Tonight’s meeting is upstairs at Watts of Cupar (Fife) 7pm. I have been astonished by the wave of popular enthusiasm and above all by the incredible meld of social media activism and old-fashioned street campaigning. The mainstream media have no idea what is going on as, on the rare occasions they try to cover a Yes happening, they are utterly thrown by the absence of men in suits to interview.
The other quite astonishing thing is the level of political radicalism at all the events I have attended. The world should pay attention to Robin McAlpine. In my view, Robin has the ability to become one of the most important contemporary political philosophers not just in Scotland, but in the World. His ideas of future political and social co-operation in more useful forms of economic transaction, and of politics without party structure, are profound. When the campaigning dies down I will discuss further.
Nobody wants simply to repeat Westminster corporate power structures in Scotland. There is a movement happening here which is truly revolutionary and feels like nothing I have experienced in my life before. I am deeply moved. If we achieve independence, it truly will be the victory of the people, not the politicians.
Postscript
An encounter at the Wellgate Centre Dundee today captured a key aspect of the campaign for me. An old lady refused to take one of our Yes leaflets. She said she was Labour, and that she had been told by the Labour Party that if Independence came, we would let all the foreigners in. I have no doubt she was telling the truth.
The Labour Party – running a Tory funded campaign against the people to try to hang on to their Westminster jobs, and resorting to the racist tactics of UKIP. An absolute moral disgrace.
How long this cretin must be endured?
It has nothing to say of any value and its shrill hatred poisons this blog.
I should think that it is a protest against the fact, as Craig himself has noted on other threads, that arguing for independence as the Scots are doing is a crime in Russia http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/aug/05/bbc-world-service-website-siberia-artem-loskutov
Humanitarian crisis? Time to carpet-bomb…
“The complex civil war, which has now morphed into a three-way free-for-all among rebels, the Syrian regime and a caliphate of Islamic extremists attacking virtually everyone, has driven at least 3 million people from Syria into neighboring countries. The movement is stressing already fragile nations such as Jordan and Lebanon, who have born the brunt of the exodus even as both deal with their own unstable internal political situations.
Turkey also has received hundreds of thousands of refugees and continues to struggle to control its own border; thousands of foreign Jihadi fighters have used Turkey to access the Syrian battlefield. They offset the tens of thousands of Syrian fleeing the fighting, leaving southern Turkey awash in desperate refugees and militants of all stripes.
In terms of world history, the IRC, considered one of the world’s most effective aid organizations, says the situation has reached a level of disaster not seen worldwide since the Rwandan genocide, more than 20 years ago that saw fewer people – about 1.5 million _ displaced but nearly a million killed. The casualties in the Syrian conflict have been estimated by the United Nations conservatively at over 200,000 dead since it began in early 2011.
Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/08/29/238157_syrias-violence-prompts-worse.html?sp=/99/100/&rh=1#storylink=cpy
“How long this cretin must be endured?”
Craig likes him.
Are you sure?
Never thought of Craig being into S&M stuff.
BTW Ben as an American you seem to be of an enlightened kind, the thoughts of human rights and freedom brand are only the brochure talk, and irrelevant in reality. Although they can be a gush darn good excuse to carpet bomb the world on its way to freedom and human rights!
” Although they can be a gush darn good excuse to carpet bomb the world on its way to freedom and human rights!”
That’s the sinecure, fedup and I’m not enlightened, just struggling like you to find the truthful banter.
Quel dommage!
LABOUR front-bencher Jim Murphy has suspended his Scotland-wide referendum tour, claiming Yes Scotland was orchestrating a campaign of intimidation by sending mobs of protesters to disrupt it.
The shadow foreign secretary is seeking police advice after a series of incidents, which culminated in him being pelted with eggs as he spoke in Kirkcaldy this week.
http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/top-stories/jim-murphy-suspends-referendum-tour-after-egging-1-3524774
I quite agree. Waste of good eggs. 😉
@phil
The consensus on the left is held together by the spotting of an opportunity to undermine the elite state. I think leftists must be guiltily aware somewhere in their subconscious of their serial failure to accomplish anything, while also noticing (though not of course acknowledging) that the despised bourgeois SNP has managed to make some social advances, or at least defend a few of our remaining decencies.
The general buzz in the country has brought McAlpine and others to wider attention, and non-party organisations like Commonweal and the Reid Foundation have done a great deal of work in delineating a different kind of politics – plausibly so, in my opinion. They have been massively active in canvassing, lecturing, registering voters – working to make independence happen. It will be difficult or impossible to exclude them from the negotiations which follow (Salmond’s invitation to Darling was mischievous).
After independence? On va le voir.. I’ve heard McAlpine say that he does not intend to start a new political party, but there are also reports that he does. For my money, the dog to watch is the Green Party. They have membership, charismatic leadership in Patrick Harvie, and some experience.
Labour? They will be left with 3000 members and no money. They’re gone, thank God.
Here’s an idea from a black-hearted Unionist:
The Westminster system is corrupt and worse than useless. (Yes, lots of people have noticed). If somebody has original and practical ideas for the governance and administration of the country, why not spread it from Land’s End to John O’Groats? We need change and we need reform. We need honesty and common sense. But I find this separatist “It’s our bat and it’s our ball and we’re going home” mentality disturbing and I suspect that it’s long-term effect will not be positive. Time will tell, I suppose; let’s hope I’m wrong.
@richard
There are no secret recipes. Google Commonweal and Reid Foundation and take away anything you think you can use. You have your own bat and ball, you just have to figure out how to use them. Be assured of our support if it can be helpful. You’ve already made a good start by reading Craig’s blog.
Vronsky, is it the brief five page PDF file that you have in mind?
The new chair of the BBC Trust. Place person of course. YCNMIU
Rona Fairhead is a member of the United Kingdom Government’s Cabinet Office, supporting the Prime Minister to ensure effective development, coordination, and implantation of policy and operations across all government departments.
From Forbes:
Profile
On February 6, 2014, the Board of Directors of PepsiCo, Inc. elected Rona Fairhead as an independent member of the Board, effective March 13, 2014.
Mrs. Fairhead, 52, served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Financial Times Group, a division of Pearson plc, from 2006 to 2013. Pearson is an international media education company and the Financial Times Group division provides financial news, data, commentary and analysis in print and online to the international business community. She previously served as Pearson’s Chief Financial Officer from 2002 to 2006.
Prior to joining Pearson, Mrs. Fairhead held a variety of leadership positions at Bombardier Inc., in the Aerospace division, and at Imperial Chemical Industries plc, a specialty chemicals company, where she ultimately served as Executive Vice President of Strategy and Group Financial Control.
Mrs. Fairhead was named a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2012 and was appointed a British Business Ambassador in 2014. In addition, she is a member of the United Kingdom Government’s Cabinet Office, supporting the Prime Minister to ensure effective development, coordination, and implantation of policy and operations across all government departments.
She currently serves on the board of directors of HSBC Holdings plc and chairs the board of HSBC North America Holdings. She is also on the board of the Economist Group.
http://www.forbes.com/profile/rona-fairhead/
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/aug/29/islamic-state-saudi-arabia-rethink-extremism
” Saudi salafism is not the wellspring of hardline Islamic groups worldwide, but it is part of something that might be – a tendency for Arab and Muslim governments to pay lip service to Islam to bolster their religious credentials through politically expedient means. These leaders simultaneously instrumentalise religion while oppressing any form of religious opposition. The combination of serious cash and the religious weight that comes from being the birthplace of Islam renders Saudi Arabia the most dangerous member of this club.
The long-term solution to the constant reincarnation of radical Islamic political movements doesn’t lie in grand public gestures like anti-terrorism funding, strong statements of condemnation, or “rehabilitation clinics” for radicals, but in dismantling state-sponsored religious indoctrination. As the Isis threats march on, the old calculations no longer work in Arab governments’ favour.
By Nesrine Malik.”
As in the West, freedom of opinion is tightly controlled in Saudi Arabia, except for a limited period for pilgrims visiting the Holy Sites. It’s very stupid to block your ears to the opinions of intelligent and well-meaning members of your own society.
Nuff said.
That idiot grand mufti with his inane grin, happy he is in the presence of the high sock puppets, mind the arms sticking up the puppets butts have been photoshoped properly.
Al Saud pederasts throwing around chump change to confuse the chase hounds.
Now everyone but their granny know about the iSIS funders, although Qataries have a lot to answer to.
Fedup
Azhar University clerics, Ahle Hadith clerics etc are all rushing to condemn Islamic State, while rushing their followers to their assistance. No doubt Cameron is offering big payouts for spraying pig-muck on Islam. The stench of hypocrisy is eye-watering.
Fedup
” find out forthwith whether the genial Robin McAlpine, of whom mention above, is in any way related to the late Lord McAlpine of non-paedophile fame? If so, please supply a genealogical tree.
How long this cretin must be endured?”
___________________
What was cretinous about my question?
The two people have the same surname and so might be related, albeit distantly.
Mary is this blog’s resident expert at finding family connections and, indeed, connections of other natures.
And Lord McAlpine was found not to have been a paedophile, the accusations against him having proved to be false.
So what’s the problem, Fedup? Is it that I didn’t use words like “scum” or “devils”?
Is anyone else perplexed by the “main news” story on the mass media over the past couple of days. Why should parents taking their sick child from a hospital and going to sunny Spain – probably for a break – be more important than the NATO summit, the activities of ISIS, and the events in Ukraine?
Would it not be strange that a cretin could discern or understand its cretinous ways?
The fundamental pillars of cretins creed lie in their blissful ignorance of their cretinous existence and ways.
Scum is to denote filth, effluent, faeces as in zionist scum! Devil is to denote an unholy rats’ knacker; an unholy trinity of a gobshite, a caviller, and a swindler.
Habbabkuk (La Vita È Bella) !;
Not that it comes within our more esoteric areas of interest and curiosity, Habbabkuk, but you wouldn’t also be responsible, or even perhaps, loosely and tenuously associated, with this Blog’s seeming preoccupation with the ‘McAlpine’s Fusiliers’ saga, that the lithe, lissome and less than circumspect, (on occasion) decorous Wife(let) of the incumbent Speaker of The House of Commons, would you.. ????? http://hat4uk.wordpress.com/2012/11/17/lord-mcalpine-shock-new-question-from-australia/
Habbabkuk (La Vita È Bella) !;
Not that it comes within our more esoteric areas of interest and curiosity, Habbabkuk, but you wouldn’t also be responsible, or even perhaps, loosely and tenuously associated, with this Blog’s seeming preoccupation with the ‘McAlpine’s Fusiliers’ saga, that the lithe, lissome and less than circumspect, (on occasion) decorous Wife(let) of the incumbent Speaker of The House of Commons, also fell foul of, would you.. ????? http://hat4uk.wordpress.com/2012/11/17/lord-mcalpine-shock-new-question-from-australia/
Yes Peacewisher I was just thinking the same thing. Have his parents committed a crime exercising their parental responsibility by removing him from the care of the NHS? They believe the NHS is not providing the care they wish for him and choose as is their right to go to other hospitals in the European Union where they may get better treatment and are prepared to pay from their own funds to achieve that aim.
Now it seems, at tax payers expense, a party of Hampshire’s plod will be flying to Spain to ask the already arrested parents questions and arrange to have the family extradited to the UK against their will. Will this be a case for the human rights lawyers to get their teeth into and sue the NHS big time? Talk about nanny state.
Kicking all the international treaties into touch, St Theresa of May is now planning to take away the nationality of the so called “jihadi terrorists”, and take away their passports.
Recollecting that the anti terror laws have now come to lend the establishment 786 national intelligence agencies, and councils are using the same laws to set up camera cars to issue parking fines, and to catch dog poop dumpers, we can expect the purchase of train tickets and metro tickets to be mandated to sale on production of passport for even a tighter control of the population.
Just wanted to say what a pleasure it was to hear you talk and to meet you on Friday night.
The whole evening was an uplifting experience.
I’m inclined to agree with you about Robin McAlpine. He is so full of energy and excitement about the possibilities that independence can bring Scotland.
Thanks for being a sport and being photographed with Munguin. You will shortly be joining his hall of fame!!
We appreciate you joining in.
As some of the panel on Friday (Jim and Robin, I think) said, we need you to be a part of the negotiating team. So take care of your health. We need you fit and well.
Its very puzzling, despite the high level of awareness we are seeing on the web, they are carrying out al-Ghouta,MH370,Maidan sniping,Gaza,MH17 with complete impunity. Even this delayed MH17 report is part of that impunity,
Surely the Beast will not allow the loss of Scotland to the “realm”.
“The other quite astonishing thing is the level of political radicalism at all the events I have attended.”
The trouble with radicals is they become loose cannons once their destabilizing antics have fulfilled their initial purpose. Will the Tartan Reich subsequently oust them, to effect ‘normalization’ for the new regime?
Labour, Tories and UKIP don’t represent the British majority. All three parties are controlled by the lobby groups working for the foreign interests. After listening to pro-Israel rants from Cameron and Miliband – Brit comedian Alexei David Sayle, compared Israeli bloodshed in Gaza to that of prolific sex offender Sir Jimmy Savile.
http://rehmat1.com/2014/07/29/jew-comedian-israel-is-jimmy-savile-of-nation-states/
“…resorting to the racist tactics of UKIP.”
So you promise never to mention the English, or the Scottish, in your ‘non-racist’ campaigns for an independent nation of the Scottish people?
Speaking of which, will the Picts get their own reservation, or be injected with ginger dna?
Mr. Murray – I just came across this post which you should read.
http://www.intmensorg.com/scottishindependence.htm
Habbabuk,
Your attempted conflation of Macalpines is one of your ugliest tawdriest sockpuppet efforts to date-and God knows there’s been many.
You deeply twisted ignorant fuck.
The helpless panic of old-time British mandarins is fascinating to behold. They imagined that they could maintain their hold on the people of Scotland with a thousand little worries: What about the currency? What about the alliances? What about this, What about that?
But it’s not working, Is it? Something is happening that the hireling Britons cannot grasp.
The one really ineluctable aspect of Scottish independence is functionally equivalent to the relief of a good puke. Disgust is the fundamental impetus. The first reaction is renunciation of a British state that has pissed away its legitimacy and sovereignty with corruption, predation, repression, and war. Your grand British traditions and hallowed institutions, you’ve tainted them and poisoned them and now I’m blowing them back out my gullet in sour chunks. It’s such a relief to leave your motley fucked-up nation steaming on the pavement.