The Prime Minister is a lying idiot
The extremely sharp and perceptive New Statesman writer Stephen Bush buries some of his political insight in a daily email newsletter (because, we assume, his fax machine doesn’t work, you can’t send telegrams any more and London flats don’t have enough room to keep a lot of messenger pigeons or let you send smoke signals).
And it’s a lot easier just to quote you a chunk of today’s than it is to rewrite the same observations into a new article ourselves.
“Good morning. Will this be the week that spells the end of Brexit? That’s what Theresa May wants MPs to believe, at any rate. She will claim that she now thinks that MPs will react to the defeat of her deal by voting to stop Brexit rather than taking us out of the European Union without a deal.
But does she? One of the neglected aspects of May’s political style is that she is happy to say things that are untrue. Although there is a widespread belief that this is part of the average politician’s toolkit, most politicians lie rarely and went they do, do it awkwardly.
But May does it frequently and with great ease. From the man who couldn’t be deported because he had a cat, through to her frequent use of the term “implementation period” (there is nothing to implement and there may well have to be an implementation period after the transition period), the Prime Minister is a politician who is happy to say things that are demonstrably untrue.
She’s at it again in the pre-released extracts of her speech, looking back to the very close result of the 18 September 1997 referendum on whether or not to have a devolved legislature in Wales, saying “that result was accepted by both sides and the popular legitimacy of that institution has never seriously been questioned”.
Just one small problem, Prime Minister, I hate to mention it, but: the parliamentary Conservative party, including you, voted against the creation of the Welsh Assembly after the referendum. May voted to reject it at the second reading, and then against the motion to give it its third reading in December 1997.
She did the same with the creation of the Scottish Parliament and that referendum wasn’t even a close-run thing. To cap it off, she – and the rest of the Conservative Party, of which she was then a senior member – went into the 2005 general election promising to hold another referendum on whether or not to keep the Welsh Assembly. ”
Bush omits another stunning line from May’s speech:
But Scottish people don’t have to imagine that. It actually happened in 1979, when the first Scottish devolution referendum delivered a result almost identical to that of the Brexit vote (51.6% in favour compared to Brexit’s 51.9%, on pretty similar respective turnouts of 64% and 72%).
That vote was nevertheless overruled at Westminster – by the new Tory government of that year, on the basis of an amendment previously instigated by Labour MPs from Scotland – and not enacted until another referendum 20 years later.
Wings readers will of course be familiar, thanks to years of helpful training from Scottish Labour, with politicians who not only habitually lie on an epic scale but are so jaw-droppingly thick that they think they can get away with it in the internet age, when any idiot with a keyboard and an internet connection (*waves*) can immediately and definitively expose the lies.
We’ll be watching keenly, therefore, to see if any of the national broadcasters who will cover May’s speech today pick up on any of the above.
.
EDIT 12.25pm:
I’m not taking bets.
And don;t forget how WM over-ruled our Scottish Parliament last year when “No Consent” was taken by WM to mean “Consent Given”.
That’s May’s idea of democracy.
Just read that Theresa May is threatening to cancel Brexit.
For the last two years May has been banging on about the will of the (English) people must be respected, now it seems its the will of Theresa May that must be respected. Democracy trumped by Monarchy.
Why this is the first stop for political news (good or bad) relating to Scotland. There may be a slant and focus in the writing of WoS, but its only because the media in Scotland is so biased against free thinking that does not involve the ‘ Precious Union’.
Well done again for picking this up REV. Hardly read any print media nowadays. (Apart from the only Scottish paper)
When I heard TM on the radio this morning my initial reaction was ‘Eh??’.
To be fair, Sky’s Adam Boulten and another reporter raised this on his programme just after 10am today. He also gave a good roasting to rabid britnat brexiteer Esther McVey.
Bush’s view … “most politicians lie rarely and when they do, do it awkwardly.”
He doesn’t follow Scottish politics closely, I have to assume. He might be right about the “awkwardly”, but “rarely”?!
And, of course, most recently, the European Union (Withdrawl) Act has been used to effectively overrule Holyrood.
Well spotted, Rev. In 1979, George Cunningham may have wielded the 40% knife but it had Brian Wilson’s fingerprints all over it and there were suspicious glances directed at Robin Cook too at the time, as I recall.
Blue or Red Tories lie on an industrial scale.
And Donald Dewar’s statue can come down in jig time after independence. Where’s our 6000 square miles of sea, Poindexters?
Andy Murray going for it. X’s crossed.
Make it to Wimbledon? Please
And all this but Scottish papers STILL on Salmond.
Not just May. Virtually the entire cast of Tory Brexit gargoyles voted against Scottish and Welsh devolution and went into the 2005 General Election promising to reverse the result by another referendum if necessary.
They want to shut down Holyrood. The Tory manipulators. The Tories are intent on destroying Democracy in Scotland. They will not get away with it.
The Scottish/UK Press will pay at the Ballot Box for all their propaganda. Losing once again. Just a bunch of losers. Just a waste of time, money and paper.
Thank goodness for the internet. Rev Stu, Nana etc.
Have you noticed how the use of the phrase *R precious Union*
has been replaced by *our country*
You don’t need to turn your back on the Tories as they shaft you they do it right to your face
You could vote Labour and wait till they do the same thing behind your back
Or you could vote SNP and take our country back, y’now control of our everything instead of Westminsters control of spanking our Arses, you notice how they can’t do that to the Republic of Ireland anymore
Will May be defeated though ? She is currently handing out Honours to wavering MPS to buy their vote.
In any event we are talking about Scotland here and in my experience the wishes of the Scottish people do not matter a damn to Westminster.
We matter when they need us and our resources. We do not matter when we try to interfere in what they do with our resources.
We are a colonised people, but many of us think they are part of the colonists. Westminster will allow them to maintain the illusion of that distinction as long as it suits.
In reality they are just as manipulated as every other Scot is manipulated. They are useful idiots in effect
Throughout history the British Empire used British friendly natives who had been given preferential positions, to keep the rest of the populace in check, just as in Scotland.
Many of these found out eventually they too were expendable.
Westminster knows nothing of true friendship. It uses and abuses others to fulfill it’s own needs.
We must leave .
What was it May said? No Brexit is better than No deal?
Something like that wasn’t it? 🙂
We live in an era of utter incompetents and snake oil sellers. That goes for the press as well as the politicians.
The Prime Minister is a British Nationalist therefore she lies and she lies all the time about nearly everything. Sad but true.
David Cameron – the same.
Gordon Brown – the same.
Tony Blair – the biggest liar.
………………………. back through history.
Scotland needs and wants a fresh start. Terminate the Treaty of Union 1707.
She has lied and cheated her way to the top and if anybody thinks she is stupid they are mistaken.
Heartless,greedy,corrupt,insane are a few descriptions but stupid is not one.
And that is also why she will fall the tories in the shadows are used to getting what they want and contrary to what people think May has not been doing as they wish.
Haha she is a loose cannon and you can smell the terror coming from the tory old guard as more and more English people sit up and go eh WTF she is lying again we know she is lying again why are you not telling us MSM she is lying again to us….
But of course she will not fall until after brexit,beware the ides of March.
Rev.,
hold on, now you’re an “idiot with a keyboard and an internet connection (*waves*)”
I thought you were a knob with a blog? Much more catchy!
All reminds me of that classic advice to journalists … “One person say it’s raining, another says it’s dry. Your job is not to report the two views equally, your job is to look out of the window and see which person is lying.”
He msm in Scotland take their dereliction of role to a whole different level. To continue the analogy – they spray water on the windows, claim it’s raining, and say it’s all the SNP/SG’s fault.
Andy never made it but can still make it to Wimbledon etc. Still have a special place in Tennis history.
Well done Andy. A great professional future awaits.
We salute you Andy. All the trills and spills and special times. Still a great future in view.
Oh I don’t think so.
This bit I mean:
“We’ll be watching keenly, therefore, to see if any of the national broadcasters who will cover May’s speech today pick up on any of the above.”
The pick up I mean, not the watching keenly.
Me @ 12:20
I didn’ finish. He point I wanted to make was the msm in Scoland see their role as covering the backs of BritNat politicians and one of the main ways is to never challenge their lies. The integrity of the Union comes first and protecting lying scheming politicians is the objective.
Is May a more consummate liar than Tony Blair ?
It’s a close run thing.
From what I can see Theresa May is basically full of shit. She has lied and U-turned on so many things now, I have given up trying to predict what she will do next.
Apparently she is now bribing MPs to vote for her. Westminster a Parliament of scum. If we don’t break free from this corrupt outfit, Scotland will surely suffer.
Aye – just imagine if the unelected house of lords tried to change the Constitution against Scotland.
Well. you don;t need to imagine – it’s actually happening.
This Thursday, amid all the Brexit fallout and hoo-ha, when no-one else is supposed to be noticing, the H o Lords is timetabled to debate Lord lisvane’s New Act Of Union. They will be looking at the effects of Brexit on the union of the UK.
This is a new constitution that they are trying to push through without us noticing
Like the way the managed to get the Scottish Continuity Bill held up until the legislation was changed to make it illegal – without anyone noticing because there are no SNP Lords.
Careful what you wish for Cubby because it might just happen sooner than you expect – only thing being that this time they won’t even try to make it favourable to Scotland.
Here’s a snippet from a Welsh analysis of the Act
link to seneddresearch.blog
Most strikingly of all, there is a clause that provides that nothing in the Act will affect the sovereignty of the UK Parliament, which even retains the power to amend or repeal the Act of Union itself. Such a clause has featured in every devolution bill since 1886, with the exception of one Scotland bill in the 1920s. It is the essential difference between devolution and the federal or confederal alternatives. It is also in glaring contradiction with the commitment to the sovereignty of the nations on which the earlier part of the proposal is based.
Never trust a Tory.
Neatly done Rev.
So far. Carried in the Independent, Guardian and on Beeb news website (though fairly minor prominence).
The national broadcasters and print media in Scotland would like to make a sincere apology to our customers for making many many mistakes when it is deemed in the national interest of Great Britiain and Rprecious Union soon to be conjoined as one glorious country under our leaders in Westminster
We feel we have as broadcasters covered our Scotland region well and will continue to make every effort in the new constituted country to come while retaining a distinct Scottish theme to our programming as demanded by the separatists, and as we try to cater for all minorities those gutteral speakers in the northen high places will still receive a service although substantially reduced which we will *not normally* charge more for
If you agree to these terms and conditions press A if you do not wish to avail yourself of same press A and your wishes will be recorded though ignored
As a company Scottish press and media make every effort to maintain the Union in its current form and will continue to work hard to do so
Thanks A Nonymouse
OT
The only conclusion I can come to is that the media is being played like a one string fiddle that’s bent in the middle.
Play it again, Sam.
So TM tried to threaten the Remainers by saying vote for my deal or there’ll be no deal, and now she’s trying to threaten the Brexiteers by saying vote for my deal or Brexit will be cancelled.
That’s either incredibly naive and stupid, or it’s a rather sneaky way of kicking the can even further down the road towards no deal.
You decide.
Hello folks,
Re brexit. Does anyone else notice that for the upcoming meaningful vote, it appears the option to Cancel the whole bally thing – has quietly been dropped and we are back to the nonsense of TM’s Terrible Deal or No Deal, with labour and snp now demanding a PV?
Or is that just me.
Some quick soundbites for folk to disseminate.
Frictionless Trade amounts to £1 out of every £8 the UK ‘earns’ = 12.5% reduction Oh Dear.
Austerity cut Gross Domestic Product by 2%, and is not finished yet. So all the cuts to public services, was due to that.
All the reports for Westminster, Bank of England, Fraser of Allander, Scot Gov, EU. ALL of them agree…
A soft Brexit will cut between 2-3% GPD
A Hard Brexit will cut between 8 -16 % depending on what area of UK you live in, and will amount to 2million job losses, 80,000 in Scotland.
And with that exit go,
Holidays with Pay, Maternity/Paternity Rights, Part time working legislation, Working Time Directive ( really big deal for all our 24/7 emergency workers – ask them if they want to return to the old 7 day shift rota?)
And of course there is no way our NHS will survive this, neither will the Fire Service, neither will the Police. They just can’t do another round of 2% cuts, never mind anything worse.
Hope the above helps. At least it is unlikely to be disbelieved, since there has been no good news about Brexit ever.
Project Fear belongs to us now (whether we like it or not). We might as well borrow some of their tactics. They used the ratio 2:1 2 parts bad, 1 part positive (shared history, stronger together, etc).
I like your headline style Rev, potentially libellous, EXCEPT it is defensible as true (see text below) AND is fair comment.
Good job you’re your own editor and don’t rely on your reporters having access to press conferences etc or you would have been banned long since.
These sorts of things of course are why our press are supine in the face of such things.
i do however have small quibble, it isn’t that she is an idiot so much as she thinks the rest of us are to propose saying such manifestly untrue things. But then she is an idiot to not expect the howls of corrective outrage at the attempt. So fair enough.
It is entirely noticeable that the general media is completely writing Scotland and the SNP out of the Brexit scenario. They are of course giving wall to wall on the SNP civil war.
Carolyn Leckie is a must read in today’s National (again)and should surely be in our Parliament.
Can I repeat that any SNP figure, elected or otherwise, who offers the media opinion on the SNP leadership position is doing our opponents work for them.
Some whom I thought better of have already done so.
We all have our opinion and our conference chooses our leader.
Which, doing some associative thinking and missing out a couple of stages, would mean Indy Ref 2 is very close, very close indeed.
Incidentally – if the theory is correct about Brexit being all about saving the ultra rich in the UK from EU tax havens, then No Deal or Terrible May’s deal both deliver on that.
Hence the lack of any real opposition from Labour – the left cheek playing its part in the WM pantomime as usual.
Cheerie to all.
Seems the sage advice might be to never be the sub in an SM act without agreeing on a clear safe word or action and ensuring that you can actually give that signal at any point.
Not sure that that’s exactly what’s going on with Brexit but it seems close enough for horseshoes.
Tory Ruth Davidson blesses Theresa May four months ago.
The Scotsman:
“Ruth Davidson says Tory rebels must back ‘remarkable’ Theresa May”.
link to archive.is
What is the difference between a Chocolate Watch and a UK
Journalist?
The Chocolate Watch will tell the truth at some point in the day!
The first thing i’d like to see in an independent Scotland is a law against any Journalist who blatantly lies.
They are required to apologise, give a detailed report on where the lies where buried and major retraction story on the front page of the Rag they peddle.
If it repeatedly happens then the newspaper owner picks up fines that makes their eyes water.
Newspapers don’t make much money these days but its a tool of the
wealthy to drip feed the masses to their way of thinking so it will continue.
With the manipulation of the internet and dark money channels the
rich can ensure their puppets stay in power.
They are smart enough to let a New Labour Type win occasionally
as they are just as right wing as some Tory Governments that we have had and every bit as corrupt and greedy.
For over 100 years now the UK have gone Tory Labour, Tory, Tory,
Labour Tory.
Westminster doesn’t work for the working classes and they never
will now.
If Norway’s Oil Fund has over £100,000 in it for every single man, woman and child there, Scotland had exactly the same opportunity to do so having a similar population.
Now if the Oil Money had to be shared with the much larger UK population, roughly 13 times Norway’s, there should be around £7,500.00 in the Tory Treasury for every man woman and child,
we wouldn’t have had to sell our national assets such as BP,
ICI, Electricity and GAS companies, our infrastructure would be in 1st Class Condition, but No.
Scotland, a country never allowed to borrow in over 300 years, is informed that it has a share of a £2 Trillion Deficit run up by Westminster’s malpractice?
I want a Norway type deal but its nothing like the one the English Politician’s put forward. Its where Norway’s Money is Norway’s and it’s where decisions are made by Norwegians for the benefit of Norwegians and not the crooked nation next door.
Put nothing past the Tories, they are a scheming, lying lot who will plot against anyone that gets in their way.
When T. May says anything, think the opposite. Cancelling Brexit? She has no intention whatsoever of doing that.
As for Britnat politicians lying, it’s their default function, look at the scheming liars of the UK Tory branch in Scotland, and the UK Labour branch. They lied to the people of Scotland in 2014, with bells on, they lie now and will do so again when Scotland finally decides to hold an independence referendum. It’s either that, or, go under.
The Britnats in WM must have to attend professional lying lessons. These people are not stupid, but they are cunning and conniving, T.May is a dab hand at it, as were Cameron, and Blair, a Tory through and through.
Re: Meg Merriless @ 12.36
Thanks for the heads up on that re Thursday, that needs to be watched very closely Scotland.
@Effijy
A bit harsh on Sweden!
Never trust the tories. Every party who listens/works with them gets destroyed in elections.
The Govt always acknowledges and follows the will of referendums – except is it is Scottish eg 1979 used retrospective rules to disallow it – have the bbc mentioned this. Almost exactly what they have done at the moment to take powers back from Scotland.
BBC scotland would rather talk about snp ‘civil war’ than the most important issue of the day. The bbc manufactured civil way is opinion not fact.
The woman is a sociopath at best.
Most of party fall into the same camp give or take a few rare specimens.
I certainly don’t trust anything which comes out of any of her shower’s mouths.
Evan Davies just getting stuck into a tory grandee over T May’s statement that… ‘there has never been a referendum that this country has not honoured’.
Just using the example that she herself voted against a Welsh assembly so it’s quite a brass neck to use that as an example…. and mentioning the 1979 Scottish referendum which was supported 74% for 26% agin ( not sure I have the numbers right there). Of course, all totally denied by the MP being interviewed.
Maybe he reads Wings?
———–
Massive respect to Andy Murray for his amazing spirit today. True Champion.
“Most politicians lie rarely…”
Fuuuuuck off.
Meg Merrilees@5.22pm
I think you mean the 1997 Scot ref. The 1979 Scot ref had 52/48 result for devolution but was rejected by Westminster so we had to wait another 20 years.
Liar: Definitely
Idiot: Definitely not
Meg: at 12:36
Not simply one to watch: this shows WM sees no danger in inciting its colonies. Years gone by blatant incitement as this new Treaty of Union would trigger strife out on the streets.
Scots Government cannot let this slip by unremarked.
The memory thing Happens To the best of them, she will
Never be Among the Best of them
The MSM are a bunch of lying hypocrit wankers. They really must think we are totally thick to believe any of their shite. I happened across Liar Robinson’s garbage interview with Gove this am. He just let him gob off and talk shite throughout and then asked “do you mind if I ask you a question?’ Just another lying, little, Unionist creep trying to interview another one. Makes you want to spew tbh.
I think he should amnend the “politicians lie rarely” to ‘party leaders lie rarely’ Case in point being David Cameron on the Indy Ref. He said things like ‘there’s no reason to think Scotland couldn’t be a succeful independent nation’ whilst leaving Alistair Darling to do all the lying and carry out all the dirty tricks bankrolled by Tory money.
It IS easy to get caught lying. Although with an extremely lazy press staffed by what are laughably called journalists who rarely, if ever, check facts, we only have the occasional lie getting reported. And, when they are partisan as they are in Scottish politics – or flat out recruited – as with IndyRef (remember Cameron having a reception to ‘thank them for their cooperation’ during the campaigning??) then there is NO chance we will get to the nub of the truth.
Maybe, just maybe, we will have a free and fair press in an independent Scotland…
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