The pandemic of stupid
Hoo boy. Here we go again.
So, for the historical record: I have no belief whatsoever, earnest or otherwise, that I can get rid of Nicola Sturgeon in the next four months.
I’m an idiot with a website. I have no power. I haven’t been elected to anything and I’m not the commander of an army. Information to which I’m privy would get me put in jail if I published it, and would in itself have no power to remove Nicola Sturgeon anyway. The only people who can bring that about between now and May are Sturgeon herself or, collectively, the Scottish Parliament.
This site has for some time called for Sturgeon to resign because it is our belief that she’s going to have to anyway, on account of events over which we have no control or influence. Because of that it would be the responsible and conscientious thing for her to quit early enough that the SNP/independence movement had a chance to deal with the issue of her succession and regroup in plenty of time for this May’s election.
The remaining window of opportunity for that to happen is now getting very narrow. And the enemies of independence will be beside themselves with delight about it.
Because, readers, you should really ask yourself what Unionists’ dream outcome from current events would be. Try to put yourself in their shoes for just a moment. Right now they’re heading for a crushing defeat at the election, and their only hope of avoiding the SNP getting a majority (they all know that none of them have even the tiniest chance of winning) is for the SNP to be fighting that election in chaos.
If the party had a new leader in place by February or March (last autumn would have been better), that chaos would be avoided. The election of a new leader would in all likelihood be bitterly fought between the SNP’s two factions, and tensions would still simmer, but there would have been a clear victor and a pressing unity of purpose.
(This wasn’t the case with the Labour party in 2019, but Labour didn’t have any kind of clear and urgent collective goal in immediate sight at that point to unify around, whereas the SNP would have. Also, an interesting aspect would be that as far as we can tell, the Sturgeon camp’s chosen successor, Angus Robertson, would be unable to stand because he isn’t currently a member of any parliament.)
But what if Sturgeon clung on by her fingertips until late March or even April, and was obliged by the findings of one or both of the current inquiries into her conduct to either resign, or be forced out by a vote of no confidence?
There would be no time for an orderly replacement. The SNP would have to fight the election with either a catastrophically tainted leader (if she absurdly tried to hang onto the role despite being ousted as FM and replaced by her equally-tainted deputy), or no leader at all.
The chances of a pro-indy majority, let alone an SNP one, would surely shrink to zero, and even the most microscopic chance (in reality no chance at all) of forcing a Section 30 from the UK government would be gone for half a decade.
The only thing that could save Sturgeon from those inquiries would be crookedness on a scale only previously hinted at. It’s an ALREADY-ESTABLISHED AND UNDISPUTED FACT that Sturgeon lied to Parliament with regard to the Salmond affair. The Scottish Government has admitted, publicly and in writing, that her repeated claims to have known nothing about it until April 2018 were false. That lie alone requires her to resign under the Ministerial Code.
She could of course refuse to do so, taking on the mantle of a tartan Priti Patel, but as leader of a minority government Parliament would be obliged to subject her to a vote of no confidence and all the opposition parties would be duty-bound to vote against her. If any opposition MSPs failed to do so, whether via chicanery, cowardice or bribery, the stink and taint of the whole affair would only increase.
For the nth time, then – this site is not trying to remove Nicola Sturgeon from office. If we had that power we would have done so without hesitation many months ago, but we do not. This site is trying – and has been trying for about 18 months but in particular since last March – to warn the Yes movement that she IS going to have to resign, barring some truly scandalous level of corruption, and that it should be preparing itself to deal with that eventuality.
(We cannot, unfortunately, definitively rule out that level of corruption. Everything we’ve learned in the last 12 months of investigation points towards a conspiracy of corruption in Scottish public life on a truly grotesque and terrifying scale.)
And of course – albeit without any hope of success – we’re also appealing to Nicola Sturgeon’s sense of decency, integrity, and responsibility to the cause, for the reasons outlined above. But really that’s just a formality, because we know from her actions that she has none of those things, only a lust for personal power.
Opinion polls and personal ratings count for nothing in the context of the Ministerial Code, in the same way they’d count for nothing if she’d murdered someone. You’ve either broken the laws or you haven’t, and there is no doubt whatsoever that Sturgeon has. We await only the formal finding of facts that are already public knowledge.
And let’s be clear: the only thing the Unionists fear is Sturgeon going in the next few weeks. If she clings on until the eve of the election and is then brought down, they’ll celebrate the near-certain avoidance of an SNP/indy majority, aided by the idiotic “both votes SNP” argument (ironically promoted by James Kelly) that ensures hundreds of thousands of pro-indy votes are wasted.
And if somehow corruption does keep her in power and even deliver a majority SNP government with her as FM, they’ll regret that majority in a smaller political sense but they’ll rejoice that at least there’s no fear of another referendum, because they know she’s absolutely set on giving Boris Johnson a veto and we learned today (yet again) that he has every intention of exercising it.
In short, then, the Unionist order of preference is this:
(1) Nicola Sturgeon brought down as close to the election as possible.
(2) Nicola Sturgeon remains in power for the next five years.
(3) Nicola Sturgeon brought down now.
The remarkable reticence of both the Holyrood opposition and the Unionist media to weaponise the Salmond affair before now is the proof of that, every bit as damningly as the extraordinary, outrageous efforts of the Scottish Government to obstruct and delay the inquiry illustrate Sturgeon’s desperation to cling to power whatever the cost.
All this site can do is what we’ve always done – tell the truth and warn people what’s coming. Maybe this time is the time we’ll be wrong.
We’ll be embarrassed but overjoyed if we are, because we’d very happily take a huge personal riddy as the price of independence. Show us that contract and we’ll sign it in a heartbeat. But we cannot with any sort of honesty tell you that we believe it’s what’s going to happen, and honesty is the only thing Wings has ever had to offer you.
Spot on Stu. In addition, Nicola is to convene a special broadcast tomorrow about increasing Covid 19 restrictions. So it is looking like number 1 of your three quoted Unionist preferences. ‘Bringing the house down’
Take a look at the c@nts bio pic and the fact he could be mistaken for ‘Manky Jaekits’ brother says it all for me. He’s nothing but a jealous attention-seeker.
Sturgeons tea is well and truly out but it looks like she’ll hang on like she’ll have to be carried out sreaming and kicking like Trump.
An excellent overview Rev Stu.
And yes, the utter corruption of Sturgeon in the Salmond affair has not been weaponised yet by the Unionists. But come the election it will be.
The time therefore for Sturgeon to go is now to give our movement the opportunity to move to take independence. The cult of the rotten Surgeon coterie needs to be exercised now.
Sturgeon tweeting today about how serious the Covid situation now is in other parts of the UK.
Is this her preparing the ground for a big announcement tomorrow of the cancelation of Mays elections?
Wouldn’t surprise me in the least.
There is little point to James Kelly,He accepts Sturgeon as the supreme being, and embraces the Wokeratti.
Sturgeon seems to need the attention of the national, last week 18 pictures in one day,She needs and craves the adulation of her followers, in one picture friday or saturday who knows.
My goodness some badger wants it’s arse back!!!
In a few short months another election,
Will she win?…I don’t honestly see it I’m sorry!!
The only chance would be a Coup d’état,
She will never go voluntarily,
It would be great if Ms Cherry was to replace NS.
All the crap that NS has created , should be enough to land her in prison (along with the trash can Sturgeons)
I have a concern that AS will be followed a week later by NS,giving her time to possibly manipulate what she is going to say.
The return of AS? Sadly I don’t see that although he did seem back to a bit of his old form.
The man has been through the wringer for over two years?
When some of your own side are as much as a waste of DNA as the Yoons. Must be awful to be proven correct time after time and still be blasted for it?
Keep up the good work Stu. Impartial journalism (as impartial as you can be) is as rare as a benevolent Tory.
Unless a leader has deep-rooted integrity and is wholly grounded in reality, it is almost inevitable that they become corrupted by power.
This whole situation is a mess, driven by Nicola Sturgeon. None of it needed to happen, if she had only focussed on why she was elected – independence.
What a mess.
“Keep up the good work Stu. Impartial journalism (as impartial as you can be) is as rare as a benevolent Tory.”
Cheers, but there’s nothing impartial about it. I’m entirely biased in favour of independence. If the SNP get in the way of that, then fuck the SNP.
And of course – albeit with no hope of success – we’re also appealing to Nicola Sturgeon’s sense of decency, integrity, and responsibility to the cause, for the reasons outlined above. But really that’s just a formality, because we know from her actions that she has none of those things, only a lust for personal power.
The concern is that she HAS complete commitment to the cause but not the one she was elected to propound.
She is the Yes movement’s greatest political asset. I don’t see any other SNP politician being as popular as she is with the general public. She’ll be a vote winner in indyref2 and for that reason she should stay. (And yes I’m aware you guys think she won’t bring about indyref2, but I think she has as good a chance as anyone else of bringing about indyref2).
I saw his idiotic tweet and thought if he was a box of sparks he wouldn’t set a firework off. Deluded like his single digit IQ followers. I used to think people were deluded in following the yoons. Some of our lot have the same single digit IQ
The failure of the BBC liars to utilize the leslie evans scandal, the genderwoowoo fiasco and yusuf’s stazi thought crime bill is more than enough evidence that they are very happy with the status quo.
Nicola should go for many reasons but mainly because she has been a disastrous leader of the SNP.
Oh and don’t give me the polls rubbish. Polls change nothing. Campaigns change things. And under Nicola’s watch – the SNP NEC haven’t even discussed obtaining independence.
That wee Kelly seems to be a bit of a fan boy for NS?
Thanks again Stu for all that you do for independence
One of the clearest, most intelligently written, assessments of the current state of play in Scottish politics.
@Aldo_macb @13h08
It’s nothing to do with chance, it’s to do with a will to deliver it.
She doesn’t want to; risking defeat – even with a near certainty of winning – puts the career plan in jeopardy
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1034008650421806/?ref=share
“I think she has as good a chance as anyone else of bringing about indyref2”
She has none whatsoever. In that sense you’re probably right, because achieving independence through a referendum now looks totally impossible.
The Sturgeon cult refuse to see this woman for what she really is: a hindrance to Indeed. I wouldn’t be surprised if she has been compromised.
I clashed with Kelly on his site in advance of the last Holyrood election over his state mathematical wrongness/ignorance over the issue of List seats. That time for the Greens.
History is repeating itself with him it seems. I do not understand beyond control freakery what the point is of having supporters utterly waste their List vote. cf the utter and complete lack of any sort of bunfight over people standing on the List for the SNP. I expect the constituency candidates will all be listed long before anyone else for a start. Also they all know the chances of being elected on the List are vanishingly small.
Quite why Kelly who is numerate wishes to be seen to be innumerate to such a degree other than being such an SNP fanboy that his whole self image requires it. That he did not seek candidacy this time frankly astonishes me.
rbol285@gmail.com
Please explain to us all why you think she will bring us indy, when so far she has done nothing to further the cause but has done much to Obstruct it.
You really have to ask yourself one very simple question.
Does Nicola Sturgeon displayed the nous to take advantage of the many opportunities that have presented themselves to push for a referendum to date ?.
Further, ask yourself if more effort has gone into other areas close to her own needs and priorities?.
Another truthful post by the Rev.
For a long time I have been posting on many so called pro indy sites that Sturgeon is under the control if the british secret service.
No, I’m not saying she is James bond, or any other type of spook, but, she is definitely controlled by them .
Where is the proof the sturgeon grannies whine?
Well, if I could provide proof, the British secret service would be doing a pretty piss poor job.
But they are not doing a piss poor job, they are in fact doing a very cynical but effective job in dividing the pro indy movement.
Here’s the evidence, they have discredited the greatest modern scottish hero, yes, AS. And demonized him among the SNP membership by getting supposed SNP supporters to try and discredit him.
They have her hubby, (loose term) as the head of the SNP, stifling any pro indy debate.
They have influenced and infiltrated so deeply that nature denying policies are pursued at the expense of any indy strategy.
They have made her, probably with her full compliance waste the last 5years of massive mandates.
Bribery, blackmail, threats, coercion and so much more have been done by the brit secret service in the SNP.
They own the leader and have been plotting this for many years.
They have the unionist press and media ready to spring this corruption in the SNP at the most opportune time. That’s why they are sitting on all this just now.
I’ve been banned from so many so called pro indy Facebook pages for stating these opinions, however, here and only here, do the same pro indy folk realise what’s being done to our indy movement.
For the doubters, remember, the British secret service infiltrated the highest level of the IRA.
Still think the SNP aren’t infiltrated by the brits??
It’s time to know the enemy us within!
The analysis of the unionists order of priorities in terms of Sturgeons departure is spot on. Imagine how God awful it would be for the SNP of the first minister has to resign just before the start of the campaign period and the SNP have to travel the country with some donkey like John Swinney in temporary charge. That would make for messy, messy viewing. Douglas Ross would have an open goal and would be made to look like some great statesman in waiting. God help us.
I actually have a gut feeling that somehow Sturgeon will manage to hold on till after May. We are obviously not fans of the first minister here bit She is not stupid. She knows every dirty trick in the book; deception, deflection, slowing down the legal process and clogging up parliamentary business. The media seem to be in no mood to provoke public outrage over this issue and seem more content on making Salmons seem like a sleezebag. And Covid is going to dominate the news for the rest of the year once again.
And her hanging on till just after May is equally bad for the cause of independence. The timing of Sturgeon’s departure is something the grassroots independence movement have no control over. We did have control over, and plenty of time to, come up with a new list party with serious potential, but the chance to do that before May is realistically gone.
Dear leaders of the independence movement or anyone who is capable of being one; we have to get a genuine pro indy alternative to the SNP off the ground. For whatever reason, the chance to do so before the next election has been wasted. For the sake of the long term health of the movement, we need to ditch the SNP. The sooner the better
Meant sane, not same in my last post. I hate predictive text
Christian Wright at 1.18pm.
‘One of the clearest, most intelligently written, assessments of the current state of play in Scottish politics.’
I was about to put something similar, but could not have put it better.
“aided by the idiotic “both votes SNP” argument”
That would be the “idiotic” strategy which has kept the Scottish Parliament out of the hands of the British parties for 14 years. Hmmm!
Personally, I would need a powerful argument to tempt me away from this tried and tested strategy. But the only ‘arguments’ I here from the snake-oil peddlers and carpetbaggers trying to exploit frustration with the SNP go something like this.
Snake-oil peddler: You don’t understand the voting system!
Me: I do. Ask me a question.
SP: The numbers don’t lie!
Me: GERS!
SP: You must be a Yoon!
Me: Fuck off.
It will be interesting to see whether the spineless seat fillers of the Opposition benches vote against Saint Nicola in a vote of No Confidence. She’s their best chance of saving the Union.
Oh, and thanks for reminding me I’m not missing anything since James Kelly blocked me on Twitter for disagreeing window cleaners had no right to work during the lockdown. The man clearly has no reverence for clean windows.
Rev says:
(We cannot, unfortunately, definitively rule out that level of corruption. Everything we’ve learned in the last 12 months of investigation points towards a conspiracy of corruption in Scottish public life on a truly grotesque and terrifying scale.)
Agreed. But hasn’t it always been so?
Some contributers seem to attribute blame for our troubles on the English. But todays problems have been a very long time in the making.
The English did, after all, put up a fight before the Normans took over, while our lot simply invited them in and gifted or traded large tracts of our country.
These nice friendly people, forefathers of de Brus, de Balliol (yes, founder of BJ’s old school), de Umfraville, de Mowbray, and the despicable de Menteith etc, all signatories of Arbroath, were kind enough to introduce feudalism to Scotland. Add religion into the mix for an extra bit of control, then everything is nailed down
Since then, the powerful have simply refined the system to what it is today. My long-winded diatribe on 31/12, written some months ago, sums up my feelings on the whole rotten mess we are in today.
Even after Sturgeon and Indy, it may take some time to unravel.
@Peter A Bell,
Let us suppose Sturgeon survives and leads the SNP to the May elections. You yourself have doubted her ability.
That being the case ,is it not a better strategy to have in place representatives of another party in case we actually do have to change horses to move Independence forward?
In all honesty, the SNP seem powerless or lack the will to gain Scotlands freedom in spite of Nicolas popularity. We must have an insurance policy, or at least an option of another route.
P A Bell
It is independence seats that matter – not necessarily SNP seats.
So, here is your question (since you asked)
Imagine if everyone who votes SNP then used their second vote for the ISP – would we have more Independence MSPs or less?
AldoMacB
Plainly Sturgeon has a much better chance than anybody else of bringing off Indyref2. She is the First Minister.
The problem is that she has no desire to hold Indyref2. The Murrells are getting very wealthy with a fantastic lifestyle and adulation from Guardian reading liberals and their European and Clinton circle equivalents. An indyref would put all of that at risk. It is much safer not to fight.
I must note that James and Stu are both very good men – and stonefree you are completely wrong James is as exasperated at Nicola as we are. This division over tactics is disproportionate, and I wish they would both stop it.
Peter A Bell says:
3 January, 2021 at 1:41 pm
Personally, I would need a powerful argument to tempt me away from this tried and tested strategy. But the only ‘arguments’ I here from the snake-oil peddlers and carpetbaggers trying to exploit frustration with the SNP go something like this.
—————————————————————–
No powerful argument required Peter just simple arithmetic, you can count can’t you ?
Where does the SNP leadership get of in letting the fucking buffoon say scotland van gave it referendum in 2055?
Where is the outrage from NS?? Or any offer MSP?
NY pursuing this referendum route, she has given credence to the british state controlled over scotland.
What happened to the Scottish people are sovereign and it’s not up to the brit PM?
That’s right it’s where the settlu up not settle down philosophy went.
Up the SNPs arse!
I think she is self deluded, believes she is the only one who can truly see the situation, probably some gook (as in her husband) convinced her she is saving Scotland from a fate worse than….. whatever.
But in the meantime she has become like her own personal demon, Thatcher, and like that her her demise will be ugly, truly nasty and will do our cause more damage than any other single individual has ever done.
Westminster win this round.
We need to regroup and move on. Somehow.
@ Bloviator Bell 1.41
Realist: Voting ISP2 will increase the number of pro-indy MSPs
Bloviator: Splittist! SNP 1 & 2
Realist: Maximising pro-indy MSPs will give us a super majority in Holyrood.
Bloviator: Snake oil…burn the witch!!
Realist: The SNP aren’t to be trusted to deliver on their promises: we need leverage!
Bloviator: Burn the witch!!
Who knew losing loads of weight included between the ears? 🙂
Peter @1:41pm:
But is that your only aim, keeping Holyrood out of the British parties’ hands? I grant you that it’s an important aim but had they not better push on with what people vote them in for?
‘You need to vote for them forever, even if they never deliver, so that the British parties don’t get in!’ is a very negative argument.
Better that the argument was a positive ‘keep voting for them because they keep delivering what they said they would’ but this seems to be becoming a more difficult one to make, huh?
We really need to get what we voted for out of this arrangement before, like Celtic in the football, the previously seemingly infallible hit the ground with a thud. And that will happen one day, even if that day is still far off. Whenever it occurs, I only hope we have got what we voted for before it happens.
Absolutely spot on Stu, my preference is that the sooner she goes the better.
BBC news stated that Sturgeon has called an emergency parliament tomorrow, my first thought was that’s good, this woman has finally grown a conscience, and she’ll do the decent thing and resign, however I later found out that the parliaments return is to do with the virus.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/nicola-sturgeon-set-to-recall-holyrood-amid-plans-to-shut-schools-for-january/ar-BB1cqSTS?ocid=msedgntp
Spot on Andy
Bully Bells argument re “tried and tested” was probably the same argument candle advocates put against these snake oil salesmen advocating electric light bulbs
Lothianlad
If you watch American TV the government with all it’s special agents, special forces, etc. is always portrayed as strong, powerful, competent. It’s the projection of power. Why is that?
It matters not whether the Murrell’s are 002 and 003 respectively or whether she’s simply not that interested in independence. The outcome is the same.
By portraying the inaction we see as the work of some dark, sinister force you send the message that not much can be done about the current state of affairs. You are, in effect, an agent of the state.
It’s the same sad story over on the comments of Craig Murray’s blog a lot of the time. All the lefties lament the state of affairs of current UK politics by attributing the dastardly deeds as the work of MI5/MI6 etc. Lots of hand-wringing and not much else.
Power is granted. By granting control over independence to some dark organisation, which now can happily murder it’s opponents without retribution you are doing the Devil’s work.
The fate of our nation is more important than indulging some psychologically flawed
woman’s fantasy about being the popular girl in school. Get her tae fuck.
-Craig Murray, Dave Oga-
Nail on head. It looks to me like it’s one gigantic ego trip for the Queen of Scots.
And good luck with your legal problems Craig- you are a good man!
“For a long time I have been posting on many so called pro indy sites that Sturgeon is under the control if the british secret service.”
I don’t think it’s anything to do with them. I think the explanation is much simpler than that – personal power. She knows that if she got a second referendum and lost it she’d be expected to quit, but she also knows that if she won it she’d have to fight elections on her other policies, which are largely pretty unpopular, and her domestic record, which is poor.
So long as she can keep dangling another referendum without ever actually delivering it, she’s set for life, because we’ve already seen that a large proportion of Yes supporters will make excuses for her until the end of time.
For anyone who thinks it’s easy to shift the First Minister for the indiscretions
that we know of-
Boris PM-
Serial Adulterer
Uses public finance to promote blond US business women he is having an affair with.
Says Blacks have Watermelon smiles.
Muslim women look like letter boxes
He physically restrained current lover while refusing to leave her home or get off her- Police called.
Shear incompetence in managing Covid and PPE.
Giving 10’s of £Billions to Tory supporters for PPE they know nothing about.
Signs EU agreement and then breaks it happy to break international law.
Tries to close Parliament against U.K. law.
Shakes hands with everyone in a live Covid Ward
Backs the farce about Cummings eye sight test on a motorway.
Has an unknown number of children to unknown number of Mothers.
Been sacked from jobs on multiple occasions.
Refused Democracy for Scottish referendum or any input to Brexit
So where is such a man after all that- No 10 Downing St- firmly entrenched.
What chance Nicola goes with i got dates mixed up and no you can’t see
the Salmond information that you asked for?
If there were enough honest politicians to rub together, I’d vote for those who
would make laws to see imprisonment for politicians who deliberately lie to gain power.
Carmichael and French Gate, Boris and £350 million per week to the NHS, Gove and the
Guarantee to keep all Scottish Fishing rights but the jewel in throwing away the Key is the Vow.
Just a note to those proponents of the SNP 1 and 2 crowd.
That policy does not bring any more power to the SNP it only denies power and seats to other Indy parties, thereby overall damaging the Indy cause. As the unionists want.
Peter A. Bell @1.41pm.
Peter.
I thought it was all about maximising the independence parties votes, regardless of whether their SNP or not. If I recall correctly the last Scottish elections saw around one million List votes for the SNP yield four seats, and a plethora of List vote seats for the British Nationalist parties at Holyrood.
I get the distinct impression that its SNP or nothing for you, where as the British Nationalist parties at Holyrood pull together for a cause, why can’t multiple indy parties at Holyrood do the same I ask you.
“That would be the “idiotic” strategy which has kept the Scottish Parliament out of the hands of the British parties for 14 years. Hmmm!”
Elections don’t take place in the past.
Sandra,
Good post. I have concerns that a few farsighted unionist MSP’s may recognise she is their greatest asset and, when push comes to shove, swing a VONC her way. I hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think we can count this out.
This entire situation is a result of either political incompetence, political malevolence, or a bit of both. If the FM was actually capable of supporting democracy and the rule-of-law, Scots would not just have lost their EU rights.
THE INNER CONNECTION
BETWEEN POLITICS AND MORALITY:
HISTORICAL AND ANALYTICAL EXPLORATIONS
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/12827361.pdf
“So where is such a man after all that- No 10 Downing St- firmly entrenched.”
Boris Johnson has a comfortable majority and can therefore survive a vote of confidence. Nicola Sturgeon does not.
What I don’t get is that the Tories will obviously set about stripping Holyrood of its powers until it becomes the parish council it was originally intended to be. What then is the attraction of being in charge of THAT when you could go down in the history books for all the right reasons?
Thanks for speaking the truth Rev Stu. But no matter what happens now to Sturgeon, I fear that she has caused so much damage to Scotland’s institutions,that it will take many years to recover from it. Time we don’t have.
Just what is Peter A Bells competence to dictate from upon high?
Well, linkedin says freelance writer, with one reference to iscot.
That’s it! Nada.
Self appointed sage.
Note to self… Start using middle initial, it lends gravitas.
As for the msm holding fire, it’ll be a game of chicken. Who spills first is the winner, and todays Sunday post is hair trigger stuff.
Hugh J Arse.
Excellent, and horrifying, article. There may just be time if we can mobilise the people, or at least the members of the SNP. If all SNP members were polled about their opinion on plebiscite / single-issue manifesto (using established, secure SNP internal system) and the result was overwhelmingly in favour then there would surely HAVE to be a change of plan for the May elections. The SNP are not a private golf club, they are the custodians of the will of the Scottish people. With no realistic prospect of another Indy party achieving mass support before May, the ordinary members must demand (at the very least) an immediate intra-party poll on a plebiscite.
I suggest we use this form to contact FM to demand a plebiscite. (You may have to try two or three times, but make sure you get the official ‘Thank You’ notification). I know it’s a long shot…but we have to try everything.
https://firstminister.gov.scot/join/first-minister-postbag/
“Maybe this time is the time we’ll be wrong.”
You’re not wrong Stuart, far from it. And in my humble opinion you are doing a far greater service for your country than almost every one of our elected representatives put together.
I think Breeks summed it up best in the previous thread:
“But with Sturgeon still in charge moving forward, the whole campaign has a glass jaw.”
And I remember reading a comment on WoS a while back which I think was one of the most prescient comments I have read about the situation. My apologies to the author because I can’t remember who it was but perhaps they will let us know so that they can get the proper recognition for it:
“The Murrells are indivisible and will bring the house down with them.”
*
“Everything we’ve learned in the last 12 months of investigation points towards a conspiracy of corruption in Scottish public life on a truly grotesque and terrifying scale.”
That is also sadly very true Stuart.
Willie says:
“The cult of the rotten Sturgeon coterie needs to be exercised now.”
I think you may mean ‘excised’ Willie, but perhaps ‘exorcised’ is more apt!
I said on here a couple of weeks ago that Mrs. Murrell is bulletproof and will be going nowhere, no matter what evidence there is of anything.
To get to the root of corruption in Scotland, you have to look to the Law Society Of Scotland and The Speculative Society. These two bodies pull the strings in Scotland and you can bet your bottom dollar that they’ll pull strings for Mrs. Murrell because neither of these parties desire independence for Scotland.
Mrs. Murrell is a member of The Law Society Of Scotland and Alex Salmond, if not a member of the Speculative Society, was certainly a guest at one of their meetings.
“This division over tactics is disproportionate, and I wish they would both stop it.”
Articles attacking me written by James: seriously about 40, mostly full of direct personal abuse about how nobody would vote for a party I was connected with regardless of its politics because I’m such a personally awful human being.
Articles attacking James written by me: about 3, mentioning him only briefly as catalyst for a discussion of the subject at hand.
Articles attacking James written by me not in response to direct provocation: 0.
Mr Kelly posting some strange things about the ISP and fringe party polling, what do you make of that?
Having read the article, but without reading the thread (apologies), I predict that tomorrow, we will see hardening and extension of lockdown measures and towards the end of the month (wink wink), ” with regret, due to the Covid situation, May’s election is postponed”.
Seems 2021 could be a year worse than 2020 for Scotland, a coup de etat or Holyrood take over by Boris and Co.
Stu keep up the work exposing the Murrell.
My only hope is 2 good guys in names of J Cherry, A McNeil step up to lead SNP very soon.
I, like many others now, am not a member/supporter of the SNP but, again like many others, I’m desperate for independence. You forget to mention in your analysis that the failure to secure independence, regardless of who leads the SNP, still leaves us much worse off with WM (regardless of which party is in power). I believe many people, like me, think the same way independence first sort the rest out later.
Peter A Bell says:
3 January, 2021 at 1:41 pm
“aided by the idiotic “both votes SNP” argument”
That would be the “idiotic” strategy which has kept the Scottish Parliament out of the hands of the British parties for 14 years. Hmmm!
It’s precisely the “both votes SNP argument that have have given the likes of Murdo Fraser and Annie Wells their seats in Holyrood.
Only an idiot couldn’t see that.
For me, the biggest red flag is the behaviour of the media. Always so quick to make something out of nothing to attack Sturgeon, their current tactic of making nothing out of something is a serous cause for concern. The Unionist opposition parties,journos and reporters all have the facts but have clearly agreed, en masse, to sit on them till a time when they’ll do the maximum amount of damage. Surely NS can see this??
Mist001.
Two links that gives us a peek behind both societies curtains.
https://www.tomminogue.com/tom/?page_id=636
https://petercherbi.blogspot.com/2006/06/corrupt-link-revealed-how-law-society.html
Honestly Stu I wonder how you have the patience.
the next few weeks will tell us exactly where we’re going (or not ) with Independence.
I fear it will be nowhere but like you I’ll be more than happy to be proved wrong.
Effijy 2.16
… I think what it shows is the public vote for people that they think will be effective.
They want politicians to do what they say they are going to do. Boris is far superior to Ms Sturgeon in that regard.
Everything we’ve learned in the last 12 months of investigation points towards a conspiracy of corruption in Scottish public life on a truly grotesque and terrifying scale.
Whatever happened to “work as if you live in the early days of a better nation”?
Thanks for the astringent writing Rev. It makes me want to roll up my sleeves and start clearing this colonial midden.
We just recorded a Twa Auld Heids for Tuesday night and came to pretty much the same conclusions for the same reasons.. There were 40 odd reporters in the Salmond trial in front of where I sat in the public gallery and they heard the same stuff I did and the stuff Stu is referring to. They could have instantly parked on Charlotte Square with their satellite trucks had it not been for the smokescreen of COVID. They are the true enemy and the only reason they did not take the FM down them was because it would have given us time to regroup but if this information comes our on every TV station and in every newspaper two weeks before the election or God forbid two weeks before a referendum then its game over. We as a movement cannot choose the weapons. They were created in Bute House by people we are not allowed to name and organised by other people we are. We can’t choose the weapons but we can choose the time and the place we fight the battle and that needs to be as soon as possible and as far from independence as our First Minister has placed herself for the past 3 years.
Interesting. Just been posting similar comments on twitter to those I made above. I made one on Sturgeons latest tweet and had my account limited immediately.
Tin foil hat?
I keep confusing him with James Kelly, the MSP. Easily done I suppose.
Regarding a change of leadership, making an assumption that J Cherry won a leadership race, who would be the First Minister, or would she be ineligible for that role as a Westminster MP as she doesn’t hold an MSP seat?
Whether they are in bed together or not (and apologies for casting up such terrible imagery!), one thing is clear – Boris Johnson can play Nicola Sturgeon like a fiddle.
Today’s Sunday Post article (linked by Stuart above and mentioned by Liz and Brian on the previous thread) is the best summary of the Inquiry so far.
It includes the following quote –
‘One senior courtroom lawyer said: “The fact that witnesses give evidence under oath suggests this is as serious as a court of law. Well, in court, if a witness gives misleading or factually incorrect evidence, they are not asked to clarify it at a later date, they are facing a perjury charge.”
Compare the lack of action against any of the ‘forgetful’ witnesses with the immediate action taken by the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service when Murrell’s messages were leaked.
Now then, where might enquiries be directed about this apparent inequity?
https://www.copfs.gov.uk/about-us/who-we-are/lord-advocate-biography
It would be inaccurate to call Mrs Murrell a « useful idiot ».
Nevertheless, in one particular she is proving politically useful and only an idiot would treat her constituency with such callousness.
I suspect the loophole for the Ministerial Code is that although the minister who lied is expected to offer their resignation, the First Minister isn’t required to accept the resignation and can keep the minister in post if they so choose. In that, given that she would be offering her resignation to herself, she would be keeping to the letter, but not the spirit of the code.
I don’t think you’re wrong, Rev. However, I do believe that, if she stakes her reputation (what is left of it) on independence in a partially plebiscitary election, she might be able to pull the iron from the fire in time and save herself from total ignominy. As Scotland’s deliverer of independence, she could turn it all around and retire from politics with grace. Otherwise, not. It will be her choice: deliver, or attempt to deliver, independence in May (by putting independence as the main policy, with a guarantee to move towards negotiations immediately and, if refused, Addressing the Floor of the General Assembly on the provisions of the Charter and on the Treaty of Union). Please, FM, just this once, listen.
I don’t believe there is any other way out for her now, even though so many just cannot, or refuse to, see it. The only thing, in my opinion, for what that’s worth, which might not be much, that would stay Alex Salmond’s hand is if she chose to save Scotland. He might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but he never once faltered in his promise to try and bring us independence in the best way for all, the S30 Order. He will already be aware that a second will never be granted, even if Nicola Sturgeon and Mike Russell pretend otherwise, precisely because he came so close to it in 2014. That he is still devoted to his country’s future was evidenced recently by the template he and Alex Neil offered us. If it appears that she will try and bluff it out – regardless of how much or how little she was involved personally, because the buck stops with her, however unfairly or otherwise – she will meet her Nemesis.
A majority for independence in the short term would mean a supine Nicola Sturgeon leading a team of tame natives to negotiate the terms of Scottish independence.
Ba Maw’s (Burmese politician who became Prime Minister in 1936) account of the 1933 Round Table Conference in London explains the techniques used then, and probably still in use now. ‘The colonial power was faced with the recurrent colonial dilemma of trying to give and yet not to give, of taking with an air of giving, of moving forward and yet remaining in the basic things where it was; and, to solve this dilemma as best it could, it had to resort to its usual devices of dividing to rule and delaying to defeat, of inventing escape clauses and conditions which would make a good deal of whatever it had been forced to give empty when given.’
That would make things difficult enough but if there is ‘corruption in Scottish public life on a truly grotesque and terrifying scale’ then exploitation of weakness, corruption and the corrupt would almost certainly lead to Scotland having to accept a deal which would make Boris Johnson’s achievements in Europe look truly majestic.
If we do nothing, nothing will change.
— .- -.- . … / — . / .– . . .–. /
… — / …. .- …- . / – ..- .-. -. . -.. / – — / — — .-. … . / .. -. … – . .- -..
Note: use the plaintext tag to stop dashes being turned into a continuous line.
“I don’t think you’re wrong, Rev. However, I do believe that, if she stakes her reputation (what is left of it) on independence in a partially plebiscitary election, she might be able to pull the iron from the fire in time and save herself from total ignominy.”
I agree. But I bet you a thousand pounds she won’t.
Damn it! It worked in preview!!!
My Morse said:
“Makes me weep so have turned to Morse instead”
Using Google’s Morse experiment learning tool, so easy to learn Morse! Was a nice break from the heartache of current politics 🙁
Sturgeon has turned Scottish politics into a place of sexual free for all’s, Power and Money.
You name it, anything goes within the walls of Holyrood nowadays, aided and abetted by the equally Free Lovin’ Scottish Greens.
Let’s face it, Nicola Sturgeon would rather have married Peter Murrell’s sister, and Peter Murrell would rather have married Nicola Sturgeon’s brother.
Money, Power, limelight, free love, it’s all there for the Murrells.
If that is all there at the click of their fingers, then why would they give it all up???
Sturgeon has no intention of giving us our Referendum, why would she?
“I suspect the loophole for the Ministerial Code is that although the minister who lied is expected to offer their resignation, the First Minister isn’t required to accept the resignation and can keep the minister in post if they so choose. In that, given that she would be offering her resignation to herself, she would be keeping to the letter, but not the spirit of the code.”
But in that event the opposition bring the vote of no confidence, and as she has no majority she ought to lose it.
They say Independence supporters are split. Nothing exemplifies this more than the twitter accounts of Angus MacNeill and Pete Wishart. The party is also split.
I had to hold my hands in my head when one of Pete’s supporters claimed Nicola is just biding her time and not letting the enemy know what she is doing. Sigh!
THIS CANT GO ON.
“… So long as she can keep dangling another referendum without ever actually delivering it, she’s set for life, because we’ve already seen that a large proportion of Yes supporters will make excuses for her until the end of time… ”
She is running out of excuses, though, and I think would face a rebellion from inside the party itself if she persisted in this tack after 2021. As it is, she will have a hard time pulling it off before the election because many people’s eyes are on that Manifesto. The other option she has, of course, is to string out the vaccination programme and then postpone the election. If she does that, she will face a rebellion from both within the party and from outwith the party, from the wider YES movement. In those circumstances, Alex Salmond will have no reason to spare her, and he himself will face calls to lead a substantial part of the movement again.
If someone, say with no fear of pokey, or with a terminal diagnosis were to ‘stumble upon’ the hidden evidence, and were to post such stuff on social media, and hundreds of people were brave enough to re-post the same, possibly out with the clutches of Scottish legal jurisdiction…
History might mention that person, and their supporters in the same breath as Wallace & Bruce.
Force the matter, don’t let the MSM dictate the timing.
Just a thought.
It all depends on the evidence you have that you can’t publish.
However, the tone of your article suggests that it’s a no-brainer that Sturgeon will go once the evidence is made public.
Do you know who will make it public and when? I guess that day will be a day no one will forget, given your warning.
Not sure I’m looking forward to that day – sounds like it’ll be a nightmare one…
Where is this wild popularity of the FM that James Kelly talks of? The only Sturgeonmania we’ve seen has been her own mania for both GRA and holding on to personal power.
Besides, any politician can appear popular through a combination of careful image making, media narrative and sufficient public naivety.
Re pixywine @ 1425…
About Tiffany Dover on snopes.com –
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/nurse-passes-out/
“But in that event the opposition bring the vote of no confidence, and as she has no majority she ought to lose it.”
Aye, that’s the danger of that tactic. The 3 Unionist parties are pretty much guaranteed to vote for any vote of no confidence while the SNP will obviously vote against so the question is whether the Greens would be willing to bring down the First Minister when she’s riding so high in public popularity over handling of the Pandemic response and take the hit at the ballot box from SNP members no longer lending them a second vote.
Grubby politics it may be, but I suspect that unless the Unionists can 100% guarantee the VONC will pass, they won’t call it with only months to go till the election where they can focus their election campaigns on the issue as an attack line.
“aided by the idiotic “both votes SNP” argument”
‘Both votes for a party’ is the only sensible strategy when support for the party is in the middle range, where the vagaries of uneven distribution of support mean that the party may win in fewer of the constituency contests than it should. If a party’s support is above this threshold, the list party votes can be seen as being wasted.
In addition, ‘splitting’ one’s vote is a perfectly proper and rational strategy for a voter whose support for, say, the SNP in the constituency vote is not based on support for SNP’s policies beyond seeking independence; or, in general, when a voter wishes to support a particular individual in the constituency, but not that candidate’s party overall.
Now I’ve come to spell it out, it seems that the circumstances in my first paragraph may be the only ones in which it is rational to give both votes to the same party.
Note that I’m not suggesting that one can predict the outcome of a personal split-vote strategy: deciding what to do, based on what you think other voters are going to do is the quintessential mug’s game — if enough voters try to do this, the result will be completely chaotic.
Stu Wrote:
(We cannot, unfortunately, definitively rule out that level of corruption. Everything we’ve learned in the last 12 months of investigation points towards a conspiracy of corruption in Scottish public life on a truly grotesque and terrifying scale.)
There is a link in the above to a superb article in today’s Sunday Post. (Never thought I would ever write a sentence like that) concerning the corrupt actions of inter alia the Scottish Gov, the Crown Office and the Scottish Gov. State Police (aka Police Scotland) in this mess.
I urge you to read it – not just for its content – but because it is an early intimation of what the Yoon press has in store when, as Stu predicts – the Sturgeon catastrophe is weaponised ahead of May’s election – with the potential of destroying the hope of independence for years – if not for ever!
IT IS THAT SERIOUS
If you were Unionist politicians right now would you prefer an election where the head of the opposition divided the electorate who normally voted for them?
She will remain.
Rev at 1.04pm
‘ I’m entirely biased in favour of independence. ‘
The name of the game.
My apologies for not including Lorna Campbell in those who I recognise as being anywhere near legally competent to discuss democracy blt. Not that I’m suggesting you need to understand the law in order to support healthy cultural values. 😉
UNDERSTANDING
OUR POLITICAL NATURE
HOW TO PUT KNOWLEDGE AND REASON AT THE HEART OF POLITICAL DECISION-MAKING
https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/bitstream/JRC117161/understanding-our-political-nature.pdf
James Kelly is a very, very, very delusional fellow.
He is very cocky with each of his opinions.
Over the last few weeks, I have enjoyed seeing arch-yoon Facundo Savala push his buttons on twitter. He just cant help himself.
Events are moving: https://archive.is/hrhZU
Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
3 January, 2021 at 2:15 pm
Quote
I don’t think it’s anything to do with them. I think the explanation is much simpler than that – personal power. She knows that if she got a second referendum and lost it she’d be expected to quit, but she also knows that if she won it she’d have to fight elections on her other policies, which are largely pretty unpopular, and her domestic record, which is poor.
So long as she can keep dangling another referendum without ever actually delivering it, she’s set for life, because we’ve already seen that a large proportion of Yes supporters will make excuses for her until the end of time.
Nail hammer head.
ahundredthidiot wrote on 3 January, 2021 at 1:51 pm:
P A Bell
“It is independence seats that matter – not necessarily SNP seats. So, here is your question (since you asked): Imagine if everyone who votes SNP then used their second vote for the ISP – would we have more Independence MSPs or less?”
As soon as i read that i knew you weren’t getting an answer. Just like he’s ignored everyone else. He’s never wrong you know. 😉
So just in case he missed it (stop laughing you lot) I’ve brought it forward a wee bit, again. LOL!
“Do you know who will make it public and when? I guess that day will be a day no one will forget, given your warning.”
The Scottish Government is currently fighting tooth and nail to prevent any of it ever coming out, at the inquiry or anywhere else. The matter of whether they’ll succeed is still a live one.
It could be freely revealed overseas, but my legal advice is that the Scottish court’s anonymity order applies to me, even though I don’t live in Scotland, so it’d have to be someone outside the UK.
Nicola Sturgeon is a far greater threat to our health than Covid-19.
Rev, where’s the sense in removing the most popular leader of any party, which is riding high in the polls and with a majority Yes in poll after poll. Where’s the sense in it? I think Nicola Sturgeon is absolutely marvellous, first class. She’s a star.
Under Mrs Murrell Scotland is being turned into country of nasty, curtain twitching informers?
https://www.thenational.scot/news/18983449.covid-scotland-notify-police-coronavirus-rule-breaks-online/
Scotland is morphing into a police state.
Just back from Mars Clwyd?
I’m impressed, not only by the article, but by the fact you didn’t stoop to Kelly’s low, resisting the urge to put your boot right up his cowardly arse. What is it with that guy? He must really feel so inferior every time your name is lifted.
Just back from Nicolas house more likely!! Hi Peter.
Hugh Jarse 3.48pm. Wonder if someone could post it on irish social media or send relevant evidence to some irish newspaper. A bit like peter wrights book ‘ spycatcher’. In 1985 Which was banned for publication in england. But was published in Scotland and elsewhere.
If she is not to able to see a way to get Independence because she only operates within parameters already laid out, let others try. Repeatedly asking sociopaths to play by the rules won’t work. These are people for whom rules don’t apply. Is there any strategy other than to hope the the Scottish people do it for her? Why not try some options. FGS? If they fail it shows she tried and the system is anti-democratic. Is she paralyzed by fear of failure?
To not try though is bordering on criminal.
You need to do it legally but also to find the legal way to do something that is being blocked by people who can change the law. Again, smart motivated people can always see a way to try.
As to what is going on in her head, no idea, but surrounding herself with advisers who have got her to this place shows her judgement is really off.
Clwyd Griffiths;
Sturgeon inherited a nation gagging for independence and, in six years, has done nothing but build her own popularity base. She’s had 4 x mandates and countless opportunities but still hasn’t delivered independence. We were promised that Scotland would not be taken out of the single market etc, etc, and yet we have been taken out of the single market.
At around 60% in the polls and the Westminster Tories clearly showing they don’t give a toss for Scots, Sturgeon has no reason NOT to announce a referendum on independence. She’s a con-woman, Clwyd.
Oh, another thing, she’s a crook and a liar and the worse thing that could’ve happened to Scotland.
-Kapelmeister-
I agree. I remain unconvinced that Sturgeon is actually as popular with the average swing voter as we keep being told she is. I don’t mean convinced Indy supporters like us, I mean swing voters. She’s just less loathsome than Dross or Ronald Lennon, but there might be an “enthusiasm gap”.
We used to note how a lot of voters threw away their 2nd Holyrood vote by voting Labour 1&2. Now, some of the SNP folk who used to laugh at the erstwhile futility of a 2nd Labour vote in most regions, proclaim the importance of voting SNP 1&2.
Sillars famously slated 90 minute patriots. Now, the SNP give us a variation on that….the party patriot. People for whom SNP prestige is paramount, even if it is detrimental to the indy fight.
Some in the SNP are, as Wingers know, simply out for personal gain and with no other goal. But the party patriot of the SNP is a different animal.A true believer who is also a dunderheid. The party patriot cannot look objectively at what needs to be done to achieve independence, not can he or she clock a superficially successful but strategically inept leader. SNP electoral triumph, even the piling up of useless 2nd votes, has become synonymous in their minds with success for Scotland.
Such people have found their apotheosis in Nicola Sturgeon.
An allegory of our struggle.
The gadgie at the end… pure quality man!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-scotland-55524464
Sturgeon is high in the popularity polls because there is literally nobody else to put their faith in.
It’s either Sturgeon or a Tory leader they have never heard of, or a Labour leader they have never heard of, or a libdem leader they have never heard of, or a Scottish Greens leader they have never heard of.
So she’s not up against the greatest political opposition leaders that’s ever been about.
Andy White @4.31pm
An interesting paragraph from the link you provided I’m sure the Rev provided the link above as well.
“One senior courtroom lawyer said: “The fact that witnesses give evidence under oath suggests this is as serious as a court of law. Well, in court, if a witness gives misleading or factually incorrect evidence, they are not asked to clarify it at a later date, they are facing a perjury charge.”
Rev: I won’t accept your bet because I don’t believe she will, either. I just don’t think that it’s in her DNA. Sad, but true. Even sadder for us.
Hang on. When does AS have his pound of flesh, Monday or Tuesday?
Stu, though you feel, correctly, you have no power to remove anybody from anything, you do have considerable influence (as I and others do), heft boasted in reference to readership numbers.
On the Murrell issue, and writing as a seasoned observer of human nature, I’ve always thought Peter Murrell’s position unethical. If his wife errs he is liable to cover for her; and vice versa. I wonder if he will resign to keep our First Minister where she wants to be, or if one will ‘give up’ on the other.
The only dignified escape I can think of is a high-end job offer. I’d not want it to be the United Nations in some capacity or other (a sinecure mentioned by others), the very place Scotland is likely to take its Declaration of Independence, based on the will of the electorate.
Scotland has few communication outlets truly a free press, hence how important people such Wings, iScot, Broadcasting Scotland, and the like exist to plug the gap.
Pressure from the electorate, the public mood, can see the nefarious removed from office. Scotland is a small country. When the smell of corruption hits the air no one need go fishing. Just use an aquarium.
Also just occurred; Kelly’s craven tweet has another, more craven, intention – to distract from Sturgeon’s incompetence. By singling-out Stuart for unwarranted, juvenile sniping it also invites the meek to consolidate their unquestioning, divine love for Sturgeon: ‘We don’t have a clue about independence, but James just said ‘Stuart Campbell Bad’ and that’s what we’re liking‘.
Why the hell is Stuart Campbell getting it in the neck when he’s done nothing to prevent us remaining part of the EU?
The media have built NS up. They constantly repeat how well she’s done compared to Johnston but in reality she has been aligning with Johnston.
The polling does give her high approval ratings.
Someone on Twitter posted how wonderful it was she stood and did the press conferences. But that because they are PR opportunities for her. That’s why she is doing them not for any other reason but that they are bringing her good publicity. If they were turning into a pr disaster she’d soon stop them.
As we all know the press build folk up to knock them down. I am praying the MSM do go after her. I’m even accepting an SNP loss in May as long as she is gone.
The sooner NS is gone the sooner we get indy so my order of preferences is:
NS goes now
NS goes nearer the election when the MSM use the powder they’ve been keeping dry against her
SNP lose the May election and NS stands down
As long as she goes this year.
wee monkey @ 6.07 pm
Re Harassment and Complaints Committee ,
Alex Salmond gives his evidence to the inquiry on Tues19th January
Nicola Sturgeon gives her evidence to the inquiry on Tues 26th January
Parliament is in recess until the 12th Jan but who will be called that day has not been published yet , It could possibly be Geoff Aberdein and Liz Lloyd has they haven’t been called yet .
I’m watching the Committee pages in case they publish any information over the holiday recess and if they do I’ll post it here on Wings .
For those harboring a belief that « international law » might step in on Scotland’s side.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2020/12/the-international-criminal-court-now-simply-indefensible/#respond
Rulers write law to suit their particular interests. Those interests are hardly ever of the desperate, the oppressed or those who have most need of justice.
Scotland is on its own.
You want freedom?
Go ahead, seize it, but prepare for pain.
Grousebeater: agree with a lot of that. Campbell Martin has a good piece (November) in which he explains the ‘new gradualist’ position as opposed to the old ‘gradualist position’, but any kind of gradualism – or, indeed, long-term foot-dragging on independence – has been rendered pointless and, ultimately, a position of extreme negativity. The parliament – Holyrood, that is – is very unlikely to survive 50 years, but not because it will be closed down but because it will be starved of funding and the means to disburse funding (Aberdeen is just one local authority that wants to by-pass it in what might become a mass suicide event in Scotland similar to the ‘rescuers’ of Brian as he hung on his cross, who all committed suicide and did him no good whatsoever, mass stupidity being even more potent that mass self-harm). Nobody could accuse the Pythons of being stupid. So, either we go very soon, or we disappear from the history books because the gradualists, both new and old, couldn’t get their nappers round the the idea that ‘their’ parliament was not going to be allowed to last for much longer anyway, unless they do something about that – now.
re. “PUT KNOWLEDGE AND REASON AT THE HEART OF POLITICAL DECISION-MAKING”. Some might think I’m psychologically unhinged and an outrageous attention seeker. That either misrepresents me and underestimates the ingrained cultural barriers that separate Scots from natural justice. Or seeks to intentionally misrepresent me, which is a form of symbolic violence characteristic to misogyny and colonial practice.
And some say I lack perspective and a sense of humour. 🙂
Whole Systems Thinking as a Basis for Paradigm Change in Education
http://www.bath.ac.uk/cree/sterling/sterlingthesis.pdf
Stupid, I know, but people who keep saying Scotland is a small Country just get on my tits.
It’s medium on population if compared to the other 198.
I would suggest over 10 mill a large Country and below 2 mill a small one with everyone else in between, where we would fit nicely in medium. If its landmass, we would sit around 115th – so, same again.
I wish people would stop calling us small – it only serves to make us feel inferior or unworthy somehow…..something to be dismissed.
Scotland is not a small Country.
sorry….That either mis-recognises me and….
I don’t often use YouTube but I’m absolutely appalled
to confirm it’s yet another bought and paid for Unionist outlet.
Today’s main breaking news is 4 days old and the picture of Nicola
says SHAMED?
Andrew Neil Crushes SNP Independence.
I download the app to monitor it after being shocked to find all headline
Scottish stories are SNP Bad.
App now deleted for good.
I wonder if your man Ellis would be prepared to comment on the content of “whole systems thinking”, or if he’s too busy polishing his clown-shoes?
Elaboration of Whole Systems Thinking
http://www.bath.ac.uk/cree/sterling/sterlingappendixI.pdf
Until it’s accepted many of the SNP politicians would not risk their British political careers for the restoration of Scotland’s national sovereignty, and deal with that, the chances of independence are small.
Until its accepted that the UK will never approve Scotland’s independence and so sooner or later Scotland will have to renounce UK Parliamentary sovereignty by asserting Scottish sovereignty, the chances of independence are zero, no matter how many “pro-independence” politicians are elected at Holyrood or WM.
Under the last 20 plus years, the SNP have normalised colonial subservience. Now, it’s the British way or no way. The SNP accepted the sovereignty of Crown in UK Parliament. All our politicians swear allegiance to an enemy of Scottish sovereignty: Queen Elizabeth, the Queen of the British Empire. They will again in May.
I still believe the people of Scotland should elect their own parliament and government and that sovereignty is ultimately held by the people of Scotland. Scotland should not be ruled by England’s UK Ministers, MPs and Lords. But, I don’t think that’s going to change. I don’t see the SNP or any of our politicians defying the UK state to liberate our nation and restore our national sovereignty. I don’t see them inspiring the people of Scotland to assert our national sovereignty. We don’t have a Ghandi or a Mandela. We don’t have a Bruce or a Wallace. We have Sturgeon and her well-paid, much respected (by some) but completely ineffective British colonial MPs and MSPs.
Cheers for putting in the effort MaggieC.
Useful work.
Speaking of which…
I see the thread breaker’s up..
It was good while it lasted!
Brilliant article Stuart . I hope you are able to derive some humour from your opponent’s delusional characterisation of you as simultaneously an insignificant , largely ignored blogger and the biggest threat to Independence since Longshanks .
-Lorna-
The British government has always been masterful at undermining countries with “death by a thousand cuts”.
Until the 1920s most of the Middle East was part of the Ottoman Empire, until 1912 there was a Chinese Empire, until 1857 a Mughal (Indian) Empire. Yet the colonial administrators openly called the shots in parts of all those countries. Not quite the same, but in Africa everything was done through the tribal kings.
Perhaps Tory councils in Aberdeen etc. will turn out to be another Arab sheik or Indian prince. Much easier than full-blown annexation.
Yet another one unable to scroll.
“Parliament is in recess until the 12th Jan but who will be called that day has not been published yet , It could possibly be Geoff Aberdein and Liz Lloyd has they haven’t been called yet .”
For reasons I legally can’t tell you, it definitely won’t be Geoff Aberdein.
Lorna Campbell at 6.39.
On your good recommendation, I shall seek out the Campbell Martin piece, a man with a Scots name the wrong way around.
And yes, the meandering gradualist approach has been over 90 years in the crawling. A chameleon can move with greater determination. Also, I share your anxiety over the swift approach of the Tory’s well planned rout of Scotland’s powers.
This is the year – no other.
Anyone got a spare side of a bus?
We now spend £350 million per week on Customs forms.
How about we join the EU and give the money to the NHS.
I see that the MSM is ignoring the fact that Boris Johnson has appointed himself de facto dictator of the UK, by what he said on Marr this morning.
“The Prime Minister has reiterated his position that a Scottish independence referendum should be a “once-in-a-generation” vote.
Speaking on the Andrew Marr show, Boris Johnson said that the gap between referendums on Europe – the first in 1975 and the second in 2016 – was “a good sort of gap”. “
So he states that 41 years is a good gap for “once in a generation” events. What was it Johnson said prior to the 2019 UK General Election? Oh yes…
““I think it will be close, I really do. That is why I urge everybody to get out to vote and get out to vote for us, because it is going to be very close. The only way to save Brexit and get it done is to vote for us.”
He added: “This is a critical once-in-a-generation election. I think this is one of the most important in modern times. On this election, the direction of the country depends.”
https://archive.is/DLjzv#selection-1603.0-1607.175
A “once in a generation’ election??? That means he has no intention of holding another UK GE until 2060!!! Does the man actually understand his hypocrisy – or is he, truly, a delusional, dictatorial, megalomaniac?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWLdZFCMx8Y
I am sorry that folk get annoyed by critical political science and stuff, as that’s kind of why Scotland is getting pumped from both ends.
Creative Holism: A Critical Systems Approach to Complex Problem Situations
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/sres.799
@ Rev: you have many useful connections. Are none of them based in Ireland and therefore able to publish the information that is banned from UK publication? Or in some other country? I know you will have thought of this yourself – I am just surprised!
A sure way of pushing for a change of direction by the SNP “leadership” would surely be for one or two MSPs or MPs to tell the FM that they will resign unless she does…[name any option]. Is there anyone we can ask who might agree to take this step?
What’s with the misogyny guff Spammers , you’re IDing as a laydee now too?
Me, me, me…
You’re not helping yourself, most here,or the Independence cause.
But you know that anyway.
I’m doing the Ian B strategy from here on. Please don’t engage, it’s not good for my anger management, and I don’t want banned.
Sarah. Craig Murray has many more international, powerful connections, but he’s got enough on his plate as it is. He could use a proxy, hint hint.
@ Hugh J: it would be such a relief if this matter was exposed. I live in sunny Scotland and have no useful connections anywhere!
Scottish politics on twitter,
`I don`t agree with much from WOS but..`
`Stu can be a corrosive pri@k but …`
`You might hate Wings but…`
`Seldom read Wings but ..`
`Stu Campbell blocked me for being `stupid` but …`
It seems to me very unlikely that the corrupt Scottish establishment can keep the lid on things much longer.
It’s a big wide world out there and there are plenty of jurisdictions which have outlets that would run the story. The thing is of course there are plenty of outlets here who would run the story just as Scotland goes to the polls to cripple the SNP.
Better truly that the Sturgeon exposure happens now and gives us time to realign before the election than to have Sturgeon overwhelmed in the days before the election.
How this woman and her crooked coterie could get into this mess is something we need to find out. It was a conspiracy, aided, abetted and promoted to destroy the man who in 2014 nearly took us to independence and could done again but with an affirmative result.
Yes, dark forces have played deep and hard. But ultimately they will not succeed and all of this will be exposed I think very very soon.
I see Ronald has finally picked the right username for his rants.
HughJArse LMAO,
excellent Ronald, excellent .
Hugh Jarse
Form the perspective of post-modern critical social theory, i.e. one that realistically engages with intersectionality, culture is inherently patriarchal in nature. This has been ingrained through liberal and neo-liberal political practice that has historically sustained racism and misogyny. Which are strongly linked with right-wing authoritarianism and hostility towards the cultural Other (see English Torydum).
Systems thinking in gender and medicine
https://jme.bmj.com/content/46/4/225
sorry….This has been ingrained through liberal and neo-liberal political practice that has historically sustained racism and misogyny. So misogyny is strongly linked….
Did someone say RT?
Double revengeski.
I’m sure he’s considered it, off the record.
🙂
“I am sorry that folk get annoyed by critical political science and stuff, as that’s kind of why Scotland is getting pumped from both ends.”
I think maybe once or twice they’d like to see you engaging with them like a normal human being, not like an annoying lecturer giving them far too much homework.
Picking fights again ‘Rob’?
Who would have thought!
There was a Rab from Ayrshire…
Willie @7.39pm
I was just about to type a similar post. Well done, yours was much better worded.
The question is can lord walter james woolf QC and the crown office and procurator fiscal service for Scotland survive the ensuing scandal ?
With the enormous number of collaborators in the Scottish media – possibly.
Remember, I’m trained to tackle cultural patriarchy, so I know how to handle British nationalism, i.e. as a harmful social pathology.
Is Man the Measure of All Things? A Social Cognitive Account of Androcentrism
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1088868318782848
“Androcentrism refers to the propensity to center society around men and men’s needs, priorities, and values and to relegate women to the periphery. Androcentrism also positions men as the gender-neutral standard while marking women as gender-specific.
Examples of androcentrism include the use of male terms (e.g., he), images, and research participants to represent everyone. Androcentrism has been shown to have serious consequences. For example, women’s health has been adversely affected by over-generalized medical research based solely on male participants. Nonetheless, relatively little is known about androcentrism’s proximate psychological causes.
In the present review, we propose a social cognitive perspective arguing that both social power and categorization processes are integral to understanding androcentrism. We present and evaluate three possible pathways to androcentrism deriving from (a) men being more frequently instantiated than women, (b) masculinity being more “ideal” than femininity, and/or (c) masculinity being more common than femininity.”
Rev. Stuart Campbell
I think I know a bit about how to communicate cognitively, and I’ve tried to respond correctly with those who’ve not sought to other me. Anyone else is fare game in my book, as I’m sick and tiered of folk like Ellis trying to exclude sound, practical, help from the debate. Just ’cause they think they’re special.
AYRSHIRE ROB
I thought I was Ronald???
I feel kinda hurt now.
Someone up thread said I was Ronald Fraser
AYRSHIRE ROB
You are what is affectionately known as,,,
“A wee fuckin sweety wife”.
Get back to your curtain, I think somebody has just left their house.
“I think I know a bit about how to communicate cognitively”
Yeah, well I know a bit about who decides what happens on this website.
Beat it Clyde, I’m Ronaldo
🙂
I wish people would stop slamming each other in here, remember the fights out there not in here.
Rev. Stuart Campbell
I respect your authority, but I’m only trying to support cognitive democracy. I’ll trying to ignore those who’re out to wind me up, but that might mean missing the chance to punt practical knowledge that is supportive of open democracy.
“people who keep saying Scotland is a small Country just get on my tits.”
Not stupid at all, it gets on my wick, too. It’s a deliberate political lie, endlessly promulgated by unionists who think it’s the ultimate answer to any pro-indy argument.
The best answer is simply to say that as a matter of geographical fact Scotland is substantially larger than England, and if anyone disagrees, just point out that they aren’t calculating the areas correctly. This is because they never include the maritime areas each country owns. Scotland’s seas dwarf England’s, and more than makes up for smaller land area.
There should be 41 years between indyrefs according to BoJo. Nicola will be bricking herself – she was hoping to spin it out longer than that.
The sad thing is she could’ve been an asset. A huge asset. I wonder WTF happened?
CameronB Brodie is king of all trolls
Nicola Sturgeon can only concentrate on Covid… and yet, COP26 is back on and will go ahead at the start of November 2021.
She is already in the good books for the Brits – for allowing Scotland to be taken out of the EU, without a whimper.
Extra, extra, bonus points for her if she can hang on in, and ensure the SNP don’t get the wheels back on the bus, their fingers out their orifices and into action to make May a plebiscite election.
I’d bet that is the carrot being dangled in front of her, keep it going a while longer and she’ll get a big, high profile role, on the international stage, following on from COP26.
The question for us, is how do we get the wheels back on the Yes movements bus, and all the Yessers pushing it in the right direction.
Struggling to know the answer to that. A look over at BTL comments on WGD, and I just have to come away shaking my head. I don’t think any amount of evidence will ever change their view now, and with every challenging piece of new info, they become more and more entrenched, more determined than ever to shoot the messenger.
The only thing that will get me to vote SNP in May would be them standing for a Plebiscite election, and/or that it becomes the only way by which I can elect SIP on my second vote. (and I don’t really understand the numbers on how that works in all honesty).
And with regards SIP (and others) do not be in any way tempted to borrow the SNP carrot. Plebiscite in plain language, or just go away. Very conscious that the rot that is now rife in the SNP could work just as effectively in party of Indy number 2.
Hey ho. Deeply helpless feeling. Waiting and waiting for some significant disclosure/event to enable clarity for all Yessers, so they can start moving forward as one, with a committed leader and plan.
Thinking aloud here for a second. The St Nikla Loyalists/now is not the time brigade. Just suppose by the end of January evidence is produced clearly showing NS, her husband, and close workers, absolutely did conspire to ruin AS. How will they react?
I think they will spend the next 2 months, chewing it over, in full denial, getting enraged, blaming Alex for not keeping it quiet and ‘damaging the party’.
Then if it hits the papers and starts to ‘damage’ St Nikla and the polls – I suspect their rallying cry will be ‘Now is definitely not the time, we need to regroup and rebuild.’
And I think that is at the crux of their ‘loyalty’ to St Nikla. They are genuinely frightened that ‘now is not the time’, and if we lose now, we lose for ever. Nothing will make them face the current danger. Nothing.
A phrase being repeated by them, is, ‘when in the last 6 years could NS have called and won an Indyref2’.
Which ignores the inconvenient fact, that not for 1 second in that same time period should Nikla and the SNP’s foot ever have been off the accelerator in Campaigning for Indy, preparing for an Indref2 campaign and operating tactically at every stage to obtain it. Cause the unionists certainly haven’t paused for a moment.
That’s the negligence, that’s the smoking gun, that’s the reason they don’t ask that question, but the other.
From the promise of Devo Max, to the reality of Devo Nowt in 6 years. What a legacy.
Xaracen 8.15
Re, Scotland being too wee,
That is why Sky News and ITV News still tilt the weather map.
It’s the english Inferiority complex.
They don’t want their deluded english viewers seeing the true size of england.
I think would be no bad idea to see if David Mundell fits into the Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon.Who gains,with Mundell,s love of Scots and Scotland.Since stepping down from Tory Viceroy,what is he up to,Oliver Mundell seems also very interested.Leslie Evans worked for Mundell !? how did she become so close to Nicola Sturgeon. Who stands to benefit from this arrangement??
Hugh J
AYRSHIRE isn’t the only Sturgeon fanatic who comes on here to deflect attention away from Sturgeon Bad comments.
I think we are ok for the moment.
I think they are all safely tucked up in bed over on the Ginger Dugger website.
But be warned, they will return…
I can’t help it if I know a bit about how to support cognitive justice. Though I’m rusty and only retained a fraction of my training, all I’m trying to do is point folks towards the foundations of sound political judgement.
Embracing Ignorance in Higher Education
eprints.bournemouth.ac.uk/3411/1/722.pdf
“Ignorance receives a bad press, which it doesn’t deserve. Negative, and unwarranted, associations with ‘stupidity’ and ‘foolishness’ can make ignorance a quality from which to shy, or for which to apologise particularly when ‘education’ is on the agenda.
‘Ignorance plays in the cultural imagination as the figure of error and the absence of rational scientific thought. As a pedagogical phenomenon, ignorance is understood to be ignoble at best, evil at worst. It is seen to frustrate the work of knowledge and therefore the work of teaching, to have no valid place in the work of pedagogy’ (Mosher 2003).
But ignorance as ‘unknowing’ or as ‘preparedness for learning’ has enjoyed some highly respectable champions. For Socrates knowing that one was ignorant was a far better state of affairs than possessing beliefs that were untrue. For Benjamin Disraeli ‘To be conscious that you are ignorant’ was ‘a great step to knowledge’.
Scenario – Alex comes back on the list. Manages to rally other indy parties (bar the greens) in a strategic, unified manner to maximise the indy list vote by getting rid of a tranche of unionist list occupants.
Also being the decent, honest type who puts indy first (before personal gain, ego and cowardice like NS has) he’d likely be encouraging folk to vote SNP in the constituency. If Nicola has not been dumped or shuffled off before the election, wouldn’t it be amusing if the pro indy list parties/coalition is the actual opposition? They could stick a rocket up the SNP on indy (if they hadn’t put a plebiscite election in their mandate) and martin keatings case should be through before then.
I wonder how long Nicola would want to hang about facing Alex at FMQ’s? Lol
With all the hoo ha going on is there an advantage for us having the Holyrood election in September? Let’s face it we are a few months behind cos of them dragging their heels in the inquiry.
@Stu Campbell 8.05pm
The excuse is frankly wearing a bit thin. Like a dog returning to its vomit Spameron can’t help himself, no matter how often you warn him.
You’ve banned other bams for less, but somehow this piece of work is special?
Has it passed you by altogether how much better the BTL discussions are in the few periods you’ve moderated him?
And don’t give us the ” I don’t like folk ganging up on him” schtick: it gets no more convincing for constant repetition.
Rev @ 7:07pm
Interesting.
I’m very curious that you can’t discuss why Geoff Aberdein won’t be making an appearance even in the abstract sense?
From memory, there was a stage where you seemed to be discussing his upcoming appearance fairly openly.
Something changed? I’ll happily take cryptic.
re. supporting cognitive justice.
The Body of the Mind: Embodied Cognition, Law, and Justice
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/234186487.pdf
“Recent research from embodied cognition strongly contests the dualist notion of the mind as distinct and apart from the biological machine of the body – a conception that has powerfully shaped our laws, legal practices, theories, and institutions for centuries.
According to the embodied (or grounded) cognition perspective, the body is involved in the constitution of the mind. Thus, beyond our conscious awareness, an abstract concept, like trustworthiness, may be primed by sensorimotor experience, like feeling physical warmth.
This Article introduces recent insights from this budding field, discusses some of the potential implications of experiments in embodied cognition for courtroom interactions, and addresses the significant challenges to using this research as a means to reform.”
Well, I’ll no doubt start another international relations incident like last night, but fuck it…
…Scotland is the largest country in the UK! 😉
https://twitter.com/Zarkwan/status/1022564235207958535/photo/1
“Though I’m rusty and only retained a fraction of my training,” CBB @ 9.01
I guess we have to be thankful for that. Imagine if he was at the top of his game.
@DaveL
Doubtless the SQ (Spameron Quotient) would rise to > than it’s default 30%?
A few of us have a book going that when it reaches the 60% hurdle like support for indy the website header changes automatically to “Wings Over Spameron” 🙂
DaveL
Imagine that, I might be more effective in helping you defend your legal rights.
re. supporting cognitive justice.
Neuroscience, Cognitive Psychology, and the
Criminal Justice System
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/144232315.pdf
@Terry
It’s very doable if Salmond led a list party, with smart tactics he’d likely get around 30% of the list vote which would give him 25 MSPs. Labour and Tories would be knocked back to 16 each. So the Baroness would be replaced by Alex .
Now it’s getting a bit late for Salmond to start a party I looked at the EC website and there is a Scotland only party called Restore Scotland waiting to be registered. Went up on 11th December. Maybe Salmond?
The yoons never made it clear before that their “no indyref for a generation” schtick meant a generation of the giant tortoise.
@ Grouse Beater 6:13 pm
“I’ve always thought Peter Murrell’s position unethical” you’re being too polite, I just thought he was a chancer much like McCann
“If his wife errs he is liable to cover for her;” I would think he’ll take the fall,BUT will be in the same position in a hidden position “off the books” as they say, Seen that done before
” and vice versa” She’ll never accept any responsibility”
“The only dignified escape I can think of is a high-end job offer.” She neither warrants or deserves such an offer and certainly not the UN
What still surprises me is ,members within the SNP STILL refuse to out “shenanigans”
Oh, and covid bad.
That’s two informative posts to inform and enlighten Scotland’s citizens, and that’s one more than the FM seems able to punt out…
And I am doing this for free! Admittedly I don’t have time to read books though, but have spent seven mornings since boxing day clearing litter around my locale to try to make this part of Scotland bonnie again, which arguably benefits far more people than me sitting on my ass self-indulgently flicking through pages of a book.
What the hell, while I am here:
Denizens of Scotland, we have now been taken out of the EU against our expressed sovereign will.
I have checked through the pile of dusty mandates lying on the mantel piece next to the leccy bill, and it seems a material change in circumstance has indeed occurred.
I will, with muchos speedy resolve, implement the process I promised you for Scotland’s future to be in Scotland’s hands.
I have prepared this process previously so it is ready to be rolled out imminently.
Tune in tomorrow for more updates folks. 🙂
#ProperStrongerForScotland
@TruthForDummies.
I saw that. Here’s hoping.
The future of Scotland sounds more like a Hollywood movie spiel as in “Only one man can save his country…” Because with the honourable exceptions of Kenny, Angus and a couple of others the rest just say feck all.
Personally I’m much more for a collegiate approach to leadership and governance. But this might be one of those situations where it’s, “cometh the hour, cometh the man”.
If this was a repeat of history we all know which contemporary three figures would make stand-ins for Robert the Bruce, Edward the 1st and Toom Tabard 🙂 don’t we?
A fair, and I think accurate, summation of the situation that will play out. The fact a leader of a party can carry on and potentially damage that party shows very little to admire in their leadership. I remember the Cat saying back in July that when any allegations are made or investigations commence, all snp members are suspended by party rules – so much for her following the rules then. And so much for her staunch supporters if she does indeed damage not only SNP but independence.
@ Scotswumman 2.24pm
https://firstminister.gov.scot/join/first-minister-postbag/
My letter to Sturgeon
Dear Ms Sturgeon I have already emailed the deputy leader of the SNP indicating that a vast number of independence supporters are convinced of the necessity that the May 2021 election be publicly announced as a plebicite election whereby Scots who are voting in that election are making an unambiguous decision
The continued constitutional assault on our country and citizens from a WM establishment cannot be allowed to continue without a meaningful challenge , a challenge which has so far been totally ineffectual and has resulted in people becoming ever more afraid for their future
As First Minister of Scotland and it’s people you have a duty to face your responsibilities of the security and safety of our citizens , and as the leader of the SNP whose stated reason for existence is the independence of our sovereign nation
It is extremely disappointing that you have continuously failed to achieve these stated aims and it is becoming increasingly more worrying that you appear to be unaware of the urgency required to fulfil these aims
You have publicly stated in the past that you do not rule out a legal case for presentation to the legal establishment in our pursuit to overcome the sect 30 blockade yet you have failed to do so , and are actively impeding and frustrating through the lord advocate a private citizen doing so on behalf of 10,000 citizens of Scotland
I am not a member of the SNP but I am a SNP voter and avid independence supporter and I find it inconceivable that any First Minister would permit the egregious ravages being inflicted on our children and poorest families without taking every step necessary and possible to free our nation and citizens from the abomination that is Westminster
I respectfully request that you action with the utmost urgency a manifesto for the election which is unambiguous in its stated aim and stated date for our independence for Scotland
@CBB
I’m thinking you wouldn’t have the time to defend anybody, you’ve a giant link maxhine to maintain and run. It can’t be easy.
@Andy Ellis
I’ll keep my money because I disagree. I think at 60% capacity the internet would just explode and that would be that, the end of all things.
And with that I’ve said enough. Have a good night but eh.
‘For reasons I legally can’t tell you, it definitely won’t be Geoff Aberdein.’
You mean he’s not likely to be called at all?
I guessed during the trial that Geoff Aberdein would have trouble with his testimony at any inquiry, given his testimony I read from the trial, where Jackson asked: “Was there ever at any time from her the slightest hint that she was making a complaint about Alex Salmond’s behaviour?” Aberdein replied: “Never.”
As Jackson appeared to finish his questioning and walked towards his seat, Salmond leaned across in the dock and spoke to him quietly. Jackson returned to the lectern and asked Aberdein: “I’m reminded; tell me if I’m wrong. There was a meeting between you, [a complainant] and Nicola Sturgeon?”
Aberdein confirmed a meeting had taken place in Sturgeon’s office. Asked if that complainant had given “any hint of any personal involvement” in issues around the misconduct at a further meeting, Aberdein said “never”. (Severin Carrell, Guardian 18/3 – which is still up on their website)
This not only identified someone for anyone who had read in newspapers what he’d said of the meeting and what they’d printed before, but it showed since any inquiry was not permitted to name the names at the legal trial that it would make it tricky for the inquiry and any testimony he could give.
I feared he’d have trouble during the inquiry but I never thought for a moment that he would never be called at all. The most I worried about was how little he would be allowed to say. It’s beyond belief they can have an inquiry and not call him when he was so integral to how the disclosure of the accusations unfolded, and especially to what he had to say at the trial which showed up this woman who was involved in telling him of the two original women and the complaint process of these two women but who later went on to make a complaint herself and so now is unable to be named despite such mendacious behaviour.
UN AGENDA 21 and the “New World Order”
Agenda 21 is called Agenda 21 because it happens in (20)21!
And for those who don’t remember what was fixed by the UN (United Nations)(!!!) within this Agenda:
Reduction of the world population to 500 million people (remember: now we have more than 7 Billion!)
This program contains a LOT of things, but I guess this point is the most significant at the moment.
Please also google “Georgia Guidestones” to learn more about the program.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Guidestones
A reduction of human population from 7,5 billion to 500 million cannot done by “socially / socioeconomically responsible actions” – it is simple genocide.
A multi-Billion-mass murder.
You simply cannot shoot so many people without resistance coming up very fast. So you have to find a method for killing them which lets you “insert the killing bullet” somehow unrecognized and let the lethal condition have effect so much later, so that in the meantime you have enough time to insert this “bullet” into all the others you want to kill.
Well…
Here we are.
Everybody who can think may remember this situation and think VERY well BEFORE accepting ANY form of vaccination these days.
No matter what anybody tells you, tries to prove you, or gives you whatever kind of legal threat if you don’t take it.
We already read here about laws and regulations putting everyone who does not want a vaccination in the corner of “being a threat to public health” and therefore be detained in (prison-)camps.
but at the end: what is better: prison or death…
Your choice….
A very personal choice..
And all in all a gigantic crime on humanity.
Everybody in government, health care system, police who joins this forcing of the people into vaccination may be reminded that with a little bit of thinking and a small test of responsibility and conscience there are enough sources which could show you the big picture.
Everybody who then does not stop is either too stupid to learn and see or a criminal.
New World Order agenda also includes transgender recognition what we see as the Gender Recognition Act and Hate Crime.
Do you see a problem here?
COVID 19 is not as you might think 19 because it happened in 2019 but is Gematria for AI which is short hand for Artificial Intelligence.
So COVID 19 means
COVert
IDentification for
Artificial Intelligence
Yes injectable nanotech does exist to place bots into your bloodstream and monitor everything you do and everywhere you go and every transaction you make. The progeniture of a “Slave Race” thats if you are chosen to be one of the 500million.
Its time to REBEL.
NO LOCKDOWN(UP)
NO MASKS
NO VACCINE
NO GENDER RECOGNITION ACT
NO HATE CRIME BILL
#DissolveTheUnion NOW.
Another good piece rev though depressing.
I just wonder how many seats the ISP will contest.
And the question remains unanswered. What is the real reason that moved the Sgov under Sturgeon to smear Mr Salmond?
What are the odds that the launching of the botched complaints procedure was part of an attempt to move Mr Salmond out of the way in preparation for a serious change in priorities in the SNP under Nicola Sturgeon (a form of coup d’etat)?
Stu, who has more knowledge in the matter and intuition than the rest of us put together, suggests that it could have been Sturgeon’s thirst for power what prompted this. I am sure he is right.
However, while I totally see how this ambitious and control freak of a woman may be insecure enough to have seen Mr Salmond (and just about everybody else that did not act as a nodding donkey) as a threat to her position, in my view this threat had to be not just for fear of him stealing her thunder, but for a very solid reason because as FM and leader of the party, she was always an step ahead from him and therefore at an advantage.
The only plausible reason to me is that this woman may have been about to u-turning on their (hers and Salmond’s) common goal, the delivery on independence, the reason why Mr Salmond agreed to pass the baton to her. Such a big change would mean that she needed him out of the way as it stands to the obvious that Mr Salmond would no go along quietly with this new decaffeinated plan and might have challenged successfully her leadership and motives.
I am not convinced that the Sgov went solo on this because there are too many actors involved and at the end of the day the ultimate beneficiary on not having Mr Salmond or Sturgeon pushing for independence will always be the the British state.
I have convinced myself that this woman is compromised and I can no longer make sense of her actions otherwise. All what she has been doing for the last 5 years was not not helping Scotland, but the British state.
I think it is clear from the evidence that the botched complaints procedure was never intended to be a serious legal process. It was never up to spec to face a challenge in a court of law. It was an unplanned, quickly and haphazardly put together solution to an imminent problem. In my opinion it was just intended to be an smearing exercise that went horribly wrong when Mr Salmond threatened to challenge it in court and expose the whole thing leaving Sturgeon leadership, pro indy credentials, motives, propriety and government under question.
This situation only got worse when the opposition parties were making in January 2019 noises to bring a parliamentary inquiry. A parliamentary inquiry at that point in time, with more than 2 years until the next election would eject Sturgeon and leave more than enough time for another leader to take over and with the help of Mr Salmond deliver indyref before brexit was completed or before England had negotiated any deal with the EU.
It is my opinion that the criminal court case was brought on Mr Salmond to continue his smearing to stop him campaigning but also to delay that parliamentary inquiry and to stop any other leader to be in a position to successfully take over from Sturgeon and deliver indyref.
The other part of the deal was to get rid of any potential pro indy leader by locking them out in Westminster or locking them in a court case.
Now, the only thing they have left, unless they go for horrible crookedness as Stu says, is to obfuscate the inquiry by delaying the release of evidence until close to the election. I would not be surprised if they continue to attempt smearing Mr Salmond all the way to the end. My suspicion is that this obfuscation and smearing will not be so much to save Sturgeon’s arse (I think her arse was already unsalvageable when Salmond brought the civil case). It is to stop any other potential serious pro indy leader, including Salmond himself, to take over the SNP or any other party and deliver independence.
It is for this reason that I am convinced this woman is not going to resign and is going to cling on until the last possible minute to stop any other leader taking over. I think this is bigger than her, she (and whoever is pulling her strings) are on a mission to stop independence and leaving the SNP in disarray and without a credible leader is the best way to ensure independence does not happen in the foreseeable future.
I now also wonder if the payment to the newspapers (May 2020) after Mr Salmond was acquitted (Mar 2020) was not so much to protect her own arse by them not talking about the inquiry, but rather to stop them presenting Mr Salmond as the victim in case that could boost his popularity due the sympathy vote and be put in a position to really challenge Sturgeon and her minions.
I think it is not the SNP who is being perceived by the state apparatus to be associated with Scottish Independence. It is Mr Salmond and this was a botched attempt to stop him getting anywhere near a campaign. He got too close in 2014. All this exercise, in my opinion, has been an attempt to gag him.
At a point when Sturgeon could have delivered independence if she had wished to do so, but she chose to move us away from it even more, the only thing that makes sense is in my head is that this woman in order to successfully steer the SNP away from independence needed Mr Salmond out of the way. The genderwoowoo was just a convenient distraction that backfired.
I may be bonkers, but I am convinced this was an engineered attempt at a coup by the british state to take full control of the SNP to derail independence. I am convinced Sturgeon is on it up to her armpits because otherwise she would have held indyref already in 2017. If anything this highlights that we should not put all our eggs in one basket. We need another pro indy party in the constituency seats.
@ Kangaroo ,No thanks.
Need look no further than the October 2015 issue of British Vogue magazine to see where it was heading, and it was not a major push for anything other than NS.
I want to be smoking the stuff Kangaroo is on.I will pass on the info to my fellow hospital chums in the morning as the masks are a pain in the ass as is all the hand washing.
I once suggested the NS compromised issue on another site beginning with W and the reply from the host was ‘not going to entertain a reply to such an outrageous conspiracy nut’, just paraphrasing.
Again, there are a number of people who know what the compromising issues (plural indeed) are, but are not a liberty to say. Just because it does not fit the narrative pumped out by HQ does not make the conspiracy untrue.
Will be an interesting month or two ahead.
and if you thought the Vacccine won’t get you the there’s always 5G at the correct frequency and strength of course.
https://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2020/04/5g-demo-city-in-ecuador-explodes-in-death-bodies-washing-ashore-bodies-left-in-the-streets-something-happened-like-a-bomb-went-off-3720941.html
Here’s a very knowledgeable Investment Banker joining the dots
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qoILpvheLWE
and for thise of you who dont know who the perpetrators of this are try this extensive collection
https://pedoempire.org/book-3-in-print-second-book-to-focus-on-uk-as-center-of-the-global-pedophilia-satanic-ritual-abuse-network/#more-458
No longer con we ignore this it is time to REBEL
Thank you so much for your input Kangaroo, I “tested positive” this morning but I know it’s a hoax and that the shivering, high temperature, vomiting, loss of appetite and near-inability to move I have been feeling all day isn’t actually happening and is somehow made up by George Soros to brainwash me. No lockdown evangelist but fucking trust me, it’s nasty.
“Kangaroo says:”
Want a lend of some tinfoil?
It’s often the case that comments complaining about Cameron outnumber comments by Cameron himself, and they regularly take up more yardage. And it’s the same people complaining every time.
Cam is harmless and he’d be a lot less disruptive if you let him be. I’ve never seen him trying to dictate who should and shouldn’t be allowed to comment, which is what you’re doing.
You should drop this stupid obsession.
Now, then, has Ian Brotherhood changed his name to kangaroo or what?
Kangaroo
All your links are lunatic rubbish. Grow up.
If the current restrictions are not working to control the virus, should we:
a) tighten those restrictions?
or
b) admit that those restrictions aren’t working?
The lockdown model that has been adopted means that we are now trapped in a never-ending series of lockdowns. Under this model, escape is entirely dependent on the development of a successful vaccine. Immunologically speaking, this is an exceedingly high risk strategy. It is akin to gambling everything you own on a single roll of the dice.
PS. Kangaroo, I have always considered the close similarity between “covid” and “covert”. However, I’m not sure I could accept your conspiracy theory as it would imply that the pandemic is by design. I think the handling of the pandemic can best be described as follows:
“Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by stupidity.”
Aldo_macb says:
3 January, 2021 at 1:08 pm
Which is in itself the problem, and people like you can’t see it.
Personality cults are never a good thing in politics, and Sturgeon’s popularity is entirely dependent on a personality cult. It has absolutely nothing to do with anything at all that she has actually done.
For months she has hogged the limelight with her daily Look at me saving you all from The Black Death and don’t anybody dare do anything to take any attention away from me and DO NOT DARE MENTION INDEPENDENCE! show, while 110 SNP MPs and MSPs twiddle their thumbs and Scotland’s future burns…
“COVID 19 is not as you might think 19 because it happened in 2019 but is Gematria for AI which is short hand for Artificial Intelligence.
So COVID 19 means
COVert
IDentification for
Artificial Intelligence”
This guy could be on to something…
This guy is more likely ON something.!!
DaveL
It the clowns like you and Ellis who are holding Scotland’s democracy back.
Research for the People, by the People: The Political
Practice of Cognitive Justice and Transformative
Learning in Environmental Social Movements
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/20/5611/pdf
Tomorrow’s front page National,,,
And this useless piece of shit Sturgeon recalling Parliament.
Not because of Brexit or indyRef2, but because of her favourite topic, Covid.
https://mobile.twitter.com/ScotNational/status/1345849164882726914
Sturgeon will be having withdrawal symptoms because she’s not been on the telly for over a week talking about Covid.
So what does she do, she calls an emergency meeting tomorrow, just so she can get her Covid fix.
Clyde, step away from the keyboard…
I don’t believe that Nicola will resign willingly and I’m afraid James Kelly may be right in believing that the Greens would support her in a vote of no confidence.
After all, they’re not competing against the SNP in constituencies, as far as I’m aware, they rely on SNP voters lending them their 2nd vote for their list seats, and Nicola is Queen of the Woke.
They’re lukewarm on independence and probably give a higher priority to the pseudo equality agenda which the SNP leadership is now sadly pursuing as well.
I hope I’m wrong, but I can’t think of a reason why they would want her gone.
@Kangaroo says:
3 January, 2021 at 10:41 pm
“and if you thought the Vacccine won’t get you the there’s always 5G at the correct frequency and strength of course.”
Are you not late for your prayer meeting at the High Temple of the Lord High Priest of the Universe Icke?
@Clyde
Imagine that, recalling our parliament over the covid pandemic, increasing numbers and more people getting seriously ill and dying.
I once read that a good technique is to say, what you want to post, in the mirror first, and if at the end of it you can’t see yourself for spit, then its probably not worth posting. Frothing imbecile.
@Clyde
You come across as a fake tan tory.
Tell me, is surrender an option?
“For reasons I legally can’t tell you, it definitely won’t be Geoff Aberdein.”
This is worrying. I’d be very disappointed if Aberdein wasn’t allowed to give evidence at some point. He’s arguably the most important witness of all, much more important than Salmond or Sturgeon.
It’s looking like the inquiry has been ‘got at’ in one way or another.
And it’s looking like the forces of darkness are winning right now.
@clyde
Clyde built lol
Fuckin hell
An invasion of gradualists just landed on the Wings Over Scotland website.
We’ll just endlessly talk about fuckin Covid and forget about everything else.
Maybe talk about Independence in 2055.
Just as Boris suggested.
Fuck off ya shower of Ginger Duggers.
@Hatey
Is it Yes or No that is worrying you most?
Sturgeon is now a Unionist pin up girl,,,they are all against Scotland having a Referendum on Scottish Independence.
@Clyde
Good to see you’re now up to date with today’s flashcards.
Any additional commentary to offer?
@ Clyde says:
“Sturgeon is now a Unionist pin up girl”
OK, you’ve maybe went a bit to freestyle there, acting on your own initiative and possibly self isolation frustration.
In 2010, the Libdems were soooo against Tuition Fees, they signed their names to it in a big sombre pledge, Clegg, Cable et al as well as putting it in their manifesto. They then went into coalition with the tories and introduced Tuition Fees.
In 2016 NS led SNP manifesto clearly stated if Scotland was taken out of EU against its will, we’d get another Indyref. Anyone willing to say this will happen before next Holyrood election (/manifesto launch)?
Political manifestos in this UK are not worth the paper they are written on.
May ’21 being declared a plebiscite would be a radical move. NS doesnt do radical. Its not happening with NS in charge.
Although Brexit ‘happened’ during this pandemic & a wee country on the American continent managed an election & Sturgeon will take part in a climate conference on Scottish soil this year, I’m sure she’ll attempt to delay this May’s election if at all possible using covid as a useful wxcuse. If she did, this might actually play into our hands. More time to replace her at a suitable distance from a delayed vote. However, I doubt she’ll be able to delay the election, more likely, as Rev Stu has previously speculated, the more likely plan is to delay this inquiry until purdah/May/election.
Lastly, vociferously agreeing with ahundredthidiot (?) & another poster upthread. Scotland is not a small country. Not by population or geography. We’re in the middle fifth of both if you list countries by land mass or population. There are a few Scottish islands that are bigger than actual countries (plural) by both population and geographical size. That it is ingrained in us that we are a small country and for small read insignificant, I suspect it is a useful myth perpetuated by our political controllers to the south. Scotland is a medium sized country. Its amazing so many are and have been duped.
El Gordo
I forgot how much of a wee Sturgeonista you really are.
You are one of the original “I luv Nikla” members.
Does the Wee Gingerbread Man know you are missin???
Is Scotgoespop’s position not that it is just fanciful to attempt to ‘game’ the system by splitting votes. As one or two have said upthread, if every pro indy voter voted SNP1 & ISP2, we’d have more pro-indy MSPs than if we all voted SNP 1 & 2. This is a simple mathematical truth. Mr Kelly disagrees vote-splitting can be done tactically or that doing it tactically poses significant risks to electing a pro Indy majority. I understand where he’s coming from but dont see it as an insurmountable problem.
I dont have my own website like Wings, WGD, Scotgoespop or Craig Murray You could say Im unwilling (or unable). So what they post and the positions they take are obviously entirely up to them. If I agree with one more than another, that doesnt make me pro-this or anti-that. Its sad to see folk cybershouting across btl threads. Theres room for everyone and I wish there was a little bit less hostility when we’re all after the same thing!!!!
Sermon endeth. Peace & Love.
Were John Swinney and Peter Murrell in the same primary school class?
Funny, I can’t think of anyone from my school days for whom I would be willing to destroy my reputation over and have my fate inexorably linked to theirs.
Swinney should have learned when he was self ID’ing as a leader and he thought Sturgeon should run the 2004 European election campaign.
“Ronald Fraser says:
30 December, 2020 at 12:29 pm
Somebody left the door open again.
Liz grunter has sneaked in past the Wings security guards.
Get her out of here.
Get back to your Ginger Dugger “Sturgeon is Brill” website.
Ya wee Lanarkshire, Buckfast addict.”
“Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
30 December, 2020 at 12:40 pm
“Somebody left the door open again.
Liz grunter has sneaked in past the Wings security guards.
Get her out of here.
Get back to your Ginger Dugger “Sturgeon is Brill” website.
Ya wee Lanarkshire, Buckfast addict.”
Enough. Banned.”
.
.
.
.
Welcome back… “Clyde”
.
Thankyou, thankyou, thankyou.
I cannot remember who posted this because of college drop-out CamSpam polluting all the WoS threads, but someone (NOT Brodie) posted a refreshing link…
https://archive.is/Grm3D
Anyone who either knows or has watched Alex Salmond will understand the total relevance of the words: “Murrell” and “evidence under Oath” in these reports.
Thank goodness for some clarity coming to the fore.
At this time it is conjecture based on these reports, but it is either Peter Murrell or Nicola Sturgeon who will be getting interviewed by some very serious individuals in uniform.
Indeed likely both Mr and Mrs Murrell will be interviewed by court officers or old bill.
In either event it WILL BE THE END OF THIS STURGEONITE MCWOKE NIGHTMARE.
On a side note, Andy Ellis, please put me down for £20 in your sweepstake for when WoS is renamed Wings Over Cameron.
I give it 4 weeks before the Rev gets so scunnered, he starts sending Spameron to the “Quarantine” pages of WoS.
The quality and flow of debate improves noticeably each time Spameron is asked to give it a break.
These are very serious times and many folk need to have space to concentrate on their “A” game. Not distracted by drivel havering w anchor Spambot.
It is incredible that Scotland with a population of 5 million is being held to ransom by a political party numbering something like 90,000 members , although many members can see through the lies and corruption and are disgusted and feeling betrayed , those self same members are openly saying they will still vote SNP because Nicla maybe still lead us to independence despite all the evidence to the contrary
The majority of female members have been openly hostile and repelled by the continuous pandering and uncontrolled surge towards legalising male infiltration into female only spaces and if anyone deigns to complain they will be ostracised as bigots and face court charges , and YET they still openly say they will vote SNP .
The same SNP and leader who will NOT relent or capitulate on her reviled policies , the same leader who is advocating and promoting policies which will pose a grave threat to their daughters and granddaughters and will facilitate an ever widening opportunity for abuse by paedophiles and deviants
When these policies were first proposed there were many people saying they would be shelved or deleted, with lots of commenters on here rounding on Stu because he DARED to keep exposing the TRUTH which was unpalatable for them to grasp , many of those who objected to the truth or didn’t care that females were being extinguished , although some of them were actually female have left for other blogs which whitewash the future and are unconcerned at the damage these policies will have on female security and safety
As a normal rational being I find it incongruous that people could contemplate supporting an entity that threatens their very existence or safety and rationalises that the entity will either see the light and reverse their stance or one objective supersedes the other
The objective shouldn’t be to capitulate to the entities demands by openly stating you will vote for them , but to THREATEN their comfortable position by vociferously and openly stating you will NOT vote for them UNLESS THEY capitulate to YOUR demands
.
Robert Knight,
I think you are right…
@clyde
…writes in exactly the same pigeon-English as the unpleasant Ronald Fraser.
Ronald Fraser/Clyde even uses the words “Ginger Dugger” as terms of abuse.
God help Stuart Campbell having to deal with the trolls that plague this place.
Plus that weird looking obsessive James Kelly. A face designed for Radio. I read through some of the Scot Goes Plop drivel. Kelly makes Spamoron look like the pinnacle of erudite incisive commentary.
It’s seems an odd place to be quoting Churchill, but he could have been talking about Scottish politics when he said “ truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies…” But that doesn’t go far enough.
Using the powers of government to pursue political opponents is state violence. Using the powers of the judiciary to selectively pursue and threaten journalists and bloggers is state violence. Let’s not forget that it was “the SNP on Glasgow City Council who pushed the police to arrest Manni Singh and initiated his jailing” – an act of state violence.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2020/08/manni-singh-jailed-for-organising-peaceful-independence-demonstration/
As the normally quietly spoken and widely respected Robin McAlpine put it;
“What could also sink the whole ship is if it is possible to pin on her accusations of using the powers of government to create procedures designed to target an individual and potentially put them in jail. It is really difficult to stress enough how high up the list of ‘really bad abuses of democratic power’ that is.”
https://sourcenews.scot/robin-mcalpine-for-independence-supporters-the-next-12-months-will-not-be-a-walk-in-the-park/
Pinch yourself and wake up. This isn’t one of Chomsky’s assessments of some Latin American junta. This is Scotland we are talking about, governed by the SNP. We are all supposed to be on the same side. Alex Salmond, Craig Murray, Mark Hirst, Manny Singh, they’re the most committed independence supporters you’ll find anywhere.
What exactly are we watching here? Stand back and think about it. What the fuck are we watching here? What is this? Someone explain it to me, slowly. What the fuck is this thing we call the SNP that we are supposed to vote for in May?
Al-Stuart @3:44
I’d bet money on it.
Hi Hatuey.
A decent “WAKE UP” comment there at 4.19am.
Now back to bed…
Hatuey, your comments about state violence against against political opponents is what makes Sturgeon and her coterie totally and utterly unacceptable.
Violence begets violence. Let us not ever ever misunderstand that simple dictum. Political death squads are political death squads and it will cut both ways unless excised. So yes, what is this SNP we are being asked to vote for in May.
Brian, trivialising bullshit aside, why do you assume everyone is in the same time zone as you?
Hi Hatuey.
Both of us seem to have been misconstrued so I will retire from this discussion. I don’t understand your point about time zones.
Hi Hatuey.
I thought I was complimenting you on the contents of your comment. It seems I was wrong to do so.
That’s interesting. I thought you were smarter. Okay, let me put it another way – why did you assume that it was 4.19 here, where I am?
Hi Hatuey.
Och, back to bed. You are trying to create a conflict that doen’t exist.
I ask myself, “Why”?
I’m not trying to create a conflict… forget it. Maybe that Aspergers test I did was right.
Mia says:
3 January, 2021 at 10:34 pm
And the question remains unanswered. What is the real reason that moved the Sgov under Sturgeon to smear Mr Salmond? …
I am not convinced that the Sgov went solo on this because there are too many actors involved and at the end of the day the ultimate beneficiary on not having Mr Salmond or Sturgeon pushing for independence will always be the the British state…
There is certainly something that stinks to high heaven, but applying the principle of Occam’s Razor, that the simplest and most obvious explanation is probably the truth.
It’s a stretch to believe she has always been pawn under the control of the Establishment, and I think a more simple explanation is the dangerous combination of Sturgeon’s hopeless ineptitude to think strategically, combining with a profound arrogance/ hubris/ narcissism which won’t let her admit it.
There’s no need to look any deeper than her ‘campaign’, which doesn’t actually have any strategy and comes apart at the seams whenever challenged. She is out of her depth, carrying a massive burden of expectation which she has simply no idea how to satisfy. Keeping the charade going means creating an Emperor’s New Clothes scenario, where nobody dares question the fallibility of the pompous idiot in charge.
Indy people have been screaming for years to know ‘the plan’, but how can they be given details of ‘the plan’ when ‘the plan’ doesn’t exist? Sturgeon and the SNP have been stalling for time because they don’t actually have a plan, nor any idea about making Scottish Independence a reality.
There’s is no positive direction from her Leadership, just constant evasion, bluff and bluster, and one distraction after another trying to body-swerve scrutiny, and put off her ‘comeuppance’ and humiliating exposure.
I don’t think Sturgeon is an evil person as such, but she is promoted a county mile above her pay grade. She is hopelessly out of her depth, terrified of exposure as a fraud, and has to deliver on Independence when she hasn’t a clue how to go about it.
The vilification and vindictive smearing of her critics is nasty and despicable, but actually, it makes perfect sense if you accept it is symptomatic of a narcissistic personality. And just as credible is the reciprocal, that a narcissist can be easily played by sycophantic flattery and hearing whatever it wants to hear.
The end product is a weak and ineffective leadership which retreats and shies away from the awkward questions from the increasingly angry and exasperated people whom it’s letting down, and gravitates towards those ‘others’ who are still prepared to flatter the great leader and ‘not’ ask the awkward questions.
Once you’ve got such a ‘leader’ ducking the rigours and responsibilities of leadership, latching onto distractions, while all the time vulnerable to the seductive flattery of sycophants (and seditionists), you have regime that’s ripe for picking by an exploitative UK Establishment and it’s pet media / propaganda machine, and “British” Civil Service.
I think that’s about the extent to which the forces of the Unionist Establishment have influence over Sturgeon, the SNP and Scottish Government. Sturgeon isn’t “one of them” in the sense of a turncoat, but with Sturgeon and her transparent weaknesses in command, the Union is not in any immediate danger and to some extent, the Establishment can sleep easy. “IF” Sturgeon ever does become a threat, her actions will be pedestrian and predictable, and containable.
If we really want Independence for Scotland, we need to stop following Sturgeon down so many blind alleys, and replace her whole leadership coterie with a much more shrewd and streetwise Scottish Government which has a definite strategy with deliverable objectives. We need a Government, or Constitutional lobby / Convention which can successfully ‘weaponise’ Scotland’s Constitutional Sovereignty and develop much greater awareness of Scotland’s sovereign credentials internationally.
Sturgeons hands might be dirty, or maybe she’s just no good, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter. Under her leadership, we have just squandered the last five years doing nothing, we have 100% blown the heaven sent opportunity of Brexit, and we have capitulated like cowards to the tragic colonial subjugation of our sovereign democracy. She is a liability which Scotland cannot afford. The fact she is popular is irrelevant. I would rather have an ogre in charge who did the right things to defend our Nation, than a populist, lightweight egotist who hasn’t a clue.
Make May 6th 2021 Holyrood Election a Plebiscite on Scottish Independence.
plebiscite.scot #pleb
Breeks 5.49am:
That certainly seems on the money to me, both diagnosis and prognosis.
The Murrell’s court are antagonistic to independence, to the point they cannot even think about it.
They even fear a majority in holyrood, which is why they are painting so many targets on themselves (with foote as a shield!).
To be the he biggest fish in the westminster catch net is the acme of their ambition.
Beyond criminal abuse of position and power, those are reasons enough to dispense with them all.
Breeks at 0549am,
Excellent post and analysis. I think her days are numbered, although it seems that just like Trump, she lacks the political intelligence to see how much events have shifted.
The sooner she goes the better. She has proved beyond any doubt that she is singularly unable to strategise politically, in order to achieve independence, or, for that matter, to even defend devolution. I mean, look, Westminster has already acted to undermine devolution, and that is just the beginning. It has NOW happened, yet she does nothing.
Where is her outrage? Where is the fight? Where is the press conference, declaring such action wholly against democracy?
Nothing. Just nothing. She is either wholly sorrupt, or wholly inept. We need a LEADER for Scotland, not an admin clerk. Scotland is in peril, and she distracts herself with ‘other’ things. She has to go. The sooner, the better.
Twatahater at 1017pm,
An excellent post and an excellent letter. All of us now need to literally bombard MSPs and MP’s and Sturgeon herself, if we want action.
This should now be the duty of every independence supporter. It will make a difference.
Sturgeon is toast and that’s a dead cert, she trapped herself in the Section 30 order bubble and the English MP’s are never going to grant or give her what she wants, but she knows this and is happy for it to continue, her problem is where people where happy to follow when she became leader now there got a chance to see what she really like people have come to realize she no leader more like a deputy and with her as leader we have no destination for the people to follow other than remaining in the UK and none of us want that. There is a lot of people who are making a living out of separation from the English so they are happy to back a lame duck and will keep backing Sturgeon the only trouble for Sturgeon is she can’t now decide that the Gold Standard isn’t important anymore she’d look like a complete idiot and she is for backing and saying it in the first place. Sturgeon will be gone some time this year and I’ll have a nice red to toast the back of her.
” She has proved beyond any doubt that she is singularly unable to strategise politically, in order to achieve independence, or, for that matter, to even defend devolution ” . Quite so Robert Louis ,and that same lack of strategic nous will be apparent again if ( assuming NS is still where she is now ) the SNP go into May’s HE fighting yesterday’s battle eg Brexit .I appreciate that for many Scotland’s forced removal from the EU is still a source of bitter resentment but for , possibly , just as many it’s a done deal and there’s also the % of YES supporters who want nothing to do with the EU and consider it a glaring contradiction to leave one Union to join another . I disagree but that’s just my opinion . Not sure continually talking about the need for more immigration is a vote-winner either when it’s the poor areas that have to contend with the social and cultural unrest that can arise , Govanhill in Glasgow being one example . Personally I have no problem with immigration ( I’m one myself – in Catalonia ) but when significant numbers of poor people are housed among existing native poor people the result is not the harmonious co-existence those who decide these things and never have to experience the downsides themselves imagine
Well it’s a good diversion from the actual serious stuff….
SNHS doesn’t have enough vaccines.
WHY?
SNHS is now planning to (re) pause “routine” services for at least two months.
SEE FIRST…..
What happens if there is no clear victor in a leadership election after Sturgeon stands down?
Is it a certainty that even if she stood down now the party would genuinely be behind a successor?
Meant to say also …..typically perceptive post from Breeks @ 5.49 . That depiction sounds very plausible to me
Sturgeon has promised her English Granny that Scotland will never “separate” from mother engerland under her leadership of the Scottish Parliament.
“Don’t worry Granny, there will be no border between north and south Britain, we will always be United Granny”.
The new English Covid Virus is spreading like wild fire.
The stinkin manky mob to the south of our border spreading their stinkin manky version of Covid around the world.
And the English Covid Virus is the worst the world has known.
It is not the new UK strain of Covid,.,it is the manky english strain.
And now they are wheeling out their Oxford english rat’s pish vaccine this morning, which will be about as much use as an ashtray on a motorbike.
Don’t you just love those Englanders, they have robbed me of my EU citizenship, gave us years of Austerity, and now give us the most contagious strain of coronavirus the world has ever known.
What’s not to like about them???
Good luck to Julian Assange today, freedom is so important including freedom of speech.
@Breeks (5.49) –
Very interesting and thoughtful, as aye. It always feels a bit dodgy, speculating, but seeing as we’re not properly in the loop, what else can we do?
FWIW I favour simple blackmail. Worked with Blair and heaven knows how many others in the Labour and Liberal movements generally.
The Murrells…they first met at a SNP Youth Camp in 1988, organised by Peter, who was then just 24 and had, presumably, graduated from Glasgow Uni (anyone know what he graduated in?). Nicola was only 18. Another 15 yrs before they became ‘an item’, and a further 7 until they married.
It’s easy to forget how old they are – NS, for all her faults, doesn’t look 50. And he’s 56. When they met at that summer camp only three years had passed since the killing of Willie McRae. And it was still less than a decade after the 1979 referendum.
I’m not going into why they could be blackmail material – that side of the speculation has been done before – but it’s worth highlighting that both of these characters have survived, as professional politicos, for their entire adult lives. We shouldn’t underestimate what they’re capable of any less than the possible magnitude of what they’ve already done.
After Sturgeon gets her Covid fix today and delivers her speech, surely she could hold another press conference regarding the dramatic change in circumstances that have taken place over the new year.
Give us an update on what her plans are for fighting back against Boris and her plans for indyRef2.
Surely!!!
Great that the Oxford Vaccine has started to be administered.
CLYDE…Shut your trap..you sound like an old man sitting in his flat spouting dribble..
Clyde, I don’t think that will happen.
Even if she wanted to talk about independence, I think mentioning it today would alienate too many people and generate a huge media shit storm.
If Sturgeon is using the pandemic as a shield then the virus is surely a co-operative wee jobby.
Let’s hope courts and parliamentary enquiries are allowed to continue, eh? This could be a precursor to shutting down both.
@Robert Hughes
You write sensibly and rationally about the real issues facing the Scots who are so busy just getting by to spend hours on political web sites.
More power to your elbow in 2021.
@Clyde
Enjoy your few minutes of self-satisfied xenophobia. There’s a new Covid variant arriving in your neighbourhood soon. It comes from South Africa. See if you can think up some racist rants to go with that one.
Incoming !!!
Since the discovery of Oil and the destruction of Scotland under Thatcher, we have been on a downward spiral.
We have never recovered.
Thatcher ripped the heart out of Scotland.
Our english/London masters came up with a grand plan of rebuilding the City of London and turn it into the money laundering financial centre of the world.
All off the back of Scottish Oil and Gas money.
The have literally been robbing the Scottish nation for decades, while Scots bounce along the bottom fighting each other over supermarket jobs.
And add into the mix Brexit.
We’re in some state. And we have a leader in Scotland who refuses to face up to the reality of all this.
Sturgeon, you must lead from the front and start by naming a date for indyRef2 after a victory for pro Indy Parties in the May election.
Cheers and the same to you John Main .
.
Good morning Breeks,
Thank you for taking the time and effort in writing such an excellent précis of the current situation. This is why it is good to read BTL as well as Rev. Stuart’s astute headline articles.
Breeks, your analysis and thought process is impeccable and IMHO right on the money.
Nicola Sturgeon is most likely an over-promoted person who has a warped idea of why she was elected and is completely out of her depth.
I think the next few weeks will be transformational in evacuating the stinking bowels of the current SNP leadership.
A few years ago, a tv documentary was featuring the Alex Salmond’s FM years. At one session in Holyrood the LibDem leader Nicol Stephen had criticised Alex Salmond’s propriety about something. Nicol Stephen was talking utter pish.
Geoff Abedein narrated the fact AS was unhappy and was tasked with some forensic research. Long story short Alex Salmond subsequently verbally disembowelled Nicol Stephen who did, in fact have millions of pounds in bent and dodgy donations in LibDem accounts he had received from dpreally dodgy people who were serving jail time.
I actually watched the Holyrood session and with some delight, Alex Salmond completed the destruction of the over-promoted Nicol Stephen with the penultimate words: “Merry Christmas”
It was bravura Alex Salmond.
Knowing this, and the FACT the current Coven at Bute House have their fingerprints all over their tawdry amateur efforts to jail an innocent man to get him off the political stage, I can almost feel premature sympathy for Nicola Sturgeon and Peter Murrell. But that is extinguished because they are both nasty selfish money-grasping little people who deserve all that is coming to them.
Alex Salmond is about to give the speech of his life. Literally. Many years ago, Nicol Stephen received righteous anger from Alex Salmond.
Soon, very soon, we are about to see 1000% of that justified wrath visited upon Mr and Mrs Murrell. One way or another, Alex Salmond will have his day in court, but not as defendant. By what has been trailed in the press, I wager Peter Murrell is set to go the very same way of the high ranking Tory grandee Jeffrey Archer.
If one Murrell falls from grace in such a dramatic manner, the other will go too.
I am not wanting to compromise any formal proceedings, so will leave it at that.
Breeks, thank you for the excellent post at 05.59.
I do enjoy seeing folk posting on a political website trying to ridicule folk for posting on a political website.
It pretty much sums up 80% of internet and social media usage:
‘Look at me….I’m right….that guy over there is a wank….I never waste my time with folk like him….except now…when I am doing…a bit….but more masterfully than him…obviously’
Donald Trump got pelters for suggesting that you inject yourself with Domestos in the fight against coronavirus.
If it came down to a choice between the english Oxford rat’s pish vaccine or Domestos, I know which one I will be using,,,and it will definitely not be anything produced in engerland.
Morrison’s sell a bottle of Domestos for about a pound a bottle.
There is no way Independence is on the table this year or next in my opinion with the new strain of Covid, even with Nicola ousted. I’m convinced had it not been for the pandemic she would be gone already but in typical Scottish fashion a once in a lifetime pandemic coincided with the best chance to sink the Union in 300+ years.
That chance has now passed and we need to regroup and develop a more cut throat strategy, the time for playing nice is over. When Nicola is exposed there will be fall out on a monumental scale. You can see the comments on the internet “If Joanna Cherry becomes First Minister I’m not voting SNP” these people cannot separate Nicola with the need for Scottish Independence, they are idiots who are swayed by cult of personality over even moderate competence. Scotland’s version of Trump supporters. Nicola has ensured that whoever takes over the leadership role will be vilified unless it is from her WOKE faction. I really don’t see a way back for the SNP because of this so we need a new vehicle. The sooner we get moving on this the better.
Breeks, as always you have wise words to share with us all and I very much enjoy reading your posts. I cannot for the life of me believe this Incompetence is not manufactured by the British State to destroy the SNP from within. The timing of the HCB and GRA leading into Brexit alone would raise suspicion of an attempt to split the vote which is exactly what has happened. The Murrell takeover of the SNP and the shutting down of debate, the Salmon smear and the deafening media silence over the costs to the taxpayer of this would also be indicators. We’ll probably never know.
@Clyde.
Aldi domestos is cheaper..
I agree with Breeks. However the British State dont manufacture incompetence. They simply use it to their own ends as in this case.
Johnson was abysmal on the Marr show yesterday.
The sooner we split from this wretched UK the better.
Meanwhile on another planet the leaders for Scottish Independence squabble with each other over the most trivial little things like P4’s in a playground.
Get a grip folks.
@ Breeks
‘I would rather have an ogre in charge who did the right things to defend our Nation, than a populist, lightweight egotist who hasn’t a clue.’
Absolutely, that follows my own feeling. I’d rather have a Bruce who succeeded than a Wallace who failed.
@ Ian Brotherhood
‘NS, for all her faults, doesn’t look 50.’
Maybe there’s a portrait in the attic? 🙂
@Breeks
I have this idea that there is a department for the union inside MI5. This consists of a team of handlers, they are not public figures but they are in positions close to the SNP leaders. They do psychological evaluations and work out how to manipulate. They also find out secrets to use as subtle threats.
With NS they homed in on her insecurity (imposter syndrome) and started feeding her stories about Alex Salmond. He says ‘you are not up to the job’ Driving a wedge
Then they went for her so called feminism. NS loves to think of herself as a feminist. I would guarantee that one of the alphabet women is a MI5 operative. They convinced NS that the women were telling the truth. NS chose to believe them over AS. Because the wedge had already been driven.
They did similar with Humza, who was actually very popular, until his handler homed on his emotion reaction to racial abuse and convinced him Hate Crimes was a good idea. Destroying his popularity and giving the unionists a huge stick to use in the Spring.
That’s how I believe it works the victims NS and HY don’t know they are being used but they are.
Ian Brotherhood says:
4 January, 2021 at 9:06 am
FWIW I favour simple blackmail. Worked with Blair and heaven knows how many others in the Labour and Liberal movements generally…
I certainly don’t exclude the possibility.. the character flaws I’m speculating upon would actually make it very easy to entrap somebody…
But the entrapment (which might very well be there), hardly seems necessary. Just look at Nicola Sturgeon waltzing in to the Section 30 Cul de sac, and digging her own grave declaring all routes except Section 30 to be ‘unlawful’. That’s a strategy straight out the Homer Simpson rule book, with no Mr Burns in sight.
@Gullane 04,
Are you now saying the leadership or demise of Sturgeon is a trivial thing? That’s progress.
Bob Mack says:
4 January, 2021 at 9:59 am
I agree with Breeks. However the British State dont manufacture incompetence. They simply use it to their own ends as in this case.
Yes! Spot on.
Hatuey,
It’s a grotesque abuse of state power and I find it distressing that some people wish to overlook it for the cause.
Rev Stu,
You have something to say, publish it. Fuck them and fuck their corrupt COPFS.
“You don’t write because you want to say something, you write because you have something to say.”
F Scott Fitzgerald
”
Hatuey,
It’s a grotesque abuse of state power and I find it distressing that some people wish to overlook it for the cause.
Rev Stu,
You have something to say, publish it. Fuck them and fuck their corrupt COPFS.”
You gonna do the jail time for me? In a virus pandemic? I’m afraid I’m not as brave as Julian Assange.
Today could be the day that the free press is systematically murdered:
https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-julian-assange-london-espionage-02df3aa0c24a7e4e2391554304a47386
There seems to be a few poster’s on here making excuses for Sturgeon via covid so maybe they would be happier over at the National.
Sturgeon is a parasite and a nasty one at that who seems to have plotted to send an innocent man to prison and who has not only betrayed a movement but a people.
I for one would not be happy if she ever came to handling separation negotiations as i believe she would sell us out.
Clyde, I don’t think the general public will have much of a choice in regards to what vaccine you are given, regardless if was the Pfizer or Oxford. I’m nervous of any vaccination of course myself, this is the result of increasing anti-vax propaganda and government conspiracies to sterilise the general public or whatever… But I will take the vaccine when it becomes available. I put human lives before any anti-nationalistic agenda.
“However the British State dont manufacture incompetence. They simply use it to their own ends as in this case”
I cannot see any scenario where after spending decades working in the SNP Nicola’s flaws and “incompetence” would not have been more than obvious by 2014 if that was ever there in the first place.
If that incompetence was that obvious, I cannot possibly for the life of me entertain the idea that Mr Salmond, an incredibly wise, resourceful and strategically minded leader, would ever allow her to take over from him at the most crucial point of Scotland’s history. He had to trust her enough to finish the job he had started. I do not believe he was such a bad judge of character.
Even at risk of being seeing as stubborn, opinionated and pigheaded, I simply do not believe this is a mere case of incompetence/character flaws of Sturgeon. There is much more to it. What has caused it, I do not know but her actions very much seem those of somebody who has been compromised and is now, willingly or unwillingly, working for the opposition.
We saw a definite change in her trajectory around 2017, after the first “now is not the time”. It is like the engines of the indy cause were at that point switched off. Ever since, rather than push the indy cause forward, she has turning on her own troops to viciously attack them every time they showed as much as an inch of dissent or questioned her ways.
It was at that point that independence was put in the fridge, the same year that a lukewarm GE campaign led to losing 35 seats, including Mr Salmond’s (I am still convinced he did not just “lose” the seat, by the way), the same year when it become a priority to stop Mr Salmond to return to front line politics and the smearing of Mr Salmond kicked in at full throttle.
It is all on the perspective you look at things, I guess. But I do not see Sturgeon’s “lack of” strategy in 2017 GE campaign, or her handing the S30 as a veto to the Uk government, or her capitulating to Westminster’s sovereignty, or her letting the genderwoowoos to take over the NEC to block Ms Cherry, alienate female voters and divide the party in half, letting our mandates expire or wasting every opportunity to progress independence as incompetence. We would not be talking just about incompetence. This would be incompetence on industrial scale and this level of incompetence does not just resurface overnight.
What looks like incompetence to the Yes side, looks like strategical genius to the no side. Just saying.
Interesting article:
https://www.sundaypost.com/fp/news-special-alex-salmond-challenges-accuracy-of-snp-chief-peter-murrell-sworn-evidence-to-holyrood-inquiry/?utm_source=twitter
I think sadly much of the disappointment with Sturgeon was originally created by ourselves. Speaking for myself only, when she assumed the mantle of leader I had great expectations of her. She was a great orator and our MPs certainly in most cases, seemed knowledgeable.
I made allowances for mistakes I perceived because I thought there were plans being laid to give us the opportunity for another referendum. This was reinforced when I was asked to contribute to a referendum fund.
Sadly one crushing blow after another caused me to re examine my view of MRs Murrell and her tenure as leader.
I ask myself the simple question. What would Alex have done with the opportunities presented to us on a plate by Westminster to end the Union.
Never mind preferring Alex as a leader. Im talking about Alex the Statesman and strategist. What would he have done over the last four years to maximise the Indy vote?
That is the difference. That is why Nicola fails the comparison. We need a Machiavelli.
“Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
3 January, 2021 at 7:07 pm
“Parliament is in recess until the 12th Jan but who will be called that day has not been published yet , It could possibly be Geoff Aberdein and Liz Lloyd has they haven’t been called yet .”
For reasons I legally can’t tell you, it definitely won’t be Geoff Aberdein.”
Would the reasons be similar to any that might explain why we have not seen any written evidence from Aberdein published by the committee?
Assange free
Well done to all campaigners like our own Craig Murray.
I know you have your own cross to bear Craig, but you have highlighted so much to help Assange. I salute you sir.
Good to see the ISP getting on with deeds and not words, https://www.barrheadboy.com/an-important-press-release-from-isp/
@Stusrt MacKay
Much more like it. Vkte ISP on the list. They have stated their intent and must be backed by us.
Nicola Sturgeon decided to call the request for Section 30 order the Gold standard and then tried to get the rest of us to believe we where actually getting some better than the Claim of Right when she was actually passing our right to be Independent into the UK hands and that’s where its laid since she took office. Sturgeon isn’t being coerced into anything by the British state I’ve never heard such nonsense, I have don’t know how many times people need to be told even by Leslie Evans that the UK government told Nicola and the SG not to go ahead with the policy that almost jailed Alex Salmond. Sturgeon decided to follow on the back of #metoo and make a bigger name for herself, her being leader of the SNP and Scotland is about power money and what ever she can get out of it while she can and unlike Mr Salmond Nicola isn’t interested in puting country or party before herself that evident. The Scots would be better of if she stood down and moved to London.
Whilst I appreciate and respect others opinions that it’s a stretch to assume NS has always been a pawn of the establishment, I firmly believe that it’s not a stretch but rather obvious that she currently is, and has been for a considerable period of time.
I believe that it goes something like this…. the British secret service have been actively involved in the Scottish independence movement and the SNP in particular for decades.
Since oil was discovered and looted from Scotland waters, they have influenced policy and infiltrated the highest levels of the organisation.
This was in response to the very real threat that Scotland could break with the union through huge popular demand once the people realised just how affluent Scotland could become.
So the brit government owned press and media went to town (and still are), claimed scotland to be an economic basket case, and that Scottish indy would be disastrous for Scotland and the Scots themselves just weren’t up to the job of self government. We all know the lies.
This is classic psychological warfare used on a population to manipulate and control.
This was used savagely in the north of ireland at the same time.
They managed to infiltrate and cause bloddy division in the republican movement. IRA and INLA civil war, whilst the most thuggish and high ranking enforcers were actually working for the british state.
The tactic is to infiltrate so deeply to cause utter division that the enemy is weakened and their threat neutralised.
So to NS…. a young fired up teenager with political aspirations has her talents spotted by the SNP leadership and the brit secret service.
Both have an interest in her rise to the top. One to have her lead the cause to freedom, and the other to obstruct it.
Those close to her ensure her rise is facilitated. Doors open and opportunities arise.
Special advisors, politicians and those with an agenda make sure this happens.
For the pro independence leadership, the torch can be passed on, for the brits, they own the leader of their biggest threat.
Through bribery, blackmail, coercion and control, the brit secret service want payback and they own the leadership.
They will cause division, corruption crime, anything that discredited their opponents.
So we have the scandal, of the stitch up of AS. Nature denying policies, one time credible politicians becoming utterly inept and mere pawns for unionism, floating under the term gradualism.
I hope I’m wrong, but given how the brit state operate it’s hard to find a simple explanation of the state the indy movement is in, with such an open goal in front of us.
Why, why this close to independence are we not being more ruthless?
In all situations where state control is suspected, ask, who has the power to organise this? Who benefits? Who has the power to cover it up?
All fingers point to the brit state!
Do we really think they couldn’t or wouldn’t do this to the SNP?
I’m not saying we cant fight this, I’m saying we need to be more aware of the enemy within .
Great article Rev.
I agree with many of the posts 1. Needs to be a plebiscite election in May and 2. Unlikely to happen if NS is still in post and 3. Can’t see her doing the dignified thing by stepping down, it’ll most likely end up a vote of no confidence.
I’m sorry Geoff Aberdeen won’t be appearing at the enquiry. We all know meetings were held on the 29th Mar and 2nd April, what I’d like to know is when these meetings were set up. I presume NS must have agreed to be there but she also must have known what was on the agenda and despite her claims of ignorance that most definitely must have been before the 29th.
Good article from Iain Lawson.
https://yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com/2021/01/04/the-nicola-loyal-is-the-real-problem/
Great comment from Breeks.
I also think the British state are ace at using peoples flaws.
We have all heard the ‘reasons’ for supposed blackmail but if true why the hell would anyone think the British state would ignore it. It would be a gift handed to them all wrapped up in a bow.
Angus Macneil has broken ranks, thank you, Angus, there is no secret plan.
So there we have it, no reason to hold noses and vote SNP for constituency vote unless a plebiscite election is promised on pain of resigning, if it doesn’t happen.
Great news about Assange, now he should be released.
Ronald Fraser @9:49
“If it came down to a choice between the english Oxford rat’s pish vaccine or Domestos, I know which one I will be using,,,and it will definitely not be anything produced in engerland”.
We can get that for you Ronnie, or lend you a bawb or two, whichever…
Oops, sorry, meant to say “Clyde”, but why bother, we see you – again!
While I don’t doubt that there are sleepers within and close to the SNP feeding info to the British state, I’m not buying this “Sturgeon must be compromised” line.
She could’ve been identified at an early age? So what? She could just as easily have met the love of her life at the local disco, lost interest in politics, got married, had a family and we’d never have heard of her.
So Murrell must be a sleeper and his mission was to marry the up-and-coming star? Doesn’t add up either… what if she thought he was a dug?
For all the talk of underhand and shady goings-on, nobody is asking the obvious: why wasn’t the main threat to the establishment, Alex Salmond himself, bumped off? Or why, given that he himself wishes he was “a better man”, wasn’t he subjected to some honeytrap setup that would then be all over the press 24/7? However… nothing. Why think long-term and go for the rising star when you could defang the snake straight away? Especially when there was no obvious replacement thus leaving the good ship SNP completely rudderless.
And why did Westminster advise the SG NOT to go after Alex Salmond? The conspiracy theories just don’t make sense here which might of course mean that the reality is a hell of a lot worse.
Could Wikileaks not publish the material?
Terrific news about Julian Assange. I find few details confirming his actual release, but John Pilger has Tweeted that Assange has been discharged by an Old Bailey judge, so I think it’s true.
Time will tell what his state of mind is after all this, but maybe 2021 is going to be the Year of Payback…
How does this play out for Sturgeon but? She must know if she can’t deliver an Indy Ref 2 she and the SNP are finished. Yes she might hang on for a couple of years as FM but she’s done that already and will be a lame duck. If she can deliver Indy she will have most to game as will no doubt become the first Scottish PM and continue for years to come. I think this explosive Salmond stuff will be more of a damp squib with most of the electorate not giving a shit. If she can’t deliver Indy Ref 2 soon that will really be the end for her.
Great news about JA. They anticipate the US will appeal the decision and they have 10 or 14 days to do so, so for that reason (from what I read) he may not be released just now.
Fingers crossed that they don’t and he can go home.
Have paid a visit to Scot Goes Pop. I have always rather appreciated his site and the work he does, though I don’t agree on everything. Think its a real shame both he and the Rev no longer get on, but that’s their story.
Sadly, I was hoping one of the questions he would ask in his forthcoming polling was regarding peoples’ attitude to a Plebiscite Election…
He is not going to do so, and dances on the head of a pin regarding all the reasons for not. One being that the SNP are not going to do it, so what’s the point of asking?
I would think that if the public clearly support a Plebiscite Election – the SNP’s refusal to entertain it would speak volumes about their genuineness with regards achieving Indy.
Perhaps the ‘calming’ influence of the National is at play once again.
So, to round up SNP policy at the moment.
Only a S30 is ‘legal’, there are no other routes – and your a tractor for mentioning it, eventually (with a few more mandates) the BritNat Tories will be nice and say Yes.
‘Only when it can be won’…. and no campaigning is to be carried out to increase support for Indy, so that time never gets any closer.
Only when support is 60% or over… and no campaigning is to be carried out to increase support for Indy, so that time never gets any closer.
A Plebiscite Election for Indy has no support amongst the public, in fact it would scare them, but we don’t have any figures to substantiate this opinion, so we will make sure not to do any research amongst the public so we can still say it, and there will be no campaigning in support of a PE, or for Indy, as that would mean we would have to do something to achieve Indy.
St Nicla, she’s not perfect, but isn’t she lovely about the Covid, not like that nasty Boris chappie. COVID, COVID, COVID, LOOK AT THE POLLS, LOOK AT THE POLLS, NOW IS NOT THE TIME, GIVE US ANOTHER MANDATE, NEVER MIND BREXIT, POLLS, POLLS, POLLS.
By wrapping herself in the Scottish flag is Nicola Sturgeon trying to use the Independence movement as a human shield and a springboard for her elevation to higher politics? Such a hustler.
Great news about Julian Assange ,let’s hope this is an end to his persecution , the man should have been lauded for his contribution to real , truth-telling journalism rather than subjected to the State-sponsered torture that has been inflicted on him .Noticeable the total silence from the self-styled ” Progressives ” in Scotland ( and elsewhere ) on the subject these last years , reflective perhaps of the climate that’s been created where mere accusation of sexual impropriety is tantamount to guilt , we don’t have to look far to see other examples
” sponsored “
Pete Murrell the Romeo Agent. Oh yes.
@Breeks
He’s not released there is a bail hearing on Wednesday
The USA is appealing
Grouse Beater says:
‘Pressure from the electorate, the public mood, can see the nefarious removed from office. Scotland is a small country. When the smell of corruption hits the air no one need go fishing. Just use an aquarium.’
Couldn’t agree more GB. I think that’s why Ms Sturgeon is ‘going abroad’ so much these days. Covid and talks with, and to, other countries are keeping the lid on the kettle for her at the moment.
” why waste AS used bumped off” ?
It’s more beneficial for the brit state to discredit its opponents than kill them.
It’s also easier to label conspiracy theories to things they dont understand.
Much easier to think it’s all just one big coincidence.
Plebiscite Election… sign here
https://www.change.org/p/the-snp-make-may-6th-holyrood-election-a-plebiscite-on-scottish-independence?recruiter=1171406145&recruited_by_id=0fac6d90-4afa-11eb-b5a5-4b9b9716d0b9&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink&utm_campaign=petition_dashboard
Excellent piece, Breeks (5.49am)
‘…. a narcissist can be easily played by sycophantic flattery and hearing whatever it wants to hear.’
Spot on.
The Murrells have used their control of personnel selection in every area of the SNP to ensure that the sycophants dominate. The tiny number willing to challenge their opinions are isolated and subjected to endless attacks.
That will change rapidly as the scandal breaks.
The self-centred sychophants will turn on the Murrells and each other, as they fight desperately to preserve their own positions.
“I respect your authority, but I’m only trying to support cognitive democracy.”
Since your idea of respecting my authority appears to constitute spamming the thread with another half-dozen posts of links to impenetrable academic papers rather than discussing the issue like a human being, I can only possibly interpret that as deliberately provocative trolling, so you can go away now.
As much as I’ve tried to avoid it, I suspect that will be one of my most popular decisions ever.
Mr Wings.
Patience can sometimes get in the way of necessary reaction to unnecessary behaviour:-)
Good move IMHO
Good news about Mr Assange too:-)
“What happens if there is no clear victor in a leadership election after Sturgeon stands down?”
How could there not be a clear victor?
I was simmering with anger by the time I finished reading that article (linked to) in the Sunday Post.
They tried to railroad Salmond. It is so fucking obvious.
What amazes me is how brazen they all were doing it, in their actions and in their lying now to cover it up. To the point they didn’t / don’t even see it anymore, with their own lawyers basically telling them they are not touching it due to how bad it looked. It is like they all feel untouchable. I wonder why…
The Crown Office absolutely stink in all of this from start to finish. Their actions throughout have been truly ‘contemptible’. And then they go out and charge Craig Murray for it. What a sick joke, it really is.
It is continually shocking to me to witness all of this happening in Scotland and most shocking of all is that it is all happening under Nicola Sturgeon and and an SNP government.
I think we have got to the point where it is massively ‘in the public interest’ to have all the information leaked somehow. I am not suggesting this site do anything but someone needs to. This is their game and their rules and we are not going to ‘win’ anything playing by them.
If they want to start putting people in jail for it then great, I guess we are going to have our own class of political prisoners now in Scotland, another glowing achievement under Nicola and Peter. They came close with Salmond and now they are trying for Murray (and the journalist as well).
If it was not for this site and Craig Murray we simply would not have known what they tried to do.
Sorry Rob @ 12.43
No chance. Change.org are a data harvesting organisation with strong ties to Labour. Neither Holyrood or Westminster have to acknowledge them, a complete waste of time, effort & a danger to your personal information.
Rev, I have engaged with Cam before to no avail, I welcome your decision as he has given himself more than enough rope & hanged himself with it.
Now for the continuously re-appearing couple of xenophobic roasters that are on their 4th or 5th incarnation now.
Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
4 January, 2021 at 12:47 pm
As much as I’ve tried to avoid it, I suspect that will be one of my most popular decisions ever.
YES!
“I have don’t know how many times people need to be told even by Leslie Evans that the UK government told Nicola and the SG not to go ahead with the policy”
I am not quite sure that is what they said at all to be perfectly honest. The wording we were shown from that particular email was this:
Sent by UK office on 17 November 2017 to Hynd:
“This feels very uncomfortable to be highlighting a process for complaints about ministers and former ministers.”
[redacted] doing a quick review for Jeremy on whether our processes have kept pace with developments/concerns – would it be possible to wait for this?
Is this process/guidance more than you have in place for complaints about current or former civil servants?
Happy to discuss it easier
[redacted]”
My own interpretation of what that email reads is “this” whatever that is, “feels very uncomfortable” as an excuse to highlight a procedure against current and former ministers.
At no point they say in that email not to go ahead. They are asking them to wait to see if the UK office had “kept pace with developments/concerns”, whatever those “developments/concerns” are. In other words, the Scottish civil servants were trying to align policies to protect themselves because from Hynd’s email sent to the UK office on the 16th November 2017, “Leslie was keen that you had the chance to see the proposal a) for any
thoughts/advice you could offer and b) to make sure that any approach of this sort
would not cause difficulties at your end of things”
An approach of “this” sort. What sort? Tailoring a complaints procedure to catch “a former minister” kind of sort? A political sort?
Isn’t that incredibly bizarre that the Sgov civil servants sought advice from the UKcabinet office on a complaints procedure against ormer ministers when they do not even have a complaint procedure for former civil servants at all and the UK cabinet office did not have idea if the Sgov have one?
What “difficulties” could the UK office possibly be expecting to encounter if “this sort” was merely a routine policy update process affecting exclusively the Scottish government?
On that email sent to the UK Office by Hynd on the 16th November – he also says:
“As we have just briefly discussed, I attach a draft paper setting out the process to be followed in the event that we receive a complaint of sexual harassment against a former Minister. (For completeness, the draft also describes the process for dealing
with a complaint against a current Minister.)”
“a former Minister” not “any” former minister or “former ministers” like he uses the plural for “current ministers”. It is just one.
From those words you understand that Hynd had discussed with this person from the UK cabinet office previously the complaints procedure against “a” former minister while the part regarding to “current ministers”, is just included in the attachment “for completeness” of the review, but secondary to it, if you like. The part they were concerned about is the one relevant to “a former minister”.
This email was sent by Hynd to the UK cabinet office on the 16th November 2017.
Let’s bear in mind that Sturgeon did not give the go ahead to make the policy extensive to former ministers until the 22 November.
Let’s also bear in mind that by November 20 Somers had already met with one of the complainers so this strongly suggests that by the time Hynd contacted they UK office on the 17th, they already knew a complaint was coming.
In my stubborn opinion as an old fart it is naive to think that Mrs A or B contacted on their own accord the sgov out of the blue when the alleged abuse took place years before, right at the precise time the policy was in the process of being drafted and before it had officially been made extensive to affect “a” former minister. They had to be either tipped off that this process was ongoing or directly contacted by the Sgov. I also think it is naive to think that by this time, the UK office did not know exactly what this procedure was all about and what its main aim was.
I am adamant none of these people, Holyrood nor the UK office, expected in a million years this procedure would be successfully contested in a court of law because they knew it would not stand up to scrutiny. Their best bet was if Mr Salmond was subjected to a crippling smearing campaign or to embroil him in a criminal case expecting he would have to give up the judicial review before reaching a verdict or before they were put in the position of having to collapse it to stop compromising evidence reaching the public. They clearly grossly underestimated the strength of the man.
You can read the trail of emails I am talking about here
https://www.parliament.scot/HarassmentComplaintsCommittee/Phase1FN30.pdf
@ Mia 4 January 2021 at 1:09
Needless to say that what we are missing from that email trail is the elephant in the room:
the actual review of the Uk cabinet office that was sent after their email on the 17th November 2017.
Why hasn’t that info reached the Parliamentary Inquiry? Was it because it was given by phone rather than leaving an “uncomfortable” written proof of it?
To Cameron Brodie: I have been reading this site for years. You have been boring me for that long. Your commentary is of PHd level and therefore unnecessary. If you were clever enough you would be able to reduce your text to quantum physics level and explain it all. You are aware of the saying……….if you can’t explain quantum physics to a 10 year old then you do not understand quantum physics. Please……enlighten us by reduction.
Rev. Stuart Campbell @12:47 pm
Just want to say thanks. This was a decision that needed taking. A lot of people tried to steer Cameron in the right direction but the effect never lasted long.
The place just won’t be the same without him – hooray!!!
Al-Stuart, I sincerely hope you are right. Nothing would please me more than to see Alex Salmond bring the sword of Damocles down on Nicola Sturgeon’s head. It would be poetic justice at its most eloquent.
Interestingly, Wikipedia says the following about King Dionysius:
“Dionysius committed many cruelties in his rise to power, such that he could never go on to rule justly because that would make him vulnerable to his enemies.”
Mia says:
“He had to trust her enough to finish the job he had started.”
Mia, unfortunately it is the ones we love and trust the most who can hurt us the most deeply.
David Lyon says:
Could Wikileaks not publish the material?
David, Wikileaks is not such a bad suggestion!
Sometimes, less is more.
@Rev Stu 12.47
Hallefuckinglujah!
@Rev –
Is there any chance of an amnesty now for those who lost the rag with CamB sooner than you did?
(Asking for a ‘Friend’)
😉
@Ian Brotherhood,
Maybe after the appeal stage has concluded ?
Free the research paper_____one!!!
Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
4 January, 2021 at 12:47 pm
RevStu, much as I appreciate the thought of never having to scroll past one of his posts again, your almost infinite patience with the Spameron did you great credit as a human being, particularly given your spiky nature.
Couldn’t you find it in your heart to bring him back and give him his own permanent thread where, like some doddery old git bumbling around in a potting shed, he could endlessly post links and prattle away to himself…
@ Mia
‘Their best bet was if Mr Salmond was subjected to a crippling smearing campaign or to embroil him in a criminal case expecting he would have to give up the judicial review before reaching a verdict or before they were put in the position of having to collapse it to stop compromising evidence reaching the public. They clearly grossly underestimated the strength of the man.’
I agree with a lot of what you state here except I believe their best bet is exactly what came about – they’ve kept him from standing for politics again, from engaging publicly against brexit, from campaigning for independence, and now the inquiry still ongoing might well keep him silent on all those things until after the next election, depending on how long that drags on.
They probably didn’t care if his judicial review was successful, whether he was acquitted in the legal case or if the inquiry finds in his favour. I know the inquiry isn’t really about him, but any slap on the government wrist is finding for him regardless. As you say, whether Salmond was caught tight in a trap or Sturgeon and her government were proven culpable was equally good for unionists and Westminster, neither is good for our side of independence.
‘Good move IMHO’
I’m not so sure. The very popularity of some decisions makes me against them. The majority is very often whipped up and easily led after all. Besides, what happens if the loud majority gets a taste for it and start to complain about another person or trait hereafter. Though even handed banning for all comers for the same crime is welcome, something about some responses just seemed vindictive to me, though I know none involved personally and have no bias for or against any. As Hatuey has said before some others took up more inches with their complaints than one individual did, so I had to scroll past their screeds far more than the original complained of.
@Polly
That’s a deeply disingenuous response. Rev Stu was more than patient with Spameron, to the extent that many regular contributors gave up altogether or posted less often. The frequency and volume of Spameron’s contributions was the main issue, twinned with the fact the vast majority were irrelevant to the thread they appeared in. As Stu also pointed out Cameron also exhibited a total inability to distill the fruits of his research, or – which is much worse IMO – even use the interminable cut and paste links as the starting point for any discussion.
His contributions won’t be missed by the vast majority, nor will his abuse and petulant responses to those politely asking him to pipe down. It was quite obvious to any reasonable poster that the quality of threads improved when Stu moderated Spameron previously: it was like night and day.
Those bloviating about it being easy to scroll past, or the complaints exceeding the posts (which is bollocks by the way) are entirely missing the point: no sensible blogger could or should have to put up with one individual spamming his threads with 30-40% of the total number of comments. It not only annoys many contributors it’s just downright rude and presumptuous: why should Spameron think he had the right to parasitise Stu’s very popular and well read blog as a platform for his own monomania? It’s obvious there was some want about the guy, but honestly anyone defending his entirely baleful influence on this place over many months needs to give themselves a good shake!
“Why think long-term and go for the rising star when you could defang the snake straight away?”
Because it may have not crossed their minds that starting on 23% support for indy in January 2013 the SNP would ever be anywhere near to deliver independence?
Because they may have thought that his loss in indyref2014 would be enough to completely finish him and the SNP’s politically and would set independence back for decades like they thought devolution would do before then and like they think now further devolution or “constitutional reform” will achieve?
Because if they went too soon and failed in their quest to move him out of the way they would only help to boost his popularity and the SnP’s as anti-establishment even more?
The only real time they realised just how dangerous Mr Salmond and his SNP was and how incredibly close it was to deliver independence was September 2014. The May 2015 election was a confirmation of this threat and changed everything.
If you can kill three birds with one shot, why would you waste two extra shots? And if you can make it look that it was one of their own who sold them out, why would you expose yourself by walking into the picture?
What are the odds that getting Sturgeon on board on the smearing of Mr Salmond and this botched complaints procedure was aiming to finish politically not just Salmond and Sturgeon, but the SNP altogether as a trustworthy pro-indy party?
I mean, look at where we are today:
1. She is finished politically.
2. He has been trapped into fighting to restore his own reputation
3. The SNP is in total disarray and unable to capitalise on its own wins
4. The Scottish government is completely discredited, ignoring votes from parliament to release evidence and holding on to that evidence to stop it reaching the inquiry
5. the Scottish Parliament is being presented as a toothless parochial assembly
6. The justice system in Scotland appears to show signs of corruption
Who is the real winner on all this? Who will be the real winner if the SNP goes into that election wounded, riddled with division and with a tainted leader? Who will be the winner if the electorate in Scotland thinks having our own parliament and government and separate legal system only opens the door to more corruption?
It isn’t the Yes movement or Scotland, that is for sure.
We need another indy party contesting constituency seats and we need it pronto. It is clear as day that for one reason or another we can no longer rely on the SNP to deliver indy any time soon.
“I believe their best bet is exactly what came about – they’ve kept him from standing for politics again, from engaging publicly against brexit, from campaigning for independence, and now the inquiry still ongoing might well keep him silent on all those things”
It is my opinion that one of the main objectives of the smearing campaign against Mr Salmond initiated back in 2017 of which the complaints procedure was just one step, was to keep him out of politics and public life permanently to stop independence. The other aim was to present Sturgeon as corrupt leader and the SNP as a failed party. I am also of the opinion that for this plan to succeed, Sturgeon needed to be in it from the beginning, so she is no innocent flower.
So far they have succeeded only in two of their aims. The ridiculous way Sturgeon attempted to taint Salmond in that Sky interview or that ridiculous letter sent on behalf of the alphabet accusers attempting to smear him after the criminal court case ended proves to me that they do not think the job is done and they fear him returning to politics as much today as they feared it when the smearing campaign started. Not only they have left him unscathed politically that they made him emerge now as the only honest one of the whole lot.
One of the first things politicians learn is that the only thing that matters for their success is perception. It does not matter an iota if somebody is guilty or not. What matters is that the person is perceived as guilty by the electorate. Well, they failed. The electorate is not perceiving Salmond as guilty as this corrupt cartel intended. They are perceiving him as a victim of a vile political conspiracy to terminate him politically because his opponents are so mediocre and so crap that they would never in a million years manage to beat him at his own game.
One of the most important measures of success in a leader is their ability to direct a movement without having to be constantly at the front pulling forward. Mr Salmond is that kind of leader. The release of his and Mr Neil’s recent paper proves that while he may not be in front line politics, he is not far of and he does not need to be at the front line to exercise a big influence. And that is why they fear the man with every inch of their beings.
@ Andy
Not disingenuous at all. I am well aware Stuart has been patient for some time about this issue – not only with Cameron but with the opposite side and your good self in particular, being the most noisy and intolerant of the posters against – and you were indeed the one I thought of when I talked of whipping up opinion. You too helped create much of the ‘binfire’ sections.
‘nor will his abuse and petulant responses to those politely asking him to pipe down’
really you’ve the cheek to talk of his abuse when you constantly call him ‘spameron’ and far worse. Or when you criticise Peter Bell as being a ‘blowhard’ and worse – Andy you’re guilty of many of the things you claim to dislike and have certainly no room to talk of others in this situation. As to why any ‘sensible blogger’ would put up with it, that is up to them even though you had plenty to say about it when they did put up with it. Stuart obviously did try hard and he’s had his own reasons now which are not yours. And any sensible blogger would and will do things his own way and not listen the loud, persistent ‘bloviating’ of those complaining of his choices of who posts on his site. No doubt you follow that rule on your own, so perhaps next time don’t be in such a hurry to tell Stuart what he should do on his, after all that would be ‘downright rude and presumptuous’.
Polly says
I’m not so sure. The very popularity of some decisions makes me against them. The majority is very often whipped up and easily led after all. Besides, what happens if the loud majority gets a taste for it and start to complain about another person or trait hereafter.
I don’t think Wings supporters are vindictive Polly, the ones I’ve come across have been particularly sensible, tolerant and generally kind (that includes you of course:-)). I was simply offering my personal opinion as to Mr Wings response to the poster. I’ve actually clicked on a few of the ‘educational links’ offered by Cameron and frankly, out of context, they were meaningless to the conversation being pursued in the comments. However that wouldn’t have bothered me overmuch, given that we have a choice to read or not read and I just needed to show some self-control. BUT about a week ago, Cameron B revealed that he had ‘purpose’ ‘intention’ in posting all the irrelevant links and at that point I simply have to say that if that ‘purpose’ or ‘intention’ does not marry into what Wings is posting, then he should find his own place to make his own mark on the internet ‘academic’ community and stop hitching a ride on Wings excellent and hard worked-research and writing. I don’t go for witch-hunts or bad-temperedness but when a poster continually writes with a personal agenda on someone else’s blog in such a way as to annoy people without adding very much relevance to the topic then ….
@ holymacmoses
No I never meant any were actually vindictive – least of all you – but there was something unpleasant in much of the talk about one person and some responses did leave a bad taste. Even the fact certain details of health were mentioned I felt, and feel, should never have been raised, no matter the reason on a public forum. I actually agree with you (and others) about many of the links, like you I’ve clicked and sometimes found something useful, but more often not, or if there were gems in there the papers were too dense and it was too time consuming to find them in the haystack. But as far as the ‘binfire’ comment sections went, many were at least as guilty as he, and I think perhaps more so. I wish you a good day.
Certain posters could be classed as unionist patsies rather than trolls. For example, those who are too self-indulgent and perhaps too naive to realise that disrupting threads plays the unionists’ game for them. There are others who encourage the patsy to further excess, maybe for commendable reasons, maybe not, and become patsies themselves.
Unionists don’t need trolls when they have patsies.
Don’t think this has been posted previously.
https://twitter.com/Documark/status/1345838800178733059
@ Dan 5.43pm thanks for that link Dan very apt as there are many discussions re the same up thread , will we ever be rid of the putrid rank corruption within our establishment
——————————-
Mia all posts well done but stop it you are frazzling my brain
Polly @ 3.38
I tend to agree with you there.
I very much enjoyed Cameron’s extremely cutting wit, which few equal, and which I felt to be authentically Scottish, linguistically and philosophically.
His complainers for the most part appear to lack wit. We live in a society nowadays where many complain, mostly on dubious grounds it seems, and this has become the norm, as reflected in what passes for Scotland’s ‘justice system’, and some of the more bizarre laws we see going through Holyrood.
Might there be a link – between the demand for ever more complaining and the widening scope of those wielding power in society to punish others? Colonialism, we may remember, is itself a scourge, that is, a form of punishment, invariably internalised in order that the colonized groups holding power (‘devolved’ by their colonial superiors) further oppress the colonized community.
Cameron, I think, was also on the right track in terms of pointing folks toward the often rather obscure scientific basis explaining Scotland’s enduring political stasis and colonial and cultural oppression, which really do underpin the motivation for independence. Being an academic I remain grateful for that.
Cam, if you’re reading in, you could always try what’s known as a “Ronald Fraser”! 😉
Admittedly you’ll probably have to raise your stealth game considerably higher than RF’s lacklustre efforts.
A start would be dropping the links coz alert readers might just clock the posting style, but your own thoughts and input when you posted them in the past were worthy in their own right.
Maybe a new chapter begins with adapting and developing an alternative modus.
If you decide to take a sabbatical then all the best and keep well bud. 🙂
The best trolls will generate sympathy from (rather naive) users of the very forum they are trying to wreck. Chapeau Mr Brodie. A solid 8 out of 10 on the trollometer for pulling in so many suckers.
Great decision Rev. Gave him just enough rope.
It wasn’t naivety on my part but probably the reverse, nor was it sympathy for any individual but the belief that such obvious trolling behaviour is likely to make him one of the least dangerous of those who frequent this site. The real danger to independence was always likely to be from an avenue least expected and one with far more stature.
It seems to me that there has been enough to point to a concerted effort over the last few years to isolate Wings from other segments of the independence movement. To some extent, from some quarters, that was always there, with the arch feminists I heard during/shortly after 2014, but I’ve noticed in the last year a similar push from other directions who aren’t the purer than pure or rise or even trans type. The various estrangements that have sprung up with other bloggers, whoever was at fault, serves to isolate Wings from the independence community as one by another they are, or he is, cut adrift. What might be more natural than that a similar picking away at individual long term friends of this site should happen next to isolate Wings from its supporters? I thought this block was bad because it came on top of the previous one, and even quite a few others from the time I’ve been here. The choice of who is blocked is no business of mine, but the pattern is more concerning. And though I complained of people whipping up opinion this time, that seems to have been happening for a while. If it continues it might indeed leave Wings with few genuine supporters which some seem so gleeful about postulating means any future crowdfunders will flop. So my concern was the pattern that might be developing and where that is likely to lead.