Your country needs YOU
Posted on
March 21, 2021 by
Rev. Stuart Campbell
Here at Wings it’s mostly our job to point out things that are broken. (Currently that’s mostly the SNP.) But there are also other more useful people working on actually fixing stuff. Readers might want to give them a hearing and perhaps offer some assistance and input of their own, especially as you can do it today without leaving your house.
It costs nothing and it starts at noon. All you need to participate is the virtual meeting software Hopin (also free). What is there to lose?
Incidentally, every time I wonder why the Scottish Government doesn’t purchase Grangemouth…
I’ll be there Stu. Time for the grass roots to come together and assert itself.
Wil do.
Yup…I’ll be there ????????
Anyone watching Craig Murray’s video last night, as I did, will be looking for an alternative.
One thing I couldn’t help noticing was that Alex Salmond’s boundless faith in our Courts system could have been misplaced. Alex was saved by the Jury, not by the Court process which contained enough faults that could have put a lesser man away for a long time.
What ever anyone does or whoever they vote for, think twice about Sturgeon/Swinney/Wolffe/Yousaf/Evans. They are a disaster waiting to happen.
Will do…
Captain Yossarian 8.43
But Craig Murray is Voting SNP 1.
He’s all for ANOTHER five years of the same, if not worse.
Can you imagine Sturgeon and Harvie running the show?.
Murray
Sheridan
Kestings
What are you three all about?
SNP 1,,, You’re having a laugh guys,,, surely?
“But Craig Murray is Voting SNP 1.” I’ve read that but he didn’t say that last night. In fact, he gives the impression he is leaving the SNP. Is that not right?
Anyway, what occurred to me was that the alphabet women are all close colleagues of Sturgeon either in Parliament, civil-service, party or husband. They ALL knew about this in November. She says she didn’t know until the following April.
Brilliant post by “Red” last night.
He puts into words the point I am trying to make about Me Murray and Co.
Red says:
21 March, 2021 at 12:53 am
Michael – yes.
Tactically, it makes perfect sense for them to promote SNP1 to try and hoover up some list seats. Strategically, it makes as much sense as invading Russia, in winter, armed only with harsh words and a rolled up copy of the People’s Friend, with your arse hanging out the window of a Lada Niva with baldy tyres and a broken heater.
Because it means the message to voters sounds something like:
“Nicola Sturgeon’s SNP is a corrupt gang of compulsive liars who’ve squandered every mandate and donation given to them while shredding your rights and turning the country into a crap version of East Germany, but, eh, vote SNP and gies the sloppy seconds?”
Or, worse, it comes across as an endorsement of everything the SNP have done and plan to do. Which basically it is.
The reason this is a strategic self-own is that the SNP is now the main obstacle not only to independence, but to even basic standards of honesty and competence in Scottish public life. It’s that bad. Maxing the Yes vote in light of this is a fantasy, the SNP needs to be either replaced or completely gutted and rebuilt. Neither of those things are compatible with asking people to vote for them with the current regime in place.
Voters don’t tend to spend a huge amount of time parsing the nuances of political campaigns, especially ones from fringe organisations that will have to work 100 times as hard to get a hundredth of the air time as the establishment parties.
They might listen to short, simple messages that hammer home an obvious point. Activists might be more politically aware, but they’re still human. It’s better to motivate people with boldness and bravery than dry, half-hearted, too-clever-by-half efforts at Numberwanging the electoral system.
Go big, go bold, or go home. Unless the goal is simply to pick up a seat or two and hope the entire parliamentary SNP succumbs to a hilarious King Ralph style mishap, in which case they’re just wasting
Ross Kilbride,
Saying voting SNP1 is voting for another five years of the same is simply not true.
Suggesting that Craig, or any of the good people on here who will vote SNP1, or are specifically voting for 5 more years of corrupt governance and the party being the Murrells’ personal fiefdom is hyperbolic ally dishonest.
Another SNP government can be held accountable, a Unionist government at Holyrood less so.
If you are saying the Scottish people are unable to hold their elected government accountable then why should they bother electing anyone? We are obviously too stupid.
Yours is a counsel of despair I am afraid.
Give Craig and all the Wingers who will, with a heavy heart and with full awareness, be voting SNP on the constituency in May a little credit.
They are not stupid, they are not weak, they are Alert.
anyone voting SNP is a total fuckwit,just say no!
I say again, voting SNP is NOT voting for ‘5 more years of the samev.
To claim that it is is fundamentally dishonest.
James,
Anyone who calls half the people who have read and supported Wings for ten years ‘fuckwits’ is not a person whose opinions bear any consideration IMO.
The political fruit is either too green or too rotten.
FFS
Another SNP government can be held accountable, a Unionist government at Holyrood less so.
If you are saying the Scottish people are unable to hold their elected government accountable then why should they bother electing anyone? We are obviously too stupid.
How’s that working out with this parliament?
An SNP win will be an endorsement of everything they have done. They will use the fresh mandate as cover for a further purge to make sure there cannot be any future committee embarrassment, or any prominent dissident.
Captain Yossarian says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:01 am
“But Craig Murray is Voting SNP 1.” I’ve read that but he didn’t say that last night. In fact, he gives the impression he is leaving the SNP. Is that not right?
You do not have to be an SNP member or supporter to vote for them.
James says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:10 am
anyone voting SNP is a total fuckwit,just say no!
Reply
Are you saying:
Vote Labour & say No thanks?
Vote Tory & Say No to IndyRef2?
Sorry, but won’t be having anything to do with Now Scotland so long as it has Charlotte Ahmed of the Socialist Workers Party as one of those running it.
The “Chancer from Kent” must be selling something.
Ignore him.
A Chancer of the highest order.
Mr Bonobo says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:16 am
An SNP win will be an endorsement of everything they have done.
NO IT FUCKING WELL WILL NOT
Stop guilt-tripping people and do something useful.
@ Ross Kilbride: Your purpose in commenting here appears to be to promote negativity and foment division amongst those who are trying to bring about unity and find a way forward. As I’ve pointed out previously, there is a very valid tactical reason why AFI is suggesting that people give their constituency vote to the SNP. It doesn’t mean people actually have to vote SNP in order to support AFI. Nor are they suggesting people vote SNP because they actually approve of or endorse the SNP. If that was the case, they would be in the SNP, not AFI, wouldn’t they?
Do you have anything positive to contribute? Perhaps you would like to suggest a way forward for the independence movement instead of shouting down those who are trying to do that before they’ve even begun?
If you vote SNP you can say goodbye to Independence.
We’re not having anything to do with you, Mark Boyle. You’re another trouble-maker and division-monger.
I very much want to live in an independent Scotland. It seems increasingly clear that to get there the SNP must be destroyed in May.
Let the yoons rule – nothing will increase support for independence more than five years of them fucking up the fallouts from brexit and covid.
Hey, maybe this is the election everyone wants to LOSE !
Ross Kilbride says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:19 am
The “Chancer from Kent” must be selling something.
Ignore him.
A Chancer of the highest order.
What makes you think I am from Kent, and what do you think I am selling?
Aren’t you on some kind of a warning?
link to apps.apple.com
Must have app for money weavers!
So far I have had to download an app that does not really work and register for something that looks like beta software.
I am now supposed tp register with now scotland who have a list of guest speakers I have never heard of and its just not worth the botheR as I don’t want to join an exclusive little club that nobody has heard of.
Ross Kilbride says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:20 am
If you vote SNP you can say goodbye to Independence.
Yeah, but if you vote Unionist a herd of unicorns will magically appear.
Grow up.
Have we just to magic away the last seven years?
Forget they ever happened?
Well the snowflakes on here can do what they like, but I am on Sturgeon’s case,,, until she falls.
John Martini, if you have not heard of Now Scotland then you are not a very alert independence supporter.
Hopin works. It is not beta. It is the same platform the SNP used for their conference.
The Chancer from Kent wants more of the same,,, fuckin genius.
@Michael Laing says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:21 am
We’re not having anything to do with you, Mark Boyle. You’re another trouble-maker.”
Who is this “we”? Get over yourself!
If others want to participate in something with people who were VERY physical enemies of Scottish nationalism and now pretend to have “seen the light” because they’ve run out of places to infiltrate and rob (like they did to Labour and all it’s little “broad churches” for years), that’s their look out.
Remember Comrade Delta.
Ross Kilbride says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:24 am
… the snowflakes on here can do what they like, but I am on Sturgeon’s case,,, until she falls.
She will be terrified when she hears that.
She thought she had enough to worry about with Andrew Neil, David Davis, Alex Salmond and her own NEC, but now she has the fearsome ROSS KILBRIDE to contend with.
She’s quaking in her Jimmy Choos, Ross.
Ross Kilbride says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:20 am
If you vote SNP you can say goodbye to Independence.
Reply
If you don’t vote SNP you can say Hello to direct rule from Westminster.
“I say again, voting SNP is NOT voting for ‘5 more years of the same”
You’re going to need to do more than just ASSERT that and demand people accept it. Because I promise you it’s exactly what the SNP think.
“Grow up.”
BOTH of you grow up. I am at the very limit of my patience with this little spat.
Sounds like yet another in a seemingly inexhaustible series of the usual secessionist echo chambers…
Is five more years of the same better or worse than five years of direct rule from Westminster?
Ross, you say if you vote for SNP you can say goodbye to Independence. How else are we going to get it. I read ion here lots of negativity about the SNP but would argue they are no worse than the Tories and they will push for Independence if they get a majority.
Is there any other path to take?
The election is a few weeks away. In my uneducated opinion the opinions spouted in here will leave us with a potentially hung parliament and a huge wedge between the SNP supporting independence supporters and others, can’t work out where your political allegiances lie, alleged independence supporters.
If we can’t be united now when our businesses are being destroyed by Brexit, power from Hollywood being eroded we may as well through the towel in. But no worries gives us something to complain about when the Tories force their draconian laws on us.
A year from now how many will be thinking “if only”
The Tories are playing a blinder, support for Indy down, support for SNP majority down.
Labour went through it, the SNP are going through it now, self destruction just before an election.
We need to find what unites us not what drives us apart.
My old friends who did not join me in leaving the SNP are determined to be more active and use the first SNP Conference to begin the clear out . They do need the SNP to win and many ,like me will vote SNP1 and ISP2 to minimise the number of nutters. The clear out begins with ridding the SNP of staffers who are just a claque for the woke. A well paid claque.
We forget the core of honest ,decent people in the SNP,like those who resigned from the Finance Committee. These are the people who will take the party back to decency and independence for Scotland.
Independence is normal. Having a husband and wife team of CEO of SNP and FM is abnormal and downright dodgy and Alex Salmond suffered for opposing that and other non separation of powers.
Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:32 am
“I say again, voting SNP is NOT voting for ‘5 more years of the same”
You’re going to need to do more than just ASSERT that and demand people accept it. Because I promise you it’s exactly what the SNP think.
Sturgeon maybe, but ALL of them?
I don’t believe all current MSPs think that. I think many more heads will appear over the parapet after May 6th.
(I personally hope Sturgeon goes before then it is not looking likely)
I also accept that you, Stu, will have a much better idea than most, as I presume you have had some insights from your dealings with Angus and Kenny.
But I do believe the Grassroots has the power to bring this out of control party to heel. It won’t be easy, but I believe it will be easier than starting from scratch.
Ironically, at the moment it looks as though the party has pissed off just enough people to be returned as another minority government propped up by the Greens. Now that IS a recipe for five more years of the same.
That’s my tuppence worth. Call me naive, shoot me down in flames, but the truth is no-one really knows what to do for the best. We are all flailing in the darkness.
What do you think Stu? How would you, personally, vote in May?
“I don’t believe all current MSPs think that. I think many more heads will appear over the parapet after May 6th.”
I’m curious as to where you’re seeing any evidence of any of them having a spine. There’s none now, and most of the ones who even theoretically might have the clout to stand up to her are standing down this year, replaced by obedient young drones.
ScotsRenewables says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:10 am
“Another SNP government can be held accountable, a Unionist government at Holyrood less so.”
So why cant we hold them to account now? Why can’t we insist that the carpetbaggers resign? Because we have no power apart from on election day. I can’t see them changing after an election either. They will simply see an election victory as a ringing endorsement of their corruption.
I’m going to the NOW Scotland assembly today , hopefully to discuss and promote The Manifesto For Indy, the quickest and simplest way of restoring Scotland’s Independence, reversing the damage inflicted by Brexit, and getting international recognition right away.
NOW Scotland’s key goal is “Independence as soon as possible” reflecting the “What do we want? Independence, When do we want it ? NOW” cries (seems such a long time ago – marches) – Manifesto For Indy delivers on Independence Now.
@Ruby says: 21 March, 2021 at 9:37 am
“Is five more years of the same better or worse than five years of direct rule from Westminster?”
For the vast majority of ordinary people, it means heehaw difference when both end up being controlled by troughers only interested in lining their own pockets at their peoples’ expense.
That’s the tragedy.
I’d like to introduce the concept of – what happens if the SNP do not get into power this Holyrood term?
Well, the Unionists would have to form some form of coalition Government.
And then what?
They they would have to Govern.
And then what?
They would have to Govern over the next 4 years, as Brexit truely takes a hold, and as genuine powers in Holyrood are stripped from Scotland.
So?
So, they would be left holding the Baby, and the public would hold them to account, as apposed to the SNP remaining in power, but with less ability to effect change, being the useful whipping boy for the press to blame.
And? And an opposition party has much more scope to protest and campaign than a governing party.
And? And an election defeat for the SNP, might just about be the only way of removing Nicla and hubby from the SNP, getting the auditors in to clean up and putting the wheels back on. A defeated party is much less attractive to raging personality disorder carpet baggers.
But… But they will say a defeat for the SNP means there is no more demand for Indy.
Well they can say that all they want, it won’t make it true, and it might even lull some of them into a false sense of security.
If it were done…
I wrote to my SNP MP about a reasonable matter to do with suppressing covid infections . Three weeks later I emailed and said not to bother replying as I felt three weeks was sufficient. An an aid replied to advise me I could do the task myself and it was akin to litter picking ! We all know the rules ! Despite the death rates from litter picking being no where near comparable I felt totally disrespected. But she did thank my husband for his contribution as a front line worker but too busy to reply !
If that’s SNP you can keep it ! Additionally she was not too busy to be present in a wee car park meeting I saw her at later in the day ! She is on the NEC committee as far as I can gather !
Career politicians with a total disregard for the electorate .
Mark Boyle says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:57 am
For the vast majority of ordinary people, it means heehaw difference when both end up being controlled by troughers only interested in lining their own pockets at their peoples’ expense.
That’s the tragedy.
Reply
“Is five more years of the same better or worse than five years of direct rule from Westminster for independence supporters”
When I say ‘direct rule from Westminster’ I mean having one of ‘the branch offices’ in power at Holyrood.
Would one of the branch offices be better than the other?
As you say Rev, ‘What is there to lose?’ I hope people always have open minds and don’t let preconceptions colour judgment.
Ross Thomson was an interesting case. I remember him as being one of the better MSP’s. He went to Westminster and was set-up on some bogus charge of sexual mis-conduct. He lost his livlihood, as has Mark McDonald, as has Alex Salmond. Is this just the way politics is in Scotland nowadays. Can nothing be done about this? If they don’t like you, they are free to tarnish your reputation for ever and none of can do anything about it?
In the meantime, the real tools of the Junta like Swinney and Dornan just sail on and no-one can touch them?
Daisy, good points, good post.
Lynn, yes they never reply to my letters either and I’m still a member at the moment.
Stu, no real evidence of spinal activity or moral compass among MSPs, just wishful thinking. No-one knows what to do.
Going to fire up the laptop and see if Now Scotland’s Assembly cheers me up.
If you want the meagerest shot of either an independence ref. or more seats eaten up by Scottish arses rather than Tory’s or labourites or even tree hugging greens.
I suggest you vote 1 for SNP and 1 for another ACTION FOR INDEPENDENCE.
Anyone with half a brain should understand the voting game in Scotland. Instead of whinging on about the mess Scottish politics is in lets all think of how to save our country from Westmonster, Buggering Battered Children/BBC, politicians with hitler genes, and our own incompetent crown office that needs spring cleaned and most importantly ,
NUCLEAR FKN WEAPONS SITTING ON OUR WESTCOAST.
and FFS! stop going on aboot Robert the Bruce and William Wallace shite. we already celebrate an idiot that didn’t and couldn’t blow up parliament by handing out explosives to the public? this world is NUTS!
Then we can sort out these blundering fools we have as our country’s representatives. one thing at a time, please?
@
‘ScotsRenewables says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:12 am
I say again, voting SNP is NOT voting for ‘5 more years of the samev.
To claim that it is is fundamentally dishonest.’
Can you lay out for us a workable method by which the SNP is going to change course? From within?
Cause the only bit of hope I’ve seen for that came in Nov last year at the NEC coup. Which has since been null and voided by Nicla ignoring sackings of delegates and putting them in charge of making policy (Fiona Robertson), Gerrymandering of list candidates (unlawfully so), and internal financial goings on so extreme and secrative that 3 members of the NEC Finance board have had to resign.
What timescale will it take to fix the SNP – if there is a plan to do so? 1 year, 2, 3 or 4.
Cause you know… Brexit, Power Grab. Its not like there’s a lot of time left to save our country.
Since it is coming down to the line – what is more important for you to save – your party or your country? And when is your cut off period, (if there is no progress on saving the party) at what point do you say, actually, this is now so serious, I have to do what is right for Scotland.
For many of us, that line was crossed when we left the EU 1.1.21 – coupled with the extreme levels of rampant corruption coming from the SNP.
First they came for Alex and I did nothing. Shame.
Daisy Walker says:
They would have to Govern over the next 4 years, as Brexit truely takes a hold, and as genuine powers in Holyrood are stripped from Scotland.
So?
So, they would be left holding the Baby, and the public would hold them to account, as apposed to the SNP remaining in power, but with less ability to effect change, being the useful whipping boy for the press to blame.
Reply
Why not have the SNP left holding the Baby?
Let them be the useful whipping boy for the press to blame.
Get rid of them that way?
Five years to form a new independence party.
Watching Mike Russell’s cringeworthy defence of Nicola Sturgeon on the Sunday Show, as he claims the committee hasn’t done its job right, the problem is that Russell isn’t happy the committee hasn’t come out in Sturgeon favour, so the leaked result from the committee is tainted in his opinion.
It seems clear by now that no-one in the lower echelons of the SNP MSPs is going to stand up and call out the leadership.
Who can we vote for without getting more of the same? RSC (that’s the Rev., not the Royal Shakespeare Company) is correct in saying that this vote is the only opportunity we have to exercise power and call them to account. It would be nice to think that the rot doesn’t extend down the whole party, but there is currently no indication of where it stops.
Even in the face of the evidence, no-one is breaking rank. They must be terrified, like rabbits in the car headlights,but unable to speak or move to avert the oncoming disaster.
There’s actually one other current SWP or certainly ex-SWP member on the inaugural committee.
FWIW the SWP have pretty good campaigning chops…it depends whether you think the possible good outweighs the possible bad but you won’t know for sure unless you (meaning anybody at all) get involved.
Bogus charges of sexual misconduct ?
You know this to be a certainty how, Yossarian?
Spouting what you believe is not the same as listing facts. A fact is something proven to be correct, not this is what I think so it’s the truth.
In my opinion sexual misconduct has become more prevalent now not because there is necessarily more of it going on. People are more likely to come forward,
I see that the Judean People’s Front are up bright and early…
So many people on here are missing the point. There will NEVER be independence under Sturgeon. She will dangle the hypocritical carrot again as always but independence is the last thing that she and her nasty corrupt group actually want. Do you want to be here again in 5 years, most likely in a weaker position than we are now with all alternative media such as Wings suppressed?
If you truly want independence then voting against the SNP is not really voting for another party, it is taking the only practical route we have which is to rid Scotland of Sturgeon as quickly as possible and start again.
In an interesting exchange on the Sunday Show, host Martin Geissler, put Adam Tomkins on the spot when he said that Johnson and some of his ministers (Priti Patel at least) had broken the Ministerial Code, as well, and that he should clean out his own house (Tory party) first, Tomkins blustered his way out of giving an answer, but fair doos to Geissler for putting the point to Tomkins.
Tomkins smearing Alex Salmond by commenting on his behaviour and how Sturgeon must have know about it, utterly disgraceful from Tomkins.
Mike Russell on the Sunday Show falsely claiming that Sturgeon answered every single question put to her by the committee, when the truth of the matter is she didn’t answer at least on fifty occasions, choosing to say I can’t recall, I don’t know, I can’t say etc.
“If you are saying the Scottish people are unable to hold their elected government accountable ”
Yes, that’s what we are saying, where you have been the past year? That is exactly the root of the debacle. And will remain the case if they get a majority (which I doubt, such is the damage they have caused to their own party and independence).
We’ve nothing to loose Rev and mibbi everything to gain.
I like the concept of NOW Scotland and the potential of it.
We saw in the past how the Constitional Convention and the Claim of Right moved things forwards.
They were outside of the political party’s but they had power and influence because they were of and from the people.
It’s undeniable that organisations who speak on behalf of thousands of members are listened to, and it’s well past time the Yes movement spoke for itself .
It’s didn’t matter when we marched who else was there we were just glad they were.
And it can’t possibly matter who the other members are when the only meaning of the membership is that Scotland being independent is the point.
I’m looking forwards to this afternoons assembly as finally after one bloody long year being able to do something …. and I’ll be looking to see if there’s anything I can bring to the table too!
Mike Russell just confirmed the referendum bill will say we’ll have our referendum when the pandemic is over. ANd no, he didn’t say how we’ll have one. But we can have an election, but not a referendum. They’re just buying themselves another 5 years right there.
Kezia on BBC R4 this morning in review of papers said that the AS complainers were interviewed in private, by the Committee, at Holyrood last week. Wonder if they got any truthful answers from them.
She then went on to say that they had been asked to … tie his shoelaces, straighten his tie and brush dandruff off his collar.
Unsure why she revealed this ‘private’ information and none of that sounds like sexual harassment to me – more like ensuring that the then FM was well turned out. Anyone employed at that level would know that is standard presentation for ‘important people’.
She was cut off by the interviewer reminding us all that AS was cleared of all charges in Court.
That was the extent of her political insight on this ‘most important election’ in the history of Holyrood to date.
Mike Russell on BBC this morning showing his true colours saying “Alex Salmond was found guilty” before hurriedly correcting himself.
@John – It has been investigated and found to be untrue. Just as Alex Salmond’s case was foun to be untrue. You don’t get sent to Barlinnie for pinging someone’s hair. Check the facts for youself. It’s Sunday, so you have some time to do it.
Meg, that would require believing that guff, none of which I believe for a second. Let us remember what Craig has been tellin us – how close a lot of the complainers are to Sturgeon. This is a political move, designed to be leaked and just a continuation of the smear campaign against Salmond, where political people are given the cover of anonymity to continue their allegations, all of which bar one, remember, were proved false, and in some cases malicious.
Whatever else is the case, and I am undecided as to precisely how to vote on each vote at present, but how can a vote (for any party btw) NOT be a vote to endorse past behaviour and all future prospective policies?
We all have reasons why we vote a particular way, but we won’t be consulted afterwards when it is interpreted in the way that the winners see fit (which may be as an endorsement of past behaviour and for particular policies on a platform which were not the ones you chiefly voted to get).
The BritNat media and the Sunday Show all deliberately and wrongly labelling the vicious set up of Alex Salmond by Nicola Sturgeon and her vile clique as a feud.
Craig Murray said in his vlog that Sturgeon wanted to make sure Alex Salmond never returned to Holyrood as an MSP again, so the half arsed plan was concocted to stop him, so it isn’t a feud by a long shot, just like the Syrian Civil war isn’t a civil war.
Are current SNP MSPs ‘rabbits in the headlights’?
Or are they ‘wheeshting for indy’ and planning to get their arse kicking boots on come May 6th?
I only know one list candidate personally, and on that basis, reading between the lines, I would say they are maybe wheeshting and looking their boots out.
(If any MSPs ARE looking their boots out for post May 6th and if you are reading this, ffs drop us a hint – the Wings et al camp represents a sizeable chunk of the electorate. Perhaps we could have a codeword on Twitter? I suggest ‘kicker’)
I have no evidence at present though, nor any huge hope, so Stu is right to call me out on it.
What I do believe is that the Grassroots have the tools for holding an SNP government to account, and the moral right – nay, the moral imperative – to do so.
We are on much shakier ground if we allow Unionists to assume control. There will be deemed to be ‘no appetite’.
A Unionist SG could spend 5 years dismantling all the progress we have made or, worse, stand by while devolution is dismantled and Westminster put mechanisms in place to make further secessionist dissent illegal.
There are no good options, just less bad options.
@Grey Gull at 10.39am
Mike Russell saying that Alex Salmond was found guilty & then correcting himself was deliberate. They now have the SNP President saying that on film just in time for the election & will use that piece without the correction at every opportunity from now on.
Mike was well aware of the aim to get that piece of film. Its been done before by senior SNP members.
I’m not voting for the SNP at all and I’ve only voted SNP and been a member all my adult life and the reason for this is simply because of the treatment of Alex Salmond and these constant attacks on his charter and the fact that Sturgeon has come across as a arrogant and vindictive woman doesn’t sit well with me so If Sturgeon resigned I would be willingly give the SNP my 1st vote and 2nd vote to the ISP in order to secure our departure from the UK, and another reason Sturgeon has got under my skin is she has made NO effort to remove us from UK and has made NO effort to keep us in the EU.
Why did Sturgeon & Murrell not want Alex Salmond to return to Holyrood as a MSP?
Could it be something to do with money?
What about these ‘AlphaBetties’ are they getting paid?
@PhilM says: 21 March, 2021 at 10:21 am
“There’s actually one other current SWP or certainly ex-SWP member on the inaugural committee.
FWIW the SWP have pretty good campaigning chops…it depends whether you think the possible good outweighs the possible bad but you won’t know for sure unless you (meaning anybody at all) get involved.”
The SWP are beyond evil – they are little more than a “network marketing” scam aimed at fleecing anyone of a left wing persuasion, invented for people who want to spend their entire life as “student politicians” and so behave as a heavily brochialist bully boy (and girl) squadristi in a permanent state of fund raising for this week’s “cause” in order to keep full time regional officers employed as well as those at HQ (eg. the SWP employs six full time staff for Scotland).
They’re modelled identically to the 1970s Tyndall/Webster NF, except on steroids. Continuous fundraising, an endless series of “urgent” causes, confrontationalism, and lots of physical intimidation of opponents – including, for example, an assault on Gaelic poet Kenneth C Steven in his younger days at Glasgow Uni for being a “Tory bastard” (ie. wearing an SNP badge!).
This is par for their course. Ask Alan Bleasdale about the intimidation he and the actors received when filming “GBH” from SWP thugs appearing during filming to “make sure you don’t make the left look bad” – as he said, without them showing the slightest irony.
Just remember, these are the people who brought you not only Comrade Delta, but also Aamar Anwar – convicted of assualting a Glasgow University Queen Margaret Union board member on his last day there as a student when he decided to go back to the QMU to settle “old scores” (ie. daring to ban him for flyposting without permission – gasp!) amongst a litany of other offences down the years which appears to have been conveniently “forgotten” by the Scottish press.
If you want to know why “broad churches” fail, look to the SWP. If you want to know why the left continually makes idiots of itself just before elections and hands its opponents all the ammunition it needs, look to the SWP. The SWP needs the left to be in a constant state of “being in opposition” to those in power in order to exist, it’s what its funding model relies on. They have no qualms at sabotaging “allies” for the greater “cause” (ie. keeping things just as they are and their money streams flowing).
The SWP are not Scottish nationalism’s friends any more than they were Labour’s when they thought they could be their own “deniable asset” little brownshirt brigade to carry out “persuasion” on opponents, and soon found like Michael York in “Caberet” asking “you still think you can control them?”
Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:34 am
“Grow up.”
BOTH of you grow up. I am at the very limit of my patience with this little spat.
Put them in the sin bin Rev, ruining my enjoyment of the sensible comments
David Davis, if Sturgeon sets the Crown Office on me and Police Scotland show up at my door, they’ll get a cup of tea and a biscuit but that’s all.
Meanwhile the SNP and the Scottish government are in full propaganda mode trying to discredit the committee’s findings which they don’t like.
What a corrupt little tinpot British colony Scotland has become under Sturgeon.
If you manage to go abroad this year, you’d better not mention that you come from Scotland, or the reply will be ah, that corrupt wee country.
link to archive.is
Much of the above, is posited in a state of complete uncertainty. The findings of both enquiries have the potential, at least, to change many things, including the electability of the SNP in the eyes of the electorate.
Another approach: vote the SNP in, even though they be a Gang o’ Bastards. Then get rid of the gang using the courts. There is no political or procedural way to do this, only the courts. Besides, they deserve to be in prison.
A sample of charges that might be brought: malicious prosection against the Lord Advocate (he has form). Conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, against most of them. Embezzlement. Other charges would doubtless apply.
Once convicted and gaoled, and the cheering is over, there would be by-elections. There would need to be some solid public figures willing to not only stand, but take sides during the prosecution process. So those responsible for taking such a plan forward would need to be attractive to voters and put their heads above the parapets early on.
It could well work, and the result is worth working towards.
Monica Worley says: 21 March, 2021 at 10:36 am
Covid is evolving with variants and vaccines need to evolve as well to be effective against them.
The pandemic will be here for years, if not decades until it is either eradicated or virus mutation slows down to a point where it is manageable.
A very easy measly thing to say.
No Covid pandemic stops an election for Holyrood colonial administrator parasite politicians.
Vote for Independence? Don’t you know there’s a Covid pandemic !!!
You’ll need to wait for that (forever).
Lyn Hay says:
21 March, 2021 at 10:58 am
Another approach: vote the SNP in, even though they be a Gang o’ Bastards. Then get rid of the gang using the courts.
Is this possible? I know private criminal prosecutions can happen. And we have a few legal minds on our side. I am sure we could raise the funds.
John @ 10:27
Therefore In your opinion
Alex Salmond
Despite being found innocent of all charges against him is still guilty, so your umbrage about the term bogus is wrong in my opinion , the effort and resources employed to imprison one man was by far the most expensive and wide ranging police action in Scotland ever undertaken , it was without equal even in murder investigations , and still no conviction , Aye Bogus was spot on IMHO .
Iain Lawson follows up on Stuart’s ‘The invisible weaving’ from yesterday.
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
Another SNP episode where those doing the right thing are attacked by the leadership’s indoctrinated faithful.
And another example of the official record being doctored to keep the information from the public.
I think we all know that the SNP are scum and need to be punished.
Here’s my suggestion:
Vote SNP
To see them handling the post Brexit/post Covid, post Lockdown, post inquiry protests and perhaps worse.
The next five years will not be pleasant for the party in charge at Holyrood.
By the end of the five years the SNP will be finished.
Independence supporting protesters can help this along.
During these five years other independence supporting parties can built up support, recruit members etc get themselves ready for the 2026 election.
Groups like ‘Now Scotland’ etc can built up support for independence.
Voting for a Unionist Party or not voting SNP (same thing) wouldn’t mean punishment for the SNP it would mean punishment for YOU!
I am surprised that nobody has yet commented on today’s story in the Sunday Mail reporting that The Chief Constable has announced that the Salmond Squad ran up costs of £850k and involved 14 officers.
May will be a least-worst election.
Unionists will take a vote for them as endorsement to strip Holyrood of powers.
The SNP will take a vote for them as an endorsement of corruption and authoritarianism.
Even if you don’t want either. So you have to then ask yourself – what is my least-worst outcome?
Mike Russell says ‘Now is not the time!”
Mark Boyle says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:18 am
“Sorry, but won’t be having anything to do with Now Scotland so long as it has Charlotte Ahmed of the Socialist Workers Party as one of those running it.”
I have to simply agree with this viewpoint. The SWP is a step too far on my very long political journey which began in 1965, the year when I first could vote.
I have chopped and changed over the years. Why?
“When the facts change, I may change my mind.”
But I will now, never *ever* have anything to do with, or support in any way, a far-left Party like the SWP.
I take this stance from very personal knowledge and personal experience.
I don’t understand why Mr Kilbride and several posters above dwell so much on who I think they should vote for in constituencies. It is their vote.
I would recommend people to vote for any decent Independence supporting candidate. I would vote for Michelle Thomson in Falkirk, for example, with no hesitation. In Edinburgh Central I would vote for Bonnie Prince Bob. In Glasgow Southside I would probably beat my head out against the nearest wall in despair, unless another Bonnie Prince were to show up.
link to archive.is
Police Scotland spent almost £850k and 14 officers investigating Alex Salmond
o/t
Brian Doonthetoon from the previous thread ha ha thanks for the clip , just shows you the picture quality of the stuff we used to watch and that clip was a good picture , how easy pleased we were , aye if only we knew it at the time, happy days and none of the Machiavellian shite we are getting now .
Glad I am on the way out rather than the way in Christ knows what we have in store from these twisted MPs and MSPs I don’t live in their world and it baffles me .
Maybe time for the Adults to take charge because the children are really fkn it up IMHO .
Whichever way you vote, it seems to me that we are at the beginning of people forming independence groups in opposition to the useless and now corrupt SNP. It’s a small start, but it badly needed and will grow over time. The SNP have set us back massively, but the only option is going forward with people who are trustworthy and committed.
@Ruby says:
21 March, 2021 at 11:19 am
“Mike Russell says ‘Now is not the time!'”
I would have liked to see a question about the resignations…
“Craig P says:
21 March, 2021 at 11:19 am
May will be a least-worst election.
Unionists will take a vote for them as endorsement to strip Holyrood of powers.
The SNP will take a vote for them as an endorsement of corruption and authoritarianism.”
A real frying pan/fire election.
@Ruby says: 21 March, 2021 at 11:19 am
‘Mike Russell says ‘Now is not the time!”’
To think, back on 24 April, 2019, the mantra from those in charge of the SNP was “It’s Time”.
Now it’s more like a Sex Pistols song.
“The time is right to do it now, the Greatest Finance & Audit Swindle, the time is right to doooooooo it now!”
Cash from chaos indeed.
Craig Murray says:
I would recommend people to vote for any decent Independence supporting candidate. I would vote for Michelle Thomson in Falkirk, for example, with no hesitation. In Edinburgh Central I would vote for Bonnie Prince Bob.
Reply
How long would you expect ‘decent Independence supporting candidates’ to remain in the SNP?
Correction: build not built in earlier post.
Renewables
Sturgeon maybe , but ALL of them?
Yes, apart from a very few, ALL of them. The vast majority have sat on their arses taking their money and said nothing about the destruction of their own party.
They are a disgrace.
Ruby says:
21 March, 2021 at 11:23 am
“https://archive.is/FcTEn
Police Scotland spent almost £850k and 14 officers investigating Alex Salmond”
Yet another insight into what actually happened:
“First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s most senior civil servant Leslie Evans triggered the investigation when she reported internal Scottish Government harassment allegations involving Salmond to prosecutors, against the will of the women involved.”
Remember: *AGAINST THE WILL OF THE WOMEN INVOLVED*.
But Leslie Evans, an obvious legal expert (NOT) decided – “She balanced their objections with the “potential criminality” when she told the Crown Office in 2018.”
Good old Leslie, eh? Instead of being a senior civil servant for the FM, why was “Inspector” Leslie not moved to the Procurator Fiscal department where her knowledge of “potential criminality” may have been appreciated. Or maybe not.
To heck with the wishes of the complainers.
Leslie decides that she knows best as to how this mess will be carried forward.
Did Leslie really and truly decide this matter on her own?
Really? Really? Really?
There are now not just chickens coming home to roost, but take a swift glance at the roof of Bute House and you will likely see many vultures flocking there. To me, they are very, very welcome. Let us hope that these vultures of the MSM finally grow some b@lls or feathers even, and go wild at picking on the bones of this whole sordid mess.
I don’t see any reference to Now Scotland on the Hopin website. Help!
Does anyone have url for the NowScotland session? Tying meself in knots here…
This has probably been shared already but just in case it hasn’t.
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
@Vronsky –
I just got it – go to this page and click on ‘checkout’
https://www.nowscotland.scot
There appears to be no virtual meeting of Now Scotland on Hopin today or scheduled in the future, and no meeting is mentioned on their website.
John says:
21 March, 2021 at 10:27 am
“In my opinion sexual misconduct has become more prevalent now not because there is necessarily more of it going on. People are more likely to come forward”
No, it’s because people no longer seem to be able to distinguish between normal social interaction and actual sexual assault. Funny how it seems to be more likely interpreted as sexual assault when it come from someone the “victim” doesn’t fancy but would be considered flattery if they did.
@Mark Boyle
I’m not sure I have any real insight into the background history you’re describing or how just the comparisons are with the NF.
My only point is that politics is an ugly trade…there are no shining knights or Boudiccas. The only things that save ordinary people from being continually shafted are the rule of law, following recognised procedures and norms, oversight and accountability mechanisms, easy access to justice, trade unions etc. (sadly in Scotland, there is very little oversight and accountability where it matters).
So up pops a body called Now Scotland and there are two SWP types on the inaugural committee…does that taint the Now Scotland beyond repair? I don’t know if it does because the proof of the pudding etc. I can understand the heat behind the hatred of any particular party but the largely ineffectual SWP are certainly no worse than (and certainly not worth anywhere near the level of justified hatred for) a party whose welfare policies have killed off hundreds if not thousands of vulnerable people (if anything the WRP are much more successful than the SWP have ever been in that many of their luminaries are in positions of real influence. The old SWP used to have a policy against members taking managerial positions).
Any road, if certain ‘progressive’ campaigns are happening, the SWP are going to be active. So what do you do? You can actually dislike them as a political force and still have some use for them as people. I don’t see it as a dealbreaker with Now Scotland when we know exactly who they are.
If someone can’t give money to Now Scotland because of concerns about the influence of the SWP that’s fair enough if giving money is all that’s being contemplated but if actual involvement and campaigning was a person’s level of engagement, it might be better to join and be a countervailing influence against the SWP lot. If ever there was a time for ordinary people to be on the move politically it’s now. There’s certainly no room in active politics for beautiful souls at any level.
Back to the SWP…they’ve been trundling along and getting nowhere politically since they were the International Socialists in the 60s. I seriously doubt that they will succeed in using Now Scotland as a vanguard to realise the dictatorship of the proletariat any time soon. The proletariat clearly aren’t interested in revolution and are content enough to suffer all manner of boring shit jobs as long as a consumerist lifestyle is on offer.
As for the subject of student politics…we don’t need to worry about that with the SWP, it’s much, much closer: don’t you think that’s exactly what we have with the SNP’s cultural revolution right now?I
A bit scattergun but I’m too tired for connected thoughts today.
click on ‘checkout’
There’s no ‘checkout’ to click on
What a bloody mess the SNP are in, and more to the the point they’ve let a helluva lot of folk down, what’s even more depressing is that not one, not bloody one SNP MSP or Crown Office personnel, has come forward to blow the whistle and stand up for Scotland, that is the biggest scandal of all, what does that say about the calibre of person within the Scottish government, the SNP and the Crown Office.
@craigmurray
You mean Michelle Thomson who made her money buying houses from people in financial distress for under value and then engaging in what can only be termed mortgage fraud?
Her solicitor was struck off for that and as a lawyer myself i can tell you I don’t know a single solicitor who would do what he did without client instructions. How she wasn’t jailed is beyond me. I wouldn’t touch her with a barge pole. Theo whole thing stank to high heaven.
@craigmurray
And as for promoting some absolute joke like Bonnie prince Bob, it should be you standing there to take out Angus Robertson. They way you have run away from that opportunity to now back someone with as much chance as screaming lord sutch is unbelievable. He has absolutely zero chance of winning. Who in their right mind is going to hand some complete and utter tool like that £70k a year plus expenses? Have you lost your bleeding mind?
Click on the Now Scotland logo above.
It takes you to the checkout. Click on the checkout button.
Sign up on the next page and it takes you to the event.
Click on live stage and you see the speakers.
Enjoy the discussion.
Ian Brotherhood:
The first Now Scotland Assembly is tomorrow, Sunday 21 March 2021. To register and attend Sunday’s event please CLICK HERE.
Please ensure that you click on the BLUE CHECKOUT BUTTON on the ticket highlighted, and then proceed to sign up to the Hopin online conference platform.
If you have used Hopin before, after the blue checkout button simply click Sign In and enter your username and password. We recommend that you register on Hopin before the event starts on Sunday. If you do, then we are better able to assist with any technical issues in advance.
It’s interesting that just a couple of weeks ago the debate on here and elsewhere was about who our second votes should go to. Today we see heated debates on where first votes should go.
For me that’s progress. Those who disagree will acknowledge the situation is at least fluid and that the they’re losing the argument.
We can expect the situation to change further. By Friday, I expect the settled view will be “No Votes SNP”.
I respectfully disagree with Craig Murray’s suggestion that we vote for good independence supporting politicians, regardless of party.
This election isn’t about independence. We have Nicola and the SNP to thank for that. I say we thank them at the ballot box.
The situation will continue to develop. Its natural conclusion, based on a simple grasp of political ballistics, is “anyone that stands for election under an SNP banner is the enemy of independence and justice…”
If you’re part of the problem, you’re not part of the solution.
So if you ain’t going to vote for SNP, who you gonna vote for?
Hatuey says:
21 March, 2021 at 12:42 pm
It’s interesting that just a couple of weeks ago the debate on here and elsewhere was about who our second votes should go to. Today we see heated debates on where first votes should go.
For me that’s progress. Those who disagree will acknowledge the situation is at least fluid and that the they’re losing the argument.
It’s right and proper that the discussion on first votes is had, but clearly the constituency voting options are much more limited than the list voting options. That’s unavoidable. That’s the frying pan/fire element here.
I suspect this week a lot of people will have a better idea of what to do, particularly after the Hamilton inquiry publishes its findings and if they are not favourable for Sturgeon.
Sturgeon resigns plus a load of civil servants go too, it may be easier to consider holding the nose for the SNP first vote.
Sturgeon makes it a “well let’s leave it to the people to see what they think” then it will be (in my view anyway) impossible to vote for the SNP if that’s going to be taken as endorsement of her rather than endorsement for independence.
Yes, Sturgeon is so dishonest and manipulative – challenging people to vote for independence, which she knows a lot will, and then choosing to interpret that as an endorsement for her and what she has been doing. Shameless.
“So if you ain’t going to vote for SNP, who you gonna vote for?”
Please stop with this shite argument. Blackmail isn’t as good a look as you think it is.
As it stands, I’ll be forced to vote for whoever is most likely to defeat the SNP candidate in my area. I’m not happy about that.
But if people on the other side of the debate can argue that we should vote for independence politicians regardless of party, they can’t object to the principled view that we must vote to defeat the SNP, regardless of party.
Ideally we’d have other options. Maybe we will. As I said, the situation is fluid.
@PhilM says: 21 March, 2021 at 12:13 pm
“@Mark Boyle I’m not sure I have any real insight into the background history you’re describing or how just the comparisons are with the NF.”
The SWP were originally called the International Socialists. They changed their name as part of an abrupt rebrand because they knew “World In Action” were investigating organised football hooligans by the far left and far right as part of an even more moronic by their standards “strategy” of “controlling the streets by first controlling the football terraces” (a reworking of the old Nazi and Trotskyite opposition to football in their early days because it distracted the working classes from wanting to have revolutions on Saturdays instead … no, really!).
“So up pops a body called Now Scotland and there are two SWP types on the inaugural committee – does that taint the Now Scotland beyond repair?”
Yes. It only takes a small virus to kill.
“… if actual involvement and campaigning was a person’s level of engagement, it might be better to join and be a countervailing influence against the SWP lot.”
And when you get a good kicking outside from your new “comrades” for daring to disagree with their Rotfuhrer at the meeting, don’t come crying to the rest of us. They’re the leopard that never changes its spots. All history, all evidence shows that you cannot work with them, they should always be proscribed. It’s part of being an SWPer that they are told to subvert any organisation (especially one raising funds) to the “Central Committee”‘s whims.
Alexie Sayle’s old joke “How many Socialist Workers does it take to change a light bulb? They wouldn’t change the light bulb, they’d SMASH IT!” was spot on. The SWP is nothing more than a bully boy gang, either for people who were bullied at school wanting to get their own back on the world, brainless morons using political activity as an excuse for barefaced thuggery, and spoilt trust fund kids having their “rebellious” phase at everyone else’s expense.
But let’s illustrate what the SWP are really all about with one of their own pictures:
link to wortharguingfor.files.wordpress.com
Look at the little hate goblin – face all contorted with her self-righteous wish to commit physical violence against this week’s “enemies”, much like the witchhunt mobs of old appealing to base instincts. Now look at the coffee cup she’s holding. Yep, she’s protesting outside Tesco for using unpaid labour c/o government “back to work” schemes, whilst happily buying from a chain that was doing the same. This is the SWP in its entirity: the old fascist “Believe, Obey, Fight!” according to what they’re told to do – and their members don’t give a damn, because it’s all about the thrill of how many times they get to put their jackboots on other’s necks.
These people are never, ever, your friends or allies.
And for those who think the Comrade Delta affair doesn’t matter:
link to theguardian.com
@Paul –
Cheers. That’s the way I got it.
@Vronsky –
Did you get in yet?
I guess the painful choice is the constituency vote. Although I’ve only ever voted SNP I cannot bring myself to vote for them until there is a change of leadership (cancelled my membership a few months back over that point).
We will never get independence with the Murrell’s in charge and the longer they are in power the more they are undermining what little devolution we have along the way.
For me its either no vote or a tactical vote against the SNP, if it looks like the SNP are heading for a majority I’ll vote tactically against them.
It feels like the the Murrell’s have everything stacked in their favour (i.e. COPFS) and a very loyal and unquestioning fan base (Reading WGD BTL makes that very clear). Lets hope there are enough people that have been paying attention and get independence back on track again.
We’d be best to wait a few days before finalising our commitment as to who to vote for. Too much panic around.
o/t
Lurkers replies
Capella you ask or you inquire what has Princess Nicola done to attract all this flack , are you fkn serious ? Are you totally bleeding blind deaf and fkn stupid ? Rhetorical by the way .
As for the other clowns in the we are with Nicola gang it’s one thing sticking by someone but being blind and not taking seriously information that’s been presented in black and white by trusted people who haven’t been bought bribed or threatened by this SNP government and proof of confirmation of wrongdoing that’s been uncovered,
That says more about your character and your assessment of Nicola sturgeons ability to tell the truth you like a whole lot of other people have been had she is no more pushing for independence than my budgie , if you are so convinced show us the evidence , just one example, just one .
StevieO says:
21 March, 2021 at 12:49 pm
“So if you ain’t going to vote for SNP, who you gonna vote for?”
What an ignorant, arrogant question.
If you think that I am going to declare my voting intention in the present poisonous atmosphere of Scottish politics, well, you have another think coming.
For the record – I WILL NOT BE VOTING SNP IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM at the forthcoming election. My conscience forbids me voting for *ANY* Party which demonstrates open corruption and the present SNP set-up shows that in spades.
Yes, I *WILL* vote.
And my vote shall remain a confidential matter, hopefully known only to myself, my conscience and the Returning Officer in charge of the ballot.
I WILL NOT VOTE FOR A PARTY, which may, *IF* returned to power with an absolute majority, may even change the system so that I may never have another free vote again. This has happened in the past in supposedly “free” countries.
There are a lot of “mays” in my explanation, StevieO, but in a long life I have seen quite a few disastrous consequences of voting for rthe likes of, “Well, ye ken, they’re the only Party whae thinks of Scotland!”
I will never “hold my nose” and vote, or “wheesht for Indy” on the off chance that those people wishing to harvest my vote may turn out to be ‘good guys’ after all.
Life is not like that and I am not willing to take a chance on a bunch of charlatans turning out to be, “Nae see bad after aaw”.
If the SNP suffer seriously enough, the Blackford mob will be crapping it in a couple of years. Then we will get another load of false promises.
What I’m lead to believe with this Hollyrood voting system is, if the SNP Constituency vote drops considerably, then this increases the chance of the SNP getting a higher percentage of List seats thus making it more difficult for other independence parties gaining seats on this List
To gain the ultimate independence power, we need to vote SNP on the constituency which will then allow other independence parties in through the list.
I ain’t happy at all in voting SNP at this present time but I am hopefully seen a bigger picture.
We can deal with the criminals at a later date once this independence alliance is in place.
Unless the inquiry produces enough criticism or Hamilton finds her guilty, she won’t go. A VONC will be scuppered by the Greens. Harvie has already rubbished the inquiry. If she wins in May he’s looking for a cabinet post. All these internal mechanisms and machinations are grist to her mill.
I wrote some time ago I thought it would come down to us plebs to deal with it and it’s looking that way. The discussion today with how we do it is the heart of the matter. Is it max the SNP1 to get as many indy folks in on the list and challenge her that way over the next 5 years? Or is it the nuclear option of “voting best challenger by constituency 1” to oust them and get a coalition minus SNP running the country?
Coverage in the MSM has been very limited on the sheer scale of corruption in our country at the moment. Even the leak from the committee causing the stushie is small potatoes.
Polls suggest if she doesn’t go SNP will have some form of majority in terms of seats. This for me is the dilemma between the 2 options I posit. Are there enough small majority constituencies where the SNP MSP can be defeated by tactical voting, say less than a 1000? I don’t live in one of those. Only that way can a non SNP Government be formed and Sturgeon gone.
On balance I’m still going for the nuclear option and cross my fingers, locally. Re-election of her is an endorsement of all she’s done. That simply cannot stand.
Don’t confuse this re Independence. 50%+ in Scotland still believe in it. When your eyes open to it, they never shut. This election is about much more than that, at the moment.
Our freedom will just take longer than it should have, that’s all.
@Shocked says:
21 March, 2021 at 12:30 pm
“@craigmurray
And as for promoting some absolute joke like Bonnie prince Bob, it should be you standing there to take out Angus Robertson. They way you have run away from that opportunity to now back someone with as much chance as screaming lord sutch is unbelievable. He has absolutely zero chance of winning. Who in their right mind is going to hand some complete and utter tool like that £70k a year plus expenses? Have you lost your bleeding mind?”
Seconded. Craig Murray could have stood there as a “loss leader” for the List, using it as an opportunity to promote his candidature more and hang Robertson out to dry.
Instead he’s telling people to vote for someone else’s ego trip to promote his “self-brand” so he can be the next Stacey Dooley, and by that video has even less talent than she’d got.
Solar, the situation for Sturgeon is such that even if Hamilton absolves her, it will spur a surge of opposition to her and the SNP. She and the SNP are dammed either way.
We’ve seen these predicaments before. Look at the collapse in support for Swinson in 2019. Look at Scottish Labour’s decline. There’s countless other examples. There’s an invisible line that’s crossed, beyond which no change of people or policy will arrest the decline.
A few weeks or months ago it might have been possible to rehabilitate the SNP. With a new leader and some deep cleaning of the stables, things could be very different today. That isn’t an option now.
Once you understand that the SNP is screwed either way, a toxic and tainted brand, you free your mind up to assess the situation without emotion.
It isn’t fanciful to imagine a massive collapse in SNP support between now and the election. By massive I mean unprecedented in scale and pace — cataclysmic.
So many things are rotten in SNP but be clear the stench
is bearable composited to Westminster.
Understand that anything other than a vote for a dysfunctional SNP
is a vote for Unionism a vote for Boris a vote for the Tories.
I’d never, ever vote for a Boris or Reese Mogg to rule over me and
and my country as plebs only in existence to make them even more money.
Just a point: I am represented by perhaps the most forensic MSP at Holyrood. There are one ot two others who are well regarded, but I think we could almost all agree that she is the best of them.
Seven years ago I reported that a school under construction was being built wrongly and would not work. A mistake had been made and it would be best to correct it now. I reported that to Scotgov and their private sector lawyers. They all told me I was wrong.
I therefore asked others for their opinions, worldwide experts this time, and I received more than 40No responses. They all agreed with me. The school will not work….”get it fixed quickly.”
That was 3 years ago. During that 3-years I have repeatedly asked all at Holyrood to “check this school professionally”, but no-one answers. Get it checked by the “Health and Safety Executive,” no-one responds to that either.
The First Minister responds, often, by saying that she will respond formally soon, but she never does.
I believe that Holyrood shuts-up shop in mid-week and so is she trying to dodge this for another year? I wonder.
As you would expect, not only all at Holyrood are aware of this, but all the folk you would expect to be informed of the safety, or lack thereof, of a school.
Get real.
The SNP don’t do asserting Scottish sovereignty.
England only has to say no to indyref or indy and Scotland’s politicians back off head bowed on their knees.
In the UK, only Unionist politicians assert national sovereignty.
Shocked and Mark Boyle, that may be your opinion of Bonnie Prince Bob but there are others, in fact everybody I know who has watched (including myself) thought that campaign video was the best we have ever seen and would vote for him if we stayed in his constituency.
And I would rather see him getting £70k a year Plus expenses than over 90% of those currently living off our taxes.
He has something that Robertson and others lack, charisma and do not rule out an anti snp establishment revolt.
So don’t vote SNP
Don’t vote for Craig Murray
Don’t vote for Bonnie Prince Bob
… apart from Anas Sarwar, can anyone on here tell me who we SHOULD vote for?
Effigy…
Pleeeeeese stop with the bullshit…
“Understand that anything other than a vote for a dysfunctional SNP is a vote for Unionism a vote for Boris a vote for the Tories.”
You remind me of the scene in Blazing Saddles where the character Bart, who is Black, points his gun at his own head and says “Hold it! Next man makes a move, the n****r gets it!”…
Hold it! Next election vote for the corrupt, scheming, lying, thieving, incompetent, Woke riddled SNP or Scotland gets it!
“ScotsRenewables says:
21 March, 2021 at 1:47 pm
So don’t vote SNP
Don’t vote for Craig Murray
Don’t vote for Bonnie Prince Bob
… apart from Anas Sarwar, can anyone on here tell me who we SHOULD vote for?”
The frying pan/fire election in a nutshell…
Constituency – I might make a decision on that by the end of the coming week, but can’t honestly say I have a clue yet.
List – either ISP or AFI, but no clue there either whom is the better option.
Most underwhelming choice for some time. Sigh.
@solarflare
Underwhelming indeed. Hopefully there will be more clarity by Wednesday.
Once Holyrood is prorogued there is presumably no chance of Sturgeon stepping down though, or of any of the other miserable actors in this sorry farce being dismissed.
You know, some people close to me ask, “Willie, how can you *not* vote SNP in May?”
I simply try to explain to them some things I have learned over more than 60 years being involved in politics and political discussions. Unfortunately, discussions are few and far between these days when it is all laid out as: “If you’re not for us, you are against us!”
Life and politics was not always like that. I wonder if civil discourse will ever return to the past times when a group of people with widely differing political views could meet up in the likes of their Local and have frank, sometimes heated discussions, but at the end of the day it was always,
“Aye weel, I dinnae agree with ye but I’ll see you next week in here again.”
It was kind of like our own little personal “Question Time”.
Ask away, any single subject you can think of. Ask the panel – a half dozen worthies standing around the bar – and then listen, argue, make your point, possibly accept someone elses point, then leave at the end of the night, possibly enlightened, possibly disappointed, but *NEVER EVER* with the thought of,
“I’ll get that barsteward next week! Him and his SNP/Tories/Socialists/etc., way of thinking, I *WILL* prove him wrong!”
We went home, went to work for another week and had another proper discussion the following week.
Life is not like that now. Voice your political opinion if you dare but be sure that you are in safe and sympathetic surroundings before you ever dare open your mouth.
Getting back to my opening line: “Willie, how can you *not* vote SNP in May?”
A blunt, short, truthful answer is:
The SNP reminds me of the old Soviet Russia!
“What do you mean?” they cry, disgusted at my comparison.
Well, in my younger days, there would often appear in the daily newspapers (remember them?) stories and photographs from out of the Soviet Union and a regular feature used to often ask, “Who is missing now?” accompanied by a photo of the High Heid Yins, but when compared with a photo of maybe some 6 months before, at least one face or maybe two might be missing from their line-up. Where had they gone? What had they done? Where are they now?
If you go to the SNP website and search on “Alex Salmond”, you will find the same kind of result. Possibly the most successful leader that the SNP has ever had does not exist. He is a non-person. He has been airbrushed from the SNP pages as precisely as the Soviet leaders in power made their own decisions as to who was worthy of a place in the Party’s history.
Someone in the SNP hierarchy (I do wonder who?) has decreed that Alex Salmond *never* existed in the history of the SNP nor even in the history of Scottish politics.
I simply cannot vote for any candidate of a Party which repudiates its very own history.
I know many will think it an old cliche, *BUT* there are many similarities to Germany in 1933.
“You are either with us, or you are against us!”
There is absolutely no middle ground with today’s SNP and I can no longer support that Party.
If you do not want to vote SNP in the constituency vote, and taking it as read that you don’t want to vote Tory, then ask yourself what Boris Johnson would least like you to do, and do that.
What do we want? Independence!
When do we want it? Now!
This is our chance to tell Westminster what we want. It is obvious that as many people as possible should vote for Parties with Independence in the party name on the list and Independence front and centre as their raison d’être. That is it, plain and simple.
SNP Branches fought for their local candidates in the constituencies. If your SNP constituency candidate is out as on-side or neutral, vote for for them.
In some places the local SNP branches did not get what they wanted as the constituency candidates. In such cases consider voting for independent candidates who are independence-supporting – Edinburgh central being a case in point.
We need to get this message out loud and clear. SNP is not the only vehicle for Independence – and we need to tell them that now at this election.
Captain.
I hope you don’t mind me asking, but who is this forensic MSP that represents you?
So we’re all going to now vote for corrupt unionist parties because our principles prohibit us from voting for a corrupt SNP?
Righto.
Robert Knight
I see your point of view.
If we keep Boris and the corrupt Tories and their Brexit Deal
non of which we ever voted for we should be able to ensure
we can expect more of the same for Scotland.
Pleeese think about what you are saying!
I’m not happy with SNP but I saved £27,000 puting my
Daughter through University. I saved a fortune with free personal
care for my elderly Dad, we have free prescriptions, Baby Boxes,
no road or bridge tolls, free parking at hospitals, the best performing NHS,
Average Council Tax lower by £400 compared to England, free travel for over 60’s
No Bedroom Tax attacking the disabled here.
You want Boris to rip all that away from us and have the powers to destroy us?
Have a think mate.
A slap in the face always preferable to a stab in the back!
@StevieO
If neither option works for you, you always have the option of not voting at all.
@Lenny Hartley says:
21 March, 2021 at 1:31 pm
“Shocked and Mark Boyle, that may be your opinion of Bonnie Prince Bob but there are others, in fact everybody I know who has watched (including myself) thought that campaign video was the best we have ever seen and would vote for him if we stayed in his constituency.”
If you’re so confident Bonnie Prince Bob’s video is the greatest thing since sliced bread, why the rush to jump all over anyone daring to suggest that it looks like a Modern Studies class project video done on the day it’s due to be handed in? Unless you’re just trying to convince yourselves.
As for “thought that campaign video was the best we have ever seen” – with respect, you’ve clearly seen few to fk all if that’s the case.
“And I would rather see him getting £70k a year Plus expenses than over 90% of those currently living off our taxes. He has something that Robertson and others lack, charisma”.
That’s it? That’s your argument for voting for him? I’d sooner see the Rev. Stu or my neighbour’s cat get £70k plus expenses than 90% of them, but that doesn’t mean we should replace one useless clown for another “just because”.
CHARISMA? Sorry, but …
… he’s like every other ageing pseudo intellectual bore you could find in Uisge Beatha’s most nights. Having a YouTube vid and standing for election does not instantly imprint on people the wisdom of the ages and the oratory skills of a Henry Hunt (unless in this case you mean rhyming slang)
Oh, and by the way, for those of you who also have VERY SHORT MEMORIES of what Bonnie Prince Bob had to say about Wings Over Scotland … straight from this very site:
link to wingsoverscotland.com
The prick may have scrubbed his incriminating Twitter account with the above on it, but guess what asshat, your vanity Instagram page, also under the name of NonideeFixe, is still up:
link to instagram.com
Oh, and just in case he tries to scrub the evidence:
link to imgur.com
The same person who called Wings Over Scotland a ‘Snake Oil Selling Charatan Piss Artist’ three years ago now wants WoS readers and supporters to vote for him on May 6th 2021.
Tell this aging wannabe ‘celebrity’ to fk off!
link to thenational.scot
900 is thousands now is it?
The National is a farce.
Mark Boyle,
Are you Angus Robertson?
StevieO says:
21 March, 2021 at 2:15 pm
“So we’re all going to now vote for corrupt unionist parties because our principles prohibit us from voting for a corrupt SNP?
Righto.”
From this message of yours, StevieO, it seems that you lack principles.
Regarding your “views” on “corruption”, StevieO –
When did a Unionist allegedly “corrupt” Party attempt to jail an ex-Minister using quite blatant false allegations? I’m listening …
And yet you seem to imply from your message that is OK to vote for a corrupt SNP Party, just because …
Because what?
Are you saying vote for the SNP because they are Scottish?
Are you saying vote for the SNP even though they are corrupt, because mebbes some corruption might show up against the Yoons?
“Righto” StevieO – I got your message loud and clear, which seems to claim:
“Corruption is quite OK in the scheme of things, *providing* said corruption is carried out by the SNP.
You seem to imply that SNP corruption should carry a “Get Out Of Jail Free” card.
I’ll bet there are some High Heid Yins in the SNP who sincerely wish that they had a “GET OUT OF JAIL FREE* card!
ScotsRenewables says,
“I say again, voting SNP is NOT voting for ‘5 more years of the samev.
To claim that it is is fundamentally dishonest.”
If it is NOT voting for 5 more years of the same, why are you frightened to death of answering a very simple question:
Would you like Sturgeon to be re-elected as an MSP, either in the constituency or on the list?
Willie Jay says:
21 March, 2021 at 2:30 pm
Ok. Crack on with your Tory vote then, or your Labour vote.
The great britnat machine will be eternally grateful for you lending them your support.
Being played a blinder.
Simon Rooke says,
“Another SNP government can be held accountable, a Unionist government at Holyrood less so.”
A Unionists First Minister was forced to resign over a realitive minor breaches of the Ministerial code.
If you have been reading Wings Over Scotland, you might have realised that this SNP government is completely unaccountable.
If re-elected, it will claim that its policies have been endorsed by the people and will be even more unaccountable.
A very simple question to you:
Would you like Sturgeon to be re-elected as an MSP, either in the constituency or on the list?
@De Valera – You’ll know her from the Fabiani Committee. I’ll give you another clue: “It’s not Maureen Watt.”
Great site to come to if you want to hear slurs against AS, Craig Murray, snp, and other rising Scottish political parties,
Thinly veiled comments attempting to root out anything that may give independence a helping hand.
It sounds like there are a lot of union contributors on what was once a site to discuss a way forward for Scotland’s people.,
NO Plan is being suggested by any of these people except we are being persuaded by a barrage of commentary hammers to perhaps let tories or Westminster rule the Scottish government as it better option, your bosses should have hired me, I could have done your job in a much more subtle manner,
Your so obvious, people are fast realising that the agenda is to divide the Scottish voters and weaken the independence movement, and it does not need saying that you are helping the Scotland to see the light of day,
Well blow me over,
Don’t you not think that you are over playing you hand a bit, it’s become so obvious that even the most simplest of Scottish people like myself can see you motives.
Ruby says,
“Is five more years of the same better or worse than five years of direct rule from Westminster?”
If that was the choice, and it is not, IMHO five years of direct rule would be infinitely better than five more years of a corrupt lying criminal SNP government led by Sturgeon or Robertson or another such corrupt lying criminal.
With the corrupt lying criminal SNP out of the way, a new genuine independence party could stand on a plebiscite manifesto at the next Westminster election in three years’ time.
Not voting for the SNP on the constituency, doesn’t mean you have to vote for another party and it doesn’t mean you have to not vote.
You can spoil your ballet paper as I intend to do.
What difference would it make to the SNP if Sturgeon was or wasn’t re-elected?
Another clone of Sturgeon would become party leader.
I read these comments with some interest. I will say at the outset that whilst I am sympathetic to Independence I have never voted for the SNP. I have not voted for 20 years but will be voting in May. Don’t know who for as yet but it certainly will not be for the SNP or the Tory’s.
Regarding the ‘new’ Independence parties springing up I hope that they will not permit any of the current spineless SNP MSP’s to join. They have shown their colours and are not worthy of any support.The ONLY policy I see is Independence and that is it.
Independence will ultimately stand or fall on the economics and finances. The more rabid of the current SNP supporters seem to be willing to support anything. The free-thinking people of Scotland will simply not vote to be worse off and for uncertainty.
Until the ‘new’ parties produce some ‘financials’ for scrutiny they will not attract the level headed amongst us to their cause. It is incumbent on me to not only think of the future for myself but also for my kids and grandkids.
I have no doubt this will upset some but people have to be aware of the reality of what they are voting for both economically and who will be acting for them as we move forward. The current SNP have been a disaster and it remains up to any new Independence parties to convince me, along with millions of other Scots, that they can do better. What is the proposed currency we will be using and what ‘vehicle’ will we use to house our share of current UK debt? We have to take our share or risk being cast into an international wilderness.I am not seeing that at the moment. If we do not like what we are ‘getting’ after Independence we cannot go back.
Money does not talk…………..it roars and shouts.
It should be pretty obvious that there are a range of options which people will adopt. Some will hold their noses and vote SNP, others will vote for a candidate who has been particularly good, SNP or not, others will not vote SNP on principle after what Sturgeon and Murrell have done.
Yes, it is called individual choice and principle.
So what is the point of people getting all hot under the collar and abusive as if they can force others to vote the way they want or that they have somehow a superior view. Waste of time. The cards will fall according to a myriad of individual reasons and candidates. But hectoring others is sure fire way of just annoying others who might have a different view than yours, and won’t change a thing. FFS.
Well said Ian Mac @ 3.01pm.
ScotsRenewables says,
“I don’t believe all current MSPs think that. I think many more heads will appear over the parapet after May 6th.”
Rev. Stuart Campbell says:
“I’m curious as to where you’re seeing any evidence of any of them having a spine. There’s none now, and most of the ones who even theoretically might have the clout to stand up to her are standing down this year, replaced by obedient young drones.”
ScotsRenewables says,
“Stu, no real evidence of spinal activity or moral compass among MSPs, just wishful thinking. No-one knows what to do.”
The likes of ScotsRenewables and Ruby can’t even bring yourselves round to supporting a tactical vote, at no cost to the SNP seats, of unseating Sturgeon in her constituency.
Says it all really.
Kcor says:
21 March, 2021 at 2:55 pm
Ruby says,
“Is five more years of the same better or worse than five years of direct rule from Westminster?”
If that was the choice, and it is not, IMHO five years of direct rule would be infinitely better than five more years of a corrupt lying criminal SNP government led by Sturgeon or Robertson or another such corrupt lying criminal.
With the corrupt lying criminal SNP out of the way, a new genuine independence party could stand on a plebiscite manifesto at the next Westminster election in three years’ time.
+++++
The ‘corrupt lying criminal SNP’ are not going to be out of the way they are going to be in opposition.
Why would the SNP need to be out of the way for a new genuine independence party to stand at the next Westminster GE?
Getting rid of the SNP surely means a Unionist Party in power at Holyrood aka direct rule from Westminster.
‘If that was the choice, and it is not’
Explain how that isn’t the choice?
If a MSP candidate said:
“I’m only in it for the money.
I don’t live in the constituency and don’t give a fig about it.
I probably won’t answer your constituency emails if elected, or I’ll get my secretary to fob you off with patronising bullshit.
I’ll just go along with whatever benefits me personally”.
Then I’d probably vote for them because of their honesty.
It wouldn’t be an improvement on the current SNP MSP. In fact it would be exactly the same. But, at least this candidate would be honest about it.
Craig Murray says,
“I don’t understand why Mr Kilbride and several posters above dwell so much on who I think they should vote for in constituencies. It is their vote.”
That is very rich and dishonest of you.
Have you forgotten that barely two weeks ago, you publicly advocated constituency AND list vote for the SNP?
Before applying to stand on the AFI list.
You are looking more and more like a Lib Dem political chameleon.
@James Che – It might be nothing to do with party politics, James. It seems to me that most who contribute to this site are Nationalists or can be persuaded to be Nationalists and that is what you want and need.
‘Should Now Scotland Take forward Civil Disobedience?’
Question on the Now Scotland Assembly, posted 10 minutes ago, currently 83% of respondents saying Yes, it should.
Craig Murray says,
“In Glasgow Southside I would probably beat my head out against the nearest wall in despair, unless another Bonnie Prince were to show up.”
Yes, and let the corrupt lying criminal Sturgeon get re-elected while voting for Sarwar would cost no seats to the SNP, would result in no exrta seats for Labour but kick Sturgeon out and instead get an SNP BAME MSP on the seat.
Leaving Sturgeon in a humiliating position if Sarwar unseats her in her constituency and then she cheats her way into parliament by forcing a BAME SNP list MSP to resign in her favour.
How could such a scenario not appeal to any sane person moaning and complaining about Sturgeon on this blog?
Kcor says:
The likes of ScotsRenewables and Ruby can’t even bring yourselves round to supporting a tactical vote, at no cost to the SNP seats, of unseating Sturgeon in her constituency.
Reply
You are suggesting more than tactical voting
(Which I am supporting in Edinburgh Central where I have a vote)
You want ‘tactical voting’ in every constituency.
in order to get
“the corrupt lying criminal SNP out of the way”
As it stands tactical voting in every constituency except Edinburgh Central involves voting for a Unionist Party.
Are you a Unionist?
ScotsRenewables says:
21 March, 2021 at 1:47
… apart from Anas Sarwar, can anyone on here tell me who we SHOULD vote for?”
Vote with your heart, Mr Renewables. Don’t over think it.
Do that, and your conscience will be clear. Don’t abstain, even if your voting choice hurts.
I’m blessed to be a member of a political organisation led by a blind woman who sees more clearly than most (and whose work rate shames the rest of us).
The herts
Great post James Che.
And as for Kcor with this…
“IMHO five years of direct rule would be infinitely better than five more years of a corrupt lying criminal SNP government led by Sturgeon or Robertson or another such corrupt lying criminal.”
This really tells us a lot about some agendas on here.
The hert’s aye the pairt, aye
That maks us right or wrong
Mark – dunna bother pal. We see you
“IMHO five years of direct rule would be infinitely better than five more years of a corrupt lying criminal SNP government led by Sturgeon or Robertson or another such corrupt lying criminal”
Ruby @3.15pm.
Although I want Sturgeon and her clique out as soon as, I certainly wouldn’t want five years of direct rule from Westminster, no matter what.
Its well known that Westminster is corrupt, and several Tory ministers have broken the ministerial code including Priti Patel and Johnson himself, yet I don’t recall any inquiry over it. You appear to want to hand over Scotland’s future to a parliament that wants devolution rolled back to almost zero.
You may not recall this but when devolution first came to the fore Johnson was a reporter with the Telegraph newspaper, who said of devolution that it was a terrible business.
Captain yossarian, politically your kidding yourself, their staying silent and watching, check which ones are here today commenting compared to those who were on this site four or five years ago.
Same with wee ginger dugs site, Scot goes pop or any of the other sites that were for independence originally,
None here can but wonder where so many have gone, you can shoot the messenger if you want, but that not gonna help you.
They are silent because they are fed up with silly destroying arguments against them gaining independence.
They will come to the fore again when their time is ready, those for the union are barking up their own tree.
Wait wait catchy monkey.
Mark Biyle, thanks for that, he certainly would not be getting my vote now if i could vote in edinburgh central, still a great video btw!
Anyone using
Who else are you going to vote for?
We can hold them to account after May.
Voting for them is not an endorsement of what they have done.
Needs to pull their head out of their arsehole and get in the sea. Especially the last one. You are specifically green lighting what they’ve done and what they are planning to do. Because you’re voting for it!
At least Henry McLeish is talking some sense in todays Scotsman.
Ian Brotherhood says:
21 March, 2021 at 3:29 pm
‘Should Now Scotland Take forward Civil Disobedience?’
Reply
I would go along with that.
The Suffragettes did it and got women the vote.
The question is would the ‘feminist’ First Minister support it?
Will the ‘Now Assembly’ be available on ‘catch-up’
interesting, from Jason Michael over at Random Public Journal ..
link to randompublicjournal.com
Republicofscotland says:
21 March, 2021 at 3:41 pm
“IMHO five years of direct rule would be infinitely better than five more years of a corrupt lying criminal SNP government led by Sturgeon or Robertson or another such corrupt lying criminal”
Ruby @3.15pm.
Reply
Hey Republicofscotland watch it!
Why have you put my name to the above?
I most definitely did not say that.
That was posted by Kcor.
@Derick fae Yell says: 21 March, 2021 at 3:40 pm
“Mark – dunna bother pal. We see you.”
Aye Derick fae Yell aka ISP member Derick Tulloch, just as I saw you back on 11th March
link to wingsoverscotland.com
link to i.postimg.cc
Not that you have sour grapes or anything.
Captain.
Surely not the “sand dancer”?
@ruby (3.50) –
Sorry, I don’t know, but I would imagine so.
There’s still another couple of hours to go and there were multiple workshops – that’s a lot of material so I don’t know how it’ll be archived.
We should be able to find out later.
Tom @3:53
That piece from Jason Michael is the best I’ve read about the Sturgeon debacle.
It’s been an interesting afternoon so far. Well organised and a lot of good debate. I think it also really helps in damping down the toxic social media debate and getting more to the core of the difficulties, ie the SNP now being the ruling party and having to govern, so needing a wider independence movement to take forward the independence campaigning element. It’s clearly time the movement has to split to an extent and become something different from the Scottish Government. That makes sense and perhaps hasn’t been articulated enough as a current difficulty.
link to rebellion.global
15 Examples of Civil Disobedience (Which Have Made a Difference)
9. Poll Tax Refusal: United Kingdom 1989 – 1990
Vote SNP & plan Civil Disobedience.
I believe what Craig Murray is saying as:
Vote SNP1 (except where SNP’s maist mankit leaders are standing)
and
Vote AFI2
Its not that complicated.
Max the Yes – vote for independence in May:
“AFI shall also campaign for a simple majority of the popular vote for pro-indy parties across both the constituencies and the regional lists, at the “Independence” election, and for such a majority to be understood to be a mandate for independence itself.”
link to afi.scot
@De Valera – Take a guess. You’ll no doubt get the right answer. It’s definitely not Maureen though.
Chas @ 2.59
It is by no means certain that we would have to take on any share of UK debt, especially as the Scottish government was not instrumental in creating this debt and hardly any of it was spent in Scotland anyway. We should be proposing a Scottish currency based on Scottish resources and there are no indications from the international community that this would be any kind of problem at all.
LOL
No sour grapes. Just a real person, with a real life, not a Borg-like drone, recharging and assimilating the latest identikit tweets overnight in some alcove at Borg HQ.
Trying to remember when I started commenting on here: 9 or 10 years ago. We see you
We need a multi party drive to improve the Scottish Parliament. Salmond and Davis are correct on that matter. Take the individuals out of it. We ALL, nationalists, unionists – have an interest in governance structures that can survive the worst Governments, not just the best.
It’s bloody embarrassing that a Tory MP in Westminster is pointing this out. Jeezo, folks, we need to up our game
@Pete Roberts – What about the Trillion incurred largely due to RBS and HBoS?
De Valera – had to google ‘sand dancer’. So are you referring to Mike Rumbles?
I’ve heard that our illustrious leader has called in the laywers.
this raises two questions to me.
1) why are they there and for what? if she has told the truth all the way through why does she need lawyers?
2) who is paying for them, is this more funds disappearing from the empty bucket?
More questions to be unanswered, perhaps another enquiry judicial or otherwise, only joking.
Trouble is, a lot of the Sturgeon fans are more worried about whether it is more fashionable to put quince or razorfruit conserve on their croissants this week than about what the FM and the CEO have been up to behind the scenes.
On the list of Civil Disobedience that work
15. Gilet Jaunes: France 2018-2019
I like the picture of the ‘gilet jaune’ with a message for Macron written on the back.
What about
link to tinyurl.com
White Coloured HiVis Vest with messages on the back & front
They are only £2.50
One thing occurred to me today, watching the media still go for the “Nicola covered up for Scotland’s Harvey Weinstein” angle which they clearly always wanted, is that she has totally screwed herself over the past few weeks. Either Salmond was stitched up, in which case she looks totally guilty for that, especially given the way she’s carried on smearing him over the past few weeks. Or he wasn’t and all this ‘everyone knew, honest’ stuff is real, in which case she totally covered up for him.
I know which of those two I believe, but it is only a belief. Sturgeon is now going to have to deal with that and it’s entirely a problem of her own making. Which is it? Did she stitch him up and create this entire “Salmond was sleazy and everyone knew it” narrative despite there being nothing there? Or did she cover up for him, which she’s basically admitted if she wants people to believe her smears? It seems to me there is no other option for her now – it’s one or the other. Either way, she can’t say she did’t lie. She has utterly fucked herself.
Captain Y @ 4.18
I doubt that would count, an independent Scotland would be under no obligation to pay for bailing out English owned banks.
From south of the border I have been following the Scottish political scene since Salmond published his white paper in 2007. I could see that it was then a corrupt one-party state ruled by Labour, and needed a moral regeneration if it were to be a fit partner in the union of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. A regime of getting fit enough to be independent was just what was needed.
Now we see that this regime has not even started. Scotland is now more dependent on the neighbours than it was in 2007, and with a one-party government that is worse than Labour.
IF I had a vote, I would copy the ‘red-wall’ areas in England and vote Tory. At least I would be assured of a grand sweep-out of corruption and also a fixing of the constitution to ensure that the Scottish Parliament could actually hold the executive and legislature to account. Then, the hard work of rebuilding social and economic life could start with practical help from the UK.
As an aside, as an Eng/Brit my fear of Scotland becoming ‘independent’ in it’s current state is not one of loss to the rUK, but of yet more subsidy and corruption that will spread like Covid and infect the whole of Britain.
Independence will come when you-all are fit enough.
Looks like another 500 jobs for the English colonialists are heading for Glasgow.
link to theneweuropean.co.uk
If the yoons (tories/labour) get a foothold in the Scot. Parliament in a governing role, they’ll immediatly team up with Whitehall to restructure how Scotland is governed.
Over a few years everything from financing, public services, education, SNHS, laws, devolution and more, will be brought into line with what the new overlords want. Scotland will be brought to heel on a very short leash, indy won’t get a look in.
I can’t vote anymore but one thing I do know, you’ve got until May to get the SNP sorted out one way or another.
The SNP/leadership is rotten to the core.
The list vote gives you at least a 50% chance of getting someone useful in.
So heres hoping the next Week brings a couple of good inquiry verdicts with maybe a glimmer of hope.
@Pete Roberts – Sounds good doesn’t it, Pete. Better make sure you don’t need to borrow anything in the future though, because Scotland would have the same credit score as Congo or Chad. Is that what you want?
Maybe the SNP will be insolvent quite soon.
60,000 members gone since around August 2018 who annually could have been paying around £30 per annum members fees ( and maybe another £15 in in donations, raffle ticket sales, merchandise purchase and etc ) could be contributing to huge income shortfall approaching £3 million a year.
And so with an election in seven weeks, Council,elections next year, and referendum preparations this year (ha ha) and ever increasing legal fees, one can see how insolvency could be looming on the horizon.
No wonder maybe the auditors resigned yesterday because a new party May be coming quicke4 than we think.
@TJenny – you’re right, but another lesser known meaning is someone who pretends to work hard, but actually does very little. I think that’s what De Valera may be alluding to.
Have I missed something?
Unless Jason Michael’s ‘great news in a couple of weeks’ happens this week (he posted on Twitbook on Feb 24), it’s going to be difficult for him to avoid the accusation of ‘blarney’
I shall be delighted to eat my words.
@Cath: 4.06
The SNP has never engaged with the wider YES movement under Nicola. At best, ignored, at worst snubbed and shunned. A few individuals have engaged, demos, marches etc. but that’s about it.
So, why should they suddenly take an interest (SNP 1&2) because some votes are up for grabs.
I agree, we need a strong, dynamic Holyrood with Indy orientated parties playing a full part. The wider YES movement owe little to the SNP. Surprisingly we also need competent Unionist opposition to goad and gell our thinking and not simply carp from the sidelines.
Independence has to carry everyone, not just the fan club. It’s real, it involves serious thinking, organisation involving life changing opportunities (and some problems). It’s far bigger than any one individual, clique or party.
Effigy 2.19
Almost all of these things were done under AS. Apart from baby boxes Sturgeon’s priorities have been woke and the hate crime bill.
But I’m not interested in Scotland being being governed by devolution (Westminster), I want independence.
So a few hours after we discovered two SWPers are involved in this Now Scotland shindig, to which I and two others raised our misgivings, and what mighty brainwave do we have from the Brain’s Trust?
‘Should Now Scotland Take forward Civil Disobedience?’
Oh! Who didn’t see that one coming?
Yes folk, because a policy of confrontationalism really has turned Sean Clerkin into the people’s hero, hasn’t it?
Oh wait, actually, most Scots want put Clerkin put on the next rocket to Mars (single fare, no in-flight buffet service or duty free trolley).
I cannot think of a single more counterproductive idea to have dreamt up in a month of Sundays than “civil disobedience”. There’s a majority for independence, all that’s wrong is that the party supposed to be delivering it has been hijacked.
Starting a self-righteous campaign, just for the need to feel you are doing “something”, may be cathartic, but when it compromises the support of those currently swayed to independence into thinking “well if this is the sort of nonsense we’ll have to be putting up with once we’re out of the UK …”, then no thanks.
Or has it escaped your attentions that almost everyone you encounter in the real world are utterly pissed off with Extinction Rebellion, Black Lives Matter, the Orange Order and every other part of the ‘get in as many people’s faces as possible means victory’ brigade?
People are sick to death of the increased boorishness of society, the Trumpian “Might Makes It Right”, and they certainly don’t want it in their politics.
Time and demographics are on Scottish independence’s side. The current farrago is a temporary setback to the inevitable. Sometimes it’s best to bide time and plan like mature adults, rather than empty gestures which are the trademark of the SWP but no one else actually interested in getting into power.
As Stu the video games buff perhaps may have put it, to quote Captain MacMillian in Call Of Duty 4, “Patience laddie… Wait for a clear shot!”
Some of Bonnie Prince Bob’s work, posted without comment.
link to youtube.com
link to youtube.com
link to youtube.com
link to youtube.com
You can find more if you search for
Discontent
at YouTube.
Ruby @3.57pm.
Okay Ruby, noted, however without inverted comma’s on the paragraph, it could be taken as your own comment.
@Derick fae Yell says: 21 March, 2021 at 4:15 pm
“Trying to remember when I started commenting on here: 9 or 10 years ago. We see you”
I’ve been campaigning for an independent Scotland since I was fifteen, champ. That’s since 1984. Longer than the ISP gravy train wannabes (ex-LibDem, ex-Scottish Senior Citizen Unity Party, and a few more dodgier “associations” besides) put together have ever done.
Captain Yossarian – Ah, ok, thanks. So Jackie Baillie?
Well that’s weird ‘Your comment is awaiting moderation’ and yet it posted?
Results from last Thursday’s Council by election in Helensburgh and Lomond South due to the death of the sitting councillor –
Con – 1206 [50.7%, +11.7]
SNP – 562 [23.6%, +5.8]
Lib Dem – 333 [14.0%, -8.1]
Labour – 133 [5.6%, -2.9]
Green – 123 [5.2%, +5.2]
SWP – 22 [0.9%, +0.9]
Con GAIN from Lib Dem elected previously via multi member transferable vote as opposed to FPTP..
But just look at the SNP vote – it’s down, whilst the Tory vote is up.
Now I know by elections are by elections and Helensburgh has lots of Royal Navy type voters due to the sub marine base, but the SNP vote at 23.6% and 50.7% for the Tories certainly suggests the SNP are a long way off taking the Dumbarton Constituency parliament seat in May.
Put simply Jackie Baillie held that seat for Labour last time and with the swing back to labour, her having come across well on the enquiry committee, and with the the Helensburgh Tories voting tactically to support Jackie Baillie against the SNP come May it looks very much like Toni Giugliano has little to no chance of taking the Dumbarton seat.
But hey ho, everything in the garden is rosy. SNP 1 and 2 we’re all with Nicola and Nicola can do no wrong, does no wrong as we soar to our assured victory. And then I took the rose tinted glasses off and the ear plugs out, and switched on brain.
But this was only a Council by election and Toni is with Nicla!
“But just look at the SNP vote – it’s down, whilst the Tory vote is up.”
How is “+5.8%” down?
Pete Roberts
@4.13
Are you suggesting that we simply walk away from our share of UK debt? That will go down really well here and internationally. What happens when Covid 22 or Covid 23 comes along and it will. Will we have to borrow to place workers on furlough, purchase vaccines etc. Who will we borrow from and at what rate of interest? Will anyone want to lend money to an effectively new country with no credit rating? The rest of your post smacks of naivety. Unless these questions are addressed, scrutinied and verified, as far as possible, how is any Independence Party going to attract the people who can think for themselves? Given the current problems with the SG the international community, especially the EU, would not touch us with a bargepole. Sadly, they would be correct.
TJenny says:
21 March, 2021 at 5:01 pm
Well that’s weird ‘Your comment is awaiting moderation’ and yet it posted?
Reply
It might be only visible to you.
The people over at WGD seem to think that an SNP minority government, backed by the Scottish Greens will be enough to secure another referendum. We have had that situation for the past 5 years and there has been no referendum, so what’s going to change this time around?
Capt.Y @ 4.38
An independent Scotland with its own currency would have greater resources than Norway and at least a comparable credit rating. Sorry but after comparing us with Congo & Chad I can no longer take seriously anything you say.
Who are the so called “thousands” of folk signing the petition for Sturgeon to remain as FM, is it SNP MSP’s family and friends, and the COPFS family and friends, or was the petition carried out by that dodgy group who released the even dodgier poll claiming no was in the lead.
Also is it the same group of dodgy folk who have all of a sudden signed up to be members of the SNP, and whose producing the figures is it the Charlotte street boys or the Tufton street boys, or is it Cambridge Analytica at it again.
We know the membership hasn’t jumped dramatically, if at all, because the SNP are now doing a SLAB and hiding membership figures from the publics eyes.
Oneliner 4.41
Jeggit was refering to David Davis speech
Don’t worry Indy supporters, you can still vote for the Scottish Marcos (sorry I mean Murrell) regime in the May election, as long as your prison sentence is 12 months or less.
So, you can vote SNP if you get jailed for marching for indy like happened to Manny Singh.
Or if you get jailed for speaking out against the SNP’s colonial Establishment criminal conspiracy to jail Alex Salmond so he’s no a threat to Nicola’s SNP colonial administrator power.
Or if you’re in jail for less than 12 months for disagreeing with the SNP’s sex politics ideology.
It is truly unfortunate that when at the height of her powers the FM did not have whispered in her ear « remember thou art mortal ».
The presence of an « éminence grise », a wise and discreet councillor, would never have allowed things to deteriorate in this manner, especially when the auguries were so favourable.
Although, in a democracy such reality checks should not be necessary.
I saw somewhere on twitter last night that the SNP were proposing giving the Green’s a cabinet post if they win HE. What’s the betting it’ll be Womxn and Equalities Minister? Eek.
Of course that little dangled carrot will ensure the Greens will vote against any vonc. SNP and carrot dangling eh.
Whoever we all vote for, let’s not vote for the Greens either on constituency or list.
Your Country Needs You
Absolutely but I personally can’t walk past the corruption. It’s which country yoh want. The SNP are no longer the vehicle to make that happen. The grand reset will happen. It’s a while off folks. We have to restore our confidence in the the Scottish Parliament and that means reform. I didn’t mention the great victory of United yesterday. I expect an automatic ban now. But it was important to us. It means SPL fitba for us. The small mercies in this madness.
Pete Roberts
@5.08
‘An independent Scotland with its own currency would have greater resources than Norway and at least a comparable credit rating.’
Wow-You really do not have much of a grasp of economics or finance.
Are you really Katie Forbes? Derek McKay?
Its hide and seek for the truth on the Alex Salmond fit up, its hide and seek for the truth on the SNP membership, its hide and seek for the ring fenced indy funds, its hide and seek for any real info on a indyref. The same applies to the Crown Office.
Basically its a game of hide and seek with Sturgeon and Murrell and the vile clique.
Just a quick scan up the pitch and see a couple of folk were on the Now Scotland today. Some of it was quiet interesting eg Bill Hill’s presentation. Just waiting for Peter Bell’s blog!!!!
Couple of rude folk. One man obviously pro trans slagging off ISP and another woman rolling her eyes at Tommy Sheridan – they both moaned about him as well. Pathetic.
We’ll see. A bit disappointed. I’ve been doing civil disobedience since the 70’s. Need to step up the game. I’m not advocating violence btw.
Ruby – so are you not seeing ‘Your comment is awaiting moderation.
21 March, 2021 at 4:56 pm
Captain Yossarian – Ah, ok, thanks. So Jackie Baillie?’
@Pete Roberts – “An independent Scotland with its own currency would have greater resources than Norway and at least a comparable credit rating.” That’s wonderful news, Pete.
Republicofscotland@5:19
It’s only one sided hide and seek, we know the truth.
Reminds me of the story of the sage who was asked to prove the existence of God.
He replied “you would have me hold up a candle to see the sun?”
We know, we see, and we are not fools any more.
Chas says:
21 March, 2021 at 5:19 pm
Pete Roberts
@5.08
‘An independent Scotland with its own currency would have greater resources than Norway and at least a comparable credit rating.’
“Wow-You really do not have much of a grasp of economics or finance.”
Well, Chas, Professor Richard Murphy is both an economist and a chartered accountant – and he agrees entirely with Pete Roberts. Scotland is more than economically viable.
You can find out here:
link to pensionersforindependence.scot
Anyone who votes snp in May, hasn’t been paying attention, and is either thick or deluded. Probably even both ?
@ Mark Boyle 4.45pm I unfortunately must agree with you I think any civil disobedience that would entail disruption to the general public would be counter productive to the indy initiative
As you RIGHTLY point out it’s not the public that indy supporters have a grievance with its Sturgeon and her lying corrupt coterie , I remember watching a AUOB podcast and a young Asian looking girl on the panel sorry I don’t know her name was proposing the same civil disobedience mantra , unless these civil disobedience actions are taken in front of HR or Bute House all they would do is annoy the general public , I have no problem demonstrating at HR or Bute House and if we could get the AUOB numbers to attend that would indicate the anger or disapproval
The really infuriating thing with this who to vote for pish and argument is it has been created by the monster Sturgeon who is betraying ALL independence supporters by her deliberate BLACKMAIL #JUDGELEDINQUIRY
The issue for most people isn’t economic viability, viability is like a Dr judging whether someone will live. Independence would have to be cast iron as good as we are now.
If Sturgeon stays and gets re-elected Rev Stu will need to produce a new version of the wee blue book this time detailing all the things you’re banned from thinking, saying or doing if you’re unfortunate enough to reside in Scotland. The day is coming when children will be instructed by the state to report their parents and grandparents “inappropriate” views and opinions directly to the police so best to be prepared.
@oneliner 4.41pm
From what I saw, Jason’s big news was David Davies intervention at Westminster.
Garavelli Princip
@5.28
SNP supporter states an Independent Scotland is economically viable but is unable to produce any figures to support it!! He did say Scotland may be worse off and I am sure that many economists will support that view.
I want Independence but someone has to convince me of its viability. Nobody is doing so at present. That worries me and it should worry you and everyone else in Scotland!’Don’t worry-it will all be fine’ is stupid and dangerous especially for the hard of thinking.
Chas says:
21 March, 2021 at 5:55 pm
Garavelli Princip
@5.28
Chas, that’s why I provided the link. You could also look at the work of (retired economics professor) former SNP MP George Kerevan.
Your unwillingness to even look at the evidence provided suggests to me that you are not interested in finding evidence of Scotland’s economic viability – and that you aren’t really an independence supporter at all – are you?
@Chas 5.55pm
What would convince you though? Where will the figures/evidence come from? Even GERS fanatics like Dog-Food-Graph-Boy Hague admit that GERS now tells us precisely nothing about the finances of a post independence Scotland. Few countries in the world would ever have started out on independence with the advantages and assets that Scotland does, but somehow British nationalists assure it it would be an economic calamity, and that we simply couldn’t survive on our own. It’s the international relations equivalent of an abusive partner telling their victim they are worthless.
No contrary positive case for the union is ever advanced of course. Why is that do you think? Particularly after brexit, the economic case for the union looks particularly shaky, not to say holed below the water line. British nationalists can no more prove that Scottish independence will be a disaster, or that post brexit “global Britain/Empire v0.2” will be an economic power house or northern Singapore, than Scotnats can prove staying in the union will be a calamity or that independence is a sure fire route to a Scandinavian style social democratic utopia.
Neither side has a monopoly on the truth, or all the answers.
In the end however I know I’d rather take my chances with the risks and opportunities of independence than the risks and opportunities of staying in the union.
“I want Independence but someone has to convince me of its viability. Nobody is doing so at present. That worries me and it should worry you and everyone else in Scotland!’Don’t worry-it will all be fine’ is stupid and dangerous especially for the hard of thinking.”
Well Chas have a look on here, if you’re in doubt that Scotland cannot be viable independent nation.
link to businessforscotland.com
Of course our neighbours such as Finland and Denmark who don’t have half the natural assets that Scotland has and they have a similar population are doing well.
You must also ask yourself why Westminster is desperate to keep a hold of Scotland, if Scotland is such an economic basket case why not allow it to leave this unfit for purpose union.
Scotland is more than capable of leaving this union and not only making a go of it, but prospering in the process, something that Westminster fears greatly. That’s why negative propaganda is spouted by the BritNat media such as the ridiculous GERS figires every year.
But I ask do a bit of research yourself instead of saying the usual speel of don’t worry it will be fine, which is generally a BritNats bollocks approach.
Yossarian is a unionist troll.
Chas,
Any reason why an independent Scotland would Not be successful/economically viable?
(please reference comparable-sized N. European countries and show your working)
is the deer viable without its ticks?
link to dailystar.co.uk
– bug-ger together
if scotland were to be provably, the poorest country in the world without the wise pimp hand of the anglo, indy would still be worth it, to lose the infestation of the coloniser, then maybe our elites would lose their treachery and the middle class lose its cringe; economically, with the resources we have, it would take active sabotage and a recklessness unseen anywhere to make a mess of it; we should be at least at the level of denmark or ireland, potentially better than norway, switzerland.
@Pete Roberts,
you are quite right Pete, don`t listen to the cringers and concern trolls,
house slaves the lot of them,
Malcolm X descibes them ,
“If the master’s house caught on fire, the house slave would fight harder to put the blaze out than the master would.
If the master got sick, the house slave would say, “What’s the matter, boss? We sick. We sick.”
He identified himself with his master more than his master identified with himself.
And if you came to the house slave and said, “Let’s run away, let’s escape, let’s separate,”
that house slave would look at you and say, “Man, you crazy. What you mean, separate? Where is there a better house than this? “.
How Westminster robs Scotland blind.
link to businessforscotland.com
Oh, I see we’re now back to the old too poor yarn being rolled out yet again.
It’s just a pity England doesn’t have the balls to go for Indy, instead of dragging Scotland into their journey of circling the pan like a jobby about to embark on its journey to the sea.
Scotland has a very good ratio of population to diverse assets / resources figure, unlike England… So the real question is how would England manage…
Meet Jim Rogers and flustering red dress woman.
link to twitter.com
Business for Scotland is all smoke and mirrors. It matters not one jot what happened in the past 40 years, it’s what will happen in the next 40. And his assumptions are all based on “it’s not our debt”
@lenny hartley
We are taking about tying to take out a serious politician, this is not the 2nd year elections at high school! That imbecile looks like a recovering junkie who lives on a bench. He isn’t even using a proper name to stand. Do you honestly think the actual serious adults who live in central Edinburgh who don’t just live in the yes bubble of idiotic videos like that and who need to be convinced to vote against Angus Robertson are going to vote for that utter halfwit? Not a fucking chance. Craig has blown it. He should have just stood as an independent because it looks anyway like AFI is a badly organised mess with no plan.
James
Yossarin has always been unionist troll, nowt new.So are a few others .Our resident Ross Kill aka 30 names.,which shall I pick for a while that’s not been banned.
Now there’s a Chas wae the too wee,too poor wae The auld ,auld guff.
Cath @ 4.25
The FM has backed herself into a corner…. I agree.
It occurred to me the other day that she keeps going on about this ‘8 hour session’ she did in front of the committee as though it is a badge of martyrdom.
BUT, and it is quite a big but, if her government had been open, honest and transparent from the outset there would be no need for any inquiry.
If they had freely provided all documents, unredacted, as requested, there would be NO need for questions, there would be NO suspicion and there would be NO doubt in everyone’s mind as to who knew what, when and where.
It is exactly because of her lies, her obfuscation and her cover up – or cover up within the party – that there has been the need for an inquiry to try and establish the truth.
So, Nicola, every time you mention your 8 hours stint on the witness stand realise that you actually had to do that because you have been and are still being dishonest.
What about ear pinging??
That can be quite sore if done properly ????
Chas says: 21 March, 2021 at 6:02 pm
“SNP supporter states an Independent Scotland is economically viable but is unable to produce any figures to support it!! He did say Scotland may be worse off and I am sure that many economists will support that view.
I want Independence but someone has to convince me of its viability.”
I have to be honest, whenever I hear anyone wondering about the economic viability of Scottish independence, I feel rather like Professor Stephen Hawking when someone mentions Schrödinger’s cat.
Short, simply answer: if Androrra and Liechtenstein can be independent and swimming in it with bugger all resources, how the devil do you think Scotland will do with oil and whisky let alone the rest of it?
Anyone who says “oh but oil’s going out of fashion” – no it isn’t, except as a fuel, and the timescale for that will be determined by the speed of both scientific innovation and its adaptation.
I used to work for Shell back in the 1990s, and even then we were being told the company was throwing most of its money at research into lubricants, renewables and the chemicals industry (tar for roads, paraffin wax, petroleum jelly for medical and other (!) purposes, and just about every other chemical process you can think up) more than fuels. Oil has always been the great diversifier amongst resources, long before someone decided it would make a better engine fuel than a lamp one.
Scottish oil has an inbuilt advantage over its competitors in that it is “sweet”, ie. an API gravity of 38.3 and a sulphur content of only 0.37%, so cheaper to “clean up” for commercial uses. Thereby lies one of life’s little ironies – when it’s Game Over for oil as a fuel, Scotland will have the market that bit more by the bollocks.
But better people than me can make a fist of the case. Just remember Andorra and Liechtenstein.
Oh, and the hundreds of city states which thrived and survived long before Scotland was born and long after it was “bought and sold for English gold”.
Ayrshire Rob and James – I haven’t voted for anyone in over 30-years. But, if I had to vote in May, it would probably be for Labour who I expect to be resurgent now. You cannot call everyone who doesn’t agree with you a troll. You need some balance in your life and to engage with folk you disagree with. That’s what’s gone wrong at the SNP.
Shaza
Can you provide us with a spreadsheet wae all this debt we accrued on exactly where it was spent? Considering we can’t borrow money and always have to balance the books fiscally on the scraps sent up here with our taxes ,where will it show?
Now if my neighbour bought his new Bmw 325i on tic, should I pay for it?
This is all old school yoonery stuff and all heard b4 that we have to share debt WM ran up. Naw ,naw and naw.
Tell yi wit, we have a few nuke subs up here that have ran up a tremendous overdraft of debt, around 8.3 % shall we just say quits noo?
@Cath
Another scenario has entered the options courtesy of that political and behavioural psychology genius Mhairi Hunter. Apparently AS was different with different people and the people he was inappropriate with were all afraid of him and the people he behaved properly with were not.
Now considering some of the claims assert his bad behaviour was done in public in front of the people who were not afraid of him it all gets a bit muddled.
And that Woman H seems the epitome of decorum, doesn’t she? And Woman A – well she never indulges in inappropriate behaviour either, does she? Morality and integrity through and through. But you can never tell apparently despite being on the road campaigning into the wee small hours for 30 years.
Aye aye Captain
So now all the socialist want to be like Lichtenstein…..the embodiment of capitalism.
I have just seen that there is a petition circulating urging Nicola Sturgeon not to resign. It has more than 10´000 signatures and quickly increasing.
For those who haven’t seen them:
By Dorothy Grace Elder
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ExBMMI7XAAEjt1i?format=jpg&name=900×900
A tweet so full of shite Bella Caledonia strongly supported it, before desperate Nicolson deleted it. Lying SNP scumbags! link to pbs.twimg.com
Rob
If you couldn’t borrow then someone else did it for you.
I was there. It was exactly what we needed. To be amongst Indy supporters, even though it was virtual. I enjoyed it all., and very well done!
@Ayrshire Rob – If you take ‘Mia’ and ‘Willie’ for examples of what I am talking about. They don’t really have much in common, but still remain polite and respectful of each other’s position. That’s the way it should be….agreed?
@ Chas says:
21 March, 2021 at 5:19 pm
Pete Roberts
@5.08
‘An independent Scotland with its own currency would have greater resources than Norway and at least a comparable credit rating.’
Wow-You really do not have much of a grasp of economics or finance.
No it is you who are totally ignorant on anything to do with economics and newly independent countries.
No country in the world is liable for any debt liabilities of the country it had just become independent from and as you have no knowledge of how Fiat currencies work. Go and give us peace.
@ SilverDarling
If it’s all about poor abused women and calling out bad blokes for their actions, even on the most tenuous claims of “assaults”, then how come there are still some prominent male SNP politicians that did actually have affairs behind their partner’s backs that haven’t had the same level of scrutiny and scorn aimed at them for hurt caused by their actions.
I don’t imagine the women gave consent to their men to screw around behind their backs.
Such unfaithful behaviour by these men seems pretty abusive towards their partners to me, but hey ho, guess if you’re a player for a certain side it just doesn’t matter…
The problem we have with winning the case for Scottish independence is wankers like Chas who bases his vote on the economic argument rather than the right of his country to dignity & self determination, I wonder how he would feel if the USA put in a bid maybe we would be better off as the 51st state, no question what currency we’d be using eh Chas.
I wonder how many of our fellow Scots who stood on the field at Bannockburn gave a flying f@ck what currency they’d be using, So called Scots like Chas make me physically f@cking sick
Shaza
Oh did they? That was nice of them.Don’t remember giving them my permission. But see that’s really what it’s all about.
Shut up,do as we say and be grateful jocks.
Yossarin
Aye aye Captain whatever you say me lord
Apparently AS was different with different people and the people he was inappropriate with were all afraid of him and the people he behaved properly with were not.
Aye, right. Only the most powerful women were terrified of a hand brushing their clothed arm as a man passed them in a narrow corridor. And remain so terrified, deapite their high rank, they must remain anonymous. So many brave women with no power have spoken out and told their stories. You’d think a very powerful woman who’d suffered sexual abuse would want to speak out without anonymity to help others, “See it can even happen to someone as ambitious, confident and powerful as me”. Except they don’t, because nothing happened.
Captain Yossarian says:
21 March, 2021 at 6:52 pm
Ayrshire Rob and James – I haven’t voted for anyone in over 30-years
Why haven’t you voted for anyone for years?
@Ayrshire Bob 6:58 pm
Aye Aye Captain is surely a naval expression and not an Army one. I only served in the Army for 3 years. So perhaps I didn’t get that one. But I am glad you referred to Jocks. It’s been over 40 odd years since someone reminded me of that. It was a term of the time and didn’t faze me. Acceptable culture of the time. I will say again an Independent Scotland will need and army, airforce and navy.
What happens if the SNP is bankrupt?
If it happens before May 6th can their candidates even stand for election?
If it happens after winning on May 6th the party no longer exists and therefore how can any of them hold First Minister position?
@holymacmoses – because I am not political. I really have no political loyalty at-all. What I will say is that my MSP is Labour and is pretty good, my MP is SNP and is not pretty good. Mind-you, I didn’t vote for either. When I was a student, and for a few elections after that, I voted SNP and then I stopped voting. We are lucky to have this website and this standard of debate and so we shouldn’t abuse it, or each other. I’ll bet you anything you like that Captain Yossarian didn’t vote either and he is one of the most respected figures in American literature….agreed?
“Business for Scotland is all smoke and mirrors. It matters not one jot what happened in the past 40 years, it’s what will happen in the next 40. And his assumptions are all based on “it’s not our debt””
Shaza.
How can it be our debt when we have very limited borrowing powers, besides the rUK under the Tories in 2014 claimed the the debt, as belonging to the UK, and not an independent Scotland.
Business for Scotland is a a trustworthy site, however there’s no smoke or mirrors surrounding this gigantic debt figure accrued by the incompetent self serving fools at Westminster.
Scots really need to kick this horrendous union into touch once and for all.
link to nationaldebtclock.co.uk
Tannadice Boy
Yes it’s mainly a term from the Navy, but can be soldiers too. I was military but never a sailor or soldier. I was a thorn in side their thou and didn’t take to well to orders unless I respected the officer.
The number of times I got told shut up jock just do it,well you can guess. Spent a good few months on jankers in my time lol.
John Jones,
Sturgeon has called in the lawyers once again because she is looking at the possibility of legal action against the 3 SNP MSP’s on the inquiry committee who allegedly leaked the inquiry report, the 3 MSP’s who she instructed too release it. I hope Sturgeon is not attempting to discredit this report that finds her guilty of misleading the inquiry and Parliament with shenanigans like this. She thought she had all angles covered until Whiteman didn’t play ball.
Fishy Willie
@7.32
I get it that you are not the brightest and simply accept what you are told-your problem!
References to battles that took place over 700 years ago are really relevant today?
The problem we have in modern-day Scotland is people like you.
Who cares what currency we use-wow. No economy means we have nothing except hills and glens, roaming in the gloaming and bonny purple heather. Dignified, self-determined and STARVING!
It really is a waste of time arguing with cavemen like you.
@Ayrshire Bob 8:05pm
In my time being regarded as a Jock was a compliment. Ok it was in the Seventies but we were respected then as a valuable contribution to the Army. I was Infantry. No shortage of muckers wanted to stand with me including non Scottish personnel. We had something then. We knew who we were. And we stood up to the plate. A very short period of my life but nonetheless very influential.
Mark Boyle says:
Sorry to be a pain, but Shell has moved away from crude oil to the far cleaner Gas to Liquids (GTL) technology as it is far cheaper on refining costs. Google Pearl GTL.
Oil cannot be relied on for income, the oil price crash in January 2016 proves this. PRT tax has been in the negative since 2016.
Fishy. I agree. Being a nation is nothing to do with economics. Ireland and India had nothing when they fought for their freedom.
A slave who is paid by his master , is still a slave. He would choose his freedom over a warm bed and 3 square meals a day. Some things money can’t buy.
Some things you should know:
1.Yossarian is a classic anti-hero. In the classic novel, Catch 22.
2.In military etiquette it’s considered a bit declasse to use the rank of Captain in civilian life. In the RN it’s okay as it’s a higher rank.
3.FMCG Companies never slag off the consumer by insulting them or calling them names, even if they buy other brands products. You will never insult anyone into buying your products. That is why they are so successful. Substitute Consumer for Voter.
Aye richt enough, successful global investor Jim Rogers kens fuck all compared to Chas.
Scotland is a net exporter of some fairly essential revenue generating resources. Stuff like food, drink, fuel, and leccy, but I guess nae cunt will want them to keep their house warm and lit and with food on the table.
As already stated, oil as a fuel burnt in engines may reduce but it will still be an essential commodity in many other industries.
Renewable power generation will develop further. Scotland is already a net exporter, England a net importer.
Not much wind at moment but we’re still exporting, when breezy we regularly export way more than we are using.
link to extranet.nationalgrid.com
10% of GB Grid power being consumed coming in from those pesky Euros too at the moment.
link to gridwatch.templar.co.uk
Plus Colin Dunn’s site is full of stuff for folk that don’t have their heads stuck in the sand.
link to indyposterboy.scot
I thought I would pop in to see what was being said re the “ Topic “
And as usual gun fight at the OK Corral fists flying all over the place
I can’t remember what football manager said it about Scots in his Team , Aye good idea to have a few , but Christ but not a whole Team it would take 5 minutes before they all started fighting with not the opposition but with each other .
Aye some things never change eh
Tannadice Boy says:
You will remember having the rule of 7 P’s dinned into you.
Prior Preparation and Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance.
The rule of 7 P’s has been ignored by the SNP and we have progressed each year through SNAFU- Situation Normal All Fucked Up into FUBAR- Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition.
Back to the 7 P’s, there has been no preparation, there has been Economic/ Financial plan for Independance and the performance is piss poor.
What is needed is a proper plan, no fanciful retoric from our current Politicians. The way to gain support is to have an Economic and Financial plan (based on hard facts to beat WM over the head with) for the first year post independance along with a 5 year, 10 year, 25 year projection. There is too much white noise floating around from the general populus to make a cast iron case.
Our Politicians, in all parties, lack the experience we need to move forward.
On economy read the wee blue book.
Watch the documentary about Estonia.
Doing nothing under Russian control but seeing
their GDP grow 5 fold in 20 years when independent.
No oil, no gas, no £5 billion of whisky sales now billions
from sea foods, no Aberdeen Angus, little renewable energy, tartan kilts, Nessie
and spectacularly scenery are all ours to attract the tourists.
And people want to stick with England who had £2 Trillion of debt before they
Mismanaged Covid?
@Chas
What is it I’ve been told that I can’t accept ?
What makes you such an authority on how bright I am ?
References to battles 700 years ago are relevant, everything in history is relevant and if Bannockburn never happened the likelihood is none of us would be on this blog discussing independence,
You’re really not the brightest are you, why don’t you go get a f@cking education instead of wasting your time spouting shite on here you f@cking idiot
o/t
Drivel update on WGD
This is all that Salmonds fault
Oh fk I really can’t be arsed reading that shite they all agree with each other at least here you get a good argument and sometimes a good fkn fight Ha Ha
Tricia Marwick now chipping in with a character reference for NS. Funny how Dorothy Grace Elder and Margo McDonald saw a different side?
Maybe ‘she behaves differently with different people’. Surely NS, who has kept the same cabal around her since Uni and never travelled further than Edinburgh, is the model of consistent behaviour?
Or maybe she is a cold fish and trusts no one so no one really knows her?
Rev Stu. Not been here long but sorry it is already time to leave the site. Too many people on here who are unable to think for themselves, are simply living in the past or are simply full of mince.
MI5 plots, colonial masters, vote the same lying SNP MSP’s in again and we will sort things out in the next 5 years!!!
The prospect of Independence is dead in the water for at least 10-15 years. Maybe longer until someone produces an economic or financial plan. Plenty of folk can talk about how successful Scotland could be but nobody ever provides anything to support this dream. I wonder why? Good luck.
See look Wullie and Chas having a right good fkn ding dong
That’s it get stuck in boys ha ha
Chas is a Troll that is now evident in his knows the cost of everything but the value of nothing, ignore.
Going all retro digging out this info* from wayback in time when men were men and women were women…
* Is anyone aware if this old list has ever been updated to take into account of further developments or other changes?
Scotland makes up about 8.3% of UK population.
But we DO have…
32% of the land area.
61% of the sea area.
90% of the fresh water.
65% of the natural gas production.
96.5% of the crude oil production.
47% of the open cast coal production
81% of the untapped coal reserves
62% of the timber production
46% of the total forest area
92% of the hydro electric production
40% of the wind wave and solar energy production
60% of the fish landings
30% of the beef herd
20% of the sheep herd
9% of the dairy herd
10% of the pig herd
15% if the cereal holdings
20% of the potato holdings
70% of UK Gin production
…obviously 100% of the Scotch Whisky industry.
Captain Yossarian says:
21 March, 2021 at 8:00 pm
@holymacmoses – because I am not political.
Of course you’re political. You’re not party political – that’s different.
Why did you vote SNP? Is it because you think Scotland should be independent?
Heller’s ambition in Yossarian was to start to work out his own religious problems. He was, as you know, Jewish, but he toyed with other religions; see the opening lines of Catch 22 ‘It was love at first sight’. Heller’s first three novels culminate in his acceptance of the Jewish faith.
“The prospect of Independence is dead in the water for at least 10-15 years”
Utter bollocks, the Smith Commission agreed that nothing in the report prevents Scotland from becoming an independent in the future (whenever) should the people of Scotland so choose.
Sturgeon won’t be around as FM, hopefully very soon, but if not I believe five years max.
Chas says:
21 March, 2021 at 8:58 pm
The prospect of Independence is dead in the water for at least 10-15 years.
In your dreams, troll-boy.
Don’t let the door skelp yer arse on the way out.
The absence of Chas’s knowledge about Scotland is striking. He most likely is just repeating what he reads from Daily Express, the Mail etc. He probably resides south of the border.
@ScotsRenewables @9:32pm
I would agree with the troll boy. Not in my lifetime. Perhaps 15 to 20 years. I would agree with that. Thanks to the cult of Nickla. Consider your part in that.
Issuing a statement on a Sunday night about leaks because they deem leaks are bad, mkay.
link to twitter.com
But did they issue a statement when their own organisation leaked info…
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Tam Fae Somewhere @ 7.50 pm.
An interesting point that you make about what if the SNP go bankrupt before the 6th May 2021. Cleary there are restrictions on legal entities when they become insolvent.
Exactly what kind of legal entity the SNP is, is another question. Could candidates carry on as candidates bearing the party badge or not, or could a phoenix arise in its place, is another question.
Uncharted waters ahead?
O/T: AFI fundraiser shows 50 donors and just under £6000 raised so far. They need at least £28,000 by end of March for candidate fees, printing and public service broadcast.
I know all indy causes need help e.g. Now Scotland, ISP, court cases, bloggers etc and many Wingers are very generous.
What if the SNP go bankrupt? Whether before or after the 6th May 2021.
Are the NEC members personally responsible for any debts that accrue?
link to caltonjock.com
The Legacy of the (Butcher) Duke of Sutherland, His Cronies & The Rape, Pillage and Theft of the Highlands of Scotland
In 1854 Britain declared war on Russia. Highland regiments, so conspicuous in the past, were now equally conspicuous by their absence. “Where are the Highlanders?” was asked. The Duke of Sutherland hastily travelled from London to Dunrobin Castle and enquired why there were no Highland volunteers, an elderly gentleman replied:
“Your Grace’s mother and predecessors applied to our fathers for men upon former occasions and our fathers responded to their call. They have made us liberal promises, which neither them nor you performed. We are, we think, a little wiser than our fathers, and we estimate your promises of today at the value of theirs; besides you should bear in mind that your predecessors and yourself expelled us in a most cruel and unjust manner from the land which our fathers held in lien from your family. I do assure your Grace that it is the prevailing opinion in this country, that should the Czar of Russia take possession of Dunrobin Castle and Stafford House next term, that we could not expect worse treatment at his hands than we have experienced at the hands of your family for the last 50 years.”
AYRSHIRE NOB 8.05pm
Who gives a flying fuck about the english army.
Yaaaawwwwwnnnnnn!!!!!!!
Same screwballs on here all day posting the same boring push about Sturgeon will be our hero and lead us to the promised land.
Those that want to take Sturgeon out at source have the right idea.
Are RCS now a front for Nicola Sturgeon ?
This organisation appears to be being used as a proxy for the continuing vendetta against Alex Salmond , they are using these Women complainers as a shield and are getting involved in political smearing and no one seems to be able to curtail what they are getting up to ,
I hope Alex legal team are taking a close look at their activities
Probably a bit of advice that should be heeded by whoever is using them , stick to the job that the organisation was set up to do drop the other stuff because it’s not really your area of expertise .
Much depends on how the independence movement responds to the inevitable collapse of the SNP, if at all.
We could be going into the sort of phase that ‘the left’ in the UK experienced in the 1980s, never to recover. There are a lot of parallels.
Politicians of principle across the board need to learn to stop turning into phoney, self-serving, trough-loving, hypocritical bastards.
Most of us would rather have honest if disgraceful scumbag Tories in charge; at least they don’t make us feel like mugs, and the outcome on the ground is much the same anyway.
People assume that there will always be an independence movement and party as long as enough people continue to want independence. That’s not really true.
There was (and still is) huge demand for an authentic left-of-centre party in the UK after Thatcher, for example. That demand has been reduced to serving as nothing more than a sort of marketing framework in the run up to elections. Sound familiar?
The best thing that could happen would be a hung Parliament.
That way you sort Holyrood out, making sure no future first minister can have the power Sturgeon had.
It would also get the justice and civil service departments sorted.
All the time having a true Indy Party strengthening in the back ground for the next election.
It has to be done because Holyrood is a car crash at the moment, as is Scotland.
At this moment in time we are not fit enough to become an independent nation.
We are years behind where we should be.
Patrick, I agree with a lot of that.
We all think this election is a foregone conclusion but it isn’t.
We are watching a political party imploding right now.
Nothing is certain.
The claims about Alex
5 branches in his CA. It was mainly Women who held CA positions and all remained in roll for several years.
Fundraisers and regular events took place across Several combined CA get togethers and never a word was ever heard regarding his behaviour.
It is also interesting that none of the women involved with the CA ever received an email during the fishing campaign.
I never believed a word of the claims. It is a very small group of claimants centred around Nicola and it looks like the smear 2 operation is also kicking off.
I’m especially disappointed in the MSP, MPs and councillors from the NE (and the large number in HQ) who have remained silent.
I know who you are! Several of you owe your careers to Alex.
You should be ashamed of yourselves.
Patrick Jones says:
21 March, 2021 at 10:25 pm
At this moment in time we are not fit enough to become an independent nation.
You say that with WM behaving the way it is. If we become independent, and rejoin the EU, we’ll be well on our feet in no time. Boris will destroy us
You know, if your going to leak stuff to the press – your going to leak the really big, juicy bits…
If tieing shoe laces, applying hand sanitiser and brushing dandruff off his shoulders (and since he was under intense scrutiny at the time, by a hostile media, I’m firmly of the opinion – any FM in his position should have someone ensuring his appearance is impeccable), if that is all they have, I’m struggling to see where the crime is, or where the harassment is.
And I really struggle to see in what way its a Rape Crisis Scotland issue.
Plenty of folk in the real world, getting shitty wages, who could give lots of examples of parts of their jobs that are a bit crap. And here’s the thing – you don’t like it, then quit and get another job. That’s what adults do.
Put money on it, the leak came from the crooked SNP – in order to try and derail the Inquiry now that its not going their way.
I’d also quite like to know – how many bites at the cherry are complainers allowed.
One of the initial complainers – ‘sleepy cuddle’ woman, made a complaint the day after it happened, Alex Salmond took full responsibility, apologised, and she was offered a career move – with no detriment to her prospects, which she declined. She then continued to work for him, with no further incidents – although it now appears she may have had to brush dandruff of his shoulders, and tie his shoe laces – michty me, the trauma.
I mean what the hell else was he supposed to do to make amends – seems a pretty fair and decent process to me.
And with a new boss in charge, its not like Alex was still in power to keep her career under a glass ceiling.
She maybe wasn’t a bad person, but this constant demonising of Alex is looking more and more pathetic. In terms of ‘sex’ scandals, I’ve seen worse at a Christmas works night out – and I’m pretty damned sure so has nearly everyone over the age of 30.
Anyway, we now need to rename Rape Crisis Scotland – to the ‘My Boss asked me to make him a cup of tea and I was so humiliated Centre.’
If the boss is chums with Nicla we can arrange for them to get a mickey mouse ‘Doctrate’ from a Scottish Uni for ‘services rendered’ and pay them Millions of tax payer money in grants. Pretty sure that’s how it works, isn’t it.
SHAME
” Chas says:
21 March, 2021 at 2:59 pm
I read these comments with some interest. I will say at the outset that whilst I am sympathetic to Independence I have never voted for the SNP. I have not voted for 20 years but will be voting in May. Don’t know who for as yet but it certainly will not be for the SNP or the Tory’s.
Regarding the ‘new’ Independence parties springing up I hope that they will not permit any of the current spineless SNP MSP’s to join. They have shown their colours and are not worthy of any support.The ONLY policy I see is Independence and that is it.
Independence will ultimately stand or fall on the economics and finances. The more rabid of the current SNP supporters seem to be willing to support anything. The free-thinking people of Scotland will simply not vote to be worse off and for uncertainty.
Until the ‘new’ parties produce some ‘financials’ for scrutiny they will not attract the level headed amongst us to their cause. It is incumbent on me to not only think of the future for myself but also for my kids and grandkids.
I have no doubt this will upset some but people have to be aware of the reality of what they are voting for both economically and who will be acting for them as we move forward. The current SNP have been a disaster and it remains up to any new Independence parties to convince me, along with millions of other Scots, that they can do better. What is the proposed currency we will be using and what ‘vehicle’ will we use to house our share of current UK debt? We have to take our share or risk being cast into an international wilderness.I am not seeing that at the moment. If we do not like what we are ‘getting’ after Independence we cannot go back.
Money does not talk…………..it roars and shouts.”
==================================================================================================
What in the fuck are you doing here Yoon worm troll? Gutless and spineless like all ("Tractor" - Ed)s.
Who has control of the RCS twitter account?
1 individual or many?
Has someone got it to themselves at the weekends?
Do tweets need a signoff during the week but not at weekends?
Is it outsourced to a PR agency somewhere?
Who has a hotline to the Sunday Times if they wanted to leak something or generally poison the well?
If there was a private evidence session it was not publicised, but why shouldn’t the comments be publicised?
etc etc
Twenty twenty four years to go
Get me indyref before I go loco..
youtu.be/zj40gnE5rPQ
If you want to know what predatory sexual behaviour looks like – it sort of looks like a man in his 40’s texting a 16 year old boy and attempting to ‘befriend’ him, and impress him with his very important high level Government job.
That’s what sexually predatory behaviour looks like – it is not confined to a very small, very select, group of employees.
Daisy Walker says:
21 March, 2021 at 10:57 pm
You know, if your going to leak stuff to the press – your going to leak the really big, juicy bits…
I don’t actually believe that stuff . Once or twice he may have asked but I remember reading a piece about Prince Charles saying the people tied his shoelaces etc and the ‘hand sanitizer’ gives it away because it wasn’t used in 2013.
Sturgeon is ‘firing in as many directions ‘ as she can, to avoid getting caught.
Very good point JSC – other than the names of the complainers – exactly why is the content of their complaints to be kept a secret.
After all, full details of the allegations against Alex were published the length and breadth of the counrty at the criminal trial.
This Inquiry is at the tail end of a long sequence of actions, that were instigated by the nature of complaints made by women A and B allegedly over AS’s conduct towards them.
I’d say the public, as well as the committee, is fully entitled to know the full ‘horror’ of what they were ‘exposed’ to – that caused the First Minister to lose sleep – and all about her to lose any rational, professional ability to carry out their work in a competent and legal manner.
Right just now, thanks to those ‘salacious’ leaks – we have dandruff brushing, shoe lace tieing and applying hand santiser.
It’s perhaps just as well the author of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is no longer on this mortal coil – with ‘sexual offences’ at this level of depravity to inspire him – I doubt if his books would ever get published.
Patrick Jones @ 10:25 pm
“At this moment in time we are not fit enough to become an independent nation”
According to Estonia’s independence leaders, after the declaration, those who led the countries institutions under colonialism need to be replaced.
Comments being made by Someone on WGD posting comments bordering on slander if there is such a thing in Scottish legal terminology ,
To the person posting the allegations and the ones agreeing with them do you have information or are you just peddling smears ? , I hope Alex Salmonds legal team are closely watching the platform you are posting unsubstantiated allegations on about a man who has been cleared of any wrongdoing in court ,
The police are the only ones entitled to investigate any and all allegations , They obviously would require , Who , When , Where , witnesses present ? Statements given ? Complaint regarding the alleged incident given to the police ? .
Humzas bill can be turned on the site you post these comments in exactly the same way as you and the people on that site have been discussing ways to shut this site down it works both ways
What have you done with Ross Kilblride?
Has he been taking out the back and shot in the nut?
This site is getting as bad as the Wee Ginger Dugs website, where you get barred for saying a bad word about Sturgeon.
What happened here?
Was Ross Kilblride too critical of Craig Murray?
Did an email put end to his critisism? This site has its share of cowardly grasses.
His message was that Murray was a hypocrite for firstly exposing the SNP for the Crooks that they are, then publicly Backing them as his first vote in the May Election.
Ross Kilblride, exposing the hypocrites Murray, Sheridan and Keatings.
Haste ye back Ross, here’s hoping the bullet they tried to silence you with missed.
Rev, don’t turn into the SNP with their silencing of the lambs shite.
Free speech is essential.
If someone has something to say, then it must be heard.
@ Holymacmoses re ‘I don’t actually believe that stuff’
How can you not believe it H? I mean really. I’m just waiting for the next instalment… ‘and he told me to get him a cup of tea… with a chocolate biscuit.
I was so ashamed, the trauma, I couldn’t tell anyone. It all happened so fast. It’ll be our little secret he said, gave a wink and tried to make out it was about his diet….’
Rev
Ross Kilblride and Scots Renewables were given a warning earlier today.
Ross Kilblride is missing, but the guy Scots Renewables is still floating about.
Stu don’t turn into Nicola Sturgeon with your selection executions. Please.
“Patrick Jones says:
21 March, 2021 at 10:25 pm
At this moment in time we are not fit enough to become an independent nation.
We are years behind where we should be.”
=======================================================================================================================
Aye that will be right quizzer. Tell that to the Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Ukrainians and oh every nation that was once subjugated by the English.
@ben madigan says:
21 March, 2021 at 9:56 pm
“What if the SNP go bankrupt? Whether before or after the 6th May 2021.
Are the NEC members personally responsible for any debts that accrue?”
On that point, someone on Twitter last week posted that once a party forms the next Government, they have to show the accounts to the Electoral Commission.
Is that true or just social media nonsense?
Daisy Walker says:
21 March, 2021 at 11:19 pm
@ Holymacmoses re ‘I don’t actually believe that stuff’
How can you not believe it H? I mean really. I’m just waiting for the next instalment… ‘and he told me to get him a cup of tea… with a chocolate biscuit.
I didn’t mean I didn’t believe you Daisy – I meant that even the trivia they created was dressed up and probably only happened a few times. Clearly Rape Crisis Scotland needs to be totally overhauled. For me the anonymity of ALL concerned is the most important issue, that way people will be able to get on with their lives outside public curiosity once the trial is over – whatever the decision of the jury.
I am truly disgusted with so many Scottish people who seem unable to realise just what a wicked idea this cabal engaged in by trying to conjure up a case against a man who gave most of them the living capacity they now enjoy
“Geoff Collins” – alias several.
Daily Record: Police Scotland spent almost £850k and 14 officers investigating Alex Salmond
link to archive.is
EVERYONE CALM DOWN YEAH?
@Alf Baird who said :
“According to Estonia’s independence leaders, after the declaration, those who led the countries institutions under colonialism need to be replaced”.
Former colonial leaders usually prefer to leave voluntarily.
In the film “Michael Collins” there is a scene towards the end where the English administration hands over Dublin Castle, seat of the English administration in Ireland.
I don’t know if it happened historically exactly like that. When the top brass and administrative staff left, they took everything with them even the office chairs and tables.
All the staff left voluntarily, with their wives, children and servants.
Many people who worked at lower level jobs (clerks,typists) in the British administration throughout Ireland left voluntarily, often with their families, particularly if the worker was head of the household.
Men in the police and the British Army were transferred to Britain,again taking their families with them.
Some tradesmen and lower class workers moved to Northern Ireland
Reasons for leaving were they felt British, were promised the same job in Britain, were loyal to Britain rather than Ireland and preferred to take their chances there, even when no job was promised.
Geoff Collins and Patrick Jones – two cheeks of the same arse? Never seen either of them on here before.
Yawn.
Rape is a horrible crime and victims need support. Moreover, there can be sometimes the erroneous view that somehow the victim was asking for it.
Support therefore is very important and that is what you would expect the Rape Crisis Centre to do.
Whether it does or not I do not know. Rape and the support of victims is not something I have either knowledge or support of. What I do have knowledge, or have formed an opinion of is how the RCC has become what appears to be a political mouth piece playing political games and trivialising rape.
Issuing comments going back many many years against an individual who was exonerated of all 14 charges of sexual misconduct and attempted rape to now say that he was difficult and demeaning in that he had people ” dandruff brushing, shoe lace tying and applying hand sanitiser” comes across as pure political smearing.
Worse still it trivialises what this publicly funded centre is supposed to be about. The Crisis Centre for Dandruff Brushing, Shoe Lace Tying. and Appliance of Hand Sanitiser – is that what we are funding. And why would a First Minister eight years ago before Covid 19 be requiring be requiring sanitiser.
Certainly comes across, at least to me, as political smearing, and a huge misplacement of effort and resources. But maybe I’m picking it up wrong.
Rape is a horrible crime and victims need support. Moreover, there can be sometimes the erroneous view that somehow the victim was asking for it.
Support therefore is very important and that is what you would expect the Rape Crisis Centre to do.
Whether it does or not I do not know. Rape and the support of victims is not something I have either knowledge or support of. What I do have knowledge, or have formed an opinion of is how the RCC has become what appears to be a political mouth piece playing political games and trivialising rape.
Issuing comments going back many many years against an individual who was exonerated of all 14 charges of sexual misconduct and attempted rape to now say that he was difficult and demeaning in that he had people ” dandruff brushing, shoe lace tying and applying hand sanitiser” comes across as pure political smearing.
Worse still it trivialises what this publicly funded centre is supposed to be about. The Crisis Centre for Dandruff Brushing, Shoe Lace Tying. and Appliance of Hand Sanitiser – is that what we are funding. And why would a First Minister eight years ago before Covid 19 be requiring be requiring sanitiser.
Certainly comes across, at least to me, as political smearing, and a huge misplacement of effort and resources. But maybe I’m picking it up wrong. I hope so as it would be so wrong to undermine such important support.
The front page of tomorrow’s National :
Indyref2 to be held after pandemic ends, Michael Russell says
That’s that then. Tha scientists are saying it may never end. How fucking convenient.
I met Russell during the 2014 campaign. In fact, he totally hijacked a meeting I was chairing.
He is a nasty, vainglorious piece of work.
Well Mike, you might just be the straw, you fucking arrogant wankpiece. I am no longer sure how I am going to vote.
Geoff Collins – you are obviously using a VPN to hide your IP address.
You were Ronald Fraser, you were Clyde, you were Ross Kilbride. We all recognise your literal style.
Why don’t you go and litter another blog? We all see you here…
@ willie
There is a difference between R*pe Crisis Centres, of which there are many, and R*pe Crisis Scotland, which is an umbrella organization of which there is, fortunately, only one.
During the passing of the Forensic Medical Services Bill, at least one RCC expressed dismay at the line taken by RCS, which went against their own evidence at the committee stage, as well as the wishes of that particular centre (and possibly many others).
The waters are muddied by the employment at one centre of a notorious individual with some controversial views.
Ruby says,
“Why did Sturgeon & Murrell not want Alex Salmond to return to Holyrood as a MSP?”
A very good question.
Although it has been answered about a thousand times on this blog, which you read and comment on every day.
Brian doonthetoon 1.16
?
Ruby says,
“What difference would it make to the SNP if Sturgeon was or wasn’t re-elected?
Another clone of Sturgeon would become party leader.”
Are you Petra or Capella?
Ruby says,
“The ‘corrupt lying criminal SNP’ are not going to be out of the way they are going to be in opposition.
Why would the SNP need to be out of the way for a new genuine independence party to stand at the next Westminster GE?”
In opposition will mean it has been rejected as the pro independence party it used to be for decades until your heroine Sturgeon took over.
The very excuses that the likes of you give for Sturgeon to be re-elected will no longer be valid.
What has the SNP done since 2016 except hindering independence when it had become achievable like never before?
Only a fresh start will put the cause of independence back on the track.
Out with the corrupt lying criminal SNP.
Ruby says,
“You are suggesting more than tactical voting
(Which I am supporting in Edinburgh Central where I have a vote)”
Whatever more I may be suggesting, your position is to support Sturgeon getting re-elected when there is a way of getting rid of her without the SNP losing a seat in Glasgow or Labour gaining a seat in Glasgow.
The SNP seat being taken by a BAME SNP candidate instead of Sturgeon.
Wings Over Scotland has been exposing the utter corruption and criminality of Sturgeon and her cronies and stooges.
Whereas, like ScottishRenewables, you are a diehard Sturgeonist and your agenda for posting here extensively is to get the corrupt lying criminal SNP government which includes Sturgeon, Swinney, James Wolffe (Lord Advocate), Yousaf to be re-elected with a majority.
Which they will tell us in an endorsement of their crimes.
And of course they will give us a referendum “when it is safe”.
Ruby says,
“That was posted by Kcor.”
And was twisted by Ruby.
There is no option of direct Westminster rule in the coming election.
If it happens before the election, it will be because of the corrupt lying criminal SNP government led by Sturgeon, with James Wolffe the corrupt lying criminal Lord Advocate of Scotland in her pocket, having corrupted the institutions of state.
Guybrush Threepwood says,
“The people over at WGD seem to think that an SNP minority government, backed by the Scottish Greens will be enough to secure another referendum. We have had that situation for the past 5 years and there has been no referendum, so what’s going to change this time around?”
Not any different from what many posters here – Ruby, ScottishRenewables etc think.
Not only did we have that situation, since 2016 we had the opportunity to achieve independence like never before.
They deliberately missed it to protect their own power and comfy and lucrative positions which they would lose if Scotland were to be independent.
‘Independence over our dead bodies’ is the moto of the likes of Sturgeon, Murrell, Robertson, Wishart and Co.
first time poster… canuck, so my vote doesn’t count… but i would just like to say i agree with much of the logic shared by a few posters here in particular – ruby, hatuey and a few others… to the poster who said this : “Voting for them is not an endorsement of what they have done.”
i tend to see it the opposite..
Dear Sir
I am very disappointed at the abscence of ‘direct action’ coming from the Now Scotland group.
For example, what about taking the Independence fight directly to the enemy with a mass drop of exploding coat hangers and three-legged self-combusting trousers over England?
If implemented this would either shorten or lengthen the Independence ground war dramatically.
Or Biological Warfare? It has been proven beyond all doubt that the high levels of dementia in this country can be attributed directly to the mass consumption of Scotch Pies from Dundee.
Could these ‘Peh’s’ not be smuggled into enemy territory by County Pie Lines?
I have no direct military experience other than practising drill at home and shouting at passing cars but believe that our armed wing should give active consideration to these ideas urgently.
Yrs etc
As people may have noted from my comments I’m someone who never commented here before, who got pissed off enough about what was going on to start commenting and in the past few days I’ve had enough.
When people get pissed off they tell the truth.
So here’s hard truth # 1.
The New SNP have reached the point where only the total annihilation of the party will cure the problem and anyone who even considers still voting for them are part of the problem and need to be treated as such,
Here is hard truth # 2.
Indy ref 2 hasn’t happened yet and there is no prospect of it happening anytime soon for the simple reason that it would have been and will be lost. The New SNP have known this all along and the only purpose of Indy ref 2 rhetoric is to keep people voting New SNP. The New SNP are not interested in making competent and persuasive arguments in favour of independence to convince the majority, because it appears to me they don’t have any, instead they have calculated that if they whip enough people into a desperate frenzy they can stay in perpetual power and enjoy the trappings and wealth that go with it. The polls they are not to reflect opinion, they are to direct opinion and convince people salvation is just over the next hill, that is the whole point of what that odious lying shit Angis Robertson has been doing with that stupid progress Scotland Ponzi scam. They have played all of us, well they ain’t playing me anymore, you lot can make your own decisions.
As a final note, being like Estonia or whatever is not a step forward for Scotland, it is a step back. I am what you would term a fairly successful person who has done it through hard work even though I live under the “yoke of the British State”, no one did it for me, I did it for myself, I paid myself through uni, I got up the morning, put in the long hours and when confronted by challenged I dealt with them and moved in instead of blaming others. Think on that people.
@holymacmoses – You’re correct; I am mildly religious, but not party political. What you go-on to say about Joseph Heller is news to me, by the way. You get some thinking folk on this website.
Just like clockwork, previous IDs of the many named obnoxiously boring, abusive bile spewer have been rumbled, up pop another 2.
Thanks for outing yourself so early “Geoff” & “Patrick”
The hand sanitiser and the shoelace tying were reported in the press in 2014.
Seems odd to me that these are the same complaints of bad behaviour being made 8 years later.
Wouldn’t they have something different? A range of different requests and actions? If they were working for such a monster?
Or maybe, like the person who had to read AS biography to find out when she was supposed to be at Bute House, the witnesses have had to look to the written word for inspiration.
Hearing Craig Murray found guilty
CynicalHighlander writes:
“No country in the world is liable for any debt liabilities of the country it had just become independent from.”
Hmmmm. I can clearly recall reading how long the UK (including Scotland) will take to pay off its debts and commitments to the EU arising from Brexit. Some of them will have to be repaid for a period exceeding the period the UK was in the EU! I will be long dead before they are repaid, and so may CynicalHighlander.
Regarding dandruff-brushing, etc.
Is that not pretty common for politicians about to appear in front of cameras? Not saying that it is particularly appropriate to ask another adult to check your appearance as if you are a 5 year old and they are your mammy tucking your collar in, but politicians get make up etc if they are in a TV studio. They have to shift for themselves if cameras appear at an event so it is not surprising if they get someone to do it for them.
@John Main
When did the EU become a country?
Apart from all the other reasons Sturgeon is deliberatly burying independence she knows she hasn’t the intelligence to negotiate the logistics of a separation from England.
She is not a bright woman and there is also something bitter and nasty about her.
link to thenational.scot
willie says:
22 March, 2021 at 1:01 am
I would never go to them or advise anyone to do so.
Ad an organisation they employed a person who lied on their job application to remain in post – and not just a little lie. The person presented as female and failed to declare that they were, in fact, a fully intact male.
To me this is exploitation of very vulnerable women by allowing an AGP male to get his sexual thrills from their harrowing experience.
They should be exposed for the political mouthpieces that they are, denied funding for their failure to protect women and Mridul Wadhwa should be prosecuted for lying on a job application under the fraud act.
Willie,
@8.14
As Craig has been waiting for ages to hear the outcome of the trial, do you not find it interesting that once he put his hat in the political ring this judgement came out. If he is jailed does that mean he cannot stand as a candidate? Or am I being a conspiracy theorist..
Willie says:
22 March, 2021 at 8:14 am
link to thenational.scot
Absolutley disgusting.
Another Scottish patriot harrassed by the “Scottish Establishment” while the rogues and criminals in the Scottish Government, Civil Service, COPFS, Media and Murrell family are a complete law unto themselves.
Vote SNP? Fucking make me. I dare you.
All of the Forth wouldn’t wash clean these stables.
Latest blog from Iain Lawson.
link to yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com
Well folks, seems my account has maybe been silenced but I’m going to say this in case it hasn’t.
Craig Murray has just been found guilty. It is a disgusting decision. The only reason I have criticised Craig is because I wanted him to stand up for himself and see who the real enemy are, the New SNP, and in my anger I perhaps hammered it home a bit much. I have family in similar situations with ongoing legal battles against the Scottish government caused by the lies of New SNP politicians who can’t see who is really to blame.
I think Craig is a decent honest man of great integrity and honour. His only faults are that sometimes he can be too trusting and try to see good in people when there is none.
If people are going to stand idly by and allow those who have done this to him to get away with it them our country is truly lost.
I weep for what Scotland has become.
JimuckMac says:
21 March, 2021 at 1:16 pm
“We can deal with the criminals at a later date once this independence alliance is in place.”
You mean the criminals for whom we will be voting and to whom we will be giving a ringing endorsement of their actions? And you believe they will allow independence to happen when they know it would be their necks in the noose (metaphorically)?
So we wait weeks for Craig’s decision and lo and behold it arrives shortly after he declares his candidacy for Lothian.
It does make you wonder…
Just Hamilton’s inevitable fudge to come now.
I am beyond despair and into anger. Fortunately I trust my proxy voter enough to ask her to spoil my ballot paper if necessary.
Residents of Edinburgh will later this week hear the Whup Whup sound of a 2nd REP Helicopter Gunship descend on Bute House with orders to then proceed to the compound of the French Consulate before heading to France and a life in exile at the Lavender Palace for ‘The Pretender’
Dreadful news about Craig Murray. I don’t know how to contact him as I don’t have twitter. But I would like him to know that I will support a new specific crowdfunder for an appeal. I had set aside as much as I could for Andy Wightman which in the event was not needed and I have been keeping it available in case there was a need for another largish sum and this would appear to be it.
I am heartsick.
“Watch the documentary about Estonia.
Doing nothing under Russian control but seeing
their GDP grow 5 fold in 20 years when independent.”
I wonder what 5 times nothing is?.
Oh dear. Poor Mr. Murray. Not somebody whose politics I can agree with but it is painfully obvious that like Mr. Salmond he has been stitched up like a kipper. And don’t get me started on the awfulness of him having to wait so long for the verdict, let alone how questionable the timing of this is. Disgraceful.
So if Craig Murray gets less than a year he can still stand and hopefully garner votes from people who are so pissed off at the COPS over the whole affair. If he gets more then he gets replaced by Alex Salmond who wins, gets into Holyrood and, under the new extension of parliamentary privilege, names all the b*****ds involved in the stitch up – or is that not covered by parliamentary privilege?
So, Craig Murray could do time for offending the petty tyrants.
Scotland is becoming like Belarus or Turkey in its persecution of dissidents.
Democratic countries will have to begin issuing Advisories to their citizens warning of dangers in visiting Scotland because of its seemingly arbitrary and prejudiced judicial system.
Geoff Collins says:
21 March, 2021 at 11:17 pm
What have you done with Ross Kilblride?
Reply
He did get a warning about being abusive to other posters. I was one of those posters. I wasn’t particularly bothered about his abuse but Stu didn’t seem to like it.
His mate Kcor seems to be behaving pretty oddly towards me. I feel I am being stalked.
The decision is do I ignore him or wind-up him up?
So the corruption in Scotland continues.
We are being smothered.
There is no democracy or free speech in our Nation.
link to archive.is
The plan to nationalise Celtic and Rangers and merge them hasn’t yet cut down hate crime as our hate monitors have reported the increased presence of the flags of Beitar Jerusalem FC and Hilal Al-Quds FC as well as Lazio and Roma. The decision to work with Interpol and MI5 in the apprehension of the Rev Stuart Campbell was a success, although his most fervent disciples regularly report sightings of him despite the CIA assuring us of his successful rendition in Guantanamo Bay.
If James Hamilton is likely to say that Sturgeon misled parliament , but not knowingly. Does she survive? Because lets be honest, that is the likely outcome.
He certainly couldn’t say she didn’t mislead parliament at all. That would be frankly ridiculous , given the evidence. He does have his own reputation to consider.
Keeping a man waiting two months for a verdict after a 90 minute trial. I’m no legal expert, but that sort of delay cannot have been necessary.
This is terrible new about Craig.
Even if his journalistic output did lead to jigsaw identification then why hasn’t Garvalli been up in front of the Court on contempt charges?
I, and many others identified two of the complainers from her writings.
The law should be fair and equal, but it appears at the moment, this does not apply to Unionists.
Looks like scotland is a social and psychological construct.
Welcome to the post westphalian world.
Kcor says:
22 March, 2021 at 2:43 am
Guybrush Threepwood says,
“The people over at WGD seem to think….”
Gonna stop you there… I’ve spotted a flaw in your argument.
I fail to understand how anyone can decide ‘knowingly’. I know the first Chair in Parapsychology is at Edinburgh BUT … there are some things we can only judge by facts.
Nicola Sturgeon told Holyrood one thing one day and then changed that statement later. That is the fact and what she should be judged on. Ignorance is not innocence in the eyes of the Law so why should she be an exception?
AND I know they lie at WM all the time and that may not be a totally false equivalence but it ought to be irrelevant to a country that wants to be different.
Holy – Not a fan of Brian Taylor. However he has said if she broke the code , according to Hamilton. Then she needs to resign. He didn’t caveat it with knowingly.
Big Jock says:
22 March, 2021 at 9:34 am
Holy – Not a fan of Brian Taylor. However he has said if she broke the code , according to Hamilton. Then she needs to resign. He didn’t caveat it with knowingly.
I hope you’re right Jock. I think ‘knowingly’, particularly when it comes to politicians, is a futile word. AND when it comes to Nicola Sturgeon, it becomes utterly meaningless because as far as I can tell – she is as much of a liar as Boris Johnson.
Well fingers crossed , we can end this sorry chapter of the Sturgeon wasted years today.
I will certainly feel more positive if the Murrell’s can be toppled.
Ruby..11.17
I think they are all one person…wind him up..lol
Deeply gutted for Craig Murray. This is a dark dark day.
What a corrupt state we live in.
So is this the same judge who excluded all the damning messages between members of Sturgeon’s inner circle clearly showing the plot to stitch-up Alex Salmond from his criminal trial?
Is this the same judge who presided over what we now know was the SNPG failure in it’s duty of candour at Alex Salmond’s criminal trial?
Is that same judge who now gets to simply ‘decide’ to convict Craig Murray over some contrived bullshit.
As someone pointed out a while ago. When Salmond thanked the judges and jury he was referring to the judges in the court of session and the jury in his criminal trial and MOST definitely not this judge. She is definitely not on his side or anyone who supports him.
Craig Murray, make no mistake, is a political prisoner to be. I assume he will remain free until appeal but if he does got to jail it is unquestionably a political prosecution just as Alex Salmond’s persecution and prosecution was.
All in 2020 Scotland under Nicola Sturgeon. Just fucking wow. This is surreal.
Is anyone wondered why this had to have the whistle blown in England, by a Tory at Westminster this shows you why. Clear as day. Scotland is an embarrassingly suppressive little country run by a poundshop tyrant.
Fuck the SNP.
@Margaret E
I too put money into Andy wightman’s court case fund, then he turned around and supported those continuing to besmirch Alex salmond after he had been found innocent by the same courts. I have zero time for Wightman after that and he won’t get another cent from me.
Yes I’ll be supporting Craig as much as I can.
Dandee says:
22 March, 2021 at 9:50 am
Ruby..11.17
I think they are all one person…wind him up..lol
Reply
Do you think Ross Kilbride, Kcor and the two new boys who have joined them today are getting paid more or less than the minimum wage by their millionaire boss?
They want to stop Craig standing as a candidate in May, and believe they have found a way. In order to do so, they will have to sentence him to a year or more in jail.
This is how corrupt this administration are. For writing a satire which identified nobody. They are scared of him and his honesty. This is an administration who think they can crush anybody who questions their methods and practices. Like every tinpot dictatorship in the world.
Mac – Scotland is turning into Catalonia. Except unlike there. We are doing it to our own people. We can’t blame the Brits for this. This is extremely worrying. Everyone who posts on here could be set up like Craig and done under Humza’s new Hate Crime Bill.
Absolutely no-one is safe.
@Mac – “Is anyone wondered why this had to have the whistle blown in England, by a Tory at Westminster this shows you why. Clear as day.” Quite possibly it is because the biggest law firms in Scotland would hang whistle-blowers from a tree. If that’s what they get paid to do, they’ll do it.
Big Jock says:
22 March, 2021 at 10:07 am
Mac – Scotland is turning into Catalonia. Except unlike there. We are doing it to our own people. We can’t blame the Brits for this. This is extremely worrying. Everyone who posts on here could be set up like Craig and done under Humza’s new Hate Crime Bill.
Absolutely no-one is safe.
Reply
What’s to say a Unionist party in power at Holyrood wouldn’t think the ‘Hate Crime Bill’ wasn’t an absolutely splendid idea?
The question is what do we do about it? Do we just ‘go to our rooms’ and be good little obedient children?
It would be incredibly convenient for the Westminster government, the Scottish judicial establishment and the SNP hierarchy to silence Craig Murray by locking him up.
An absolute fucking disgrace of a mess we are in, yet we have completely brainless nicophants telling us everything is fine and dandy, just vote SNP 1 and 2.
Of course none of the blame belongs to Nicola Sturgeon personally as nobody who works for her has told her what’s going on and if they did she would have forgotten already.
Political prisoners in Scotland shows us that the SNP, who are in charge of this clusterfuck, is not only broken but irreparable.
Ian – I think Tommy Sheridan suggested that Craig could still run his campaign from prison, as an eligible MSP. He would need to have a sentence under 1 year though , according to the EC. So if he appealed the sentence and had it reduced to a year?
Sturgeon is going out with a bang.
It’s as if she is oblivious to what others are seeing OR saying.
Furious about the verdict for Criag Murray.
Lady Dorian has certainly put any doubt about her integrity beyond the pale now.
Will contribute to Craigs crowdfunder and his election campaign.
Edinburgh is a bit of a village – I rather think the Streisand affect might kick in and get Craig elected. Hope so.
Best wishes Craig.
Captain Yossarian says:
22 March, 2021 at 10:08 am
@Mac – “Is anyone wondered why this had to have the whistle blown in England, by a Tory at Westminster this shows you why. Clear as day.” Quite possibly it is because the biggest law firms in Scotland would hang whistle-blowers from a tree. If that’s what they get paid to do, they’ll do it.
Reply
Re England part of your question:
Is it not because Holyrood doesn’t have PP?
Re Tory part of your question:
Perhaps because Nicola Sturgeon can’t fire/set up Tories
If Craig Murray immediately appeals this corrupt judgement by Dorian, then there’s no reason for him not to stand as a Hollyrood candidate. I will fight with all I have to stop him going to jail.
Has anyone any links to Murray case.
I have looked and can’t see a thing.
@Mike Robson says: 22 March, 2021 at 6:59 am
“Dear Sir
I am very disappointed at the abscence of ‘direct action’ coming from the Now Scotland group.
For example, what about taking the Independence fight directly to the enemy with a mass drop of exploding coat hangers and three-legged self-combusting trousers over England?”
Dear Neddie Seagoon er I mean Mike Robson,
Many a true word said in jest. Exploding trousers were an issue for New Zealand farmers in the 1930s due to a national campaign to control ragwort (which causes damage to livestock’s livers) after spraying the government issued Sodium Chlorate on their property to destroy the weeds.
Unfortunately due to most people wearing clothes made of cotton or wool in those days, there was an outbreak of trousers smouldering, bursting into flames and in a few cases exploding due to farmers walking too vigorously causing the two halves of the cloth to chaff against one another with the inevitable result. But the usual cause of the exploding variant was attempting to dry them by the fire after a day’s work.
You can sometimes find online Dr James Watson’s “The Significance of Mr. Richard Buckley’s Exploding Trousers: Reflections on an Aspect of Technological Change in New Zealand Dairy Farming between the World Wars” which tells the whole bizarre episode.
(Okay, my day now cannot become any more bizarre after this, and that is a good thing).
Craig Murray is one of the most decent and well-meaning human beings you could ever meet.
Enjoy your victory, Nicola. I hope you are happy.
Wild horses couldn’t drag me to the polling booth on 6th May.
If the Scot Gov think all this corruption and fit ups is gonna appeal to voters then they’re in for a big shock.
They will have to mobilise vasts amounts if their wokeratti brigade to get numbers the need to unleash more woke hell on our nation .They don’t have vasts amounts of wokeratti because only a tiny majority of people think men with penises can be women.
If 50% of voters turn up to vote for this mince I’ll be surprised.It was only 55% last time in 2016.
Tik tok
Tiny minority I mean
Sick in the pit of my stomach re Craig murray. God alone knows how he must be feeling. This is what they do. They eliminate anyone whom they perceive to be a threat to them. This is how feared he is by the establishment. Whereas folk like Garavelli and Wark are just froth to them and of no consequence. Will be more than happy to contribute to a fund. A first rate man if ever there is. I wonder if he kinda sensed this judgement in his last video.
link to archive.is
Clive Thomson got 6 months
“You not only provide the names of five of the complainers, you linked them with the initials by which they were referred in mainstream media.”
How could they give more than a year for ‘jigsaw identification’
If CM had been tried before a jury (just like AS) I reckon he’d have walked.
Trial by 3 judges not so much.
Posted Times link before but men of Scotland beware.
link to thetimes.co.uk
It is not like we all don’t now know more than enough about what happened to be cast-iron sure that Salmond was maliciously stitched-up and prosecuted.
The only pieces of that stitch-up jigsaw that remain missing are the pieces the SNPG have been fighting tooth and nail to keep secret… and that is because they are DAMNING.
So without even knowing the specifics of those suppressed pieces of hidden evidence we know it only takes the existing malicious acts we do know about and makes them far worse and far more damning.
We know it, they know it, and we all know each other know it at this point. (The mass of the general public are just playing catch-up here now…)
And yet they STILL persecute and now jail the one whistle-blower who merely hinted at the jaw-dropping plot to screw over Alex Salmond in a truly diabolical scheme to pervert the course of justice and send an innocent person to jail. That is who they go after in all of this!
Craig Murray is hero, a genuine bona fide hero.
Do the Scottish Government have even the slightest iota of self awareness left.
Do they not realize just how grotesque this now appears in light of what has been revealed this last year and beyond.
Like Sturgeon’s disgusting performance at the Fabiani Farce this might play well to her gallery of woke sycophants but to all others WHO KNOW it only confirms just how rotten she and her government are.
It would be incredibly convenient for the Westminster government, the Scottish judicial establishment and the SNP hierarchy to silence Craig Murray by locking him up.
An absolute fucking disgrace of a mess we are in, yet we have completely brainless nicophants telling us everything is fine and dandy.
Of course none of the blame belongs to Nicola Sturgeon personally as nobody who works for her has told her what’s going on and if they did she would have forgotten already.
Political prisoners in Scotland shows us that the SNP, who are in charge of this clusterfuck, is not only broken but irreparable.
Nally Anders,
Yes, decision making by ordinary people on juries are more than a trifle inconvenient for the Scottish Judiciary.
I have written a article about the actions of the Crown Office regarding Alex Salmond:
5 lessons Scotland took from Putin
Very important given the news about Craig Murray today.
Big Jock @ 10:07
“Scotland is turning into Catalonia. Except unlike there. We are doing it to our own people. We can’t blame the Brits for this.”
Can’t we? According to Fanon, the colonized develop “a depersonalized self”, and a “colonial self”, where the objective is “to be an imitation of the coloniser”, and more especially among the bourgeoisie who seek to protect their status under colonialism. How do they do this?
Take a close look at the privileged Scottish bourgeiosie, the 3% who go to private schools and elite uni’s, the group our meritocratic elite and leaders of our institutions are primarily drawn from, and who are predominantly Anglophone and unionist, as well as privileged. There you see Brits.
Wow, this is an amazing gesture by an ex Snp MP towards the Craig Murray injustice.
link to twitter.com
How did Clive Thomson find out the names of all the complainers?
How many people on Twitter read his tweet?
How many of those people spread the info to others by word of mouth?
How many people/journalists attended the trial & perhaps passed on the info re names of complainants to friends & family?
How many of those friends & family passed on the info to other friends & family and so on and on.
Is this idea that the complainants are anonymous totally false?
Does everyone in Scotland know their names or has ‘lockdown’ stopped the spread of the information to only half of Scotland?
Drookit
There’s no tweet there?
drookit says:
22 March, 2021 at 11:08 am
Wow, this is an amazing gesture by an ex Snp MP towards the Craig Murray injustice.
link to twitter.com
Reply
Tweet unavailable.
Alf Baird says:
22 March, 2021 at 11:04 am
No Alf, let’s not go down the psychobabble road of “depersonalized/colonial selves”, or the “it’s they posh bastards that go to private schools so it is” bollocks, let’s quit the “it’s still all the English fault” bollocks the Irish have still been reflex using for the last hundred years of self-inflicted fuck-ups.
This is Scots, doing it to other Scots, for their own aggrandisement. There’s no other hidden agenda other than being the same sort of sleekit wee bastards to be found in every Scottish workplace who will grass up their workmates a hundred times before lunch, in the hope they’ll be promoted to supervisor or deputy line manager.
It’s a story as old as Scotland, and we’ve no one to blame for it but our own homegrown “me first” mentality.
ayrshire bob
He deleted it to change it to £100 a month, rather than £100 a week. Understandable. Still very generous though link to twitter.com
First they came for Alex
and I did nothing – for Alex was a powerful man
Then they came for Hirst
and I did nothing, for, who was he to me
Then they came for Cherry
aghh, but she’s a QC – well able
Then they came for Murray
Och, but he wiz an ambassador – probably loaded
Then they came for the candidate places
And I put up a token resistance – but you know, what can you do
Then they came for the money
and answers got I none, be rude to push for more
Then they came for the women and children
And I knew that to speak up – was to be threatened with rape, bullied and lose my job
Then they came for my freedom of speech
and I said nothing – for anything said would jail me
But they never, ever came for Independence,
and I’m left – sookin on carrots.
Is this it drookit?
link to twitter.com
Right about now Dani Garavelli will be in a cold sweat, no?
Hmmm!
Craig Murray called to court on Thursday.
Conveniently the day after parliament is finished sitting?
How to shut down any dissent.
Also how convenient that no one can then raise the issue with guaranteed media coverage.
Craig Murray has likely been awaiting a comeuppance from the British State for many years. So it’s convenient for them that they can administer retribution under the guise of another regime. I also suspect that the delay was to keep Craig’s gas at a peep whilst Nicoliar was still due to appear before the inquiry.
Now the showpiece has been enacted without bringing the house down the (Scottish) state is doubling down before any more video diaries appear, and as part of an attempt to create some clear water prior to May.
o/t
Just had a look at Craig Murray’s blog and it looks like we are about to have our very own Julian Assange , our very own Political Prisoner, a well respected man who has annoyed this SNP Government , exactly the same way as Alex Salmond has and all the other people that have been targeted by organisations under control of this SNP Government , independence supporters targeted by a independence supporting government , aye that makes fkn sense doesn’t it , work that one out .
Well a rock and a hard place is on offer in this next election, don’t support this SNP government and wave bye bye to indyref2 , Support this SNP Government and watch them fk up everything they can before they are stopped and believe we might just have indyref2 when it’s safe to do so .
What to do, vote for them meaning you approve of what they are doing , don’t vote for them and the Media spins No Support for Independence , you can’t win , we are fkd either way, one thing is for sure I won’t see a Independence vote in my lifetime maybe not even my children’s either,
Fk you Sturgeon and the SNP we have all been conned into believing your shite
THE SCOTTISH LEGAL PROFESSION: – We had the grotesque spectacle of the Lord Advocate warning all at Holyrood that they risked the attention of his law officers should they help jigsaw identification of the complainers. I got the impression that everyone at Holyrood already knew that they couldn’t identify the complainers. The Lord Advocate repeated the warning several times anyway, just to make sure.
The complainers are being treated as whistle-blowers, whereas according to the criminal trial, there only was one genuine complainer and her case had been admitted by Salmond and dealt with several years previously. The verdict in that case was ‘not proven’. The jury found the rest of the cases to be bogus.
If there are any real whistle-blowers out there then be in no doubt that the full force of Scottish law will come down on your head if what you have to say displeases those on the front benches of Holyrood. The public interest doesn’t come into it but, wait a minute, it should come into it shouldn’t it?
Whistle-blowers have something to say which is in the public interest. In the rest of the world, the legal professions accept that principle and protect them . Not so in Scotland it seems, where we only protect phoney political whistle-blowers.
The legal profession in Scotland is in a mess. It’s in an uneccessary mess of its own making. Law should be distinct from politics and that’s the only way it works. Under the Scotland Office, that’s the way it did work. Under Holyrood it is not working and that is the fault of Holyrood of course, but it is also the fault of our lawyers who appear to me to be just taking the money and doing what they are told to do and not do.
An embarrassing disaster.
Just a thought. What’s to stop people sticking the jigsaw women’s names on posters and sticking them all over every town and village in Scotland. The whole thing is beyond farce!
On a positive note it would seem that Scotland’s progressives are over the moon with the news about Craig Murray. They really do seem to have a problem with anyone that doesn’t agree with the herd or should that be flock.
Never mind once the holy one regains her place as our glorious leader and we all have to identify as female to avoid the jail it’ll all seem worth it. Now remember both votes SNP Bah, Bah.
I see Phil Boswell SNP is supportive of Craig Murray. link to twitter.com
I was an Indy supporter long before I heard the name Nicla Sturgeon, and d’you know what, I’ll be an Indy supporter long after her name is dried out mud, blawin in the wind.
Mark Boyle @ 11:14
“let’s not go down the psychobabble road of “depersonalized/colonial selves”
Yes, “let’s not”; and I dare say we might also deny all the scientific evidence over the last century and more surrounding what Memmi called “the disease of colonialism”.
The proven remedy (to treat the ‘condition’) is of course independence, in case you ever wondered what the purpose of independence is.
Surely there are forms of punishment, falling short of incarceration, that might be applied to a 62 y.o. man. Craig has atrial fibrillation and the danger of having a stroke is much higher in someone with this condition. Combine this fact with the long hours of inactivity involved in incarceration and we have an added risk factor for a stroke.
At the very least, the equivalent of house arrest should surely be considered under a basic article 2 right to life challenge to any custodial sentence in Craig’s instance.
Poor Craig. Poor Scotland.
Let me see if I understand the current position on jigsaw identification under Scots Law. I can identify someone (to myself) from the information in Dani Garavelli’s article, which is still available online, but if I quote as much as a paragraph from that article I can be charged with contempt of court. Got it.
@Alf Baird says: 22 March, 2021 at 11:41 am
Yes, “let’s not”; and I dare say we might also deny all the scientific evidence over the last century and more surrounding what Memmi called “the disease of colonialism”.
Memmi was a novelist, not a scientist. His degree was in philosophy, not science.
I’m appalled and saddened regarding the Noble Lady Dorian’s verdict on Craig Murray.
Saddened for Craig— a man of principle who never wished harm to anyone.
Appalled at the Noble Lady’s verdict.
I shan’t say any more…
Daisy Walker@ 11.36
Dead right.
I like your style.
Simply shocked by this news about Craig Murray’s conviction. ( I hadn’t become quite as cynical as I thought after all, with all the many shocks to the system induced by the unscrupulous behaviour of the SNP and the Crown Office.)
The conviction and trial of Craig Murray does show that the Scottish legal establishment is, after all, an integral part of the UK establishment and in fact, the Lord Advocate is not acting as a rogue lone wolf after all. ( Pun intended.) If we were in any doubt, his seeming overreach in issuing warnings of prosecution to news outlets in England were not actually overreach at all. His actions seem now to indicate a law officer who is extremely confident of the basis of his power.
With this conviction, the Scottish legal establishment has locked the gates, with us inside and no democracy. Who would have thought, in those heady days of 2014, that it would come to this?
Garavelli will not be quaking in the slightest. Like Rape Crisis Scotland, she is an arm of the conspiracy. See her wetting herself excitedly on Panorama last week.