Wings Over Scotland

Thanks to the alert reader who pointed us at a Plymouth Herald story today about lovable UKIP candidate and teacher of British children, the charming Ron Northcott.

“Plymouth UKIP man quits after calling Scots ‘workshy addicts’ in Twitter rant

A UKIP politician has “fallen on his sword”, after abusing Scots people on the social media site Twitter. Ron Northcott, a former election candidate in Plymouth for the UK Independence Party, resigned from the party yesterday. David Salmon, UKIP’s Plymouth chairman, said:

“Ron is not talking to any member of the press. I can say that following the appalling behaviour of some Scots against Nigel Farage, Ron was involved in what he describes as banter with a Scot living in London.

His out-of-character remark was unacceptable and he has stood down with immediate effect as a potential candidate for next years elections. We in no way condone his language and the sentiments expressed. He has stepped down and will be leaving UKIP.”

Northcott’s “banter” came to light because this site highlighted it and posted it on Twitter, where at the time of writing it had been seen by over 8,000 people. You can read the now-deleted badinage below.

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As our Twitter followers will know, we’ve experimentally decided to reserve Saturdays for light-hearted comic banter, as a bit of relief from the serious business of politics.

Of course, this week politics has been so absurd – from “Better Together” deciding it was Better Apart to Gordon Brown promising Scots that if they vote No he’d increase their taxes and send the money to England, and the still-ongoing Faragemageddon – that it hardly seems necessary, but we’ll stick with the plan.

With that in mind, then, it’s time for… British Loony Of The Week!

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Never let it be said we don’t do balanced reporting.

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Somewhat to our surprise, the tabloid press at least hasn’t been able to avoid covering Labour activist, election candidate and BBC pundit Ian Smart’s astonishing brainfail outburst of Sunday night. (We’ve just noticed a Herald piece too, leaving – surprise! – the BBC and Scotsman as the only media not to consider it worthy of note.)

[EDIT 7pm: Scotsman now belatedly also covering.]

Smart himself has attempted a hasty damage limitation exercise, claiming that his comments, which presented Scotland as a nation of violent racist bigots suppressed from attacking minorities only by (relative) economic stability, were in fact directed solely at a small faction of independence-supporting “cybernats”.

But that isn’t true.

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Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones yesterday:

Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones today:

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The Scotsman reports today the less-than-astonishing news that the Orange Order plans to take the (Ulster Says) No side in the independence debate, lining up with such other lovely “Better Together” bedfellows as the BNP, National Front and UKIP in a coalition of all the most likeable aspects of Britishness.

In the light of this exciting and important development, we couldn’t help but wonder how their last attempt at influencing Scottish politics had gone.

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We don’t really need to write anything today. If you want to know why you have to vote Yes in 2014, just turn on your TV.

Alert contributor Scott Minto came across a weird little story in The Sun this week. We had a look into it and found the “Loyalist” nutcases responsible, whose Facebook page helpfully also provided us with a much more beautiful and uplifting sight.

Flying proudly over Glasgow City Chambers, just as it should. Not long now.

When someone sent us the image below on Twitter, we actually went to the “Better Together” Facebook page to verify it was real, because it can be hard to tell the No campaign’s real leaflets and posters from satire. But it’s totally genuine.

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(And finally… #24)

A charming shot of a British nationalist from an EDL march in Manchester today.

You might need to click the pic to get the joke.

This guy’s on your team. Congratulations on that.

(We’re particularly impressed by the attack on Nicola Sturgeon, just days after a poll found her to be the most popular politician in Scotland, and probably Britain. Genius.)

At the last Scottish Parliament election, UKIP secured 0.52% of the vote, a little over half the share achieved by the Scottish Senior Citizens Unity Party. We’re not sure why the press doesn’t give their leader, whoever it is, more front covers.

Unionists never miss a chance to sneer at “Braveheart”, a film which won five Oscars and tells a true story (very heavily embellished by Hollywood) about a people’s fight for self-determination. Only last night, Scotland Tonight retweeted one eager young No voter using it as an explanation for the increase in support for independence among the 18-24 demographic, even though the film came out almost 20 years ago.

This sort of thing, though, is fine:

That’s because nationalism is great, so long as it’s British.

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