We agree with Margaret Curran
Posted on
December 06, 2013 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
And that’s something we can’t say every day.
“It must be his message, and his legacy, is the capacity of people to govern themselves, and make the right decisions in their own interests, where you can share democracy, you can share power among the people, but you have that innate ability.
So yes we need leaders, but it is about that – the inspiration about people governing themselves, fairly and equally, that’s his legacy.“
We’ve added emphasis. But otherwise we couldn’t have put it better than the woman whose party spent decades denying Scots a referendum on self-governance, and which even today urges them to reject it. We assume an announcement’s in the offing.
WOW
What a boomerang, again and again.
Aaaaargh. Agreeing with Margaret Curran. Steady on there Rev; I almost choked on my cornflakes! The irony of her remarks won’t even have dawned on her.Doh.
Here, Magritt, what are you like?
Clearly independence is slowly becoming the easier and natural path, once that dawns on folk then its a shoe in…..
The typical attitude of Labour in Scotland. Everyone else is deserving of running their own affairs but somehow, uniquely of all the Nations of the world, we couldn’t manage it ourselves.
Woman speak with forked tongue.
Are you certain she didn’t say “people governing themselves, fairly and equally, in such areas as licensing of air weapons, that’s his legacy.“?
We assume an announcement’s in the offing.
Is she pregnant?
If has black furry ears, and a wee black nose, you will all know that I have taken one for the team and my cover will be blown.
She has expertly set herself up for a very awkward question, the next time she appears in public.
Discussing this shambles this morning and a friend sums it all up with :
Scottish Labour politicians have to be the most hypocritical, self centred people in the country.
Their heads and their hearts tell them Independence is the clear direction to support but by doing as they are told by London Labour they are willing to sacrifice the great good of the people and their own conscience.
Truly pitiful.
And there was us thinking it might be Malcolm Chisholm. Wrong MC, its to be Magrit Curran. Who’d a thunk it?
As one of WOS’ readers said in an earlier thread, Magrit’s statements have an unspoken caveat
“except for viewers in Scotland”
And so sayeth the BritNat fighting against Scottish Independence.
The lost irony on her would be funny if it weren’t so sad…
Won’t Mags just say the British people have a right to govern themselves?
Lots of words come to mind but best summed up with “Doh!”
Another day, another Labour foot blasted at short range.
I guess she was so eager to jump on the Mandela bandwagon, she just uttered the first thing that came to mind. Oh Dear!
Like the Royal family, Labour reinvent themselves to survive. You wont recognise Scottish Labour a month before the referendum.
Maybe she doesn’t consider Scots to be people?
“Maybe she doesn’t consider Scots to be people?”
That’s the only rational conclusion.
I actually managed to see this last night by luck (flicking the channels) as I was mostly watching coverage of Mandela’s death. I couldn’t believe that Curran said that. SLAB politicians must really hate Scotland. They clearly do not see Scotland as a nation.
Maybe she doesn’t consider Scots to be people?
That thought also crossed my mind. I’m slightly concerned about that.
Cant wait to see her try and get oot o that statemnt lol
Does this hypocrisy by Curran, not simply highlight the incongruous nature of the stance of ‘Scottish’ Labour against Scottish independence. On the one hand, they shout long and hard about democracy, and the freedom of peoples to determine their own form of government all over the world, yet when it comes to Scotland it apparently does not apply.
Similarly, ‘Scottish Labour would like a socialist vision of the world, yet when the Scottish Government offer such a progressive vision for Scotland in the form of a white paper, in great detail, it is ‘Scottish’ Labour at the front of the queue to condemn it.
Labour in Scotland are the biggest hypocrites the world has ever seen. Much as I despise Tories, at least they, unlike Labour, do what they say they believe in.
We are seeing SLAB ‘internationalism’ for what it is: a complete sham and fraud.
“the inspiration about people (apart from those that are so wee, so poor, and so stupid as to rely on conflicted self-hating ethical wreckage like the Scottish Labour Party) governing themselves, fairly and equally, that’s his legacy.“
… We hear you, Margaret. Some legacy.
This is up there with Lamont’s idiocy at FMQs yesterday. She asked a question about childcare arrangements which would obtain under independence. When the FM answered that question about child care arrangements which would obtain under independence, Lamont opined, face contorted with hatred, that it was ‘disgraceful’ that the FM tried to weave the notion of independence into his answer.
Labour really are the pits.
“What Ah meant to say wuz, Ah mean, you know Nelson Mandela wuz a great man, but you know, it wuz afore ma time, really. Ah don’t think we should be making political capital out of this. The SNP should be ashamed of themselves. He wuz a great inspiration, and yes, I wuz inspired by him. Ah wuz actually there, you know, at George Square all those years ago, even though it wuz afore ma time. We’re talking about two different issues here. Of course Ah believe all people, everywhere in the world should be free to govern themselves, but ah believe we are stronger together. We live in a wonderful democracy, you know. It’s our union that has served us well for 300 years. It’s because of our strong union, that we enjoy those freedoms that Nelson Mandela fought for in South Africa. Am a proud scot. He wuz an inspiration to us all. That’s why, I believe, we are better together.”
Watching Mags on QT last week I have to say she looked as though she was struggling a bit with the message she’s delivering. I think quite a few people in SLAB are going through internal struggles right now. Don’t be too hard on them. At times like this it may be those internal struggles show themselves accidentally.
I for one welcome Mags’ conversion to the Yes cause and hope to see her out on the streets campaigning…
Carlsberg don’t do hypocrisy, but if they did, they couldn’t do it better than the Labour Party.
ok im not a political genius or mathamatic genius,The childcare thing this is how i seen it,it would cost the SG 500million total but would generate 500 million in taxes so the investment would be paid off only if the taxes that were collected went back to the SG but they dont they go to rUK,its strange Slab cant or wont see whats wrong with this?
Magrit Marydoll Curran, trying to sound important, putting everything over with extra gravitas. I always get the impression she’s acting on a stage, trying to get her lines right and she comes across as being as shallow as a puddle.
That woman has some nerve doesn’t she, goodness me I could hardly believe what I was hearing there. Is she stooping so low as to use Nelson Mandela’s passing for some political point scoring regards Scottish Independence and to attempt to put down, once again, the people of Scotland? Lets see shall we.
Absolutely disgraceful and incredibly hypocritical, almost seems deliberate, she will pay for this, I hope she is given a grilling about this big time at the Scottish parliament.
Agree with all of the above about Mags – also she is one of those who believe in a free Ireland – you must wonder what goes on in her head.
Also unfortunately they still get the votes in – shettleston – I was wondring why they have been a bit quiet about that as although they ‘won’ – their vote is down 7%.
Gathering in honour of Nelson Mandela. Friday 6th December 5pm. Nelson Mandela Place, Glasgow G2 1QY. ACTSA Scotland in collaboration with the STUC and Glasgow City Council. link to actsascotland.org.uk
Well all you unionist BT types (Tory/Libdem/SLAB) Here is again the proof you have been seeking, here is one of your leaders honest, sincere, genuine, intelligent. God you must be so proud. You have got such thickness in your team.
Hope somebody can explain to Magrit what she said, and more importantly what it means. I ain’t holding my breath. Vote YES you know it makes sense!
Aye, I bet she wulnae be saying that tae her pals oan the bingo bus the night, so she’ll no.
@hetty
Margaret Curran is an MP and one of those who’ll be losing their jobs in the near future.
Thankfully I suspect that this awful woman will never be a member of any future Scottish Parliament.
She thinks it, she believes it, she says it. Understanding and reflection, none, self awareness, none. Muppet.
Maybe we should all email Ms Curran thanking her for her recent conversion to supporting;
‘the capacity of people to govern themselves, and make the right decisions in their own interests, where you can share democracy, you can share power among the people, but you have that innate ability.’
and therefore Scottish Independence.
Let her know that she will be welcomed out from the blight and into the light, in a forgiving manner, al la Nelson Mandela.
of course that does not include Scotland, we are somehow unique in the world the we do not deserve democracy, social justice, self-empowerment, self determination and the capacity to govern ourselves on a par with other nations on the planet, funny that.
I’m surprised Curran still has the ability to speak, I would have thought she would be choking on her hypocrisy by now, obviously there is still much space to fill in that gub!
fairiefromtheearth,
You are quite correct regarding the childcare policy. Of course the Scottish Government could introduce it right now, but it would be unsustainable, as such a policy is predicated upon increased workplace tax receipts as more women return to work. At present under devolution those additional tax receipts would go to London, whereas under independence, the increased tax receipts would stay in Scotland, thereby paying for the continuation of the free childcare.
Better together and Labour are being deliberately disingenuous when they say the free childcare policy could be introduced at present, as although technically it could, it would not in any way be sustainable, and would instead hand London with a free tax windfall courtesy of Scottish taxpayers.
This is why people are turning against Labour and Better together, because what they say, is mere spin that doesn’t stand up to the mildest of scrutiny. The fact that such nonsense ‘spin’ arguments are still being peddled by Labour and better together, is symptomatic of the utter contempt both groups have for the Scottish electorate. In other words, they both collectively still think our heads ‘zip up the back’.
Labour clearly learned nothing from their utter drubbings in 2007 and 2011.
She should get George Galloway’s leotard back from the clearners pronto and they can serve each other some cream. Two individuals that want freedom and democracy for every other country in the world except the land of their birth. Hypocrites.
Creigs1707repeal – what a totally vomit inspiring vision.
I see that the interviewer (Rhona?) was in full agreement with Ms Curran at the end.
So that’s another one voting Yes.
She’s wonderfully clueless. It’s great when the terminally uninspired are promoted beyond their capacities. She’d be fine wittering on about drains and sewerage in a Council Chamber, but it’s just cruel making her spout on about anything beyond ‘bread and butter’ issues.
I agree that many Scottish politicians must be struggling internally with the Independence thing – it makes sense for the people of Scotland and yet, they fly in the face of a logical solution for the country – Why?
Putting hydrocarbons, exports, balance of trade etc. aside, the way I see it with these politicians supporting BT…it’s simple self interest. We vote YES and they loose their jobs. Political influence and political careers would be dead and gone for may of these poor second rate Scottish constituency MPs.
I suspect that much (not all) of the BT campaign and the anti-independence thing is all about MPs protecting their political careers and all of the perks that goes with them, not about what might be best for Scotland and its people.
Funny to see the flag at Westminster at half mast – the same flag flown at half mast for Thatcher.
In Mandela’s autobiography he mentions a member of an international human rights organisation that used to visit Robben Island. Mandela, wearing the required prison-issue shorts, formally met with this person in the prison commander’s office.
Mandela wondered why this human rights person did not wonder why a grown man was wearing shorts. They gave the impression that all the black prisoners were like boys, not men. Mandela thought this was the way the Afrikaners perceived the blacks that were campaigning for equal rights.
Maybe Curran also sees Scots like children? Enthusiastic, but ultimately not able to look after themselves without parental oversight.
Well said Margaret. You’ve been a long time getting there but you’ve made it in the end. Welcome aboard.
Looks like YES have a new recruit, unless of course, utter p**h was being talked.
Hmmm…. foot …mouth…. where to put…
If anyone is on that twitter thing you could leave Margaret a message.
link to twitter.com
Derek Bateman in his blog yesterday looked ahead to the point in the near future “where Jim Naughtie will preface his question with an erudite essay on the vicissitudes of the political fates before asking Alistair: Mr Darling, where did all go wrong?” Perhaps sometime soon he could do a dummy run with Margaret, a lengthy exposition on the history of these isles and their inhabitants before flattering her with the question: Mrs Curran, just what is it about the Scottish people that makes them so exceptional?
Glad to hear Mags Curran has come out for Scottish independence!
This morning I woke up in a happy and content frame of mind, it’s Finland’s Independence Day and I was looking forward to a slightly patriotic but most of all a fun evening with friends. Then I heard the news about Nelson Mandela.
Sad news, though not unexpected. Time for reflection. He fought for what was (is) right, and the struggle wasn’t always peaceful. However, after his release he wanted to look forward to a better future for all the people in South Africa, even his opponents, guided by a vision of humanity and forgiveness. His greatest achievement must surely be the mostly peaceful transition of South Africa to a modern democracy.
Nelson Mandela visitied Finland twice, in 1992 and in 1999. There’s an anecdote about his 1999 visit, in the middle of the winter. Finland’s President Ahtisaari was showing him the views from the presidential residence and Nelson Mandela asked why dozens of people were sitting scattered on the snow-covered field. Ahtisaari explained that they were ice fishing, it wasn’t a field but the frozen sea, which made Mandela laugh in delight and wonder.
Snow is softly falling and it’s getting dark now, so I’ll go and light two candles in the window for Finnish independence (nobody knows why it’s two candles, it just is) and maybe a third one slightly apart for Nelson Mandela.
Dearie me, she believes that but then again, not in the case of her own country and it’s people.
Is it a case of MaCu being of the opinion that Scotland is not a country and her belief of self governance does not apply? Shame on her if so.
Everyone and their dog in the British establishment is tripping over themselves to share how inspired they were by Mandela and his legacy.
Here we are in Scotland, in the run up to arguably the most peaceful attempt for a country to gain its sovereignty from a power hungry, war-mongering elite, and all the same people can do is pile scorn on us for even daring to attempt it.
As others have said it seems all those nice things like democracy, fair society and self-determination are for everyone else but us Scots.
I sit here gobsmacked.
I have in front of me a Better Together leaflet virtually every word of which is untrue. What is not untrue is distorted completely.
Its been lying about for few days but I didn’t bother reading it. Lying is now the major tactic of Better Together. Everybody in Scotland is getting one of these I imagine
I would love to make it into a leaflet with “lie” printed all over it
“I have in front of me a Better Together leaflet virtually every word of which is untrue. What is not untrue is distorted completely.”
Let’s see it, then.
More importantly we must all agree, given the opportunity on TV dabates or elswhere to call the Labour party machine out on this one, quote her statement verbatum and watch them squirm. Its the duplicity that must be challenged at every opportunity to show the people that Weasel words will not wash.
You cant have it in some parts of the world and not in others –
This is the classic everybody should be free to govern themselves – (from Curran to Robertson ) everybody that is except Scotland because it doesn’t somehow make sense as we have the best of both worlds and Mr Darling says sums don’t add up, (ie – because we’re not Glasgow Irish and we don’t have a culture anyway = we’re better with Britain)
Classic British Labour in Scotland garbage (remember if they wont stand up for us, then there is no Scottish Labour).
Just make sure this gets spread far and wide across all social network platforms
Ive already placed the video on my facebook page
Cant really wait to hear her getting questioned and her denying she said it
“ok im not a political genius or mathamatic genius,The childcare thing this is how i seen it,it would cost the SG 500million total but would generate 500 million in taxes so the investment would be paid off only if the taxes that were collected went back to the SG but they dont they go to rUK,its strange Slab cant or wont see whats wrong with this?”
Its worse than that.
They are saying, at one and the same time, that a post independence scheme would be only partly funded (their claim) and therefore unworkable whereas the scheme could be launched right now – no problem with none of the extra generated tax take contributing.
Self-funding or partly self-funding unworkable – no self funding at all, no problem.
The lack of logical cohesion seems to have yet again been lost to SLAB, and the Scottish MSM.
This is only the latest in a long line of a deliberate scatter gun strategy where it does not matter if pellets are moving in opposite directions as long as they have a chance of hitting individual targets. It is a strategy which can only exist in a political theater where there is a compliant and morally bankrupt MSM completely devoid of any duty of care towards democracy.
Completely O/T but more evidence from EU experts that Scotland’s membership of the EU is pretty much assured and the good reasons why:
link to newsnetscotland.com
link to archive.is
I’ve an impression that Rhona off Scotland Tonight is a Yes. She clearly enjoyed Carmichael pleading with her to intervene in the slaughter that was unfolding.
Maybe she just doesn’t like the bruiser Carmichael
‘Please, Nicola, stop this’
Still makes me chuckle
Where’s the vetriloquist operating the dummy?
Watching that made me spyoo. Hypocritical cun! Like watching an alcoholic drinking sparkling water to be in with the in crowd. Maggrit Cun! More like.
You know that guy you worked with? He was a right laugh, always dodging the boss, and hiding in the toilets for a fly fag. He was always playing practical jokes, and was one of the boys. He would do anything for you.
Then he was made a gaffer, and turned into a right bastard.
That’s Labour, that is.
Aye Magrit are you George Galloway in disguise, independence for everybody but not for Scotland, Gorgeous George and Moothy Magrit, make you want to greet, with their sheer hypocrisy.
O/T Rev I never found out the result of the “Best Comment” When Curran was blissfully looking into Edd’s eyes with Edinburgh Castle in the back ground, could you point me to it please. There were some great cracks being made.
Murray McCallum: see if you can dig out Big Bill Broonzey singing about exactly this in a blues song called, “When will they call me a man?” so moving. Might still be on iplayer programme about Big Bill -” The man who brought the blues to Britain”.
My breath has truly been taken.
Apologies – OT
Heedtracker posted this link in the Guardian’s
‘What should a new Scottish currency be called?’ article:
link to nationaldebtclock.co.uk
They try to scaremonger Scotland’s people with tales of a £7 billion black hole. Here’s mismanagement on a massive scale – and £1.3 trillion reasons why Scotland’s people need to vote YES.
Nothing to add about Magrit—despicable hypocrite.
Pardon an O/T but perhaps good news.
“A source” tells me that at the recent conference of TPAS (asociation of Scottish tenants) at the Fairmont Hotel in St. Andrew, there was a question/answer session involving MSPs James Kelly (SLAB) and Roderick Campbell (SNP). At the end there was a “vote” for Yes or No to independence which came out about 50/50. Most of the delegates came from the West of Scotland.
True or false, anyone?
@Rev Stu
I suspect I have the same document as Dave .. let me know where to send it.
Okay, sent it to your twitter thingy.
“She has expertly set herself up for a very awkward question, the next time she appears in public.”
Note to self, avoid Subway for next few weeks….lest she be questioned and takes refuge in a fast food restaurant.
I hope you realise I’ll never get these boak stains out of my carpet?
@ Chalks – Indeed it was also the quivering of the bottom lip when Rhona told him to ‘hold his own’ that creased me up. With a good PC video editor one could set the frames to a suitable piece of music. Just for a Christmas Special of course.
“Everyone and their dog in the British establishment is tripping over themselves to share how inspired they were by Mandela and his legacy.”
Scotland was about 30 years ahead of them on that. Now they’re all falling over themselves to praise him because, in spite of them, their intransigence, and all their bluster (“ANC is a terrorist organisation… Anyone who thinks it is going to run the govt… is living in cloud-cuckoo land”, Thatcher) they were in the wrong, morally and factually. They were on the losing side.
As they are with Scottish independence. I await the praise of Salmond in another 30 years time.
Have uploaded a video clip to youtube of the Freedom Fighter Song by Project Bona Fide which of course includes mention of Nelson Mandela. Sound quality is not great but its a good song and I hope an appropriate tribute to one of the greatest human beings of our time.
link to youtu.be
Margaret Curran’s “people governing themselves” arrangements will be in place soon after the 2015 General Election, with “powers” bypassing the Scottish Government and coming straight to your local authority, but with insufficient funding to do anything other than re-arrange the deckchairs.
Or you could vote YES next year.
And from the mouths of babys, muppets, & Magaret Curran, Rev should that no be under, so blind you cannot see, is that another piece for them to wipe out ha ha, can somebody no get that up on U TUBE an that describes Mags tae.
REV, Email lock out, I sent a wee present to your account let me know if you receive it 6/11
The British State sold a lot of arms to South Africa. Anyone that threatened that trade was a terrorist.
Nothing has changed. Just look at all the countries Cameron has prostituted himself to recently.
Then he was made a gaffer, and turned into a right bastard.
That’s Labour, that is.
Juteman, that is so true.
@ Liz
You mentioned the Glasgow Shettleston council result from a few days ago. Labour win.
Lab 53%
SNP 28%
It really does get you thinking of why does a man/woman from Shettleston so faithfully stick with Labour. What do we see that they don’t.
Or what do they see that we don’t.
Why are the Yes campaign not reaching these people, why can’t they get a fairly straight forward message through to them.
Why has Labour got such a hold on these people when their record up till now regarding health, employment and housing, is so disgraceful.
Have a read at the description of the Shettleston, (e.g. Life expectancy 63) it just makes it an even more baffling question – Why Labour?.
link to blog.scottishelections.org.uk
Dont anyone become to excited, she’s too stupid to understand irony.
If you love Margaret Curran – set her free.
Greetings once more fellow Teuchters
Yoiks, yoiks and tallyho the fox is up!! mark you to my bloodshot eyes it looks more like an overgrown drowned rat yclept Curran.
Murgatroyed, a true man of steel, at our last meeting surprised me by his intimate knowledge of the said Ms. Curren, seems they troughed together at the same upmarket nosher on the rare occasions when she was up in town, these MPs. are of course paid whether or not they attend the House, one of the main reasons why those of us who are able to sign our own names are so keen to join the best club in London I understand that my friend and fellow old Etonian Dave the Rave has commissioned a multi-million pound IT contract to design a system whereby all we old Etonians who never mastered the art of writing at Eton will be able to submit an expenses form to the house, I understand that the main thrust of this system will be to mark the preprinted expenses claim form with an X.
Pairing takes on a new meaning when uttered in the same breath as the said M.C. she with 46 other members of the true blue/red party did not think it important enough to vote against the so called bedroom tax an action that even Murgatroyed considered to be against the rules and he, if anyone, knows how to bend the rules. I understand that at their next meeting he looks forward to giving her a big hug in return for her staunch upholding of our mutual objectives.
LumiLumi, happy Independence dayhiv a couple of drams on us
@caz-m.
I know it’s a sickner.
I think maybe most of them rely on getting their news from the Daily Record and probably the BBC news, so unless these change their reporting I don’t see it getting better.
I remember a personal story from WoS a while back where the guy writing was a definite No – believed all the lies about AS etc – got his info from the DR and what changed his mind was personal circumstances concerning his non-eu wife.
My brother runs a taxi in Glasgow and listens to a lot of anti-AS comments which have no basis in fact.
He says from now on he’s going to start challenging their views but he reckons a lot of people in Glasgow are Nos – at least the ones using his taxi.
I said he should mention LFI and that it’s not about the SNP.
Some a ove have speculated maybe she doesn’t see Scots as a people, and I wonder if she then wouldn’t see the Irish as a people.
At some point chickens are going to come home to roost. On the international stage they might want to preach to some other country about democracy and then be ridiculed by pointing to how they responded to Scotland.
One only needs to see how American Exceptionalism (we can do it but nobody else is allowed to) is beginning to backfire and look sick. The billions they are losing in computer sales because of NSA. Losing out to China over currency.
Labour’s One Nation democracy looks sick already.
OT
Another “triumph” for North Briton Broon. No laughing at the back, now …
link to trendingcentral.com
Posted it on facebook and this was the response from one of my No friends:
“But we do govern ourselves as a nation…? It’s called the United Kingdom…”
I haven’t responded yet.
@ Caz-M “Why are the Yes campaign not reaching these people, why can’t they get a fairly straight forward message through to them.”
It’s a tribal thing. Nothing more, nothing less.
I’m not usually one for gossip, but…
A little bird told me that Alistair Carmichael was speaking at a business awards ceremony in Edinburgh last night and after raising the topic of the referendum and talking about the so-called benefits of the union, he was booed off the stage.
scaredy cat
It looks like it is all going Alistair Carmichael shape then?
@BTP
@ creigs1707repeal
Might even be the famous ‘Mags Curran’ ; I’m – Glasgow ,Irish & British thing (anything but Scottish will do for Labour).
Caz-M. Dont Stress about it, the turnout was under18%. Assuming that more pensioners voted (due to not being at work), then you can’t read anything into this.
“Martin Neill won the ward with 2,026 votes on a turnout of 17.55%.
The SNP’s Laura Doherty polled 1,086 votes with Raymond McCrae polling 224 for the Scottish Conservatives.”
Heck with a normal turnout, the Tory’s could poll more than Labour actually won with.
Alba4Eva
they probably voted by post?
Any idea how many postal votes were cast?
Anyone?
2,026 apparently Mr P. ;o)
Alba4Eva
The case for the Prosecution rests, your Honour.
Apologies O/T
Here in Nelson Mandela Place, Glasgow. Hunderds of people gathered to commemorate the great man and his life. Humza Yousaf has just given a great speech.
Frrrreeeezing…..
Viva Mandella.
“Humza Yousaf has just given a great speech.”
I hope he didn’t refer to “Mandiba” as he was repeatedly doing on Twitter last night.
ronnie @ 4.38pm
LumiLumi, happy Independence dayhiv a couple of drams on us.
Nae worries, we’re having a couple of glasses of bubbly and then glögi (mulled wine) and watching the President’s reception on the telly. This year is different. The Independence Day Ball has always been held in the President’s Palace in Helsinki, but this year the palace is undergoing major restoration so the reception is held in Tampere Hall, a major concert hall in our second biggest city. There won’t be dancing but a concert with Finnish music and literature themes.
I’m glad it’s something different this year. It’d be a great idea to have the President’s reception in various regional “capitals” from now on.
Oh, the concert’s starting now. With an old cavalry march from the 17th century while the President and his young and pretty wife take their seats…
Got to watch the concert & literary thingy now. Expecting Sibelius, of course, but hopefully more modern things, and lots of Finnish literature.
Don’t get upset. Personally I just laugh now. like a raving lunatic I just keep laughing.
These people are so funny though, they, need your votes. It is easy to deny them, find it hard to believe that I supported these numpties my entire life.
Lets be fair, many Labour MP’s and MSP’s support Independence, just don’t have the balls to say so. That is sad.
lumilumi, yir a lucky man.
“lumilumi, yir a lucky man.”
Unless my memory’s playing tricks on me, which is wholly possible, lumilumi is a lucky lady.
Labour’s answer is to change parties,how?(a piece I wrote elsewhere seems apt)
I am sick of hearing from those that claim to be “The Labour Party” that they can change things.They cant or rather wont change anything just use different words to salve the troubled mind.The real party of Westminster is “THE WESTMINSTER PARTY” there are no other parties with the exception of the smaller ones.When the Labour party took the bribes from Westminster they joined the big party and lived off of the backs of the men who financed them,used the workers to create a new social class.The bribes of Westminster entail the Ermine Club with an extra large pension,the rest of the bribes are the expenses,and the extra pay for “being in or on a committee” this gives them a pay of a quarter of a million pounds a year,not bad for selling out those that you hold in contempt,the ones that believe in you though you broke their trust almost daily,some are awakening and shall bring democracy to these islands.There is no democracy in a monarchy nor in the land of privilege & title.
O/T
Well, it’s started–the starting pistol for the Engerlund footy-fest next summer. Already heard 1966 mentioned twice today (funny how they never seem to bring up 1066). Anyway–ramp it up BBC and we’re sure to get a YES avalanche.
creigs1707repeal
I canne be ersed setting up a dummy account anb logging in to comment.
Give us Uber Engerland please.
They can have the 2014 World Cup and we can have a YES vote?
Seems fair to me.
@ caz-m
re. Shettleston
The turnout was only 17% – so hardly representative, except of the apathy party.
Don’t understand why the SNP couldn’t get more of their local supporters out.
I notice that Peter Higgs Nobel Prize winner has expressed an opinion on Indy……
He has not yet decided which way he will vote in the referendum on Scottish independence. “My attitude would depend a little bit on how much progress the lunatic right of the Conservative party makes in trying to get us out of Europe. If the UK were threatening to withdraw from Europe, I would certainly want Scotland to be out of that.”
link to theguardian.com
Hardly a ringing endorsement but if Nigel Farage and co do well next June…..then I think the YES canvassers can put the man who found the God particle down as a YES
@ Scottish Renewables and on,
It has no meaning?
Money is tight and reserved for the big Fight?
can’t bring myself to watch the video – I’m sure I’ll vomit
Liz
I think we are probably trying to make a broader point other than Shettleston. Because the same could be said of Ferguslie Park in Paisley. That is run by Labour councillor Terry Kelly.
Ferguslie is probably on a par with Shettleston regarding health/life expectancy, drugs, housing and employment.
Same with Inverclyde, also parts of Lanarkshire.
All staunch Labour voters.
I would say they are no different from you or I, yet they completely blank the thought of Scottish Independence and all the good things that it could bring into their lives.
If any of you are reading this, please vote YES in 2014.
If not for yourself, then for your children.
@lumilumi – How does the President manage to get a young and pretty wife? Is he a young and handsome man like me? [Cough cough]
I have scanned the Wargle Fargle Gargle pages for suitable YES YESSSS YESSSSSS possibilities but all I find is rejection. I am bereft. I did ask Rev Stu to create a tab for lonely bleeding hearts but he called me a Twitter numptie.
Perhaps Finland is the place to be at this time of celebration and congratulations to you all.
Archie (not Erchie)
A Finnish Model, I am up for that as long is does not include Aunty Bella. She has form, you know.
They say the words but fail to understand them. They use the words like gaudy baubles to clothe themselves in as they and their peers fight for the media spotlight to bask in reflected glory. A gut-wrenching sight and sure to be added to when westminster’s ‘great and good’ try to persuade us that they are the most Mandela of all. A tory PM who will fawn at the funeral. A repulsive Bullingdon toryboy stereotype who used to laugh and jeered at Mandela and his cause when he was younger.
Re shettleson _ i didn’t know there was such a low turnout -probably another reason why Slab haven’t been crowing much.
@ BTP – Do you mean a Finnish model? Sound as a pound, stable around the block with a penchant for long parties.
Now Aunty Bella is a different model. Do not get me started, the weekend has hardly begun. Her form is like Scotland with several hundred Munroes waiting to be conquered.
Archie etc
In fact aunty Bella was involved an exchange with Mike Russel about education models and what he said was a undeliberate double entendre about Finnish Models and she responded accordingly.
A game bird but, a bit cheuch?
lumilumi, yir a lucky individual.
@scaredey cat – I’d heard the same thing. It was the Scottish Renewables Green energy Awards, and the SoS gave a very pro union political speech, which did not go down well. Over a 1000 folk there, and there was some polite clapping, but also some very loud booing. Almost unheard of for that type of event.
Interestingly Fergus Ewing MSP – Holyrood Energy Minister won the politician of the year award, against Ed Davey MP. Loud cheers and lots of noise. Not a boo there at all.
O/T I see the EU are again starting to try and ban me from vaping e liquid.
link to ecigarette-research.com
Finding out about this product, has totally changed my health, I have not had a cigarette for six months now. I still consume nicotine, I just do it now in a mix of food grade products. I actually make my own and flavor it with certain food flavours.
Im not talking about the “e cig ” things pushed by big companies. I use a variable volt/ watt one and large tank that attaches to it. It’s a bit like a torch with a tank on top. I know so many people who have quit tobacco using these vaporizer and now the governments are trying to ban them under the guise of concern about health.
in my opinion it’s more to do with the fact that pharmaceutical companies and tobacco companies are going to lose big time as the word gets out just how good an aid these are to quit smoking. How much cash will they lose when no one needs their patches or rubbish inhalers or gum..
what kind of message are the EU pushing here , it’s ok to buy and smoke cigarettes, but if they ain’t getting tax money from you, it’s getting banned.
i know that one of the SNP MEP’s backs this ban, I can’t remember who it was. But it’s just an other attack on my own choices.
AlexMci
I have some sympathy for your position but, it has nothing to do in any way, with this thread?
I hope you can stick it out.
“what kind of message are the EU pushing here , it’s ok to buy and smoke cigarettes, but if they ain’t getting tax money from you, it’s getting banned.”
As just about the most extreme fundamentalist anti-smoking Nazi you could meet, I’m massively dismayed at the prospect of an avalanche of regulation around e-cigarettes and equipment like you describe. They preserve the freedoms of smokers and also the freedom of others not to breathe their smoke. They might also be the salvation of many a struggling hostelry – I’m perfectly happy sat in a pub with people “smoking” e-fags, while I find the real thing utterly intolerable. Your angle on why it’s happening is an interesting one.
“It really does get you thinking of why does a man/woman from Shettleston so faithfully stick with Labour.”
They don’t, that’s on a turnout of less than 18% ! So there’s 80%+ who don’t feel the effort it takes to vote will make any difference at all (or didn’t know there was an election happening).
You’ve got less than 9% of the population voting Labour there!
A2 and how many of them by post?
How many folks in retirement homes or housebound in Shettleston?
Oh wow, what an idependence celebration! (Here in Finland.)
Predictably, much Sibelius. The best parts were quotes from Finnish literature read by wonderful actors. Poetry, prose, children’s literature. Eino Leino and 19th centry national romatic poetry, Väinö Linna and Pentti Haavikko and their realist gritty prose about WWII, Tove Jansson and her description of Moominpappa, the dad we’d all want to have. And some Finnish nonsense nursery rhymes, translated/written by Kirsti Kunnas (the mum of two legendary Finnish rock mucisians…)
The concert was good and the finale was… Tampere Philharmonic played Sibelius’s overtures while a youth choir walked down to the stage and then the young people sang the Finlandia Hymn. I and my friends wiped a tear.
The concert ended with our national anthem, which is like a German drinking song, nothing like Sibelius anthems.
Most of all, we Finns are glad we’re independent.
Holly fuck I just read this
“From the weeks of canvassing, Councillor Neill said the biggest issue to tackle was dog fouling. ‘That was definitely Number 1 problem,’ he said. ‘Next is anti-social behaviour. That’s a big challenge. But I’ve got the energy and will be an all year round, open surgery, Councillor.’”
link to localnewsglasgow.co.uk
Shettleston’s biggest problem is dog fouling !@5&! frankly you’d have to be wading knee deep in the stuff for that to be the biggest problem.
Unless Alba4ever was being ironic, postal votes were 100% of the number or people who voted Labour.
Alba4ever, over to you?
You AP you!
AlexMci,I have been on PG nicotine for 3yrs ( smoked 8x2oz a week ) patches didnt work vaping did Alex Neil MSP knows about the benefits of e gigs for me i have brought that to his attention six months after I stoped smoking, we have had many discussions on the benefits so nae worries with a SG
@A2
Hi A2
Read my other post 6.19pm.
It’s not just about Shettleston.
It really does get you thinking of why does a man/woman from Shettleston so faithfully stick with Labour. What do we see that they don’t.
aken, its illogical, hard to understand.
david
I think it is part of the logic of feck-it as it doesn’t matter, except for the OAP postal votes?
@david
I think it means, we have a vision david.
Why cant they see it.
Nightol
Bed beckons.
I see all the parties have so much support in the area that only 1 candidate actually lives there.
The fact that she happens to be SNP is probably just co-incidental and I wouldn’t read too much into it.
Thanks ronnie, we can keep this discussion for an other day I think.
Just thought I’d thank Margaret on twitter for supporting Scottish Independence. Glad we could bring her over to the right side Lol! @Margaret_Curran
Anyone aware of the bile spouted by “Scottish” Lords yesterday in reaction to the White Paper, not recommended if you plan to unwind and relax on your Friday evening but is a stark reminder of why independence really can’t come quickly enough:
link to publications.parliament.uk
Kev
They form a sort of “mutual support group.”
Think of it like a sort of dependency dissonance group, with us paying the bill, for the moment.
A2 said: “From the weeks of canvassing, Councillor Neill said the biggest issue to tackle was dog fouling. ‘That was definitely [the] Number 1 problem,’ he said.
Surely that would be the “Number 2” problem.
MajorBloodnok
BOOM, BOOM !! Pffftttt
O/T – But great graphic to explain ‘London overbearing dominance’ in cartogram on link below about 4 pieces down – The UK as a Cartogram
really hits home (even more than stupid BBC weathermaps)
link to arcofprosperity.org
I and my friends watched the Independence Day celebrations on the telly, and it was an excellent concert and prose/poetry thingy. Very good new way to celebrate independence, don’t take President’s reception back to Helsinki, move it to all the regional capitals!
Our independence celebrations are often backward-looking, the war veterans who won our independence. And they did. But Finland has to move forward, not get stuck on past glories.
Oh, and right now I’m writing here because I told my Finnish friends about the plight of Scotland in their independence struggle, and they wanted to see some of it, so I showed WoS…
I’m showing them sites that tell the true story, and pointing out how biased and warped the BBC is.
I have several friends who work for YLE (the Finnish national broadcaster) and I tell them about the dismal state of BBC, especially BBC Scotland. They’re shocked. They’re confused, should they not believe all BBC stuff and actually do some own journalism?
I ask them to think back to Finland’s independence struggle. Our press was cencored, pro-indy papers were shut down, we didn’t even have the internet! But we got the message around.
I have very much confidence on the YES campaign and their “foot soldiers”. BT doesn’t have feet on the ground, only the ridiculous MSM stories.
Irrespective of the political party, what kind of person votes repeatedly for- Foulkes, Darling, Sarwar, Curran, Lamont, Kelly, Gray Etc. They the rich and well heeled politicians are looking after the working class, give me a break. Do these voters not have eyes to see with, ears to hear with and a brain to realise what these muppets say and dae are two different things. If they don’t mind being used to feather SLABS anointed ones then that is their business, let them stew in their own juices. If they want help the first thing they have to do is get the monkeys off their own backs. Then their lives might just pick up. It doesn’t do SLAB any good to help lift these people out of squalor and poverty they might get ideas above their station and vote for someone with principals instead of a big house, big bank book and deep pockets! SLAB the party where the rich mug the poor and expect thanks for doing it. A skunk round their sloping shoulders at the end of their service to the Westminster gravy train.
@ lumilumi
“Oh wow, what an idependence celebration! (Here in Finland.)”
Have fun as always in Suomi ..!
At the end of the eighties when I worked at Sanomapaino for my old company, my girlfriend at the time, Tertu, introduced me to the Leningrad cowboys …!!
Wow! If anyone thinks the Finns are boring or just classical fans – have a look at this.
What’s longer the hair or the shoes?
@ Panda
That was a quick sleep Panda.
illy
Needs as, needs must.
Now in my pit with iPad
@Kev
Ach, keep up Kev – that was yesterday’s thread!
Wings moves on as the clock ticks – gotta be quick to be cool…
Newsnet Scotland’s
Duggy Dug – Scottish Pound.
New link to youtube.com
Sibelius, eh, lumilumi. That would be something to share with the world. Meanwhile over on another channel over here we have (at random) the impassioned poetry of Mr Rainbow Harper. Jings. Set this to the clarsach…
“Within the security of the UK and the EU and the history we have in common, we are free to express our individuality and still control eighty percent of what happens in Scotland through our own elected Parliament. The duty and overriding aim of all politics is to keep the people safe. Safe in a world political and economic system that is volatile, unpredictable, and often teeters on the edge of economic catastrophe. Safe from the siren calls of political adventurism.
(Bet that’s got you shaking in your boots up there in Finland.)
“The people of Scotland should not get sidetracked by the wish-list points in the White Paper. The political visions of the separate political parties will all still be there after a No vote, and a No vote will not reduce any of the aspirations about Scotland’s future that have been aired, and will continue to be aired between now and then.
(An air to lift the very heart.)
“I’ll be campaigning for the Scottish Green Party in the 2016 Scottish Parliamentary Election on a manifesto tailored to the powers of the Scottish Parliament. Forget independence, look to the visions and stay safe.”
“Forget independence,” says the bold Robin. Aye, right.
@chalks
I’ve an impression that Rhona off Scotland Tonight is a Yes. She clearly enjoyed Carmichael pleading with her to intervene in the slaughter that was unfolding.
Maybe she just doesn’t like the bruiser Carmichael.
I don’t know if she is a Yes. However, it did look like she was trying to stop herself from laughing.
@Rev Stu
I hope he didn’t refer to “Mandiba” as he was repeatedly doing on Twitter last night.
That is dire, awful stuff from Humza Yousaf. Acting like a political darling and still getting it wrong. I do not get this whole thing where people pretend to know famous or well known people they in all likelihood have never even talked to? It is the same with Boris Johnson. All the media call him Boris. Yikes…
Meanwhile in the bunker, a heart to heart chat ensues.
link to derekbateman2.wordpress.com
If God had meant us to smoke,
we would have been born wi’ a chimney oan wur heed.
I don’t know how many of you subscribe to the Scot Independent but there is a neat poem in there by David Wilson called ” the Prize ” about independence.
Apologies kininvie always knew this site was way too hip for me
Cheer up Kev – just find the breaking news and you too can sport the flares & the Hendrix hairdo….
@caz-m Likewise we would have a job picking ones nose with a knife in on one arm and a fork in the other!
@ call me dave
One of his best…. so cruel. Barbara Cartland has nothing on the agonised pathos of a conflicted Johann…
caz-m: that’s what ears are for surely?
And tonite’s peerize goes to the MajorBloodnok that dog fouling in Shettleson is newly elected Councillor Neill’s No2 problem.
Good to see Mags cross over from the dark realm of the fleg mongers at Project Fear.
” I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.” – Nelson Mandela.
Shettleston should be straightforward for the next election – whoever promises to start attaching ASBOs to guilty dogs will be a shoo-in.
The eminent Peatworrier on why the knives are out for Darling:
link to lallandspeatworrier.blogspot.co.uk
Shit on the streets is always a high priority for SLAB. It is a matter of great concern to them when it located there instead of inside the electorate’s heads, where it should be.
@Rev Stu, thanks. It has seriously been brilliant for my health. I’m not struggling for breath and coughing in the morning and have been slowly cutting down on the amount of nicotine mixed in my liquid. I really believe these devices can help loads of people quit smoking. My fiance my sister, brother in law and mum have all been off them for six or seven months due to these.
As I said the lookalike cigarette version isn’t up to much, but that’s the version the governments are wanting to use and tax. The refill cartridges are about £10 for five which won’t last long, maybe a couple of days. But the version with the tanks are perhaps costing me £20 a month. The savings I have are astronomical. But the healthy feeling is worth so much more.
I had had never even considered the pub trade in this at all Stu. As you say it could be a boon for them, although I find that most of them won’t let you use them inside up here in Scotland. Some places will, most don’t.
Like all cringing “proud and patriotic” so called “Scots” it is ok for other people and other countries to fight violently for and get what is rightfully theirs, it just simply isn’t ok for the people of Scotland to reclaim what is rightfully theirs through peaceful means.
@Dan Watt –
‘…it just simply isn’t ok for the people of Scotland to reclaim what is rightfully theirs through peaceful means.’
Aye, it’s infuriating, but what can we do?
It’s a serr fecht to even get people to put ‘Yes’ stickers on their cars. (Ohh, ahm feart some rank badyin might see it and take their key doon the side ay ma Fiesta..)
I sometimes wonder if asking our fellow citizens whether or not they want independence for our nation isn’t just a wee bit too much for some of them to handle – perhaps we should be asking them why they’re such forelock-tugging, downcast, glass-half-empty, soul-less, whingeing miseries. If they could even make an effort to work that out, the bigger question might not be so impossible for them to even contemplate.
O/T – and sorry if already mentioned, couldn’t see it:
Interesting to see the IFS coming out with their predictions about the UK economy needing tax increases or spending cuts if wee George Osborne is going to balance his budget as promised.
Of course it’s bang in line with their predictions for Scotland, bearing in mind that those were bizarrely predicated on an independent Scottish Government just sticking to the same ropey policies as the UK. And it’s the sort of thing they always seem to say anyway.
But I wonder how long they’ll stay “greatly respected” if they keep criticising Westminster like that?
@ian
Having a down day? We got rid of 50+ car stickers on Wednesday, even in the West Lothian badlands….
But if it’s a prob, give them an Aye Right leaflet and tell them to come back when they are ready to come out!
Let them come to you….you know they will, sooner or later….
In regards to that trade agreement.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a huge, ultra-secret deal among twelve major countries that would give corporations unprecedented power — allowing them to use new global tribunals to sue our governments for passing laws that protect us, but reduce their profits! This could apply to everything from labeling GMO foods to protecting internet freedom. Wikileaks has broken the story and opposition is building fast, but the countries are rushing to seal the deal in 48 hours.
link to avaaz.org
Shettleston? That dump? Listen, when Scotland eventually achieves her independence the vast majority of the folk in Shettleston won’t even notice it and certainly won’t care. Beer and fags, chips and cola is all that interests most of the people that live there. They have had chance after chance to vote for something better and improve their lot in this life but they don’t and they won’t. EVER!
Feck ’em. Let Labour have them. They deserve each other.
As for those there that do have the intelligence not to vote Labour my advice is to get out of Shettleston…sharp.
Either that or die before your time.
@ midgehunter
I was actually at that concert, they did it for my 40th birthday.
It goes so deep. Sleepy Sleepers (=Leningrad Cowboys) were a big humour rock band in Finland from the early-mid 1980s and thereafter. In 1984/1985 I and frieds went to the New Year’s concert in central Helsinki where this band played. Next day, the second biggest daily newspaper had a front page spash, a picture of me and my friend, who’d broken her front tooth on a beer bottle… The paper took the line of less than laudable Finnish youths… My parents saw me and my friend on that fucking front page!
My parents shrugged and said, well, yeah, you’re 16, you ought to know better, you ought to know what to do. Don’t get on the front page ever again. We trust you to be a bit smarter the next time around.
Ouch!
Lovely parents.
My parents never said or asked a thing about my school, ever. They never asked me if I’d done my homework.
I did, only maths, because I liked it, loved it, and knew maths is cumulative work.
Maths was the only subject that I ever did all homework, almost never played truat. I loved maths at school. My favourite, my lovely, my simple subject. Sciences and languages, social sciences were so confused.
The Finnish broadcaster YLE website had this PISA test, “Are you better than 15 yr olds at maths?”
I was a bit shocked at how easy the questions/problems were. I’m not a particular maths genius but the PISA questions were ridiculosly easy. I scored 14/14.
OK, so I did three more years of maths at high school, but I haven’t done any maths since then. I need pen and paper to get my head around equations, like, x miles per hour, and in Finland wind speed is measured as metres by second. Eh? So 93 mph is 42 m/s. (I’ve made a tiny Excel thingy. All British wind measurements will be multiplied by 0.444)
I like the fact that Great Britain is inch by inch becoming metric. Newsreaders say miles and kilometres, temperatures are Celcius. Only the US with their delusions of grader are wed with rhe old system. Most of the world is metric. Engeneers and well-educated people are all right and comfortable about it.
UKIP of course won’t like an international set of measuremnts. They want to retreat to the eNGLISH VILLAGE IDYLL THAT NEVER WAS.
@The Rough Bounds
1. Try living there and saying that.
2. Try living there in the conditions you describe and getting out.
3. You are cringing hard right now and therefore part of the problem.
O/T a funny one from The National Collective, ref Nicola v Carmichael, sure to bring a smile to your face !
link to nationalcollective.com
A wee reminder of Meg Curran’s selective memory with Derek Bateman.
The old ones are the best.
link to ayewecan.blogspot.co.uk
@kininvie –
You are a perceptive and kindly being.
Aye. Sometimes you just get a bit down, eh? Not sure why.
I was in a Sainsbury’s earlier today, looking for ‘reduced’ bread with which to pack the chest freezer (got quite a stack as it turned out), but as I was wandering up and down the aisles, the instore muzac was playing that Ure/Geldof song ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas’. Given what’s been dominating the news, mixed with the memories of Live Aid and all that’s followed, it just feels a bit bewildering, nay overwhelming, that we’re still where we are. That song seemed visionary (to many of us) at the time – now, it’s excruciatingly patronising, and it’s a fucking supermarket soundtrack?!
Cameron’s weasel-words today – he won’t get pulled-up by anyone. It’ll be business as usual. That’s what gets me down – these people are so, so powerful – and they know it – that our movement here must be little more than an annoyance.
Anyway – tomorrow, in Saltcoats, North Ayrshire SSP will be in the main precinct. We’ve decided not to picket Anas Sarwar’s appearance at the Labour Club (at 11 a.m.) because we want to use the time positively. I had already prepared a massive ‘Bedroom Tax Abolition? Yes/No‘ ballot-paper and was going to wave that in front of him whilst proffering a big blow-up pencil, but, hey-ho, so it goes, there will be other chances…
@Ian Brotherhood
Hey Ian want a laugh – go and visit Gordon Brown & Labours Flagship of their campain for Britain Together the United with Labour website.
Complete ghost site with nothing happening, you can just about hear the ‘tumblweeeds’ – it always cheers me up !
@ianbrotherhood
As always an eloquent and arresting post. But take comfort from the fact that in my work today I found no one over the age of thirty who did not feel amazement at the chutzpah of Cameron and revulsion at his hypocrisy. People do notice.
We’ll win next year because people do notice, no matter how muted that awareness might seem on some days.
@lumilumi
Would have came down to Saltcoats Ian, but will be to busy leafleting in Renfrewshire.
On the subject of the Bedroom Tax, did you hear that dickhead Ed Balls in the HoC the other day in reply to the George Osbourne Budget statement.
He had the cheek to scream across the floor that only Labour can get rid of the hated tax.
Forgetting to mention that they all went AWOL a couple of weeks ago when they had a chance to put the brakes on it.
@Gordoz –
Cheers for that.
It did make me smile right enough – here’s Scottish Labour’s page for ‘Upcoming Events’:
link to members.labour.org.uk
Kirsty Wark on Newsnight discussing amongst other things G. O’s claim that the economy is improving and panel guests on discussion panel consisted of Times journalist and Financial Times journalist, so much for balance.
they are so removed from real life. Parallel levels of reality are now broadcast live.
Jobs figures up welfare costs down. Just base statements no analysis.
Anyone spotted cumulative risk assessments on welfare cuts recently.
No, thought not.
So sorry Stu, missed out numeral in email tag.
Rough bounds takes the prize for the most disappointing, depressing and frustrating post on here to date.
The only consolation being their rather loose grip on arithmetic “As for those there that do have the intelligence not to vote Labour…” sheesh!
A fantastic example of the lack of empathy that drives the whole system we are trying to extract ourselves from here. Why, I wonder do I rather suspect it comes from a supporter of that system. (Probably the inability to count)
Quite a striking wee event map. when you scroll up past Blyth
@Training Day and Caz-M –
Cheers to youse too.
Any form of human contact which involves getting away from MSM shite is always a tonic. I’ve been avoiding the radio, papers etc all day, just can’t bear to hear any of the shite about Mandela. These bawbags sounding-off (like Michael Kelly, FFS?!) just make a mockery of ‘respect’ by weighing-in, trying to claim a bit of the guy’s past to justify their wretched existence…and BBC Scotland giving it the whole ‘Glasgow was the first city to give Mandela the symbolic Freedom’ etc?
aaaaarrggghh!
Totally boak-inducing: so, BBC Scotland is, all of a sudden, some cutting-edge advocate for radical change, and Glasgow (a quarter-century after being named ‘City of Culture’) is a model of socio-economic justice?
No-one would dare make this shit up. And yet, and yet…these fuckers actually do it, on the radio, on the telly, for all the world to see, and show not the slightest blush…
BTW, I’ve got a copy of ‘The Long Walk to Freedom’ sitting on a shelf not six feet away, but I’ve never opened it. I know nothing about the man beyond what’s appeared via MSM, and some online stuff, fuzzy memories of a sub-standard Simple Minds song. I’ve no idea whether he was a terrorist or a saint, and right now? I don’t much care. I’ll get time to read it in years to come, and then I’ll make my own mind up. What I do remember is seeing the live coverage of him being released from prison, and walking, walking, hazily, as part of a wavering horizontal line, like a mirage, with never-ending commentary. Eventually I got fed-up with it and went to the pub…where everyone was watching a slightly bigger wobbly-line, and the same commentator was still droning on…
What’s important right now, is that we get this job, our job, done – for our people, for our selves.
Scotland, right now, is as good as dead if we don’t get away from the parasitical bastards who have control over the real power players in Westminster and the City of London.
Question – if he found himself reincarnated ‘tomorrow’ (or 20, 50, 100 years hence) what would Mandela, as a ‘Scot’, do?
@ian
‘What’s important right now is that we get this job, our job done’
Amen to that. And frankly if we focus on anything other than getting over that line we deserve to lose.
A2 at 7.12
What is happeninga the moment is that the only real result of the Better Together inspired vicious media onslaught on the SNP and Salmond is keeping the SNP vote down in some areas, but it is not increasing the Labour vote.
The Shettleson result is meaningless at the moment
Megrahi in my opinion, the man was a gentleman. I resided in close proximity to him in a previous life. I can’t say whether or not he was in any way implicated, though after reading all his transcripts I find the evidence against him fabricated. Although he never denied being with Libyan secret service the man should never have been incarcerated in a Scottish prison. But put it this way the residents of Chrisswell house were in no doubt about the mans innocence of the conviction brought by camp Zeist. The fact the British government could not afford him a Jury of his peers speaks volumes for me. In my opinion Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi was an innocent man sent to live out his best years away from his family on a political decision. I hope the man rests in peace and forgives the Scottish people his treatment by the establishment. The current Scottish government would rise in my estimation if they were to divulge the truth about this sordid affair.
@Training Day –
‘…if we focus on anything other than getting over that line we deserve to lose.’
Precisely so.
This movement towards independence/freedom is so much more powerful because it isn’t pinnable to any ‘ism’, be it Neo-Liberalism, Socialism, Maoism, Communism, Mandela-ism or anything else – if anything, it’s genuine, grass-roots ‘scunnerism’: we can not and will not take this any more.
Anyone else agree that the SNP should start really putting the boot into Labour? Show them up for what they are and as mentioned above that they are the biggest bunch of self serving political types maybe the world has ever seen. Total hypocrites in the extreme!
I was a bit annoyed that John Swinney the other night with Brewer didn`t even mention the fact that Scots pay more to Westminster than we ever see back but when challenged by Brewer that he should be grateful for a little extra funding he didn`t even mention it.
I did even wonder to myself that maybe he doesn`t want independence, silly I know but can we see more of Kenny Gibson, Alex Salmond and the few others who take no prisoners with these awful presenters.
I thought with the release of the white paper we should have seen all our best gunners out there. If the media can get away with the way they behave without being passionetely challenged at every turn then what`s the point?
We all know how energizing it is to see good debates and things going our way as they well should be, When things look bad it saps the energy out of us bit by bit.
GRRRRR
Sorry, maybe i`m being negative but it feels like the YES camp are trying to run through treacle sometimes. Would just love one poll showing that natural majority firm in the Yes side.
How can 80 percent of the population not engaging in the process at all be meaningless.
These are people who don’t think they can change anything
Also the shettleston ward covers not only shettleston itself. What’s the bet the campaigning concentrated on Mount Vernon & Carmyle where they were more likely to get people motivated to turn out.
@ian
or even refugees from UKIP 
All I want to do is to get over that line and then put whatever energy I have left into making Scotland a better place
Yep – scunnerism – that does it for me. But also ‘hopeism’ – that I don’t care whether I have to work with a bunch of left wing loonies like you
Roughbounds, do you feel the same way about Morningside or Bridge of Allan , leave them to the Tories, they’ve had chance after chance and they keep voting for them. Dinner parties and Heals , whit would you do eh? Except they don’t’ because people are’nt just one big homogenous group and no matter how frustrating it is, people can use (or not) their vote as they please.
There are plenty of politicians talking about strivers and skivers( plus the media who quote them verbatim)without writing everyone off. Are you honestly saying that behind closed doors there are not the same hopes or aspirations that everyone else has.
i read somewhere , 2 things we all need is to feel safe and have some control.Well there are a lot of people who feel they have next to no control over what is happening in their world and when that kicks in, people react differently and not always in their own best interests,We do what we can to feel safe, we’re human. That happens in Shettleston and Morningside , Labour voter or Tory.
Your role and mine Roughbounds is to get the message across to every estate is that with Independence we’re aiming for both.
@kininvie –
Ha!
More power to ye mister – you’re ploughing your own furrow, and I respect it.
I daresay you’re familiar with MacDiarmid’s ‘stuff’? I wasn’t, until recently, and I love his epitaph:
‘I’ll hae nae hauf-way hoose, but aye be whaur
Extremes meet – it’s the only way I ken
Tae dodge the curst conceit a’ bein’ richt
That damns the vast majority a’ men.’
Excuse my if this has (definitely) been said I haven’t read another post but Wow someones about to come out of the closet, she’s realizing she’s been batting for the wrong side!
Now to go back and read what everyone else said
Hetty says
“Absolutely disgraceful and incredibly hypocritical, almost seems deliberate, she will pay for this, I hope she is given a grilling about this big time at the Scottish parliament.”
I wish they could but she’s in Westminster Hetty.
@John king
Can you give us a bit more detail on that John.
Who is coming out the closet?.
Is this a gay closet or a Yes/No closet?.
there seems to be a lot of closet yes supporters out there (Scottish skier) who say no but mean yes, she seems to be following that pattern
Lumilumi says
“Snow is softly falling and it’s getting dark now, so I’ll go and light two candles in the window for Finnish independence (nobody knows why it’s two candles, it just is) and maybe a third one slightly apart for Nelson Mandela.”
Just felt the need to repeat that,
there’s something about your posts Lumi that fill me with delight/hope/joy special person Lumi special person!
John king
Who is “she”?.
Freedom and democracy for everyone in the universe, except for Scotland.
Doesn’t matter if a couple of thousand people voted for Labour in Shettleston.
I believe the majority in Glasgow will vote Yes.
After all, the polls suggest that poorer people are more in favour of Independence than the rich.
Re childcare. It would have to raise more than the cost, otherwise women are working for nothing, especially with young children. Children who need one to one care when young. More tired, stress out women. Sometimes women need a break.
The richer/richest have endorsed Alex Salmond as FM, and the SNP gov as the best to run Scotland, including Tory/Labour/LibDems. David Murray, Stagecoach, Weir Group, McColl. Many entrepreneurs etc. It could be the higher paid public sector workers, colluding with a system from which they hope to gain or women were there is less support Independence. Even teachers etc lack knowledge of Scotland’s disadvantaged fiscal position within the UK., and how much is raised.The WP might help to inform people,
The MSM is Westminster controlled by right wing tax evaders. Thatcher made sure of that by giving too much power to the right wing Press. People have to view worldwide news sources and the Internet, for more balanced news coverage. The Guardian is the only Paper in the UK with an element of freedom of Editorial.
The Referendum is different from a Gereral election or a bye-election. it is unique. That is why the Polls are often wrong, weighted by circumstances aligned to a Gereral election. It is not voted for on Political Party lines. An increased number of traditionally (‘they are all the same ‘) non voters will turn out to vote.
Caz-m
“Who is “she”?.
Margaret Curran the subject of the blog
I think gordoz & WND are on the money, Curran will pretend that’s what the UK is giving us.
I also happen to think Salmond has a whole bag of magic that he hasn’t yet used & that’s what’s worrying the unionists this week.
We are going to win.
Jock McDonnell says
“I also happen to think Salmond has a whole bag of magic that he hasn’t yet used & that’s what’s worrying the unionists this week.
We are going to win.”
I think you might be onto something there Jock
think back to the hacking of the yes campaigns emails, its not beyond the realms of possibility that the SNP’s systems have also been hacked and they have forewarning of Salmond’s next moves,
now as things stand the gap is 9 points they are probably seeing the release of whatever Alex puts out there next as being the game changer we all keep talking about,
they are indeed truly worried not just saying it for the papers.
Ken 500 – The Guardian is the only Paper in the UK with an element of freedom of Editorial.’
No way hose. Its another unionist mouthpiece as for its editorial stance, it peddles nothing but the same old unionist pish as the rest. Remember this is a newspaper with a history of grassing up its sources to the authorities. It’s might be lefty/liberal but its unionist lefty/liberal unionist establishment and never forget that.
Shettleston result – Mags back on form !! (17% turn out and she punts this mince)
Margaret Curran, Labour MP for Glasgow East said: “This win is a blow to the SNP. It shows once again that people want representatives who stand up for their communities, not people who will just stand up for separation.” from NNS
Think you’ll find it was aboot the dogshite doll.
Labour – your Number 2 party ?
Had a wee sneaky look on the BT site as never been there before. They are asking for volunteers to distribute a new leaflet! Its titled ‘Don’t Let Them Switch Off our BBC”. Will just quote the rest of the accompanying diatribe.
“The nationalists have tried to get our BBC leaflets banned. They know that Scots won’t like the idea of paying an extra £100 a year licence fee, more adverts on telly, paying £44 a year to view iPlayer, or losing access to channels like cBeebies. We received lawyers letters from BBC copyright officials and we were happy to remove the BBC logo from our leaflets – but if they think that Scots who support the BBC will be silenced, they have another thing coming. As the First Minister found out when he was booed by thousands of Scots on Friday, we will always find a way of making our voices heard.
We need your help to deliver the leaflet they tried to ban. They don’t want Scots to know about their plans to switch off the BBC in Scotland. We want to deliver one hundred thousand of our leaflets next week. Will you help us deliver them in your area? Show the nationalists that you won’t be gagged: get leaflets for your neighbourhood by emailing info@bettertogether.net.”
Well I’ll be off for a lie down now.
“Had a wee sneaky look on the BT site as never been there before. They are asking for volunteers to distribute a new leaflet! Its titled ‘Don’t Let Them Switch Off our BBC”.”
That’s from 2012:
link to archive.is
Yes,it’s ok for the rest of the world to be free,but not Scotland.
Couple of points – I was around when the SNP were gaining ground on Slab in the 70’s but I had no idea they were that close to taking areas of Glasgow – just read the old Derek Bateman blog – where did it all go wrong?
Re Shettleston and Morningside – the conservatives look after their own, hence people voting for them in Morningside makes sense.
Slab pretend to look after their own, therefore voting for them in Shettleston makes no sense.
Possibly when the establishment realised that Scotland might vote in a majority SNP at Westminster the full force of the Uk came down – and cos we didn’t have the internet then, it was harder to notice.
The British establishment are quite happy if Slab run Scotland as they can make deals with them.
As for Mags Curren she is a disgrace – she knows the poverty that existsin slab areas but she doesn’t care.
Sorry Rev tried to edit oot that nasty bit aboot the contact email but my ipad froze (probably shock).
Can someone survey dogshit per sq foot mapped to political representation?
Just which is the shittiest party?
IanBrotherhood, you have no consideration fur my pocket money post Referendum, Ive all ready invested in Stink Bombs fur BT meeting, noo you come up wie a big blaw up pincil ( ah wish you would hay thought of that before I went intae the Science centre, am fearful your gonna come oot wie a tablet of stone fur ANUS tae rite on,hay some pity man it takes me awe ma time tae walk without a heavy load Hummpf
Liz what I was trying to say ( to Roughbounds) is you can’t just write off a whole area of folk because a small committed group vote Labour and the same with areas like Morningside. I don’t believe for a minute everyone votes Tory there .
If you look at Shettleston or Morningside as an area of people rather than Labour or Tory voters aren’t they just trying to do what’s best for their own ?
Shettleston is an easier target though isn’t it?
@Dan Watt 11.14pm.
I did get out.
IanBrotherhood, Bye the Bye hiv a good day in Salcoats, its a pity yer littin that ANUSHOLE aff,but priorities take presedence, all the best
“Had a wee sneaky look on the BT site as never been there before. They are asking for volunteers to distribute a new leaflet! Its titled ‘Don’t Let Them Switch Off our BBC”.”
That’s from 2012:
link to archive.is
Someone should let BBC Scotlandshire know about that via twitter
The Independence Referendum vote and local election, bye elections are different. ie turnout out 18% – ‘all politics are the same’ why bother voting. A high/er % would turn out for the Independence election. That will make a change. Voters did turn out Devolution. 63%. The same negativity was displayed by the No element during the Devolution campaign.
Elections are different from single issue Referendums. Referendums do not follow Party Political trends. One of the reason the Polls are not reflective, they are being round along PP trends.
Re Better Together shoving out any leaflet, i think it’s time for us to compere notes again.
We were told by BT that they were going to put tons of leaflets regarding the white paper, most of us in Clackmannanshire are still waiting, they, (Better Together-Stirling), Stirling? Were going to cover five wards for two hours starting at 10am.
So two hours later I started phoning around Central Ward, one of the targets, some of those lived in streets next to the starting point, and they never received diddly, it transpired it was the same in three other wards, in the forth one, A labour Councilor was heard moaning that he was only doing it because he had to and that he had more important things to do with his time as he put out a few.
so c’mon folks how was it in your area, remember they boasted they would be going out from the borders to shetland.
Re: Margaret Curran….
link to youtube.com
@Ken500 @6.49am
Oh, and the housing benefit is paid monthly to the recipient, not the landlord. You know, to a rational person who’s supposed to run his/her own household budget like a grown-up person.
Re childcare. It would have to raise more than the cost, otherwise women are working for nothing, especially with young children. Children who need one to one care when young. More tired, stress out women. Sometimes women need a break.
I have two issues with this.
Firstly, it seems to assume that only women look after young kids. In my circle of friends and family, dads also take a big role. Both parents might work but at home mums and dads share the running of the family home. Their input isn’t identical but dads do change nappies, cook, look after the kids. Maybe mums do a bit more of the mundane stuff but dads are great at playing with the kids, teaching them stuff, getting them out of mum’s hair and giving her some time of her own.
Secondly, this idea that state-sponsored childcare should be self funding. Wait a minute! Does anybody demand that school or health care or care for the elderly or any progressive social policy should be self funding? Of course not.
The state ought to spend money on childcare, and hopefully reap some benefits in the form of wider participation in the workforce by parents of young children.
Not having proper childcare provision effectively locks one half of the workforce – often educated, trained, skilled workers – outside the workforce. That cannot be good for a national economy.
A note about the Finnish welfare state. Nothing’s free here, except school (including school lunches) and higher education. Health care, prescriptions, child care, care for the elderly… You pay a nominal fee, but it’s all capped and some of it is means-tested (poorer people pay less than more better-off people).
My parents are now retired and they don’t get free buss passes, they get 50% discount. Housing benefit in Finland has always been means tested and tied to the size of your home. A single person is deemed to need max 35m2 (= typically a one-bedroom flat), a couple with one kid 70m2 (=typically two bedroom flat) and so on. The max you can get is 2/3 of the rent for the m2 deemed adequate, if your home is bigger, you have to finance the extra m2 yourself. We’ve always had the bedroom tax!
jim mitchell 1.02pm
jim keep your voice down we know they said borders to shetland
the map was upside down
its now borders to sheffield
Typical Labour, freedom for everyone except the people they were elected to represent.
Doh! No dates, no comments so it still looks current. They must just leave all their out of date rubbish on there.
Sorry to come back to this, and going wildly O/T… Unless I can pass this off as foreign policy realities and opportunities of a small independent country with a bigger neighbour… ;-D
Anyway, midgehunter posted a Youtube clip of Sleepy Sleepers/Leningrad Cowboys yesterday at 8.16pm. If you watched it, you would’ve noticed how Youtube suggests similar clips. The one to watch is “Those were the days”. Here’s a direct link:
This thing is a mad, happy thing. It could only have happened in the special circumstances back then. A Finnish humour rock band and the Red Army Orchestra and Choir collaborating! Oh, just listen to all those balalaikas!
Today, Putin wouldn’t let his army do things like this, but right after the break up of the Soviet Union, it was so volatile, hopeful, nobody knew what was going to happen. This Finnish humour band had this totally mad idea of preforming together with the Red Army Choir and Orchestra, wrote to them, and the rest is history…
The Red Army was in disarray and the choir and orchestra were only too glad to get some western gigs and money. Leningrad Cowboys and the Red Army Choir and Orchestra toured extensively (they filled stadiums in Germany and other central European countries) and recorded a couple of CDs together. A friend of mine, fluent in Russian, was there as their interpreter.
That was the high point of Finnish-Russian relations. The early 1990s, after the fall of the Soviet Union, was a time of hope and friendship. It’s got a lot chiller now, with Putin’s dictatorship. And we share a fucking 1500 km land border with this hostile nation. Count yourselves lucky, Scots!
Don’t worry about Margaret In a few days she’ll just claim not to remember it just like she does on everything else ”
Margaret Curran’s Strangly Disfunctional Memory by Alan Smart, who like me, was there. link to ayewecan.blogspot.co.uk