The Idiot
Although we’re retired we already wrote this, so we may as well put it up for the 99.9% of Scots who don’t read the comments on David Leask‘s columns in the Herald.
Scotland’s worst, most reliably wrong and most pathologically insecure self-identified “real journalist” rehashed one of his favourite hobby-horses yesterday, namely that it’s a “nationalist myth” that Scotland got poorer after discovering oil in the North Sea.
It’s a claim he’s been banging on about since at least 2014, without ever providing a scrap of evidence to support it (his standard modus operandi), and yesterday was no exception. So let’s show Little Dave how proper big-boy journalists do it.
With his trademark pious huffiness, Leask appeared repeatedly in the Herald’s online comments yesterday to insist that he’d somehow proved his point, without providing a single fact or source or reference, because everyone simply knew it to be true.
The closest thing to a “factual claim” in the article was the unsourced assertion that “overall the Scottish economy did not shrink over the first oil boom decades”. That’s a fundamentally fairly meaningless statement, because it neither provides any figures nor even identifies its terms. What’s the measure? What’s the time period?
So we’ll leave it to one side for a moment – we’ll come back to it – and look at the broader picture. Let’s assume the quoted line refers to the first two decades since oil started coming ashore in significant quantities, which puts us at roughly 1975 to 1995.
1975 was a terrible time for the UK and therefore Scotland. It had just come out of the 1973-74 recession and went straight into another one in 1975. We’d just had the three-day week and were heading for power cuts, waves of strikes and the Winter Of Discontent. Eventually the country was in such a mess it elected Margaret Thatcher in the desperate hope of fixing it.
Mrs Thatcher promptly took the country into another recession, the worst since the Second World War. It saw a truly dizzying spike in unemployment, up as high as almost 19% in Scotland, while interest rates rocketed to 18%.
This state persisted right through the 1980s. The UK government implemented a series of fiddles to redefine the term “unemployed” but even those only succeeded in bringing it down to 15% in Scotland by 1986, after Thatcher’s utter destruction of the country’s manufacturing industries.
Steel and coal and car-making were all turned to rubble, and public services slashed and thrown on the bonfire and/or privatised while the Big Bang turned financial traders in the south-east of England into “loadsamoney” millionaires.
Yet these years were also by far the highest period of oil revenues. In the six years from 1981 to 1986 Scottish oil brought in a staggering £125bn (in 2021 money). In the first half of the 80s Scotland, like Norway on the other side of the North Sea, was notionally absolutely stinking rich, exactly as the UK government had predicted a decade earlier in the infamous secret McCrone Report.
But what did this incredible bounty in such a short space of time bring the country? Record unemployment and half the country scrabbling to put food on the table from crappy service-industry jobs at pitiful wages, that they could barely even afford to get to because by this point the bus industry had been privatised and decimated.
Things then picked up a little for a few years until the UK crashed into the 1990-91 recession. Unemployment shot up again, reaching 11% (by the new fiddled counting, in reality nearer 15%) by 1993.
Interest rates peaked again in the early 1990s, hitting a crippling 15% on Black Wednesday as the UK government tried to tame runaway inflation of almost 10% and keep the UK in the Exchange Rate Mechanism. The UK’s budget deficit hit 8% of GDP.
Public assets were sold off by the barrowload to balance the books – British Airways, BP, British Steel, British Gas, British Shipbuilders, BAA (which owned all four of Scotland’s main airports), British Telecom and many more were taken from the public and put into private hands during the 20-year period Leask considers to be some sort of great and glorious economic boom for Scotland.
Scottish voters, though, had responded by slashing Scottish Tory seats at Westminster from 22 in 1979 to just 10 in 1987. A decade later, in the first election after our test period, the Tories were completely wiped off the Scottish electoral map, their vote cut in half, which we can only assume was because everyone was angry at how wealthy the country had become.
At this point, an embarrassed Leask clutched at “GDP” and “growth”.
But Scotland doesn’t HAVE any reliable measures of its GDP, because it isn’t in any meaningful sense a country and therefore it doesn’t have a Treasury equipped with the resources to produce them. The best we have are a load of bodged estimates based on subjective and arbitrary interpretations of UK figures.
Secondly, GDP is a wildly bogus measure anyway – as Robert Kennedy famously said, it measures everything except all the things that make life worth living. The Lockerbie disaster increased GDP. Let’s grow the economy by getting terrorists to blow up more aeroplanes over our towns, eh?
And thirdly and most crucially here, GDP only counts for anything at all if THE COUNTRY ACTUALLY GETS TO KEEP THE MONEY IT PRODUCES.
There’s no doubt that, for example, from 1981 to 1986 Scotland generated a huge amount of money from oil, and that that massively increased its notional GDP. But the question under debate here is whether Scotland – Scotland, not the UK – got richer as a result, and the facts are that not a single penny of that money made Scotland richer because IT ALL GOT SENT TO LONDON.
London spent all that cash on what London wanted, and all Scotland saw of it was some dole money.
(The exact same goes for “growth”, because all tax receipts went to the Treasury, but even by that measure it was hardly a great time. Countries almost never have actual negative growth, so it’s generally measured relatively, and in the first decade of oil money Scotland’s rate of growth plummeted. By 1995 it was still barely half of what it had been in 1973.)
By the universal agreement of even Unionist economists and the UK government itself (as reported, ironically, in the Herald, back in the days when it still employed actual journalists), Scotland got back far less from the UK in those years than it contributed. What should have been its riches were squandered on alleviating the cost of Tory policies in England. Nothing was even put aside for a rainy day.
But that simple, basic, empirical and obvious fact – Scotland didn’t get richer, because Scotland didn’t get to keep the money it made – cannot penetrate the dense wall of solid bone that exists where David Leask’s brain is supposed to be.
The Thatcher era is remembered by Scots – entirely accurately – not as a glorious time of plenty, but a national catastrophe so traumatic that it has so far prevented the Tories from even coming remotely close to winning an election in Scotland for the 42 years since the day she walked into Downing Street promising to bring hope and truth and faith and harmony.
(Only once this century, in 2017, have they even come within 20 points of the winning party in Scotland, despite governing the UK for 29 of those 42 years. Leask must consider Scots quite the shower of ungrateful brutes.)
This entire article up to this paragraph is only 90 words longer than Leask’s (excluding the explanatory intro it’s shorter), yet we’ve still managed to include 32 sourced links to factual data backing up our claims, compared to his zero.
So if you do want a crass 4chan-style internet troll peddling clickbait “disinformation” about Scottish politics, stick with David Leask. If it’s actual journalism you’re after, you know where it can be found.
The literary equivalent of a kick in the balls.
More please.
Glad you are back. Thanks for another immaculately researched article.
Brilliant article Stu, a trip down nightmare lane, when Thatcher’s scorched earth policies in Scotland, via Milton Freidman and the Chicago Boys ripped the heart out of Scotland, whilst Thatcher squandered our wealth.
Leask is an incompetent fool, at best a unionist useful idiot, I can’t recall how many times you’ve shotdown this gadfly that passes for a journalist.
Ach Stuey…..there you go, applying logic and evidence to things again. Just as well you’re not a “real” journalist, eh…..! Where would we all be then? 🙂
I remember a number of interactions with the very odd Mr Leask back in the day. After the publishing of the “cybernat7” spread in the Daily Heil he approached me (and I seem to recall at least one of the other 6) and invited me for a chat to put my side of the story- as long as I was happy to pay my own expenses!
I didn’t trust him then and it’s been apparent since that my instincts were entirely correct.
There’s definitely something of the night about Mr Leask.
Good to see you back, showing unionist propagandists what an actual journalist does!
I miss really well reasoned and researched articles like this. I wish everyone in Scotland could see these articles and ignore what’s in the national media (newspapers, BBC, etc) – then realise what we could have been, or even might yet still could be.
I have no idea just how old Leask is, but I would imagine not old enough to actually remember the Heath and Thatcher years. He will not remember the workforce being on a three day week, He will not remember the rationing of electricity and he will not remember the years of Thatcher’s hitman a Scotsman called McGregor dismantling our heavy industry on the Alter of monetarism. All this following on from Beeching when he decimated the railway network in the country.
I am one of the people who looked around the country, bemused, as the towers fell at Ravenswood, the mines of Fife were closed causing mass unemployment and then looked out to sea where oil wells were appearing in their hundreds.
David Leask is simply a fool.
I remember the SNP slogan “It’s Scotland’s Oil”. But, even though I was an independista, I thought it should be shared equally throughout the UK because 1) Scotland wasn’t an independent country 2) I was a very young idealistic socialist.
I also remember Dennis Healey later saying the the oil revenues had shored up the UK economy – without them, the UK would have been gubbed.
Thanks for you brilliant article.
PS I’ve just come accross one of your posts about Healey from 19 May 2013, entitled ‘Lies then and lies now’.
Folks, read it.
“I have no idea just how old Leask is, but I would imagine not old enough to actually remember the Heath and Thatcher years.”
According to this Leask went to uni in 1986, the same time as me, so presumably we’re near enough the same age and he has absolutely no excuse for not remembering the Thatcher era. link to wikispooks.com
He definitely is a cretin, though.
Excellent! Thankyou. Please do more of these. Your skills are sorely needed.
Sadly, the only difference between the Herald and the Daily Star these days is that the tits in the Star are in pictures, whereas the tits in the Herald write the articles.
In a single article you encapsulate all the reasons why you are so revered and so despised,the simple inclusion of evidential fact exposes our media as irredeemable charlatans who at best sell us short ,and would sell us out in a heartbeat,I sincerely hope this signals your return ,you are sorely missed and much needed at perhaps our lowest ebb
Cheers Stu, Wings back to its finest.
You didn’t just hit the net, you tore it from the posts.
greyskies@2.30
If only it had been fairly shared equally across the “pebble” rather than building London and the Saf East at the expense of the other regions.
OT
Just got my voters registration in from Fife council,
Everything OK until you come to nationality,
British?
It’s got nations all ocpver the world including,
Wait for it! Gibraltar, parts of Cyprus and other regions not classed as countries, perhaps it is like our 4 nations?with northern Ireland not classed as a region of the Irish mainland.
Sent form back to correct version with our correct nationality,
SCOTTISH
Can Leask account for all the revenue that was taken/stolen under this union by England for England’s gain? Where has Scotland’s north sea oil wealth all gone?
So good to read something well researched and written by a real journalist, something Leask may claim to be but shows no proof of. I would be interested to hear what any of his lecturers thought of him. If his articles are anything to go by, it can’t have been very much.
Please can we have more articles which contain facts, which should embarrass those who profess to be something they’re not.
Great to have you back and with another brilliant essay. Hope the rest is doing you good and that you’re building up strength to come back on a more regular basis. We need you more than ever.
And THIS is why you should come back.
Please never give this up, even if it’s only when you feel like it or have time. We really need you, despite what any slavering wanker says.
Leasky, McDonald and co are the disinformers, self id’d journalists politicians etc.
I lived through all these eras, and by feck do I know how hard times were. I would have loved the chance to go one to higher education, but we couldn’t afford the new uniform, (1975 education system), as my grandmother was terminally ill and my mum gave up work to look after her. So for the princely sum of £11 a week, I started at 8.30 am and finished when the door shut on the last customer around 7pm in a mangey hairdressers.
Every time you mention has been hard going particularly for Scottish poor people. We may not have had his education, but at least we’re honest.
Have a very pleasant Saturday.
Unionist journalists writing shite shockarrooney.
There was a time when I read the Herald almost daily.
Can’t recall the last time I read a unionist paper.
Some folk are simply anti Scottish.
Must go to the shops to buy dinner and count the Union Jacks on the produce. As always if it’s got a Jack put it back.
You made the Thatcher years, and her hatred of Scotland, a little too vivid there, Stu.
Excellent to see you in print again.
And Last but not Leask, some fine Scottish journalism.
greyskies says on 24 July, 2021 at 2:38 pm
“I’ve just come across one of your posts about Healey from 19 May 2013, entitled ‘Lies then and lies now’. Folks, read it.”
And here it is!
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Stu. Wether you are back temporary or permanent, you still know how to run circle around their nonsense.
Hope you are keeping well and enjoying the summer with friends and family.
Obi Wings Kenobi. You’re our only hope.
Please come back.
@ Stoker 2:38 pm
Thanks! Why didn’t I think of that?
@ Stoker 3:54 pm
Thanks! Why didn’t I think of that?
We need you back for more of this Stu
Superb analysis we need you back Stu!
(1) #LIVE Anti Lockdown Freedom Rally 24th l Trafalgar Square – YouTube
MORE OF THIS REQUIRED
Al Ba says on 24 July, 2021 at 2:25 pm
“I miss really well reasoned and researched articles like this. I wish everyone in Scotland could see these articles and ignore what’s in the national media (newspapers, BBC, etc) – then realise what we could have been, or even might yet still could be.”
As do most of us. Many folk, including Stuart, worked hard to get the info out far & wide during the 2014IndyRef campaign. But i’ve always felt we were, and still are, missing a certain something.
I would like to see Stuart enjoy his break, come back with a new focus, and with all our support, get the show on the road again but this time, rather than the repetitive debunks, focus on putting together info sheets. Fact files if you like, on the top 10 or 12 main issues such as defence, SNHS, taxation, currency etc etc.
Make each one A5 or A6 booklet form for ease of putting through letterboxes. He has, at his fingertips, the worlds best archive of pro-indy material which he already owns. Of course, this is just a rough idea of a suggestion, he would obviously tweek how it was done to suit his preferences and the Wings network, ie: us, could then get to work ordering & distributing etc. Hold a separate fundraiser for each issue if necessary. Again, all other suggestions/ideas welcome.
His wee books were a roaring success so i know he has the ability to do something like this and make it a resounding success. Just an idea but i feel this is what’s missing from our armoury, handy fact-file reference educational type cards/booklets made up from all WOS’ best articles over the years. We, to help with the workload, as we have done before can even act as “research” assistants retrieving info from the WOS archives for him.
As i said, just an idea. But yeah, he is very sorely missed. And this weather will not be encouraging the lazy so-n-so to return to the fight any time soon. 😉
A bit more info from the heart of the thieves den on Grousebeater.
link to grousebeater.wordpress.com.
Thanks Rev for a return to sanity – albeit briefly.
Nice example of how to disembowel with the pen, (or keyboard in this case).
The thing about Thatcher is she never would have been hailed as great if it simply had not been for Scotland Oil. She used that to cripple Industry across the UK including Scotland. No Oil, no Thatcher!
It wasn’t the Darian project that screwed Scotland it was all the plays put in place prior to that to make Darian the last straw. The Etonians et al don’t care about recession, it doesn’t affect them! They are just carpet baggers who then move in to benefit from the already poor.
I absolutely loved the article about how great GB Olympians have benefitted recently from lottery funding. The lottery paid for by the poor hoping to become winners, or celebrities! We haven’t a hope in hell, it’s a myth, a fable to make us think one day we could be like Boris or Harry! I have more chance of giving birth (I’m a man, adult human male) than winning the lottery.
I dont want to win the lottery I want to live in a happy country with well educated and healthy citizens!
Jeez Stu, nice for the wee input!
Welcome back to the Scottish blogosphere, Rev, even if only briefly.
The Herald’s stablemate The Nation isn’t much better, as I took some delight in explaining on my own site recently:
link to jaggy.blog
The minute I saw that idiot spouting in the wee front page of the Herald, I just couldn’t be bothered my arse even engaging with it.
The sooner he is gone from “Scottish” journalism, the better.
I am impressed though that you took the time Rev to even bother to produce an article counteracting “Leask’s” article.
I remember the 3 day week and grew up throughout the Thatcher years. Scotland was indeed a bleak place with a bleak future. We were all struggling to get jobs. The unemployment was massive and I’ve no doubt the drug culture was initiated during these times. Hard skilled workers suddenly jobless and penniless.
Leask is a fucking terrible journalist and the Herald is a fucking awful rag.
This article is brilliantly researched and written.
Please come back, you’re sorely missed.
Good to see you back. A joy to find you writing again as Leask obviously thought the way was clear for him to regurgitate his nonsense once more.
Grateful thanks Stu.
Once again showing the pygmies how it’s done.
Stuart, so glad you are “back” and so pleased I continued my monthly standing order to Wings.
What a very stupid journalist he is or was he just tasked with writing a “scotland os bad” piece.
Either was a low life
Hahaha, brilliant. Come on Stuart, stop teasing, you’ve just got to come back.
Does anyone have a really good question I can ask M Russel on a zoom meet I have in a couple of weeks time? Keep it clean!!!
A real question!
What joy to actually see a journalist doing what journalists are supposed to do.
Leask got a job at a news paper because he got a degree, can spell and he is willing
and ready to put forward right wing fiction for a big bag of silver.
It must pain him to read the Rev’s work as it’s beyond his realm but there always the wages of sin
to comfort him.
I actually have a feeling of relief having read this. I’ve missed you, Stuart!
That was a very classy and thoroughly justified kicking Stu Hell- lash-it-into them!
.
Yup, both tha Christchurch and Kaikoura earthquakes raised NZ’s GDP. Rentsating the transport links along the Kaikoura coast was almost as big an effort as putting the road and rail through in the first place.
It goes either vertiginous mountainside-rail-road-ricky shore or mountain-road-rail-rocky shore.
Just to add a little often overlooked detail about the disaster of Thatcherism…in 1979 when she was elected the dollar-pound exchange rate was just above $2-£1 and quickly rose to $2.30, reaching a peak of $2.40 in November 1980. I remember this well because the tourist buses my dad’s business relied on pretty much stopped coming.
Fast forward less than five years and the dollar and the pound are almost at 1:1. The town where I had my first job was crawling with Americans picking up bargains. You can’t run a successful modern economy when the exchange rate moves like a seesaw, ridden by two maniacs on either end. Unless you have lots of lovely oil that is…
By the time the dollar and the pound were at near parity in 1985, my dad had sold his business, his health was utterly broken, and our family was scattered around the UK. My dad died in June 86 at 49 but he looked in his 80s.
Thatcherism was evil personified. There was nothing good and certainly nothing moral about it. We’re currently living through another of the Tories’ experiments on the people of these isles. Scotland has an exit route out of this madness and that’s why Don Sturgleone’s current inertia is criminal.
My response from Leask just now…..?
I appreciate this “real” journalism jibe but misrepresentation and misdirection are usually considered low arts in my trade. So, I’m really sorry, at some point you’ll have to reconcile yourself with the reality that this kind of content is not journalism at all. A response to my tweet from Leask…
Great article – glad you are writing again even if it’s just a one off – keep them coming.
link to bitchute.com
I was visiting the London area at least once a month in the late 1980s.
The amount of inftrastructure work happening was staggering. Every visit you could see lots of progress. The M25, new underground lines in London, huge sewer pipes. So much. It was obvious then, and we know for sure now, that it was all being paid for by Scotland’s Oil.
The GDP from the oil sales and taxes alone must have been massive. All straight to Westminster, do not pass through Edinburgh. Then the additional GDP from the wages and contracts payment for all that work. Again, all straight to bank accounts in London and the South East.
At least in those days the SNP spoke about these things.
It was people speaking out that created the impetus that led to 2014.
That’s what you call a comprehensive put down – you should retire more often!
As you hint near the end if you lived through those years as a reasonably intelligent adult you didn’t need the figures to know that we (working people and Scotland in particular) were being shafted.
My response from Leask just now…..?
I appreciate this “real” journalism jibe but misrepresentation and misdirection are usually considered low arts in my trade. So, I’m really sorry, at some point you’ll have to reconcile yourself with the reality that this kind of content is not journalism at all.
Good article. More like your old self.
Every so often something appears in my email account that isn’t trying to sell me some pish, or trying to steal from me.
Thanks for an automated email that made me smile, laugh, then wonder at the state of journalism.
That’s the proper stuff not the pish that Leask and his ilk peddle.
More power to your retired elbow, and may you soon have a reason to give up bear patrol as a semi-professional pastime.
Interesting that the “Yoons” who have blighted the site for a while, have gone very quiet.
Stu Campbell=Journalist.
Leask = Churnalist.
Maori,
indirectly that may be a good thing for stu, being as Priti Patel and Boris, Etel, in Parliament, are passing laws covertly at the moment that considers most journalist as spies unless it’s government broadcast gives the okey,
While FOI is being side lined and obfuscated.
Prison sentences will raise from average 2 years to 14 years imprisonment.
Maori,
Sorry stupid autocorrect,
New Uk legislation under state , counter attacks, threatens all journalists and whistle blowers.
One of the things I never got my head around about 2014, is the voters who rejected independence were the ones old enough to have lived through the Thatcher years. They knew exactly what the Tories would do to Scotland in the event of a no vote.
Yet they still voted no.
Still can’t get my head around that.
Leask is a bad propagandist, who tries to draw attention from the fact by accusing everyone else of his own flaws.
The wee coloured books were mentioned above.
This fell into my Inbox this morning.
The Wee Blue and Black Books
Posted on July 24, 2021 by grumpyscottishman
link to grumpyscottishman.wordpress.com
I remember the first time the Oil came onshore ,it was the the wrong kind of oil that couldn’t even be used in sewing machines didn’t stop London getting rich on such poor quality oil . Welcome back Rev
Not bad.
Possibly onside by a testicle hair’s breadth Stuart.
Var required in due course.
I see the vermin are doing to Marion Millar what they did to Mark Hirst and Craig Murray and Alex Salmond now, as is their now-established modus operandi: make up some fake allegations, drag the person very s-l-o-w-l-y through the court system, causing them considerable financial, mental and emotional stress, and finally taking them to court. Hirst and Salmond were found not guilty, so let’s hope this happens with Marion too – it should, as the disgusting allegation is ludicrous – but, as usual, the punitive damage will already have been done. And, of course, Craig Murray got found guilty. There is not Hell too hot for these vile people.
Ach, I’d forgotten how bad it was and how my blood boiled at the very mention of the Thatcher name. The stress and the frustration and depression we young’uns (then) felt. The 1987 election, the change beginning for Scotland…
What a joy to see you back posting stu…. your 100% correct again….leask is a cretin
And spouse says:
24 July, 2021 at 5:08 pm
Does anyone have a really good question I can ask M Russel on a zoom meet I have in a couple of weeks time? Keep it clean!!!
A real question!
Might make you a bit unpopular Spouse, but my question would be…
Why did the SNP sponsor an Opposition Day debate on the Claim of Right for Scotland in the Commons Chamber on Wednesday 4 July 2018, the motion being :” That this House endorses the principles of the Claim of Right for Scotland”, and then subsequently betray every principle of the Claim of Right, by doing absolutely nothing as Scotland was colonially subjugated, and removed from Europe contrary to the emphatic democratic will of Scotland’s sovereign people?
Follow up question… Who should be held accountable in the Scottish Government for Scotland’s spineless acquiescence to Scotland’s wholly unconstitutional Brexit subjugation?
Excellent piece, this is exactly the type of accurate information that the SNP should be spouting on a weekly basis, people (especially the younger generation) need to know about this sort of stuff and how Scotland has been robbed of its oil fund.
“If it’s actual journalism you’re after, you know where it can be found.”
All the more reason not to retire Stu ??
How much would we have to crowdfund to get Leask a seat on the next flight to the Moon?
He could demand to know what currency the Clangers would use.
Most excellent. You can certainly teach ‘journalists ‘ a thing or three Stu.
We are regularly regaled with the fact that Scotland has the highest drug death rate in Europe. Many of these people, I think mostly men, are over forty.
Many of these people started taking drugs in the eighties when unemployment blighted the young working class children of industrial Scotland and left them totally without any kind of hope of a decent working life. It is a sick joke to think that at this same time Thatcher was closing down Scotland`s manufacturing industries and using the billions from Scotland`s oil to finance infrastructure in the south east of England and foot the unemployment bill.
When Scotland`s drug deaths are discussed I am always surprised that the source of the problem in the eighties is never brought up.
It is great to have a new post from you Stu, exhibiting real journalism and exposing Leask as a journalist with no facts to back up any of his articles.
Like many on Wings now I rarely write a comment but still read regularly. I have joined Alba and am becoming increasingly angry at the lack of action by THE BETRAYER Sturgeon. This lack of action by Sturgeon was correctly predicted by Stu several years ago.
The softly , softly approach of the SNP is doomed to failure so direct action and demonstrations at Bute House and Holyrood must be the first steps to remove Sturgeon. Time for some hard-line Scottish patriots to step forward and challenge the BBC and the Unionists.
Aye, I was wondering where the references were. As for his pals, one of them’s been on his holidays…
link to nation.cymru
In my humble opinion, in comparison to Sturgeon, Thatcher was a Saint.
Don’t get me wrong, I detested Thatcher and everything she stood for.
Derek – was going to say Adam Tomkins needs his mooth shat in, bit he talks shite onywey, so it renders it academic.
I don’t know why it should make me feel better to read an article which exemplifies just how screwed Scotland has been over so many, many years BUT I do feel better. Because I know that Wings is still OK and will be around if it becomes really, really necessary.
Thanks for the trip down Real Journalism Lane Mr Wings. AND take care.
Mr Anderson@7.34
Great to see you on here again.
Regarding the oil situation, in 2015 an estimated 100 billion barrels of oil were found close to Gatwick. As England have stolen most of Scotland’s oil, we will be recompensed with our “unfair share” of England’s oil?
Its only fair is it not?
Just google Gatwick oil for the story.
Still very, very quiet from Yoon central?
WhoRattledYourCage@10.54
Rumour has it Tomkins and the rest of the Yoons carry a mouth organ holder, but rather than it holding a “moothie” it holds bog roll to catch all the sh*t that comes from their mouths.
Hopefully we don’t have to wait for the Dandy Dons to stick 5 goals past their opposition every time before you pen an article Rev!
Nail, Head, Hit!
This article is why they hate you.
This article is why the Independence Movement needs you!
David “I only accepted a cheese sandwich from the Integrity Initiative” Leask, an absolute CockWomble and shill.
link to craigmurray.org.uk
link to scotgoespop.blogspot.com
The US Government consider journalists can be considered “unprivileged belligerents” under the International Law based on their reportage (that was when GW was President, not Trump)!
Can’t remember ever buying or reading the glasgow herald, but I do remember the beano and the dandy, now they where worth reading, but I must say, according to what I have read here there is less fiction comes out of dundee compared to glasgow
Your question(s) for Mike Russell @And spouse says 24 July, 2021 at 5:08 pm
Is exactly what @Breeks says 24 July, 2021 at 8:36 pm
Another supplementary question could be to ask Mike Russell if he still believes the SHNS should be privatised.
It may be like BritNat Broadcastings Question Time with pre-selected questions from plants – in which case I suspect it will all be pro-GRA, hate crime and Neolibertarian softballing.
Good Luck anyway.
Good to hear from you Stu.
I remember the SNP slogan:
“It’s Scotland’s Oil”
But here we are with encroaching Climate Change about to deprive us of any lasting benefit from the still available oil and meanwhile, the licences for offshore wind power and renewable energy – the next Scottish Bonanza – are being traded away without a blink of the eye to the highest private bidder and Scotland again will lose out.
Plundered and tossed aside – we really ought to know our place by now – and another generation of young Scots will be cast adrift with few prospects and the lure of other countries, emigration, as the only attractive option.
But England has the Channel Tunnel, HS2, Crossrail, excellent motorways, the M25, connectivity and another Tory government that has run up 3 trillion of debt and what is their great suggestion? A bridge connecting N.Ireland with Scotland!
And before we know it, devolution will be gone and we will become a dominion of Westminster.
Ravenscraig no more, Linwood no more, Bifab no more, Mc Vities no more… who will be next?
Why are we not an Independent country yet Nicola?
How many mandates do you need?
When will Scotland be free?
Great article exposing in detail the fifth columnist David Leask.
He and his kind are all too extant in Scotland to do down independence. Pap for the paps is Leask’s stock in trade.
Fantastic to see you back, even if it is only transient Rev Stu. Your style, attention to detail, and scorching analysis has been missed. The SNP have for the time being parked us in a cul de sac. But independence has not gone away and Sturgeon and her ilk’s time will come. They will ultimately be cleared out as sure as night follows day.
And so, hopefully you will continue to be around to help reignite the movement when it steps out of its torpor …….. enjoy the sabbatical meantime.and enjoy the food, fuel and product shortages which are everything to do with COVID and nothing to do do with Brexit.
@ and spouse
You could ask him how he intends to raise support to the 60% threshold (or whatever the excuse is now) against a hostile and divisive (albeit Scot gov subsidised) local press and perhaps, in light of today’s article from the courageous Mr Leask, follow it up with a question about whether infant mortality rates in Campania have seen the same dramatic rise as they have in Scotland this year – coupled with an if not why not, and if so why the silence in preference to cheep shots about Mario Draghi’s apparent determination to outperform other ex finance ministers in the matter of coerced jabbing of as many teenagers as possible.
@ me
for clarification/ correction, the dramatic rise is not quite as high as I originally thought (having misread last year’s baby girl deaths as the total for the year) but there is a potentially disturbing trend nonetheless.
eg:
2020 – average weekly deaths 2,8 with standard deviation 1,4;
2021 – date average weekly deaths 3,3 with standard deviation 1,6;
last seven weeks – average weekly deaths 4.4 with standard deviation 1,8
Apologies for the earlier exageration and my being an idiot
The Rev’s blog is the all the too often missing half of the case for independence, namely the need to get away from a ‘UK’ that for decades has been in serious economic and therefore social decline. By the 1970’s the UK economy was exposed for what it was, unable to pay it’s way in the world.
‘The 1976 UK Sterling Crisis was a balance of payments or currency crisis in the United Kingdom in 1976 which forced James Callaghan ‘s Labour government to borrow $3.9 billion ($17.5 billion in 2019) from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), at the time the largest loan ever to have been requested from the IMF. The IMF loan meant that the United Kingdom’s economy could be stabilised whilst drastic budget cuts were implemented’ – link to en.wikipedia.org
‘This was the largest amount ever requested of the Fund, which needed to seek additional funds from the US and Germany’ –
link to nationalarchives.gov.uk
So only 31 years after the end of WW2 the UK had to borrow from (West) Germany.
Then North Sea oil came to the rescue and after that a reliance on privatisations & financial speculation, has led to a situation where the UK hasn’t had a viable economy for a long time, although with it’s long history of dependence on overseas wealth (India in particular and then the Middle East), it’s hard to see when the UK ever did have a viable economy if wealth gained by stealing from other countries is excluded .
Even now as Brexit shows, the UK cannot accept it’s true position in the world, so for the foreseeable future it still won’t be able to adjust accordingly, something it should have done decades ago. The UK’s continued decline is therefore inevitable. North Sea oil was it’s chance to get its act together, but instead it chose to grandstand. Then it started to sell the family silver. Then gamble.
The 1976 crisis was caused by an inability of the UK to pay it’s way in the world (a negative balance of payments). Now with nothing left to sell, it looks like the averted (delayed) UK crisis of 1976 will be coming back, namely an inability to pay it’s way in the world, only this time without an oil windfall or things to sell to bail it out. The only way that situation can be balanced out is by a drastic and long term cut in the standard of living in the UK.
Meanwhile all of Scotland’s near neighbours, from Iceland to Austria, are and have been wealthier and have much less inequality than the UK for decades. These are varyingly different countries but they all have one thing in common – they are all independent and not hamstrung by a delusional controlling neighbour that is determined to live in the past. Unless Scotland wants to continue to decline as part of the UK, it simply can’t afford to continue to be part of the UK. I hope more focus will be placed on this side of the case for independence.
At least the Tories didn’t attempt to deny their expensive wallpaper. Sturgeon & Murrell now need to be facing jail on charges of obtaining monies by deception or theft charges etc. link to archive.is
link to m.youtube.com
Cameron McNeish quits SNP criticising their lack of action on environment issues, lack of progress on independence & their poor treatment of women’s rights. link to archive.ph
“Now with nothing left to sell, it looks like the averted (delayed) UK crisis of 1976 will be coming back, namely an inability to pay it’s way in the world, only this time without an oil windfall or things to sell to bail it out…”
The nightmare scenario is much bleaker than that.
A couple of years ago, Michael Heseltine was asked where did all the NS oil revenues go?
He replied, without pause, “it was spent on mortgage income tax relief”.
Stoker says:
25 July, 2021 at 9:32 am
At least the Tories didn’t attempt to deny their expensive wallpaper. Sturgeon & Murrell now need to be facing jail on charges of obtaining monies by deception or theft charges etc. link to archive.is
Reply
Thanks for that Stoker. Very interesting article.
“Critics say that the present arrangements put too much power over party and state in the hands of one couple, something that Salmond warned Sturgeon about when she took over in 2014.
Was this when Salmond became ‘persona non grata’
Was this the big fall out when the revenge plot started to be formed?
Been a busy and very hot week, like the topics on Grouse Beater.
Your essential weekend reading:
‘Nationalism’ – link to wp.me
‘The Man Who Knew Too Much’ – link to wp.me
‘The Arrogant Englishman’- link to wp.me
I remember the Thatcher years like they were yesterday. Never so well-off before, and never so well-off since. Ironic really, as it was only a few years since I had been walking to school from the family council house with holes in my breeks. My builder’s labourer dad and housewife mam only ever got out of that council house in their respective boxes BTW.
Maybe these are all false memories implanted in my brain by the Unionist MSM. Thing is though, I hold onto stuff and I still have many of my bank statements from those years. Makes me weep just to look at them.
I must have been one of the lucky ones. At the time, I just thought that there was plenty to go round for anybody who was prepared to raise their sights a little and graft. Most of the guys I worked with thought the same.
Anyways, Thatcher and the Tories were booted out (not because Scotland did not feel richer, we all believed at the time it was about the Poll Tax). Labour came in for 3 victories in a row and 13 years of power. I waited for one pit to re-open, one shipyard to be commissioned, one steelworks to be laid down. Funny that, it was almost as if even Labour and the so-called Left could see that there was no economic justification for ever again trying to make industries like that work in Scotland.
After that came the wilderness years of the EU and mass immigration. Countless incomers arrived, many with only the clothes they wore on their backs, and went on to build jobs, careers, businesses, houses, families, prosperity, etc. New roads and houses everywhere. Roads clogged with flash cars and the fashionable “must have” the SUV. And still there were many who sat at home waiting for the pits to re-open and cursing Thatcher.
My post won’t go down well with the grievance-nursers here. But what the Hell, it brings some balance to the dialogue.
There couldn’t have been any Thatcher if there hadn’t been any Wilson, Healey or Callaghan before,to finally bring the (UK) country to its knees.
Giant, suffocating nationalised industries bankrupted all the UK nations, and governments being run by the TUC were unwilling to act,, and someone had to appear. Happened to be Thatcher.
If there was any time for Scotland to vote for independence, it was then, and we didn’t.
Scotland wasn’t viable, and still isn’t. If we are reliant on North Sea oil to fund us, we don’t deserve independence.
We will succeed as a nation only when our bright ideas, our energies, and our confidence in competing in the world, mobilises us.
And when we stop electing useless, bitter idiots to run the show.
Ian
Your post contains a factual error. Austria is not an independent country. It has had most of its major decisions taken for it by Brussels since joining the EU in 1995 and the Euro in 1999.
It is my view that being wrong on such a binary fact as this leaves the rest of your post open to question. But it could just be that like so many BTL here, you don’t actually understand what is meant by the descriptive term “independent” when applied to a nation state.
I know you’re retired but…
…Stu rides again!
Yeeehaaaahhh!!!!
@Wally Jumblatt at 10:51
We can hardly succeed if the rewards our efforts achieve are taken off us by another country.
Or did you miss the point of the article?
@Ruby 10:37 am:
That’s something i feel very strongly about. Never will i believe one person should hold more than one important position of power at the same time. And likewise couples/family members having more than one position within their set-up (family etc).
With hindsight it’s obviously been the intentions of the Murrell’s to create this situation all along, as was their immediate move to bring the legal system into their administration. These were all things Salmond rightly opposed and we know he had very little time for Murrell, he didn’t like/trust him. Boy, he didn’t half call that one correctly.
I’ve said it before and i’ll say it again, nothing will persuade me from believing Murrell is one of them within the SNP working for the Brits. And not to be making excuses for Sturgeon but she started turning for the worse not long after she got with him. Now she’s as low as him as far as i’m concerned. And i also, to a degree, hold Salmond responsible for not spotting her
vulnerabilities/weaknesses before dumping her on us.
But as they say, hindsight is a wonderful thing because there was a time i would have taken a bullet for her. Oh how we were all deceived by the great pretender.
“My post won’t go down well with the grievance-nursers here. But what the Hell, it brings some balance to the dialogue.” John Main 10.43
“Grievance nursers” also know as ‘grievance monkeys’:
We’ve stolen all your oil – stop complaining!
We’ve taken you out of the EU – stop complaining!
We’ve removed your regiments south – stop complaining!
We’ve destroyed your steel industry – stop complaining!
We’ve destroyed your ship building industry – stop complaining!
We’ve smashed your nasty union rights – stop complaining!
We’ve removed your key powers and more – stop complaining!
We’ve sent your youth to die in unjust wars – stop complaining!
We’ve blocked your trade east and west and north – stop complaining!
We’ve stymied you civil and constitutional rights – stop complaining!
We’ve ensured you remain a small provincial territory – stop complaining!
We’ve hobbled your economy, culture and parliament – stop complaining!
We’ve inflicted Bojo, Churchill’s reincarnation, upon you – stop complaining!
We’ve …. ad nauseam, ad infinitum.
Ian says on 25 July, 2021 at 9:08 am:
“The Rev’s blog is all the too often missing half of the case for independence, namely the need to get away from a ‘UK’ that for decades has been in serious economic and therefore social decline.”
This is along the lines of the point i’ve been making recently. It’s not a criticism of Stuart, far from it. It’s simply because of the very nature of the beast, his focus is to scrutinise and expose the media in the UK.
He has demonstrated time & time again that he has abilities capable of producing far more than media scrutiny. His ‘wee’ books were outstanding, he could easily produce something similar with all the reasons and facts for indy.
His mastery of the English language and his style of writing appeals to a very broad spectrum of folk. From the folk like me who detest ugly English to the folk who are educated & qualified to far higher degrees. And as i said in a post yesterday, he owns the worlds biggest & best pro-indy archive facility.
Stuart Campbell is a serious threat to the UK establishment because they know *exactly* how clever & skilled he is. And they fear him far more than they fear *anyone* in the current SNP. To be fair, mind you, that’s not much of a competition.
“Your post contains a factual error. Austria is not an independent country. It has had most of its major decisions taken for it by Brussels since joining the EU in 1995 and the Euro in 1999.”
What utter blocks John Main, Austria is an independent country, and it can secede from the EU whenever it wants without first having to plead with Brussels to issue a form of S30.
Yes Austria has ceded some sovereignty to the EU via its rules and laws, on the other hand countries like Hungary which still hasn’t adopted the Euro, and bends EU laws constantly is also in the EU and is a sovereign nation as well.
Being a EU or EFTA member doesn’t mean your country isn’t a sovereign nation. I’d take the EU over this rancid union any day of the week.
Just read that Petra has passed away. I never knew her but she always had good post worth reading here. Condolences to her family and friends.
Sad that yet another person will not see their nation independent.
Please come back Rev. We need these articles. There is no one that can do this like you. Imagine hiding in a cave and watching a spider try try and try again. Imagine if Robert the Bruce had given up. Yes, I think I just likened you to a King of Scots.
If I lived in Scotland I think I would be printing this article out and post it through the doors of all the union supporters I know. How can this tale of financial abuse of Scotland by London Westminster not make them feel such shame and send them down a different road?
Everybody wants the Rev. back but why put the all the load back on those shoulders. Where are all the mini-Revs ready to step up to the challenge?
There’s even a ready market for this type of journalism – much, much more than the sugar-coated shit The National drops onto the carpet each day. The money is probably there too? A Wings-style crowdfunder with a bit of arm-twisting could probably sustain 5 people writing articles like this. Sure the quality might not be up there but there’s a master craftsman available to guide their hands.
Even one or two people more writing like this would do more for the cause that all the wailing an gnashing of teeth over what nationalism means or who gets to vote. Make Scotland a place worth living in and the rest will take care of itself.
Just been reading these last few comments…does anyone here know any economic history at all? The operative word here really is ‘any’.
Thatcher was necessary coz the unions held the plucky UK by the knackers is barely worthy of the Daily Star.
I have so missed this kind of great journalism.
Derek @10.23am.
Derek.
By Tomkins logic, the USA should be more like North Korea, or Japan should be more like China, Tomkins certainly won’t be missed by many at Holyrood.
However our universities are laden with unionist gatekeepers like him from North and South of the border such as in the John Smith building at Glasgow Uni.
@Stuart Mackay.
I agree. Great idea. There is too much pressure on one person’s shoulders when it comes to taking on all of Scotland’s unionists and unionist media.
@ John Main 10.43 am & 10.52 am
You’re right that your appreciation of the Thatcher revolution is unlikely to gain much traction here. The concept that all that is needed for the “underserving poor” to better themselves is that they…how was it put it…raised their sights and grafted a little. As analysis of what was wrong with the British social model that will strike most people as more than a little trite.
Of course much of your ideological back story can be discerned from your hostility to immigration and your belief that membership of the EU and independence are mutually exclusive. That’s a trope that never gets old of course, and proof positive that you just can’t kill a bad idea.
Of course, one has to wonder why if Thatcherism and its general ethos and policies were such a good thing, the UK is not a latter day paradise rather than the sick man of Europe. BoJo’s Global Britain is of course just as much a chimera as was Cameron’s Big Society: indeed it’s probably got even less chance of being realised or of showing any meaningful benefits to the people.
In truth both of these “grandes projets” were just a way of cementing the existing order and ensuring that power remained more or less where it always has in the UK. Tories have only ever really been interested in protecting their entrenched interests. They may assert they want to “level up”, but they’re not interested in promoting equality of opportunity, eradicating poverty etc.
People must perforce pull themselves up by their bootstraps and get on their bikes. The undeserving poor aren’t poor due of systemic issues, but because they are feckless. The deserving poor will “raise their sights and graft”, tug their forelocks and say “thanks for the opportunity guvnor”, while being taught that grammar schools are a good thing, private health care might not be so bad, immigrants are dangerous and that the EU was a plot to take away their sovereign rights to bendy bananas, noisy lawnmowers, and using imperial weights and measures.
The interesting thing is that so many little Englanders fell (and contiue to fall) for this nonsense. The atavistic class cringe is of course strong amongst most of them.
“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” as they say in that famously non-independent country France.
John Main says: at 10:52 am
“Ian
Your post contains a factual error. Austria is not an independent country. It has had most of its major decisions taken for it by Brussels since joining the EU in 1995 and the Euro in 1999.”
——————
You try telling that to an Austrian and you’ll get a swift “Schuhlplattler” up your bum.
Fancy going eye to eye with a Frenchman that he’s not sovereign or independent in the EU.
How about you telling Danes ans Swedes that they HAVE to join the Euro.
The EU is an association of independent nations who are pooling together to benefit all the members. Bit like NATO or the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP).
It’s not perfect by any means as we all know, but it’s a damm sight better than 27 individuals trying to survive in a global economy against sharks like China or the USA.
Leask said Stuart mended!
And spouse,
Question to ask,
Do the snp and Scottish government recognise the sovereignty of the Scots still lies with the Scottish people and NOT according to the claim of right?
That one should be asked as the snp are trying to absorb that sovereignty.
That would encourage many of us here and be much appreciated in formatting a way forward to independence.
Correction,
With the Scottish people and Not with them,
John Main is a conservative/Brit Nat., albeit a polite one.
He does however still follow the WM ideology and textbook.
As for some of the lunatic ravings of some other commentators… 🙂
“It’s Scotland’s Oil” should be changed to reflect the parties new direction.
“It could be Scotland’s oil (unvaccinated are killers) but a pansexual beaver was displaced from it’s home in Quebec by heavy rain (probably the unvaxxed responsible) so we don’t really want it and England says no anyway, plus this isn’t really that important because we need to concentrate on jabbing”
Not quite as catchy though.
.
Well hello Stuart,
What a refreshing sight. Hopefully you are keeping well. Better if you are bored out of your Leasks (new euphemism for “tits”).
If you are bored, then it’s natural to put that prodigious talent of yours to good use.
As a betting person, would you wager on this random challenge…
If Peter Murrell is required to attend a police interview under the ignomy of a criminal caution that anything he says “may be used in court”, please will you add that to reasons why you should DE-RETIRE when you take your penultimate decision in November?
For legal reasons I cannot claim facts on this matter at this time, but sufficient key personnel at senior rank in Police Scotland alone with significantly learned and respected members of the Faculty of Advocates have had enough.
Enough of the disrepute into which the Scottish legal system has been brought.
A great proportion of “the 19” who have reported allegations of theft by clandestine possession and similar to Police Scotland over the missing £600,000 came from Wings Over Scotland.
Why?
Because of the research, integrity and quality of forensic journalism on this website.
Stuart, it is not safe for you to resurrect this website at this time. That is a fact. Sturgeon has said so at the NEC meetings.
But if/when the glacial speed of true and fair justice reaches the doors of Bute House because of alleged misconduct of the current temporary tenants and one of the two is dragged from there by uniformed officers, Scotland WILL become a safer place for you and Craig Murray and Ian Lawson and the rest of the real internet journalists.
I can quote a factual source here: link to scotland.police.uk
In addition to which, this morning The Times indicates a source where the net appears to be closing in on the miscreants posing as high ranking politicians with £600,000 in brown envelopes…
link to thetimes.co.uk
Stuart, reading through the comments here, I think two things jump off the page…
A). Many many people want you to return.
B). It is proven beyond any doubt that Leask is, in fact an idiot.
Stay safe my friend. Enjoy the break.
May you suffer being so bored out of your Leasks that you WILL return in November 🙂
“Austria is not an independent country. It has had most of its major decisions taken for it by Brussels since joining the EU in 1995 and the Euro in 1999”
If we are going to apply that rationale, then neither the UK can be an independent state either, as it appears to have most of its major foreign policy decisions, percentages of GDP that need to be invested in military equipment etc taken by USA and Israel for quite a while. Judging by the interference during the EU referendum, the “necessity” of dropping our food standards to give way to a toxic USA trade deal and the excessive fawning of the fraud’s government to USA and the recent use of faux antisemitism accusations to discredit some political candidates, one could argue that the external influence of those two foreign countries does not limit itself to just foreign policy.
Sending back to you your own words, “it could just be that like so many BTL here, you don’t actually understand what is meant by the descriptive term “independent” when applied to a state”
I would choose for Scotland the “independent status” that Austria or any of the EU countries have today instead of the colonial status that Scotland has been subjected to by England for the last 300 years, any day.
“I remember the Thatcher years like they were yesterday. Never so well-off before, and never so well-off since.”
John Main.
Many miners were viciously beaten up and their families left hungry, many just survived due to donations to them some coming from as far away as the USA. I recall that it was cheaper to import coal from Poland than it was to dig it up in the UK, so the mining communities and their families were sacrificed. This is why I don’t understand parts of the Red Wall (ex-mining communities) in Northern England voting for a rampant lying Tory capitalist such as Johnson.
Thatcher adopted the Milton Friedman and the Chicago Boys school of thought, which cut its teeth in Chile which saw thousands die and the socialist president Allende usurped and killed (they say he committed suicide, if you want to believe that), and who was at the head of this neoliberal coup, Thatcher’s good friend General Pinochet.
“Enough of the disrepute into which the Scottish legal system has been brought”.
I remember a few months ago Stuart Campbell wrote that he was 80% certain that Nicola Sturgeon would be found to have broken the ministerial code and would have to resign.
Had he been right, then this website would probably still be running and the rest of us would be a lot more relaxed about living-out our lives in Scotland.
He was proven wrong because Nicola Sturgeon dictated to the then Lord Advocate how she wanted the law to work in Scotland. For the law to work in the way she wanted, information needed to be suppressed and folk frightened into not speaking the truth.
That’s the way it turned-out in the end and the whole country is now viewed as a legal shit-hole as a consequence.
Stoker.
Thanks for that very interesting link.
The paragraphs that stands out for me are these.
“Police are said to have announced the formal investigation into fraud allegations, despite concerns from the Crown Office.
The Sunday Times has been told that police officers were “stunned” by the position taken by the prosecution service.
One source said that police officers and the Crown Office were “at loggerheads” before the force’s announcement this month that it was opening a formal investigation, having conducted initial inquiries into complaints alleging fraud.”
“The source said: “Police told the Crown days beforehand. The Crown wanted a change of wording. They wanted a form of words that made it more of a fact-finding mission but the police had already had that and it was because documentation had not been handed over that they wanted to escalate it to an investigation.”
“Police were stunned that the Crown was putting them in that position. They were unhappy because if it was about anyone else in this position they would call it an investigation.” The source added that warrants were expected to obtain any material the party has not handed over.”
By that reckoning it sounds as though the COPFS is still a political tool that’s being wielded by the Scottish government for its own benefit.
Nosferatu should shut his hole.
Maggie pumped that oil more frenetically than a chimp at a zoo spanking it in front of the schoolkids – you can see it in the “depletion curves” for the North Sea. Fuelled her “economic boom” with it and gave credit to the city for “creating wealth”, trickling all the way down the South East, as far as … Brighton.
Rev back in the game, with “3 stabs of the gladius” … nice
– also nice to see a wider range of commenters BTL.
BTW everyone should read the Herald original as the bald fool LEFT THE COMMENTS ON (a sure way to be eviscerated when talking pish) and paid for it, bigtime.
.
In case you cannot see past The Times firewall, I suspect a kind Winger has done the honours…
link to archive.is
In any other circumstances this would be an ex plosives case of brown excrement.
But purely as a matter to exonerate the risk he has put himself in, I would like to APPLAUD Stuart Campbell for his tireless and proper investigative journalism that has set a chain reaction in motion that will stop butterflies being broken on wheels in Scotland. We all know to whom that refers.
The one telling paragraph from The Times article that has a skunk-powered WHIFF of spin about it is…
The row is the latest in which Sturgeon is in danger of being embarrassed by her husband, who has led SNP HQ for 22 years. He has faced calls in the past to stand down over claims, which he denies, that he was involved in a malicious campaign to bring down Salmond.
Is it just me, or does that smell as though someone in the SNP media dept., is preparing to throw Peter Murrell under the bus to SAVE Her Majesty, Queen Nicola of The Dregs?
Sorry Nicky darling, but as a former lawyer, having left that profession under a cloud, even you should know about the rules of “art and part”.
IF Penfold Murrell is going sub-bus surfing, then you will be joining him my dear. Albeit via Zoom calls from Corton Vale. Apparently working at home in isolation is all the fashion. As you are Queen of Covid TV, a Sturgeon YouTube channel from the new series: “Betrayer in Cell Block H” should help you raise enough for that pesky PROCEEDS OF CRIME order that will be chasing your man’s uber-salary once a link can be proven between the missing £600,000 of DONATIONS and your partner’s sort code and bank account number.
KHARMA. NICOLA AIN’T IT A BITCH-?
He’s coming home!
He’s coming home!
He’s coming!
Stuey’s coming home!
An very important point and the key to many of our problems ( not all) is sovereignty of the Scots as a legal position,
The snp has been using the uks health rules for political shut downs of marches and rallies, except for marches she considers can go ahead. That is using Covid as a political tool for the benefit of stymieng and closing down the yes movement as can be seen since 2020.
I am pretty certain that if a nation is recognised as sovereign people, ( in 2018 and the Scotland Act.) That uk goverment and the Scottish goverment cannot lockdown sovereign people even under the health Acts,
Although their are varying degrees of opinion over covid, the underlying important fact is that it attempts to eliminate the sovereignty of sovereign people in their own country,
As does the hate crime bill.
For us to blindly forgo our sovereignty for any reason places us in a poor political position in anything we undertake.
Including allowing new laws of intrusion into our homes by Scots law becoming a weapon of the snp and Scottish goverment against its sovereign people.
What the right and wrongs of recognised sovereignty is and how far the powers that be, challenge our weakness or ignorance over our own sovereignty is in the making right now.
Surely we must reconsider how important this is and prioritise this to the top of our minds and lists , in our actions and our plans.
For without it we are the same as any other colonised country,
Effigy says:
25 July, 2021 at 12:13 pm
Leask said Stuart mended!
That’s one for the parliamentary bricks.
Superb, effigy!
Stu.
You should come back home,
If the governments are developing the method of taking down free speech of journalists in new legislation, at least there may be some protection for you under Scottish sovereignty as a tool of protection as a last resort.
Legally recognised sovereignty of the right to choose who governs us gives us psychological and legal protection in a way that staying in England might not do.
And I can see that future dispute coming you’re and our way very soon.
“Maggie pumped that oil more frenetically than a chimp at a zoo spanking it in front of the schoolkids – you can see it in the “depletion curves” for the North Sea”.
Margaret Thatcher was so desperate to pump oil from the North Sea as fast as she could that she excluded all independent safety audits from North Sea platforms.
That was one of the reasons given for the Piper Alpha disaster. Folk said it was always going to happen in the North Sea and it was just a matter of time.
Her name was mentioned again in relation to Grenfell in as much as Thatchers drive for deregulation in the 80’s allowed these dangerous materials to be used in cladding.
Thanks
James Che and Breeks, two loaded questions!
Grousebeater at 11.29
I like your list because isn’t it about time we recognised it’s not about Oil, or any other commodity. It’s about a group of tie wearing, equally educated establishment people just simply lording it! Dishing out awards to high powered industrialists and financiers.
There is no individual plan for each new “ let’s worry the nation about some new up coming problem”.. It’s a never ending game of chess to keep the masses in their place. Its monopoly, they even sold us the game so we could see how we are being screwed, it’s such an irony. I include all the areas of England too that are subjugated along with us.
It’s a game that needs a new strategy, unfortunately we don’t have the resources to explain this to the people of Scotland in a way that will make them wake up.
Al-Stuart says:
25 July, 2021 at 1:00 pm
.
In case you cannot see past The Times firewall, I suspect a kind Winger has done the honours…
link to archive.is
Always get a bit suspicious when a newspaper claims to have the “inside” of what the police are thinking, but for once, I hope they’re right.
I am also suspicious about the money going office refurbishment. I find it tricky to join the dots between a £600k windfall, and a decision to tart up the office. Funny smell of red herring in the air, and I’m sure any financial auditor worth their salt will also have their spidey senses tingling.
At most basic level, who the hell decides it’s a great time to refurbish the office when you’ve just raised £600k to fight a referendum? Not exactly planning to be busy then, eh? Hmmmm…. Fetch the thumbscrews and branding irons I think… Funny smell of rat in the air…
You could see the overall situation as indy being held back by the Murrell Gang, so getting rid of them is the priority (otherwise we are stuffed for several years at least) – so the police investigation for fraud would seem to be a magical “hail mary pass”.
What is more likely –
– the prosecutors hobble the police, or
– the police move glacially themselves, telegraphing their moves so the criminals have time to “clean house”
– a case is put together and the prosecutors say “no case to answer” – or – “not in the public interest”, or
– a fire breaks out in an evidence room, or (remember fettesgate)
– a burglar steals all the evidence
– if it ever did get to court, it would be prosecuted/presided over by PEOPLE THE MURRELLS GAVE JOBS TO
your chances of success make online gambling look good.
For all the tech innovations of the internet, anonymity, encryption – whistleblowing in Scotland does not seem to happen very much. Our little land is full of secrets, yet wrapped up tighter than a gordian knot trapped in a steel vice; lockerbie, dublane, fettesgate, willie macrae, the alphabet women, the nuclear industry, safety in the north sea, the real public accounts, plus who knows what else, scandalous things we do not even know the existence of. There is an omerta in operation that the camorra would be envious of.
Penfold? – always thought Murrell looked like Don Estelle of It Ain’t Half Hot Mum.
– those “decorations” must make the SNP HQ a reasonable copy of the Amber Room.
yossarian –
link to youtube.com
And spouse,
I know you will ask the question,
It will be interesting on how an snp member might get around the ownship of sovereignty.
The best article I have read since you retired Stuart. It’s your life, but I wish you would consider returning to Wings full time.
From a btl comment on this site a year ago;
‘We’re stalled I’m afraid. We need a complete change of leadership in the SNP. Nicola Sturgeon is a dull and dutiful First Minister but she and her team have wasted more than five years paying homage to Westminster and look well set to waste another five if they’re given the chance. I don’t think she’s capable of taking us to independence. She might even fall for the Union of equals myth.
I’d hoped there would have been a leadership challenge in the SNP by now but it looks like they’ve all been ‘captured’ by the Establishment and the promise of an easy life. The dream looks dead in the SNP.’
Stinking like a Banana Republic
link to grumpyscottishman.wordpress.com
I am more worried now that Sturgeon will decide to hold a referendum, using the same rules as in 2014. With the number of incomers to Scotland having increased greatly since then, we would have no chance of winning our independence.
@Brian Doonthetoon – If you cast your mind back to the Westminster expenses scandal; what do you think happened to those found guilty of scamming a few thousand pounds on TV’s, I-pads and general flim-flam…….they went to jail. Several of them did time…… six-months to a year.
Good luck to The Times and Police Scotland. At least someone still has some balls in this bent wee country.
The only problem with this analysis is that Leask is a nationalist and devoted supporter and defender of Nicola Sturgeon.
Rather than people ranting about oil conspiracies perhaps people would be better directing their fire at reports in today’s press that the corrupt Crown Office have been pressuring police Scotland to downgrade their investigation into the theft of the £600k indy fund.
This is the same crown office that still haven’t investigated Nicola sturgeon, Peter Murrell and the rest of the corrupt bastards at the head of the New SNP for perverting justice, contempt of court and perjury.
“TWEETS from SNP MPs and MSPs about independence more than HALVED after the Scottish Parliament election, the Sunday National can reveal.”
Surprise Surprise, NOT!
This was completely predictable, they’ve got their snouts back into the trough, so the masses can go and take a flying f*ck to themselves when it comes to independence.
Anytime the SNP finds itself slipping down the popularity polls, it just has to utter two words to the masses Scottish independence, and hey presto the masses come running.
link to archive.is
‘Prosecutors v Police Scotland?’ on jaggy.blog is an interesting take on Murrelgate.
“The only problem with this analysis is that Leask is a nationalist and devoted supporter and defender of Nicola Sturgeon.”
Thanks Shocked for cheering me up a wee bit, that any of the two b*stards you mention in your above comment actually support an independent Scotland, both are nationalists alright, British Nationalists. I never realised that you are so good at sarcasm.
Are you a comedian by any chance?
RoS
Leask is a nationalist whether you like it or not, his articles in the herald made that blatantly obvious as do his increasingly shrill and demented rantings on twitter following the collapse of his journalistic career….
And I’ve got laugh at that shite coming from a signed up SNP 1&2 Sturgeon cult member such as yourself. Party first and fuck the country. Get off your knees.
oor nicola and oor rabbi have something in common, they where both in Irvine at one time, rabbi went to train there to become a waxer, but nick ma bra, did not need to learn as she is the best self taught waxer that Irvine has ever produced.
Rabbi was thinking of going to jamaica at one point and the people said, Rabbi don’t go, we love you, really we do.
Nick ma bra, I heard at one point was thinking of leaving Irvine for the philippines, but the philippine government got wind of her plans and closed all the ports and demolished all the airports to keep her out, they even paid a guy a lot of money to make sure she did not leave these shores.
His name was Alick Sallyman or something like that, yes he or she as the case may be got 45 million philippine pesos, so he put her name foreward for an accounting job with Crook and Sons, and that’s where she learned about books and cooking.
As for Alick Sallyman, he never really recovered from the shock, you see 45 million philippine pesos where worth between half a crown and 5 bob on a good day at that time.
Poor man, I often think of him and wonder what he’s upto these days.
We love you philippines o yes we do,
we love you philippines o yes we do, we love
you philippines we do, oh philippines
we love you
Shocked I am right you are a comedian, Leask is a mad Russophobe, who works for Integrity Initiative, Stu even posted the link.
link to wikispooks.com
As for the two-votes SNP, you’re not fooling me with that shit, what does Brigadier Turner think of your skills as a comedian then?
RoS
You were banging the drum for people to vote SNP every day on here leading up the election.
And I’m damned to know what Russia has to do with Leask being a Scottish nationalist. The man is a disgrace, nothing but a Nicola Sturgeon New SNP shill.
Somebody said to me, that Tommy Cooper was the greatest magician ever, he could even pull a rabbit out of a hat he said
I said, that’s nothing, my mates better than that
He can pull a hair out of his arse
link to m.youtube.com
Wake up Scotland.
“At most basic level, who the hell decides it’s a great time to refurbish the office when you’ve just raised £600k to fight a referendum?”
Someone with no interest in the referendum but with a great deal of interest interest in giving somebody else open access to the office in order to dispose of/gain evidence?
When was the last time somebody other than Murrell saw the accounting books?
Shocked @4.18pm.
Yes I pushed the SNP 1 Alba 2 vote, but not the to vote Green, to maximise the indy vote, hoping that Salmond could win a seat and hold Sturgeon to some sort of account in the chamber. Alex asked us to vote SNP 1 and I did as did others.
Sadly no Alba candidate won a seat, and both votes SNP which Sturgeon and her party pushed allowed 46 unionist MSPs into Holyrood.
Tell me Shocked who did you vote for in May, or is that a big secret.
“And I’m damned to know what Russia has to do with Leask being a Scottish nationalist. The man is a disgrace, nothing but a Nicola Sturgeon New SNP shill.”
Jeezo Shocked you’ve answered the question in your own comment above, you say Leask is a nationalist, then go on to say he’s a Sturgeon shill, everyone and their dug knows that Sturgeon isn’t a nationalist
How can Leask be a nationalist when he’s as you say shilling for Sturgeon a non nationalist-besides Leask works for a unionist statecraft body.
link to archive.is
GB news is really living up to its right wing rabid description not only has Nigel Farage joined it, the DUPs Arlene Foster now presents as well.
Soon we’ll have the Orange Order playing the intro music and marching around the studio.
The really BIG STORY today was buried away in the middle of a Sunday Times news report – Police Scotland and the country’s crime prosecutors at “loggerheads” over dealing with the alleged fraud by our SNP chieftains. If cops and the Crown office are seriously split over this, a steadily gathering crisis is no longer just engulfing Scotland’s governing party but also our criminal justice system.
link to jaggy.blog
So, Roddy Dunlop says that James Wolffe is of unimpeachable honesty. Plenty of folk have said in the past that John Swinney is unimpeachable too. Fortunately, most Scots aren’t daft and know that both are as bent as a nine-bob note. Both have managed to ensure that there is no change to Scotland’s political landscape and all they needed to do that was a redactor pen. Scotland is now a corrupt cess-pit and plenty of us know that, even if Roddy Dunlop doesn’t.
@ Republicofscotland at 5:46 pm
Arlene Foster and Orange Order? Hmm, awaits GB News being embroiled in a #CashForSash scandal.
For clarity, that’s not to be confused with pawn shop owners getting a #SashForCash from hard up OO members who need dosh after spending all their money buying pallets to set on fire earlier this month in a global warming celebration of their culture.
Jaggy, good stuff.
As I understand it though, the investigation could only become a prosecution if the relevant Procurator Fiscal’s office gave the green light. And since PFs answer to the Lord Advocate (who sits in Government), we can probably assume this is almost certainly going to be neutralised. No?
Ron Maclean says:
25 July, 2021 at 3:05 pm
‘Prosecutors v Police Scotland?’ on jaggy.blog is an interesting take on Murrelgate.
Short of Murrell “The Bookkeeper” being fished out of Leith Docks, it’s difficult to imagine how any of this could possibly look even dodgier.
When you think of the actual Watergate, what actually happened, it is tame beside this “carry on”, and this scandal when it blows is going to be global news, and deeply humiliating for Scotland.
Quite an achievement for a Scottish FM to bring the whole country into disrepute…. And that’s as of now. But you just know there is so much more to come.
Another Quisling named and shamed.
It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if some of the ring-fenced money had been used to tart up their offices, especially as they had no intention of using it for the purpose to which it was intended. Expensive wallpaper can be useful for papering over the cracks. Perhaps they also papered over all the mandates they have collected so as not to be reminded of them.
It has been clear for quite some time now that Nicola Sturgeon is being held in place by the English Crown to prevent any movement towards independence. It is really COPFS which lies at the root of corruption in the Scottish criminal justice system, ably abetting the Murrells in their criminal endeavours and denigration of Scots law. Yet another reason, if one is needed, to become an independent republic.
Let us just hope the police refuse to be intimidated, stick to their principles, and uphold the rule of law. Even if COPFS refuse to prosecute, the police still have the power of arrest, and a night spent in the cells while they complete their investigation would bring sobriety to many and the matter into sharp relief.
Scotland again leading the world,
most corrupt judiciary in the world,
most inept journalists in the world,
most woke politicians in the world,
most second rate football in the world,
most misogynistic universities in the world.
I wish people would not abbreviate words, if your to fecking lazy then why should I bother trying to decipher any of your comment
I was talking to R A Brown today, he said have you seen the news about RADA and Soda, it seems that RADA went to Soda about that thing we where talking about, and now Makka is not talking to Rada and Soda is talking sheet to the MSM, do yer crust in all this stuff from guff and gruff of adda nuff
will nicola survive the investigation
?
Saffron Robe says:
25 July, 2021 at 10:13 pm
….Let us just hope the police refuse to be intimidated, stick to their principles, and uphold the rule of law.
Aye, let’s hope that Saffron Robe, but meantime, does anybody know what happened to Alex Salmond Task Force of officers, whom, if memory serves were also the ones taking away Mark Hirst’s Computer tech, and possibly involved with Craig Murray too. Who are they, where are they now, what are their assignments, and who are they taking their instructions from?
Can we perhaps satisfy ourselves who it is we’re talking about, when talking about Police Scotland? (And that’s me trying to have faith in them… We need a Police Investigation, but it has to be diligent, and be seen to be diligent. Scotland cannot afford to have this grubby business rubber stamped with the old “Move along, nothing to see here”, routine…
Will the real Police Scotland please stand up….
shug says:
25 July, 2021 at 11:18 pm
will nicola survive the investigation
I hope not.
If actual charges follow, you would think her position would be untenable, but that’s assuming a basic level of honest integrity which would seem is in short supply.
Her position should have been untenable since 2016, but selling Scotland’s ancient Constitutional Sovereignty down the river didn’t phase her in the slightest. I think she’s full blown sociopath / psychopath unburdened by guilt or empathy.
It seems more likely she won’t leave the building until she’s dragged out in handcuffs after she’s burned everything to the ground… including Scottish Independence.
Corruption within U.K. politics is so strong and powerful it
encompasses the judiciary and the police.
Thatchers greed is good and only the strong survive has been
fully adopted across the board at the highest levels.
Dare those filling their boots within corrupt cabals dare to lose
their seat on the gravy train for the sake of justice or morality,
not on their life.
When you have had many years on 6 figure salaries the bad things
you see happening to others pales into insignificance.
On Covid, this Tory mantra of world leading Covid management continues
as the U.K. media support their lies by ignoring the reality.
Did you know the U.K. has the highest death tally anywhere in Europe.
The Germans have millions more vaccinated and even Spain who the
Tories look down upon and apply traffic light travel colours more quickly
than traffic lights themselves, has a higher percentage of vaccinations than
the U.K. but somehow, Tory England is great an far superior?
It’s all very well Kenny MacAskill and ALBA lobbying Westminster to separate the COPFS from Government, but it needs to go MUCH further and implement an actual Impeachment Protocol into the Scotland Act.
But why stop there? Why strengthen the colonial Scotland Act and strengthen it’s attempts to usurp and supplant the popular sovereignty of the people?
It’s the Scottish people who need access to an Impeachment Protocol.
RoS
Nicola Sturgeon is a Scottish nationalist. She is not an agent of the British state or a yoon or whatever else bullshit conspiracy theory you want to claim. However, what she also is, is a power crazed narcisstic psychopath who abandoned whatever principles she claimed to have long ago when she realised just how much power and money she could extract from the New SNP flock. Nicola Strugeon is in politics for herself. She is not working for anyone else. She takes no instructions from anyone else. To even try and claim that she does belittles what she is and is a pathetic attempt at excusing her crimes.
On voting New SNP, the Rev told you all what would happen, as did people like myself. We were all attacked by you and the rest of the New SNP shills and when what we said would happen did, did any of us get an apology? Did we hell. You lot just tried to reinvent history and excuse yourselves from taking responsibility. Now you dominate the comments on WoS pretending that you did no wrong and have no responsibly for the utter corrupt flaming oil tanker wreck that Scotland has become. Corrupt to the core with a criminal first minister pulling the strings of the crown office and keeping the media under check.
The entire leadership of the New SNP, the heads of the Scottish civil service, the Scottish crown office, some police and few judges all need the jail and yet people are still carping in about some conspiracy about oil that doesn’t stand up to the slightest bit of scrutiny. Perpetrated by people who haven’t worked a day in their lives or contributed a thing to society. No wonder actual grafters like me who have put a shift in our entire lives get so pissed off with the Scottish nationalist movement. I always sat out because of bullshit like this and the sturgeon scandal got me into commenting as I decided something had to be done. Seems most folks just don’t care and would rather cling to a grievance that sort out the corrupt bastards who have dragged Scotland into the sewer.
People whinge and moan on here about sovereignty, only managing to demonstrate just how little they know, completely ignoring that nothing will change until sturgeon and her cabal are out of politics for good and rotting in jail. Alex Salmond himself didn’t even get that, he surrounded himself with grinning idiots none of whom had the intelligence to tell him that until sturgeon is out of politics he’s finished. They fuelled his fantasies about holding her feet to the fire in FMQs; well you are only going to manage that if you get elected and you won’t get elected if everyone things you’re a pervert and a rapist who should have gone to jail!
How the hell samond thought the best way to deal with Sturgeon was giving her a pass and grinning politely when she threw dirt at him is beyond me. What an absolutely clown, he’s reputation was so trashed and the sturgein controlled media was so intent on ruining him that rising above it was not an option. He should have stayed on the attack, revealed all that he knew and finished her. If the result was Holyrood being shut down for a while until the corruption could be expunged then so be it, but no, he knew better. Same goes for Craig Murray, permatan Tommy and the rest. Zero tactical nous between any of them. Let’s just tell people to vote SNP, it’ll be fine. Well you were told it wouldn’t be and from what we are seeing now it clearly isn’t.
Some good news from Gordon Dangerfield re. Mark Hirst’s case.
We all know it was a politically motivated/malicious procecution as is Marion Millar’s. We know one complainant is a third rate actor, but it is believed (could be wrong) the other is an SNP Councillor, a particular favourite of NS herself.
link to gordondangerfield.com
Shocked, no conspiracy here.
Sturgeon very much is an agent of the British State.
Alex Salmond called Sturgeon to testify at his trial, she was excused by the courts from appearing. The reason she was excused was because her British State colleague Bojo called a Covid Cobra meeting for the same day.
Do you remember the stooshie Sturgeon caused after this meeting where she released details of this meeting before Bojo? This nonsense was all sanctioned by the British State to divert media attention away from Sturgeons non appearance at court.
Just read Gordon Dangerfields blog here
link to gordondangerfield.com
It leaves me wondering just how long can it be before the whole roof caves in on Sturgeon and her accomplices
Nally Anders, Fishy Wullie
After all the work the Rev put in into exposing the issues and having appear to be for naught it was heartening to see that all those involved were probably only successful in papering over the cracks and we still might see justice served on those responsible.
The tensions between the COPFS and Police Scotland are the most interesting. The “system” is clearly broken and now that the in-fighting has started who knows where it will end. Given the sterling service performed by Wolffe it seems unlikely that COPFS will survive this. So no matter how clever the SNP leadership think they’ve been I don’t think they’re going to get out of it alive this time.
Police Goonland formed a crack investigatory team to investigate the serious and disturbing potential crime of Gail Sheridan’s miniatures collection, cunningly hidden in a glass display cabinet…
Yet 600 grand gets defrauded / stolen from members of the public in PLAIN SIGHT by the ruling party (and in a totally unsophisticated scam) and yet the Scottish Judicial System is completely paralyzed (aye right, sure…) and unable to do anything… and they won’t. I guarantee this story will amount to nothing.
Just like the Police and COPFS all studiously could not work out who leaked the Salmond accusations to the Daily Record. Geee who could it be…
The level of bentness is so blatant and all pervasive most people don’t even see it, won’t see it.
The last few years have been an absolute eye opener at just how deeply rotten and corrupt the COPFS, the Police and the SNPG are. I always had some concerns about the first two but hooooly fuck they are well beyond my worst fears.
I always knew the media were totally bent but this combination of weaponizing the COPFS and Police Scotland along with them to politically assassinate a former SNP FM… that is way beyond just having to deal with a biased media. This was / is an open attack on what little democracy remained in Scotland, to snuff it out.
The fact they even did what they did to Alex Salmond is a measure of just how out of control these people are now.
What they have done and are doing is really wild. They are not even really hiding it anymore, it is brazen, in-our-faces level of bentness.
I can only think they plan is to systematically disgrace Scotland and the SNP to the point people are utterly sick of them. I know I am. The masses will catch up for sure but who knows when and by then the damage will be astronomical, it already is.
I would say we have got the point where it appears that there is not a single identifiable person in a position of power who is ‘on our side’.
Something has caused them to lose their fucking minds… and I think all roads lead back to what really happened in 2014.
JimmuckMack
The person who excused her was the Scottish justice minister and the Scottish courts. The Scottish legal system is completely devolved. It was done because she didn’t want to commit perjury in court.
She has no connection to the British state or MI5 or whether other deluded fantasy you want to claim.
Stuart MacKay – That’s just what I was thinking. There are a great many lawyers in Scotland who must be dismayed at the way their profession has been used as a human shield for Holyrood parliamentarians over the recent few years. These parliamentarians will remove anyone’s livelihood in order to ensure their own survival and I think we all know that. Lawyers shouldn’t have allowed themselves to get wrapped-up in that in the first place. Law is for ‘public protection’ remember.
Stuart McK & Capt.Y
I occasionally allow myself to indulge in the odd flight of fantasy.
My latest is despite QC Roddy Dunlop’s suspiciously effusive epitaph (highest levels of integrity etc) on James Wolfe’s resignation, I wonder, I just wonder if Wolfe woke up one morning to find a severed horses’head in bed beside him.
Did the Judicial Mafia decide they had to reclaim the Legal profession’s tattered reputation therefore Wolfe needed to go?
I like to think so.
OK, I’ll get me coat!
The whole ‘woke’ politics garbage is very reminiscent of all the colour-coded revolutions we saw. I think this is the ‘domesticated’ or ‘home’ editions of those same activities.
It is very well planned out going back many years now and is extremely well funded.
When you look at the entirety of Nicola Sturgeon’s short reign, and you really have to remind yourself at all that she has ‘achieved’ in just a few years. None of us could have foreseen just how bad she would be.
Instead of exploiting BREXIT she misplayed it and at the exact same time attacked the icon of 2014 and tried to fit him up. Came very close to succeeding…
Nicola gets a lot of help from places she should not be getting help from.
All the woke politics garbage you will note is now wed to an abrupt change in SNP foreign policy as well. Neocon Nicky does not quite reconcile with Woke Nicky but hey it is not like she will ever be held accountable for any contradictions but the media that never barks…
It is all quite boring in a horrific way. Like watching professional wrestling or a maybe a soviet show trial… maybe both, Scotland style.
Mac
The plan isn’t to disgrace Scotland or the SNP. This is 14 years of unfettered power and cringeworthy displays of worship towards a failed 2 bit bent lawyer coming home to roost. The displays at the hydro were like something out of Scientology or some other cult. It is absolutely bat shit mental the way some people worship Nicola Sturgeon. This is all the New SNP’s doing. These people are so deranged that they think they are above the law (in fact in Scotland they now own the law) and that the people exist to serve them and to give them limitless power.
Ever since the New SNP started havering on about being at the top table of the EU or UN it has been clear that the New SNP pursuit of independence is all about gathering personal power for the leadership and obtaining personal power and wealth comes before all else. Therefore if independence doesn’t happen they are happy to sit back and consolidate corrupt power within the Holyrood framework. Indeed this arrangement probably suits some of them, they get all the power and money, don’t have to take all the big decisions or decide where the money comes from and get to blame someone else when they fuck it up. Of course the public let them away with this provided the Indy carrot is dangled along with appropriate Anglophobia when necessary. Add in a legal system and media completely under their control and it’s the perfect arrangement.
I was going to say I am surprised, but quite honestly nothing surprises me about the way people think these days.
Scotland is not unique as far as corruption in politics goes, visit the philippines if you want to see some real badass corruption, and nobody there gives a shit about it, they just say when asked, that’s the way it is, its always been like that.
Just because we have all these outlets, more so than we have had before, does not mean that things are worse now, it just means we get to know about it quicker
So all you folk that think your somehow revealing something, your not, as the old saying goes, there is nothing new under the sun, yes the faces and the way corruption is formulated may differ, but its all been done before, and as for Dilly Dolly and her ragtime band, they are only amateurs at the game of politics, I have seen more intelligence being put on my roses than that lot have between them all
Oh, come on, Stuart. Find something fresh to do, look for new challenges all you like, but are you really going to find a job that’ll make you happier than when you’re taking people like this apart like a cheap clock?
@Andy Ellis – 25 July, 2021 at 11:58 am
A poor post Andy, full of muddled thinking. I notice you set quite a little platoon of strawmen marching though: “atavistic class cringe”, “little Englanders”, “sick man of Europe”, “on their bikes”, “undeserving poor”, “forelock tugging”, “grammar schools”, “bendy bananas”, “imperial measures”.
Sheesh! Pity you could not deal with some (any) of my points. Which were:
Thatcherite policies destroyed the old smokestack industries, not just in Scotland, but across the UK. You can argue that these policies were wrong or misguided. You can even argue they were plain evil. What you can’t argue is that in the considerable time since, despite a few opportunities to do so, no UK or EU or home-grown Scottish politicians or industrialists have shown much interest in reversing them. Now why would that be?
Thatcherite policies created new opportunities for ordinary people. You can argue that the new jobs were vastly outnumbered by the old, disappeared jobs if you wish, but you then have to explain why we seemingly need all the immigration to do these jobs.
A country can be independent, or it can pool its sovereignty in a union. I see that some posters here are conceding ground and now clarifying that they want Scotland to be in a union, just a different one to the rancid Westminster one. That’s absolutely fine with me if that is what the majority of people in Scotland want when they are asked that specific question in a referendum or plebiscite election. But I view my politics through the same lens that I use to view my breakfast cereals, or anything else that somebody is trying to sell to me. If the sale can only be completed by the seller lying about the fundamental nature of the goods or services I am being asked to buy, I become deeply suspicious.
BTW, my hostility to immigration? That’s particularly rich when the BTL comment here has just spent a week proving that Indy in 2014 was spiked by immigrants voting “the wrong way”.
Anyway Andy, as you say my comments are not going to gain much traction here, at least, not with the regular posters. With the silent readers, who knows? Maybe they see politics in shades of grey, populated by people who have to weigh competing considerations knowing that no resolution will please everybody. Maybe they see politics as a Xmas panto populated by stereotypical heroes and villains, staged for its entertainment value.
“Thatcher’s behind you!” “Oh no she isn’t!”
link to twitter.com
JimuckMac says on 26 July, 2021 at 9:33 am
“Sturgeon very much is an agent of the British State.”
“Alex Salmond called Sturgeon to testify at his trial, she was excused by the courts from appearing. The reason she was excused was because her British State colleague Bojo called a Covid Cobra meeting for the same day.”
“Do you remember the stooshie Sturgeon caused after this meeting where she released details of this meeting before Bojo? This nonsense was all sanctioned by the British State to divert media attention away from Sturgeons non appearance at court.”
You’ll never type a more honest post for as long as you live.
And further to my response to ‘JimuckMac’ @ 11:08 am
Every bit of it orchestrated & pre-arranged by Lesley Evans no doubt.
“despite QC Roddy Dunlop’s suspiciously effusive epitaph (highest levels of integrity etc) on James Wolfe’s resignation”
Couldn’t agree more. Let’s hope there’s a change and it’s happening now.
Shocked @8.45am.
Shocked good to see you’ve shut up about Leask being a real nationalist, and I see you conveniently dodged revealing who you voted for in May, possibly because you don’t even live in Scotland.
As for Sturgeon being a nationalist, again I had a wee chuckle to myself, Sturgeon is on record actually saying she doesn’t even like the word national in her party’s name.
If she were a nationalist, we’d have had a second indyref by now and we’d have more than likely won it. Sturgeon has done everything in her powers to hinder the indy movement, from Alex Salmond’s trial, to Craig Murray’s unjust conviction, to the blocking of Martin Keatings S30 saga, and the putting of the unpopular HCB and GRA bills ahead of independence.
Shocked you can push the Sturgeon’s a nationalist agenda all day long if you want, but her actions show she’s no nationalist.
Jimuckmac.
Sturgeon has cosied up to Alastair Campbell, a war criminal when at Westminster, she can go on marches in England but not indy marches in Scotland, and she can employ Sir Nicolas MacPherson one of the arch architects in the downfall of the 2014 indyref.
RoS
I voted Labour constituency to try and get the SNP out and didn’t bother on the list.
Leask is a nationalist whether you like it or not, his articles and ranting in Twitter in support of sturgeon makes that clear.
I live in Scotland, well done for showing your true colours, a shameless sturgeonite who throws out the anglphobia to deflect.
Sturgeons actions are not about hindering independence, they are about obtaining and consolidating power and wealth. But of course, you knew that anyway.
Nally Anders
I presume the legal profession is like the medical one – they all hang together or they’ll hang separately.
Mr. Dunlop is just exercising professional prudence by not airing too much in the way of dirty laundry in public.
@Shocked
“Leask is a nationalist whether you like it or not, his articles and ranting in Twitter in support of sturgeon makes that clear.”
How can someone who supports Sturgeon be a “nationalist”?
Unless of course you mean British Nationalist, or BritNat as they’re affectionately known.
Anyone whose purpose, despite attempts to claim otherwise, is to maintain the devolution settlement and retain the constitutional make-up of the UK, Sturgeon for example, is NOT a Scottish Nationalist.
O/T
British Govt. have pulled a fast one – from 28 September your GB sticker on your car or as the side badge on your registration plate will be illegal overseas. You’ll need a UK oval sticker or UK side badge on your registration plate. A sop to those angry Norniron Yoons no doubt. Next Olympics it’ll be Team UK not Team GB. Which would be more accurate but, frankly, who here gives a to$$.
@ John Main 10.56 am
The point about the nativists who have been pushing the franchise restriction narrative is that, despite their high profile and volume contributions BTL here recently, they don’t represent either the movement as a whole or the general readership of WoS, much as they wish they did.
They enjoy negligible support in both, despite their valiant attempts to present themselves as speaking for the “ordinary rank and file” nationalists. Nary a one has yet effectively answered Rev. Stu’s original twitter thread denunciations of their regressive nativism, nor has anyone in any of the pro-indy parties shown any interest in their cunning plan, still less endorsed it.
Your point is spurious. The fact that no politician or anyone else has argued to reverse the policies of yesteryear tells us precisely nothing. Thatcher’s policies were often ideological, not economic. It suited her and her supporters to “let” old industries die, to fail to support them or invest, because it had a political and ideological upside for them. The fact that other countries continued to invest and/or intervened to stop the social damage caused by such policies shows that there was an alternative.
Changes were and are inevitable of course, but how we deal with them and the policy decisions we make aren’t.
RobertK
Going by your logic all the SNP 1 crowd (of which you are one) are not Scottish nationalists because you all supported Nicola sturgeon despite being told exactly what would happen if you did. Party first, country doesn’t even get a look in.
Great article. It puts into perspective all the nit picking issues such as Gender sex conflation issue distractions. Anyone who reads it should be fired up and ready to fight for Independence and hold our elected officials to account.
The way it’s supposed to work is that the Lord Advocate is asked by members of the Government: ‘How would the law see this….is what we’re doing lawful?’
The Lord Advocate gets his team of law officers to investigate and he reports back.
What’s been happening in these Sturgeon years is that the Lord Advocate is instructed by Sturgeon and Swinney the outcome that they want and they leave it up to him and his law officers to deliver.
The Rangers FC fiasco should have seen the COPFS cleaned-out but nothing happened. It can only be assumed that they have been retained for a reason.
You’re all having a bite at this “journalist” who has been thrown into your pit while every other “journalist” in the land blows smoke up your arses about covid pandemics Hellooo.
The introduction of Britcoin will be another screw on the lid of our freedoms. No cash in pocket no real free spending power. Also the political narrative against the unvaccinated is being stoked up by the media and useful idiots among the public.
To the Resistance. Stay strong. Say No to the Fascist political class. They have no real power over us. If the State comes to your door to flim flam you into raking the prick you have the right to say “no”. No arguments no explanations just No.
@Shocked
Guilty! For once I went against my better judgement and did as AS suggested: SNP1 ALBA2.
And we all know how that turned out.
Never again… I see Sturgeon for what she is, and she ain’t a supporter of Indy.
For anyone who hasn’t seen this yet (sweetie money).
“BP fined £50,000 for breaching licence condition” link to archive.is
I’ve been working this morning and came into Wings and found this link from Fishy Wullie at 9:49am today.
link to gordondangerfield.com
Gordon Dangerfield is a Scottish Solicitor Advocate.
This morning’s link is far too important to be lost in subsequent comments. Please read. Thankyou
My apologies.
“The Rangers FC fiasco should have seen the COPFS cleaned-out but nothing happened. It can only be assumed that they have been retained for a reason.”
A full scale enquiry would have brought into the open the whole dodgy legal and corporate culture up here that allowed Rangers to do what they liked financially in the first place with little in the way of “due diligence”
For instance, footballing authorities forcing professional clubs to have their accounts all with the same banking group for “sponsorship reasons”, one which denied loans to all the other clubs bar Rangers, and on ridiculous free and easy terms at that, in short getting the rest of Scottish professional football to bankroll one of their number – and all of which came unstuck upon HBOS’s collapse.
It also would have brought into the open the entire Scottish media not merely keep silent about this state of affairs, but become little more than a propaganda machine for it.
For instance, they published and broadcast outright lie after lie about “off the chart wealth” from owners whom basic checks by English based hacks showed were little more than old fashioned confidence tricksters juggling everyone else’s money to make it look like their own.
It’s no coincidence that Dear Leader’s done her best to put the Scottish media and Scottish banking in her back pocket, with it coming the inevitable “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” wink and nod culture, and the closing of ranks when required. If Rangers could get away with it for as long as they did, why not her and the SNP?
Sorry that should have said “RBS”, not “HBOS”!
Pixywine@1.26
Really interested in what you post, any chance of providing “fact checked” links.
Real fact checked, not some ramblings from discredited nut-jobs.
Mark Boyle – This isn’t an anti-Rangers forum. If it was, your post would have some merit. What we are talking about is a ‘malicious prosecution’ which will cost us 10’s of millions to put right. In most jurisdictions in the world it would be met with resignations (at least), but not in Scotland. The question is: why is that the case?
RK
Not supporting sturgeon anymore just because she ain’t a supporter of Indy downplays her crimes. She is a power crazed narcissistic psychopath who in 7 years has absolutely destroyed Scotlands public institutions, legal and justice systems in pursuit of power.
Jack Murphy @1.44pm – Thanks for posting.
And worth repeating :
link to gordondangerfield.com
The wheeels are coming aff their bogey !
Hope wings returns to report their downfall.
P.S. To all the cowardly SNP MSPs and MPs – You have lost my vote forever. Don’t dare try to come back from this
“I voted Labour constituency to try and get the SNP out and didn’t bother on the list.”
Shocked @12.12pm.
You voted for Labour, the Tories buddies, and you wasted your list vote.
Enough said.
So the pompous git James May is getting in the neck for having a pop at Sturgeon there was a time I would have defended her but not now, not ever again.
Anyway it reminds me of that irritating sod Jeremy Clarkson saying on Sturgeon that she had the memory of a goldfish during the botched handling of the inquiry at Holyrood, where Sturgeon’s replies to many of the questions were, I can’t remember, not to the best of my knowledge, and I don’t know.
I suppose I have to give some credit to Clarkson on that one.
stoker @1.39pm.
Stoker BP oil, has always been at the heart of the British governments interests, from Iran, to ignoring Putin’s devastating war on Chechnya for BP’s personal gain, and even in Libya, where it began drilling for oil off the coast in 2010.
Of course BP oil is a save haven and staging post in whatever country its in for MI6 personnel.
“Next Olympics it’ll be Team UK not Team GB. Which would be more accurate but, frankly, who here gives a to$$.”
Robert Knight.
I just can’t bring myself to watch the Olympics, I think the last time I watched it was when Allan Wells was running in the hundred-metres.
A wee interesting snippet on the Olympics is that Pierre de Courbertin, who revived the Olympics in 1894, wanted to add a ring after the completion of every Olympic games, which if it was implemented would have seen the now recognisable logo have around twenty-eight rings.
Bojos plan to be rid of the devolved government has to be seen to start with corruption and bad laws, if he wishes for excuses to close Holyrude.
Moothie Ruthie rape clause, covid tool of political sovereignty, hate crime bill, and question about lord advocates, stolen ring fenced money, and of course legally causing divisions in the football and hoping to gain grounds of divisions between sturgeon and Salmond supporters, protestants and catholic’s, law and law enforcements, covid and vaccines, green new deals and job losses, Brexit and internal market trade deals, open ports in Scotland. And the long term one instigated is Scots hate English. Trolls payed for or encouraged to redirect conversations away from independence and on to nationalists or Nativism matters on Scottish independence blogs and sites to do the rest, etc,
I have mentioned a few here,
The overall long term picture is the breaking down of the Scottish Parliament, The Scots law and Scottish society with the purpose of dis- enabling the powers of and in Scotland,
A renowned tactic of subversive warfare is division.
Long term and short term planning has been their goal, we can see the divisions that are set up and being set up since 2014, in the way our plans are undergoing subversion over the last number of years,
Tackling one abuse after the other, we are often to close to A subject to see all the pieces of jigsaw as a complete picture.
Breeks, I read your comment from yesterday, and it saddens my heart that you imply the Scottish government are the arbitrators of you’re sovereignty or any Scots sovereignty for that matter.
It is not theirs to do anything with any more than it was the right that a small number of men living in Scotland in 1707 illegally exchanged A Scotland and people they did not own for financial rewards.
It belonged to the recognised sovereign people of Scotland since the international declaration of Arbroath.
To buy not only a country but the indigenous people in that country is slavery, to beholden the people of Scotland under such an agreement in present day Britain and international laws is tantamount to people trafficking. As it was done without consent of the sovereign indigenous Scots whom were trafficked abroad to make up colonies in the new world and as compulsory cannon fodder in wars not of their making.
It is time for the Scots to wake up and recognise their sovereignty that has a legal recorded history and say NO, enough is Enough and sue the hell out of Westminster parliament as trafficked slaves under the 1707 treaty of the union.
So Alex Salmond’s Alba party finally got a reply to a FOI from the Scottish government on what progress has been made towards gaining Scottish independence.
Unsurprisingly the answer is none.
“It said: “As of July 3, 2021, no ministers or civil servants in the Scottish Government were working on updating the plan for an independent Scotland from 2014.”
“It adds that no analysis or assessment of the potential timescale for a second independence referendum or on the referendum bill since the Holyrood election in May.”
link to msn.com
There’s been on analysis, no background work, nothing, which as we all know means no indyref. Oh but we do have the HCB and the GRA, and if media speculation is correct, the SNP governments HQ has had a lovely new make over at our expense.
RoS
You voted for the lying criminal Nicola sturgeon and told many others to do the same. Anti freedom of speech, anti justice and anti law.
And the irony is you call me a tory for voting Labour to try and get the corrupt bastard sturgeon out while humiliating yourself on a website owned by a man who said he would have voted Labour himself if he had a vote.
You really are a prize fool. Perfect for the New SNP cult machine:
Shocked.
Alex Salmond asked us try and get a supermajority for independence at Holyrood that’s why so many folk voted for the SNP on the constituency vote. Sturgeon can be replaced, and the SNP will be around for a while yet, who knows what a new leader might do on the indyfront, Sturgeon has intimated that she’ll stand aside in 2026, hopefully she’ll be forced out before then along with Murrell.
What is one-hundred percent certain is that Kier Starmer’s lapdog Anas Sarwar the branch manager of Labour in Scotland will never look upon independence in a favourable way and we know that. On top of voting for the union, you failed to give your list vote to the Alba party citing some limp excuse that no one in their right mind will buy.
robertknight says:
26 July, 2021 at 1:28 pm
@Shocked
Guilty! For once I went against my better judgement and did as AS suggested: SNP1 ALBA2.
And we all know how that turned out.
Never again… I see Sturgeon for what she is, and she ain’t a supporter of Indy.
Don’t be hasty there Robert. Just because Sturgeon is an absolute disgrace and parrots in the SNP like pouring scorn at ALBA, don’t let that prejudice you against the principle of a “primary” party of Independence being augmented by a supportive List Party.
The strategy is sound. The weakness last election was Sturgeon’s vindictive paranoia and galactic stupidity. It was specifically NOT a weakness amongst voters who properly understood the List Party principle.
When you remove the idiots in the SNP hierarchy from the equation, the equation itself is perfectly sound. It’s the equation the Unionists use every election to vote strategically and win seats from the Stupid Nicola Party.
@ Shocked
I’m guessing this opporchancity to empower Labour by voting SNP was just too much for you… Which to be fair is totally understandable. 😉
link to archive.is
Bring down AS, bring down the SNP, Bring down Scots law, bring down the devolved government,
No leaders left, no direction left, no power in government left, being by passed by bojo with funding direct to Councils, free ports, and internal market bill. Bring down Scottish bloggers, Bring down devolved government and the disorganisation of the “yes” movement has its foundations removed.
Unionist Rangers thugs proudly boasting that no arrests were made
regarding the sectarian singing when they wrecked George Square.
Thank goodness the police were able to stand watching and have their
fingers in their ears at the same time.
link to followfollow.com
Unionist elated that Scotland’s duly elected First Minister
is not permitted to take part in a Summit meeting in her
own country.
If she had any balls she should tell Boris to Fuck off.
link to twitter.com
Hmm, looks like someone may have thought SNP was an acronym for Sending Naked Pictures…
link to twitter.com
“She has no connection to the British state or MI5”
Sorry, not credible. Every one of her actions for the last 7 years points to the exact opposite.
The woman and her praetorian guard have been acting far more in line with the ways of the vindictive and arch-unionist New Labour than with the traditional SNP that she took pleasure in destroying.
No real nationalist would eviscerate the party in the way she has done, removing all democratic control and accountability structures, driving members away on their droves.
And who benefits of the destruction of the main vehicle of independence? The English ruling elite.
No real nationalist would dare waste so many opportunities to deliver independence and progress Scotland’s autonomy like this political fraud has done in the last 7 years.
And who benefits of an incompetent wasting opportunity after opportunity to deliver Scotland’s independence? The English ruling elite.
A real nationalist would not abuse their position of power to waste taxpayers’ money for political vendettas trying to wipe off the scene the only, demonstrably, capable person to lead Scotland to independence.
And who benefits of having the best pro independence leader Scotland has ever seen, removed from the scene? The English ruling elite.
A real nationalist would never undermine Scotland’s popular sovereignty in the way this political fraud has done. A real nationalist would never hand over to the English ruling elite a free veto to frustrate Scotland’s self determination.
And who benefits from being handed a free veto to frustrate Scotland’s self determination so England can continue sucking from Scotland’s resources? The English ruling elite.
Frankly, what would be the shock of the century is if this political fraud and her praetorian guard are not another handful of New Labour useful idiots working for British state to hand over Scotland’s assets and frustrate once again Scotland’s independence.
Just like Labour has been doing for decades.
She is in my view the female political version of Gordon Brown and Tony Blair. Insincere, dishonest, untrustworthy, unethical, unprincipled, slippery and politically speaking, equally repulsive. Her actions ooze the New Labour style to betray Scotland: pretend you are helping the Scots when at all practical effects you are stealing their assets to send them down south. Just like New Labour did when they stole Scotland’s territorial waters to hand over to England.
But if Labour overtly did what she has done they would be stoking independence even more. The only way the English ruling elite could get away with forcing brexit on Scotland to steal its powers and assets, openly violating the Treaty of Union and yet preserving the “union”, is with an infiltrated SNP and a bent FM who does the dirty work on behalf of Westminster while keeping the yes movement on a tight leash to stop it going anywhere.
The advantage of such dirty strategy is that if such infiltrated SNP can simultaneously give the impression of incompetence, total contempt for voters, democracy, justice, unhealthy authoritarianism etc while overtly refusing to progress autonomy and independence, more than a few yes voters may change their mind.
Just what we are watching happening.
You cannot deny the strategy has been a masterstroke and nobody can deny that this political fraud has giving a masterclass at executing the dirty work for the British state. So that this lady is a tool of the British state, I think is more than obvious. And the joke is on us for letting this political fraud and her praetorian guard of useless MPs and MSPs fool us for this long.
Dan.
Thanks for that link, I’m hoping this can of worms opens up from the inside.
@James Che – If you asked the owner of this website who had brought down Alex Salmond, Scots law and the bloggers, he would say ‘Nicola Sturgeon’. Do you think there is someone else involved?
Captain Yossarian 1:55pm
I may have missed your post because I have been enjoying a great Scottish summer. What’s the situation on the Engineering reports?
Effigy @6:16
Apart from the WM snub, one should wonder why the UN has withheld their invitation to NS when so often it has been extended?
I have seen a number of critical references today to the fact that civil servants in Scotland have ‘done no work’ towards yet another referendum on independence
Setting aside for a moment that ‘doing no work’ IS the default position of the Civil Service, a more central issue in my view is ‘why should they ?’; the main merit of the British Civil Service as I understand it is that it should be independent of party politics. Since the SNP and the eat-your-greens party are the only ones who have this as a policy it seems to me that doing this type of work is very much the job of those two parties-why, they have at least £600,000 of you lot’s money for this very purpose-don’t they…..?
The Civil Servants should get on with sorting out the many shambles that beset the majority in Scotland, not waste time being activists for a deeply contentious (And probably minority) party political stance
I’ll get me coat
Good to hear from you again.
The collapsed apartment block in Miami is analogous to this school, you know. Tidal water was washing into the site and washing back out again, removing small amounts of sand and silt from around the foundations and all the time incrementally removing support. It’s cumulative and with rising sea levels it was getting worse year on year. Finally, subsidence occurred and it was immediate.
The Engineering Institution are on the case. They respond to me immediately and they are connected, as you know, to the best engineers in the world. The perticular engineer they are speaking to was the President of Engineering Institutions on both sides of the Atlantic. I’m an old cycling man and so you may call him the ‘Eddy Merckx’ of engineers, or the ‘Mohammed Ali’ of engineers. A typical engineer in many ways – brought-up in a council house in Knightswood, but gifted with an exceptional, clear-thinking brain.
They will respond to me formally, as will the Law Society regarding the conduct of one of their members.
I cannot remember who advised me to do this, I don’t think it was you but it was someone on this site, but they said to forget all at Holyrood and report this to the Professional Institutions. I have done that and they will respond. I’ve explained this once to the Engineering Institution and they get-it instantly. I’ve explained it a hundred times to the Scottish Government and I would be as well talking to a door or a brick wall. I’ve worked with two other Governments and they are nothing like Holyrood. Holyrood is just full of liars, I’m afraid.
The school term starts again in 3-weeks and so they’ll need to make their minds up soon.
I think they know the answer already but, as you can imagine, it’s become a political fandango. If only all at Holyrood would just devote some effort to investigating these things at the time instead of covering them up we would all be a lot better off.
I don’t know where you are at the moment but when this is over, I want to get myself away from this country. There’s something about the desert you know. At the time it is too hot and the people are unfriendly, but I have to say it still beats Scotland.
Mia
Still not getting the “less is more” message I see.
Question. I have long liked to believe in the existence of the Ruling Elite so I am with you there, but is being English really a necessary qualification?
Is it really a closed shop? No room for merit at all? Not even one (dare I say it) Scot up in there?
Sorry, more than one question, but I got carried away.
“The Civil Servants should get on with sorting out the many shambles that beset the majority in Scotland”
You mean the shambles the civil servants themselves created?
Remind us all again how many times those civil servants had to be called to the Fabiani Farce because they were dishonest with their first statements and had to then amend them time and time again?
Remind us again about that civil servant that pissed off the police because she was trying to get them to tell her that the civil servants working for the SGov could progress complaints against Mr Salmond without the consent of the actual complainers?
Remind us again how many senior civil servants participated in the preparation of the unlawful complaints procedure?
Remind us again what senior civil servants did not brief fully their counsel and as a consequence that counsel had to threat them to pull out forcing on the Scottish taxpayers a bill over 500,000 pounds for a unlawful and tainted with apparent bias procedure a senior civil servant in Scotland claimed ownership of?
What senior civil servant allowed confidential information to be leaked from the SGov to a newspaper and then was totally useless at identifying the culprit because the parameters they set up to investigate purposely left the culprit out?
Sorry, but after the deplorable behaviour, total lack of honesty, ethics and principle, the aiding at deliberately suppressing information and what looked like abysmal violations of the code of conduct of the civil service that contributed to the shambles we are seeing today, cannot be dismissed that easily.
Andy Ellis
Thanks for your reply.
“Thatcher’s policies were often ideological, not economic.”
Hmmm. I interpret that as you saying that Thatcher wanted to shut down the smokestack industries, whether or not they were profitable. That being the case, it would have been much easier for a subsequent administration to re-start some of them, as it would not have been pursuing the some ideological agenda.
So the fact that nobody ever reversed Thatcher’s policies suggests to me that these industries were uneconomic. So as somebody has already commented, if Thatcher had not closed them, somebody else would have done. Sooner or later.
Fast forwards to now. Post-Covid, post-Brexit, with anti-China suspicion rising everywhere, and with localisation, not globalisation, supposedly the new reality, maybes it’s time to look at building a new steel mill or a new shipyard in Scotland. They may still not be able to compete on straight economic terms with foreign competition, but at least we wouldn’t have to worry about EU competition law if we needed to subsidise them.
Maybes we could agree on that as an aspiration.
@Captain Yossarian 7:15pm
I totally get the desert stuff..I was on a contract in the UAE my taxi didn’t turn up a Scottish guy shows up in a Lambourgini. He says you look Scottish. I was from Dundee He was from Arbroath. Unbelievable but it happened. He took me back to my hotel,forever grateful. We need the Engineering reports Captain.
@Tannadice Boy – The Engineering Institution are providing ‘guidance’ to all the multitudinous Scotgov, council and legal spoofs (there are at least 30No of them). Everyone is afraid of the engineers, you know; especially this guy. They can all gang-up on me and they have been doing that for years, but that is not possible any more.
I’m expecting this to be over soon and so I’ll let you know how I get-on.
@ John Main 7.42 pm
Well, yes. From memory some coal mines were profitable (yes…I know, environmental factors etc. but….). There’s always a tension between the costs of providing state aid and subsidies on the one hand and the prospect of getting “stuff” cheaper abroad, whether it’s coal, steel, ships….whatever. We were assured by the Tories and free marketeers that it didn’t really matter, because we’d prosper on the back of service industries. They either didn’t care that our manufacturing base was being hollowed out or thought it was unimportant.
Perhaps there was no future for some or many of the industries or plants, but too often there was a sense that they were being actively sacrificed and/or could at least have been reprieved or saved. Of course it may not have worked in all that many cases, but there was never really any serious attempt either by Thatcher or New Labour to come up with a serious alternative or plan to renew industries, improve our (comparatively poor) productivity. It was all thrown away on the promise of what…?
I have my doubts either the proponents of the Tory “Global UK” or Sturgeon’s SNP are up to the job of providing much in the way of strategic direction.
We’ll probably get more of the same, similar (or worsening?) levels of inequality, and not much in the way of systemic change. The gradualist SNP of the Growth Commission are unlikely – at least to my mind – to lead us to the sunny uplands of a new social contract or Scandinavian style society.
Who knows…maybe we should plump for the non-EU model, “do a Norway”? Time will tell I guess…..
@Captain Yossarian 7:58pm
Well we will know soon. I am thinking about the Arbroath guy. He had a couple of kids, one of wasn’t doing well. I a got from it was critical in my short journey. Unbelievable he knew I was Scottish. I wish him well.
Rev as you said real journalism. Which is what Scotland and Scots need we need you rev Scotland needs you. Indy needs you. Without you I don’t know if we can do it. You give us hope because you give us truth
@ Dan at 6:17 pm
I for one am not surprised, I have believe this from early 2015,I was of the thought that a MSP was being “inappropriate” and controlling actions,
When I challenged the leader , over one issue the reply was “Not Again”
Encouraging news re the possibility of the alphabeti knot unfurling, and in an oh so appropriate way.
😉
Hmm, as a confirmed cynic of everything to do with the current Scottish government, I can’t help but wonder in my own deluded way, if this is an attempt to erase any possible show that we have a viable “bank” in Scotland, therefore, fulfill the requirements of a fully sovereign nation without need to ask for permission. Annoyed with myself (it’s late and I probably have had too much sun (and beer lol)) as I forget the exact phraseology, but pretty sure that having our own banking system is the only barrier to telling Westminster to gtf?
Are we about to see a run of other financial institutions in Scotland, closing down their Scottish headquarters?
link to archive.is
As I say, probably sun induced madness on my part, but worth the watching
and apologies, for hijacking the thread, but I miss Stu and don’t have twitter ( though an avid follower, means I see everything and don’t get blocked ala comfy slippers lol)
Great article hope your back in the fight. Soar Alba
.
Do you remember the utter shock at hearing Alex Salmond had been arrested?
Prepare for that shock to be on the other boot.
Fortunately the Scottish Legal system including the Faculty of Advocates and sufficient senior police officers who still understand the word “integrity” are ensuring that….
The political gerrymanderer, Nicola The Betrayer was and is impotent .
Never forget…
link to wingsoverscotland.com
As for the temporary coterie of…
Toxic woke-captured £600k club and Hubby, the cadaverous looking wee bald undertaker Penfold Murrell, time is almost up…
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
The girning beard of a mortuary magnet that shacks up with Nicola The Betrayer will be subject to due legal process first.
Then the squatters in Bute House will be headed to a rather large legal iceberg from which there is no escape. Onward sails…
Nicola Titanic
As for the Sturgeonite supporting lurkers that visit this website, the tipping point is nigh upon you. We are now at 36 degrees. Do your research. When you reach 38 degrees, if you have not turned honest or turned Queens evidence, then the jails are going to start filling up with senior law officers and senior police officers.
We will know this is kicking off as a ridiculous thing will happen: Rock/Kcor/Gordon/Eugene/Labour4Indy will crawl out from under his/her/its stone and Wings will once again become infested by the industrial quantity Trolls.
Would be fantastic if She/Her announced at the start of The 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, also known as COP26 (to be held in Scotland)
that public transport (electric buses) would be free in Scotland for all Scottish citizens,immigrants and tourists,
there is going to be a lot of virtue signalling about the environment and climate , lots of words and no real action,
Free public transport could actually save the planet.
@Mia 6:27
I agree with much of your post re Sturgeon’s actions, however I do take issue with a particular part
You talk of the English ruling elite.
You should in fact refer to the British ruling elite.
The likes of Gordon Brown, Michael Gove, Alistair Darling, Alister Jack, Fluffy Mundell, the list goes on, are NOT English, but British.
It is the British ruling elite, with Scots by birth among their ranks, who seek to lock Scotland into the Union.
Your average Joe in England probably couldn’t care less.
.
On the topic of idiots, I was reading some of the older links that I hope Stuart keeps online if he decides to completely retire from WoS in November.
This post by Stuart was almost kind in relation to backstabber PAYPAL PAUL KAVANAGH…
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Stuart, I very very rarely disagree with you but PAYPAL PAUL is MONETISING his website in a cynical way by highlighting his want for a house and want for a nice wedding.
But Wee Ginger Dug sneaks in the disability issue. Those of us who struggle with similar or worse medical prognosis to PAYPAL PAUL do not monetise our disability and prey on the good nature of decent people.
His URL mentions REHAB…
link to uk.gofundme.com
But this has little to do with rehab and NOTHING to do with the YES movement or Independence for Scotland. It is PAYPAL PAUL GRAFTING money off of people who have a heart and feel sorry for him.
Kavanagh proves that old idiom attributed to J. M. Barrie…
“There are few more impressive sights in the world than a Scotsman on the make.”
Forgive me Stuart, but I suffer from the same devastating problem as your Dad. Yet you have NEVER monetised your website to pull on readers heart strings to get your Dad a new house.
Whether it is David Leask prostituting his badly written work for Unionist gold, or PAYPAL PAUL soliciting massive amounts to buy himself a house, these people turn my stomach.
Stuart, you are absolutely right. If someone asks people to support their crowdfunder to pay for their luxury honeymoon and their blog readers dipo that, then fine.
But to milk a disability in this way sticks in the craw.
If PayPal Paul had any integrity on this, he would put the HOUSE BOUGHT BY A FUNDRAISER INTO A REGISTERED CHARITY, and have it transferred to that charity once he passes.
We all die in the end. It’s just sickening to turn disability into a personal and selfish fundraising racket.
Stuart Campbell, you were very reserved and diplomatic in your rejoinder to the hurtful crud written by POISONOUS PAYPAL PAUL.
Ironic as this wilfully blind, Sturgeonite monetiser has banned people from his blog from uttering things HE finds offensive.
WGD = Warped Greedy Dreghorner
Captain yossarian.
You’re naive if you think she managed all this own her own,
She has advisors, think tanks, news papers and media compliance and parts of high up law and legal teams to protect her, now do you personally think she did this as an isolated individual.
Team work on all levels, and from all angles.
I would say fm and accessories after the fact.
Funny how the world works.
With Alex Salmond, you had a good and kind man who dedicated his life to Scotland’s Independence suddenly facing the most serious and disturbing allegations, which would have seen him rotting jail for the rest of life branded as a sex offender. Then Mark Hirst. Then Craig Murray.
You had the raging monster of the state apparently deaf and indifferent to the man’s innocence, raging that there had to be a criminal trial, the police were turbocharged in their trawl for witnesses, and the media were drooling at the prospect of Alex Salmond’s public humiliation and painful disassembly. Talk about innocent until proven guilty??? What an indelible stain on Scottish Law saved only at the last but the integrity of a Scottish jury.
But now, we are living through the looking glass. The slobbering evil apparition we now see emerging from the fog as it runs rampant isn’t a rabid judicial monster hunting down an innocent man, it’s a different monster. This monster has the black heart and grasping tendrils of a sociopathic criminal racket totally unburdened by guilt, lacking any sense of propriety, and devoid of responsibility. We can hardy draw a breath that isn’t laced with the stench of SNP corruption, or grubby, self-serving malpractice, and yet there hasn’t been a single consequence for any one of the rogues running riot. Nothing as strong as a reprimand or rebuke.
But the times they are a-changing.
It’s felt like a lifetime coming, but I hope the end is in sight for Sturgeon’s crooked and rotten regime. And when the end comes, may Scotland have mercy upon their souls, because a lot of people are going to be very, very angry, and when Scottish Justice finally holds those rogues by the throat, rogues who tried to misuse Scottish justice to fit up and jail innocent people, well, you do the arithmetic. I can’t see there being many demands for leniency.
How does Craig Murray’s trumped up Contempt conviction stand up beside a malicious and deliberate orchestrated conspiracy to literally pervert the course of justice and send multiple innocent people to jail?
Don’t forget, it isn’t just the SNP’s book keeping going under the microscope.
Mark Hirst is suing the COPFS for malicious prosecution, and Alex Salmond is also taking Leslie Evans to Court.
I am with Warren Buffet, he says if I don’t understand where the value is in something I stay away from it.
Bitcoin
………..
A ponzi scheme, where is the value, its purpose seems to be to give the illusion that bitcoins are worth something
The guy that created it did not create a ponzi scheme but that’s what most of it has become, most of it will end in tears eventually for a lot of people, I have no doubt about that.
Warren has always been a very astute man, i first came across him about 40 years ago, I never really got involved in anything in those days to do with investing and finance, and I still don’t bother much to this day as I found it hard to trust all the so called financial gurus apart from people like buffet and his pal.
There are a lot of sharks out there, to be safe is simple
Stay out of the water, you don’t belong there
Most interesting but there appears to be a story breaking about an SNP employee who was reported to Ian McCann ( SNP compliance officer ) for sending unsolicited naked pictures of themselves to an intern.
The sender was then blackmailed into helping nail Alex Salmond and is still drawing a large salary.
Seems that the story has been picked up following the recent complaints and investigation into the missing money. Be most interesting if the naked snaps of the aforesaid senior SNP employee make their way into the Press.
Anyway, Sunday’s press may be telling.
When am I going to be allowed back into the philippines to see all my good friends there, even the yanks are cracking up about the whole silly situation there.
People in america and the philippines are meeting up in Mexico because nobody is being allowed into the country
I give up, the world has gone completely bonkers
When am I going to be allowed back into the philippines to see all my good friends there, even the yanks are cracking up about the whole silly situation
People in america and the philippines are meeting up in Mexico because nobody is being allowed into the country
I give up, the world has gone completely bonkers
Another great post Breeks,
It’s been painful watching good men & women like Alex, Craig Mark & Marion ruthlessly persecuted by this thoroughly evil administration,
When Nicola came to power in 2014 I believed she was a goddess who would lead us to a better fairer and just independent Scotland, I hung on to every word she said and wouldn’t hear a bad word said against her, but the scales have fallen from my eyes, never in my life have I misjudged anyone as badly as I misjudged her.
I don’t know when or how this nightmare will end or how much more damage she will do before the roof finally comes down on her but I feel the tide is turning and the fightback is on and truth and justice will prevail.
It’s so sad she had an opportunity to go down in history as the woman who brought freedom and liberty to Scotland remembered by generations of Scots to come but she discarded that for reasons I will never understand.
History will not be kind to Nicola Sturgeon
Explanation
If you where born in the philippines you cannot by law be kept out of the country, if your married to a filipino you can come and go as you please.
The rules are bad in the UK, but the rules in the philippines are made by idiots who really have no idea about anything
I love the people, I love the country, but the government there are bloody awful, no wonder most people ignore them and just get on with life as best they can
House of Commons- London
………………………..
The late Tony Benn…. Deceased
Dennis Skinner …. Still Active
Scottish Parliament- Edinburgh
………………………..
Alex Salmond …. Watch This Space
So as yet another story breaks revealing the use of the SNP blackmail book to bring Alex Salmond down some of you lot are still clinging to the fantasy that Nicola Sturgeon is an agent of the British state. Get a grip of yourselves.
This is nothing but a bunch of jumped up 2 bit scheme rats fighting in a sack to get power and money. Using every sleazy dirty trick in the book to get what they want and being so blatant about it because they know they’ve got the legal system and the media in their back pocket… and of course that the majority of the New SNP cult (some post on here) are too dense to notice what’s going on or even care.
Also got to laugh at the SNP 1 fanatics like RoS trying to blame Alex Salmond for their decision to vote for the New SNP cult leader Nicola Sturgeon. They voted New SNP because they are members of the Sturgeon cult and now that the campaign to send salmond to jail has failed they now try to blame salmond for Sturgeon being elected as they try to ingratiate themselves to the people who actually give a shit about Scotland.
As for Salmond, from the moment he tried to convince himself that he would still be a force in politics while Nicola Sturgeon was not rotting in jail he was doomed. He was a complete irrelevance in the election and Alba is going to fizzle out to nothing unless he wakes up and faces reality. It’s not too late to take the gloves off and get the job done. His reputation with the man in the street is so below zero it will be impossible for him to ever be relevant until he destroys Sturgeon. The only way to discredit everything she has said about him is to expose her as a corrupt lying criminal because until that happens there are far to many people out there who regard everything she says as the gospel truth.
“some of you lot are still clinging to the fantasy that Nicola Sturgeon is an agent of the British state”
Agent of the British State? That sounds far too glamorous. I think the more appropriate nomenclature here would be “useful idiot with an use by date”. It seems her “use by date” is getting close.
Every single one of her actions over the last 7 years in the matter of the constitutional subject; the way her praetorian guard jump to protect her every time she makes a mess; the ratfucking and whatsapp messages under her leadership from within the SNP HQ and her loyal circle to discredit Mr Salmond, his followers and any genuine challenger to her position of power; her cooperation with the UK civil service and crown agents to bring down Mr Salmond; the way information has been suppressed so this useless leader and the chief executive of the SNP could be protected by elements of the british state to continue in power; the cynical way she tried to get SNP voters to waste their votes to ensure unionist parties retained representation in Holyrood (or to justify the presence of these parties in Holyrood if like me you will not believe the election result until you see an exit poll and proof that the poll boxes were not tampered with); the way the unionist parties start to demonise indyref to give her credibility every time her arse is under fire for not progressing independence (which is now on a day to day basis), tells us Nicola Sturgeon is a useful idiot of the British state.
How long she will remain useful remains to be seen.
Dear Mr Reverend Stuart Campbell. You need to get your arse back here and pronto. The fruits of all that hard labour of yours are about to bring her/them all down.
Mia
You just don’t get it, like many on here you need to see everything through the prism of the battle for independence where everyone is motivated to either support or oppose that proposition. The reality is that some people are motivated by other things.
In Nicola sturgeon’s case she is motivated by power first and money a very close second. She will do whatever it takes to acquire and then hold onto these two things. Independence will only have been considered where it is useful to pull the wool over the eyes of the dumb saps who’ve spent the last few years kneeling in front of her. She is not and never has been an agent or instrument or whatever else you want to claim of the British state. The British state has simply sat idly by and watched this shitshow develop but I suppose like most of us they too will be shocked at what sturgeon has managed to get away with thanks to the corruption in the Scottish political and legal systems.
Shocked.
What you seem to be arguing, a sort of “selfish bastard” theory, is arguably no less damning and equally unlikely to be proved or disproved.
The evidence conclusively points to a regime that is at war with the independence movement. A lot of effort, time, political capital, and money has been invested in that war by this regime.
We can only guess at the motives.
I think, much like the Labour Party with regards to the goal of socialism, there was a decision to move to the centre (or right, which is the same thing when you’re coming from the left), abandoning principle and ideology in favour of electoral and personal success.
That explains the war with independence movement and those within the SNP who opposed the new strategy.
Sturgeon’s career in politics isn’t much to be proud of. All of her policies have failed going back many years. It’s easy to understand why she’d want to avoid going toe-to-toe with the British state in pursuit independence.
The only success she has had by an meaningful measure is in winning elections. It’s agonising to watch her do that by pretending to be pro-indy when we know she’s openly been at war with the independence movement all along, certainly since 2017.
She’s being played like a cheap fiddle, of course, the sort of fiddle the British Government has been playing with for years in other countries. The BBC tells her she is great, makes life easy, as a reward for shafting her own side, and she likes being told she’s great so she’s continues doing it.
The people in the SNP who support this are a bunch of second-raters that would struggle to hold down jobs in the real world, so they go along with it, enjoying the pay, the cars, the pretensions, etc.
Meanwhile, in the background, the country is being fleeced and instead of living happy prosperous lives a large number of people are struggling in torturous poverty.
Does it really matter what motivates her from the perspective of Scotland’s many lost souls?
“The sender was then blackmailed into helping nail Alex Salmond and is still drawing a large salary”. No-one gets bagged within the SNP. In fact, misfeasance often gets you promoted. Education Scotland contains a few such dogs of war.
I think “Shocked” above hits the nail on the head when he says: “what sturgeon has managed to get away with thanks to the corruption in the Scottish political and legal systems”.
The Scottish political and legal systems are supposed to be there to protect the public. I think there are far too many of them, they look after each other’s backs, and they have discarded that principle (and all other principles) long ago.
The Sunday Times should be interesting in the next 2 or 3 weeks.
Police Scotland has sent fifty officers to train police in Colombia, Colombia is a staging post for US interventions against socialism in South America, socialism that’s kept at bay by violence, murders and puppet presidents. It’s a good possibility that Police Scotland officers will train there Colombian counterparts in suppression techniques.
Police Scotland has already sent officers to Northern Ireland to “help out” the PSNI, and I’m pretty sure Police Scotland has also send officers to oppressive dictatorships in the Middle East, to train the officers there in “techniques”. The (SPF) Scottish Police Federation, has said that it will open an office dedicated to sending Scottish police officers abroad to help “train” counterparts in other countries.
It looks like the oldest police force in the world, is now a rentable trainer in crowd suppression for any country.
@David caledonia
RE: Bitcoin
Agreed. However the same could be said for our entire financial system which sends debt and paper down while assets and the fruits of labor get sent up.
@All
RE: right v left
This is now a meaningless dichotomy to me now. Left, right or center doesn’t make a difference if the people in power serve the financial elite or simply serve themselves (which tends to be the same thing).
The real difference for the last century or more is: to what extent does a regime attempt to serve the people they govern, whether the regime has the trappings of democracy or otherwise?
Most of our ‘democratic’ governments have been beholden to international financial interests and the results are clear to see.
Whenever a leader puts their people first in some aspect, such as Chavez in Venezuela or Gaddafi they become the enemy of the banking cartel – regardless of their political brand.
Global communism and global capitalism all serve the same ends.
The true split is nationalist v globalist at this point in time and has been for a while.
As I have said before the nation state is the last means ordinary people have of mobilizing to protect themselves against international finance. That is nations governed around ethnic and cultural heritage for the protection of their populations – such as the Scotland most nationalists would wish.
What we have, and should be quite easily observed now, is an all out attack on the foundations of nation states and especially those states who are obviously opposed to globalist projects such as the trans movement, LGBT, mass immigration (with easily obtainable voting rights) etc.
It is important to recognise where we are. Under normal circumstances I would not be against an LGBT movement. Nor would I be against some hard up foreign family being able to settle and join us as equals in our country. The problem is that all these things are being used against us to destabilise us and make us more easily governed by outside interests.
Mass immigration to the point of demographic change while offering all comers a say in the future of our country is soft warfare. Pure and simple. It is supported by the right and left on the internationalist (global finance) side of things which makes such concepts pretty redundant.
This is nationalist v globalist.
When you lose the ability to choose the future of your nation state you effectively become a people without a home. We as Scots have had this for a long time. The nails of our coffin are being driven in with some force now and the question is if we can look outside of the overly ‘democratic’ and hyper charitable mentality that we are working from now, which is ultimately a con pushed by the people who would have our generous will used against us.
Captain Yossarian @ 9:26 am
“The Scottish political and legal systems are supposed to be there to protect the public.”
Get real. In a colony ‘the native can expect nothing’ from the oppressor – which includes the ‘dominant national party’ and its ‘pampered bourgeois elite’ who are busy ‘feathering their nests’ in their tête-à-tête ‘accommodation with colonialism’ and remain all too ready to use ‘the forces of colonialism’ against the people and independence movement.
Here the colonizer uses all means to hold back liberation of the people including: ‘incapacitation of the (independence) leaders and periodic destruction of those who…manage to come forward; by corruption or police oppression, aborting all popular movements and causing their brutal and rapid destruction.’ (Albert Memmi)
@Alf Baird – In Scotland, our Holyrood parliamentarians and lawyers exist in order to oppress the public. That’s what I find too and so on that we are agreed.
One last thing Alf…a few months ago Andrew Neil likened Scotland to a banana republic without the bananas because of our current disdain for internationally accepted legal process and our comedy of the criminally incompetents at Holyrood and Victoria Quay. He was condemned by many on these pages for saying that but he was right, wasn’t he?
@Shocked
Given that a powerful independence movement in Scotland would be by definition a national security threat to the British state (not in terms of violence but in economic and political terms) then the intelligence services of the Britain would be failing at their principle role if they did not try to have as much leverage as possible over Scottish independence parties, movements, blogs, news and forums etc.
If I was the British prime minister and I realised that the intelligence services had not put significant resources into gaining leverage over such organisations I would want the heads of the intelligence services sacked.
Alf @10.20am.
I couldn’t have summed it better myself, on our current position, well said.
Hautey and Joe
There you go again, everything has to be looked at through the prism of independence. I bet one of the first things you think about when you wake is independence and during the day when you encounter various situations or read see or hear something it is always considered through the prism of independence.
Nicola sturgeon is not like that. Nicola sturgeon is in my view a narcissistic psychopath who’s entire life revolves around the obtaining and consolidation of power. She does not think like normal people, the only thing she thinks about is who she can use or exploit next. She has never had a genuine friend her entire life and any empathy she displayed is merely her acting to obtain what she wants. I have never seen anyone who can lie as shamelessly as sturgeon and I believe it is her psychopathic qualities that led Salmond to believe she was a good deputy for him. Unfortunately for Salmond she was using and manipulating him the entire time and when he was no longer useful and potentially even a threat to her grip on power she turned on him and directed the mechanisms of government to destroy him.
This whole saga has nothing to do with independence, it is about a narcissistic psychopath acting in more and more extreme ways as she tests and finds the limits of her power. I have no doubt that sturgeon would have no qualms committing a murder to get what she wanted if she thought she’d get away with it, indeed trying to send Salmond to jail was akin to an attempted murder. Time and again she has demonstrated that she is absolutely heartless only to turn on the fake empathy for political gain. It is at the stage with sturgeon now that every time she opens her mouth she is lying. In a normally functioning country she would have been in jail long ago, but when the legal system is as corrupted as ours and the media so in thrall to the party leader as the Scottish media is she gets away with it.
@Shocked
I am aware of the problems that narcissistic psychopaths pose to our civilisation. We have an entire cabal of them in the major financial and political centers and throughout the corporate world. In fact one of the problems we have is squaring ordinary people and their empathic understandings of the world versus the aims and designs of people who are alien to empathy, remorse or a sense of shame.
However – what I have said is absolutely true.
The idea that British intelligence would not be all over Scottish Independence is ludicrous in the extreme. It would have begun decades ago and they would have made sure to have close ties with as many outstanding figures as possible.
The jackpot would be owning a number of people at the top level, especially the leader. Especially if those people had personality disorders to exploit.
Secondary goals would be to own or have large influence in sources of news and opinions to shape public perception.
Influential people who do not follow along could be character assassinated.
That is not to assume they have been absolutely successful but to pretend that it would not be an absolute goal of any British intelligence agency is naive in the extreme.
Square this with the actions of many so called Scottish Nationalists, politicians, news outlets and opinion writers and a picture starts to emerge.
If the British army announced its intention to ‘combat disinformation online’ about Covid what do you think the security services motivation regarding maintaining the existence of the UK as a single state along with all the resources the northern part still has to offer?
J.O.E.
The idea that British intelligence would not be all over Scottish Independence is ludicrous in the extreme. It would have begun decades ago and they would have made sure to have close ties with as many outstanding figures as possible.
——————————–,
Agree 100%. British intelligence plays the long game. They always have. Decades ahead. That’s why they are so good.
Captain Yossarian @ 10:42 am
“One last thing Alf…a few months ago Andrew Neil likened Scotland to a banana republic”
The UK is the banana republic within which its devolved ‘Department Scotland’ (aye managed by Whitehall’s finest) merely functions as a second layer of colonialism, and with Holyrood’s dominant national party administration having made its own ‘accommodation with colonialism’, thus halting a more rapid movement and momentum towards independence and national liberation.
Joe
The thing with all of that is that you are in effect excusing sturgeon by claiming that a bad English man made her do it with zero evidence to prove that hypothesis.
Whereas in support of my theory we all know that before Nicola Sturgeon even got into politics she was a lying psychopath who was completely unfit for office. People who knew of her at university attest to her psychopathic tendencies. As for her short legal career, that ended when she resigned to avoid being struck off for letting down and lying to a victim of domestic violence. She has been lying about her disastrous legal career ever since and if the people in the SNP who supposedly vetted her as a future MSP had actually done their jobs she would never have been inflicted on us.
As an aside to this, you may be aware that it was apparently threats by the daily record to reveal the disastrous end to her legal career that led to the Salmond investigation being leaked illegally to them as a bribe to keep the lid on it. The whole thing stinks and it seems that a close friendship that was formed on a jolly to the USA has become very useful.
‘The thing with all of that is that you are in effect excusing sturgeon by claiming that a bad English man made her do it with zero evidence to prove that hypothesis.’
No. Im talking probabilities and motivations. Im not entirely stating one thing or the other.
You are correct that she is obviously not mentally in the same category as your average person but this is something I have been talking about when it was totally unacceptable to do so.
But that IS exactly the kind of person who intelligence services get a handle on.
As for the ‘big bad English man’ part – my take on things is nuanced and informed. If you want to read my take on it at that level of simplicity then its your own understanding that is at fault.
Sturgeon is onboard with every stated globalist goal there is and is fans of every other globalist owned leader out there. This has been obvious for a long time now. Whether it is British intelligence or other groups – her loyalties are not to nationalism or the Scottish people.
If she weren’t dancing to the tune of one of the active powers she would have been replaced by now. She is protected and secured and its not by her own evil genius, because she has none.
Another great initiative to be focused on, pissing away yet more time and money during a “global pandemic”, and now with “Brexit” bonus food and alcoholic drink shortages on supermarket shelves.
So does anybody really give a flying fuck about taking the “Pronoun Pledge”…
link to archive.is
Just 1 last thing to point out –
How easily could Nicola Sturgeon and her entire government be brought down if it was in the interests of the powers that be to do so?
They could do it in a single day at this point.
They wont, and indeed they work to protect them, because the SNP serve the powers that be.
“Agree 100%. British intelligence plays the long game. They always have. Decades ahead. That’s why they are so good.”
This did make me laugh.
Joe
The bad English man point is because I think you and many others seem unable to accept that sturgeon is as downright evil and twisted as she is. You need to believe that someone has a hold over her because to face the truth would mean that you would have to accept that she has played all of you and that you were all such poor judges of character that you deified her until the mask started to slip. You can’t accept that the wee Scottish lassie from a scheme in dreghorn has managed to con an entire political movement without her being cajoled blackmailed and assisted by the British secret services.
The reason sturgeon has risen to the top of the SNP is because with a few exceptions such as Salmond the entire SNP hierarchy was and is comprised of imbeciles. Sturgeon surrounds herself with these idiots because she knows none of them will ever be a threat to her, of course there is also extensive use of the SNP blackmail book containing juicy secrets about people such as the dribbling imbecile and pervert Mackay or rear admiral Robertson.
As for your comments about her love of globalism, she doesn’t. It is just her being a good psychopath and displaying the qualities she thinks will get her to the top table of the UN or wherever else she fantasises of going after she bores of Scotland. The same goes for her love of woke politics and transgender rights, it’s just a means to obtain an online army of devoted trolls to do her bidding. The instant these people are no longer useful they will be dropped and if globalism is no longer fashionable with the elites she will change to the new poltical obsession.
I suppose the inability of many to work sturgeon out also explains her rise. Who would have thought the wee lassie with the bad haircut and even worse fashion sense who bobs her heid up and down like a wee woodpecker would turn out to be the worst thing that’s ever happened to Scottish politics. I suppose it’s like that line in the usual suspects, “the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was to convince the world he didn’t exist”.
Of course when she obtained power, the bad haircut was replaced with the £300 do, the expensive make up was clarted on and the bad clothes were replaced with £3000 suits and £750 shoes and the image consultants did their beat to cultivate the image of the “world leader” Nicola Sturgeon. “The careful and astute lawyer”. “Oor ain Jacinda Ardern”…. And thousands went to the Hydro and give homage to the new cult leader…. Give me strength, it’s enough to make you vomit.
‘The bad English man point is because I think you and many others seem unable to accept that sturgeon is as downright evil and twisted as she is. You need to believe that someone has a hold over her because to face the truth would mean that you would have to accept that she has played all of you and that you were all such poor judges of character that you deified her until the mask started to slip. You can’t accept that the wee Scottish lassie from a scheme in dreghorn has managed to con an entire political movement without her being cajoled blackmailed and assisted by the British secret services.’
Ok I am not going further with this argument. You and I agree she is a nasty and probably psychopathic piece of work.
However stop with this patronising crap. I have never, ever supported her while she was in power and I was the first that I could see to start loudly ringing the alarm bells years ago – on this blog and in other places to the condemnation of absolutely everyone.
I have been right about her and i have been right about where we would be now. 100%. I even said that she doesn’t need to look out for retribution anytime soon because ‘something’ would happen to make resistance difficult. Long before you had anything to say about the matter.
I was talking about psychopaths being useful to establishment goals and how it is difficult to get ordinary people to look at the awful truth of how evil many of their beloved leaders are.
The fact that you are so resistant to the fact that British intelligence would wish to manage a separatist movement as much as possible tells me it is you, and not I, who are simplistic in their thinking.
I can balance both the likelihood of Sturgeon being free of empathy and shame along with the realities of how state security apparatuses work and what their priorities are.
If Sturgeon was just a lone psycho and not under the protection (control) of someone she would not be backed up my the media and have only tepid challenges to her policies.
Joe @1.01pm.
Joe in my opinion it would be fair to say that the British security services have stuff on Sturgeon, we got a glimpse of this when it was banded about about Sturgeon fighting with her French girlfriend at a Scottish hotel.
There was an entire media blackout of the incident, and we know the UK MSM is a compliant British state propaganda machine.
Joe
I’m afraid your thinking is simplistic. You need to see outside influences that have brought us here as you cannot accept this sorry situation is 100% a Scottish homegrown disaster. Alex Salmond spent years trying to create a new Scottish establishment to rig the system in his favour and obtain independence. Control was obtained of the legal system, academia, charities, media and any other branch of Scotland that would be useful to him. Unfortunately he didn’t think about the consequences of this course of action if power was obtained by a dangerous psychopath like Nicola Sturgeon. Alex Salmond himself is on record of saying this.
Nicola Sturgeon walked into the perfect situation, a country where democracy was under threat and where the media and legal system were already compliant and willing to do whatever she wanted and by Christ has she taken advantage of it. Until people wake up nothing is going to change her and all her henchmen and women need long prison sentences and the entire political set up in Scotland needs to be changed with powers fully separated and new governnance at Holyrood where the ruling party is held to account an cannot merely do as sturgeon has done and ignore the will of parliament.
RoS
It’s called a super injunction.
I see Stu has already cited this already
link to wikispooks.com
But it worth actually reproducing it:
“David Leask is a journalist who has been openly working with the Integrity Initiative.[1] In 2019 he was chief reporter for The Herald. He was introduced to the group[2] by “former BBC Monitoring colleague of Chris Hernon”.[3] Craig Murray termed him a “Russophobe nutter”.[4]”
In 1986 David Leask went to the University of Glasgow to study Philosophy and Slavonic Languages.
Career
In the 1990s Leask worked as a Russian translator.”
It is worth decoding this. Those of us who hung around Glasgow University from prior to Leask’s time, until longer than was good for us, understand that there were really only two types of folk who had that kind of academic profile:
1. Marxist True Believers (until the great Berlin Fall)
and
2. Mad Fucker Right Wing Spook Wannabees wanting to do their bit for Queen, country and the American way.
I’m sure we can all guess which category the “Russophobe nutter” falls into.
Sadly, he’s had to settle for the (lack of) Integrity Initiatve and peddling pish in a former newspaper
“you need to see everything through the prism of the battle for independence”
Oh, come on shocked, stop being ridiculous.
What is the biggest current threat to the British state, to the success of brexit and the avoidance of EU transparency laws by the VIP taxdodgers? What is the biggest threat to the free salary for all those political rejects undemocratically parachuted out of the way and into the the graveyard of UK politics, aka the HoLs? What is the biggest threat to the monarchy’s power in Scotland and to the economic survival of England?
Scotland’s independence.
Since 2014, and I suspect since the minute Mr Salmond became the FM of Scotland, EVERYTHING has been about a desperate, urgent need to stop Scotland’s independence. Only if you are incredibly short-sighted or deliberately attempting others to watch the other way, you can say otherwise.
I have mentioned here several times that I do not believe for even a second the May election result. After we saw the frantic cooperation of police, COPFS, Civil service, Lord Advocate, Sturgeon and her immediate members of staff, elements of the SNP executive, a crown agent, press, the Fabiani Farce etc to destroy Mr Salmond’s reputation, to suppress information that should see some of those elements in prison and to stop him launching another party, you have to be very, very naive to think the british state was going to allow this man to force progress for independence by entering Holyrood. It is clear as day that England is currently at is weakest possible point and that is why they are throwing at us the kitchen sink with plumbing and all to stop independence.
The fraud on her own would not be able to get away with rigging the election, nor would have been able to suppress all that information without serious help.
I am convinced the result of the election was already decided the minute Mr Salmond walked away an innocent man from the criminal court threatening this political fraud. In my opinion, the “vote SNP 1 and 2” mantra was just the excuse to justify the result we were fed, not to provoke the result.
“where everyone is motivated to either support or oppose that proposition”
Look at Holyrood for the last 7 years. look at the political parties of the UK: EVERYONE is motivated to either oppose or pretend their support that proposition and have been doing so for over 7 years. The only political party that actually supports that proposition today is ALBA, which incidentally has been blocked access to Holyrood.
“The reality is that some people are motivated by other things”
Sure, but the current motivation of what controls the strings of the political parties in Scotland and England is the threat of its independence. If Scotland ends the union, the economic disaster for England will be such that Tories, labour and libdems will not survive as political parties either.
“In Nicola sturgeon’s case she is motivated by power first and money a very close second”
I doubt it very much. If she was motivated for power she would have already become the leader of Labour and would try to be become PM. If she was motivated for money she would have chosen another profession that pays better. In my opinion what is motivating this woman is the frustration of Scotland’s independence and the adrenaline rush of fooling us all for so long. Clearly the woman has more political affinity to New Labour than to the original SNP – you have to be blind to not see it. It is clear as day that for the last 6 years she has been eviscerating the SNP to transform it into New labour with the help of her praetorian guard.
“She will do whatever it takes to acquire and then hold onto these two things”
No. She will do whatever it takes to continue stopping independence because that, and handing over to England Scotland’s powers and assets, is her remit. If she fails to stop independence, she is finished politically.
“She is not and never has been an agent or instrument or whatever else you want to claim of the British state”
Bllcks. As I said above in my comment, EVERY FCKNG MOVE this political fraud has made since she took over the leadership of the party points in the exact opposite direction to the one you are so desperate to send us to. As I said in my comment, in light of the evidence, the only thing you can plausibly deny is the asertion that she is not an useful idiot of the British state.
Any way, why are you so desperate to separate the British state from this when evidently, the one that stands to gain from derailing Scottish independence is precisely the British state?
“The British state has simply sat idly”
More bllcks. The ex-spook crown agent had had his finger in all the pies. The UK civil servants in Scotland were up to their eyebrows in the dirt of that unlawful complaints procedure and responsible for the 500,000 pounds wasted in the civil case. There was one of those civil servants that was pressing the police to tell her that the Sgov could report Mr Salmond to the police without the consent of the complainers.
Furthermore, it is because England MPs deliberately refused to separate the powers as they are separated in England that this situation was allowed to happen. In other words, Westminster left deliberately the COPFS door open to use it and gerrymander our government to stop independence. If it didn’t, it would have closed it immediately as soon as Mr David Davis mentioned the problem, months ago, in Holyrood. Did you see them lifting a finger to close that loophole or they are leaving it open?
If there is something the British state does not do is “to sit iddle”.
@mia
I don’t even know where to go with half of that but what I will say is that ultimately the people to blame for the current situation as those who voted for Nicola Strurgeon. The thing is quite a few of those people don’t know any better so can’t be blamed too much, their culpability is nothing compared to those who knew full well what Nicola sturgeon has been up to and still voted for her. To now seek to blame the British state for their actions is pretty desperate stuff.
@Shocked
The crap that people are going along with is unbelievable. We have a desperately uninformed, uncritical and passive public who seem to believe they can constantly outsource their thinking and everything will work out fine for them.
This lack of responsibility is why the votes have gone the way they have. Totally agree with that. There are always going to be total arseholes out to gain power its the public that, with bovine complacency, put them in power and keep them there. Not only that they shout down detractors who have reservations.
The average uninformed voter is like a millstone around the neck of the rest of us and it is fucking infuriating.
Your resistance to the idea that the British state (and other organisations) has any influence in Scottish politics and Scottish political movements, news, activist organizations and others though takes some working out.
It makes zero sense to conclude that the British state would say ‘oh look. Separatists. Lets leave them alone to their ideas and aspirations which would result in the end of Britain as we know it and a potential loss of most of our remaining energy reserves. No need for any involvement. Lets spend our budget of billions and use our cross-discipline organisation that is already involved in media, politics, political organisations, protest movements, alternate media, blogs and online influencers for anything but that. Also lets not make sure Scottish political sentiment and their major party doesn’t turn favourably to a competitor nation by getting assets in their first – after all that is not what interior intelligence organisations are ever used for’.
lol. Its actually laughably silly.
Joe
I think it mainly comes down to you not wanting to rake responsibility and not wanting to accept that sturgeon could behave the way she has without being coerced by some nasty English person.
Just read a twitter comment by David Leak who says that 99.99 % of Scots don’t read Wings Over Scotland.
And if there are 5.4 million people in Scotland what he is saying only 540 people read Wings.
Well I don’t know where this prize diddy gets his information from but I’d hazard a guess, just a guess mind that Wings gets ever so slightly teensy weensy more readers than 540 folks.
Kind of brings into sharp focus what the Rev is saying about the prick. The guy’s a feckin donkey!
Hi willie.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Rev Stu publishes the recent readership figures in the next couple of weeks, possibly reflecting the fact that he has the same status as me, ie, retired with a part-time job.
excellent stuff! this is what we used to go to wings for, before the anti-snp sideshow dominated…