The news that isn’t fit to print
I’ve known my mate Chris since I was five years old and we lived next door to each other in a council scheme in Bathgate. He’s a grand lad, the sort of Rangers fan that you can introduce in polite company, a hardworking, small-c-conservative successful business owner who’d go out of his way to help you and has a few SNP councillors in his social circle.
He isn’t the least bit political. In 2014 he was a soft No whose vote was narrowly tipped by the fact that his company did almost all of its business with English clients and he feared losing them to red tape (and, ironically, English nationalist sentiment) after indy, but after the Brexit referendum he was leaning very much more Yes.
The SNP’s staggeringly incompetent rule since then blew that chance and has pushed him further back into the No camp than he ever had been before, but last night he texted me “can’t believe this actually went to print and came through our door today”.
I can’t say I blame him.
It’s the front page of an eight-page newspaper-style leaflet. Here’s the rest.
(Click pics to enlarge, or download from here.)
Let’s count the ways in which it’s so utterly awful.
We inescapably have to start with that jaw-droppingly atrocious front page. Even I recoiled from its hyper-aggressive shouty-caps-and-stamped-stencil messaging, and I loathe almost everything the Tories stand for.
We can’t begin to imagine the colossal towering idiocy of anyone who needs to have it explained to them that “LET’S MAKE OUR COUNTRY INDEPENDENT SO THAT WE CAN ERADICATE [any group of law-abiding people] FOREVER!” is the most astonishingly obviously dreadful way to persuade anyone to your cause.
I mean, what precisely is it you’re offering people there? Are you going to OUTLAW the Conservative Party in an independent Scotland? Are you going to ban ANY right-wing party from existing and contesting elections? No? Well then they might win one at some point – name us a country anywhere on Earth that’s never had a right-of-centre government – so even on the utilitarian level your promise is manifestly a lie, even before you get into whether it would be a desirable outcome or not.
Secondly, who are the people you need to win over to build Yes support? Well, they’re Unionists, duh. People who currently vote Tory, Labour or Lib Dem. As recently as six years ago, 29% of Scots voted for the Conservatives. That means that at a bare minimum, roughly 60% of the Unionist vote does, has, or might be prepared to vote Tory, and you’ve just told them that they’re intolerable scum.
Good luck getting them to read the next seven pages of your pamphlet, lads.
But really, good luck getting anyone at all to read it. It’s large, unwieldy and extremely densely packed with text. Speaking as someone with a background in magazine publishing, it’s a horrible mess. And back in the 1990s as a rookie hack writing for Amiga Power and Your Sinclair and Sega Zone I’d have been hauled over the coals forwards and backwards by my editor for garbage like this:
Wait, what? These are quotes, are they? All these people said the exact same thing, did they? And… what, exactly, is why they changed their minds? These blobs are just dropped at random across the pages with no discernible connection to any other parts. Are we supposed to assume that they’ve been persuaded by the contents of the leaflet? But it can’t be that, because they’re IN the leaflet.
There’s no QR code or link where we can go to hear the stories of these mysterious people, verify that they were ever No voters, be told what supposedly persuaded them to Yes, or get some skincare tips from “64”-year-old “Neil” from Edinburgh. Whoever wrote this drivel is aiming it at an audience of gullible cretins who they expect to just dumbly swallow anything they’re told without question.
Oh, right.
And if anyone’s still ploughing past the front-page hostility and crappy layout to read the words rather than lining the budgie’s cage with it, perhaps hoping for some answers to their questions about independence, they’re on to plums.
All they’re actually going to get is the same vague, woolly waffle the SNP has been punting at them since 2015, full of empty hand-waving promises with no detail.
Oh, can it? Great! No need to say more! I’m sold!
But maybe it’s for the best that they avoid detail, because when it even comes within periscope distance of anything specific it all goes a bit wobbly.
How long will it take to get back into the EU? Throughout the paper it treats re-accession as something that’ll happen automatically and instantly. Nor is there a single word about how EU membership, free movement with the non-EU UK, and using the UK pound can all be reconciled. All these issues are resolvable but only with a lot of work that the SNP simply hasn’t put in since the Brexit vote.
(And perhaps more to the point, it hasn’t remotely generated the confidence in its ability to do so were it ever required. This is a government of ham-fisted dunderheads that can’t even conduct a census or a deposit return scheme or build a boat or know what sex a rapist is.)
By now alert readers will have spotted that the whole thing is predicated on the assumption that we need to get back into the EU, because Brexit was a terrible idea.
And it certainly was, but WHO IS YOUR AUDIENCE? You’ve already driven off the 60% of Unionists who are actual or potential Tory voters, so from the front page alone you were immediately down to around 20% of Scots.
Now you’ve also alienated the roughly 35% of Labour ones who voted Leave, all the UKIP/Brexit Party ones and a chunk of Lib Dems, leaving you with maybe 10% of the electorate who are willing to even consider reading your godawful “newspaper”, long before we start contemplating how useless the content of it is.
If – and this is a heroically optimistic assumption – you somehow managed to convince half of them with this apple-pie arsewash, you’ve still barely got support to 50%, and the SNP keeps telling us we need 60% and beyond to have any hope of anything.
We don’t know how many copies of this atrocity the SNP has spent money on, but every penny of it was a waste, and the party doesn’t have cash to chuck away these days. We’re just lucky that not many people in Scotland have open fires in their homes any more, because it’s where this would be going and that’d knacker their Net Zero goals as well.
Does that not go against the SNP’S own Bullying and Harassment Policy!?
I don’t like the front page image. Motherhood without the apple pie.
I find it very weird and I’m a TERFy mum. Imagine being an involuntarily childless woman (not a small number), recovering from an abortion, miscarriage or child death; bi-racial; most men; trans; a student; or over 50!
Also, what’s with that hand supporting the baby??
I wonder if it cost, er, £600,000.
“Chris” thought red tape in EU Scot/EU rUK would be a hassle but in a Brexited UK/EU Scot he’d consider moving across? puleaase. if the former was enough to frighten the horses, i can’t see this person being persuaded, albeit may make a few heartening grumbles.
Tying indy to EU membership is the strongest card we can play, loads of soft Nos want their kids, themselves to have EU rights. You can’t persuade the unpersuadable, dying cohort. need to nail the colours to the strongest mast. Even if the ship is assunder, the life rope is the EU.
rubbish leaflet though.
Surely you aren’t saying that Murray Foote isn’t a very good newspaperman, Rev?
He is clearly slaving away in his new role as Chief Executive, using his expertise from newspaper world to help us all [apart from Tories, obviously] achieve a bright new future.
SNP members’ money well spent…
The only response to this booklet is mega lolz ?
I read it and no obvious mention of the SNP.
Who is this from, what do they want. Are the SNP do ashamed of themselves they hide their identity.
Casting the Tories as the Bogeyman is such a short term. thin, cheap political strategy of the Sturgeon era.
In the absence of any SNP strategy on Independence – it proved a useful tool for herding SNP supporters & voters to a common cause ‘Kick out the Tories!’.
A call to arms!
But what next? It sows greater division and mistrust- fatally undermining the ability to build a broader coalition for independence.
Toxic legacy of Sturgeon has set the cause of independence back 20 years.
And if I see that multi-coloured Yes logo once more I will scream.
The SNP cannot seem to grasp that if we retake our independence, they will not be needed.
Their sole raison d’etre was, and is, to bring about a return to independence. It did not come into being to generate support for its domestic political programme, for its administrative skill or managerial competence in any sector of Scottish life.
It has not only signally failed to adequately perform in any of these areas but almost all functions and responsibilities are in a worse state than when they were run from the Scottish Office. No one would vote for them, surely, in an independent Scotland given their performance over the last few decades?
Not only that but they have not an iota of a clue as to how an independent country might be run. Currency, defence, international relations, overseas trade, imports/exports, borders and immigration management…
Worse than their managerial incompetence, their bizarre and unChristian introductions, new restrictions on freedom, and financial profligacy, is their utter failure to take us one step closer to independence.
I would expect, and hope, that in a new Scotland there will be Conservative (non-Unionist) Labour, Liberals and all the wee minor parties that comprise a normal political landscape.
When under pressure, create a bogeyman to focus the minds of your supporters.
This country will never be free unless we bring the uncertain into the fold rather than demonise everybody as the enemy.
Isn’t this Nicola’s version of the Wee Blue Book that The National was going to distribute which was promoted at the same time Alba were creating their version?
@Stoker since you appear to be back, see link to wingsoverscotland.com about getting a complete archive of Wings posts.
Two points:
An independent Scotland, as has been typed, will need at least one right-of-centre party for balance. If that be ‘tartan tories’, so be it.
The SNP is too fixated on EU membership. I see it as a mistake to tie it to any independence campaign. I was pro-EU but am now pro-EFTA, having seen what the EU has done in recent years. How many Yessers are put off by the SNP’s EU stance?
Independence must be achieved first, then referendums on –
retention of the monarchy or elected “Protector” as head of state,
EU or EFTA membership or none.
Membership of NATO.
Neutrality.
No doubt other subjects for referendums will arise as time goes by.
Our current pro-indy parties really have to start pushing the EFTA possibility as a serious option that has many of the benefits of the EU without the drawbacks.
Remember folks this is still about politics, not how much hatred the SNP have generated in BTL commenters.
Having seen that neither Tories nor Labour are courting the large pro-EU majority that now exists, like a hypothermic Leo DiCaprio, the SNP see some possibility of surviving the Sturgtanic disaster (“they said she was unsinkable…”) by clinging to the makeshift raft of EU accession. Maybe they think the EU can rescue them from their own incompetence…
So the promised Summer of Independence turned into the Believe in Scotland pro-EU march, accompanied by threats…sorry, I meant to say calls for unity in the independence movement, and because the SNP can still demand MSM coverage, the march manages to ‘breaks through’ the brain fog of the average huddled Scot for a few days.
What next thinks Murray Foote?
Yer dumb average Scot, who by now thinks Kelly Given is a minister of something or other, might just about remember the march, so they’ll really, really enjoy an eight-page paper (that can also be used for the litter trays of many of your household pets) aimed squarely at those who will see the front page and then throw it away but they might just remember the mother ‘n’ cutebaby…aaawwwwwwww…zzzzz…
Generate some media chatter, keep the EU raft narrative afloat, see how other parties react, then back to counting ‘whatever’ may be in those brown paper parcels that we never saw at any time officer…
“The SNP cannot seem to grasp that if we retake our independence, they will not be needed.”
I think they grasp that all too well.
I have an open fire? How many copies can I get plus I can compost the rest ?
“puleaase. if the former was enough to frighten the horses, i can’t see this person being persuaded, albeit may make a few heartening grumbles”
I mean, do feel free to tell me you know my friend of the last 50 years better than I do.
PhilM @ 13:09pm;
Perhaps, but is there enough strength of feeling re the EU for that to succeed?
I noticed David Halliday on X the other day (I think) cautioning against a strategy of trying to increase support amongst “not that bothereds” for independence. What he was saying that is that there was no point getting 60% of people to say they would vote Yes if they weren’t that interested and would accept being told they weren’t even allowed to vote on it.
His view was that the SNP had to do an awful lot more to make them bothered about it before any success was going to follow.
Similar here: you might have a lot of people who nominally would like to rejoin the EU but are they that bothered that they are going to raise more than a slight grumble if told they aren’t being given a choice? Is there a chance they COULD be inspired to care more? If so, is the SNP doing enough to inspire here, either? If not, are people going to care about it enough to vote for them on that basis….?
Oh dear, so folk like me who believe independence for Scotland doesn’t mean subservience in the EU don’t fit in to the desired target group then.
Looks like any thoughts of the EFTA or similar trade agreement(s) have already been dismissed out of hand by the SNP. Not sure how much of a vote winner that is.
Funny thing is they are spiking their own guns.
P45’s are in the post.
The message of getting back to the eu and a scottish pound are there but not so you would notice and without explanation.
If they stuck a red rose on it I would have thought it produced by labour in the 1970s.
Funny that
No to Yes.
Not very subtle.
Good dissection of this SNP regurgitated carrot dangling rhetoric, how many times have we read and witnessed a SNP MP/MSP spew this shite out over the last decade, without no further action being taken, too many is the answer.
That propaganda filled tract, has one purpose, and that is to fool unsuspecting Scots who still think the SNP is a party for Scottish independence, into voting for the party at elections, a bonus for the lying SNP would be, if the same folk donated cash to them as well.
This party of lying deceitful grifters and careerists, needs to be shown the door at every election.
Speaking of election according to radio news photographic ID must now be shown at polling stations or you don’t get to vote, this applies to the up and coming Rutherglen/Hamilton by-election.
I foresee many people in Scotland ending up disenfranchised because of this, mainly poorer folk who might not have photographic ID. This foul technique is already used in the USA, and millions of poor Americans have been disenfranchised for years because of it.
As with all Indy literature we have seen in the last 20 years it is big on bluster light (or non existent in detail).It’s Groundhog Day from the Yes camp. To enact change people will need to be convinced to shift position fro No to Yes , not the other way round . What we have seen since 2014 has been anything but convincing for anyone who may have been a soft No. Your spot on rev this is just more antagonising pish
I didn’t get one and I can see Bathgate from my lounge window.
?
The last thing I read today was Robin McAlpine’s “Reconciliation: 2”, it was like the setup to the Rev’s punchline here.
I didn’t laugh though.
Sigh. Where to start? If the current buffoons running the show really aren’t as thick as they appear. If there’s actually a hidden agenda to finish off the SNP? If this is the case, all I can say is they are doing a bloody good job.
KEEP USING THE £ STERLING i.e. the ENGLISH CURRENCY with BofE fiscal controls, a rather queer idea of independence.
The SNP has had long enough to get a Scottish currency sorted which may initially be peg that to whatever currency of choice.
link to economicsobservatory.com
Ireland was far «poorer» at the time of independence than Scotland is now but the Irish took the risk and opted for independence.
Independence makes important choices possible, all the rest is rainbow blarney and Unionist scare mongering.
get some skincare tips from “64”-year-old “Neil” from Edinburgh
Never mind about skincare!
Is he wearing a rug? Can every Scot (who needs one) get one in the promised iScotland?
It’s all very well knocking that leaflet, but there’s a lot of slapheads out there (I hear) who may be persuadable to turn that No to Yes after a wee look at “64”-year-old “Neil”.
And for most “Neil”s, there will probably be a significant other, who may well want a makeover, courtesy of iScotland, for their very own “Neil”.
In the rush to post his article, Rev Stu may have overlooked a demographic for whom that leaflet strongly resonates.
Scotland free, or a dessert.
@Shug says:13 September, 2023 at 1:47 pm
If they stuck a red rose on it
Good point.
Maybes stick a red nose on it instead.
Selling independence on the basis that it will make you rich/er has all the banality of conventional British politics.
Independence has more existential weight than fabulous material prosperity in a wonderland of niceness.
A brick wall might have more comprehension of its significance.
Scotland free or a dessert (sic)…would that be an Eton Mess?
Of course it makes no sense to alienate a huge swathe of the electorate while sounding like some mentalist calling for political ethnic cleansing.
Unless you wish to erode the support for YES. Then it makes perfect sense.
This is just the same as adopting all the highly divisive and contentious gender garbage and all the other woke crap. The aim is to destroy the commonality of the SNP banner that Salmond so carefully nurtured. So that people at different ends of the political spectrum felt comfortable uniting under it to achieve the goal of independence.
By turning the SNP into a woke marxist shithole of course people right of centre and just plain centre are not going to support it anymore, it is opening calling for their permanent eradiation FFS. So they would be mad to support it in its goal, like turkeys voting for Christmas.
And of course the woke cretins characterize anyone right of centre as n@zis. So this also has some real sinister undertones. If these wankers could get away with sending folk to camps they would be doing it. They are well capable of it these little creeps.
And who came up with that nauseating colour scheme for the big YES on the front page. It is juvenile and dated. The whole thing is vacuous. Did they not think that the phrase ‘No to YES’ sounds like your campaigning against YES not for it. Fucking amateur hour but entirely in line with quality of people at SNP HQ. Could not run a bath…
Is this the finale of the phantom “Summer of Indy”?
RepublicofScotland @ 14.20
I just applied for, and got, my Voter Authority Certificate, no problem, Red. So, they are obtainable for any of us poorer pensioners (or others) without a DL or Passport.
It’s only for national (Westminster) elections meantime, so it remains to be seen if it’s ever introduced for LA or Scottish ones.
The first thing that caught my eye was the harlequin YES logo probably copied from the Volkswagen Harlequin.
Harlequin is just a posh word for clown.
Volkwagen created a clown car and the SNP have copied it and created a clown logo. 🙂
link to tinyurl.com
Volkswagen was having some fun when it came up with the Harlequin. The name and the paint scheme are likely derived from the comedic, clownlike character from bygone days, who wore a colorful costume and liked to play tricks on people.
At that time you could actually buy a peppermill to match your clown car,
OOPS, for some reason (old guy’s moment) I’ve managed to misname both RepublicofScotland and Red in my last post.
Apologies to both.
If you take the starting point as being the need to fail rather than succeed, then it makes perfect sense.
Maybe there isn’t really any actual “independence movement”. Maybe there’s just a lot of people who’d like it, but have no motivation to do anything about getting it – apart from waiting for instructions on what pointless activity to participate in next.
Beauvais says:
13 September, 2023 at 3:01 pm
Is this the finale of the phantom “Summer of Indy”?
Is that Nicola up in the rafters wearing her wee tartan mask?
THE PHANTOM OF THE MOTORHOME IS HERE
I’ll simplify it for the SNP, Yessers, No’s, Remainers, Leavers, tories, unionists, monarchists, republicans, EU Nationals, jihadists, communists, tourists, WI, not interested’s, men who like to pretend they’re women and any other category there is.
Independence first. All else second.
That simple. I’d also suggest as a future strategy to get there: Two referendums. Bear with me.
First referendum asks:
Should a country run its own affairs?
If (when) Yes wins, we move on to the second referendum. Note, anyone voting No in the first referendum doesnt get to vote in the second one as they explicitly state they don’t think they should get a say in things. Sharpen a few minds.
Second referendum asks:
Is Scotland a country?
If (when) Yes wins, job done. Takes the emotional politicking out of it and boils it down to simple common sense.
If somehow we’re still “too stupid” to vote for self determination, referendum 3 would ask:
Should Scotland give away all its tax revenue and political power to England?
Just keep beating on the door of the misguided, duped, misled No voters until they are forced to make sense.
You’re welcome!!!
For those that don’t do X/Twitter but like to read what’s going on in it, Nitter is available, however a few clone Nittersites have been created, by well lets just say they’ve been created to deter you, they always return the message No Items Found.
Here is a link to the genuine Nitter search page, save it and use it to inform yourselves.
link to nitter.net
Oh and here’s the Rev’s Nitter page.
link to nitter.net
Sven says:
13 September, 2023 at 3:09 pm
OOPS, for some reason (old guy’s moment) I’ve managed to misname both RepublicofScotland and Red in my last post.
Apologies to both.
No apology is necessary. I usually get mistaken for Marti Pellow.
“YER A JUNKIE, MARTI PELLOW!”
Which is very hurtful because it’s only half true.
Stay Wet,
Red xxx
@TURABDIN says:13 September, 2023 at 2:55 pm
Selling independence on the basis that it will make you rich/er has all the banality of conventional British politics
You write this kind of thing often, but I don’t agree you are right. If you are right, decades of “it’s Scotland’s oil”, “we subsidise England” and “we’re self-sufficient in renewables” have been and will continue to be a complete waste of time.
I think that at the very least, you should be prepared to accept there is a solid tranche of Scottish voters who will support Yes if they truly believe they will be better off.
There may indeed be a small minority for whom it’s the principle of Indy that counts, but they need that solid tranche of pragmatists with them.
To paraphrase: Wha’s gonna vote Yes tae poverty? Damn few, and they’re a’ eejits.
The section about the EU, and not needing a passport to get into our country after Independence sounds bonkers.
There is no such common travel area legislation between Scotland and England. It does not exist.
The common travel area between the EU Republic of Ireland and Brexit Northern Ireland was in place before the existence of the EU.
Oh I see they’ve used the harlequin aka clown colour scheme through the brochure.
I wondered about the orange text.
Got anything to do with carrots?
Not too sure about the word essential.
link to tinyurl.com
Waitrose shoppers will associate independence with products from the budget range. The products they only buy to donate to food banks.
Tesco & Sainsburys call them ‘basics’.
I’m still at the top of the front page and I’m getting a bit bored I think I’ll focus on what the paper from the brochure can be used for.
Be warned some of my suggestions could be upsetting for those suffering from trigonophobia and could also be transphobic.
“…an audience of gullible cretins who they expect to just dumbly swallow anything they’re told without question.”
That will be anyone voting Yes without there being any detail or credible policies for how an iScotland could sustain itself economically, socially, in an inter-connected world that’s full of risk, and opportunity, no idea about trade balances, a central bank, currency, national debt, whether to be fully independent, or whether to give up most sovereignty to the EU with only 1% of the voting power in Brussels…
Nobody has ever credibly addressed those elephants, and it’s quite a small room that Scottish politicians occupy.
We’ll have a border.
With armed guards, gun patrols and passport checks.
I don’t want any terrorists getting in. I don’t want open borders and open jails like England.
From Grouse Beater’s Nitter page.
“Sturgeon has set up a company to handle income from her personal earnings. It comes out of a lucrative deal with Pan MacMillan for her memoirs. Using a modest Fife accountancy firm, she registered “Nicola Sturgeon Ltd” at Companies House. She is sole director”
link to nitter.net
Meanwhile that little BritNat shite McCoist owns up as to why he was miffed.
“Co-host Alan Brazil then posed the question of whether Super Ally was singing God Save the King on the gantry. And he replied: “Actually I was. Because I am British, you got a problem with that?””
link to footballscotland.co.uk
It’s so bad I thought it was from years ago. The only interesting part is the ‘SNP 3 Jacksons Entry’. Is that code for an independent Scotland getting a Eurovision entry fronted by Pete Wishart?
Why would there be any other political parties in an independent Scotland? The Tory Party would lose interest, Labour has only ever seen it as a means to an end and the LibDems and other are, frankly, irrelevant.
Scotland would stop being a democracy.
Why England can’t afford to let Scotland go.
I believe in Soft Noes just like I believe in coincidences; they must exist, just never seen one. I don’t think they are a big number, nor do they matter.
I think there is going to be a clear out and it will all get nastier, polarised. The nationalists will realise – this is decolonisation, anti-imperialism, anti-globalism, anti-wokism and class war – and the enemy are the UK, deep state, new scots, c0lonials, plus the entirety of our own middle class, including the fake-nats who would be our leaders, but move slower than frozen molasses. It’s not about “making the case for indy” in the public forum but defeating a determined enemy who will cheat and stop at nothing. The new nationalists will read more widely.
Politically, centre-left economics and socially conservative (i.e. liberal by the standards of 2000) should be the norm. Prepare to get called “fascists” even if the communist party calls sex “biological reality” and gender “ideological construct”.
Most people are squeezed economically right now, they are keeping their heads down, hoping for some respite; the penny has to drop that things are only going to get worse and there is no place for them in this new society – middle class, new scots, s3ttl3rs, anglos and trannies are what matter. Aye, there’ll be new oil wells and wind power and drones digging up the sea bed and fancy big houses being built in the scenic bits – but its not for the likes of -you-, native Scots; do you think being born here, along with your parents and grandparents, working here all your life entitles you to something?
– when people have nothing to lose, that is when they act : they don’t give a shit anymore. Kids are also a redline – meek, law abiding people turn into wolves if you touch their kids.
Patrick Harvie getting called a deviant in the street might be the start of it; look how he shat himself and ran for the hatecrime shield.
– it’s a shame we had imposed on us this concocted system which makes people with almost no supporters, “ungetridofable”; I would like to see FPTP, but on much smaller constituencies, more MSPs I know, but none of this list weirdness.
I had hoped the SNP would dissolve like the wicked witch in Oz, Alba to pick up the mantle, but they seem to be under an “omerta”.
Speaking out about the puberty blockers madness gets you expunged.
“Can BBC Verify or the @bbcpress verify or deny that singer Roisin Murphy has been cancelled by the BBC after criticising puberty blockers?
Five hours of Ms Murphy’s songs, interviews and highlights of her concerts were put together for a programme called the 6 Music Artist Collection. This now appears to have been pulled.
Also reports that old radio programmes she was in have been removed from BBC Sounds. True?
Meanwhile Ms Murphy is making abject apologies for her apostasy in questioning puberty blockers. She will quickly find out that no matter how grovelling the apology, the extremists she has offended can never be assuaged.”
@Frazerio
“If (when) Yes wins, we move on to the second referendum. Note, anyone voting No in the first referendum doesnt get to vote in the second one as they explicitly state they don’t think they should get a say in things. Sharpen a few minds.”
This is like the BTL posts in the Guardian and Herald saying that there should be a publicly available list of everyone who voted for Brexit or No.
Ah memory lane, anyone remember these two brave young patriots (I think they were sisters.) in Freedom Square (aka George Sq.) on the night of the 18th of September 2014, later they were man handled and had our national flag ripped out of their hands even though they put up a brave fight to cling to it
I’ll never forget that night for as long as I live.
🙂
No. That’s the name on the 100’s of boxes of files that the the police took from SNP HQ.
Operation Branchform SNP 3 Jacksons Entry
link to youtube.com
Not satisfied with wrecking our country and costing the tax payer millions it now appears that so much as poking fun at them will soon be a criminal offence. link to bbc.co.uk
Now we know what the horsebox is used for, its SNP printing HQ.
Clock is ticking on the next GE.
SNP is going to have to cope with (IMHO) a 60% drop in short money which will bankrupt them almost immediately. Murrells company/association/whatever that he set up in the 00’s to handle SNP business is going to get struck off.
Hard to see where you go from there given the local branches have already been “tapped” and hence nobody sane is going to put any of their money into a “New SNP”.
Still they manage to find money for drivel like this. For a by-election the SNP triggered themselves lets remember.
Who actually is funding the SNP because there’s no longer a majority of people in the membership who want independence….
Its end days for the SNP and given Alba haven’t registered much increase in support then its end days for independence as where are people going to go?
I’d assume the first thing a unionist Holyrood/Westminster would do would be to impose a supermajority on any future independence vote – like 80%. Both parliaments pass the acts, supreme court says its legal and that’s game over (without violence) for the next 100 years. No external body/country is going to get involved in terms of legalities.
In terms of a country close to us (Spain) its worth noting that the Basques got most of what they wanted in autonomy while the Catalans got much less.
Even closer is NI where external pressure after Brexit forced a loss of sovereignty on the UK.
Draw your own conclusions about what works, pretty depressing but as Mao Zedong said “power grows out of a barrel of a gun”. This isn’t advocating violence in any way, merely pointing out that states only negotiate loss of/reduction of sovereignty under “stress”, whether external or internal.
SNP members have a lot to answer for in the years to come.
I may be naïve, but I see this bullshit as a sop to the woke and extreme left who hold much of the power in the disgraced SNP.
As a conservative who is in favour of the independence of all nations who wish it, I feel my social and economic views are vindicated after wading my way through stuff which is only fit to be hung in the shithouse, before the days of “Andrex” or, god help us, “Izal”.
The EU is not long for this world, as the policy’s which were at its inception are seen to be counter productive and war looms. We would be well advised to steer well clear before our children and grandchildren are offered up on this altar of wokery and perversion. How could we ever be free in such a union? how can we believe that it won’t be worse than we have at present with our Iffy devolution?
Our interference in Middle Eastern and North African countries and the removal of the dictators who kept some sort of order was the biggest political mistake in my lifetime, supported by a certain Mr Blair and with the honourable exception of Mr Galloway
The past few years have shown us that all nominal Nationalists are not good or even intelligent people.
Be very careful who you vote for and always try to define their motivation.
Seems well designed to do the job intended.
Keep the Indy vote at 50/50 – a disaster for the SNP if support for Indy grows.
Secondly to bolster SNP support – look we are doing our job.
Why would the SNP feature a woman with a baby on the front page and not a man with a baby?
Are they being transphobic?
On page 2 the paper chain family consists of a man a woman, a boy and a girl.
Are they being homophobic? Why not 2 women or two men with their children?
Any ideas why they might do this?
This has the disingenuous fingerprints of Angus Robertson all over it. The latest con-trick: to pretend that independence = automatic admission to the EU, whilst having an open border with England, and the use of the £ Sterling. Three in a row for a bonus!
It’s a desperate attempt to dangle the Euro-Carrot before the weary donkeys to get them still voting for the SNP.
Judging by past performance, it will probably work. The Ginger biscuit brigade will love it.
What about their Misogyny Bill is that all a big con to get voters to believe they care about women?
On the other hand, this could be the first product of Sturgeon’s newly announced “Artistic Creation Company”
President Xiden.
Scotland is fast heading towards becoming a totalitarian country, satirically poking at politicians has been a mainstay for centuries.
Frankly nobody believes a word that the rainbow SNP publish.
They together with their Westminster chums voted to take us out of Europe. They squandered mandate after mandate. They focussed on unwanted, divisive and hugely disruptive trans polices, they are quite frankly a crock of shit. And if I may add utterly totalitarian too. This is a party that would stick the legal knife into you and too disembowel and disfigure a political opponent.
The sooner they are gone the better. And not just gone. Ones like Sturgeon should be in jail.
With Murray Foote in charge, things will only get worse.
Humza Yousaf named by Time as one of its one hundred emerging leaders (of covert ethnic tribal warfare.)
link to archive.ph
Ruby, Don’t mention men and babies in SNP company.
Ruby says:
13 September, 2023 at 5:39 pm
Why would the SNP feature a woman with a baby on the front page and not a man with a baby?
How do you know that baby isn’t trans?
I see that Frank Kitson is still alive.
Maybe it’s one of his low intensity operations.
@Anton Decadent says:13 September, 2023 at 5:58 pm
Thanks for the link. Here’s some wee quotes:
credited with “shaping the future and defining the next generation of leadership”
Uh oh, looks like the next generation of leadership is defined by being catapulted into place via flawed and fraudulent processes, whilst those involved resign in disgrace and the polis investigate.
first Muslim leader of a Western democracy
No concerns whatsoever by the great and the good that NO valid Western democratic process was involved in Yousaf’s elevation. Just box-ticking.
I guess democracy ain’t what it used to be.
We’ve been right royally screwed, and now they’ve come to rub our noses in it.
#NotMyFM
Are you avoiding my question Red?
Why not!
@Red says:13 September, 2023 at 6:44 pm
I understand how there is a sleekit expectation by the SNP reality-deniers that readers will see a mother with her baby.
But that same SNP will insist with the full rigour of the law that the adult pictured could be a biological male, but still be entitled to be called a woman.
And, as the word “mother” is deemed to be offensive and biased, the adult may, if related to the baby, have to be the involved “birthing person”.
TBQH, I wouldn’t worry about the baby. In the SNP’s Scotland, in 2023, babies will usually be the most sensible people in any room, right up to the age at which they can be indoctrinated to parrot shite.
I am not sure I agree with all this analysis. I mean, some parts are quite crass, and slogany, but then. elections are won and lost on slogans, whether we like it or not. Most folk do not analyse policy detail – this explains why people make the utter folly of voting green because they care about the environment, only to find their number 1 priority is gender ideology.
As regards the EU, well, yes, it is all overly simplistic, but then NOBODY can firmly say ‘this is how and what will happen’. Matters so complex and liable to change as they progress, so it is genuinely difficult to say, here is a final accurate blueprint of exactly the timescale and what will be done. That just is NOT possible. No political party could do it.
I think waiting around forever, until somebody decides here, this is EXACTLY how things will turn out with the currency, the EU, trade or whatever, is just silly. All that can be stated with absolute certainty, is INTENT. We INTEND using the pound (or whatever), we INTEND returning to the EU, etc.. I just want freaking independence, whether we use the Euro, US dollar or English pound.
Where I do agree entirely with this analysis, is the simple fact that for over eight years, under Sturgeon, NO preparation has been done on analysing the options for all of these intents. The preparatory work should already be done, but that does not mean campaigning cannot start.
Most folk want back in the EU, and very simply stating that would happen, is enough for most folk. Of course, we do not know how long it might take, but the EU itself has indicated they would expedite matters. At least with independence, we would be heading back in, which is miles better than where we are now.
As regards the leaflet overall, it states the case, it makes aspects easy to digest, and helps push independence. It’s a start. Back in 2014, some literature was seriously lacking in detail, and we all know about the discussions over currency etc..
The fact is, that ANY country becoming independent, simply cannot know for sure exactly how such things will turn out. Why? Well, to quote Harold Macmillan, “events, dear boy, events” and he was talking weeks, not years.
I mean if Keir Starmer were smart (he isn’t), he would be standing on a platform to take the entire UK back into Europe. THAT would kill every other UK party stone dead.
Anyway, I just want to see the SNP really hammering the independence cause, and COLLABORATING with other pro indy parties and groups, REGARDLESS of their views on gender or the environment (eh, Humza?). When that happens, I will start assuming the SNP is getting back on course.
Anyway, the leaflet above is better than nothing, and does raise some good points which relate well to voters. Most folk in Scotland want back in the EU, and I will vote for people standing on such a platform coupled to independence (If I think they are serious). Detail? nobody aside from political anoraks and opposition politicians look for detail.
@Robert Louis says:13 September, 2023 at 7:18 pm
Most folk want back in the EU …
At least with independence, we would be heading back in …
There’s no reasoning with this level of reality-denying idiocy, but tell you what I’ll do, Bob.
I’ll ask you nicely for some evidence that Most folk want back in the EU.
And some evidence that Scotland in the EU will be Independent.
Come on Stu, give them a break! At least the birthing parent that they featured on the front page doesn’t have a beard! ?
The Euro-carrot has already captured one donkey I see.
Plus ca change…
link to tinyurl.com
No More Children After the Third One, Says Pregnant Man Thomas Beatie
That would have been a good photo for the SNP brochure
or this one.
link to tinyurl.com
Got any questions?
Stuart MacKay says on 13 September 2023 at 1:10 pm: “@Stoker since you appear to be back, see link to wingsoverscotland.com about getting a complete archive of Wings posts.”
Thanks, Stuart! Haven’t been pursuing it as i thought best let you get on with enjoying your break then getting back into the fold. If i remember correctly the archive you built/linked-to looked, on appearance anyway, very similar to ‘archive.is’. Thanks again! I’ll sort something out.
I’ve seen comments in various news media asking why it is taking the Polis (sic) so long to sort out. Surely it shouldn’t have taken 2 years and shed load of money?
I question why the suspects that were arrested just didn’t calmly explain what had happened to the money – does it take 2 years for them to remember?
The question is not why the Police are taking so long – it is a question of why the explanation is so difficult.
@republicofscotland
Not sure how good it’d have been for any contracts he’s got for Germany but if England hadn’t nicked it in last 10 minutes it’d have been a great tee up for the observation that, fellow royalists notwithstanding, it sounded as though the whole of Scotland had finally gotten in ahead of the English commentatoriat, even if only to diss their team for not getting on their knees for OUR national anthem 🙂
Do the punters get ah free lucky rabbits Foote with that pamphlet .
Talk about the EU does my head in.
I had more than enough of that during the 2014 IndyRef.
Here’s an idea why not sell independence by saying with independence Scotland will have the chance to vote for a variety of different things one of them being EU membership.
Another could be whether or not we have a Gender Recognition Act.
Or even if we want to vote Tory.
It’s all pretty simple.
Do you think Scotland should be an independent country like every other country in the world?
Yes or No.
It’s not just talk about the EU that does my head it’s everything that was covered during a three year period prior to the 2014 Indy Ref.
What about the paper doll family on page 2
That looks to me like a family with two parents a mum and a dad with two children one boy and one girl.
This is definitely not what you would call inclusive and on top of that they are all white, white, white.
Making these paper doll families is something you could do with the brochure instead of burning it.
Time to get creative.
After you’ve made your family of dolls and put faces on them you could them burn them or stick pins into them.
It would be very therapeutic!
Burn baby burn!
Ruby @ 8.13.
Better come to terms with this latest wheeze from the SNP to attract voters to keep them in the manner to which they have become accustomed.
They know it’s nonsense, but “Independence = automatic EU membership” will be the mantra for some time yet. They may try something else after the next elections.
“I see that Frank Kitson is still alive.”
Johnlm
What a dirty b*stard he was.
“Kitson’s tactics included the use of ‘counter-gangs’ involved in false flag operations, torture, extrajudicial assassinations, and setting up paedophile blackmail operations. In 1985 he became a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire.”
Kitson was said to be responsible for setting up psy-ops in NI.
“Among the ‘tricks’ attributed to various British intelligence agencies in Northern Ireland in the 1970s – army intelligence, MI5, MI6, British Special Branch, RUC Special Branch – were torture, for which Britain was censured by the European Human Rights Commission in 1976; murder, faked to look like ‘sectarian’ killings; the planting of bombs in Dublin in 1974 …; homosexual seduction and blackmail; ‘black’ propaganda and disinformation; ‘shooting to kill’; fabricating evidence; and ‘covering up’. At one stage, because of inter-departmental rivalry, MI5 and MI6 were rumoured to be indulging in covert operations against each other.”
Reminded me of a very old Wings post about independence Buckaroo. If you load it with so many positions that divide the electorate then we are screwed. We want independence for the sake of democracy and self determination, and that means allowing voters to support Tories or anti EU parties afterwards. So fed up of this patronising BS.
Sad stuff. Read Robin McAlpines blog today. If the SNP had pursued persuasion and comptetence over the course of their rule we’d be over the threshold now. This flyer smacks of desperation and alienation. The party has to end.
“This flyer smacks of desparation.”
Sadly it looks to me worse than that. Advertising is a very dark and conscious art, and it’s hard to resist the impression somewhere down the line there had to be something conscious and cynical here — even gleeful. There are more visual and cognitive blunders per square centimetre than fifty Labour leaflets of twenty years ago put together. Anyone who bought into this thinking it did good knows nothing of how marketing works. But who can say? Maybe it was indeed sincere? But I don’t know which is more depressing. The 2019 Corbyn campaign also seemed to buy into similar equally counter-productive false-positive snake-oil in whoever was paid to produce their “great idea on the surface” manifesto messaging. Meanwhile, Bill Hicks… (But where is his ilk today?)
No Merganser I do not need to come to terms with anything the SNP are saying.
They might be trying to deny me freedom of speech but I still have the right to freedom to listen.
My advice to everyone is to stop listening to the SNP everything they say is a huge con.
Mark them as spam. Get them moved into your spam folder along with the Nigerian Prince and all the other con artists who want your money.
Do not give them your bank details.
Do you need a reminder what happened last time you gave them money. Google Branchform & Campervan.
If the SNP were being honest this is the picture that should have been on the front page of their brochure
link to tinyurl.com
Shame that he’s holding his arm across his mastectomy scars.
This picture is more representative of the SNP than that beardless birthing person that they have chosen. It’s a con.
I didn’t get past the first page. Can anyone who has read it all tell me if there are any pictures of drags reading to children or mention of the GRRB, Isla Bryson etc?
The SNP has a death wish, getting more likely by the day example to suggest Inheritance tax to have a 20% band starting at £36k will wipe out all their MP’s (losing 30% of the parties income) and perhaps 50+ MSP’s. Now I know it was the youth wing but it can not fill anyone with optimism for the future of the party. Look at the Bloc Quebecois its most likely your fate.
Truly the flyer for the End of the Pier Show, the final act for the SNP.
RoS,
re General Frank Kitson.
I hope you’ve got a good lawyer. What you’ve written is completely untrue. And General Frank is likely to go on the warpath.
Well said Ruby
The alphabetties remind me of the tukunia
informers.
ASA, f*ck you Chinthe.
Not my words, and it shows there’s no god when an evil old c*nt like Kitson is still kicking.
link to wikispooks.com
RoS,
let’s just say that General Frank is now aware of your words, and that you’ve written them from a UK IP address, and are thus subject to UK law. Wikispooks isnt.
I wonder if it is deliberate now, all the SNP literature lately has been branded YES. Right down to the multi coloured symbol. There is no sign of the clootie dumpling symbol.
This attempt has all the hallmarks of the BiS takeover of the URS movement, as the arms length mouthpiece of the SNP.
Wonder if the funding came from BiS ( probably not as they are busy touting for signed up members and donations)or Scottish Independence Foundation?
As Foulkes would say, they are dressing up as Yes and they are deliberately doing it!
“gullible cretins who they expect to just dumbly swallow anything they’re told without question.” Unfortunately COVID proved there are an awful lot of them out there.