.
RoS, your link to AS speech doesnt work.
Does anyone have more info on the issue of Sara Salyers speech at the alba conference and the reactions of Kenny and AS? I missed that. FWIW I have found Sara to be inspiring, in a way that politicians are no longer. I do admire Kenny but he is a politician and much as I admire AS and appreciate all he has done for Indy and I have defended him to the hilt, nonetheless, I have some questions about his past actions re indy, nothing to do with the court case, but the way he handled the route to indy, and how he handed everything over to the Sturgeon charlatan.All the years she was his deputy, and given how smart and intuitive he was, how did he not see through her at all?
@Hatuey 10.15 am
how do we know you don’t have other handles in here which you use anonymously? If I was willing to be you did have other anonymous accounts, how could I provide it?
You don’t, other than my assurance it isn’t so. I have neither the time nor the inclination. Such is life. Until and unless there is some method online of people having to sign up as themselves, and have their identities known, I guess you’re stuck with the ambiguity.
Isn’t the question rather why folk on this particular site, and in this democratic country, feel the need to hide their identities? I mean, it’s obvious that a swearly, low life harridan like “Ruby” wouldn’t want to identify her/his self, or that Republic of Scotland would want to preserve his moral compassless anonymity as Vlad’s chief fluffer in the indy movement….but for most other folks, why is it even an issue?
anonymity is actually a central facet of democracy (i.e. secret ballots, etc.) and for good reason, which I will happily discuss if you’re that bored.
This is just an online blog, not an election. We all know why ballots for elections are anonymous and can see the sense in it. Trying to assert that is the same as “Hatuey” being anonymous isn’t just a stretch, its just bonkers. One might almost think you and more particularly some others with more colourful views and ways of expressing themselves (if that isn’t too grand a description of their usual MO’s) had something to hide.
The focus when it comes to free expression and discussion should be on the ideas being exchanged but yet again you reveal that you want it to be personal and want to play the man rather than the ball. I don’t blame you — your arguments are usually hollow and crap.
I’m not putting limits on free expression and discussion though am I? I’ve consistently said I think what passes for the arguments of the moonhowlers on here should be exposed to the light of reason so the rest of us can point and laugh at them more easily. Far better such woo woo is out in the open than festering in the dark with them under their bridges.
In some cases it becomes personal because certain individuals – many of whom you tolerate or actively encourage – are just nasty pieces of work. Life’s just like that. If people don’t like being called nativists when they are advocating nativist positions, that’s a matter for them. Similarly, an individual renowned for repetitively cunt calling can hardly expect to be dealt with as a rational actor whose arguments should be separated from their online persona. Someone with your limited capacity for arguing a case rationally really isn’t in any position to pontificate about others playing the man rather than the ball.
@Ruby –
I don’t know if Scott Ritter is right about everything but as Breeks said, this is stuff we have no chance of ever hearing via BBC. And, of course, RT has been banned because we mustn’t be exposed to such filth.
The one solid ‘truth’ which emerges is this – no one who expects to be taken seriously has stated that R***ia sabotaged their own pipeline.
John Main says:
16 October, 2022 at 10:58 am
Soft No #1: I dinna ken aboot Indy. They jist bang oan and oan aboot 1707 an that.
This one is obviously directed at James Che.
Why has John Main decided to write in Scots? Is he not just a cunt but a bigoted cunt?
Why is he not leading from the front and doing his bit to convince all the Soft Nos to vote for independence especially those who are concerned about the money?
If he is a ‘committed independence supporter’ he should be able to convince others. If he like Chas another ‘committed independence supporter’ who believes money is the big issue they should be able to convince other voters why they are independence supporters.
Ian Brotherhood says:
16 October, 2022 at 11:50 am
@Ruby –
I don’t know if Scott Ritter is right about everything but as Breeks said, this is stuff we have no chance of ever hearing via BBC.
I think he is right! It all sounds feasible. As they say ‘the truth will out’
I don’t watch the BBC I just get the BBC’s version of events from posts by Andy Ellis.
“Think to get the sums right, you need to divide the time difference between appearances by the number of representatives on each show.”
No, that’s not how it works. You’re either on it or you’re not. It’s vanishingly rare for any party to have two representatives on one show.
@ Fionan
Re. Salyers clip(s)
https://twitter.com/faraheit17/status/1581309742181679105
@Ruby 11:33
FFS, grow up.
Stop deluding yourself that you are somehow or other getting at me when you call me a cunt. What do you think we are? 8 year olds?
But for the love of God, above all else, stop deluding yourself that your endless sweary ranting is somehow or other advancing the cause of Scots Indy.
But for the love of God, above all else, stop deluding yourself that your endless sweary ranting is somehow or other advancing the cause of Scots Indy.
Preach, brother! c.f: nativism, covidiocy, shilling for Vlad, insisting Scotland is a colony, banging on about WEF/Davos/the Illuminati/George Soros, and of course unselfconsciously using the term “Great Satan”.
John Main 10:14 am.
I don’t drink. FFS are you another timekeeper?
Does the internet now have a lights out policy?
No one has ever left NATO. I cant imagine why? Is it because they’d find themselves disobedient & deserving of punishment like so many of thier puppet regimes have found to thier cost? Left with no weapons & no defense because the yanks provided all that for a handsome fee of thier GDP.
Anyway, your comment is duly noted. I’ll leave you to talk shit with yer alter ego Andy cause it seems every other Knut ignore you.
I see the moonhowlers are now fluffing Scott Ritter as a source whose views should be given due consideration. No….really…Scott Ritter.
Whatever next, Alex Jones’ hot takes on gun violence? Donal Trump on accepting defat gracefully?
Honestly, you folks are a laugh a minute. 🙂
Ruby says:
16 October, 2022 at 11:37 am
Yes it was very interesting but the question is did I make a mistake of accepting what was said as the truth?
I cannot vouch for it all directly, but Ritter has been “there” since this whole war kicked off. He actually came to prominence as a critic of the Iraq war. I doubt he’d still be giving interviews all these months later if he wasn’t considered credible… but of course, that’s not proof of anything.
But I wouldn’t have posted the link if I didn’t think he was at least a semi credible source of information. (I think he’s a lot better than semi-credible myself. I actually think he pretty much nails it.
He does sometimes come across as very hard on NATO and the US, but I think being a US Marine Intelligence Officer for over 20 years, and former UN Weapons Inspector, he’s harsh on the US because he knows what they’re like from experience. That “might”, I stress might, impinge on his neutrality at times, but I don’t think it clouds his objectivity in any way at all. He’s harsh on America because he wants a more circumspect America he can be proud of.
What he says also resonates with what you see and hear from other sources outside the Western / BBC bubble. The whole theatre is awash with propaganda and false flag shenanigans, so it pays to be cynical and go with your instincts.
You pays your money and takes your chance Ruby, but I think he’s a good ‘un and legit.
Stuart McTavish 10:08am
That’s always been. It’s part of plan b.
Majority in WM + Majority in Holyrood = negotiation of our exit.
John Main says:
16 October, 2022 at 12:29 pm
@Ruby 11:33
FFS, grow up.
Stop deluding yourself that you are somehow or other getting at me when you call me a cunt. What do you think we are? 8 year olds?
But for the love of God, above all else, stop deluding yourself that your endless sweary ranting is somehow or other advancing the cause of Scots Indy.
Yawn!
Why don’t you fulfill my request made in
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707346
and show me what a post that would advance the cause of Scots Indy would look like.
Thanks
Andy Ellis says:
16 October, 2022 at 1:00 pm
I see the moonhowlers are now fluffing Scott Ritter as a source whose views should be given due consideration. No….really…Scott Ritter.
Who should we be giving due consideration to?
Farage was never off QT & he had zero seats at WM. Only a seat in the EU parliament that no one ever seemed to pay attention to.
I think the BBC are missing a trick here. Have these two on defending self-ID, in a Glasgow studio, see if they can survive until the credits LOL
I’d pay my license fee to see that!
Thank you for that clip Dan, very interesting. I find I agree with Sara on this.
Everyone who’s been on the internet since the beginning knows of the whiney pub bore types found endlessly typing on forums putting the world to rights.
If you don’t swallow thier made up rules & constantly finesse thier ego on how right they are in everything – they shout anonymous troll at everyone & lowering the tone of their superior discussion while screeching for the mod to start evicting.
It’s the adult version of a kid in the cereal aisle. Scrolling past was always a good rule of thumb.
Geri says:
16 October, 2022 at 1:24 pm
Farage was never off QT & he had zero seats at WM. Only a seat in the EU parliament that no one ever seemed to pay attention to.
I think the BBC are missing a trick here. Have these two on defending self-ID, in a Glasgow studio, see if they can survive until the credits LOL
I’d pay my license fee to see that!
I don’t think self-id is the main problem.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707325
I’ve heard Patrick Harvie speak about the GRA. He said something along the lines of all the complaints he hears are about the 2004 GRA.
2004 GRA nothing to do with the SNP or Greens.
@Geri
Cunning plan, not surprised they kept it secret for so long – someone might have been inclined to ask what comes next circa 2016 – and its truly not surprising they kept that bit secret
Not sure what you mean Stuart?
The original Plan B (by Chris McEleny & now adopted by Alba) was majority at WM & use Holyrood election as a Plebiscite.
Double whammy & negotiations begin on our exit or it goes external.
Fk knows what Sturgeons is. It’s still a secret, locked in the drawer with all her mandates.
He’s lying.
His complaints are that ppl can’t self ID.
Let men’s toilets be men’s & let women’s toilets be unisex.
There’s no a avoiding medical intervention. Abnormal behaviours lead to other abnormal behaviours & close medical intervention reveals that. It can be either peer pressure or far more sinister beliefs under the surface. A medical professional can scratch the surface.
Fionan @11.39am.
Apologies Fionan.
You can read it here, click on the link then scroll down to story click the story and it appears unblocked.
https://twitter.com/ChrisMcEleny
Stuart @11.30am.
Yes Kwertang, is a scapegoat for Truss’s Trussonomics, which is all about making the rich richer at the poor’s expense, an age old Tory ideology.
As for Labour, it was Labour’s millionaire knight of the realm leader who when head of the CPS, aided the fast tracking of the extradition of Assange, Labour are just as complicit as the Tories, and are in my opinion two-cheeks of the same arse, of Tory and Labour.
https://www.assangecampaign.org.au/ken-loach-calls-out-sir-keir-starmer-what-was-his-dealings-in-the-julian-assange-case/
“Farage was never off QT & he had zero seats at WM.”
Geri @1.24pm.
It’s well known among the indy masses, the saying on Farage, that the only safe seat he had, was the seat on QT. Did David Cameron bring about the Brexit vote to try and destroy the UKIP party among other things, it certainly looks that way.
“I see the moonhowlers are now fluffing Scott Ritter as a source whose views should be given due consideration. No….really…Scott Ritter.”
Putting his private life aside.
William Scott Ritter, Jr. was a United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991 to 1998. He was chief inspector in fourteen of the more than thirty inspection missions in which he participated.
He became a major voice of opposition in the run-up to, and during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, being one of the few analysts who were right about non-existent weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
His articles also appear regularly on Consortium news, and they are very informative.
@Andy Ellis 12:46
They really can’t handle facts, reason, pragmatism and reality.
They really do believe Indy can be gained by lies, magic, ideological purity and make believe.
I would walk away, but truth to tell, this is too important to be left in the hands of these eejits.
Scotland needs better. Scotland deserves better.
@Geri 12:58
My apologies. I naturally assumed your earlier post was the result of a night on the booze.
Your assertion that you were stone-cold sober when you wrote it just makes things even worse.
John, a blind man on a galloping horse knows neither of you are indy supporters.
@Ruby 11:57
See this change from “cunt” to “bigoted cunt” you write about.
Is that a promotion or a demotion?
Asking for a family member who is looking around for her psychiatry dissertation subject. She has until the end of the month to notify the faculty. No pressure.
Haha Geri, you self-ID-ing as a blind man on a galloping horse now?
Certainly explains a lot about your posts.
RoS, thanks for the link to Gareth- it is good to see him looking well.
Well I’ve been here only a few months & it’s like listening to bbc shiteland from you both.
You don’t exactly ooze enthusiasm. On anything. It’s always negative peppered with derision at others while you don’t exactly like scrutiny or share your own wisdom. You ignore it like the classic staunch naw voter we’ve all came to spot from 100 paces.
This is coming from mouth of a one-time President of the European Parliament, who still holds a high-ranking position within the EU.
“Josep Borrell says Europe is a garden and most of the rest of the world is a jungle.”
https://twitter.com/wallacemick/status/1581582877825044480?cxt=HHwWgMDQ-e3P9PIrAAAA
A wee trip to yours for Scotland to update yourselves, if you have not already done so, regarding the strange folk inhabiting the SNP.
Dorothy @3.23pm.
You’re welcome, he was down for bit there I think, but yes, he’s looking much better.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707372
Well OK John Main!
As an independence supporter can you tell us how you think independence can be achieved? What would you say to a undecided voter to convince them to vote for independence?
Christ if only we had someone as FM, of the calibre of Clare Daly, the skies would be the limited for Scotland, as usual she doesn’t hold back.
https://twitter.com/ClareDalyMEP/status/1577294218195877889?cxt=HHwWgoC-3YGv1uMrAAAA
@Republic 3:25
Looks very much like a speech I linked to (via Unherd) on the previous thread.
That used the garden/jungle narrative. Of course, it was bloody obvious that he was referring to the difference between a rules-based society (the European garden) and those opposed parts of the world where tyrants enforce the law of the jungle. You know the ones I mean: Russia, Iran, NK, etc etc.
I am not surprised the usual saddos have managed to refract his words through their twisted prism to reinforce their “white folks as iredeemingly racist” trope. As always, it’s all they are capable of.
“Of course, it was bloody obvious that he was referring to the difference between a rules-based society (the European garden) and those opposed parts of the world where tyrants enforce the law of the jungle. You know the ones I mean: Russia, Iran, NK, etc etc.”
Main.
Was he really!
Well, that’s your interpretation of it, others will see it for what it is, racism.
Geri says:
16 October, 2022 at 2:26 pm
He’s lying.
His complaints are that ppl can’t self ID.
Let men’s toilets be men’s & let women’s toilets be unisex.
There’s no a avoiding medical intervention. Abnormal behaviours lead to other abnormal behaviours & close medical intervention reveals that. It can be either peer pressure or far more sinister beliefs under the surface. A medical professional can scratch the surface.
Being trans is not consider an abnormal behavior/a mental health issue hence no need for medical intervention.
It has been declared that
‘Transwomen are women.’
end of.
It’s a crazy idea to think a woman should go to the doctor and say I think I am a woman.
I’m trying to imagine myself going to the doctor and saying doctor I have a problem I think I am a woman.
What would the doctor say? He would say yes you are a woman everyone who thinks they are a woman are women.
Not that I’m going to do that as I suspect being that I am a woman the doctor might suggest I have mental health issues.
Although I might ask why I don’t have a penis like other ‘woman’ and what exactly is a woman.
@Republic
Naw, not wacism! Say it isn’t so. My tiny, delicate, mind hurts.
Who are these “others” you write of? Maybes they should read the entire speech, and not rely on Twitter snippets quoted out of context.
Cos it’s not my “interpretation”. It’s what he wrote.
But WTF. He might have presented an entire speech about the European Single Market instead. But if he had referenced monkey nuts as an example of traded goods, the same Twitter hysterics would have broken out from the same professionally insulted.
Rationalists see through all of this, Republic. What’s the issue with you?
Fionan 11:39 am
What didn’t you like about indyref1 regards AS?
As for handing it over to Sturgeon – he’d no choice. There wasn’t anyone else. The stars amongst the class of 56 hadn’t emerged until later.
SNPs popularity only soared after the No vote. I think they only had Sturgeon or possibly Russell. I could be wrong but isn’t it an unwritten rule it’s passed to deputy dawg?
@Geri – sounds like you’re saying Alba plan A is SNPs plan B but the SNP plan A remains a secret.. logically this means every time Alba attack SNP plan, those not privy to it are bound to deduce that SNP plan might be rubbish but the Alba one, by definition, must be even more so (or it would have been first choice)*.
@republicofscotland – I guess Douglas Ross or Lorna Slater might be tempted/ persuaded to present such a bill as it would undoubtedly raise their international profile and earn some well deserved acclaim, but reason I suggested labour was more based on what you said and to help Labour cut the umbilical (eg Monica Lennon, Neil Findlay or even eternal bridesmaid JB might have good reasons to seize such opportunity were it feasible)
*manner of observing, doubtless hypocritically, that the blue on blue vitriol risks doing no-one any favours (not even the 1922 committee, as funny as it may first appear to be)
@Ruby 3:57
Why automatically assume a doctor must be male?
It’s 2022. Women can aspire to all sorts of jobs. Raise your sights, think outside the box, and dare to do better.
Smash that glass ceiling, Ruby!
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707375
Your family member wouldn’t go wrong if she picked you or should I call you Ellis as a psychiatry dissertation subject.
I’m pretty sure writing about someone with a dual personality would be of interest.
One minute he posts as John Main then he switches to his other personality Andy Ellis and tells personalty number one John Main what a clever boy he is he even calls his 2nd personality brother.
Talking to yourself & having dual personalities is definitely worth psychiatric research.
Do your family member a favour and nominate yourself or should I say yourselves.
“Who are these “others” you write of?”
Main.
Well according to Borrell, anyone who doesn’t live in Europe, which he described as a jungle, and Europe as a garden. Of which if you watch it a few times, one could say with some certainty that it’s not taken out of context.
No, I’m pretty sure Borrell knew what he was saying, and in what context he was saying it in, and on reflection I’m not even that surprised by it. Mick Wallace and Clare Daly berate the European Parliament, day in and day out, on inaction by them, and it doesn’t make a blind bit of difference those at the top of the EU have their own agenda.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707391
John Main/Andy Ellis says:
16 October, 2022 at 4:14 pm
@Ruby 3:57
Why automatically assume a doctor must be male?
Because my doctor is male. He has pronouns.
Not just a cunt but a nit-picking cunt!
Are you doing all this trolling/stalking in order to avoid telling us why you are an independence supporter?
Ruby says:
16 October, 2022 at 1:19 pm
Andy Ellis says:
16 October, 2022 at 1:00 pm
I see the moonhowlers are now fluffing Scott Ritter as a source whose views should be given due consideration. No….really…Scott Ritter.
Who should we be giving due consideration to?
Ritter was the primary whistle blower and skeptic of the WMD pretext for the war in Iraq. I can’t remember if he was sacked or quit from the UN Inpection Team, but he wasn’t having any of their bullshit / coverup / whatever.
As I recall, he tried to prevent the Iraq war, because he knew Saddam was being played and set up with tall tales about WMD’s.
He was kinda disowned at that point for embarrassing the US Bush Administration, and later found guilty of online sex stuff, but given how we know the Establishment likes to smear it’s critics and enemies with a lurid sex scandal, (Assange, Murray, Salmond, etc) grubbier the better, I have my doubts he’s actually a perv. (It was a police sting, no victim, which “caught” him. I don’t know the truth. Maybe he was guilty as charged. But…eyebrows raised).
Obviously, it all came out in the wash that the whole WMD carry on was taken straight from Jackanory, Bush and Blair were war criminals, and Ritter was actually telling the truth right from the beginning. If people had listened to him, maybe Iraq might not have been blootered sideways by “Shock and Awe”.
So yeah, I suppose it is possible he has an axe to grind with the US, but actually, I think he’s the proverbial whistleblower type who just wants people to know the truth and trusts that the truth will see him vindicated. Obviously the US has a different perspective.
You pays your money, you takes your chance. I think he’s a good guy who made himself an enemy of the state, or rather, the state made him an enemy of the state.
Alf Baird.
Nice to hear your name in the Alba Conference.
Signatures for a general election made welcome
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/619781
Stuart McTavish.
No. SNP have no plan other than remain in power.
They point blank refused to carry out part 2 of the original plan B – use Holyrood election as a Plebiscite. They used it for their own self serving agenda instead with a declaration on national telly they not work with AS & they continued the SNP 1 & 2 myth to lock others out.
Lol wee Harvie has split from green party England until they mend thier trasphobic ways! LOL
I took up my responsibilities as Fisheries spokesperson as part of my DEFRA brief this week. We debated the impact of Brexit. ‘Never before has a sector been so deceived and betrayed as fishing’. The Tory Brexiteers will pay a heavy electoral price in fishing communities.
@Geri 5:50
Short post there, but I count 6 negatives and 0 positives.
Ordinarily I would have thought nowt about it, but in view of your earlier accusations, maybes you should set an example, eh?
Can I ask if Sara Salyers or Alf Baird is reading wings if they could enlighten readers who are not members of ANY political party but desperately support independence what Sara’s and therefore SALVO’S points were about at the ALBA conference
Correct me if I am wrong but is it that ALBA are pushing the convention of the estates as belonging to politicians within Scotland , whereas SALVO are insisting that the convention of the estates is the sovereign grouping of Scots and BELONGS to the people , those who are SOVEREIGN
Is this another case of politicians demanding ownership
I see they have voted to break all links with the Greens in England and Wales because Lady Dick told them too.
Useless tools.
@Republic 4:19
Thanks for your reply. Tell you what, let’s knock this on the head, and throw the question open to the audience.
We are comparing a garden of relative prosperity and safety to a jungle of poverty and anarchy. The flow of people, counted in the millions yearly, is as close to uni-directional as to make no difference.
Now, which one is the garden? And which one is the jungle? Is the jungle the one that all these millions are sacrificing just about everything to get to?
Needs no answer, does it Republic?
And here’s another no-brainier. Given there are already tens of millions of lucky immigrants who have made the garden their home, if it is such a hell-hole, how is that message not getting through? Why is the uni-directional flow increasing yearly?
Rationalists might believe that is an immediate and conclusive squashing of the “racist” trope.
There’s always room for more at the taxpayers trough.
“Boris’ New Tory Peers
13 include Nicholas Soames, Hugo Swire, Michael Hintze who donated to Tories; historian Andrew Roberts and Arlene Foster former DUP leader.”
https://twitter.com/Grouse_Beater/status/1581017613668605953?cxt=HHwWgoDT5ZPJ8_ArAAAA
Geri and Roger
The Scottish Greens refer to the English and Welsh Greens as their ‘sister’ organisations
It would be interesting to know how they define ‘sister’.
I had to stop at the thought of them including radios (transistors).
I’ll get me coat.
@Ruby et al
There are more female GPs in Scotland than male. Medical University entrants are 60/40 female. My beef is on working class entrants. How many decades is it going to take to decide if UK CAT test is a detriment of Doctor success? 40, 50 or a 100 year timescale?. It’s a money racket.
Breeks says:
He was kinda disowned at that point for embarrassing the US Bush Administration, and later found guilty of online sex stuff, but given how we know the Establishment likes to smear it’s critics and enemies with a lurid sex scandal, (Assange, Murray, Salmond, etc) grubbier the better, I have my doubts he’s actually a perv. (It was a police sting, no victim, which “caught” him. I don’t know the truth. Maybe he was guilty as charged. But…eyebrows raised).
He sounds like someone you should take seriously.
Even if he were a ‘perv’ that doesn’t mean he isn’t a credible witness.
I’m ready to believe him and also to believe that he may have been set-up.
Like you I have my doubts about all these sex scandals Assange, Murray, Salmond and also Derek MacKay and Mark MacDonald.
My suspicious mind wants to know what Derek MacKay & Mark MacDonald actually did to deserve
the treatment.
My question ‘Who should we be giving due consideration to?’ was actually for Andy Ellis/John Main who I now believe is just one person with two accounts.
Decisions, decisions, decisions!
A ‘sex pest’ who tells the truth or a liar who writes government propaganda?
@ determinant
George Ferguson says:
16 October, 2022 at 7:51 pm
@Ruby et al
There are more female GPs in Scotland than male.
What do you mean by female George? My doctor is male hence the reason I referred to the doctor as he. I’m pretty sure he is a biological male cos he looked like a male way long before it was trendy to be trans.
I haven’t been to the doctors surgery in the last five years so things might have changed. I just wonder if male doctors still ask their patients if they would like a female/male doctor to do certain intimate procedures?
You got any info about that George?
I’m just curious I don’t have a problem with male doctors. These examinations are equally embarrassing whether the doctor is male of female. I would however be pretty miffed if I asked for a female doctor and I ended up getting a ‘trans woman’ doctor.
Sorry I don’t know what UK CAT test is so can’t comment.
I was thinking if joining a gym with a jacuzzi. I thought that would be a lovely thing to do during the winter months but it turns out jacuzzis are being closed down for six months.
https://archive.ph/frwPS
‘The announcement comes after leisure facilities warned of mass swimming pool closures across Scotland due to energy price hikes and chlorine shortages.
Insolvency aid organisation CompanyDebt dubbed the threat to the UK’s community pools “poolmageddon”, warning that the majority of public leisure facilities could be forced to close their doors within the next six months.’
Chlorine shortages?
Is it due to Brexit?
UK-raine war?
or Covid?
I wonder if these gyms like the Omni Centre Nuffield gym are losing members not just because of the jacuzzi closure but also because of the communal changing rooms.
As far as I know the Omni centre doesn’t use chlorine in their pool they use UV light.
Merganser says:
16 October, 2022 at 7:18 pm
Geri and Roger
The Scottish Greens refer to the English and Welsh Greens as their ‘sister’ organisations
Sisters and not cisters?
I don’t need to get my coat I’ve already got it on.
@Ruby 8:17pm
I refer you to J K Rowling to know what is a female or woman. A Unionist I know but a protector of women. Screeds of lines in the Sunday Times and other papers today. Don’t denigrate male doctors by talking about examinations. It’s their job to look after women’s health. Trans is an anathema to them. My assigned Doctor is a female but I would walk past her in street because I have never met her. I have only been here in this community for 16 months. Last word from a male Doctor the lawyers will make a fortune from trans ideology.
Has there been a derogatory name (in amongst all the others) thrown about btl yet for folk that support Scotland not being members of NATO.
Democracy in action in a political party, but will it be too much for certain members to deal with…
https://www.albaparty.org/scotland_not_to_seek_nato_membership
Dan
It will probably refer to transatlantic hating.
I was told I must be pissed if that helps?
*Hic*
Transatlantic Equality Requires Freedom = TERF.
Seem to have heard that before somewhere.
@ Merganser
Not hating those over the Atlantic, just afraid of some of them and their perpetual warmongering antics. A bit like David Bowie was.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LT3cERVRoQo
And to wake everyone up here’s a retro bump for Green Day (which in no way relates to the Scottish Greens Conference this weekend)
American Idiot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee_uujKuJMI
Talking of Yank WMDs, fiscal policy & music, what if this John Denver song had come true instead of the one that did?
If peace is our vision…
Let Us Begin – John Denver & Alexander Gradsky
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LajVC_cF3Lk
twathater @ 6:23 pm
“Is this another case of politicians demanding ownership”
National parties (according to postcolonial literature) tend to mimic the structure and policy orientation of parties in the ‘mother country’, which writers such as Fanon viewed as a mistake. The primary urgency and priority is that of freeing the people through national independence/liberation, whereas national parties tend to focus on a whole range of other policies which acts to delay and confuse the most urgent matter at hand. Whilst a transitionary administration incl. new heads of all institutions and gov depts and agencies owing allegiance ONLY to the new state is vital and needs put in place immediately upon independence, policies on many other matters are best debated after independence is secured and also will be proposed during the first elections to a new state’s legislature. Salvo has already published the Scottish constitution as part of the Claim of Right: https://salvo.scot/scottish-constitution/
Okay, all you oldies..
Bringing it up to date with a tune & BBC & MTV banned. I guess it hit a nerve.
Faithless bombs. The vid says it all..A compilation of all the great *Made in the USA* moments & lyrics on point.
youtu.be/_VyaeyXD374
Alf, sounds good to me.
Independence started out that way. Not belonging to a political party but somewhere along the line the SNP think they own the whole Yes movement.
@ Alf Baird 10.35pm , Thank you for your response and explanation Alf , I watched Sara’s speech on yatube and picked up that she appeared mighty pissed off that ALBA were manipulating all the good work , energy and research that you members of SALVO and the SSRG had dedicated to FORCE publicity and knowledge of the CLAIM OF RIGHT by insisting on a convention of the estates to be RESERVED to politicians at all levels
We have had DECADES of unionist governments in Scotland some of whom will probably have realised the significance of the COR and the power of the Convention of the Estates but deliberately chose to ignore or hide the significance from the Scottish people because they are t raitors to their own people and country
The SNP have been in government since 2007 pushing independence YET it is only NOW that the COR and the convention of the estates is gaining prominence and significance and that is through the hard work of the SSRG and SALVO , where have all the independence supporting politicians been since 2007 that should have been SCREAMING the COR and COE at EVERY opportunity
IF the CONVENTION OF THE ESTATES is to be seized by politicians , IMO it can ONLY be on a temporary basis to facilitate the independence of Scotland , once independent a means must be worked to return the convention back to the rightful owners , the sovereign people of Scotland , I would further propose that ANY COE formed MUST include a considerable representation from SALVO and SSRG to ensure politicians don’t prevaricate or delay the return to the people
Looking and listening to the audience when Sara was making her speech it appeared to me that many were in agreement with Sara , people must remember the last ALBA conference when Sara first revealed the extensive work SALVO had undertaken to research the COR and the COE and the uplifting feeling that all was not lost on the indy front , and the resulting adoption and inclusion of Sara and her propositions on the many indy sites and blogs
twathater says:
17 October, 2022 at 2:24 am
IF the CONVENTION OF THE ESTATES is to be seized by politicians , IMO it can ONLY be on a temporary basis to facilitate the independence of Scotland…
I can’t give you any authoritative reply, but I can tell you that Sara Salyers is absolutely clear about the constitutional framework, and in particular the pecking order. The people can overrule Westminster, the people can overrule the Crown, the people can overrule the Court of Session. The people are Sovereign and their will cannot be overruled.
Nevermind the SNP’s accounts being woven through with our IndyRef fighting fund, UK legislation properly does have Scotland’s Claim of Right woven through it. Sara made the point that despite the histrionics and contempt which is routinely heaped upon “anything” Scottish in Westminster, Westminster still knows better than to strike down the Claim of Right because the Union dies the moment they do.
We have the biggest gun in the arsenal, and don’t let anyone tell you different.
Our problem isn’t the power we have, our problem is nobody is familiar with the Manual, and the drill for implementing our sovereignty properly is needing to be re-written. There are big blanks which require a bit of reverse engineering to make the dysfunctional parts of our Constitution function again.
That process is complicated, because Sovereignty in the 14th Century is different in the 21st Century; still sovereign, but different, less notional, more explicit.
The same is true for democracy, which didn’t properly exist until the 20th Century, although there are formative principles of what would become democracy which predate the Declaration of Arbroath.
There is a third component long, long, overdue for radical modernisation, and that is the roll of Scotland’s Convention of the Estates.
Now Sara Salyers will no doubt put me right, but Scotland’s Convention of the Estates, the Three Estates of the Scottish Parliament, and other constitutional bodies were all mechanisms for holding those in power to account. They weren’t there to define the sovereignty of the people, they were mechanisms to enact it. They often weren’t permanent assemblies, but created themselves according to need. The rights were permanent, the assemblies were ephemeral.
The roll we envisage for the Convention of the Estates in 2022 is focused upon restoring Scotland’s popular sovereignty to it’s rightful place of ascendancy, but that’s a new direction and uncharted territory for any “traditional” Convention of the Estates. The sovereignty never had to assert it’s credentials before the Union muddied the waters and unleashed a tsunami of bogus conventions and fallacies. – Bogus conventions and fallacies which have survived 300+ years because Scotland’s Constitutional rights and defences were quashed.
Another aspect of Constitutional modernisation is that in 1320, we were presenting Scotland’s credentials to the Papacy, but in 2022, we need Scotland’s credentials to be recognised and respected by the International family of Nations. The UN doesn’t ordinarily listen to bodies below the level of National Governmments, but it can under some circumstances. One of those circumstances is becoming a formal liberation movement, and thus being allowed to present your case to the UN.
So at the moment, the situation might seem a bit fractious, because it is a bit fractious, a bit like a discordant orchestra warming up before the tap! tap! tap! of the Conductor brings them to order.
So yes, now is the time to beware of political Boromir’s who would take the sovereignty and use it for themselves, but at the same time, we need those Boromirs to advance the wider cause.
I trust Sara Salyers, and I trust Alex Salmond, and more importantly, I believe they trust each other. Interesting times…
Breeks, the people can do anything. However do the people want to do anything? Do enough of them want to do something? Unless we take a clear majority with us it won’t gain enough traction. I believe this is at the back of quite a few of SNP and Alba politicians’ minds. No matter the legality, the will of the people is the key. I’m as impatient for independence as y’all are. 60% YES could be enough but 51% wouldn’t quite be enough IMHO. Legally yes, but settled will? Afraid not.
@Breeks (6.47) –
Ha!
What a great way of putting it.
🙂
@ Luigi
Although I share your doubt that “cunning plans for indy” have support outside a small political bubble, and don’t really seem to be making any progress even within Alba, we should beware of accepting that 51% for indy somehow isn’t enough! We don’t need a supermajority: 50% + 1 is enough, whether in a plebiscitary election or a referendum.
The 48% who voted Remain in the brexit referendum didn’t get to say the result wasn’t valid, neither should Scottish or British unionists in the event indy is approved by 51%!
Indeed and is Brexit the settled will? Absolute chaos IMO with politicians terrified to grasp the nettle and do what urgently needs to be done. Do we want this for Scotland? I think the legal evidence will be crucial at a later stage but not before there us a clear majority for independence. And even then we have a fight on our hands. Cart before horses comes to mind. Its coming for a that:)
I trust Sara Salyers, and I trust Alex Salmond, and more importantly, I believe they trust each other. Interesting times…
Isn’t “May you live in interesting times” an old Chinese curse?
I trust Alex Salmond too. I’ve read the output of Salvo and SSRG with interest but remain unconvinced that it will result in an acceleration of independence, or provide an extra-parliamentary route to achieving the aim without the use of either a referendum or plebiscitary elections. That isn’t to say what is being proposed is impossible or might not become necessary if there is an impasse with the British nationalists trying to illegitimately blocking “legal” routes and/or acting in an anti-democratic way.
As has been said before, a legal remedy that can’t be used is no remedy at all.
Convincing the majority of the Scots people, and the pro independence movement and parties that they need to abandon existing routes however is a big ask. It could take longer than just concentrating on gaining and winning another referendum or plebiscitary election. Many people will have read the exchanges between Sarah Salyers and Roddy Dunlop for example and have found themselves agreeing with the latter more than the former.
@ Geri at well it’s not really late enough to complain Faithless stylée about why you can’t get no sleep. 😉
Here’s your link to Faithless – Bombs vid.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VyaeyXD374
When posting YT links you copy the entire YT link and paste it into your comment box… NB. But you should strip off the https:// before the www or the vid will embed on the page and there’s enough warring, death, and destruction going on at the moment without Stu looking out his hammers…
Luigi says:
17 October, 2022 at 7:47 am
Breeks, the people can do anything. However do the people want to do anything? Do enough of them want to do something? Unless we take a clear majority with us it won’t gain enough traction…
Funny how Scotland’s Parliament agreeing to the Union didn’t lose any sleep over what the people wanted or gaining traction. They didn’t let it stop them.
Funny how Westminster didn’t give a flying fk about Brexit “gaining traction” in Scotland, because you know,
fuck your Sovereign Scottish Constitution“democracy” is inviolable and all that shite…If the people are simply too sheeplike and indoctrinated to defend their Nation, then fine, let them stay sheep and wake up one day to a Constitutional dissolution of the Union. They are sheep. What do they care? We have only the wrath of sheep to worry about, but at least the cursed Union will be legally dead.
Don’t get me wrong, I actually do believe in Democracy, but proper democracy, just not the pseudo-democracy of the UK regime which is merely a cable tie around Scotland’s neck, and only ever clicks it’s grip ever tighter.
Democracy is the new religion; a blessed deliverance forced down your throat by fanatical evangelists craving power. That isn’t what democracy is all about.
We don’t get news, or political debate, we get the BBC and propaganda. That isn’t what democracy is all about.
Scotland’s Constitutional subjugation is contrary to International Law. You don’t need a majority to de-legitimise and overturn a breach of the law or treaty. Justice will suffice, and the sheep won’t care either way.
I’d stack the legality and legitimacy of Scotland’s Constitution against the perfidious democracy of Westminster any day of the week.
Westminster’s use of democracy (I remind you, Truss says we’re not getting a Referendum even if Tony Blair’s Supreme Court says we should), is every inch as cynical as Mr P’s use of Democracy in the (D)onbas. Mr P deftly turning Western Democracy against the West. I bet the bombed out Iraqis, Afghans and Syrians had a wry smile seeing that. They know Democracy is a trap and a pretence which justifies the bombings.
It seems there’s democracy and then there’s “democracy”. So while the sheep are bleating about all that, we’ll just test the legitimacy of our Constitution with the UN… Even better, we’ll just assert our Sovereignty, politely inform them, and invite them to update their records.
@Breeks (8.53) –
‘…Even better, we’ll just assert our Sovereignty, politely inform them, and invite them to update their records.’
Yep.
No-one has to be a member of a political party or have an opinion on Scottish independence or anything else to make the observation that the system we have – whatever it’s labelled – does not deliver.
It’ll never be perfect, aye, but we have to be a lot closer than we currently are. Having war criminals like Blair still accessing msm studios to spout globalist shite is, in itself, a perennial indictment. The UN is a nice idea, aye, but many of us will never forget Colin Powell’s cred-shredding performance with the vial of talcum powder or that rat Netanyahu’s Wile E. Coyote ‘bomb’ cartoon. Unfortunately, those are the rogue states with the whip hand and god help anyone who dares defy them.
Sara Salyers has tweeted that SALVO will be dissolved as and when ALBA gets its act together and awareness is raised sufficiently across the whole political landscape. (That’s my take on it anyway.) That seems fair enough. It’s up to the rest of us to keep engaging, thrashing this stuff out and preparing for the day when Sturgeon either resigns or is hoofed.
Dan @9.05pm.
From your link.
“Commenting ALBA Party General Secretary Chris McEleny said:
“The NATO of over a decade ago is not that of today. As an independent country that is a member of NATO, the risk of Scotland being dragged to conflicts we do not support would be real. The increasing seduction of our politicians by NATO forces would inevitably lead to a roll back of the speed at which Scotland removed Trident from the Clyde.
“ALBA will not support an Independent Scotland’s membership of NATO.
“An Independent Scotland’s defence should exist to keep our people safe and to be an ally only of the voices for peace in the world
That is the principals of which we have set out today.””
Wise words indeed.
Dan @9.05: “Has there been a derogatory name (in amongst all the others) thrown about btl yet for folk that support Scotland not being members of NATO.”
Given the way things usually work in the MSM, surely “NATO-denier” must be a candidate?
Don’t get me wrong, folks. I think Sara Salyers and SALVO are doing a fantastic job. All this effort and legal evidence can be banked and ready to be used when it is needed. If we secure a majority in favour of Scottish independence, the UK government will fight tooth and nail. No matter the majority, they will be extremely awkward and aggressive (existential threat an all that). That’s when all the hard work by SALVO will be invaluable. No harm to bank it until needed. Just a matter of timing IMO.
https://archive.ph/zHRjD
This article is worth reading:
Time and again, UK Prime Ministers and politicians, including Margaret Thatcher, have acknowledged that the Union is a voluntary one, and that Scotland has a right to self-determination.
But Scotland doesn’t have the right to self-determination. All these UK Prime Ministers and politicians, including Margaret Thatcher have being lying to us.
It’s all a big pretence to make us believe we aren’t just a colony.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707417
Dan says:
16 October, 2022 at 9:05 pm
Has there been a derogatory name (in amongst all the others) thrown about btl yet for folk that support Scotland not being members of NATO.
Democracy in action in a political party, but will it be too much for certain members to deal with…
https://www.albaparty.org/scotland_not_to_seek_nato_membership
It’s difficult to keep up with all the derogatory names. We might have to compile a list and the meanings of all the derogatory names.
Is someone who believes Scotland is a colony a ‘moonhowler’?
If so I am a ‘moonhowling, cunt calling, schemie, fringe nutter,skid mark, know nothing harridan with tourettes’ 🙂
Today this ‘moonhowling, cunt calling, schemie, fringe nutter,skid mark, know nothing harridan with tourettes’ is totally pissed off about all the jacuzzis closing and the prospect of ‘swimageddon’ due to a shortage of chlorine.
Bloody Brexit!
Hot tip! Don’t go signing yourself up for any gym membership that involves a year’s contract.
Ladies should avoid all gyms with communal changing rooms and watch out for phones peeping through the bottom of your cubicle.
Arguably the most important thing to happen on the international stage in decades, and we all missed it…
https://asiatimes.com/2022/10/china-based-us-chip-experts-fade-stay-go-dilemma/
Apparently the US government told Americans working for chip manufacturers in China to get out or they’d face losing citizenship. Consequently they all left and now China is facing chipless future.
One of the things the fake history books imply, and don’t tell you much about, is that Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbour came out of the blue. It didn’t. It came out of an economic war waged against it by the US and Britain…
As it happens there’s a little Island not far off the Chinese coast that manufactures chips;
“Taiwan makes 65% of the world’s semiconductors and almost 90% of the advanced chips.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/race-for-semiconductors-influences-taiwan-conflict-/6696432.html
It was inevitable that US economy would be superseded some day and go into decline. I always wondered how they would respond to that. I guess this is it.
It would appear that the Britnat media is obsessed with when the lame duck Liz Truss will be sacked as PM, the current rules state that she has to have a year in the job before that can happen, but it’s looking increasingly as though that rule will be changed for Truss.
Here in Scotland, it doesn’t really matter to us who becomes PM, nothing will change especially on the indy front, and Westminster will just continue to take what it wants from Scotland no matter what.
Westminster has been going through one form of turmoil or another for years now moreso since the Brexit vote was announced, yet our FM Sturgeon whose party’s main remit is to free Scotland from this union, couldn’t capitalise at all on the turmoil at Westminster. Oh, she managed to get many SNP MPs into the HoC there were 56 of them at one point, but still she chose to do nothing to fulfill the mandates that we gave her.
Sturgeon made many promises on holding an indyref since Brexit, but again she failed miserably to deliver, her government and her then Lord Advocate even hindered a private citizen on finding out if we actually needed consent from Westminster to hold an indyref.
Her latest gimmick to stall the indy movement was to have her current Lord Advocate seek reassurance that Holyrood has the competence to hold an indyref, and that reassurance is now in the hands of a UK construct the UKSC, and even if we do have the competency to hold an indyref, Sturgeon has assured Westminster that it will be just a mock indyref with no consequences for the union.
Now if Sturgeon is what she claims she is, an independence supporter, then why appoint a die-hard unionist as your LA, and standby as that LA claims that she’s not confident enough to put the bill to our very own Court of Session, it all stinks to high heaven of a stalling process to further hinder the independence cause, a cause that hasn’t progressed at all since Sturgeon became FM, infact one could quite easily say that since Sturgeon became FM the indy cause has been put down, and only wheeled out by the current SNP leader at election times or when she, or her MPs have a gripe with the UK Tory government.
Sturgeon can only stall for so long before the indy masses eventually tipple, that somethings not right, when that happens, I think a plan will already be in place, for some form of extra devolution or fiscal autonomy for Scotland, that Sturgeon and her party will back, to try and make sure we never leave this union.
I don’t know about all this thing with Salvo.
Are all these things not letting Sturgeon off the hook.
Is it not her job to get us a section 30 from Westminster.
Like Alex Salmond I haven’t seen her do much about that.
Outwith the cosy setting of Holyrood she has absolutely no experience of politics.
If you want rid of Sturgeon I believe we should focus on her inability to get us a section 30. If she cant do that then we should demand her resignation.
Sturgeon out out out!
Breeks @ 8:53 am
“let them stay sheep and wake up one day to a Constitutional dissolution of the Union”
This is a very valid warning, Breeks, because where colonialism is permitted to continue the nation itself will perish. An oppressed nation and people, their culture, language(s), identity and hence national consciousness will eventually disappear along with their history and constitution, all consigned to the oppressors Imperial dustbin.
Independence is not about policies on this and that, or on matters of Left or Right, which tend to pre-occupy the ‘national parties’; independence is about the right of ‘a people’ to exist.
Anyone remember a speech by this guy’s uncle that sounded a similar warning?
Robert F Kennedy Jnr, as tweeted earlier today (my punctuation, breaks etc)
twitter.com/wopizza2/status/1581895097427582977
Ooops posted this on the wrong thread. This one should have come before my other posts.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707437
Andy Ellis says:
17 October, 2022 at 8:23 am
As has been said before, a legal remedy that can’t be used is no remedy at all.
That was highlighted in this article
https://archive.ph/zHRjD
As the SNP brief in this case argued, if there is no way to exercise a right, then it is no right at all: ubi jus ibi remedium. However, if the UK government continues to reject any negotiation with Scotland, or to countenance any further independence referendum, then, as Ciaran Martin has written, ‘you have to give up the pretence that this is a voluntary union, that Scotland is allowed to leave’. This reduces Scotland to the status of a colony, or a region with no history of independent statehood, which flies in the face of history, and also undermines any claims for the exceptional, voluntary, ‘family’, nature of the UK Union.
Why all this pretence that Scotland isn’t a colony?
http://robinmcalpine.org/failure-is-not-inevitable/
Whilst reading the linked to article it brought to mind that *proper engineering systems incorporate routine servicing and preventative maintenance schedules to ensure equipment continues to run as designed and with as little downtime and expensive repairs as is possible.
* That’s “proper” as in oldskool commonsense engineering, not to be confused with modern “engineering” which is generally form over function and designed for maximising profits and built in failure of equipment just after warranty ends.
This boy is ignorance. This girl is want. Beware them both and all of this degree but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom unless the writing be erased.
Charles Dickens
Ian ,seems that Robert Kennedy and he were in agreement.
@Dorothy Devine (11.48) –
Haven’t seen that one before. Quite chilling.
🙁
Dorothy Devine.
Dickens’s moralising has much to commend it. It is as relevant today as it was in the 19th century. If only billionaires would read ‘Our Mutual Friend’
Or civil servants and would-be politicians would read ‘Little Dorrit’.
Hunt with a C has torn up the Truss for PM campaign manifesto.
Her policies, her people in charge, her guarantee of no u-turns.
Scrapped the freeze on Corporation Tax
Scrapped removal of the 45% tax band.
Scrapped 1p cut to 19p for the majority.
Scrapped Alcohol Duty Freeze
Scrapped VAT free shopping for tourists.
The Tories raised N.I. tax recently but back to square one with it.
Thank God the Bankers get to keep their No limits pay deals in the U.K.
and for first time buyers, must in London, no stamp duty on £425,000 homes.
Most bankers can forget about new mortgages at these rates.
What percentage of first time buyers can pay £2,000 per month on a mortgage that is likely to escalate?
We have recently seen an average home energy bill increase from £12,000p.a. to £2,500.
Hunt suggests the cap will end in April even though Truss said last week it would be over
£6,000p.a.
So in April the average home energy bill will have increase by £5,000p.a.
Mortgage rates doubled
Food bills up 20%
Time to drag this mob out of government and into prison.
When the car crash budget was launched the mortgage rates went up straight off.
Now everything is scrapped will the rates be down at the same pace???
Twathater
Alf Baird.
Yesterday I was having a rant along similar lines.
The problem for Alba is similar in attitude to the Snp and NS,
Where the choice is to be in the leaders political seat first to steer the Grass roots of independence along a one route political track, of lets get the party up and growing to eventually lets grab those seats in a devolved government.
The politics of placing a political party first is ingrained like a stain into a system that believes people have little or no rights without politicians / them at the head of the helm.
That nothing can be done unless the people bow to politicians.
The attitude in of itself is old Colonialism.
People become serfs and servants to politics.
The point by Sara is both the snp and Alba missed it.
The people are Sovereign in Scotland,
If the people decide that Scotland is leaving thats it,
Politicians state all sorts of clauses to hamper people Sovereignty such as you have to abide by our rules regarding the criteria,
You have to have a set amount of majority and that we the politicians will call out that number and change the goal posts when we wish the rules to change against the people.
That we politicians hold Scottish Sovereignty, because you lend it to us when you vote,
This is nonsense.
They are voted in to do what you and I want them to do as a set of actions,
They are employed employed in the same manner. you would tell a carpet fitter which rooms you want the carpet in and the choice of pattern and colour.
The carpet fitter does not have your borrowed Sovereignty in you home to do as he pleases.
Salvo and SSRG recognise the difference of whom is the employer and whom is merely a employed politician.
The sovereignty remains in the hands of the people regardless, it is not lent or given away to the employees,
The political carpet fitters in Scotland have taken it upon themselves to become carpet baggers.
Am I along in thinking the SNP hierarchies are in the process of issuing policies designed to put people of independence and to provide an open goal for the unionists.
Where would one start??
Gender
Faith schools
Use the pound
Immediately rejoin the eu and get a hard border
NHS
Stopping oil and gas
Ignoring farmers and agriculture
It’s starting to read like an SNP agenda. I must stop.
Who are the unionist plants in Nicolas office. Thoughts
IanB and Merganser, that quote has stuck with me since my first reading of A Christmas Carol – which is not today nor yesterday!
Dickens had a deal to say on society and its ills.
Favourite for politicians in my book is Hilaire Belloc,
‘Here richly with ridiculous display the politicians corpse is laid away,
While all of his acquaintance sneered and slanged , I wept for I had long to see him hanged.’
The politics of political parties here in Scotland even in the independence parties? Believe the people are helpless unless they vote for one of their parties,
This retains the status quo of politicians are sovereign in government, and superior above the great unwashed masses,
This was always how Colonialism worked.
I am not surprised the neither NS, NuSNP nor The old snp spoke to much or to loudly on the Scottish Peoples Claim of Right.
I have been trying to remember if any political party explained Salvo or Scottish peoples Sovereignty during the lead up to the 2014 referendum as Sara has done with Salvo, and the SSRG.
I doubt there is a political party in existence today in Scotland that would tell the people of Scotland you can walk away from the treaty at any time, you are sovereign.
No politician would wish to loose such long term well paid employment.
Hatuey says:
17 October, 2022 at 9:39 am
Apparently the US government told Americans working for chip manufacturers in China to get out or they’d face losing citizenship. Consequently they all left and now China is facing chipless future.
America just doesn’t feel happy in it’s skin right now.
I think it sees itself being overtaken in the technology stakes, and I suspect it’s that NeoConservative model which diverts the capital needed for research, development and investment, while simultaneously not investing in it’s little people. America is lashing out in every direction, but somehow flailing and looking less and less powerful…
I don’t have much insight into the USA these days, but it seems ill at ease with Hispanics from Mexico, Muslims from the Middle East, and Asians / Chinese from, well, Asia and China. You Democrats and Republicans seem bitterly, bitterly divided, and all heavily armed into the bargain. Racism seems to be widespread in the Authorities, tensions run high, and yet, there seem precious few initiatives promising change.
It’s not just healthcare the poor is starved from getting, but education seems checkered too.
I cannot believe it’s 46 years old, but I think one of the most underated songs of all time is White Man, by Queen, from the Day at the Races album. Was the writing really on the wall in 1976? I guess it was.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0LSuY2TDwE
Did anyone watch Alex Salmond’s coupon when Sara Salyers gave her speech on the sovereignty of the people / Claim of Right?
No disrespect to Alex, but he had a face on him like a well skelped airse. From what I could see, he never applauded her contribution whatsoever, which I felt was rude. If I am wrong about that I stand to be corrected.
Maybe someone could tell me if I have this right? It seems Sara was promised at an earlier conference by Neale Hanvey that there would be a motion asserting Claim of Right / sovereignty of the people but this didn’t happen and so she raised this issue and wanted the motion reverted back instead of a vote.
Instead there a different motion that made references to the of Claim of Right as part as a wider motion and that’s why she sought to have the motion referred back?
So, Sara highlighted that this implies we place our sovereignty in the hands of Alba politicians if elected. Whereas, In Scotland, Claim of Right means the people remain sovereign at ALL times.
Why are senior members of political parties, such as SNP / Alba on stage anyway? At conference it’s supposed to be for all members, so why is anyone but the speaker and chair on stage anyway; so delegates can more easily be influenced by displays of approval / disapproval from the senior members on stage?
In other words, “follow my leader” politics.
Nicola has now produced the long awaited further economic/financial strategy for an Independent Scotland.
Can anyone spot any projected financials?
What does the SNP actually propose?
There is absolutely NOTHING in the paper setting out a way forward other than stating that further papers will be produced at a later date.
What will these papers tell us? More confusion and a distinct lack of clarity on almost every subject matter. One thing is very clear-be worried about your state pension in an Independent Scotland.
I said a few days ago that the latest ‘strategy’ would raise more qustions than it would answer. I was not wrong?
Meanwhile – It is yet another fuck you peasants know your place Jocko budget from the English Tories.
So as the fourth Tory chancellor (This is the guy who was a nasty Jeremy Hunt, during his time as Health Minister) in as many months, tries to look as though he has a clue to what he’s relaying to the UK with regards to a U-turn on Truss’s woeful policies.
We have yet another paper from Sturgeon the betrayer on Scottish independence, the umpteen that’s led absolutely nowhere. From picking up what I can from Sturgeon’s carrot dangling at Bute House today, (a timed propaganda exercise to capitalise on the disaster that Westminster to adhere more folk to the SNP) it looks as though Sturgeon the betrayer will continue to use Sterling on independence, which will be disastrous for the Scottish economy. It’s patently obvious this is just another exercise in duping the indy masses.
This doesn’t go down too well with renowned economist Richard Murphy.
“In three simple paras the SNP shreds its economic credibility in a way only Truss and Kwarteng have done before, because quite literally no country can do what this plan published by Sturgeon this morning suggests. Using sterling would economically ruin an independent Scotland.”
https://twitter.com/RichardJMurphy/status/1581993208656977920?cxt=HHwWgICj8aCcr_QrAAAA
Salvo and the SSRG are explaining to all of us in Scotland as a nation of Sovereign Scots you can walk away,
End the treaty of union.
That court cases, and politicians here and in Westminster are creating the false picture you are caught in a loop.
Legally though the peoples choice of government through the Claim of Right wrote into the treaty of union give the Scots people the power to walk away,
I have always thought that the legal challenges of Westminster, of being recognised by other Countries. And any cases bought before the UN would forcefully come to light and the attention of the world after Scotlands people decides to walk away,
Whining and complaining is easily ignored as background noise by the UN, other Countries across Europe.
Walking away through the Claim of Right of the Scots people is not illegal nor UDi and would be a massive game changer in how the world suddenly studies and reviews the construction of Britain and the Treaty of Union.
Political parties and structures in Scotland and England will ask for details of, How? When. Where,
Simply to form preventative measures and put the Scottish people back under their Colonial thumbs.
But This is the sovereign Scottish peoples Choice,
and do not need to keep establishment informed of these details.
The english parliament of Westminster
The English parliament of Westminster cannot contest the Scots Claim of Right wrote into the treaty of Union without demolishing the agreed terms of the Treaty of Union.
https://archive.ph/TutWN
It’s very bad news if women see the Tories as defenders of women’s rights.
We need an IndyRef with a section 30 not some bonkers ‘de facto referendum’ where women have the option to vote Tory in the mistaken belief that they will save women’s rights.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/gender-recognition-certificate-applications-and-outcomes
Only 1.8% of all decisions led to an application being refused.
What I would be asking Douglas Ross is
What is the difference vis a vis womens rights between Sturgeons Self-id and the current UK legislation?
UK legislation allows men to become women.
It also requires men to ‘live as a woman’ for a period of two years.
I would ask him how a man would be expected to live as a woman if he didn’t use women’s toilets, changing rooms, and serve his sentence in a woman prison.
I cant see a huge difference between current UK legislation vis a vis womens rights and the self-id madness.
The Tories are allowing men to become women and issuing them with GRCs.
Douglas Ross’ party are telling us ‘Trans Women are women’
Douglas Ross using this issue to try to win votes needs to answer the question
‘What is a woman?’ and why does the Tory Government allow men to become women?
More from Sturgeon the betrayer on her bonkers plan.
“Sturgeon says that the deficit and debt an independent Scotland would start out with would be derived from the overall UK position.
Therefore the level of debt upon becoming independent would be determined by negotiations after a Yes vote.
“As was established in 2014, Scotland would not have legal responsibility for UK debt,” the FM said. “We do, however, in my view, bear a moral responsibility.””
So, from the above Sturgeon wants to take a slice of debt that we did not create, and pay for it, to help a foreign country that’s been robbing Scotland for centuries, and she cites it as the moral thing to do, this from the betrayer who has no morals.
Where was Westminster’s morality when it hid the McCrone Report from Scots, where was its morality when it stole six-thousand square miles of Scottish waters, if you look out to the North Sea at Carnoustie you are now looking at English waters.
Where was Westminster’s morality when it introduced the Poll Tax a year earlier in Scotland. Westminster like the betrayer has no morality, we didn’t create the debt, we shouldn’t be paying it.
http://oilofscotland.org/
Chas says:
17 October, 2022 at 2:04 pm
Nicola has now produced the long awaited further economic/financial strategy for an Independent Scotland.
Can anyone spot any projected financials?
What does the SNP actually propose?
There is absolutely NOTHING in the paper setting out a way forward other than stating that further papers will be produced at a later date.
What will these papers tell us? More confusion and a distinct lack of clarity on almost every subject matter. One thing is very clear-be worried about your state pension in an Independent Scotland.
I said a few days ago that the latest ‘strategy’ would raise more qustions than it would answer. I was not wrong?
Can you tell us why you support independence Chas? That could be a great help in convincing other voters who are undecided.
The Claim of Right and the Right to self determination should have been at the forefront of Lord Advocates and Snp Supreme court case
It breaches the treaty of union when Englands parliament and the Supreme court contest or make a decision against the The Scots Claim of right of freedom to choose a new form of governance through deterring independence for Scots to actually make that choice in a referendum for themselses.
The interesting aside to the legal decision of the Supreme court would be to imply that Scotland was under a Colonial Treaty with England and it was not voluntry.
Republicofscotland
Everybody complains the Brexiters are welded to the past when they dream of Making Britain Great Again but clearly the SNP have been asleep for the past four years. The pound is barely worth the, err, plastic, it’s printed on.
It’s like their every thought and every word is based on idea that Scotland is a wee, baby country that needs to be kept on a leash by the Bank of England until it’s grown up and responsible enough to go it’s own way.
The only reason to maintain sterling other than they are simply too stupid to know any better is they want to somehow make the jump to using the Euro relatively quickly so why bother with an intermediate currency.
The Bank of England does what’s best for England. It’s not a benevolent organisation. They don’t seem to realise that.
@Colin 2.02 pm
No disrespect to Alex, but he had a face on him like a well skelped airse. From what I could see, he never applauded her contribution whatsoever, which I felt was rude. If I am wrong about that I stand to be corrected.
Why is Alex obliged to applaud if he disagrees with what is being proposed, if indeed he does disagree?
Do you know that is the case? Has he said so?
Perhaps he’s just not convinced that the proposals for Conventions and short cuts to independence will work, or that they will need more work?
Perhaps he resents people trying to turn Alba in to a vehicle for Salvo and the SSRG or for individuals with a hobby horse about the Claim of Right and cunning plans to deliver independence without the need for a referendum or plebiscitary election?
It’s up to Alba’s members to decide what happens surely, not Sarah Salyers and those who support Salvo.
@Hatuey
“One of the things the fake history books imply, and don’t tell you much about, is that Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbour came out of the blue. It didn’t. It came out of an economic war waged against it by the US and Britain…”
Your point about China and microchip engineers and the comparison with Peal Harbor is interesting, but there’s one HUGE difference. The US in 1941 was the world’s leading oil exporter. It cut off oil exports to Japan, which, as you rightly suggest, provoked Pearl Harbor. But the US banning tech workers who are US citizens working in China is different. Japan had no way of replacing US oil (bar invading the Dutch East Indies) but China can train its own technicians.
That’s the difference between natural resources – like oil, gas and fertile farm land – and technology and manufacturing. You can train people and you can move factories, but you can’t move oilfields or fertile land. And you can’t sanction raw materials either without shooting yourself in the foot. If you want to see the reality of this in action, look at the current war in the east and energy, food and inflation crisis in the west.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707472
Sturgeon what a dud!
I suspect in her view we have a moral responsibility not to break up the UK and turn family members into foreigners!
I wonder if journalists are busy copying and pasting these articles they wrote before the 2014 IndyRef claiming that burdened with such a huge debt an iScotland couldn’t possibly survive or some such shit!
The lame duck PM (Liz Truss) spokesperson has responded to Sturgeon the betrayer’s carrot dangling exercise at Bute House today, by repeating Theresa May’s infamous words, “Now is not the time” referring to an indyref.
We have to remember that Sturgeon the betrayer has given a cast iron assurance to Westminster, that her indyref planned for next year will be a mock indyref and will have absolutely no powers to dissolve the union. She’s also made sure her die-hard unionist Lord Advocate passed over the decision on competence to hold an indyref to a 2009 UK construct that is the UKSC.
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fnews%2F23054952.downing-street-issues-response-nicola-sturgeons-economic-case-scottish-independence%2F
Colin,
The motion that was being discussed did assert the Claim of Right, quite clearly.
Sara proposed to remit back the motion on the grounds (as I understood her) that Alba should concentrate solely on the Claim of Right and drop other political campaigning.
The large majority of people did not agree with this. And personally I am increasingly concerned by people who think that the Claim of Right is in some way a magical bullet that will bring Independence via some mechanism which is at present undefined.
At the end of the day regardless of protesting voices, supreme court case and Westminster political parties or the devolved government to Scotland opinions
It is the Scots people as a nation of Scots whom have the right to walk away and endthe treaty of the union.
Not the devolved government.
The Snp’s attempts to own the Scots Sovereignty and therefore to hold control over Scots is seen on two occassions,
1: Through this Supreme Court Case omitting the Scots “Claim of Right” as Sovereign people and thus the right to self determination.
2: Was the Snp’s attempt to control Scots Through a political ( party’s ) Code of Conduct for all Scots,
Alba seem to be erring in the same direction as the SNP. Party before Sovereign Scots people.
The large majority of people did not agree with this. And personally I am increasingly concerned by people who think that the Claim of Right is in some way a magical bullet that will bring Independence via some mechanism which is at present undefined.
Well quite. Nobody who supports these “cunning plans for indy” seems able to answer fairly basic questions about who the “we” is in these undefined and novel mechanisms that will magically waft us to the sunny uplands of independence.
Who elects those who are part of these Conventions, or are they appointed?
If the latter, who is appointing them?
How do we demonstrate that a “Convention of the Estates” or whatever it is styled/called represents the settled will of the Scottish people, or at least of enough of them to have their claim for independence internationally recognised?
It sounds very much like Sarah Salyers and others are trying to turn Alba in to a Salvo front organisation.
The mechanism the remains undefined is that Scottish politicians do not place the Sovereignty of Scots first as a the magical bullet.
James Che
But who exercises that sovereignty in practice if not the Scottish Parliament?
The Convention of Estates was effectively the old Scottish Parliament with a different hat on. The very Convention of 1689 that passed the Claim of Right went on to declare it was now sitting as Parliament.
If the Salvo plan is to reinvoke the Convention of Estates, how is that different to Parliament? Who votes for it?
The notion that 17th century Scotland was some kind of anarchist collective is batshit crazy.
This is why many in the scottish independence movement feel that carrots are the main diet. To be viewed on the end of a stick.
Give them a magic bullet on a silver platter, that is part of the Scottish Constitution and wrote into the Treaty of union and they ignore it.
The notion that 17th century Scotland was some kind of anarchist collective is batshit crazy.
Welcome to James Che world Craig! 🙂
It’ll just happen because *reasons*.
I’m not convinced that a ‘defacto referendum’ is such a ‘cunning plan for indy’
Nobody as yet has answered fairly basic question about this plan yet yet there are people who support it.
‘À Chacun Son Goût’
I’m sticking with the Section 30 option.
@Craig Murray
If the Salvo plan is to reinvoke the Convention of Estates, how is that different to Parliament? Who votes for it?
It appears that representatives are to be chosen for us….?
I’m not sure what the Scottish National Congress or the Liberation Group are, who makes them up, or why they appear to think themselves entitled to “become” the Convention or the delegation (presumably to the international community to plead our case?).
What is involved in “becoming” a member of the Convention or delegation I wonder?
https://twitter.com/SSalyers2/status/1580953961422389250?cxt=HHwWhICgzY3Q1vArAAAA
Craig Murray,
No offence meant to all your years of experience in politics
But politicians are educated to look at politics in a box,
May I answer by asking you some questions.
1: Which parliament is the 1989 Claim of Right sitting in?
a) The English parliament of Westminster? .
b) The Scottish Parliament that closed its doors in 1707?
c) The Devolved english legislated government to Scotland?
d) The British Parliament?
e) the UK parliament?
Is it not The English parliament of Westminster that runs all of these governments?
Except the closed 1707 parliament.
What is Alba’s cunning plan for Indy?
Sara Salyers has made it pretty clear that SALVO will disperse as and when awareness has been raised and the whole COR issue is given due prominence.
If folk want to squabble about it fair enough – isn’t that healthier than the SNP snoozefest where abody’s terrified in case they ruffle feathers?
Correction to date printed.
1: Which parliament is the 1689 claim of Right sitting in?
Ian Brotherhood,
A point well made,
Hi Roger. Yes, you’re right, there’s a big difference between depriving a country of know-how and depriving it of resources. Economic warfare like martial warfare can take many forms.
In the case of Japan, they did more than deprive the Japanese of oil and other resources though. They also denied them access to markets, in both the British and US colonies…
But what happened to US globalisation and the global village? Everywhere I look I see the US putting barriers to movement and trade up.
Clearly, the US is feeling quite insecure and looking for leverage. For decades leverage meant ‘area bombing’, ‘gunboat diplomacy’, and counter-insurgency warfare, but those days are over.
The Sino-Russo alliance changes everything. It’s deep, expansive, and highly appealing to the growing number of countries who have been at the sharp end of US/Western foreign policy since 1945. In short, it’s a game changer.
Japan didn’t have an alliance like that in the 1930s (the so-called Axis meant virtually nothing in terms of trade and economic relations between Germany and Japan).
I think this is the beginning of the end for the US. Will they go quietly? Probably. Most of these sort of empires go quietly. They did okay for a country whose economic rise depended largely on slavery in an era when most civilised countries had outlawed slavery.
craig murray says:
17 October, 2022 at 3:51 pm
If the Salvo plan is to reinvoke the Convention of Estates, how is that different to Parliament? Who votes for it?
It’s my appreciation that a Convention of the Estates was not a typical parliament, but more of a non permanent, Constitutional pressure group / watchdog / troubleshooter, (forgive me, that’s a terrible description), which historically convened itself to address some perceived impropriety of the day. It was reactive.
The Claim of Right is a similar concept; the Sovereignty is always present, but the Claims upon that perennial Right are sporadic and relate to contemporary circumstances. The motivation behind one Claim of Right might vary considerably from Claim to Claim. It, too, reacted to circumstances.
Thus the function of a Convention of the Estates might vary from one Convention to the next.
In SALVO’s case, a 2022 Convention of the Estates would work towards resurrecting the Constitutional Sovereignty of Scotland and pulling the rug out from under the feet of the Treaty of Union. Thereafter, with that objective secured, the 2022 Convention of the Estates would dissolve away until the next time a new issue required a new Convention.
I believe the auld Scottish Parliament was a more ordered forum for the Three Estates, the Kirk, the Nobility, and the folk from the Burghs, which had a more mundane function of government closer to a rudimentary Parliament.
At times, I think it’s safe to say the lines of demarcation were undoubtedly crossed, but I think it is entirely possible for Scotland in 2022 to hold a Convention of the Estates specifically to rise up and defend Scotland’s Sovereignty, but do so without stepping on the toes of a separate Scottish Parliament, whether that was a devolved Parliament or a resurrected National Parliament. In fact, there’s no reason to suppose the two might not compliment each other.
Who votes for it is a good question, but as I said in an earlier comment, if Scotland’s Constitutional grievance is the repeated breaching of an International Treaty, then it is a matter of legal clarification and judicial ruling, which does not require a democratic mandate.
I’m not an authority on the subject, but that’s how I read the landscape.
…but I think it is entirely possible for Scotland in 2022 to hold a Convention of the Estates specifically to rise up and defend Scotland’s Sovereignty,…
Who in Scotland?
How is this Convention established?
Who votes for its members?
How many will there be?
What will its remit be?
Will those appointed/elected be vetted? If so….by whom?
Who votes for it is a good question, but as I said in an earlier comment, if Scotland’s Constitutional grievance is the repeated breaching of an International Treaty, then it is a matter of legal clarification and judicial ruling, which does not require a democratic mandate.
Surely it’s not just a good question, it’s the $64,000 question which nobody appears able (or willing?) to answer. So a democratic mandate isn’t required, just a legal clarification / judicial ruling to allow us to declare independence?
In the words of the auld “Chewin the Fat” sketch, I think I can smell shite…..
Breeks,
Thanks for stepping up and supplying a explanation,
I have hundreds of questions that many avoid answering while others do not seem to know the answer too.
While others dismiss answering on the pretext that it is not worth engaging such questions to fill the gap, with evasion. And thus evade an deflect answering at all.
Not so much a dream world as getting down to the nitty gritty of facts.
@Roger
Also means, that without American citizens filming it on mobile phones, details of the manner in which the chinese sovereign people treat the common cold, the common people or the common good can stay secret that little bit easier.
Thankfully the Lord advocate confirmed to the UKSC that any backbench Holyrood MSP can bring forward any bill they liked without (LA or SG or UKG) prior approval meaning any MSP that still believes in free speech, and doesn’t mind infringing on reserved matters (which I guess leaves only the green party*), can try and get one passed extending free speech to the Chinese despite themselves and to expose an apparent lack of UKG action in this regard (dont be surprised to get one back teasing sex perverts in skirts – and not just to keep face – though)
*ie MSPs representing 0,66 % of the UK electorate..
NB Since there is undoubtedly a lot more than 8.1 % of the UK population that genuinely does believe in (worldwide) free speech, that simple disconnect ought to be more than enough warning to keep contemporary parliament(s) on a very tight leash with regards to temporary delegations (if any) of a peoples’ sovereignty.
Sovereign Scots do not need to answer establishment question of.
Who?
Why?
Where?
As I fore told above in my earlier comment, and as usual the same people will always want to know Scots future plans in readiness to cut you of at the head of the path.
Saw that one coming.
The Sino-Russo alliance changes everything. It’s deep, expansive, and highly appealing to the growing number of countries who have been at the sharp end of US/Western foreign policy since 1945. In short, it’s a game changer.
Delusional on much the same lines as the “end of history” shite punted by some when communism fell. The Chinese know the Russians have little to offer. Russia is now a second rate power: the Chinese will happily take advantage of them for their natural resources, but certainly don’t regard them as equals. Russia is Italy to China’s Germany – more of a liability than an actual help.
China will happily take advantage of Russia being defeated in its current war, and pick over the bones when it happens: it will make their pretensions in central Asia and Siberia much easier to realise, as well as helping to weaken India which previously looked to Russia as a counterweight to China.
We may be moving toward a more multi-polar world, but the idea that the BRICS are somehow going to change the game and act as a unified force to counter the USA/NATO is magical thinking. As many countries who have accepted Chinese aid and money are finding out, it often comes with strings attached. Chinese imperialism is still imperialism.
Stuart @3.02pm.
Using Sterling after independence will leave us beholden to the Bank of England and its fluctuating interest rates, which of late we have first-hand knowledge of.
It’s as though Sturgeon wants to somehow protect the English economy from what will be a bone-shaking shock that will be Scottish independence.
Just thought of another SNP spoiler
We will rejoin the eu right away, not EFTA to keep all markets open.
Let’s talk only about the eu to let the unionists talk about closing the Scottish border
Yep great plan
Okay, Andy, the second biggest crude oil producer, the biggest oil exporter, and the biggest gas producer has little to offer to China…
And you’re university educated, right? Let me guess, social sciences?
Bonkers.
Hatuey 5.33 pm: “the second biggest crude oil producer, the biggest oil exporter, and the biggest gas producer”
Me 4.58 pm: “the Chinese will happily take advantage of them for their natural resources…”
Dude, my degrees may be in social sciences, but at least I can read. 🙂
The Cunning Plan
‘Vote SNP and take on British debt’ – Sturgeon.
Did she really say what she is quoted as saying: ‘An independent Scotland has a moral responsibility to take on UK debt’?
How many votes for independence is that going to attract from the undecided? ‘Vote for me and get more debt’ is monumentally stupid.
She says she is a feminist. Now a moralist. Can’t blame those who claim she is a Unionist
“China will happily take advantage of Russia being defeated in its current war,”
China will help prop up Russia in this war if needs be, already the West has asked China to help it against Russia with sanctions, with a Chinese spokesperson hitting it the nail on the head in saying, you want us to help you defeat our friend, so that you can then come after us.
Russian and Chinese troops are trained on each other military equipment for a reason. The (SCO) Shanghai Cooperation Organisation easily rivals the EU market, with more businesses moving in that direction than away, of late the manufacturers of the Mini motor car are moving production from Oxford to China.
I see the emphasis has shifted with regards to the mini budget. When they criticised it before they done so on the basis that it promised tax cuts for the rich. As I pointed out in a previous comment, I can’t remember a budget that didn’t give tax cuts to the rich.
But now the talk and emphasis is on cutting public spending and they’re even going to abbreviate the planned relief on domestic energy costs.
So that’s why the markets and Tory backbenchers hated the mini budget; helping the poor and public spending are anathema to right wing fruitcakes and their markets; their hostility had nothing to do with tax cuts for the rich.
I was right.
“We will rejoin the eu right away, not EFTA to keep all markets open.
Let’s talk only about the eu to let the unionists talk about closing the Scottish border”
Shug.
It is a great plan, if you want to knock independence on the head, and that’s exactly why Sturgeon the betrayer said it, so that the Britnat media will pick it up and run with it, and frighten or turn away soft yes voters. As you rightly say EFTA is the way forward, which leaves open the EU market and the UK market
Andy, stop dancing on the heads of pins, you said the Chinese know the Russians have little to offer. I say they have a lot to offer. It’s probably the most energy rich country in the world.
I know you like arguments but saying stupid things in order to provoke them isn’t a good strategy. Not that you have much a reputation to worry about, I suppose…
@Vlad’s bestie 5.44 pm
…the manufacturers of the Mini motor car are moving production from Oxford to China
They’re moving production of some electric Mini’s to China. Close but no cigar. Just more disinformation from the “playbook of shilling for Vlad” perhaps?
China will help prop up Russia in this war if needs be…
It will up to a point. Doubtless as one authoritarian dictator to another Xi Jinping would rather see Vlad staying at his post rather than dangling upside down from a lamp-post as both of them probably should be, but the Chinese aren’t going to cut their noses off to spite their faces either.
Xi and the CCP know that if they go too far, the USA and West will sanction them too, which will cause huge unrest as their economy goes in to melt down. China, India, Brazil and others have all been very clear in their condemnation of the pretendy referendums and annexations too. Awkward that.
Perhaps it’s because they know that if you start down that path, it might blow up in your face down the line when you have lots of oppressed subject peoples within your own borders? Sauce for the goose and all that…?
@Ian Brotherhood 10.43: an amazing speech. I’m surprised the brave Mr Kennedy is well and still walking about, mind you.
@Merganser and Dorothy Devine: yes, Dickens had a way of hitting the spot about the appalling cruelty of poverty and the hypocrisy of the ruling classes. The “money is shit” euphemistic dust piles of Our Mutual Friend and The Circumlocution Office/How Not To Do It of Little Dorrit took the stinking (geddit?) rich, politicians and compliant civil servants to task but 150 years or so later the same crapola still plays out.
Thank God Jeremy Hunt is here to sort it all out, though. What a wonderful job he did with the NHS.
Ahoo, werewolves of London…….
NakedGunModeON/ Looks like I picked the wrong three weeks to be on antibiotics and quit drinking…
https://commonweal.scot/this-paper-answers-nothing-this-government-has-no-answers/
Shug,
That seems to be the union minded scaremongering tactics from the SNP, invent a border that does not need to be there.
So as to scare the daylights out of people that might vote for indy at the same time as the fear ritual being magnified to people on the other side of the border,
Where as joining Efta would solve that problem.
Andy Ellis
One of the posters further up the thread claiming that Alba have just ruled out an iScotland being part of NATO.
Is this true?
If so, I would say that Alba have just removed themselves from serious contention for responsible government in Scotland.
For that reason, I hope it’s false.
@Hatuey
Because you say it doesn’t make it true, any more than because I say it makes it true. Judgement is involved.
Folk can doubtless make up their own minds which opinion is closer to the reality.
Having a bad rep amongst the coterie of moonhowlers and conspiracy theorists you pander to in here is an approbation not an indictment.
The question of joining the EU or not should be a question put to the Scots. Rather than a dictatorship party in Scotland.
Somehow I do not think the Snp would last more than a few weeks in a independent Scotland.
The mindset in Scotland would have changed considerible.
I posted today at 2.04pm.
Since that time the two founder members of the BPHB have, between them, posted 19 times.
I have no idea what they have said, as I simply skip by when I see their names, but I have a pretty good idea of what it will be. Do any of the sane, educated people on here, there are a few, actually read their constant, repetitive drivel? Does anybody think that they are representative of the Independence movement? If yes then we really are in big trouble.
Shug says:
17 October, 2022 at 5:21 pm
Just thought of another SNP spoiler
We will rejoin the eu right away, not EFTA to keep all markets open.
Let’s talk only about the eu to let the unionists talk about closing the Scottish border
Yep great plan
It wont be just the border it will be the Euro, can’t join the EU with huge deficit, it will takes years, Spain will boycott, leaving biggest market and all the rest.
The journalist won’t have to do any new writing. SSDR.
The only thing missing will be voting NO to keep EU membership.
Does she have to say anything about the EU or even EFTA?
Any reason why she can’t say Independence would mean we here in Scotland can make decisions regarding EU/EFTA membership and everything else.
I don’t think I need to read anything more of what Nicola Sturgeon said I remember it all from the 2014 IndyRef which we lost.
I saw a comment on Twitter which said ‘I’m voting for independence to get rid of the SNP” 🙂
Me too so here’s hoping the SNP will have no say in what an iScotland decides.
Oh dear the backend has failed again!
OK time for some ‘Guru Meditation’
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!
@John Main 6.25 pm
One of the posters further up the thread claiming that Alba have just ruled out an iScotland being part of NATO.
Is this true?
So I understand. I couldn’t attend due to family commitments. I’m not sure if it was close or not. Personally I think it’s the wrong decision, but I suppose you can’t expect to agree with everything in the party’s platform.
If so, I would say that Alba have just removed themselves from serious contention for responsible government in Scotland.
The thing is, I doubt they would / will ever comprise more than part of a coalition post indy. I’ve long thought that one of the huge benefits of indy will be a recasting of the party political environment and set up in the immediate post indy period.
Whatever those opposed to NATO think, the fact remains the overwhelming majority of Scots post indy are most unlikely to support an anti-NATO stance, particularly given recent events and the imminent accession of Sweden and Finland.
Dan says:
17 October, 2022 at 6:18 pm
NakedGunModeON/ Looks like I picked the wrong three weeks to be on antibiotics and quit drinking…
https://commonweal.scot/this-paper-answers-nothing-this-government-has-no-answers/
I started to read it, (the paper that is), but I just stopped before my brain cell started committing suicide.
It’s just getting embarrassing now. You could read the damn thing cover to cover and still not have enough info to win a school debate.
These morons are taking us all for fucking idiots.
Wise words, lets ditch the warmongers club, on independence.
“Alex Salmond’s ALBA Party have agreed that an independent Scotland should not seek NATO membership.
The debate, held at the party’s conference, was part of a policy motion on Defence and Security which was approved today.
Moved by the Party’s General Secretary Chris McEleny, the motion also set out the broad principals Alba believe should underpin the Defence and Security of an independent Scotland, including an anti nuclear stance.
Commenting ALBA Party General Secretary Chris McEleny said:
“The NATO of over a decade ago is not that of today. As an independent country that is a member of NATO, the risk of Scotland being dragged to conflicts we do not support would be real. The increasing seduction of our politicians by NATO forces would inevitably lead to a roll back of the speed at which Scotland removed Trident from the Clyde.
“ALBA will not support an Independent Scotland’s membership of NATO.
“An Independent Scotland’s defence should exist to keep our people safe and to be an ally only of the voices for peace in the world
That is the principals of which we have set out today.””
https://www.albaparty.org/scotland_not_to_seek_nato_membership
“It will up to a point. Doubtless as one authoritarian dictator to another Xi Jinping would rather see Vlad staying at his post rather than dangling upside down from a lamp-post as both of them probably should be,”
Is the John Bolton of the UK, calling for the murder of two world leaders? it certainly sounds that way. A reportable offence surely.
“Xi and the CCP know that if they go too far, the USA and West will sanction them too, which will cause huge unrest as their economy goes in to melt down.”
The above is laughable at best, the West has imposed over 6,000 sanctions on Russia, and the West is suffering terribly because of that, image the suffering in the West if heavy sanction were to be placed on China, it will never happen too many US corporations rely on Chinese manufacturing plants, and with America being controlled by the corporations that idea is a non-starter.
Anyone read the “plan”?
– here is what a fucking dumbass would do, to do it successfully : phone the Norwegians and say
tell us whit tae dae
Then just do it.
Taking advice from other people who have done it before, is allowed.
Ask Goldman Sachs what to do. Ask JP Morgan what to do. Take their plans and hire Hudson/Keen/Varoufakis to point out how these plans are designed to screw you and correct them. Then make your own plan and do it, off to the side, and gradually feed it into the whole system.
A conspiracy theorist might think we had a saboteur in charge.
Chas says:
17 October, 2022 at 6:53 pm
I posted today at 2.04pm.
Since that time the two founder members of the BPHB have, between them, posted 19 times.
I have no idea what they have said, as I simply skip by when I see their names, but I have a pretty good idea of what it will be.
Do any of the sane, educated people on here, there are a few, actually read their constant, repetitive drivel? Does anybody think that they are representative of the Independence movement? If yes then we really are in big trouble.
So if you don’t read their posts what exactly is your problem?
Are you referring to those who consider themselves sane & educated?
There are a few of those and yes they read every post. They believe it’s their duty to point out what they consider ‘wrong thinking’ and to give everyone a derogatory label.
Would you consider yourself representative of the Independence movement?
It would be helpful if you told us why you support independence?
How long did it take you to count all the posts by those you’ve labelled ‘founder members of the BPHB’
Last question? Are you sane & educated?
@ Republicofscotland says:17 October, 2022 at 7:05 pm
“An Independent Scotland’s defence should exist to keep our people safe and to be an ally only of the voices for peace in the world”
Did anybody clarify who these “voices for peace” iScotland will ally itself with actually are?
Asking on behalf of a sawdust-stuffed cuddly toy.
To paraphrase E. J. Thribb:
So, farewell then, Alba …
What’s Sturgeon saying about Nato?
Same as before?
So Unionist will argue you can’t join Nato and get rid of nuclear weapons.
I was thinking things would be much better this time around what with us having what could be considered a dress rehearsal in 2014.
But it looks as if nothing has been learned and all the mistakes made in the dress rehearsal will be repeated.
Sturgeon is a complete dud!
Get her aff! Boo! Boo! Boo!
Slow hand clap!
@ Confused says:17 October, 2022 at 7:13 pm
“here is what a fucking dumbass would do, to do it successfully : phone the Norwegians and say tell us whit tae dae”
Naw Confused, you’ve got that one wrong.
“As a founding member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Norway has been an active participant in NATO since the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington on the 4th of April 1949.”
The fucking noggie murdering colonialist racist aggressive warmongering bastards.
Don’t anybody, ever, EVER, mention the noggies on here again!!!
There’s nothing we can learn from them. You got it, Confused? NOTHING!
But China can’t be that bad can they, I mean they do some dos scran (although I’d recommend swerving the al dente pangolin and bat fritters…), and they even ended up with our blood plasma supplier so nae danger our “caring” UK Government would have sold off our State owned supplier to bad guys, no siree.
The above was a gratuitous attempt to justify linking back to previous blood chat a couple of threads back. 😉
https://wingsoverscotland.com/nothing-but-surrender/comment-page-1/#comment-2707528
I am not talking about NATO, Main, you fucking tit.
– is there not a Radio Clyde Phone in you should be infesting
“whats your point caller”
(whoosh)
over your head
EFTA is the way forward for an independent Scotland.
EU,,,Royal Family,,, NATO,,, Trident,,,can all be voted on in referendums for each,,,at a time of OUR choosing.
That is the beauty of independence.
The EU is too complicated an organisation to join right away.
As per usual, Sturgeon picks a route that slows us down from going forward. EFTA is a far smoother route to getting access to trading with other nations.
IMO she is also choosing the wrong election to have a plebiscite on.
It should be the Holyrood election, where 16 and 17 year olds and EU citizens get to vote.
It’s something Sturgeon has done since she came to power,,,if there is a way of kicking the Indy can further down the road,,, Sturgeon will find it
She’s an Indy imposter.
And I am also voting for independence,,,so we get rid of Sturgeon and her SNP wasters.
(There’s a good slogan in there somewhere).
There are two “gangs” btl.
One is what is termed by the other as the BPHB.
The other is led by a member of the party of which I am a member, and continually derides the comments of the other “gang”.
I slide past the second because there is rarely anything new and I slide past the other due to bad grammar making the comments uncomfortable to read. When the word required is “who”, why use “whom”? When the word required is “your”, why use “you’re”? That’s not a product of dyslexia – that’s just bad grammar.
Back to my shelf in the corner…
Onnyhoo, I don’t like the SNP’s presumption that an independent Scotland would immediately apply to join the EU.
We should apply to join EFTA, then, if successful, possibly, apply to join the EU, from membership of EFTA. But membership of the EU should be put to Scots in a referendum, after the negotiations are concluded and the terms of membership are known. It should not be policy in advance of independence.
@ Brian Doonthetoon says:17 October, 2022 at 8:27 pm
“Onnyhoo, I don’t like the SNP’s presumption that an independent Scotland would immediately apply to join the EU.
We should apply to join EFTA, then, if successful, possibly, apply to join the EU, from membership of EFTA. But membership of the EU should be put to Scots in a referendum, after the negotiations are concluded and the terms of membership are known. It should not be policy in advance of independence.”
Amen to that.
Brian Doonthetoon
I don’t like the assumptions of anybody in the Indy movement that we should be anything other than Independent.
Indy is stuck flatlined at less than 50% support cos of the insistence by the ideological purists that Indy must also come with republicism, or pacifism, or EU membership.
What the supermarkets call a BOGOF offer.
IMO, it is the same carpetbagging on the Indy cause that the gender woowoo nutters are practising. And it’s having the same malign effect.
The reality is, Scots who don’t want a republic, or who actually would like a government that will protect our interests in an unpleasant world, or who wish to see just how the EU will try to rip us off before we decide to join or not, inevitably decide that the easy route to avoiding these downsides is to just say No to Indy.
Republicofscotland @7 :13
Interesting dilemma for COPFS given David Llewin’s speech on Saturday (likelihood of the charges having been brought by the brilliant Lord advocates malicious predeccessor, at specific request of those claiming to have suffered fear and alarm from his tweets/ posts notwithstanding)
Hopefully, like the Trump-Zelenski calls, NSA can overrule john Swinney to publish unredacted transcripts of the investigating officer’s confirmatory phone calls..
Either way, respect to Andy Ellis (and the investigating officers), if it does go all the way to a conviction – reference like that should be good for a top gig at NATO so (maybe) small wonder he’d want Scotland to remain a member!
Rab Davis says:
17 October, 2022 at 8:13 pm
EFTA is the way forward for an independent Scotland.
EU,,,Royal Family,,, NATO,,, Trident,,,can all be voted on in referendums for each,,,at a time of OUR choosing.
That is the beauty of independence.
I agree with all of that. Everything in the independence campaign should be kept as simple as possible.
Just tell people what could be possible if we were independent.
For example we could have a referendum on ‘Gender Recognition’ and ask people if they think a man should have the right to become a woman?
This Gender Recognition Act passed by the UK Gov in 2004 seems to be causing all sorts of problems for women even to the extent that nobody knows what a women is anymore.
Ruby
“KEEP IT SIMPLE”.
That slogan should be sent to Sturgeon c/o Bute House.
@ John Main 8.31 pm
Seconded. Given some of the comments above with respect to both EU/EFTA membership and NATO membership, it strikes me the indy movement faces a dilemma. In the short to medium term we have a dominant pro-independence party focused more on retaining power within a devolutionary framework than on constructing a “single purpose vehicle” to achieve the ultimate goal.
Irrespective of of policies on issues like the EU, NATO, monarchy versus republic, if we don’t have a united SPV what we’re left with is parties proposing different and often competing policy platforms trying to convince Scottish electors to put their differences aside. A lot of people who are invested in political parties will find that hard to do: we only have to look at the bad feeling between many in the SNP and Alba, never mind between pro and anti indy folk.
The question then is how do we promote a SPV that commands popular support, allows those involved to bury the political hatchet (preferably not in each others backs!) toward a common goal, and is seen as legitimate and fully representing “the settled will” of Scots?
I’d happily support a SPV with a limited purpose that wasn’t just a creature of the SNP and fight a referendum or plebiscitary election on the basis of “JFDI”, but I’m also sceptical that there are short cuts to indy involving abandoning the referendum or election route in favour of some ill-defined Convention of Estates.
I honestly can’t see current parties agreeing to dissolve their identities – even just short term – and surrendering their power, influence, sinecures and money. I wish it was otherwise, but how else do we actually ensure a referendum or plebiscitary election happens?
Brian Doonthetoon says:
17 October, 2022 at 8:27 pm
We should apply to join EFTA, then, if successful, possibly, apply to join the EU, from membership of EFTA.
I mean it as a sincere question, so given that Indy Scotland is an exporter of oil and gas, with a big % of Europe’s wind and wave power potential, why does Scotland need to join Norway / Switzerland / Iceland’s European Trade Agreement?
Given the crisis with energy from the East, what’s to stop Scotland negotiating it’s own Free Trade Agreement with Europe?
In energy and oil, in food, in whisky & gin, we have what Europe wants, plus of course we have the potential for Scapa Flow to greatly alleviate the congestion of Europe’s ports. We have geography too.
Why join EFTA “or” the EU, but instead be brazen and see whether we can negotiate a bespoke and unique status for Scotland?
I’ve suggested it before, but Scotland could be the Istanbul of Western Europe, and become buffer state between Europe, USA, and post-Brexit England and the Commonwealth.
We could fashion Scotland into the equivalent of a duty free departure lounge, where everything can be traded from everywhere, but only fully compliant trade leaves Scotland bound for Europe.
We’d likely have to concede to EU Legislation and the dominion of the European Court, but I don’t see that as problematic.
Scotland could be a virtual law unto itself… the Middleman for EU / England /North Atlantic / global Trade with significant commodities of it’s own. If we were benign towards Europe with our oil and energy, the benefits for Scotland could be off the scale.
What does EFTA membership actually do for us?
The massive irony is, it’s England which wants live in regulation free isolationism, but it’s Scotland which is infinitely better situated to cope on it’s own two feet and make such an arrangement actually work. Not through isolationism, that’s stupid, but the empowerment of having resources and commodities which Europe in particular needs. We are a producer of products in very high demand. Don’t sell ourselves short.
“I don’t like the assumptions of anybody in the Indy movement that we should be anything other than Independent. Indy is stuck flatlined at less than 50% support cos of the insistence by the ideological purists that Indy must also come with republicism”
The SNP were monarchists in 2014 under Alex Salmond and they are now under Nicola Sturgeon so republicanism is NOT the reason for the lack of progress.
My republican beliefs are not just because of a loathing for the genetic, religious and economic inequality of the Anglican-Church-Protestant-only UK monarchy but also because it is the very foundation of the UK state’s claimed authority for the oppression of the people of Scotland, as it has been for millions of other victims of the British Empire: (Crown in Parliament sovereignty).
But, I agree policies that an indy Scotland must be pro-this, pro-that, anti-this, anti-that is only fantasy politics which does nothing to promote Scotland’s independence.
Lol @ “Main, you fucking tit…”
Factual poetry is an exciting new genre.
The Alba decision on NATO is interesting. Despite wall-to-wall propaganda, people know what’s going on. Can we assume the people of Germany and the rest of Europe do too?
With every day and week that passes, Europe gets colder and colder. Will the winter confound NATO just as it confounded Napoleon and the Nazis? I think it will. I think we’re going to see anti-NATO protests and unrest all across Europe on a scale we haven’t seen before…
There’s no need for power cuts. There’s no need for Europeans to freeze this winter. And there’s no need for all that death and destruction.
You’ll see.
Hats is so, so, right!
There’s no need for any of it – there never is.
All of us always have the option Hats favours – lie down, roll over and suck it up.
When they come for your country, your freedom, your daughters, your neighbours, your home, your very own life, you always have that option – submit.
Face it folks, in Hats’ world, there’s no need for Indy.
Still, one wee niggling doubt remains. There’s no need for Hats to ever get riled over some posts that ridicule him on here, yet he just can’t let it go. How odd that he expects the Europeans he claims to love so much to just put up with armed aggressors killing their friends and family, destroying their country, and shipping tens of thousands of their neighbours east in cattle trucks.
How very, very odd.
Hatuey 17 Oct @5:45pm
Pound had recovered by time question time was putting the boot in over the tax cuts so my convoluted theory is that the bbc couldn’t possibly allow Kwarteng to be seen as successful, and become a more positive role model by extension, so they hid their true motivation to flex their muscle and attacked a happy go lucky PM with great sense of humour instead (misogyny being less likely to be noticed than (genuine) racism apparently)
Be great if she could get even by scapegoating Hunt for the covid conspiracy and bring Boris next door for the wind up, or JRM for his demonstrably responsible financial acumen, but whether Scots could be entertained enough to support such sweet revenge in exchange for a looks like now’s the time after all S30 might be a different question entirely.
@John Main 7.10 am
Hatuey’s still doing his mystic Meg act. I wonder what the timeline is for these “anti-NATO protests and unrest all across Europe on a scale we haven’t seen before” happening? Doubtless when they fail to happen, there will be some excuse or other. Passing strange isn’t it?
Almost as if the overwhelming majority of ordinary folk agree with you and me rather than the wee coven of Vlad fluffers polluting this place on a daily basis. I mean, I don’t know about you, but apart from in here I’ve never come across anyone in “real life” expressing any support for Vlad, still less opining that the folk of Country 404 “had it coming” as Republic of Scotland insists.
I see people and businesses flying the yellow and blue flag and wearing the colours every day, but I’ve never seen any flying Vlad’s flag. The usual suspects had an aneurism when Alba had a blue and yellow flag covering the table at one of their events. Why it’s almost as if these people have no sense of perspective… 🙂
Hatuey says:
17 October, 2022 at 10:53 pm.
I think we’re going to see anti-NATO protests and unrest all across Europe on a scale we haven’t seen before…
There’s no need for power cuts. There’s no need for Europeans to freeze this winter. And there’s no need for all that death and destruction.
You’ll see.
There already are protests happening in France, Germany, Czech Rep… Biggest in France, but there’s also a strike affecting fuel supplies. Lots of angry people, but angry in lots of different directions.
Anti NATO, yes. Anti EU, yes, but to some unknown extent, anti EU through the EU’s attitude to NATO.
I was staunchly pro EU throughout 2014, through Brexit and beyond, but the EU effectively being complicit with NATO’s Eastward expansion and apparent disinterest in Peace Talks has frankly shocked me. It isn’t just the US and UK taken leave of their senses, but Europe has slept walked itself into a catastrophic predicament. I think heads have gotta roll in Brussels.. but I think they might.
There has been protest in Europe before, and despite the UK and BBC drooling at the mere scent of European disharmony and disintegration, the EU has proven resilient.
But somehow this feels different. The EU has made a massive blunder in my opinion, and the consequences of that blunder can only manifest itself a lurch to the far right, with Le Pen and other National Front parties being emboldened. Do you really suppose the rehabilitation of Brexiteering Farage types is going help this situation? I don’t see it myself.
The EU needs a solution to it’s woes, but it’s woes are a direct consequence of it’s knee jerk sanctions against Ruskiland, which have backfired spectacularly. I’m not even sure there’s a way to retreat without a charitable forgiveness from Moscow, but BRICS is here to stay.
It is also a disaster for Scotland. Had Scotland been pushing on the door for Independence, Scotland’s crude and gas could have made Scotland of vital importance to a European Continent, and a pivotal lever to advance our recognition internationally, but instead, we have Sturgeon the warmongering imbecile, positioning herself to the right of even the US warhawks, and I don’t know about you, but NATO and the US is getting a refresher course in just how strategic Scotland, Scotland’s location and Scotland’s resources actually are. Sturgeon’s treachery is painting Scotland as a US/UK asset, not the European asset we Scots would choose to paint ourselves.
I would bet big bucks if I had any that Scotland escaping the grip of the UK and US will now become harder than ever, because it is understood how vital a commodity we are. England is about to watch Germany shivering in winter, and think about where it’s own energy comes from.
Nevermind the protests in Europe, we need protests at Bute House until Sturgeon the fraud is gone and Scotland’s “government” is purged of it’s limp seditionists who have squandered every vital opportunity Scotland has encountered these past 8 years.
Here’s a wee song which kinda encapsulates my mood… but just remember, (lest I suffer the same fate as Mark Hirst), that it’s prescribed solution is a metaphor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQ1ooZl4tyU&list=RDEM9KZ5T4-BRLo9rSz9QqA6ig&start_radio=1&rv=VYIdx0J7SPA
Incidentally, IF the EU does decline into disintegration, in the decades that follow, the UK’s shitstirring Brexit and rabid Russophobia will be seen as the root of it, and the 70 years holiday from imperial jealousies and wars which blighted Europe for centuries will be at an end.
Park the economics. Get our post WW2 heads back on, and find a way to get Europe through this in one piece and back championing peace, – for all our sakes.
Rab Davis says:
17 October, 2022 at 9:19 pm
Ruby
“KEEP IT SIMPLE”.
That slogan should be sent to Sturgeon c/o Bute House.
The risk with doing that is she would probably think we’re sending her a kiss!
Truss making promises on TV again even after a whole raft of her promises sank quicker than the Titanic.
I couldn’t even take in what she said as her word and credibility is completely worthless.
To be fair she did keep her word to the richest of the bankers by removing the cap on their multi million pay packages.
As sign of flights full of the best international bankers relocating to London after being sickened by $10 Million salaries stifling them in the US
Colin the Keelie @ 9:59 pm
“But, I agree policies that an indy Scotland must be pro-this, pro-that, anti-this, anti-that is only fantasy politics which does nothing to promote Scotland’s independence.”
Correct. The first priority is to liberate the people. This is where national parties tend to go off track fiddling around with policies on this and that, which will always upset different groups. The only thing that matters for now is to secure independence and that should be the primary focus. Key in this is that the people should understand what independence means and why it is necessary. This is still to be done:
https://wp.towson.edu/iajournal/the-socio-political-determinants-of-scottish-independence/
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707582
Andy Ellis aka John Main says:
18 October, 2022 at 7:54 am
I see people and businesses flying the yellow and blue flag and wearing the colours every day,
I see even more people and businesses flying the rainbow flag and wearing the colours every day. I think they do that because they are afraid not to. Could be the same applies to the yellow and blue flag.
Sturgeon has already got 45% on side thanks to Alex Salmond.
So IndyRef2 is a lot different from the 2014 Dress Rehearsal.
She should take a look at ‘Better Together’s’ strategy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UjKkVd1LtU
Concentrate on the undecided. Dah!
You’d probably need money to employ someone like Rob Shorthouse & unfortunely for us the Sturgeon-Murrell team have blown the money we donated on fuckin’ Herman Miller chairs.
Anyone expecting Sturgeon to tells us that IndyRef2 will be a ‘once in a generation opportunity’?
Here’s my song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3_0GqPvr4U
Alf Baird,
Most pre independent parties in Scotland at the moment are lining themselves up to be leaders if a new independent Scotland should happen.
Party survival before people survival is the why the old politicians and way of politics are being abandoned by people across Scotland,
A few cling on in the hope that the Tories, Snp, labour, will bring something new to the table besides austerity and cancel culture.
But as long as these parties are funded and paid for by lobbiests there will be no policy change forth coming for the people.
And as long as these same politics pay for MSM and do their dirty work, and the invites to their political party party’s keep coming,
There is no loyalty to millions of people,
Their loyalty is to those that pay the piper.
Imagine if party promise manifesto’s were held to legal account, and misleading the public was a crime.
Imagine if a set wage with no perks attached to politician employment was the norm in Scotland.
Imagine if lobbying politicians was made illegal in Scotland
Just about every politician in Scotland would either be behind bars for lying. Along with MSM pals.
They would pay more attention to public opinion and less to corporations with big money,
Career politicians looking to make a quick buck from their employment position would be a thing of the past,
https://archive.ph/0Qx4o
Aww! Look at their wee cute faces.
Maybe what we need to do is feed them.
We feed the birds, squirrels, swans, badgers etc so why not the rats?
I wonder what Stu thinks?
FAO of Chas (another Ellis account?) That’s five posts that I’ve made this morning.
Never mind the quantity check out the quality. They are all bloody interesting!
Enjoy!
Another spoiler
Let’s take a share of London’s debt.
London has accepted it is their debt why make such an offer
We will have no defective as they will was to keep Faslane operational for a time and they will have to pay us rent equivalent to any defecit
Job done
Why does Nicola give away a negotiating position
Shug @ 10.35 Because she doesn’t know how to negotiate. She doesn’t do negotiation. It’s not in her song-book. Look at the state of the SNP: she imposes, she does not negotiate. She is, by her own admission, after all – at least in terms of her feelings, and she equates feelings with reality – she is, after all, an ‘impostor’. And isn’t that what impostors do – they impose. They don’t negotiate. And what they impose is their own sweet selves, and their own anything-but-sweet wills. On other people.
There is no negotiation with her. One hint of opposition to her and you are out. Finished. Even wiped from history. Remember the time Alex Salmond was to be erased from the SNP’s history, as if he had never even existed?
Imposition all round, therefore – on history, and on reality. No need for any history checks: history is what I say it is. And anything (or anyone) I don’t like in the history books is simply to be erased from them. Just like reality.
If I say signing a piece of paper changes a person’s chromosomes, then that’s what it does. Never mind the science, these old chromosomes are erased by the stroke of a pen, and that person is now whatever he / she / or it says it is. The law which I just invented says that that is so, therefore it must be true. And all must adhere to it, and bow down before it, otherwise they are criminals. No negotiation. If you don’t like it, the next bar you will be drinking (water) in will be Bar-Linnie, with only bread for a chaser!
Don’t forget, I have a mighty erasure pen. Oh yes, a very big one: size does matter. And very powerful it is. Also very blotchy – don’t you remember all my lovely blinkety-blink-blink blotchy-blotch redacted documents? (You would have thought they might have been forgotten them by now, since just about everything else was, so that questions did not have to be answered.)
If I cancel you, you are cancelled. If I forget you, you are forgotten. The only thing you are supposed to remember is … ME!
It’s all about ME.
There are many other reasons why she doesn’t do negotiation, Shug. Maybe the biggest one is money, and how it is used.
If anyone gest used to using other people’s money as if it was their own, then they get used to chucking it around willy-nilly any old way they please. But it isn’t her money, it’s ours. Public money belongs to all of us. She can’t just decide to give it away to whoever she likes unnecessarily, on her own whim, without our consent. It is not for her alone to dosh out enormous bungs to the soon-to-be independent English Treasury in whatever way she likes.
They say 600,000 ring-fenced donations already disappeared from the accounts of the SNP. Vigilance much required therefore. If public money suddenly becomes the government’s money pure and simple, without accountability to the Scottish public, and if ‘I’ am the government, ‘I’ might presume that ‘I’ can do whatever the blazes I like with it. Including burn it all up unnecessarily. But if it isn’t yours, you can’t.
The consent of the people, and their sovereignty, means accountability to the people. And no one is entitled to forget it.
On independence, Scotland should pay off whatever it is required in justice to pay off, but not a penny more. In the light of which, the big question will be how much she has paid off already, and how that is calculated.
The fact that almost 90% of the wealth generated by the Scottish economy for each of the past 50 years+ went down south, to finance projects down there, might mean we have paid it all off already. What kept the Thatcher years afloat for the whole of the UK was not some brilliant economic policy on her part, which Truss believed in as if it was a religious faith but – pure and simple – the revenues from Scottish oil. Revenues which, by an accounting trick (which might amount to theft / diversion of funds) were never attributed to the Scottish economy. And about which every successive British government has lied to the Scottish people. Both Tory and Labour governments and the Cameron-Lib Dem coalition (remember Danny Alexander?). And the lying has even been explicitly admitted by them – do you remember what Denis Healy said about this not long before he died?
Once the Scottish share of the National Debt is calculated, taking all that lying and deception into account, and bringing to light just the truly enormous contribution the Scottish economy has already made to the London Exchequer over the past 50 years, and how much of it was used in and for England, it might turn out that we have already paid our share of the National Debt, and owe nothing further.
We might even be due a rebate.
She needs to get the independence ball over the line. There are a lot of things which can only be settled after that, and not beforehand. The real answer to these hypothetical questions is ‘wait and see’. Various alternative scenarios can be imagined (for instance in regard to the way of calculating the debt question, to find out who owes how much, and to whom). They could all be mentioned as possibilities / hypotheses, but not dwelt on – at the moment they are a diversion – and with no firm pledges.
The throwaway remark about ‘once in a generation’ prior to Indy1 should have warned her by now that you avoid statements that you make you a hostage to fortune. You would think that people who are maybe quite accustomed to taking hostages (within their own ranks) would be adept about such matters, and know better how not to be taken hostage themselves.
“The EU needs a solution to it’s woes, but it’s woes are a direct consequence of it’s knee jerk sanctions against Ruskiland, which have backfired spectacularly.”
Breeks.
The USA played Europe beautifully, an article in the Times of India said that Europeans will now pay seven-times more for their LNG from the USA than if they were still importing gas from Gazprom.
I’m pretty sure the majority of Europeans didn’t sign up for this or the sanctions that have backfired, Biden is on record saying that Nordstream II would never be activated, of course with the German Chancellor Scholz refusing to issue licences for the pipeline to send the gas, I’m pretty sure we know who’s behind that, it left the pipeline in limbo, and as usual it’s the European citizens that suffer the brunt of such actions, whilst US firms coin it in.
https://consortiumnews.com/2022/10/12/scott-ritter-pipelines-v-usa/
Breeks,
Republicofscotland.
Party politics before the welfare of their people.
What can be said, NS has done that in Scotland, along with every other political party in Britain,
We need to change how politicians are employed by the people here in Scotland,
It Should not be any different from any other employment.
Wull and Shug
I’m glad that there are at least two other people who see the idiocy of Sturgeon’s statement about paying UK debt. From the lack of response to my earlier post it seemed that everyone was happy to go along with what she had said.
For me there is no difference between Labour and the Tories. Starmer is as right wing and is as beholden to the corporate financial elites as Johnson was.
Under Blair, and Brown. there was, albeit not as obvious, as much privatisation as under Thatcher. Moreover, both Labour and Tories have continued with the destruction of the industrial base. Pursuing riches through black financial magic has been the game.
But now that game, that magic unravels. Britain and the US have lost their trade and technology supremacy retaining only their perceived financial supremacy.
But financial supremacy does not deliver a fully functioning society. Production of everything from steel to ships, from cobalt to computers, from tungsten to trains, to computer chips, to in fact all things industrial is the key. Money is an illusion, you cannot eat it, travel on it, live on it
But with production of food, goods and services you can.
Maybe I am stating the obvious but in the last remaining area of supremacy the West may have committed suicide through the implementation of their all out sanctions war.
These sanctions are wreaking havoc on the Western economies wrecking the West’s financial infrastructure and the current chaos in Britain most certainly seems to be testimony to that.
Moreover, with sanctions now into their eight or ninth iteration, it is clear with every increase in sanction that they are not working as initially envisaged, and sanctions are running out of road. The east, China, Russia, Iran are not collapsing, and countries like India, Saudi Arabia and more are realigning.
And in realigning, these resource rich and industrial endowed countries are putting into place alternative financial structures that by pass what the West thought they had supremacy of.
The exclusion therefore of countries from the financial exchange and settlement system SWIFT is I think a clear example as to how the sanction war is turning into an own goal because now there is a fully functioning alternative. There is to put not a too fine a point on it a functioning world out there, and a world that is realigning not reliant on the West’s financial wizardry.
Money is illusory, production is not, and without production we are mought.
This I think is the lesson we in Britain are now learning. Bullshit baffles brains, that is if we have brains. But look around. Do you see a successful UK, increasing living standards, first class social support, industrially endowed. I don’t. I see the exact opposite.
But who am I to say. People see things differently. Maybe our star is on the way up and not down.
Republicofscotland says:
18 October, 2022 at 11:39 am
The USA played Europe beautifully, an article in the Times of India said that Europeans will now pay seven-times more for their LNG from the USA than if they were still importing gas from Gazprom.
Yeah, but kinda no too. I think the US expected their sanctions to rattle the Ruskis, and they were genuinely caught off guard when they backfired. Europe certainly was.
But I think it’s true that the USA will happily set a fire in Europe and retire a safe distance to sit back and see what happens.
I think the problem for the USA and NATO, is that citizens in Europe seem to be more alert than their governments, and a lot of the anger is focused upon the relationship with their governments and the overly cosy relationship between NATO and the EU.
This “could” deliver a sea change in attitudes amongst European Governments, and potentially, down the line a bit, the European Union finding accommodations with BRICS, and have the generally “underliked” English speaking Anglo-Saxon World, with the exception of Ireland, kept at arms length.
In those circumstances, I want Scotland shoulder to shoulder with Ireland.
The UK and US will take everything from Scotland, whereas Europe will buy all that Scotland can produce. That’s the difference. And for me, it is the essential fulcrum making Scottish Independence essential.
Even if Scottish Independence gets off to a rocky start and it’s touch and go for a bit, we absolutely need Westminster OUT of Scottish affairs, or Scotland’s future is bleak and grim.
“IF” that’s the way this all shakes out, where is Europe going to source it’s armaments? I’m guessing it won’t be the UK or the US.
I think America, through NATO, might have bitten off more than it can chew, and the World, not just Ruskiland, has tired of America’s methods.
If the American economy takes a nosedive, and the Dollar has competition as the acknowledged global currency, then all those simmering tensions and divided communities in the US could blow up into something nasty. What good are your Ford and Nimitz class Aircraft Carriers when you’re fighting public disorder amongst heavily armed people who have nothing to lose and so much to loot?
Breeks.
I’m pretty sure the sanction did rattle Moscow; however the price of energy has stayed high and that has benefitted the Kremlin, and by pivoting further towards the East and away from Europe on sales of energy the economic damage has been limited, I think.
As for Europe in 20214 I saw it as a bit of shining beacon, but now not so much, EFTA would give Scotland access to its markets, will less red tape.
According to radio news LBC, the USA is predicted to go into recession soon, a worry for Biden and the Democrats at the next election. I fully expect recessions to occur across the globe.
You are correct when you say that Europeans citizens are taking to the streets to protest the steep rise in energy prices not to mention the cost of living crisis.
Norway has a pipleline that will supply Poland, Denmark and another EU country, its name escapes me for the moment, though the pipelines capacity is far smaller than the NordStreams.
Merganser
Make that three who have noticed. I’ve only just caught-up with your post.
With each utterance, Sturgeon comes out more and more as a Unionist plant, trying her damnedest to delay and hopefully kill-off Independence.
Never mind the Manchurian Candidate, there is now a Scottish version: The Dreghorn Candidate.
Willie @12.36pm.
Willie.
Scotland is the rowing boat being towed behind the UK Titanic, as long a s Sturgeon the betrayer is at the helm in Scotland we will be dragged along and go down with it.
Since she was elected as FM Sturgeon hasn’t moved the indy cause one step forward, that alone tells us that she isn’t interested in freeing us from this union.
The latest bollocks from the betrayer is to plead with a 2009 UK construct the UKSC, to be allowed to hold an indyref, that in itself is nothing more than a mock indyref that will have no consequences to the union if yes romps home, I mean WTF, and still you have the Sturgeonistas fawning over how wonderful she is, she’s sold Scotland out its as plain as the nose on your face.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707602
Republicofscotland says:
I mean WTF, and still you have the Sturgeonistas fawning over how wonderful she is, she’s sold Scotland out its as plain as the nose on your face.
https://archive.ph/DamCZ
The Rev posted the first three paragraphs of this article on his Facebook page and commented:
This isn’t about the SNP, but it doesn’t half sound familiar.
Merganser says:
18 October, 2022 at 12:31 pm
Wull and Shug
I’m glad that there are at least two other people who see the idiocy of Sturgeon’s statement about paying UK debt. From the lack of response to my earlier post it seemed that everyone was happy to go along with what she had said.
I’ve found all her statements to be idiotic.
I did comment on the on the UK debt but I guess you aren’t reading my posts. 🙁
When I read that she said we will join the EU & that we would take on the debt. I thought of articles like this:
https://archive.ph/ySWp3
Scotland’s record high deficit ‘puts EU entry in doubt’
This article was published on Sunday April 25 2021 but during the IndyRef2014 there were loads of articles like this.
“Ministers want to change the law to prevent former RAF pilots from training the Chinese military, amid reports at least 30 British personnel are believed to have taken advantage of “very generous” recruitment packages offered by the superpower.”
The above makes a change from UK airbases training Saudi pilots to kill Yemeni families. It also shows that China isn’t the bogeyman that the Western media portrays it to be.
It must be very embarrassing for the MoD to see ex-RAF pilots train Chinese military pilots. I suppose what goes around comes around as the saying goes.
The main argument the Unionist had in 2014 was basically Scotland is too poor to be independent.
Too poor to pay pension, austerity would be sky high, banks would move, we couldn’t borrow money & all the rest.
I do believe Sturgeon confirmed this or maybe Andrew Wilson did.
Taking on the UK debt will ensure all the Unionist predictions will come true.
Any reason why we can’t say ‘After 300 years of being in the Union we are in fact very poor so we cannot pay this debt you have run up on our behalf’
SNP politicians contact Professor Richad Murphy and ask him not to be scathing about their Sterlingisation plan for Scotland, which is utter madness.
https://twitter.com/staylorish/status/1582268555650691072?cxt=HHwWgMCj7ce3rPUrAAAA
https://archive.ph/FFW96
Yeah… If only Sturgeon and her Trans Taliban had been required to “cut ties” with the SNP before they launched into their Transgender Crusade and the hijacking of the Independence Movement to usurp and exploit the electoral popularity of Independence and usurp it for their own ends…. If only…
I wonder if Harvie’s “cutting ties” is a euphemism for getting a boot up the arse on his way to the Exit, because the Greens actually want their mandate to be used for Environmental issues, not the screaming hysteria and unhinged denying of science and biology we’ve come to expect from the nut jobs infesting the SNP.
So if the Green Party splits because the Trans Weirdo’s flounce off, how do we go about keeping the proper Green Party we might actually want, and cutting loose the freaky mandate usurpers so they can continue their journey to Oblivion without making such a nuisance of themselves in the process?
Do you suppose Sturgeon & Harvie believe their ‘Transgender Crusade’ is a vote winner or are they getting huge donations to do all this stuff?
” They don’t like it up,” said the man in Dad’s Army.
But they do. That’s really the truth. Thought I’d just declare that now for the avoidance of doubt. Cryptic I know. But oh so accurate.
And Nicola for cannonisation. You know it makes sense.
Breeks.
Republicofscotland
A bit of fun and mockery.
Here is a interesting statement. See if you can guess where it is from.
By agreeing to the Union, the Scottish parliament had also voted for its own extinction.
Ruby,
I think the latter half of your statement would probably be nearer the truth,
And meanwhile in Grateful Glen the sheep happily graze in the safe and secure knowledge of the great stewardship being visited upon them through the Conservative governance that has delivered and is continuing to deliver the economic and social dividends that we today enjoy.
Two mantras to bleat come to mind.
One is that ” things can only get better” ( D.ream) together with ” all we are saying is give Liz a chance” (Plastic Ono Band)
These are the sentiments that should guide us. Tried and tested we wouldn’t be wherever are without adherence to them. And the sheep know it and may safely graze.
Normal service will be resumed tommorow when I tell you about the Brexit Bounce and Better Together.
@ Republicofscotland says:18 October, 2022 at 11:39 am
“an article in the Times of India said that Europeans will now pay seven-times more for their LNG from the USA than if they were still importing gas from Gazprom”
Wow, Republic, that’s a disaster of the first magnitude, assuming it’s true.
If only Vlad had kept his tanks and guns behind his own borders, eh?
@ Willie
Re. Tunes. We need a timely remix of the old retro days of UK success in Europe.
Bucks Fizz alter ego Fucks Bizz seems about right…
Innarestin article:
https://unherd.com/thepost/the-left-has-just-ushered-in-an-age-of-austerity/
I particularly liked this quote:
“Comrades, we’re in for two years of painful austerity. And Labour, having implicitly demanded it from Kwarteng, will now condemn it from Hunt — but be forced to do it when it forms the next government.”
Same old, same old. The Age of Starmer will just be the same as the Age of Truss.
Can Scotland break free?
Alba dissing NATO while pensioners worry about bills. The ScotGreens finding transphobia under the bed while the environment outside their windows withers.
The auguries are not good.
@ Breeks says:18 October, 2022 at 12:41 pm
“I think the problem for the USA and NATO, is that citizens in Europe seem to be more alert than their governments”
Sure, Breeks.
I think the citizens of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Finland, Slovakia, to name but a few, may be the most alert of all.
Thank fuck none of these countries is in Europe, eh, let alone the EU?
FFS, Breeks. Educate yourself.
“National Grid’s chief executive has warned British households to prepare for blackouts between 4pm and 7pm on “really, really cold” weekdays in January and February…”
http://www.ft.com/content/d31fbbd6-8325-43b7-94e4-29101cfe6045
“British households”, of course, includes “Scotland the Brave” households. And they are brave. A country that produces much more electricity, oil, and gas than it needs and sits nodding as a bunch of English aristocrats cuts the power off deserves some sort of recognition for its ability to endure.
In the background the UK government is scaling back its commitment to cap electricity bills. You thought they wanted rid of Truss because she gave tax cuts to the rich? No. The real problem is the relief for the poor she offered.
Right now they’re frantically looking for someone bastardly enough to let people freeze and starve, but, don’t worry, they’ll find someone — they always do.
Rule Britannia.
@ Hatuey
And dinnae be forgetting that the National Grid boss John Pettigrew got paid £6.5m whilst the plebs see their bills rise.
On a positive note, I can see oor sewers flowing much better soon once the plebs have to start mining all those fatbergs to use as fuel to burn for heat.
@Hatuey 7:53pm
Hatuey or the BBC for the latest scaremongering. It’s your choice. Energy rationing will probably not happen but if it needs to be done, Industry will be the first port of call. We already have self rationing. The public are taking the required steps to prevent enforced rationing. (Supply and Demand principles) The FT link otherwise known as the pink sheet. Further left than Starmer and no realisation that the wind is an intermittent source of energy not blowing for 60 days of the year. You cannot store electricity, flywheels, etc have already been tried. Hydrogen is way off. Can we have a grown up conversation about energy policy that doesn’t involve Nicola Sturgeon?.
You can’t store Alternating Current but you can store Direct Current. That’s why hospitals have rooms full of batteries for use in the event of Mains power cuts. That’s their “emergency backup”.
@ George
Well there’s always tidal power (not wave). Scotland has a very extensive coastline and as long as the moon is in the sky we’ll have tides. Tides which interestingly vary their high and low tide marks in different places along oor coastline so staggered continual generation is feasable.
And unlike solar, wind, and wave power, the tides are far more consistent to deal with as the flow rates stay within very defined parameters and don’t get wild fluctuations.
That means the power generators for tidal power can be built more efficiently and optimsed as they don’t need to be heavily over-constructed to cope with hundred year storm events.
IIRC MayGen was on their 2nd phase in the Pentland Firth a couple of years back, but no doubt “Brexit” and Covid may have affected the project.
Imagine countries had to put a certain percentage of the GDP into renewable tech development rather than warmongering defence budgets…
@Briandoonthetoon 8:20pm
You trying to teach a Granny how to suck eggs. Hospitals first line of defence is automatic mains failure Generators. Batteries are reserve for emergency lighting and critical services. Many a time when I was an operational public supply electricity engineer both the public and mains failure Generators failed. And not forget the rural supply to critical customers like young children on a nebuliser. Aged me 30 years.
@Dan 8:23pm
I am all for innovation. The CEO of the company I worked for was very patient and invested lots of money into tidal and wave sources of energy. (To the point of criticism from the rest of the Board) There time will come but not now. Not helped but the off shore Dounreay incident where a valve was left in the open position and the infrastructure sank. Blamed it on a storm but it was the quietest summer in Caithness for years. The BBC reported a storm. I report a balls up.
Lol @ fatbergs
George, you can store electricity. What do you think batteries are for? I can reveal that there’s work underway in Scotland right now that will allow wind generated electricity to be stored on a huge scale. You don’t know about that because you’re just a guy…
The chaos we are suffering right now would all disappear tomorrow if we were independent.
Instead of sitting waiting on power cuts, we’d be making a fortune selling the excess energy we produce.
Instead of sitting waiting on a recession with rising unemployment and people losing their homes, we could invest in housing, create jobs, and stimulate all sorts of economic activity.
As for inflation, there are basically two ways to deal with it.
One way is to simply increase productivity. I say simply but there’s no simple way for the ailing UK economy to do that after Brexit. In energy rich Scotland, by comparison, there would be lots of ways to increase productivity.
The second way, the way the UK government has opted for, is to watch living standards and the economy collapse so that inflation is restrained by poverty. That’s the plan. Basically, if people are too poor to buy stuff then prices will come down. It works but it isn’t pleasant.
@Hatuey 9:25pm
Your the only person in the world that has worked out that an infinite busbar system of AC generation otherwise called the National Grid. Can store energy in batteries. You are indeed an overachiever. Can I have some Capital investment in your start up company?.
Don’t forget Hydro energy is ‘stored’ by pumping all the water uphill during the night or off peak so it’s all ready to skoosh through the turbines when there’s demand, I know it’s not really storage, but it kinda is.
Hydro power kinda rocks.
You’re drunk, George, go to bed.
Ach George, dinnae you be getting into the “now is not the time” vibe tae!
Christ on a bikeSome imaginary deity on a responsibly sourced bamboo and wicker E bike charged by fan turbines rotated by the draft emitted by willing dugs wagging their tails, next you’ll be saying “jam the morra”.@Hatuey 9:41pm
Nah I forgotten more than you know about energy in Scotland than you do. Overacheivers can’t accept somebody might more than them.
@Dan 9:48pm
I am a big fan of tidal and wave power but the technology is in it’s infancy. The seasnake remember that. God’s gift to energy requirements in Scotland. I visited the manufacturer on a possible investment opportunity for the company and said No!. It’s produced enough for your bairns 9volt battery torch. Collapsed financially as expected through hydraulic problems. I think it’s a museum piece now. I started my contribution my saying can we have an adult conversation about energy policy without Nicola Sturgeon. No takers apart from yourself that grounds me in practical engineering.
Breeks.
For perspective, the volume of water being pumped back up a height in a pumped storage system is tiny compared to the volumes moving around with the tides.
1 cubic meter of water weighs a tonne, tidal height ranges can be 5 meters. Scotland has a huge coastline. Doing the math as they say, there’s massive amounts of energy that could be harnessed if the will was there.
I recall whilst working offshore there were times around peak tide flow when it was impossible to operate the ROV submarine as we couldn’t hold our position on the job, because even with a 100hp electric / hydraulic power pack driving the thrusters, the force and speed of the tidal flow acting on a submarine the size of a mid size car and our umbilical cable was too much and we’d drift off location.
Any info on the gym equipment that generates electricity?
Everytime I use the bike or the Xtrainer I’m told how much electricity I’ve generated. ie 40 watt lightbulb for 10 minutes.
It’s intriguing!
Maybe we could all get on our bike between 4pm – 7pm on weekdays and generate some electricity.
All that pedalling would definitely keep you warm, keep you fit and reduce your leccy bill.
The seasnake was wave power which is compromised for the reasons I gave above. IE. Pretty useless on flat calm days and pretty useless in huge stormy seas, and inefficiently overbuilt to try to cope with storm force events
But below that variable top water wave splash zone the actual tidal flows are incredibly consistent.
The tech isn’t really in its infancy as the MeyGen setup is a fairly well proven concept. It’s just that the political will isn’t their to push development on further like there is in say their mental desires to continue developing highly sophisticated military equipment and weaponry.
Fucks sake, the amount of dosh historically spent on warring shit could have provided every area on the planet with the means to be self-sufficient, thus reducing the inclination for countries to go to war to gain resources from different geographical areas.
Not joining Nato will damage independence as voters want to feel safe and this would leave them feeling vulnerable and isolated.
After indy that issue can be revisited.
The other thing that is unhelpful is describing our post indy armed forces as a “defence force”. Again would be voters would want to know that we will have a proper army/navy/air force.
I asked quite a few people about this in `14 and almost all agreed with the above.
@Dan 10:29pm
OK unproven as a technology rather than infancy. But tell me of the investment opportunity of either. By the way the last time I checked tidal is time based, the energy markets is real time. We can’t wait on the tide coming in. It’s a bit like nuclear, compromised but the fact they are base load and have to accept the price they are given. Imagine we set up a tidal wave company technologically proven adventure. How do you think the commercial market will respond to that?. They know when the tide comes in. The unit income price will be lower is the answer. If you are making the argument of a Nationalised Energy regulated market with public ownership then I am there. Got a spare 80 billion? . Plus innovation costs? We might have to hand over our wedding rings.
” Here comes another winter of long shadows and high hopes
Here comes another winter waitin’ for Utopia
Waitin’ for Hell to freeze over ”
Wait ! Salvation is at hand .
SCOT/GUV has published it’s latest Soft-In-The-Head YES/NOES-convincing Rizla Paper : HOW SCOTLAND CAN BE ADDED TO THE LIST OF NEOLIBERAL SUCCESS STORIES – AND OTHER FABLES OF THE DECONSTRUCTION.
This one was written by a 15 yr old – ergo … the intellectual rigour is more apparent .
They make a dog’s dinner , and call it a dessert . Ha minus ha
I foresee a time when all prophesies fail . Ha + ha
Get set for the Nu Oligarchic Feudalism , kids 🙂
Of course, the Alba decision on NATO is a complete humiliation for Ellis since it’s his party and he devoted a lot of time and effort on here to the task of ridiculing those of us who want nothing to do with NATO.
So much for his superstitious claim to know and express what the people of Scotland want and expect; he doesn’t even have a handle on his own tribe. Actually it’s much worse than that, he is violently at odds with his own tribe on a very important issue.
If he had any sort of handle on his own integrity, he would consider resigning or something. Not that anybody really gives a fuck, of course, since he’s just a guy.
You’ll never be an overachiever, Andy Truss…
McDuff, I’m not sure if you noticed but there are these things called inter continental ballistic missiles and being a member of NATO right now means people in the real world are more likely to explode them on our heads.
The history books are full of stories about dead people that felt safe.
Ruby…18 October, 2022 at 8:57 am
“KEEP IT SIMPLE”.
That slogan should be sent to Sturgeon c/o Bute House.
“The risk with doing that is she would probably think we’re sending her a kiss!”
Very witty Ruby lol.
Took a minute to work that one out,,, got it in the end. Chuckles.
In regards to George Ferguson’s claim of superior knowledge, and to give evidence to my assertion that work is ongoing in Scotland aimed at storing wind energy in batteries on an huge scale, those interested might want to take account of the following;
“ScottishPower Renewables aims to install 1.5 gigawatts (GW) of energy storage technology by 2030 to keep the electricity grid secure and stable as we move to Net Zero.”
“Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) allow excess generation to be stored when demand is low and used later, rather than that electricity being wasted. Batteries are green technology and produce no emissions or pollution during normal operation.”
https://www.scottishpowerrenewables.com/pages/bess.aspx
German companies are working on more interesting solutions, if you ask me, based on kinetic systems, but I won’t bore you all with the details.
Overachievers eh, pffffffffff…
@ Hatuey 11.47 pm
Of course, the Alba decision on NATO is a complete humiliation for Ellis since it’s his party and he devoted a lot of time and effort on here to the task of ridiculing those of us who want nothing to do with NATO.
Why is it a humiliation? I think the decision is wrong, and it certainly doesn’t represent the opinions of the Scottish electorate as whole or the majority of pro-independence supporters. I don’t expect to support every single policy position of the party, and I doubt most reasonable people would expect that of any member. I think the ship of you being considered a reasonable person sailed long since though Hatuey, didn’t it?
So much for his superstitious claim to know and express what the people of Scotland want and expect; he doesn’t even have a handle on his own tribe. Actually it’s much worse than that, he is violently at odds with his own tribe on a very important issue.
Feel free to prove me wrong. I haven’t been able to turn up much in the way of polling evidence that is recent, but if you’re so convinced my take is wrong and yours is right, show us your proof. We’ll wait.
Of course, what froths you and your posse of contrarians, conspiracy theorists and sophomoric Marxist shills for Vlad in to a lather is the realisation that your woo-woo beliefs and world view have negligible levels of support. Doubtless post indy all the parties new and old will set out their stalls and make their cases on issues such as NATO, EU membership, the monarchy.
Of course I’ve made no secret of my personal preference for Scotland to be part of a mutual defence and security organisation comprising of our Scandinavian neighbours outside NATO, but given the fact of Sweden and Finland’s imminent accession to NATO I think that’s even more of a pipe dream. When independence happens, I’ll make my choice in light of the circumstances at the time. It’s not really something we have to worry about now.
Alba having a policy on NATO membership is like them having policies about what they’ll do when they form a government: I see why they’re setting their stall out, but nobody takes the chances of them being able to do anything concrete about it remotely seriously.
<If he had any sort of handle on his own integrity, he would consider resigning or something. Not that anybody really gives a fuck, of course, since he’s just a guy.
You’ll never be an overachiever, Andy Truss… ,
It’s not a matter I feel constrained to resign over. I can live with an independent Scotland that is outside NATO if that’s what the majority of Scots vote for. Similarly I can happily stay inside Alba even though I disagree with them on the issue of whether Scotland should join NATO.
As you rightly say, I’m just some guy as are you…unless you’re a woman of course. I’m not an office holder, nor do I want to be. My opinion holds no more or no less weight than that of any other party member when it comes to party policy, or than any member of the public in general debates here or down the pub.
Obviously some people do appear to give a fuck, given the way discussions of the issue seem to trigger the moonhowlers in here, most of whom have a world view that is shared by a tiny percentage of the population or independence movement. They’re the kind of folk whose contributions sensible folk used to roll their eyes at back in student days. Tout ca change….
George Ferguson says:
18 October, at 10:59 pm
“OK unproven as a technology rather than infancy. But tell me of the investment opportunity of either. By the way the last time I checked tidal is time based, the energy markets is real time. We can’t wait on the tide coming in. It’s a bit like nuclear, compromised but the fact they are base load and have to accept the price they are given. Imagine we set up a tidal wave company technologically proven adventure. How do you think the commercial market will respond to that?. They know when the tide comes in. The unit income price will be lower is the answer. If you are making the argument of a Nationalised Energy regulated market with public ownership then I am there. Got a spare 80 billion?
I’ve already stated tides times vary around the coastline so staggering generation is feasible. Plus tidal power is generated as the tides flow both in and out, so not just at peak tide times.
You can see the blades on the generator head propeller have adjustable pitch so they can be optimised in realtime to most efficiently harness power from available flow and direction.
https://simecatlantis.com/tidal-stream/meygen/
https://www.offshore-energy.biz/meygen-set-for-additional-28mw-of-tidal-energy/
@Hatuey 1:17am
Of course attempts are being made to solve the storage problem. Once again the technical solution is on the horizon 2030/2040. It always has been. Like many projects and innovators before them. Electricity to cheap to meter. Many big claims have amounted to nought. I don’t have the confidence to invest in the proposal of Scottish Power. My money will be staying in my pocket on this one.
‘I’m not going to be used as a focus for accusation & division here. I had a difference of political principle on a party motion. I spoke to my conviction. I had a complaint about how something was handled. I made it publicly & was answered. This is political life NOT conspiracy.’
Sara Salyers.
twitter.com/SSalyers2/status/1582416089203363840
‘I’m not going to be used as a focus for accusation & division here. I had a difference of political principle on a party motion. I spoke to my conviction. I had a complaint about how something was handled. I made it publicly & was answered. This is political life NOT conspiracy.’
Sara Salyers.
So according to Hatuey, Sara has suffered a complete humiliation and should consider resigning then? That’s how it works in moonhowler world apparently. With geniuses like him involved it’s hardly surprising we are where we are……
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707660
Rab Davis says:
19 October, 2022 at 12:44 am
Took a minute to work that one out,,, got it in the end. Chuckles.
Most people say KISS stand for keep it simple stupid
I like this better
https://tinyurl.com/u36s2p5x
‘KISS’ sometimes also means ‘Keep It Simple, Stupid!’. While this has some shock value and hence may be remembered, it is not necessarily a persuasive framing. ‘Keep It Short and Simple’ is often a more acceptable format.
We wouldn’t want to be calling people names now would we.
It’s very quiet here on Wings!
Stunned into silence?
Andy Ellis says:
19 October, 2022 at 8:49 am
So according to Hatuey, Sara has suffered a complete humiliation and should consider resigning then? That’s how it works in moonhowler world apparently. With geniuses like him involved it’s hardly surprising we are where we are……
This looks very much like ‘fuckin’ playground shit’ all over again.
PS What is a moonhowler? Is that just the name for everyone who doesn’t agree with you. Please explain.
PPS KISS
I’m getting utterly confused now!
Is Sara Salyers not one of these ‘moonhowlers’ with one of these “cunning plans for indy” ?
Why wouldn’t you want her to resign from the party?
This from the Sturgeon the Betrayer.
“A year today, I want people in Scotland to be able to go the polls and choose that better future. And I am certain that when they are given that choice – they will vote to become independent.”
Translation, I want the UKSC to allow me to hold a mock indyref, that even if yes wins by a big margin will mean absolutely nothing, for I’ve given the Tory government a cast-iron promise that the mock indyref scheduled for next year, will NOT lead to the break-up of the union.
The rest of the puff piece article, goes on to say that Sturgeon the Betrayer, has said that if there’s no MOCK indyref next year, the next GE will be fought as a plebiscitary one.
Translation, if my UK masters say no to the MOCK indyref next year, I’ll dangle the indy carrot at the next GE to get the indy mugs to vote for my party, I’ll get many new SNP MPs out of this, then I’ll kick any notions of independence into the long grass until 2026, job done.
Why risk voting for the NuSNP which is now not a party for independence, the last eight years of wasted mandates and carrot dangling has proven that the NuSNP is not interested in ridding Scotland of this rancid union.
Come the next GE, we MUST vote for the Alba party they’re the only major Scottish party that actually wants Scottish independence.
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fnews%2F23059251.nicola-sturgeon-case-union-collapsing-ahead-2023-indyref2%2F
Professor of Economics Richard Murphy continues to blast Sturgeon the Betrayers bonkers idea of Sterlingisation after independence.
“He backed a timetable put forward by the Scottish Currency Group which would see a new currency set up in three years – based on the assumption negotiations on Scotland’s exit from the Union would take a similar length of time – and in use within months of Independence Day.”
“Problems which would arise with Scotland using the pound without a formal agreement with England, Murphy said would include being tied to interest rates and quantitative easing policies set by the Bank of England and that Scotland’s financial regulation would still be set in Threadneedle Street.”
Of course, it doesn’t matter what the betrayer proposes it’s all pie in the sky, bits of paper that their contents will never need to be implemented, and for the unaware Sterlingisation will comfort them in the thought that they can still use the pound on independence, and everything will remain the same.
We have the likes of Andrew Wilson who help found Charlotte Street Partners, which has strong unionist ties, and it provides interns for the SNP, Wilson is also on the board of the John Smith Centre at the UoG, just take a look at that board it’s an eye opener, and we’re supposed to believe the likes of Wilson’s Growth Commission Plan has Scotland’s best interests at heart.
Then there’s Sir Nicolas McPherson who was head of the UK Civil Service who said on tv that Scotland could never use the pound after independence, he now works for the NuSNP, not that we want to use the pound after independence, but between Wilson, and McPherson and other at the NuSNP is mind numbingly obvious that independence isn’t even on the cards.
https://www.johnsmithcentre.com/about-us/our-board/
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fnews%2F23058962.richard-murphy-snp-currency-plans-independence-so-wrong-switch-no%2F
James Che @12:06
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707596
Heard an interesting answer to a Desmond Swain question in HOC yesterday about SLAPPs (strategic lawsuit against public participation) relating free speech restrictions to corruption in Ukr (of all places).
There was also a half decent debate on police hauling protestors out chinese consulate in Manchester to allow the beating of one in particular whilst they stood guard* (much as though they were following standing orders for the deplatformed covid/ gilets jaunes protests rather than the blm and climate change productions)
More directly related to your comment though, I jstumbled across (week) old news that one of this year’s French presidential candidates, Jean Lassalle, made it known last week that not only had he survived what he claimed were no less than 4 vaccine related heart operations since this January, but that President Macron and OVER HALF the French legislature had not themselves been vaccinated (despite photo shoots suggesting the contrary and (i think) actual legislation which removed employment and opportunity from the unvaccinated)
Its not impossible that this astonishing revelation escaped wall to wall coverage thanks to too many slapps from Ukr, or requires further substantiation, but one method of checking its veracity (/extrapolating an appropriate response to the wider world) might be to bring legislative employment conditions down to the levels imposed on other high performers (eg nuclear scientists) and publish blood/ drug test results every month or so to help their employer (ie general public) monitor performance. [whilst at it teach the nuclear industry the relative size of virus particles and face mask air gaps]
Going a step further, by presenting KPIs (key performance indicators) in form of league tables, it might even encourage greater public participation, especially (legal strategy permiting) via ladbrokes and a bevvy of attractive outsiders with enough boost to outclass the eton favourites – your guess as good as mine as to who might deserve equivalent status in Scotland, but if rumours of a salvo/liberty punch and judy winter special are anything to go by (and assuming sarah salyers has not been silenced after all) it could all be much clearer by springtime.
*That wasn’t quite how it was presented ergo that half of the debate that was missing
I was on Google trying to find info on the guy who was expelled from Alba can’t remember his name or why he was expelled. Can you help.
While I was doing the googling I found this:
https://archive.ph/uWMpK
Alba Party: Scotland should leave UK without share of debt
Salmond, who was previously SNP leader, has urged his former party to adopt this stance on what Alba called a “clean break settlement”.
“That debt is largely owed by one branch of government (the Treasury) to another (the central bank) and therefore forms no legitimate liability for the Scottish or any other people.”
As to slapps from Ukr, its may also be interesting to note that youtube’s ‘redacted channel’* went large yesterday on CNN greenscreens (and warmongering propaganda going back years) which could, by extension, render bbc an intriguing source for an alternative revenue stream.
As I understand it from the HKSC submission, without an S30 agreement, any Holyrood backbencher can forward a bill to instruct COPFS to investigate all broadcasters WITH regulatory authority approval, ie with specific aim of collating substantiation on any allegations of their having spread fake news and ultimately nudging a woke public with strategic lawsuits encouraging public trust..
Following which it should not be too difficult or controversial to use the judgement against Alex Jones as international benchmark for the fines and (until it is corrected) historical limitations on any and all incidents requiring exposure and remedy.
*which for some reason was not deplatformed to the darkside in same manner as the relatively sane, entertaining and extremely politicaly incorrect (inc pro UK, pro locker room chat, anti snp, etc) UNN
For those with an interest in a Scottish currency/reserve bank and what’s happening with it Dr Tim Rideout is involved with it.
https://www.reservebank.scot/#gsc.tab=0
https://archive.ph/SBu8f
Alba backs EFTA membership in manifesto
No debt no EU membership.
“The controversial Public Order Bill has been passed at Westminster by 276 votes to 231.
The bill would introduce new laws governing protests, as well as the powers police have to stop and search people.”
Meanwhile up here in Scotland, the SPCB bans demos outside our parliament, we have a very good idea which party pushed for that to happen. Also, Police Scotland, can cancel Yestivals, and kettle smaller protest or disband them without any reasons given, and we have the HCB, which also has an article within that states having a “controversial” opinion in your own home can lead to an arrest and a conviction and up to seven years in prison, thanks to the NuSNP government.
Alba say
https://archive.ph/7KGut
No Trident
No Nato
No Warmongering
No EU
No Debt
No self-id
Still to find out what they are saying about the section 30. If I remember correctly Alex Salmond said he didn’t see much effort being put into getting a section 30.
Then there’s the franchise. I believe Alex Salmond supports Holyrood election franchise.
Andy Truss is asking if Sara Salyers should resign…
And I’m puzzled. Did Salyers make a complete idiot of herself too? Did she go around calling people who disagreed with her all sorts of nasty things? Has she been siding with unionists against the Indy movement? Is she a cheerleader for hypocritical Americans on the make in Easter Europe? Has she single-handedly turned BTL comments into a running sewer?
If so, then yes, I think she might consider her position.
@Hatuey
I’m merely pointing out the inanity of what passes for your argument up thread about me being humiliated and having to think about resigning from Alba on the basis it has a policy I disagree with on NATO.
It’s true that certain contributors regularly make idiots of themselves BTL here, but the adults taking part know who they are and can identify pretty easily. Calling people with nativist views nativists, or ridiculing conspiracy theorists and shills for Vlad as moonhowlers is entirely fair comment.
The reason BTL comments are in the state they are is entirely due to the moonhowlers, cunt callers and mono maniacal know nothings who have been given free rein to pollute the place with their fringe nutterdom.
Happy to help clear that up. I’d have thought a self described over achiever would have been able to work it out for themselves, but the phrase “all mouth and trousers” springs to mind whenever one of your ponderous contributions hoves in to view Hatuey.
McDuff says:
18 October, 2022 at 10:41 pm
Not joining Nato will damage independence as voters want to feel safe and this would leave them feeling vulnerable and isolated.
After indy that issue can be revisited.
I used to be pro-NATO back when there was a Warsaw Pact, but I think NATO should have reciprocated much further than it did to the collapse of Communism. I think history will judge that as a missed opportunity.
Ironically, I think the same was true after the first Gulf War, when the West forced the Iraqi’s out of Kuwait but then stopped in line with their mandate. I think there was a chance for much greater interaction and improved relations throughout the Middle East, but all of that potential was swept away in the lies of Gulf War 2. – Almost as if “someone” felt threatened by improving relations… but that’s another story.
But the various coups and well document political interference by the USA in a whole host of countries is very disturbing, and the present war in Europe would not be happening if the US had not installed a virulently anti Russ Government in Ukr. Not exactly subtle, and now we’re all paying the price.
What is the US / NATO’s objective here, if not to install a military presence which attempts to encircle whoever the US perceives as an enemy? Why does NATO need to expand at all? It’s role and relevance “was” greatly diminished when the Iron Curtain came down, and for a military alliance, surely that’s a good thing?
As it stands right now, I wouldn’t touch NATO with a barge pole, but having said that, a big feature of the Northern Irish Backstop regarding Brexit was that the US Government was backing the Good Friday Agreement to the hilt.
To play Devil’s Advocate on the matter, I think Scotland’s attitude towards NATO might greatly influence the American view of Scottish Independence, and not in a good way if Scotland is staunchly anti-NATO. It’s not a deciding factor, but remember, the US looks kindly on a Nuclear free Ireland, and Scotland could do a lot worse than to encourage a similar view towards Scotland.
To my mind, there’s an obvious compromise, (fraught with problems I know, but nevertheless obvious to me), that Scotland could join NATO but only on condition the Nukes on the Clyde still got removed.
But I wouldn’t argue that ALBA is wrong. There is tremendous scope for compromise and negotiation, and having a strong opinion is a good place to start.
Thats me done with politics (hopefully) but for anyone thinking of joining the labour party’s extraordinary attack on Liz Truss* (after its dress rehearsall v Corbyn) I humbly submit that her epic line:
“I dont think the honourable gentleman can take yes for an answer”
Was a cracker
*rather than, say, her policy (or even, as IB cheekily suggested whilst inviting the rebuke, that of the appalling Jeremy Hunt)
Hautey
I am reassured that not being part of NATO would guarantee our safety and security.
Have you ever picked up a history book.
@McDuff 10.41 pm
After indy that issue can be revisited.
The other thing that is unhelpful is describing our post indy armed forces as a “defence force”. Again would be voters would want to know that we will have a proper army/navy/air force.
I asked quite a few people about this in `14 and almost all agreed with the above.
An entirely sensible approach. It’ll never catch on with the usual suspects in here of course, but you’ll notice that while they continually howl in protest about me daring to say my views represent those of the overwhelmingly majority of ordinary Scots, they never have any back up to support their fringe worldviews, whether about America being the Great Satan, or NATO being a threat and Vlad and his nice bunch of lads being entitled to feel surrounded.
The plain fact is hardly anyone shares that outlook or would want to see an independent Scotland being demilitarised, neutral and living in splendid isolation. They’ll expect to see Scotland being little different from its neighbours in Scandinavia with sufficient armed forces for its needs, including a navy, army and air force.
We can still make huge cost savings in comparison with our contribution to the UK defence budget, be better protected, non-nuclear and maximise the benefits of defence spending for our own industries and workforce in Scotland, as well as contributing to UN peacekeeping and NATO if that’s what the majority decide.
You’re always going to get a coterie of cappuccino commies and contrarians posting here insisting that the USA and NATO are evil, and no better than Vlad and Xi. Meanwhile the general population just writes them off as fringe nutters and sees what is going on elsewhere, like Finland and Sweden deciding to join NATO on the entirely sensible grounds that it will make them more secure rather than less.
Every dog in the street knows that if the Baltic States weren’t members, Vlad and his nice bunch of lads would be doing the same to them as they are to country 404. The sophomoric anti western world view of the unrepresentative extremist claque in here isn’t convincing anyone.
Stuart@ 12.31
Starmer misses open goal (again) and the humble crofter celebrates defeat by scoring the best own goal You’ll ever hear in the Westmonster Parliament. I don’t think he understands what he has done. That’s the problem with not being able to think on your feet. Or in IB’s case not being able to think at all.
Scotland safe in the SNP’s hands? If only Alex was still the leader.
@McDuff 12.31 pm
Hautey: I am reassured that not being part of NATO would guarantee our safety and security.
Have you ever picked up a history book.
I don’t think history is the strong suit of Hatuey and his mates.
Or indeed reading.
The moonhowlers and Bonnie Purple Heather Brigade don’t really hold with experts or people being educated.
Having the chutzpah to declare yourself to be an over-achiever is apparently enough. It does explain a lot about their worldview.
Andy Ellis says:
19 October, 2022 at 12:58 pm
I don’t think history is the strong suit of Hatuey and his mates.
Or indeed reading.
The moonhowlers and Bonnie Purple Heather Brigade don’t really hold with experts or people being educated.
Having the chutzpah to declare yourself to be an over-achiever is apparently enough. It does explain a lot about their worldview.
It’s just more ‘fuckin’ playground shit’
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707683
Is what the Americans think more important than what the 10% we need to vote YES think?
Of course we don’t know what the 10% think because the SNP are either too stupid to ask, don’t what to know or have spent the money required to do the research on Herman Miller chairs.
https://archive.ph/ysHpQ
SNP referendum donations ‘spent on office renovations’
Any news about the police investigation?
Is Norfolk known for the desperately thick? I ask this because I caught two comments from there about Poor Boris having to deal with the pandemic and poor Truss having to deal with the economy and how she should be given a chance and no witch hunts.
Did these folk sleep through the ‘Boris years” and are they now extending that to the Truss and Hunt ones?
I don’t read books. I think they’re overrated, to be honest, as is knowledge and education. And most educated people are selfish assholes. Not all, but most.
I don’t watch TV either. And I don’t read newspapers.
Most of my knowledge and understanding derives from reason, hallucinogenics, inference, and deduction.
From a drop of urine a logician can infer the whole universe… something like that.
Ellis, please stop looking to me for approval; you really don’t need to explain yourself to me. I’m glad you’re here anyway, I’ve said that before, just don’t expect me to love you.
As you were.
What we seem to have is Sturgeon saying the same thing as we heard in 2014 when we lost and the MSM doing likewise.
Nothing has been learned from the IndyRef2014 dress rehearsal.
What if Sturgeon said:
No Trident
No Nato
No Warmongering
No EU
No Debt
No self-id
How would the MSM/Unionist respond?
What about the 45% would that number decrease or increase?
Would any of the 45% decide oh no we cant support any of that we want more warmongering, we want iScotland to have the highest military budget in the world, we want to take on the UK debt it would be morally wrong not to, we want to be in the EU and have to listen to the SS we heard in 2014 about it being impossible for iScotland to be in the EU ‘cos Spain, deficit, no currency, borders etc,
As long as Andy Ellis, Hautey etc are committed to independence it doesn’t matter what they think.
Having a pissing contest/indulging in ‘fuckin’ playground shit’ about who has the most O grades/who has read the most Ladybird/Horrid Histories isn’t going to convince any of the 10% we need to win our independence.
But hey as long as they are happy, keep voting YES and have no complaints about the BTL comments all is good!
Let boys be boys!
Hatuey says:
19 October, 2022 at 1:49 pm
I don’t read books. I think they’re overrated, to be honest, as is knowledge and education.
I read loads of books. All fiction. I love them much better than TV.
Like you I have serious doubts about the highly educated.
Thinking of the ‘very highly educated’ Tory politicians
@Merganser
To be fair, after a brief look at the summary of Hunt’s personal life on wikipaedia, its as likely to be me that’s been appalling – but that’s just another good reason for me to find something more positive to be a mono maniacal know nothing about than what is clearly an increasingly difficult, personalised, and probably overly scrutinised political arena* – preamble to the US declaration of independence and whatever Lance Armstrong was taking springs to mind 🙂
*quid pro quo for the surveillance state?
Grrr… Who thought getting rid of the Imperial System was a good idea…
No, not on about ideas of global domination and colonisation this time, but the un-democratic implementation of the Metric System riding roughshod over the use of feet and inches, and causing no end of hassle for those having to deal with the clash of systems.
My roof truss centres are 18 inches which is approx a thick baw / fanny hair away from 460mm, but the between joist insulation comes pre-cut at 400 or 600mm centres.
It’s a totes arse having to re-cut to size without it all going to shit, and tbqh I feel I’m being oppressed by denying my right to source the correct dimension of pre-cut insulation, and especially so when I am doing up a listed building that the State wants conserved.
The highly educated have read loads of books but probably only books from their university reading list. If they go off track and start reading books that are not on the reading list they would probably fail to get their degree.
Being highly educated = being highly brainwashed and totally unable to accept and alternative point of view.
It’s all very scary!
Dan says:
19 October, 2022 at 2:16 pm
Grrr… Who thought getting rid of the Imperial System was a good idea…
Aye, it can be a real pain in the asre at times. Working in the oil and gas industry, it can be hard getting imperial parts for older lab equipment, offshore rig fittings etc. I am sure there must still be a healthy spares market in the states for supplying imperial fittings for older rigs and equipment they made back in the day and supplied to the middle east and Asia etc.
Even in the North Sea, some wells are drilled and logged in feet and inches whilst some others are in metres.
You could say that the metric system makes more sense in a way but the imperial system shouldn’t have been wiped out so quickly, if at all.
Ruby says:
19 October, 2022 at 2:21 pm
‘The highly educated have read loads of books’
Only when education is defined in narrow academic terms, Ruby.
I remember a year or three ago watching a telly series set in an isolated area and called ‘Our Yorkshire Farm’. I was in awe of the family of farmer dad, mum, and around seven children.
The bairns helped from the age of about three in the delivery of lambs, milking cows, feeding and so on, and progressed as they got older. They could all drive at around 10 yrs, and advanced to large tractors and other farm vehicles soon after.
The whole family mucked in doing all sorts of tasks from cooking, sewing and dressmaking, woodwork, masonry, and many other practical skills as well as farming expertise. At Christmas time, no one bought presents for other family members, the simply made them.
It was a joy to watch, and no surprise when a couple of the older kids got degrees – one in, no surprise – engineering.
It’s too bad educationalists cannot come up with a curriculum that captures the imagination of children and offer practical courses to those with no interest in standard subjects.
The University of Life is just as important – arguably more so – as academia, and one that politicians should be very experienced in before getting anywhere near power.
“Every dog in the street knows that if the Baltic States weren’t members, Vlad and his nice bunch of lads would be doing the same to them as they are to country 404. The sophomoric anti western world view of the unrepresentative extremist claque in here isn’t convincing anyone.”
Back in the real world, as opposed to the above, Nato has steadily crept East even though promises were made that it wouldn’t that’s the reality of the situation.
Now let me see, ah yes, what happened the last time Russia tried to put nukes around 90 miles off the coast of the USA, WWIII almost erupted, as the USA gave an ultimatum that the nukes must be removed from Cuban soil. Now the shoe is on the other foot, some have short memories indeed.
The Bay of Pigs and the 600+ CIA attempts to murder Fidel Castro, from poisoned ice-cream to exploding cigars.
Meanwhile as the Tories go into meltdown Suella Braverman has just quit as Home secretary, Grant Shapps a conman who has used multiples aliases is tipped for the role.
Check out his shady business ventures.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Shapps
As the three-ringed circus that is Westminster loses just about all its credibility,and crashes the economy not just of England but Scotland’s as well, Sturgeon the betrayer is still pushing the MOCK indyref bollocks for next year.
As I’ve said before, and no doubt I’ll say many more times before the betrayer is history at Bute House, it doesn’t matter how bad it gets as part of this rancid union, we’re going nowhere with Sturgeon at the helm.
Republic @ 5.06
Sturgeon’s means of transport is rather eccentric. A big yellow bus fitted with one gear. Reverse.
@ AberdeenPict
For sure it keeps me alert as Stu on bear patrol when working on machinery, and I have a good eye for identifying thread pitch differences. I deal with allsorts so it can be Imperial AF, or even Whitworth / BSF, then next job metric.
The ROVs had a mix of AF and Metric as some of the ancillary components were from the USA.
Of course I lack the intellectual heights of academic qualifications in engineering so I’m essentially jist a useless no mark in the scheme of things, but I regularly have to sort out all the bright spark Uni educated fuds’ fuckups, for example when one beasted in a metric M8 std thread pitch bolt into a 5/16 UNC threaded hole in a $100k robotic arm. Out with the helicoil kit… Or coming on shift to take over piloting the sub only to find the previous educated twat had somehow managed to tie a bloody knot in the sub’s umbilical cable. Had to get my spacial awareness maneuvering A game on to fly out of that one.
@ Hatuey says:18 October, 2022 at 11:47 pm
“[Andy Ellis] is violently at odds with his own tribe on a very important issue”
Shame on you Andy! Violence solves nothing and besides, this is Scotland, the nicest, weeist, inconsequentialist non-nation in the entire world.
Haud oan, though.
Is “violently at odds with” maybes just over-achiever speak for “disagrees with” or “does not support”?
Is there an over-achiever in the house who can clear this up?
Here is who it is-
https://twitter.com/AdamBienkov/status/1582807892633485312?t=2CJ4kNQJ16X-qEqLFhrKlA&s=08
@Republicofscotland says:19 October, 2022 at 4:54 pm
“the 600+ CIA attempts to murder Fidel Castro, from poisoned ice-cream to exploding cigars”
Got any references for that Republic? Actually, make that 600+ references.
It’s just that here in the real world, that “600+” looks dodgy as hell.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707709
Excellent post Ebok. I totally agree.
I should have perhaps have put ‘highly educated’ in inverted commas.
One thing I did find very educational was living & working abroad.
It’s sad that Brexit has made that very difficult for young people.
Leaving aside the oddity of posters on here being proud not only to revel in their ignorance but to advertise its depths, it is worth dealing with some of their output: after all even a blind pig can find an acorn once and a while.
What if Sturgeon said:
No Trident
No Nato
No Warmongering
No EU
No Debt
No self-id
How would the MSM/Unionist respond?
What about the 45% would that number decrease or increase?
Would any of the 45% decide oh no we cant support any of that …
There IS an issue for the independence movement about how to persuade enough “soft No” voters to switch, whilst ensuring existing Yes voters don’t change to No voters, or not vote.
I think most of us are persuaded that most Yes voters, most of the time, will prioritise voting for independence over party political loyalties or policy differences. That’s why it is often said it doesn’t really matter what the SNP, Green or Alba policy is on specific issues like NATO, the EU, monarchism, Self-ID, currency or whatever because it can all be decided post independence. The minority who are opposed to the EU, or to NATO, are not going to vote against independence (whether at a referendum or plebiscitary election).
It may be a somewhat different prognosis for “soft No’s” however. If we accept that the “core” Yes vote has already been convinced, then it’s obvious that those we still need to convince to switch and deliver us a majority will tend to be former Labour, LD and (less likely) Tory voters.
However much some of the usual suspects in here don’t like it, such folk will be overwhelmingly pro EU, pro NATO and broadly Atlanticist in outlook. They will treat with derision folk in the independence movement who are banging on about “The Great Satan”, or the people of country 404 “having it coming”, or who are prone to outlandish conspiracy theories about Covid vaccines, WEF/Davos/the Great Reset, or 300 year old treaties and how it’s possible to achieve independence without a referendum or election by following a cunning legal wheeze.
That’s the reason why the moonhowlers in here, in spite of the relatively trivial levels of support they enjoy, present a clear and present danger to the independence movement. They and their woo-woo worldviews are far more likely to cost us more votes than we’ll lose by not adopting politically suicidal policy positions (which can wait until after independence), or by pandering to the hurty feelz of fringe cranks, whatever their personal hobby horse issues are.
Having a pissing contest/indulging in ‘fuckin’ playground shit’ about who has the most O grades/who has read the most Ladybird/Horrid Histories isn’t going to convince any of the 10% we need to win our independence.
I doubt the 10% are going to be much impressed by the usual suspects in here, who are the “Know Nothing” movement de nos jours: crowing about their own ignorance, espousing nativism and othering furriners and indulging in ever more outlandish conspiracy theories.
The somewhat startling Damascene conversion of this site’s cunt-caller in chief to BTL moderator whining indignantly about “fuckin’ playground shit” will be treated with the contempt it so richly deserves by alert readers, much like the author.
@John Main 9.00 pm
I suspect you’re as likely to get a response from Vlad’s BFF as you are an explanation as to why his confident assurances about all those western forces in the Azov steel plant were all Kremlin agitprop. Funny that.
Conspiracy theorist is as conspiracy theorist does, huh?
O/T: Quite amusing, in a nauseating way, to see Speaker Lindsay Hoyle creeping nice as pie to Kenny MacAskill for the latter’s 10 minute motion [on removing the higher charges for people on pre-payment meters].
It’s as if he didn’t like the publicity of his rant against Kenny and Neale a few weeks ago.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707732
It was interesting until half way down when you veered off into the SSDD.
However much some of the usual suspects in here don’t like it, such folk will be overwhelmingly pro EU, pro NATO and broadly Atlanticist in outlook
That is just utter bollocks! Nobody knows what the soft nos/undecided think.
Well that is nobody within the independence movement. ‘Better Together’ on the other hand probably do.
The UK Govt/British State, call it whatever you like, falling to pieces as we watch.
What would Alex Salmond do right now if he was still FM?
I think blackford played a blinder today. They have been talking about breaking the triple lock and he got her to commit to it on TV
Did he mean to ???
Having said that in an election or referendum it would have been ideal to have the UK cutting pensions
@Andy Ellis says:19 October, 2022 at 9:30 pm
“I suspect you’re as likely to get a response from Vlad’s BFF as you are an explanation as to why his confident assurances about all those western forces in the Azov steel plant were all Kremlin agitprop”
Indeed. You don’t hear much about the biolabs these days either.
I am interested in how long Alba’s new-found pacifism will last if “God is telling me to do it” Vlad decides to double-down on his nuclear bluff and drop a tactical nuke or two on the heads of the Russti’s estranged brothers and sisters in UK raine or even the disputed republics.
The sudden and harsh realisation that those countries that are too nice and fluffy to fight back can get nuked in the 21st century, might finally teach Alba the nature of realpolitik. I expect the lesson will get through to Scottish voters, so should this nightmare happen, Alba will have to do a Truss U-turn, or fade into oblivion.
“I think blackford played a blinder today.”
That’s… a take, I suppose. He made an absolute tit of himself by not even listening to her answer and just carrying on with his script that clearly expected a totally different answer.
Hmmnn… I see on twatter that all is not well between some in Alba and the proponents of cunning plans for indy? Some pretty public fallings out after Sara Salyers didn’t get her way at conference.
Interestingly I now seem to have a least a partial answer to some of the queries that folk have raised about how the proposed Convention was put together. Apparently there’s a Scottish National Congress (who knew…? I’d never heard of it….) the members of which are hard at work designing the structure of the final Congress so it will be representative. Is it just me or does that beg some questions too?
Unsurprisingly I see Lawson is sticking his oar in and being slapped down for it by Denise Findlay.
Now where’s that popcorn….. 🙂
Blackford played a blinder today getting the government to commit to the triple lock after weeks of doubt. And it was recorded on the BBC
Having said that I would prefer the government shafted the pensioners before an election.
Any other observations
More chaos (its daily now) from the three ringed circus known as Westminster.
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fnews%2F23062727.chris-bryant-alleges-mp-manhandled-voting-government-sky-news%2F
Thanks to that treacherous shit Sturgeon the betrayer, Scotland is still tied to this lot, but hey we might get a MOCK indyref next year, if the 2009 construct the UKSC decides we can, Sturgeon needs to go, and go now.
This laughable from the betrayer, Westminster will slap her down, in the same fashion that she slapped down the indy movement.
But let’s be crystal clear here, Sturgeon the betrayer doesn’t want a GE/plebiscitary election to leave the union, far from it, the Betrayer wants it to put more SNP MP bums on seat at the HoC.
Sturgeon is such a coward, that she wouldn’t dare defy Westminster, she’s far too shitty to even bend a reserved matter never mind actually break one, and when Westminster tells her that the next GE can’t be used as a plebiscite, she’ll roll over like the obedient dog she is.
“NICOLA Sturgeon has called for a general election amid a chaotic evening in Westminster.
It was widely reported on Wednesday evening that Chief Whip Wendy Morton had left the position having only been appointed six weeks ago.
However, a No 10 spokesperson has since said the “chief and deputy chief whip remain in post”.
This comes following a tumultuous evening in Westminster which saw the departure of Suella Braverman as home secretary followed by bullying allegations in the lobby outside the Commons. ”
https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenational.scot%2Fnews%2F23062717.nicola-sturgeon-demands-election-tory-chief-whip-resigns-amid-government-chaos%2F
@ sarah says:19 October, 2022 at 9:33 pm
Thanks for bringing that story to our attention. The scandal of higher per unit charges for electricity supplied via prepayment meters has been ongoing for years now.
This should have been sorted out decades ago.
One of the more blatantly unfair aspects of the prepayment meter scandal is that even when the supply is cut off (because the householder has not been able to feed the meter), the daily standing charge continues to accrue.
When some money is eventually found to prime the meter, the standing charges are settled first, so the householder can find herself with hardly any actual electricity supplied before the credit runs out.
I sincerely hope that this injustice will be addressed. No standing charges should be payable for time periods when the supply is cut off.
Right , who spiked the Tory Homo Non-Sapient Party ? with – well , it could be * acid * , but , judging by the degree of shamble , I suspect some potent psychotropic is play here : maybe Sonoran Toad Venom ; mixed with internal Tory Party Venom . A cocktail guaranteed to induce acute seat-loss paranoia .
Don’t be surprised if there are calls for Nic The Sturge to become P.M of Greater England and the Colonies .
More probable is Elon/Gates will buy the country and turn it into a holiday destination for adventurous , thrill-seeking Martians
“Blackford played a blinder today getting the government to commit to the triple lock after weeks of doubt. And it was recorded on the BBC”
Shug.
Do you actually think that the Tory government takes anything that a SNP MP (indy MP) says seriously, in saying that Blackford is now embedded at Westminster and wild horses couldn’t drag him or his MPs out of the HoC, they are now troughers beyond redemption.
Oh, and the only blinder Ian (Scotland won’t stand for it) Blackford ever played was, when he ordered his SNP MPs to walk out of the HoC years ago. I doubt we’ll see that happening again.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707732
Yes vote has already been convinced, then it’s obvious that those we still need to convince to switch and deliver us a majority will tend to be former Labour, LD and (less likely) Tory voters.
However much some of the usual suspects in here don’t like it, such folk will be overwhelmingly pro EU, pro NATO and broadly Atlanticist in outlook.
This is even more bollocks from Andy.
There are always 30% who do not vote. The undecided/soft nos will be part of that 30%. They cannot be described as voters of any party. They don’t fuckin vote!
They probably don’t even know what Nato or the EU actually is.
@Republicofscotland says:19 October, 2022 at 10:30 pm
“when Westminster tells [NS] that the next GE can’t be used as a plebiscite”
How’s that then? WM can’t tell any person or any party in Scotland not to treat the next GE as a plebiscite.
WM COULD decide to ignore the result of said plebiscite, but that’s a different matter altogether.
Scotland can make any national vote into an Indy plebiscite, should Scotland be able to get its act together and agree/decide it shall be so.
@ Ruby says:19 October, 2022 at 10:39 pm
“They probably don’t even know what … the EU actually is”
That’s funny, Ruby, I had already concluded you don’t have a scooby about what the EU is. Your uncritical, faith-based conviction that iScotland must be in the EU kinda telegraphs that.
Let me help. The EU is a mechanism whereby free, independent, sovereign nations agree to be governed by foreigners who live abroad. These foreigners are not answerable to voters in the formerly-free nations, so they can implement policies that dilute sovereignty, disadvantage sovereign citizens both politically and economically, and work to asset strip poorer and smaller countries of their resources and their youngest and brightest people.
But it’s not all bad. By undercutting local skilled trades with cheaper incomers, you can get a house renovated for much less money. You can get hot, unhealthy food delivered to your house 24/7 by some grinning unfortunate with little or no words in your language. And you can save a few quid on mobile phone calls when on holiday.
And, for a certain class of citizen, your spoilt, bratty kids can spend a summer grape-picking before going to uni, without having to bother with filling out any paperwork.
Who cares about our sovereign, democratic rights and ancient, cultural heritage when we could be enjoying all of that, eh, Ruby?
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707754
John Main aka Andy Ellis says
And, for a certain class of citizen, your spoilt, bratty kids can spend a summer grape-picking before going to uni, without having to bother with filling out any paperwork.
I don’t expect you would want your kids to work abroad …… too many foreigers who don’t speak English. Fuckin’ racist!
No spoilt bratty kid would last even half a day grape-picking. The chances of them getting a job grape pick even if they filled in whatever paper you think is required is zero.
Do you really think that working in an EU country just involves filling out an application form.
It’s all a bit boring to me, speaking as an overachiever. I’ve never felt more like a mere spectator when it comes to British politics.
What difference does it makes to us who is in Downing Street? Thanks to Sturgeon, it means less than it ever did.
And it’s the same thing with Scottish politics. There’s nothing in it for any of us.
Sturgeon destroyed everything. She’s a devolutionist and devolutionists are unionists.
Things are going to get extremely miserable for poorer people in the next few months. They’re struggling now. The middle classes will just quietly watch, as they always do, smugly content because they managed to avoid the misery that the poor are suffering.
Same as it ever was…
The most tragic shit is the unnecessary shit that people go through.
Ruby, please don’t take this the wrong way, but, don’t you think arguing with John Main is a bit like going for the low hanging fruit.. like, honestly, from where I’m standing, speaking as an impartial onlooker, it’s a bit of a mismatch, as in beneath you.
That comment you linked to is a good example of the sort of dumbed-down crap he splashes around in. Anyone that knows anything about decision-making in the EU knows that all the big stuff gets ironed out in The European Council, which is composed entirely of politicians elected in the member states. He has no clue.
As an overachiever, I know quite a lot about European institutions.
Hatuey says:
20 October, 2022 at 12:13 am
Ruby, please don’t take this the wrong way, but, don’t you think arguing with John Main is a bit like going for the low hanging fruit.. like, honestly, from where I’m standing, speaking as an impartial onlooker, it’s a bit of a mismatch, as in beneath you.
He really winds me up especially when he posts things like this
You can get hot, unhealthy food delivered to your house 24/7 by some grinning unfortunate with little or no words in your language
I’m not arguing with him I just want to hurt him as much as possible.
Fuckin’ racist ignorant cunt!
I expect your post is designed to do the same.
I’ve heard rumours that ‘these grinning unfortunates with little or no words of english who delivered food to your house’ are actually Uk-rainian refugees. Finger cross they never have to go near John Main’s house.
PS I agree with you regarding Westminster. Quite frankly my dear………………
Bit worrying that Sturgeon is calling for a General election when she is so unprepared for her ‘defacto referendum General election’
@Ruby
In theory I dont care anymore but am intrigued by the wanting to hurt him as much as possible objective – sounds like the sort of thing a sports coach or quintessential English gentleman might enjoy.
That said, main reason to care less and less is that its not at all clear to me that HM opposition wasn’t trying to do something similar with yesterdays chanting to coordinate with the MSMs rather surprising* and arguably ignorant, racist, (misogyne, etc) bullying of the new PM and her cabinet within days of the Queen’s mourning period being abridged.
Accordingly, and doubtless against better judgement, I find myself hoping from a distance that Truss is/was a keen swimmer (not impossible given city of paisley’s once excellent reputation for same) such that she might have heard the chanting of “GO!” from the benches in same way Sharon Davies would – and that that part at least would be water off a ducks back to the cheery lass.
*if you exclude ways and means hitherto employed to ignore the indyref2 elephant
This is even more bollocks from Andy.
There are always 30% who do not vote. The undecided/soft nos will be part of that 30%. They cannot be described as voters of any party. They don’t fuckin vote!
They probably don’t even know what Nato or the EU actually is.
I don’t think we should judge everyone according to Ruby’s self professed level of ignorance. People who don’t vote, don’t get a say and can safely be ignored. They’re hardly entitled to whinge about the result if they can’t be arsed to participate. Perhaps we should introduce compulsory voting as in Australia? In any case the turnout in indyref1 was 85%, and in the Canadian referendums they managed >90%. Surely the independence movement should be trying to achieve the same?
We’re not discussing those who didn’t vote anyway, we’re discussing converting enough of the 55% to join the 45% in #indyref1 terms, or in current polling terms if it’s true that those in favour of independence are now around 50% +/- standard polling error of 3%, then we just need a few % points to deliver victory, right?
Undecidied soft No’s won’t be disproportionately from the group that doesn’t vote anyway: if anything the opposite is true. Poorer people tend to have lower turnout rates. Poorer people voted disproportionately for Yes in 2014, and disproportionately support indy. Soft No’s are not (mostly) going to be from that socio-economic group.
Once again, what passes for Ruby’s point disintegrates immediately under the slightest scrutiny. It’s her point that is “even more bollocks”. Imagine the lack of surprise amongst alert readers. 🙂
@John Main 10.42 pm
Scotland can make any national vote into an Indy plebiscite, should Scotland be able to get its act together and agree/decide it shall be so.
Hear, hear. Given what I was reading last night on the twatter feeds of Salyers, Finlay, Ian Lawson et al, I’m afraid ah hae ma doots on the getting our act together front!
Time will tell I suppose. Given the current omnishambles in government, the next GE may be closer than a lot of people think. I wonder if Sturgeon will make common cause with Alba to ensure it’s a plebiscitary election if it happens before the SC court decision comes in? 🙂
I’ve heard rumours that ‘these grinning unfortunates with little or no words of english who delivered food to your house’ are actually Uk-rainian refugees. Finger cross they never have to go near John Main’s house.
If that’s the case, you can understand why Republic of Scotland and the rest of the Vlad fluffers in here are keen to protect their anonymity and remain snivelling online cowards, eh? I imagine some of the delivery folk from country 404 – or indeed anyone else from there who is currently here as a refugee from Vlad’s invasion – might have a thing or two to say to someone who opined that “they had it coming”.
Strange that none of the usual suspects have ever taken him to task over his remark don’t you think? Maybe they lack moral compasses too. Of course if I was a conspiracy nutter like most of them, I’d insist they were all the same person.
A cunning plan…
https://www.albaparty.org/recall_holyrood_to_immediately
I’m not arguing with him I just want to hurt him as much as possible. Fuckin’ racist ignorant cunt!
@John Main
I think she’s a bit obsessed to be frank. I already have 1 creepy as fuck stalker, “Scott” so I can sympathise. Though since she’s convinced we’re the same person I wonder what it is she intends to hurt us with? It’s not going to be with her rhetorical brilliance or the power of her intellect that’s for sure.
Still at least we’ve had no more of the playground shit huh?
Oh…..wait….. 🙂
@Dan 8.49 am
If only Scots voters had had the smarts to actually elect a few Alba MSPs….
I’d like to say I thought there was an SNP MSP I thought would have the cojones to table a motion but I can’t immediately bring any to mind that would be up to the task.
When Alba started to get up and running there was talk of certain folk crossing the floor to join them, but due to the short time before the Holyrood election they stayed with the SNP.
There have been various points since relating to certain matters when crossing the floor would have been an option, and it makes you wonder just how much more stimulus an individual needs to do so than where we find ourselves now.
@Dan (9.21) –
There’s never been a better time for a ‘call to action’.
The traditional slogan ‘Fuck The Tories’ feels strangely out of date because no-one could have envisaged that they’d do it to themselves, and so spectacularly.
Alex Salmond and Tommy Sheridan, Eva Comrie, Tasmina, Sara Salyers, Hanvey & MacAskill. Between them these people have the gumption, experience and balls to initiate peaceful civil disobedience.
But they’d better get on with it. The BBC appears to be softening us all up for inevitable ‘power cuts’ throughout the winter. With wholesale gas prices collapsing we have to consider the possibility that these aren’t ‘blackouts’ so much as a de-facto curfew. People are ready to take to the streets as they have all over Europe but we need leadership and we need it soon.
We also need Rev back in the saddle.
I’d like to say I thought there was an SNP MSP I thought would have the cojones to table a motion but I can’t immediately bring any to mind that would be up to the task.
Perhaps you are the man for the job.
Your talent for vivid pornographic invective would have any opposition scurrying.
Ebok says:
19 October, 2022 at 4:26 pm
The University of Life is just as important – arguably more so – as academia, and one that politicians should be very experienced in before getting anywhere near power.
That’s not a million miles away from my upbringing, and I suspect most kids who grow up on farms. Not sure I’d call it driving, but I remember being given the huge responsibility of steering the Landrover, in the dark mind, while my dad threw bails off the back and fed the sheep. No idea what age I was, but I was standing on the seat to reach the steering wheel. If it had been invented, I’m pretty sure the Mission Impossible theme would have been playing in the background because I remember it being tense, but kinda wow too….
You also get familiar with death very early. Stillborn lambs, chickens, predation, disease, and killing things yourselves or with your four legged friends. Not for sport, but business, but yeah, while you didn’t do it for fun, you’re just a kid, and sometimes it was fun.
I forget now, but I think it’s 5 rabbits eat as much grass as one sheep. It’s not just what they eat. If there’s too much rat shit / bird shit in your barley, it’s not going to sell and if it’s your own fodder, your beasts can get ill.
Crows will sometimes take the eyes from newborn lambs if they’re not strong and the crows are hungry from being too many crows. (I actually like crows, they are very intelligent, and they play a big part in folklore, but they’re also ruthless and quite merciless).
Rats and mice will nibble big holes in the bags of that ultra expensive fertiliser or feed bag and the waste is very expensive heartbreak. Sometimes they’ll perch on the engines of your machines because it’s warm, no problem little friends, except they’ll chomp away on all the wiring to pass the time.
Most farmers are very adept at killing things, but inmy experience, the vast majority take no pleasure from it. It’s a necessity, not a choice. Yes, a few maybe do enjoy it, but most of them I suspect enjoy being proficient with a weapon as much as blootering some unfortunate critter.
But most of the farmer’s “enemies” are prey species, so they’ve evolved to well, breed like rabbits. Unchecked, the numbers go through the roof very quickly and you’re on your way out the farming business. Farms focus large and unnatural quantities of foodstuffs, so a rampant population of rats or mice will proliferate far more than any wild population, and once they’ve eaten everything, the wretched things either starve to death in misery themselves, or head off to your neighbours, who generally won’t thank you.
Farm kids will go to primary school knowing this, and very quickly learn that there are lots of things you don’t really want to tell these impressionable town kids, for whom a rabbit is Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit, not 1/5 of a sheep, and God forbid, that you can actually eat…
But there are other downsides to it too. Neighbours of ours had young sons doing a power of work, but boys (and girls) cannot lift what a man can lift. Back in those days, we used man-sized square bails, not like the round bails you see nowadays.
When you were making these bails, you could adjust how much hay or straw went into the bail. Now when your workforce are kids, you make your bails a weight and density that kids can lift. All good. Except these loosely packed bails became a real hazard when stacked on trailers or in sheds, because they were soft and the stacks would collapse. So it was fairly common to see these kids turn up at school with broken arms and legs.
The kids who worked beside men or big brothers however, became phenomenally strong. I remember a Physics lesson at school where the Teacher said people could usually squeeze a set of bathroom scales to round about their own body weight. My bail lifting fingers could squeeze 3 times my weight. I wasn’t superman. I’d just been lifting bails all summer. The tan was pretty good too.
https://www.albaparty.org/recall_holyrood_to_immediately
IanB , indeed we do!
@Paul
Perhaps you are the man for the job.
Your talent for vivid pornographic invective would have any opposition scurrying.
Does “cojones” count as pornograhic? I’m not sure the rest of my invective does either although it could reasonably be applied to some of the usual suspects with vocabularies as limited as their intellects. Perhaps with your talent for exaggeration there would be a place for you in office? 🙂
Luckily for the people of Scotland I take the William Tecumseh Sherman view of holding public office.
I am as happy and unsuprised by your response and will happily leave it for all to see.
It must be wonderful to shout day and night with such limited intellects.
Do you expect to raise them to your level?
Republicofscotland says @10.37
Read what I said
@Paul
It’s more a case of showing the rest of the movement and undecideds that we can do better than said limited intellects and the others in the basket of deplorables.
It’s a sair fecht right enough, but it’s important that we don’t leave the field free for the moonhowlers. We only have to look at what happened in America and what is happening even as we speak in Westminster to realise what happens when we don’t tackle conspiracy theorists head on.
As for raising them to a higher level, who knows? Some may be capable of change but I have my doubts about quite a few of them. Individually the game certainly isn’t worth the candle arguing with some of them, but they aren’t the only or indeed important audience.
World Economic Forum: The Global Risks Report 2022:
“…knock-on economic risks that are now clear and present dangers.
Supply chain disruptions, inflation, debt, labour market gaps, protectionism and educational disparities are moving the world economy into choppy waters…”:
https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_Global_Risks_Report_2022.pdf
MARCA (06/08/2022): Hunter Biden loved to be reassured that his ‘9-inch very big penis was actually big’:
“…One note was a rant at Hallie Biden, Hunter’s sister-in-law-turned-lover and widow of Beau Biden…
Hunter Biden’s penis obsession:
“…In the note, Hunter reveals that he has body dysmorphia and needs to be reassured that his penis is large.
“I loved to be reassured that my 9-inch very big penis was actually big. It may sound funny to you but its body dysmorphia,” Hunter wrote. “I know my penis is almost twice the size of an average man’s penis.”
The POTUS’ son also says that ‘sadistic’ Hallie often insulted his penis to tear down his ‘already fragile ego.’…”:
https://archive.ph/ZU3do
Kanekoa News (29/07/2022): Hunter Biden’s ‘Sexually Inappropriate’ Relationship With His 14-Year-Old Niece:
“In violation of Delaware’s mandatory reporting law for child sexual abuse, the Biden laptop reveals how the Biden family, a disgraced business partner, and the first son’s former psychiatrist failed to report Hallie Biden’s allegations that Hunter was “sexually inappropriate” with his 14-year-old niece.
While the Biden family’s shady Chinese business deals collapsed with the ‘disappearance’ and ‘arrest’ of Hunter’s CEFC China Energy partners, Joe Biden, Jill Biden, Jimmy Biden, Ashley Biden, Naomi Biden, Liz Secundy, Devon Archer, and Keith Ablow all ignored Hallie’s jarring allegations that Hunter was “gettin off sexually” with his deceased brother’s daughter…”:
https://archive.ph/oFRPM
BBC (20/10/2022): Child sex abuse: Failing to report it should be made illegal – major inquiry:
https://archive.ph/LjrvP
Andy,
Thats is Interesting position to take,
That there is a portion of Scottish electorate here, that you think should be derailed.
That they are moonhowlers and not worthy of contributing to a future Scotland because they differently.
Is that not attempting to eliminate democracy.
“…Howling in shadows
Living in a lunar spell
He finds his heaven
Spewing from the mouth of hell…
Bark at the moon.”:
https://tinyurl.com/rrujwm2h
@James Che
Not for the first time, you appear to be engaging with what you *wished* I had said, rather than what I actually said. Whether that’s because you are ill intentioned or just mistaken I’ll leave for others to judge.
Nobody is saying moonhowlers and conspiracy theorists aren’t allowed to contribute or aren’t worthy of contributing. Everyone has opinions and contributions James, but they aren’t all of equal value. Some will simply be objectively and factually incorrect, others will be their subjective view on an issue, and some will be faith based which simply aren’t open to reason.
Far from calling for such views or their airing to be eliminated I’m all for them being exposed to the full light of day, all the better to point and laugh at them, or where they are particularly odious like e.g insisting the Sandy Hook massacres didn’t take place, or closer to home folk in here telling the people of country 404 that they “had it coming”, that those airing such odious views can be identified because they’re a clear and present danger to the chances of achieving independence.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707761
In any case the turnout in indyref1 was 85%, and in the Canadian referendums they managed >90%. Surely the independence movement should be trying to achieve the same?
We’re not discussing those who didn’t vote anyway, we’re discussing converting enough of the 55% to join the 45%
You might be but I’m not.
Normal turnout 70% if you’re lucky.
Better Together got an extra 15% to turnout and vote NO.
Where will this extra 5% you want to turnout to vote come from? Will ‘Better Together track them down find out how to convince them to vote NO while you are having a ‘pissing contest’ with hardcore Unionists?
You are making an absolute tit of yourself posting utter bollocks all because you I called you a cunt around six months ago.
It looks as if calling you a cunt really did hurt and you just can’t get over it.
The truth really does hurt.
Yes! Air punch!
Ooops typo in previous post. Should read
You are making an absolute tit of yourself posting utter bollocks all because I called you a cunt around six months ago.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/comment-page-1/#comment-2707768
Well pal calling you a cunt seems to have hurt pretty bad so I reckon calling your conjoint twin ‘a fuckin ignorant racist cunt’ could also hurt unless you’re other half has some serious mental health issues.
Here’s a link to John Main’s post
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707754
This is what a Brexiteer looks like.
You might be but I’m not.
Taking to yourself seems a bit well…..odd.
The discussion is about converting enough “soft No” voters or current people who are opposed to independence but might be persuaded to switch. Logically therefore the turnout % doesn’t really matter, because the only ones that matter are those who actually vote.
Since you’re still having difficulties understanding perhaps you can ask an adult to use your Chubby Crayons to draw you a picture?
As for your constant cunt calling, it just makes you look a bit sad and desperate. No normal person would use it with the frequency and abandon you do, and the period over which you’ve sustained it speaks volumes about the kind of low life you really are. Of course it doesn’t necessarily mean you have psychological issues, but the inevitable concomitant of that not being an extenuating circumstance is that you’re just a particularly nasty piece of work.
It doesn’t hurt me at all. If anything I feel pity and revulsion for you in equal measure. Don’t you have any friends who could stage some kind of intervention? Being as rabidly foul mouthed as you are over such an extended period can’t be good for your mental well being.
” The Alba Party leader has now called for members of the Scottish Parliament to be ordered to return from holiday…..”
It truly defies belief that when the English Tory Gov are a global laughing stock and visibly crumbling into utter , frantic disarray * our * representatives are on FUCKING HOLIDAY !!!
So much for the ” Truss premiership will be advantageous to Indy support ” fantasy – her head has rolled and not a single advantage has been gained ; the SNP/GOV could have a basket of such heads and all they would do is ask them if they could have a S30 , please .
Again , it won’t matter a damn what sociopath is next up on the Tory leader conveyor belt , the SNP are cretinous cowards and this , current , priceless opportunity to walk the fuck out of WM and hold a Holyrood PE will go ungrasped .
In essence , they are no better than any of the Brit Parties . In some ways they are worse
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707811
Why do you waste so much time on someone you consider a low life, know nothing,skid mark moon howling foul mouthed schemie with tourettes?
That’s a fair number of post you’ve made about me this morning.
What’s wrong? Worried that these so called ‘alert readers’ might agree with me.
They can’t be very alert if they need you to point things out to them in all these mile long posts.
WTF do you not just ignore me?
Why the need for all this ‘fuckin’ playground shit?
It’s all very weird. It’s not as if I said anything outrageous in my initial post which triggered your ridiculous outbursts.
The post wot did it:
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707694
@Ruby
I don’t waste any more time thinking about you than I have to and I devote only the time available in responding to some of your low brow output, more particularly when you’re referring to me directly, but sometimes because I just can’t stop myself responding to your latest brain fart. Even when I made a determined effort to ignore your output due to Rev Stu’s threat to ban is both, you happily carried on bating me and cunt calling on here.
Even in the second post you link to above you directly refer to me and John Main. You’re now fixated on the woo woo that we are one and the same person, which is rich from a snivelling anonymous coward with a sewer for a mouth.
If you don’t want to be described as a sweary harridan with mental à issues, stop behaving like one. Problem solved.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/squealing-for-fame/#comment-2707829
Whatever!
Bye!
Nah Nah Na Nah Nah
I hung up first!
Ruby @2.44 pm:
Whatever!
Bye!
Nah Nah Na Nah Nah
I hung up first!
Ruby @ numerous points over previous weeks, usually accompanied by the stock cunt calling:
Why the need for all this ‘fuckin’ playground shit?
Are you thinking what all the other normal people are thinking alert readers….? 🙂
Andy Ellis
Ever considered that “Ruby” could be an Indy wrecker hiding in plain sight?
Absolutely nobody could ever claim that the stuff she posts advances Indy one iota. Mostly, her posts have the exact opposite effect. Is that her intention?
“Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth”.
No shit, Sherlock!
@John Main 6.31 pm
Ever considered that “Ruby” could be an Indy wrecker hiding in plain sight?
Oh absolutely. Not only her but a few of the other usual suspects. Even if they aren’t however, the overriding point of rebutting the effluent that comes out of most of the moonhowlers mouths is to demonstrate to undecideds and normal people in the movement that the place hasn’t just been abandoned to the nutter fringe.
It’s an old debate on here though, whether it’s low voltage repetitive cunt-callers like Ruby, barely comprehensible monomaniacs like James Che, or extremist Vlad fluffers like Republic of Scotland. They’re more noticeable now than in the past due to the fact there are many fewer articles and each has many fewer comments than when WoS was in full flight.
It had to be a really egregious head case like Cameron Brodie for it to be noticeable before, and even then some of the hard of thinking wanted to let him carry on.
Whether they’re actively yoon wreckers or just the barrel scrapings of the movement the effect is much the same.
@Ellis
The thing is, you are a cunt, a whiny one at that. Cunt is a pretty benign term here in Glasgow, so taking such offence suggests you had your mouth washed out with soap once too often, or were sworn at repeatedly by your parents as a child.
Anyhoo, if enough of us sign a binary petition calling for the end/continuation of the union, that would be a lawful expression of the will of the people as much as a state run referendum or plebiscitary election. The King is obliged to act on the expressed wishes of the sovereign people of Scotland, etc.
Public funds are available to enable this, so I nominate you (again) to run it. I would, but can’t for health reasons. Scotland needs you, and you’ll be a good cunt if you do. Good luck.