The topical news quiz
Your first question, Ian Murray: who is the First Minister and leader of the SNP?
Ooh, sorry, zero points.
Let’s just look at that quote again, in some confusion.
“She will be the first Prime Minister or First Minister in history to be arrested by the police, and indeed the first current or sitting leader of any political party since Jeremy Thorpe in the 1970s.”
(1) She is of course NOT the first (former) PM or FM in history to be arrested. She got her predecessor arrested on trumped-up charges of which he was acquitted.
(2) She is not the current or sitting leader of any political party. She resigned in mid-February and was replaced in both roles by Humza Yousaf at the end of March.
(3) Jeremy Thorpe resigned as leader of the Liberal Party in May 1976, long before being arrested in 1978. He was acquitted of conspiracy to murder in 1979.
We know contempt of court laws place heavy restrictions on what you can say about an ongoing investigation, but we’re pretty sure you don’t have to pretend the last four months simply didn’t happen. Someone buy this man a newspaper.
He’s not the brightest guy to begin with and probably letting understandable excitement fluster his speaking today.
If Ms Sturgeon had no recollection of events some 50 times during the Alex Salmond inquiry one doubts that she’ll be saying much more under caution.
It can only be hoped that Messrs Salmond and Murray are enjoying a sense of satisfaction, equalled only by the apprehensions the Alphabetties should be feeling.
If Ian Murray has a brain cell it must surely be dying of loneliness.
Loved the ending by the interviewer who thanked him for giving the time to speak to her. Fact is Murray would have crawled over broken glass to do the interview. In fact Labour would have had the petted lip out if the beeb hadn’t had someone on from their ranks.
He was also allowed, without challenge ( like “well why have people voted for them all this time?”) to repeat that everything is crap in Scotland.
If the interview showed anything it’s level of prejudiced ignorance in the BBC.
Police statement released at 2.28 pm today says ” a 52 year old woman has been arrested …. as a suspect”
The Police statement then goes on to remind of the Contempt of Court Act and the need for restraint on social media.
Iain Murray has certainly not done that broadcasting on the wires that her arrest was not surprising and inevitable given.. ” the scandal that’s engulfing the SNP and it’s finances”
Folks would be best advised to wait and see what is going on.
Disappointed to see Murray not wearing his butcher’s apron suit.
The story is in the New York Times.
Wasn’t Boris Johnson charged and fined not so very long ago?
Ok, he might not have been arrested as such, but he did get a fine, and so too did the present Prime Minister.
Clearly this anti Scottish renegade from Labour is trying his best to make it sound as bad as it can get, but if he doesn’t know she is no longer in Office, then he is way out of touch.
Unless he might think Nicola Sturgeon is secretly still in charge of SNP?
I’m guessing MSP Sturgeon will probably be released with the usual “investigations” ongoing comments. It was a pre arranged date with Police.
At any rate, she has brought this upon herself, just as Boris Johnson brought everything on him.
SNP leadership was well warned about its financial accounts and those warnings were dismissed out of hand.
Also, SNP leadership basically betrayed the membership over Independence, but as so many gave their unwavering trust to Nicola Sturgeon, they went along with it.
Now they see the deception or simple outright betrayal, and with Humza following the exact same path, many of the members, ain’t happy one bit!
Nicola Sturgeon IS still in charge of the SNP. Pay attention.
I just don’t know how I am going to get through the next few days, hours, minutes and seconds until the next post from WGD!
Willie says:
11 June, 2023 at 5:01 pm
Police statement released at 2.28 pm today says ” a 52 year old woman has been arrested …. as a suspect”
How can Police Scotland possibly know she’s a woman? I hope they asked her pronouns.
There should definitely be one charge against NS and that’s impersonating a first minister. Going to be a long few hours for “fingers” Sturgeon
I think he also said her husband and MANY others have also been arrested towards the end of the interview. Might be misremembering but can’t be arsed to check.
Him and Jackie Baillie are two cheeks of the same truth vortex.
Seeing as how we’re not allowed to talk about a live police investigation, how about we start talking about exactly how the SNP got to where it is now and precisely what (if anything) can be done about it?
I now view the independence game as being like one of snakes and ladders. Alex Salmond took us within sight of the final square on the board and then his successor came along and we found out too late that we’d landed on a snake taking us all the way back down to square two. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the party has now imploded, infiltrated as it is by unionists and greens, both pushing their own agendas at the expense of independence.
I have to concede that I for one didn’t see any of this coming. In common with many others, my thinking was that having got so close in 2014 all that was needed was one more push to get across the finish line. How wrong I was. Nine years later we’re further away than ever from that finish line and the person I blame for that state of affairs is currently in police custody.
Why did Sturgeon not submit herself voluntarily to make a statement?
I don’t know about buying him a news paper he needs a brain.
Ach I am sure it will just be a no comment interview
She’s out already “pending further investigation”.
Police Scotland are good at pending.
Ian Murray comes along just to give everyone a laugh.
The serious question is who votes for these people like Murray?
Sturgeon released without charge.
Enquiries continue, one has to be careful what one opines at this stage, suffice to say I hope justice is done.
“Someone buy this man a newspaper.”
Run that by me again?
That WAS satire, yes?
And not in any way a serious suggestion that it is possible to obtain accurate and truthful information on any issue or matter from a media run entirely by the propaganda arm of the security services?
LA to Police Scotland, I’ve spoken with my pal Sturgy and she’s agreed to come in for a wee chat today, go easy on her but keep her for a few hours to make it look good, then let her go without charge, add in the pending further investigation bit to keep her detractors on the edge of their seats.
Ian Murray MP or as he better known in Scotland Union Jack Suit Man, why would anyone in Scotland listen to him, when his party is nothing more than a London branch office in Scotland, British Labour in Scotland (BLiS) wants the status quo to remain.
Think the only way a newspaper is going to impact this one is if you roll it up and hit him with it.
Well, well, well. Oh, indeed, well, well, well, well. Michty me. And on the Sabbath too…
Do you think if charged, she would prefer a jury or just a certain lord Braxfield.
The alphabets must be bricking it cause she won’t protect them now or woman H
Karma’s a bitch
I might need to see a doctor to get the smile off my face
Looks as if Ian hasn’t been getting enough hydration in the hot weather. Not that he ever dazzles people with his intellect anyway.
Shug at 643pm,
I think you are right. A lot of very anxious people around Scotland tonight, wondeing if theirs is the next hoose to get visited by the polis.
Never mind if any end up in prison they can always share their cell with thon male rapist they think is a woman – in the name of ‘inclusiveness’ you understand.
Must take some amount of alcohol to be completely oblivious to all that went on in the day job this year, so +1 for that 🙂 (-1 for not making the connection between scandal of the moment and its timing/ choreography though!)
As to any alternative excuse required, would it be unfair to label him as a fully over paid member of the institutionally racist society police Scotland keep banging on about – or is his apparent confusion between Humza and Anas entirely understandable now that their underlings all sound the same (vow/devomax, women with penises, mandatory burkas for seasonal flu, arbitrary punishments for women of independent mind, etc, etc)
I’m glad she’s getting a taste of her own medicine after the hell the 24 team police task force and trial by media Alex Salmond was out though.
She’ll be on the front pages of all of tomorrow’s papers. You’re nicked!
If only Nicola’s behaviour was more becoming of a former first Minister.
If only there was a menchanism in place by which to investigate the former first minister Nicola Sturgeon’s behaviour.
If only she’d been a better woman.
If only.
Rev’s tweet here links to Sturgeon’s statement on release.
Mind-boggling brassneckery.
https://twitter.com/WingsScotland/status/1667948266040721411
lexo says : innocent until proven guilty and let her have her day in court …
the ambassador says : let’s not jump to conclusions
fake nat bloggers say : it would be wrong for us to comment and we must let due process occur
dana scullivelli says : SHES A WITCH BURN THE WITCH SHE CAVORTED WITH LUCIFER AT A PRIDE MARCH AT WHITSUN SABBAT … oh sorry, thats another piece I am writing, what I meant to say we should distance ourselves from what may be a politicslly motivated witch-hunt by establishment enemies who are sexist misogynists transphobes … phew …
Nikki says : fuck the pigs ahm no a grass – also a big boy did it and ran away (donald findlay would weave a not proven from that)
we might be looking at indy the wrong way – once holyrood has proved itself to be as incompetent, inefficient and incorrigibly corrupt as westminster, we will have proved ourselves worthy to join the ranks of other western countries
a swiss acquaintance was asked of his country, much admired :
– it’s corrupt as hell …
(eh, whit)
– they are just VERY ORGANISED ABOUT IT
maybe that is the best you can do
and HUMSA sweats – what was in that package Sturgeon told me to hold onto for her … BUT DONT LOOK INSIDE IT, EH?!
MI5 Agent released without charge! Surprised not Sherlock!
Humza on Kussenberg thinks his deal with the green party is “worth its weight in gold”
He thinks he’s not paying business tens of millions of pounds in compensation.
I’m sure there’s going to be massive scale legal action from all of the big chains. Scotland’s poor will pay the price for Humza’s mess.
Detective Plod: “For the record, would you please confirm your name”
You know who: “I don’t recall”
Detective Plod: “I’m sorry?”
You know who: “I can’t remember”
Detective Plod: “I’m simply asking you to confirm your name for the benefit of the legal recording”
You know who: “I’m sorry, but my memory isn’t terribly clear on that”
Detective Plod: “Can you please state your name!”
You know who: “I’m uncertain as to the specifics”
Detective Plod: “Oh FFS!”
Quality Polis! Saving taxpayers’ cash for overtime / weekend work by having she / her in ‘n oot quicker than it takes to do a dual-mass flywheel and clutch on a Mondeo!
Ach, aw this was probably jist an orchestrated and elaborate ruse to get a polis mugshot to add to her selfie album bucket list.
A more accurate description might be the first FM and political party leader by proxy perhaps ?
Ian Brotherhood.
The stitch-up.
Hasn’t Sturgeon got the sense to realise the effect of her statement of ‘I am innocent’? Two other people arrested and released in similar circumstances have not protested their innocence publicly like she has.
By going public like this is she she not prejudicing the position of the other two, and trying to influence the outcome of a potential trial?
It was different in the Salmond case – he was the only potential/actual defendant, so he was free to claim his innocence without it affecting others.
Is her public pronouncement not contemptuous?
An observation: Sturgeon says today, ‘I know beyond doubt that in fact I am innocent of any wrongdoing’.
But innocent of what Nicola? What wrongdoing?
It is another classic example of her sanctimonious bullshit – she knows we know virtually nothing at all about the police investigation, so she can say she is innocent because there can be no scrutiny about what she means. And even if we did know, the media couldn’t discuss it because the investigation is ongoing!
If she really were keen on showing she is innocent of all ‘wrongdoing’ she could have instructed her officials to make it totally clear what has happened to this 600k any time in the last year or so. But course that didn’t happen because they hoped it would never be necessary, and frankly it still looks like it never will. But either way, this does not look like the (non) action of a totally innocent person does it? Though it may mean that when it comes to the law, they can pin nothing on her (or anyone). That is what she means by ‘innocent’.
Ian Murray is a miserable fat British Labour thug squeezed into a cheap suit,
he works for the British state to undermine his own country.
Sturgeon is still FM and leader of the SNP im all but name. Useless is just her stooge puppet.
The 600k walked to the shops and spent its self, think we are F*cking stupid and some are for listening to Sturgeon for so long.
A yone seen the bit of craic going round with a picture of Sturgeon sharing a cell with Isla Byron.
I had a wry grimace at that. Very apt, a chap wouldn’t know which way to turn.
But tell me this. What is actually going on?
@Merganser/Southernbystander –
Aye, *what* wrongdoing?
What was she referring to?
We know for fact that she misled the Scottish Parliament how many times? If that’s not wrongdoing, what is?
So she’s referring to…what exactly? The missing dosh? Conspiracy to pervert the proverbial? Giving false evidence under oath?
We won’t know until we find out what she was asked about.
Polias eccose
“Mrs murrell – that your name
“Sorry i can’t answer that -there is a live police investigation going on
Mmmmmmmmm
Southernbystander.
Up to now Sturgeon has repeatedly said she can make no comment on an ongoing police enquiry. Now she feels free to pass comment on it as it affects her, regardless of the effect that will have on the position of others.
If she had said ‘Ihave no doubt that Peter and Colin have done no wrong’ as well, that would have been something, but it’s always me, me, me, me, and bugger anybody else.
I can’t believe any legal bod advised her to come out with this statement. She should have just kept her trap shut and prevented any speculation about what she meant, and the effect of it on others in any potential trial.
” ‘I know beyond doubt that in fact I am innocent of any wrongdoing’”
How can she know beyond doubt anything at all when she systematically forgets, cannot remember, cannot recall or is not sure of anything?
She cannot have it both ways.
Ian Murray. A man who talks in paragraphs and thinks in syllables.
Willie @ 8:44 pm
“But tell me this. What is actually going on?”
I hear that a member state sanctioned UN job starts soon, perhaps as the new ‘global champion for gender equality: https://www.unwomen.org/en
Nobody in the SNP appears to have heard of C-24, the UN’s Decolonization Committee. Pity, they might have discovered the meaning of independence!
As Frantz Fanon said: “colonialism is in fact the organization of a Manichaean world, a world divided up into compartments.”
It says a lot about how far down the wormhole we are. That no-one is shocked at Sturgeon’s arrest. I just shrugged my shoulders. I didn’t even know until someone sent me a message.
@Oneliner 9:51pm
You are definitely a paratactic commenter, Oneliner. 🙂
So Sturgeon is “arrested” then released without charge after several hours of “questioning” pending further investigations”?
Anyone buying into this clown show needs put in a padded cell. A proper arrest should have taken place months ago and unannounced. She knew this was in the offing and would have been very well briefed with very expensive legal advice. Not to mention all the time in the world to get rid of anything incriminating and to get stories synced etc.
____________
Hoozat Useless being quoted by the BBC in Scotland saying “the SNP could make life very difficult for Labour in a hung parliament”. And anyone buying into that shite needs put out of their misery, pronto. The establishment will ensure, in the event of a hung parliament, that its 3rd Westminster Brigade, the LibDems and Ulster Unionists will be called into play LONG before they even contemplate giving Sturgeon’s Nonce Party any consideration. Anyway, *IF* hung parliament. And if my aunty had balls she’d be my uncle. All this shite is intended to plant fake possibilities into the heads of indy voters. The SNP are desperate and shitting a brick at the thought of being removed from the trough feeding frenzy they’ve become accustomed to.
Useless is also being quoted as saying: “It’s obvious that independence is not the consistent settled will of the Scottish people.”
FFS! I don’t even know where to start with that sack of smouldering excrement. I wonder what, *exactly*, he considers “the consistent settled will”? We had 20-odd pre pandemic polls on the bounce putting the majority in favour of independence and wanting indyref2. And you SNP scumbags threw it all away.
Anyway, Useless, the will of the Scottish people has to be *worked on*, something not one of you filthy Sturgeon troughers have done in over 8 years. Nothing other than roll out Mike Russell’s horse-box trailer as the SNP’s big secret weapon. Was that, by the way, intended for hitching to the back of the motorhome?
We’re fucked, folks! Truly fucked! And i’m starting to get serious misgivings about Salmond and ALBA too. They need to be doing a whole lot more than just issuing soundbite emails every Friday for those who have subscribed. They need to be going all out on a war footing, i’m tired of nicey nicey. We’ve done that and got nowhere. Westminster needs confronted, not appeased. If we truly have rights then someone should be leading the charge to defend them at the Court of Human Rights etc. I’m seeing absolutely nothing. I’m starting to question the speed at which Salmond got in and took over control of ALBA, and now they appear to be just stagnating.
It’s all far too depressing. And for a movement that was once driven by nothing but positivity? That hurts like hell.
I’m off to my bunk. G’night, Troops!
Scot Finlayson says on 11 June 2023 at 8:31 pm:
“Ian Murray is a miserable fat British Labour thug squeezed into a cheap suit, he works for the British state to undermine his own country.”
Correct! And with “Loyalist” leanings too. I wouldn’t piss on him if he was on fire.
Goodnight, Troops!
Alf Baird,
still dribbling on about colonisation?
Nobody has been worried about that since 1946. It all got sorted by the mid 1960s. Time for you to look forward in life, not backwards.
Has she gone yet?
A spokesperson for the party said it was “co-operating” but MacNeil has suggested Sturgeon should be sin-binned until the investigation is officially closed.
“This soap-opera has gone far enough,” he wrote on Twitter.
“Nicola Sturgeon suspended others from the SNP for an awful lot less!
“Time for political distance until the investigation ends either way.”
Alex Salmond was presumed guilty until proved innocent.
Will the 52 year old woman arrested today be given the same treatment?
What happens with that campervan?
Does it really need to be kept in a polis lock up for the next five years it takes for the Crown Office to slow walk the case out of any relevance?
Summers here, surely someone ought to make use of it. All those poor sods who chipped in.
Can I remind Ms Sturgeon that as this is a ‘live police enquiry’ she should not be making any public pronouncements on the matter particularly since her memory is so bad.
Did she remember anything about anything the Police asked her about?
If Mia, Tinto, BDTT, Lorna, Breeks, Joe, Stoker and many other notable regulars here would like to consider submitting expanded comments to offtopicscotland.protonmail.com, they will be very welcome.
So I’m told anyway.
Hoots all
😉
Someone better warn the residents of Santorini that there’s about to be a shortage of whitewash…
A question for all previous supporters of the SNP.
Was the bar to being suspended in Sturgeon’s heyday set pretty low? I think it was, but it’s not my specialist subject.
And has Yousaf now raised it to be impossibly high?
Cmon folks,,,hold it together.
The Trolls have slowly but surely been sidelined by the majority of Wingers.
Only the usual suspects can’t resist replying to them.
So keep up the good work and sling these Yoon Trolls a massive deefy.
They are wankers of the highest order.
Just scroll on by.
IGNORE THE TROLLS!!!, no matter how nicely they try to reel you in.
Ron Clark,
since when did you get to define who has an opinion on Indy?
Since never, I’d say. With great confidence. And until you can prove your case, get used to contrary opinions to your’s being pushed at you, with great confidence.
Three is the magic number in rhetoric, but to explain why that is we have to check out the much more mundane number two first.
The human brain is a signal processor, a switchboard, if you like. It handles external stimuli through our senses and tells our bodies what to do with those stimuli.
But it’s also a pattern recogniser. And a brilliant one at that.
Even if we take two things that don’t fit we’ll find some pattern in them that does.
Mice and men? Well, they’re small and big. Cabbages and kings? One is familiar and accessible and the other grand and distant.
That’s just how the human brain is built, and it’s all the fault of God, and possibly Darwin. We see pairs and we see patterns.
But add another word and it become something else.
With a Tricolon you can set up a pattern and then break it.
“Lies, damned lies, and statistics” is a simple example.
Or Eat, drink and be merry. Or Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Or The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Or Truth, justice, and the American way.
The first two words establish the direction we’re going. The third twists things in a completely different direction.
This is, by the way, the structure of a certain type of joke.
Did you hear the one about three people in a strange situation? The first two do something you’d expect, but the third does something really weird.
It doesn’t matter whether you populate it with priests and rabbis and vicars, or with Englishmen, Irishmen and Scotsmen; it’s always the same basic joke.
When you finish a tricolon, you finish because there is nothing more to say. You’ve said it all. The list is complete.
This sense of completeness makes the tricolon ideally suited to grand rhetoric. The kind politicians and presidents like.
That’s why Barack Obama packed, I think, twenty-something tricolons into his wee victory speech.
Tricolons sound statesmanlike. It’s government of the people, by the people, for the people.
Although I can’t see what the difference is between “of the people” and “by the people,” but it doesn’t matter. It’s three and three sounds good.
Two is only a pair, and four is all wrong.
Churchill (yep, him again) tried a tetracolon, that’s four. In his first speech to Parliament as Prime Minister he told them that he had “nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat.”
But four doesn’t work and the line is remembered as “blood, sweat, and tears.”
It is always three and never four. Estate agents don’t use the rule location, location, location, location.
A variant of the tricolon makes them sound great if the third thing is longer.
The American way is made up of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The pursuit of happiness is, if you think about it, the least of the promises here. You can pursue happiness as much as you like, and most of us do anyway. We rarely catch it, though.
Life and liberty were the more important guarantees. But it sounds so good when you witter on a bit at the end.
The longest bit of the tricolon must be saved for last or it won’t work, even if it’s the least important.
Lady Caroline Lamb knew this when she called Byron “Mad, bad, and dangerous to know.”
And Shakespeare knew it when he wrote: “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.”
So, Tricolon. It’s three, not four, and useful to know.
Ron Clark,
I can’t speak for others but when I reply to people you may consider as trolls, I’m speaking to the people who are reading their gibberish. I believe their nonsense needs to be challenged, it’s perfectly normal to have a dialogue and a counter argument.
Of course, there is no need for screeds of contradiction and gainsaying.
I personally believe it is important that Unionists are allowed to make their rather embarrassing arguments public and that we do not create an echo chamber.
You are of course, entitled to disagree.
Breastplate, I’m an ardent believer in Scottish Independence, and firmly believe once Scotland resumes it’s Independence, we will pull away on a different trajectory like boat leaving the harbour.
We are a massive oil producer, but pay amongst the highest prices for fuel on the planet.
We are a massive electricity producer, but pay amongst the highest prices on the planet for power.
The way our people were dispossessed of their lands and homes is scandalous, yet the vast acreage of Scotland remains owned by a tiny, tiny, number of people.
All of our industries play second fiddle to UK industries.
The Union is a curse upon all of us.
Yet despite my passion for Scotland, and unshakable belief we are all living lives imposed upon us by greedy and exploitative colonial administration, a racket from start to finish, I remain a decent an honourable person, and feel no inclination whatsoever to head over to some Unionist blog or website, and make a nuisance of myself just to get under people’s skin.
Weeks before Blair Jenkins articulated the point back in 2013-14, I was already promoting the argument that if the UK Union didn’t exist, why would you invent it? It was never, ever, satisfactorily answered.
Whenever Unionists are challenged to make a progressive case for the Union, all you get is a load of pish about “punching above our weight” and being party to the West’s nauseating militarism and prejudices. There is NOTHING progressive throughout the Unionist’s entire arsenal.
I would actually like to engage with “genuine” Unionists who actually did believe in the Union, because if they were rational and objective people, they would have to concede that Scotland’s mismanagement under London Rule is a scandal of biblical proportions. It’s objectively the truth. I have yet to find one.
That’s why you don’t see Unionists engaging with the Independence arguments constructively, but instead you face an endless stream of trolls who don’t want a Union of equals, they want Scotland utterly subjugated and powerless to defend itself from exploitation. They want us, forward thinking Independentists, to be quiet and cease to exist. We are rocking the UK boat and must be silenced or discredited.
You will see it in every comment they write, that Scotland is bad, doomed, stupid, ungrateful, incompetent, naive, feckless, incompetent, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah… Tiresome, isn’t it?
They do not come here to engage with us, or persuade us our beliefs in Independence are misguided. They come to disrupt our conversations, be rude and insulting to contributors, break up threads of continuity, and above all discourage people from coming here and downgrade conversations held here.
It is the “Briddish” way. Anybody who doesn’t see the world through the British Imperial perspective must be derided and insulted. You can’t discuss the French without them being Frogs, the Germans are krauts, the Chinese are Chinks, Arabs are all Ragheads… The British will never knowingly engage with their “enemies” as equals, because the Briddish elite have to overcompensate for a truly massive inferiority complex with the delusion of British Exceptionalism.
The practice of “not” feeding Trolls isn’t about allowing their arguments to go unchallenged, but that they succeed in luring another individual off the path and into engaging with their bile, rather than keeping their eye on the prize. Job done for the troll.
They don’t come here to persuade you to be unionist. They come here to make you feel frustrated as an Independence supporter. That is how shallow and fickle the whole deal is. You’re not in a dialogue converting a No voter to a YES, you have a rogue on the line.
Don’t engage. It’s a bit like cold calls on your mobile. Once you’re “known” to answer and engage with the caller, the frequency of unsolicited calls goes through the roof because they’ve detected that essential seed of gullibility, – someone who doesn’t recognise the nature of the interaction, so the grifter is off to flying start.
Don’t engage with cold callers. Don’t feed the trolls. It’s essentially the same thing.
Will Hamas Useless have the determination to suspend his predecessor from the SNP and the Scottish parliament, given that she has been arrested and is now under major criminal investigation?
I stopped believing in “Trolls” when I was ten.
We are very very fortunate to have Mr Campbell running this site which is one of the best on the Internet.
Mr Campbell is a believer in freedom of speech, with the exception of personal abuse. His biggest problem is idiots, not so called Trolls.
Do you think she could end up sharing a cell with Jullian Assange.
After all they won’t want her to start blabbing about who did what to who or who is pulling the strings.
Or could it be a car crash.
Northcode , I am loving your grammatical input – keep ’em coming!
I very much enjoy your posts about rhetoric Northcode. Informative as well as fun.
Ron Clark 12.39am
Amusing how your comment triggers the ‘mea culpa’ and even the bot (“no matter how nicely they try to reel you in”).
Will Useless suspend Sturgeon the betrayer? not a chance if you ask me, yet folk have been suspended from the NuSNP for less.
It was sad to listen to Ash Regan’s interview on the colonial London controlled Radio Scotland earlier this morning, as she did her best to defend her party, a party that’s now in freefall, and is grasping at anything and everything to try and halt the plunge.
Asked if there should be a rerun of the SNP leadership contest Regan said no, it appears that just about every SNP MSP/MP is now in survival mode to secure their spot on the taxpayers gravy train.
Vote Alba, Join Alba.
Given this has been bubbling along for some time it is a bit of a coincidence that the police move the weekend following Boris Johnston splitting the conservatives.
Am I the only one that wonders if the timing is connected
Breeks
I had tears in my eyes reading your impassioned post. It is all so unfair.
Scotland, the Country, produces no oil and generates no electricity. Foreign Companies, operating in Scotland do.
There are 2 kinds of Independence supporters. One branch wants Independence end of. The other kind want Independence with a competent, honest, functioning Government in place or waiting in the wings. A government with economic/financial ability and a vision for the future that is backed up with accurate projections of where we could be. Where are these people to form such a Government and take us forward?
In your eyes, a troll is any individual who does not share your point of view 100%. I admit there a good number of like minded individuals on here, who to prefer to wallow in the past. I would be surprised if these individuals amounted to 2% of the electorate. Posting the same garbage repeatedly does not help the cause amongst the other 98%
It would help the Independence cause if people looked to the future rather than dwelling in the past. The thing is, events that happened years ago cannot be changed no matter how much you want them too.
It may surprise you to learn there are a lot of frustrated Independence supporters out there in both Independence camps.
Dictatorships only last for so long. In all walks of life compromise is required.
Look forward not back.
So the LA has sat in on forty SNP cabinet meetings since the police began its investigation, the Solicitor General, has attended Cabinet fourteen times in the same time period.
The LA is head of the Crown Office as well as being a minister and chief legal officer in the Government.
How long is ALBA gonna wait until expanding it’s representation? Defection from SNP is anticipated. Are those same politicians to remain as spies in the SNP camp, until the last possible moment?
The damp squib of SNP ‘Convention’, promises to cause the party more harm than good. Retaining Devolution, first and foremost on the party’s priority list.
I’m still not convinced that SNP is out of the woods, concerning its own financial stability.
No matter how ineffectual SNP Indy policy, I’d assume that beaks in Whitehall will do their utmost to prevent SNP from recovering from its self-made calamity.
Annihilation of SNP (a clean slate) would be the preferred option, even to many of it’s former members.
A blessing, in diguise? At least, the pretence would finally be over!
Karma is a bitch eh
Steepbrae, intit!
As many have posted before, this is not just about sturgeon its about the rest of the gutless trash that represent the SNP and are just as responsible for its downfall.
Vote them out and vote Alba in.
Another outburst about trolls on the day the darling of the Indy movement and Scotland’s Mammie gets her collar felt by the polis.
FFS, some of yous really do still believe that only yous have the answers and the nous to set out a viable future for our country.
It’s laughable conceit, and indicative of cognitive dissonance so big it can be seen from orbit.
Meantime, the rest of the world is pointing and laughing at the only Independence movement in history to have outsourced its leadership because the nation and culture seeking independence couldn’t find anybody up to the job. FFS, read that paragraph again, why don’t you. Keep reading it until the sheer, risible horror sinks in.
So, cut out the whinging about trolls, don the hairshirt of humility and accept that you had the chance to do Indy your way. You spectacularly blew it. So it’s back to near Square 1.
And new ideas and new approaches are bloody obviously necessary.
Breeks,
I think I understand you’re stance completely, unfortunately I’m not sure you understand mine.
As I have explained, although I may answer who you deem as a troll (how do we know who is and who isn’t, I think some people confuse mischief with actual ignorance or stupidity) the arguments I put forward are for consumption by a wider readership, those who may see merit in the hypocritical and illogical arguments of the Unionists.
Regarding trolls, who decides who a troll is? You’ve been here long enough to know that pretty much anybody can be accused of being a troll, I’ve been accused on a number of occasions and I know others have been accused of being a troll that, in my eyes, are quite obviously not.
If disrupting the thread makes us a troll, then I’m afraid nobody here would be allowed to answer anybody on anything, we’re doing it right now.
Does it matter if a thread is disrupted?
No, it doesn’t.
Does it matter to what extent the thread is disrupted?
Yes, it does.
There’s a difference between healthy and unhealthy debate.
On some of the threads previously, there were a bit of to and fro-ing, nothing excessive in my opinion, this then lead to Wilson McBride posting screeds of links to Unionist outlets in a show of petulance a toddler would be proud of, he then became the troll of those particular threads. CameronB was also more than excessive with his posts, there are others.
Again, I see nothing wrong with asking so called trolls to explain their stance, it allows everyone to see their workings and how much thought has been put into it or not.
Of course, I agree that there is no point in repetitive gainsaying.
If you think all dissent must be quashed then we will have to agree to disagree, I think debate is needed, I certainly wouldn’t want to frequent an echo chamber, there are other sites that already wear that badge.
Breeks, in essence, I think this site could do without Trollfinders General and posters should apply a bit of common sense in how long they engage with others they don’t see eye to eye with.
“To find myself in the situation I did today when I am certain I have committed no offence is both a shock and deeply distressing.”
She showed no understanding of the shock and distress of innocent people such as Michelle Thompson, Craig Murray and Alex Salmond when action was taken against them.
Hehe,
Sooner or later someone will post the right comment BTL.on here,
Northcode,is interesting though!
One step back… two steps forward…see…(or don’t)…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE6YAjFucdQ
Chas says:
12 June, 2023 at 9:33 am
Scotland, the Country, produces no oil and generates no electricity. Foreign Companies, operating in Scotland do.
What absolute piffle. You are absolutely wrong Chas.
Scotland DOES produce those resources, and they are resources which belong to Scotland.
The fact these resources are being plundered and pillaged by “others” outwith Scotland does not nullify the “theft” of said resources, and furthermore, the degree to which a nations resources are plundered to benefit others with nothing recovered to benefit the Nation’s people, is a recognised yardstick to judge the degree of colonial exploitation occurring in that nation.
By your argument, a thief is not only entitled to steal, but also entitled to profit from the sale of the goods he stole, based upon the “logic” that the owner should have / should have sold the goods themselves. Theft is still theft, although the British Empire has never been troubled by the concept.
These are Scotland’s resources being pillaged, assets which should only be exploited for the benefit of those who own them, Scotland’s people.
Scotland’s people are being robbed of their Nation’s vitality, and we are witnessing the hollowing out and asset stripping of Scotland for the benefit of others while the people are being kept powerless to prevent it.
If you want to shill for the Union, “meh none of it belongs to Scotland”, then stop masquerading as a supporter of Independence.
You continually whine about those preoccupied by Scotland’s Constitution, then reveal your own towering ignorance about why colonialism is so acutely relevant to Scotland’s current predicament, and what can or cannot be done about it.
Perhaps you need to read more, and talk less.
What is the easiest, quickest way to report this to COFPS and Police Scotland? Lets all do it.
It was never “Scotland’s” oil.
Even in the brief and ghastly days of the Weegie tyranny known as BNOC, the North Sea was never developed by Scotland.
The oilfields of the UK sector of the North Sea were developed by American and Dutch and French and Norwegian companies. BP, formerly Anglo-Iranian and before that Anglo-Persian, was the only significant British player.
Scotsmen swept the decks and cleaned the toilets offshore in the North Sea in the 1970s and ’80s in the same way Philippinos do nowadays.
@jockmcx 10:43am
The first 20 seconds of the monochrome YouTube video in your link.
That’s me! Me and my girl, Mae, out for a Sunday walk. Ah, happy days.
Everything was just so…well, black and white back then.
Not like now, and by now I mean here in 2063. Here, and ‘now’, things are so much more complicated.
And I miss, Mae, too.
Breeks says:
12 June, 2023 at 11:00 am
Chas says:
12 June, 2023 at 9:33 am
Scotland, the Country, produces no oil and generates no electricity. Foreign Companies, operating in Scotland do.
What absolute piffle. You are absolutely wrong Chas.
Scotland DOES produce those resources, and they are resources which belong to Scotland.
———————————–
So breeks only scotland should be paying the windmill subsidies then rather than the rest of the uk? It will put leccy bills up 10 fold in scotland but thats ok with you? lol
Thank you, Dorothy Devine, and thank you, too, Beauvais
Breeks
‘Scotland DOES produce those resources, and they are resources which belong to Scotland’.
Please let us know how Scotland produces them? I think that you will find that mainly foreign based companies produce them. How can anyone think otherwise? Unless you try and nationalise the Companies that do so, at a cost of hundreds of billions, in an Independent Scotland, you are simply just wrong. Perhaps you can advise where the cash would come from?
The rest of your response is the usual emotional guff we have come to expect from the from the probably well intended but ultimately hard of thinking ultra nationalists and not worthy commenting on.
Perhaps you need to think more and comment less.
@Breeks says:12 June, 2023 at 11:00 am
assets which should only be exploited for the benefit of those who own them, Scotland’s people
Great post, Breeks.
I have a friend who believes himself to be a Sovereign Scot. Can you put a number on the value of his share of Scotland’s assets?
Make it a one-off lump sum, or a PA value. Either will do, whichever is easiest. Regarding currency, make it USD. Soz and all that, but he’s not yet ready to make the leap of faith to BRICS.
One other thing. If this is all beyond you, because nobody has ever done this, just say so. Don’t cloud the issue by banging on about trolls or whatever.
Soz, but there’s a second one other thing. If this is all beyond you, because nobody has ever done this, take a few minutes out to think on how that plays with the wider and more alert Scottish readership.
Show us the money, Breeks. You’ve wasted 10 years just telling us it’s out there somewhere. Time to step up to the plate and show us it.
John MacGregor
“Karma is a bitch eh”
Karma does tend to run over dogma – eventually.
“Ebenezer Scroggie says:
12 June, 2023 at 12:16 pm
It was never “Scotland’s” oil.
Even in the brief and ghastly days of the Weegie tyranny known as BNOC, the North Sea was never developed by Scotland.”
Scotland was NEVER in a territorial union, Westminster had absolutely no right to sell off our assets, it still doesn’t.
Sumbudy diddyit but we might have to wait on the sequel coming out .
There’s a book n film in this Mr Brotherhood lol.
I used to believe that if the ‘right’ political party could win an outright majority Scotland would be well on its way to independence.
I used to believe that our political leaders had at least a wee bit honesty and integrity and intelligence.
And I used to believe in Santa Claus.
So, I was thinking last night that maybe there was another way. Another way for Scotland to escape the ‘Union’.
And this came to mind.
Randolph Frederick Pausch (1960 – 2008) was an American educator, a professor of computer science, human–computer interaction, and design at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
In August 2007, he was given a terminal diagnosis due to pancreatic cancer: “three to six months of good health left”
He was a big Star Trek fan and William Shatner sent him a signed photograph, and on it Shatner had written the words “I don’t believe in the no-win scenario.”
For those who are not Star Trek fans Shatner was making a reference to the Kobayashi Maru test.
In Star Trek the Kobayashi Maru is a training exercise designed to test the character of Starfleet Academy cadets in a no-win scenario.
And James T Kirk is the only cadet ever to have found a solution to the ‘unwinnable’ test.
For those of you thinking what a fictional character in a fictional future has to do with Scottish independence, you should know that the fictional term, Kobayashi Maru, has been applied to real-world scenarios with no perceived positive outcome, or that require critical lateral thinking in areas such as climate change, constitutional law, and education.
Computer systems security specialists and educators have used the Kobayashi Maru to teach students to think like an adversary, and that by stepping outside the rules of the game the game itself can be redefined.
Kirk’s unorthodox answer to the Kobayashi Maru test has also been used as an example of the need to redefine the premises upon which an organisation operates — by changing the rules rather than playing within them.
So what was Kirk’s solution that allowed him to win in a no-win scenario?
It’s commonly believed that Kirk cheated, but that isn’t the case.
Kirk thought the test was fundamentally unfair. To Kirk the Kobayashi Maru test itself was cheating.
He believed the idea of an unwinnable scenario to be ludicrous, and that any problem could be overcome with intelligence and perseverance.
Kirk saw that the test itself was the problem, and he solved that problem by re-programming the game.
We need to understand that Kirk didn’t modify the Kobayashi Maru to win, but rather to make it winnable.
The game could still be lost if a player wasn’t good enough. But now that Kirk had changed it’s conditions, the game could now also be won.
And Kirk was a good enough player to win, and he did.
When a subordinate officer accuses Kirk of cheating, he replies “I changed the conditions of the test!”
Cheating is creating an unfair advantage, which Kirk would argue was the entire basis of the Kobayashi Maru test. That the test itself was a cheat.
By changing the conditions – by evening out the odds – Kirk actually made the whole thing more fair, the opposite of cheating.
The point I’m making is that maybe we should do what Kirk did when it comes to winning, what on the surface appears unwinnable right now, Scotland’s Kobayashi Maru scenario.
Maybe we should start thinking about how we could change the conditions of the game by changing the rules rather than playing within them – in a way that the united nations of the world would support, of course.
Because playing the game by the rules of Westminster’s unwinnable Kobayashi Maru scenario doesn’t seem to be working.