The worst apology in the world
Posted on
August 24, 2018 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Earlier this evening the Herald’s poor demented David Leask made an extraordinary and completely untrue allegation:
We haven’t said a single word on the subject (we haven’t a clue if it’s true or not), so several people challenged Leask on the claim, and eventually got a response.
We, um… we have no idea what any of that random collision of words means, but he does seem to have deleted the original tweet so we assume it’s his idea of admitting he totally made it up and saying sorry. Apology accepted, Dave.
Twunt.
He’ll maybe claim he was talking about the band!
Mad as a box of frogs..
‘Off’ as in ‘stale’, ‘unpalatable’, ‘potentially boak-inducing’?
Aye…
He really should be attending to other business, like updating his CVs.
He was in an emotional state and retired for a nap shortly afterwards.
I come up against loads of people like DL on facebook pages and to be truthfull it does wear you down as to how “thick”? people can be and there seems no way getting through to them, even to discuss matters in a reasonable way. I just end up shaking my head
BBC News going into overdrive at this very moment
Ahhh…the luvvies.
They all(well..not quite all) (BBC SCOTLAND/QUEEN MARGARET DRIVE)..used to home into the Doublet Bar /Park Road.
@scottieDog
do you mean Genesis or Wings 🙂
“His wee fans” Uh huh.
The height of journalistic professionalism right there. Everything we’ve come to expect really. 🙄
“Sorry seems to be the hardest word”, eh Mr Leask?
I do wonder now if Mr Leask has ever read The Sealand Gazette.
At least Mr Leask didn’t tweet this garbage on the same day that Murray Foote was blaming negative comments about Scotland’s print media, by some Nats, for the Sunday Heralds demise.
Cos that would leave Murray Foote looking like a prize chump, as well as the MSM in Scotland sounding really quite pathetic and small minded.
I just hope the owners of these titles don’t ever find out that the behaviour of people like Leask etc on social media is doing as much to harm their newspaper sales as the fact that they print a whole lot of Unionist propaganda.
Not that it matters, because as Murray will not be surprised to hear, I’m one of the growing army of Scots who would celebrate the closing down of every newspaper in Scotland.
@Scot Finlayson (10.11) –
Naw, ‘Yes’.
Poor DL. He just doesn’t seem to get a break. One wee lie and those vile cybernats are on him like a rash. Oh for the good old days when the plebs just believed everything we told them.
Nicola,,we are begging you,,please call IndyRef2 in October.
We can’t take any more of this mind numbing, soul destroying Unionist propaganda.
Signed,
A desperate Scotsman.
I’m proper middle class, live in Hyndland and everything. When will this roaster realise that he’s pissing off the very people who would have historically been the bedrock of his publication. My dad partakes of the herald, I never will because of the likes of Leask and Gordon.
@Thepnr –
Aye, indeed – he seems to be unaware of who he was conversing with.
That’s churnalism fur ye, to be sure to be sure!
😉
So if Salmond is proven innocent. Which I believe he will be. Will people like Leask reveal the truth about another Scottish Big Beast involved in far worse actual crimes. I won’t hold my breath.
Surely it is the WM arm of the Scottish Govt that have made these allegations against AS – The Scotland Office and who is in charge none other than Mr Mundell – just saying and remembering.
[…] Wings Over Scotland The worst apology in the world Earlier this evening the Herald’s poor mad David Leask made an extraordinary and […]
There is a weird collective madness infecting journalists in Scotland right now.
As others have expressed, but to add my tuppenceworth, it is just too much of a coincidence after two BBC apologies and D Raab’s body language and Brexit mess, to ‘suddenly’ blast all the news with this assertion about AS. And how would the DR even know? Etc.
Unless Leasky was reading Wings comments section and came up with the usual churnalists maths which was to automatically blame the site owner for the words of someone else
Which seems to point to the interesting conclusion that Leasky sits and reads Wings to get some idea of what’s going on in Scotland, well it saves actually journalisting doesn’t it
I mean we know Davie Clegg can’t get enough of Wings, glued to us nightly eh Davie? cept whan he’s at the Ludge meetings o course, or on the phone to Arlene
How did the DR know? Leslie Evans said to Nicola she was going to make the allegations public. I don’t know how the Permanent Sec in Scotland goes about making allegations about private citizens public. But that is what Nicola’s statement says.
Like everyone else, I’m deeply suspicious about this whole episode. But since I don’t know the facts I think it best to say nothing. I do back Alex in his effort to get some clarity on what sound like a Kafkaesque process.
Correct Patrick @10.20, regarding these journalists online social media presence.
What also seems apparent to me, is that they know that their time is up, they know that their style of writing and even their very newspaper is soon to be history, but they burn the bridges and poison the ink wells for the young journalists trying to start out in the career.
They seem to care only for themselves, with never a thought for those who will follow behind them.
Why don’t they just bloody retire.
Don’t you listen to what the man says.
winifred mccartney @ 10:51 pm
You wrote: “Surely it is the WM arm of the Scottish Govt that have made these allegations against AS – The Scotland Office and who is in charge none other than Mr Mundell – just saying and remembering.”
With respect, I truly, truly despair at the conspiracy theories that are emerging today from contributors to Wings, even from contributors that I had come to regard as sound and sensible. But who needs evidence – when we have imagination!
In my worst moments I see an alert Unionist reader going through them all and … no, I’ll stop there before this becomes a self-fullfilling prophecy bringing down ridicule upon us!
Completely through-the-fucking-mirror, now.
I wonder if he will still deny being chief shite writer at the new Herald on Sunday
Whoever the case is against, it does seem ridiculous if Alex Salmond has no opportunity to respond to accusations when complaints are made.
One thing that makes me think they have little merit is the timing. December 2013. Does anyone seriously think that the leader of the SNP, someone who has campaigned for Scottish independence all his adult life, would put it all at risk by sexually harassing women in the middle of an indyref campaign ?
They are out to get Alex Salmond and the Rev. Stuart Campbell by any means possible.
They are not too worried about Establishment lawyer Nicola who stood “shoulder to shoulder” with Saint Theresa and the “ghastly” Boris Johnson as they declared war on Russia after a false flag operation.
Nicola is not going to call an independence referendum before Brexit has been completed.
Dear Dave, oh dear oh dear oh dear.
Good on yee’s K1 and Liz g for setting things straight on ‘The frosties ned’ thread hehe, tis awe aboot the “Treaty” xx.
*****
Wouldn’t you at least like to hear both sides of the story?
link to wingsoverscotland.com
link to craigmurray.org.uk
link to cairnstoon.com
What’s a goin’ on in Edinburgh 2018 like?:
link to united4yes.org
*****
Try posting that as a footer comment wherever’s ye go.
Toon time soon time… 🙂
The ‘Press’ are filth. No one is buying. It stinks. How low can they go. Until they reach rock bottom. When people think it could not get any worse it does.
Another own goal, it will put up support for Independence. No one believe it. Just another con job,
Salmond tells RT he’s headed to ‘highest court in the land’ over govt’s handling of harassment case link to rt.com
So now (Saturday 25th) the Daily Record has revealed that the details of the allegations against Alex Salmond have been leaked to them, and they have published them.
Do people seriously believe that someone inside the Scottish Government are leaking details to the Daily Record, that would damage the Scottish Government?
Of course not!
This ‘allegation’ is a smear campaign of the most disgusting type, and the fact that the Daily Record is at the centre of this campaign, will be of no surprise to anyone.
Even if the allegations turned out to be true, the Daily Record, and the person who is in a senior enough position from within the Scottish Government, to have access to the details of the complaints, are embarking on a campaign to discredit AS, no matter the truth or otherwise of the complaints.
Tommy Robinson was jailed for 12 months, for putting a court case in jeopardy, so whoever is leaking the details of this ‘sexual harassment’ crime, is surely doing the same thing?
The whole thing stinks.
@Terry says: 24 August, 2018 at 10:32 pm:
” … Nicola,,we are begging you,,please call IndyRef2 in October.
We can’t take any more of this mind numbing, soul destroying Unionist propaganda.
Signed,
A desperate Scotsman.”
Excuse me, Terry, but you forgot to mention who is this, “we”, you are appointed as spokesperson for?
One thing I will say. Sturgeon has form on not sticking up for party members and mps when they are targeted by the state. Michelle Thompson was left hung out to dry. She was in the end completely innocent.. Where was the support. Salmond may also be completely innocent. In fact I would put my mortgage on it.
So why is Sturgeon so quick to distance herself. I couldn’t imagine Salmond ever leaving his members to stew like this.
Surely you stick up for your colleagues. I was disappointed in her tone when talking about Salmond. We all know that the state is out to get SNP members and politicians. This is part of the strategy to divide us. I am becoming disillusioned with Sturgeon over these type of things. Maybe that’s what they want. But that’s just how I feel.
@ScottishPsyche says: 24 August, 2018 at 11:01 pm:
” … There is a weird collective madness infecting journalists in Scotland right now.”
Nah! That madness has been there for a very long time, ScottishPsyche. Perhaps it is just that their erstwhile customers are more aware of it now. This is probably very much due to the emergence of social media and some on-line real journalists.
When I first began to buy newspapers, a very long time ago, the real regulators of what was acceptable for publication was not either the owners or the editors of any particular publication.
It was the NUJ – National Union of Journalists. Woe betide an editor who tried to gag or unfairly influence a journalist. There were historic instances of them taking action. Now that doesn’t mean that any newspaper didn’t have its particular political stance.
It means we all knew the difference between a reporter, a columnist, a correspondent and an editorial. Reporters were mostly not named and their job was to report news honestly. We knew the political slant of individual, named, columnists and named correspondents.
So no matter which newspaper you favoured you knew the news reported was fairly reported and, as you knew the columnists, correspondents and editors political leaning you knew what to expect from them. Then things changed and news reporters became fewer with named columnists becoming the norm and they got far too full of their own piss and importance. Publications began to be the news rather than reporting it.
Then the reader couldn’t trust that news was simply reported. It was one thing knowing that editorials were always the opinions of the editor and not simply a true report of the news and quite another not knowing if the reported news was a true reflection of the published item and control went from the NUJ to the owners and editors becoming more biased in the process.
Then the inherently biased political lot got in on the act and established an official self-regulatory body which has never worked as a proper regulator and that led to IPSO.
and I quote IPSO, (Independent Press Standards Organisation) :-
I can only add –
AYE!
RICHT!
….boy have you got under his skin! 🙂
Anything in the World not to his taste must have you to blame…somehow
It appears that Clegg has printed specific details today least one of the allegations against Salmond. I haven’t read his article, but he was tweeting it this morning as HIS story with a link to it (I won’t click on it)
On the face of it, this is a classic smear campaign.
The detail he tweeted alludes to an incident in which allegedly Salmond was worse for wear on alcohol, but there were NO witnesses and NO other supporting evidence.
I smell shite.
How about a competition to name as many 60s and 70s music groups as you can in a single tweet that makes some kind of sense?
I would add that this is designed so Salmond is tarnished even if he is cleared.
By the way, does anyone of reasonable mind think it responsible to print specific detail of a case under consideration by the Police BEFORE they decide to investigate, let alone BEFORE the detail is heard in a Court.
There is NO fair justice in that.
The Herald’s own Commissioner Dreyfus…
The best way to describe David Clegg is an unreconstructed piece of white Ulster trash. I don’t believe for a minute he doesn’t know about the known facts about the other big beast of Scottish politics.
That other beast was protected by a former pm. The facts are pretty scary and criminal. He walks among us but he is a serious sexual criminal.
The alleged details of the alleged offence which took place at an alleged location allegedly unwitnessed are released today by a newspaper alleging that this is *news*
Do you remember once upon a time when you thought that news was something that had actually happened or was proven to be happening in the future, I have to say this latest newpapering is verging into the realms of *Love Island* or Kim kardashian has new kind of plastic in her bum what do we think readers shockerroony
I mean more importantly is Steven Gerrard going to march with the Orange Lodge today now that they’re NOT passing a Catholic Church or is he declaring he isn’t now or ever was a Catholic, now if you believe that then you’ll believe any old garbage that comes out of the Daily Records daily drip drip of *we’re getting back at Salmond at last* story
If Mr Leask thinks that BTL comments are effectively comments of the author then I presume all the BTL comments below his Herald articles can also then be attributed to him, it’s only fair. I would say. If that is the case then he has some truly vile opinions.
Mr Leask, I search for the truth, now we can presume if the truth doesn’t match what he wants, he merely makes it up.
Ffs [ Wings wee fans ] ah didnae know ah hud diminished in stature overnight . Anybudy goat the measuring tape oot measuring their suitcases fur their RyanAir flights gies ah len o it lol.
Thing is look at Michelle Thompson. They dragged it out for years before she was cleared. This is their method. Not necessarily to legally win. Just to throw mud and ruin a career.
The next indi campaign will not involve Salmond. That was their objective. Things are going wrong for the UK. They don’t have an argument for Scotland remaining. So they will now attack all of us in the Indy movement.
The timing of the allegations and their release by Orangeman Clegg are not an accident. Someone has been looking for a patsy to bring down Salmond. They have it now.
@BigJock I think you’ve hit the nail on the head there
Have to wonder when the police were informed?
Were the alleged complaints made directly to the police in January? If not, why not.
What (who) prompted the alleged victims to come forward after 5 years of silence?
Jan – Aug 2018, 8 months and the police are still in
‘early stages of investigation’.
Has AS been charged? No
Has he been questioned by the police? Apparently not as he has no idea of when, what or where.
Which is it? harassment/misconduct/assault – with or without the abbreviated sex/sexual. All very different yet the press seem to know or make it up as they go along. Whatever helps sell their failing rags.
I know we are meant to shut up and allow due process to take place but, if this were happening to a member of my family I’d be asking the same questions.
To be fair to the complainants – IF Mr Salmond is found guilty of a serious offence, I will personally hit him with my broomstick but until then, I firmly believe there is an almighty stench coming from the British Establishment in this sorry whole affair.
Julian Smith I think you’ve took ah wrang turn reset yer SatNav tae ah twatteraty page .
People seriously need to stop proclaiming Alex Salmond’s innocence and saying it’s all a big conspiracy.
He may well be innocent. But we don’t know. And we certainly don’t know that it’s all a bit Yoon conspiracy.
What do the Yoons want us to do here? They want all of us to jump, knee-jerk, to Alex’s defence, claim some huge conspiracy, and then us to be proved completely wrong – thereby undermining our ability to point out any actual conspiracy in the future.
Let’s respect the (Scottish Government-led) complaints process and respect its conclusions.
If anyone has sexually harassed anyone, they deserve to be held to account (and those who were harassed deserve justice). Equally, if anyone has been wrongly accused of sexual harassment, they deserve to have their name cleared in full. Let’s see.
Use the ‘hairy string’ Ronnie, you’ll get just as accurate a measurement as the journalists and unionists in Scotland do of the ‘black hole’ in Scotland’s finances when they use their K****H**** calculator 😉
Jules Alex Salmond’s being vilified by the Civil Service Code of Conduct ( no rights to defend himself ) alien to Scottish Law ( see Craig Murray blog ) he went through the same process of accusations without the rights of a defence , Its a Trial by Media but Alex Salmond has put a spoke in their wheel by taking the issue to the Court of Sessions ( will Lesley Evans appeal to the Supreme Court if Alex wins ) lol.
Links
link to beta.gov.scot
This is the SNP Fact checking service and beware there is a fake one doing the rounds
link to twitter.com
link to alynsmith.eu
link to thoughtcontrolscotland.com
link to scottishconstructionnow.com
link to taxresearch.org.uk
link to sluggerotoole.com
link to politico.eu
link to blogs.lse.ac.uk
link to tompride.wordpress.com
link to rt.com
link to newshoundsnewsround.wordpress.com
link to briefingsforbrexit.com
Brexit: a lifestyle choice
link to eureferendum.com
Warning comes in government ‘technical notices’ telling businesses and public how to prepare in event of no deal
link to archive.is
Hey you’ll never guess what, the UK is about to do something breathtakingly stupid related to Brexit
link to twitter.com
K1 ah think the Hairy strings stretched ah bit visitors at the stall keep pulling it lol .
link to eci.ec.europa.eu
link to politics.co.uk
At least 26 children and four women killed in airstrikes in Yemen
link to archive.is
WEEK IN REVIEW: THE ‘CIVIL UNREST’ HORROR STORY
link to archive.is
@Jules says: 25 August, 2018 at 10:35 am:
“People seriously need to stop proclaiming Alex Salmond’s innocence and saying it’s all a big conspiracy.
He may well be innocent. But we don’t know. And we certainly don’t know that it’s all a bit Yoon conspiracy.”
Well no, Jules, you see it simply doesn’t work that way.
The reason being that under the law of the land, and that is both the independent Rule of Law of the Kingdom of England and the independent rule of Law of the Kingdom of Scotland and there is no such thing as United Kingdom Law and neither Wales nor N.Ireland have an independent rul of law being parts of the Kingdom of England.
That tenet of the law correctly opposes your claim that “we”, (whoever the “We”, you speak on behalf of is), must and I’ll bold it for you, If anyone has sexually harassed anyone, they deserve to be held to account (and those who were harassed deserve justice). Equally, if anyone has been wrongly accused of sexual harassment, they deserve to have their name cleared in full. Let’s see.
Last post in reply to Jules went off all by itself while I was still typing it. I’ll sum it up again briefly.
You are legally wrong, Jules.
Both the independent rule of law of the Kingdom of Scotland and the rule of law of the Kingdom of England say that, and I’ll bold it for you:-
“EVERYONE BY LAW IS INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY”
What is more those independent Rules of Law of the kingdoms of Scotland & England are the only rules of law of the United Kingdom which is NOT a country but a United Kingdom of only two kingdom partners.
That is except for Elizabeth Regina who has a personal British United Kingdom that includes the three Crown Dependencies of Man, Jersey and Guernsey that are not governed by the Westminster parliament.
Which means that when Scotland legally declares the end of the Treaty of Union that Her Majesty’s personal United Kingdom, which dates from the 1603, “Union of the Crowns”, will continue but the union of the two United Kingdom parliaments will cease to exist.
So there you go the laws of both kingdoms independently categorically state, EVERY ACCUSED PERSON REMAINS LEGALLY INNOCENT UNTIL A LEGAL COURT FINDS THEM GUILTY.
I say it again – loud and clear Mr. SALMOND IS NOT GUILTY.
If you or anyone else say he is then they are breaking the law, both civil and criminal, and could be arrested and charged, (but remain innocent), and sued for damages by Mr Salmond.
I don’t know who Mr Leask is or if he’s important, but I think he has just chosen words suggested by spellcheck to form a sentence. Like the following:
I have danced with the Liberals before they became a member of the most important thing in the future.
Random words.
link to snp.org
This ‘leak’ seems designed to cause a mistrial as might the procedure used to delay contacting the Police who are far more experienced in the pitfalls of investigating allegations of this sort.
The reason enquiries are held on the QT is to minimise any bandwagon jumping. The incident mentioned is a he said she said kind of thing. If it gets passed on to the police the problem is that any witneses will already have been contacted and, unless care has been taken to avoid it, could have been guided to a view of events contrary to reality.
What’s probably about to happen is that the case will be thrown out due to “accidental” interference with evidence prejudicial to the defendant. Given Salmond claims to be oblivious of the allegation any investigation can only test one version of events so infotmation supporting his will be ignored.
Unlike Michelle Thompson who eventually had to be cleared as they could only spin things so long Salmond might never be able to clear his name. Certainly if the allegations hadn’t been passed on to the Police he’d have no chance at a defamation case against his accuser. Even then there’s the Jason Donovan case where even being right can seem wrong.
Interestingly enough the main UK papers e.g. Express, Mail, Guardian, telegraph are quite quiet on the Salmond story, but the “Scottish” papers are going into overdrive.
Could it be that the Scottish papers are deliberately trying to make it difficult for a conviction so Salmond will not go to trial, but the mud will stick anyway.
Or am I becoming paranoid?
Regardless of the outcome of the alledged harrassment one sector of the public will definitely suffer: the media in Scotland. And rightly so.
The media’s wolf-pack-drooling over this story, and its obvious glee in persuing it, will be noted by all regardless of political affinity.
Keep boycotting the Britnat media. Wipe the slimy smile from their incestuous faces.
Today’s DR “story” archived:-
link to archive.is
I think that the content would suggest that “SOMEONE” in the civil service has leaked to the DR.
Wonder if there’ll be an investigation into the leak?
I like to think of the yes movement as a family. Families stay with their brothers and sisters when their world caves in. We don’t leave them to the wolves!
If Salmond hadnt existed there woukd never have been an SNP government or a referendum.
@ Brian at 1:02pm …
Thanks for the Daily Record link, Brian. Taking a chance with this, eh?!
Alex Salmond as per the Law is innocent of any wrongdoing at this time: innocent until proven guilty. The article published by Mr Clegg would surely be considered to be defamatory and in fact could seriously jeopardise the forthcoming legal case. And if the case goes ahead (maybe not due to Mr Clegg), Mr Clegg could find himself in the stand having to explain how he acquired such “evidence.” Strange evidence too I would say from a woman who constantly complained to Alex Salmond about his “unwanted behaviour”, but was still there, having moved to his bedroom, later at night. I’m sure the first question she’ll be asked is why didn’t she walk out after the first incidence of “unwanted behaviour”, followed by reporting him in 2013.
Jules says:
>“Let’s respect the (Scottish Government-led) complaints process and respect its conclusions.
If anyone has sexually harassed anyone, they deserve to be held to account (and those who were harassed deserve justice). Equally, if anyone has been wrongly accused of sexual harassment, they deserve to have their name cleared in full”
Problem is such cases is the accused DOESN’T get their name cleared in full once allegations are passed to the police and made public. Even if subsequently found innocent, a significant number of people are going to think “no smoke without fire”.
Unless the complaints process gives the accused a chance to defend themselves, they are only hearing ONE side of the story, making it more likely that the case is referred to the police.
Otherwise it could be more quickly determined if there is a genuine case or if a personal vendetta or some other agenda is involved.
Right now no-one knows the full story, but Salmond is effectively judged as guilty by a large section of the public, and doubt will remain even if he is cleared or the case is thrown out.
In response you Robert – as you may have gathered, I’m no legal expert. But i agree, Salmond is (and should be) considered innocent unless/until he’s found to be otherwise.
To clarify, my point is that we (by that I mean Yessers) shouldn’t make this out to be some sort of huge conspiracy – unless we know the exact facts. I don’t know anything about the alleged incident, so I don’t make any claims about whether this is a conspiracy or not. In my opinion we have to respect both those who make any allegations and the principle of innocence unless proven otherwise.
So I’m keeping quiet.
Petra – I agree, it’s like a boozy Xmas Party. Everyone leaves but you decide to stay with the boss ‘cos you really want to see his new bedroom curtains and try out the new bedspread. FFS
I sincerely hope that Alex at some point over the course of his shows invites Craig Murray and others to tell their story.
I believe RT has a far larger audience worldwide than the BBC.
Alex Salmond may be hated by the British Establishment, but he still has many friends in Westminster, at home and around the world.
Meanwhile, in other news which you may have missed. During Theresa May’s tenure as Home Secretary, over 100 files relating to paedophiles went ‘missing/lost’.
Just remember folks, Perfidious Albion never sleeps.
@ Shinty ….
I don’t know about the second complaint Shinty, but if this one is anything to go by it / they won’t see the light of day …… get past a Police investigation.
More than anything I hope that Alex does everything in his power to get this resolved ASAP and doesn’t allow the “Establishment”, imo, to drag this out like the Michelle Thompson case.
I also hope he demands to know, have an investigation carried out, who leaked information from the Civil Service to the Daily Record. And why the Daily Record in particular? That’s a conundrum! Then again maybe not.
Seems to me a lot has been going on in the last year or so with Gillian McGregor becoming the new Director of the Scotland Office and Leslie Evans taking over as Permanent Secretary to her predecessor who was castigated for going “native.” Guess they ain’t!