The lies of others
It’s weird watching the Sunday papers all decrying the media’s handling of Wednesday’s leaked Scottish Government document. Everyone seems to agree that the Cabinet paper wasn’t any kind of smoking gun – the consensus is that John Swinney’s comments were sensible, cautious and largely misrepresented in the press.
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, for example, noted that “Few of the issues presented within the report were in any way revelatory” (though it didn’t stop him from referring to them as “revelations” later in the piece anyway), but then diffidently observed that they “produced a disastrous set of headlines”, as if his own publication hadn’t written any of them, and as if it wasn’t continuing to do so on the very same day Barnes’ piece hit the newsstands.
We’ve already highlighted the Scottish Sun’s view of No-camp scare stories:
“The latest is over a leaked SNP document that’s cue for a doom-laden warning about slashing pensions, cutting defence spending and shedding public sector jobs. Strip away the hysteria and what you actually have is a sensible Government prepared to make sensible decisions about spending. A Government aware they are operating in a tough economic climate where there is no bottomless pit of money. And that’s whether you’re an independent country or part of the UK.“
Yet its News International sister paper The Times was one of the ones blaring “Swinney’s secret report reveals a nation in debt” earlier in the week, as if nations being in debt was something unusual or surprising, or as if Scotland wasn’t already massively in debt as part of the UK.
Even a brilliant piece in today’s Sunday Herald by Iain Macwhirter, containing a stinging attack on “press coverage [which] was over the top, economically illiterate and rather childish” must be read in the context of the Herald being at the forefront of that self-same economic illiteracy.
The Scottish media (and the Scottish elements of the UK media) appears to be suffering something of an identity crisis since the turn of the year. Increasing numbers of commentators, writers and editorial columns – in even the unlikeliest of places – are becoming so sickened by the negativity and dishonesty of the “Better Together” campaign that they’re beginning to recognise they’re on the wrong team.
So far, cognitive dissonance is still just about hanging on to its grip. The growing anger at the sheer insulting crassness of the Unionist lies hasn’t as yet translated into any newspaper declaring itself for the Yes side. At this point everyone is still continuing to attack all the other papers for falling for the clumsy misinformation and deceit, while simultaneously perpetuating it themselves.
But that’s not a delusion that can be sustained forever. With the No camp seemingly set on continuing the same tactics from now until autumn 2014, it can only be a matter of time before an editor somewhere finally cracks and breaks ranks in the current anti-independence uniformity of the Scottish media. And on that day, things will start to get really interesting.
I really hope that this is the beginning of a new era in Scotland’s press. It will be a slow process but I will sleep better knowing that the tsunami of negativity will ease.
It will be very interesting to watch the BBC upholding Bitter Togethers opinion while the press says otherwise.
I am hopeful that last weeks events will be the beggining of the end, the proverbial tipping point so to speak.
OT Look at this wee snippet i thing he should take both of them on!
link to thetimes.co.uk
This wonderful sentence from BBC Scotlandshire (who else) sums up perfectly the confused and floundering MSM and can be applied to any scare story you wish to name….
“The lack of evidence for our assumption only makes it all the more damning for the Yes campaign, as this proves they are secretly going behind our backs to make us appear biased and mendacious, and that’s really not cricket.”
link to bbc.scotlandshire.co.uk
From today’s piece by the “political editor” of the Sunday Mail Mark Aitken
“On Wednesday, it was revealed a secret SNP document had warned that state pensions would be slashed in an independent country”
That is a barefaced lie. The fact is also that Mark Aitken knows that it is a barefeced lie. I will contact the Sundau Mail to ask if they are happy to print lies written by “journalists” in their employ.
Otherwise a good Sunday Herald and a good Sunday Sun with a particularly enouraging column from Aamer Anwar
I remember a few weeks ago someone tweeted to the effect that whatever the result, the day after the referendum there’ll be very few people willing to admit they voted No. The media won’t have that option – their words will be branded on their careers and reputations. I’m sure some of them are beginning to realise that.
If the doom-laden print media, aka ‘parcel o’ rogues’ and their spoken media accomplices think that is bad news, just wait until they read the NO campaign’s view of Scotland’s future.
@The Man in the Jar
Once the print media facade begins to crumble there will be no hiding place for Auntie Scotia.
O/T Just thought I’d put in a plug for The Lib Dem Voters for Indy facebook page. A fair amount of intelligent discussion & writing : link to facebook.com
Here’s hoping, Rev.
It’s thanks to sites like yours though, that have helped to remove the fog of lies. I keep telling people to come here. I’m guessing even a few Unionists editors (such as Iain MacWhirter and Ian Bell) are coming here for info also.
As you say, someone is going to crack sooner or later, and I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if old Rupert Murdoch begins to tell his Chief Editors to start telling the truth. What a game changer that would be! Should this happen, I think we can safely say that the Yes percentages will climb dramatically. All Alex has to do is hold his nerve, tell the truth, and make sure that no SNP MSP does or say anything silly!!
I get the feeling that was BT’s atomic bomb to extinguish the Independence threat. The blanket coverage on MSM and television would testify to this. That’s it, they’ve held on to this ‘leaked’ document for ages and now they had to use it because they don’t have anything else. You can see now why they wanted a quick referendum as this spun dossier would have been the peak of the Unionist attack machine on any notion of Independence. They had to use it now because the document was already a year old and rapidly ageing as a weapon against the SNP. All they have now is to keep opposing everything from the Scottish Government because that is the nature of the beast they have created since the last Scottish elections.
What we should see in the coming months is a ramping up of the YES campaign leading to the White Paper publication in November. Alistair Darling and BT will then be seen as failing as London Labour (ie Dougie Alexander) start a full on rhetoric of Devo Plus and a federalist UK jam tomorrow-fest and the MSM will only be to happy to have their jelly and ice cream in that direction even though the Unionistas are moving in ever-decreasing circles. It’s the only way it can go, but they still have to campaign for NO to push for jam tomorrow, and that will be coming from a political party campaigning from a position of not being in power to make any decisions on behalf of the Scottish electorate!
O/T Welcome back Rev ‘ I have been pulling what little hair I have left out all morning as I have not managed to get my daily fix of w.o.s . Every time I have tried to get on it has came up error ‘ I take it the gremlins have been playing up this morning .
@Rev –
‘…it can only be a matter of time before an editor somewhere finally cracks and breaks ranks in the current anti-independence uniformity of the Scottish media.’
This is crying out for a sweepstake. I don’t know enough of the riders, but anyone in the loop have any tips?
Do you not think that SG should call in the European group whose job it is to ensure
fair play in referendums such as this. Surely, there is a mass of evidence that they could view. It makes sense to me, I do not see why others are not agreeing that it should be done. It would give a bit more hope to those of who are totally fed up with our portion of daily bile which is the Unionist Conspiracy. Go to it SG.
Come on Stu what are your views?
I’m banking on the Sun first, followed by the Record in an attempt to keep pace. The Herald I suspect is stuck with the Gardham approach lightened by Bell and Macwhirter. The Scotsman may not even be in existence come the day and the London based dailys and broadsheets to continue spewing the Westminster line.
Plausible?
To see oursels as others see us!
Silverytay
Is it “Not Found Error 404” by any chance? I’m getting that off and on as well
To paraphrase John Stewart – these people think their shit don’t stink. They spent all of last week gloating and cheering on their assertion that if Scotland gained anything, then it was handout and an entitlement from the rest of the UK. Their “smoking gun” more or less endorsed the view of Ruth davidson that we were a country of scroungers and layabouts, living off the fruits of other peoples labour. And how quick they were to jump on that bandwagon, from our Hermoine to Alan Trench – the practically revelled in the learned helplessness and incompetence of the Scottish people.
Now, someone has pointed out to them, just what a steaming turd their argument was. And like a massive internet troll, they’ll just walk away from it and find something else to attack us with. Its a willfully blind, cognitive dissonance powered by sheer belligerent imbecility. They affirm this belief in the helplessness of the Scottish people that they will ultimately lose credibility. With each scare story that fails, with each exlcusive abandoned, they’ll dig deeper & deeper into a hole they won’t be able to climb out of.
When they reset the campaign later this year (imho this is going to be increasingly on the agenda) – it will no doubt involve the inserting of a paper clip into the hole in the back of Bettertogethers collective brain – and then we’ll see all regurgitated once again. Einstein said that Insanity is repeating the same mistakes and expecting a different result. Hanlons razor says that we should never ascribe to malice that which can be explained as stupidity – but I think we should always remember that the stupid can bear malice.
Apologies… iPad doesn’t allow editing of first post of day….. The link is
link to newsnetscotland.com
Now I’m posting too quick, gotta slow down!
Dave McEwan/Silvertay,
I have had no problems at all. I use Firefox. Maybe worth a try
I think the big player here is the internet and social media. With so many sources of information and the chance to counter accepted editorial the titles are finding it hard to simply spout without challenge. Basically the internet is keeping them in check. Literally people power.
Where there’s a will, there’s a way.
I would advise the SG to hold off making any complaints to the EU etc at this stage. We’re beginning to see fractions within the Bitter and Twisted campaign and these disparities within the ranks will be reflected in the variant stances that will be adopted by their respective MSM supporters in due course. Give them enough rope and they’ll undoubtedly hang themselves.
We, Joe Public, can however make complaints, particularly as we have to pay a mandatory licence fee to watch any televised news broadcast, even if we choose against watching BBC in Scotland. I’ve got my complaint registered; I’ll post any response.
D.M.H Yes it was .
Macart I think it was you who suggested we post any good news on facebook etc ‘ that is what I now do along with any story I can find highlighting media bias .
This does not make me very popular with certain members of my family but hay ho Scotland’s needs come first and always .
@David McCann
It was a server issue, not browser related. The error message would have been either “404 Page not found” or “503 Guru meditation” depending on ISP. I’m still getting 404 from the reply/comment links in the emails.
Trying to access the site I’ve had Fatal Error, GURU MEDITATION XID: <some really big number> all day up until now. That was trying Firefox and Crome. Googled the really big number to see if it was a known error code. Nope.
Cognitive dissonance presents no difficulties whatever for the MSM. Private Eye documents it tirelessly in every issue. I don’t see the Herald changing – I think they took a decision a few years ago to hunt with the hounds but do a little cautious running with the hare, so you get a New Labour pamphlet on Page One and some vaguely balancing input from McWhirter and Bell inside, though both sound as if they’re choking on it.
The Scotsman is in the Macbeth predicament: “in blood Stepp’d in so far, that, should I wade no more, Returning were as tedious as go o’er” – so it’ll go down with all guns blazing, nothing to lose. The BBC is owned and operated by the British State and will continue to do its duty to god, queen and country. No change there either, unless pressure can be brought via OSCE/ODIHR as suggested by Craig Murray.
The tabloids are harder to call. Which one would you want? The Mail has some history of representing both sides of an argument. From their general social attitudes one presumes that this is not from any moral consideration, more just to broaden their reader appeal. For example, they give more space than most to concerns that Megrahi was framed and Dr David Kelly was murdered. They’d be my outsider tip.
I’d want The Sun but wouldn’t trust them not to do an about-turn the week before. As for the Mail or the Rectum, there’s more chance of me being kidnapped by aliens and forced into an inter-galactic breeding programme with Little Mix.
The thing is with a lot of the media its driven by sheer hatred of the SNP.The independence arguments have long been won but their hatred of the SNP is embedded.
If the SNP came out for the union I’m sure the Labour party and their media representatives would come out for independence.(and I apologise to those in the Labour party who do support independence)
@Silverytay
Yup, works wonders on most threads. On Mr Carrell’ article on climate change and oil I spent a chunk of time just posting links to the SGs renewable initiatives, green credentials and successful schemes. They print the scare story, we lead people to concrete proof of the counter. No circular argument required, just the facts.
The MSM nuclear button (i.e. the “secret document”) was pushed in panic. With the favourable Scottish GERS report, coming hot on the heals of the loss of UK AAA credit rating, it was not a great week for the union. The constitutional wind has changed direction and they know it. BT are terrified that the Yes campaign will gain traction and Scottish opinion will start to shift in favour of a yes vote in 2014. If the proportion intending to vote yes reaches a consistent 40% by the end of 2013, it is all over for the union. It really is.
The good thing about their journalistic deception is that they’ve opened up the debate regarding oil revenues. They have asked for updated figures which John Swinney will be delighted to provide using Independent projections from e.g. UK Govt Oil and Gas and OECD etc.
Huge faux-pax on their part.
It will be interesting to see what BT try to pull out of the bag when the 2014 GERS comes out. And I look forward to seeing yet more comedy “Top Secret” stamps waved about on Newsnicht.
“They have asked for updated figures which John Swinney will be delighted to provide using Independent projections from e.g. UK Govt Oil and Gas and OECD etc.”
And which will be reported nowhere.
I don’t think the MSM will change position on independence. A week before will not make much difference after years of unionism. However, the blatant pro union press, as Mr McWhirter states (in today’s Sunday Herald) ie all the media are unionists means that people know it’s biased automatically thus if you want the true picture you need to search for it on the internet. This works in the Yes camp favour, as undecided people need to use pro indy blogs and sites to get the full picture.
After the Yes vote, it will be harder to believe in the MSM thus their decline will be quicker.
Given that this site specialises in media monitoring etc, I’m wondering if any regulars are familiar with the American HBO series ‘The Wire’.
I watched the five series last year – ’twas was meant to be research and I wasn’t over-keen, but ended-up completely hooked.
The fifth series (2008), entitled ‘Read Between the Lines’, concentrates on one of Baltimore’s major newspapers. Here’s part of the blurb from the back of the boxed-set:
“In a city that can no longer even recognize its problems, much less begin to solve them, police detectives attempt to bring in one last, worthy case against a violent crew of narcotics traffickers. And when bureaucratic poverty and infighting threatens that case, one detective will risk everything, creating a fraud that will eventually entangle the city’s newspaper, which is weakened by declines in circulation and advertising. With journalism itself so vulnerable and desperate, an unscrupulous, ambitious reporter will ride the story wherever it goes – or wherever he wants it to go.’
The writers of ‘The Wire’ went to extreme lengths to ensure authenticity – with that in mind, series Five may be an effective way of getting people who don’t frequent sites like this to wake-up to the reality of what can and does happen before any ‘news’ stories appear. I’m not sure if there are any UK equivalents – David Peace’s ‘Red Ridings’ quartet was adapted for telly-films, but they ran out of money, only made three, and the result was even more confusing than the books. ‘The Wire’ is, by comparison, fairly straightforward.
Just a thought. If nothing else, ‘The Wire’ is brilliant thought-provoking entertainment. If you haven’t seen it, check out the Amazon reviews – there are hundreds, and it scores as close to a perfect 5 as you’ll find for anything. Some believe it’s the greatest television series ever made. The books it’s based on (The Corner and Homicide) are epic, and you can get paperback versions on Amazon for washers. Authors – David Simon and Ed Burns.
O/T but possibly of interest to folk in Ayrshire.
BBC Radio 4’s Any Questions (the radio equivalent of question time) is coming from Ayr on Friday.Don’t know if tickets are still available but could be worth checking.
Would be interesting to see if they would accept a question on media biasbin the run up to the referendum!
@Boorach-
I’m within striking distance of Ayr, but I won’t go. Maybe it’s a sign of how cynical some of us have become, but I won’t even apply for a ticket because there’s no way they would accept any question I might want to ask. I’ll certainly tune-in though, and thanks for the heads-up.
(SSP had a strong branch in Ayr before the Dmitry Noshame calamity – perhaps some of them will manage to get in and ruffle some feathers…but, sadly, I doubt it.)
Any idea who they’ve lined-up to appear?
@ Boorach
Sorry Boorach, but I do not realistically think there is a hope in hell of that ever happening. This is an existential battle not only for the future of Scotland, but for the survival of the British state as well. I can not really see them giving us any of their toys to play with, even for a second. Can you?
The young woman who “stuck it” to the UKIP the other week on QT was fine, as she was not having a dig against the state. Instead, her target was another threat to the state, i.e. UKIP. Their threat is to the comfortable equilibrium that our false left-right political paradigm has produced. Whitehall doesn’t want the all-party consensus on austerity to be undermine, in any way. So Whitehall instructs the BBC, and we get a citizen hero who makes a stand against the nasty “extremist” politicians.
In the modern world, brand integrity is king. The British state is one of the world’s longest running brands. This needs to be remembered when viewing any MSM source, especially the BBC.
Vote Yes in 2014
When I attended the Yes campaign’s inaugural meeting in Oban, on being questioned about the unrelenting bias of the MSM press, Blair Jenkins said that he had regular contact with the press and he reckoned that at least one of the print MSM would come out in support of a ‘Yes’ vote, although, obviously, he wasn’t able to be time specific. My money would be on the Sun to be the first to ‘break ranks’.
@CameronB-
The longer this nonsense goes on, and the more obvious it becomes exactly what the role of the BBC is in this ‘debate’, doesn’t it become ever-more likely that someone, at some point, will manage to raise at least one question – via the BBC – about blatant media bias?
Having said that, I now confidently offer 100-1 that the following is mentioned on ‘Any Questions’:
link to newsnetscotland.com
I was reading comments on the Herald website (Salmond asks Cameron to apologise) and came across a stunningly offensive comment from who I believe is Terry Kelly – Labour Councillor from Renfrewshire. The thread is as follows;
Kevin Kelly, Ireland
Jumped up regional politician tells leader of his country to apologise? I don’t think so.
James Munro, Glasgow
Was Ireland a region, a country or a nation prior to independence? You’re a disgrace. Shame.
Terry Kelly, Renfrewshire
James Munro – “Was Ireland a region, a country or a nation prior to independence?”
Ireland was and still is according to some, under military occupation and at the time they were at war with the British occupier. When was the last time the Scots. did any fighting James?
I missed out my comments as they are not really relevant. Is it just me or should an elected official, if indeed it is councillor Terry Kelly, be sanctioned for saying stuff like that. He is always making pretty stupid comments but this is worse – is it worth following up?
My money is on the Sunday Herald to be the first to break ranks. If they do I hope a lot of us will regularly buy the print-edition (as I did today for the first time for a year) as I think we should actively & financially support any editor trying to go against the tide and their peers – plus the pressure of daily phone calls from Labour bruisers!
@ ianbrotherhood
I rarely listen to “Off the Ball”, or whatever it is called on Radio Scotland, but that is probably your best bet for an awkward question. Unscripted (?), somewhat chaotic and with guests who future do not dependent on towing any media lines. It would have to be a belter of a question though to have any impact, as I doubt it would be allowed to be developed.
CameronB
The young lady on QT was a Labour worker of one kind or another She tweeted that she had spent time that afternoon with ?twigg the Labour panellist Her tweet was later removed but not before it had been picked up
@ mato21
What a surprise.
@ Ian
Digby Jones, Jo Swinson, Joan McAlpine and James Forsyth
That’s an excellent article! Thanks for link.
@ Cameron
The battle is getting through the door. Once in how passive you are is a personal choice and any attempt to publicise the bias is to be applauded.
@ Boorach
I can not wait until the White Paper defines the battleground. We should all have a lot of ammunition by then, and it will be a pleasure to go on the offensive for a change. Of course I mean this in the non-violent political sense. I am just struggling to come up with more suitable metaphors, for what is an existential struggle.
Vote Yes in 2014
@ Cameron
Enough of the big words they mean no more or less than their more common equivimpress but only smack of pretentiousness.
@ Ian
I particularly like the question posed in the penultimate (sorry last but one) paragraph of that article
CameronB
link to politicalscrapbook.net
Further to my earlier post here is the link
Apologies; equivimpress = equivelants
Bloody ipad
Listening to the tennis A.Murray the Scot lost the first set won the 2nd and is leading in the 3rd so he is again a Brit
@ Boorach
Why have a dig at me? I do not see how anyone could consider the word “existential” as pretentious, if that is the “big” word you have a problem with. How else would you phrase what I was saying? That was rhetorical (sorry, asked off myself), as it would be pointless to disrupt the thread with meaningless disagreements over style.
@CameronB-
‘Off the Ball’ has been going for a long time, maybe fifteen-years or more. When it started it was ground-breaking in the sense that it had Cowan (who has always stoutly defended his right to speak in his ‘natural’ accent/dialect) as a co-host i.e. virtually a ‘presenter’. I don’t remember ever hearing anyone with a ‘real’ accent like that on radio previously, apart from Andy Cameron when he was on Clyde back in the 70’s.
When Billy Connolly came back home on a rare visit, many years ago, he made some remark about being astonished that he was hearing ‘real’, ordinary Scottish voices on radio, and I remember thinking that he was probably alluding to Cowan. It’s important to remember that Connolly, even way-back, when he was doing ‘The Crucifixion’ etc, wasn’t using an authentic accent – he was mindful of making himself understood to a larger audience, so always used a Glasgow ‘telephone-voice’ not far removed from the way he speaks even now. If he hadn’t done so he would never have made it onto ‘Parkinson’ etc.
Cowan doesn’t do that, and never has – that’s likely why Connolly picked-up on it and found it remarkable. But that’s not to say that Cowan, Cosgrove, or anyone else who gets a gig in BBC Scotland isn’t acutely aware of the tacit red-lines. (Cosgrove has openly admitted – and more power to him for doing so – that he has approx a dozen different ‘voices’ he can deploy depending on what media he happens to be using.)
In the coming months it’ll be increasingly difficult for those who purport to be on the vanguard of progressing so-called ‘ordinary’ voices in this country not to acknowledge the enormity of what’s happening.
@Steve McKay at 9.44pm
What an absolute disgrace. It doesn’t matter if it is “Councillor” Terry Kelly or not, that is incitement to racial violence.
Dan Simmie at 2:41pm said:
‘ The thing is a lot of the media its driven by sheer hatred of the SNP. The independence arguments have long been won but their hatred of the SNP is embedded.
If the SNP came out for the union I’m sure the Labour party and their media representatives would come out for independence(and I apologise to those in the Labour party who do support independence). ‘
Yes, the basic No Better Together argument from the self serving Unitarist politicians and media – including the BBC – is that independence is unnecessary because devolution gives Scotland and the Scots the best of both worlds through the ‘all in it together greater sharing of risks and rewards’ – the false finnesse of who unjustly is rewarded at we, all the people’s risk.
Given the total failure of the UK’s political economy since WW Part 1, it’s an astonishing claim, especially now when mired in the compounding interest of inexoraby rising debt – until the deficit is much reduced – by their cack-handed failure to forestall the present depression in all but name. Its all so other worldly, one wonders what planet their drugged with power on.
Their excuse: it wasnae us, who wasnae there, who didnae see it coming frae somewhere else amounts solely to an incompetence which is culpable if they knew what they were doing, and negligent if they did not know what they should be doing despite our voting for them. Guess whose fault they will say that is in not knowing the difference? It’ll be someting along the lines of our getting the politicians and governance we deserve. Gorgious to him George’s coice of buyer beware choice of two cheeks from the same arse and not a fanny between them in Hailsham’s warning of elective dictatorship based on ‘strong government’ however weak-minded.
Collectively, they hate the SNP for showing them up to be a bunch of self-serving elitist numpties. And that rattling the cage of their cosy stutus quo is all the fault of the SNP’s in general and AS along with as many others in particular – who have exposed their bare-arsed residue of empire to exploit at home – that they smear with their lies and doom laden propoganda in attempting to discredit and deflect the whole independence movement, their simplest ploy being to accuse their avowed enemy of the their British state with their own crimes – a feature of their own adversarial political system’s ritual right of passage to power that masks the revolving door of their duopoly getting its retaliation in first to maintain the sole and their symbiotic purpose of the UK state to remain in being – a task they feel duty bound to do and will stop at nothing to succeed in accomplishing at any cost but their own. (Overlong sentences in memory of Bernard Levin.)
It’s a sheepish in wolves clothing herd mentality retreating in the face of declining party membership and voting the registered have long since walked away from. No single party of UK government has been voted in by more than 25% of the total electorate since the make hay while the sunshine’s dark day’s of the 50’s struggle for who should rule to whose ends wherein most of us were bypassed.
This is a travesty of majoritarian rule hugely leveraged via FPTP safe seats to the advantage of what is in reality fractional, factional minority interests rewarding their paymasters and real powers that be of patronage and priviledge via cash back for voteRus, but now without coffers bar our own and our chlidren’ children.
And they will keep hammering away in public, however ridiculous they look in the short term, precisely because the top-down British political system is incapable of giving up power unless cornered to give way to – having saved face and thus survival in putting up their best fight, no matter wheir private belief.
And they will continue in doing so in the signalled full and certain knowledge that they can claim victory in defeat by saving the Union.
But it’s not this one. It’s the confederal Union of our British Isles, which for the geographically challenged includes Ireland. NB this is not a new state – as a federal UK might once have been – but states transformed in and by an intergovernmental BU like the EU, but sans all the trappings of a commission in favour of a simple secratariat which is already in being.
The key part of the Belfast and now Edinburgh Agreements is that their aim and outcomes are based on the totality of relationships that exist between we, all the people of all our islands.
Unitarists be dammed: it’s the independenistas and/or unionists by voting Yes who will bring about the only outcome that accommodates most people’s preferences being being part of our greater whole.
That’s why I’m voting Yes for Independence and Union: the former based on our personal and plural sovereingty, the latter on a confederal association of optimal autonomy all round.
That’s the end game within our reaching out. When it’s put into play is the real question. Care to put a percentage intending to vote Yes on it provided we don’t beggar our neighbours?
Bottom line in our quest for freedom is that we will be free to do what we will when we share that responsibility equally with everyone who is like minded in being inclusive, not least the middle who would otherwise be exclude by the UK’s jealous government of the day deity.
(I part wrote this before attending to my English friends arriving to bide with us for a couple of nights, and to save time in cutting, spell-checking and then re-pasting after reading germane comments since 2:41pm. Please accept my apologies in not doing so beforehand in case I’m repeating already covered ground on grounds i think worthy of ramping repitition of a principled deal-making negotiating that is not about beggaring anyone’s neighbour.)
@Indion-
You mention George Galloway. His position is noteworthy:
link to heraldscotland.com
ianbrotherhood at 12:00 am
Yes, read already. Even hypocrites can get somerthings right!
Apologies, I ran out of editing time.
(Note to self: be less long-winded to avoid running out of breath.)
“Some believe [The Wire is] the greatest television series ever made.”
Everyone else doesn’t know what they’re talking about. The Wire will never, ever be bettered. Absolutely phenomenal programme. If you haven’t watched it yet, do.
Indion ,there is a clip on youtube where Gerry Hassan touches on a similar point to one of yours,in the fact that, it is a disgrace that our politicians/parties are voted in by so few (paraphrasing here). He was talking in a Westminster/lack of democracy/social justice/equality context.
This is to me an extremely important point ,which I think cannot be emphasised enough,and for practical reasons will be vital to get a YES,
Now, people may for 101 reasons not want to vote and that is their right BUT the importance of getting people to register so they can vote is going to be so essential
.Secondly and possibly more basic than that is,if we really want change in Scotland, if we really want the people to matter and the people to feel they matter then all of us who comment on this site and others sites need to try and somehow get 40/50/60/70 % of people engaged so we can actually aim for the kind of Scotland ,we all in our own different ways want to live in.
I think that is one of the reasons better together and Labour in particular via our media are so rattled because as history has shown , we’re a wee bit contrary,a wee bit unpredictable and if fired up enough may just cause a force 9 gale right through the establishment.
51% would suit me but would’nt it be great if all the people who don’t vote,have never voted, never felt their vote mattered, really felt they had a stake in their future?
The entire phoney argument has been rigged by Westminster.
This is not about Scotland’s ‘Right to self determination’ which is unassailable and a straw man in this case.
This is about Westminster’s improbable survival when Scotland’s massive resources are placed beyond its reach. Then, Westminster must survive without having unfettered access to Scottish wealth and resources and must then live within its own means.
If they cannot do this, Scotland will be blamed, naturally.
As was succinctly said: ‘Those days are over’
Anyone who claims the Wire is the greatest TV show of all time has clearly never seen ‘The High Life’.