This blog is severely hampered by flu. I hate flu. In a globe-trotting life I have had a number of illnesses that became life threatening – peritonitis, typhoid, cholera, cerebral malaria, pulmonary embolism, pulmonary hypertension (thankfully misdiagnosed) severe arrhythmia. I was once declared dead and awoken by a cockroach eating my nostril as I lay naked on a corpse trolley in Kaduna. I refuse to die because of the thought of the people – Jack Straw, Islam Karimov, Alisher Usmanov, Tony Blair, John Reid etc – whose day I know would be momentarily brightened by news of my demise. But for sustained misery and feeling really, really awful and uncomfortable, a week with the flu, while not nearly as dangerous, is pretty well as unpleasant, at least to me.
As I lie in a sweaty bed, my thought are perhaps unsurprisingly not happy and light. I am paying keen attention to all the proposals for how to move forward the Independence movement after that check, and am struck by all the calls to reach out to No voters and bring them in.
I have no idea how to reach out to No voters because I find the majority of them stupid beyond my understanding. This is not because they desired an end result different to that I desired. That is a perfectly legitimate choice. It is because, by voting No, they are going to get an end result which is not what they wanted at all, and that was very obvious. Asking me to reach out to these unbelievably thick people is like asking me to go for a drive with someone who, against my advice, drove the wrong way down a motorway, causing a lot of people to get hurt as a result.
Through their No vote they are going to get five more years of Tory rule – which most of them absolutely did not want. And it is going to be Tory rule that lurches further and further to the right. It seems no proposition was too right wing to be applauded to the rafters by the Tory Conference.
Tax cuts for the rich. Benefit cuts for the poor. Openly declared government in the interests of multinational corporations. Censorship of the internet and severe restrictions on freedom of speech. The government intercepting all communications. Even more detention without trial. Permanent war in the Middle East. Leaving the European Convention on Human Rights and in consequence the Council of Europe – the first country to leave the body set up in 1946 to prevent the rise again in Europe of just the sort of proto-fascist measures the Tories wish to impose. To be followed by leaving the European Union.
All of these are direct consequences for Scotland of the No vote. This is much more profound than the entirely predictable and immediate dishonouring of the pledges on Devo-Max by Cameron, Clegg, Miliband and Brown. Brown’s call for a petition to request him to work for what he assured the electorate was already “a done deal” is beyond contempt. It should do for his reputation what the tuition fee betrayal did for Nick Clegg.
Frankly I have no interest in any devolution measures that do not give Scotland control of its oil and whisky revenues, and those are not on offer. But there were people who voted No – 23% of No voters them according to Ashcroft – because they wanted the promised pretend “powers”. Well, you are not going to get those either.
Mostly, of course, those stupid No voters acted under the crass assumption, against all modern precedent, that the opposition could win a general election from a position of just 2 per cent ahead, eight months out. And the even more incredible belief that the Labour Party was still in some significant way different from the Conservative Party.
The consequences of what is coming will fall disproportionately on the poor, with even greater escalation of the UK’s astonishing wealth gap. There will be still more damage to the social fabric that Scots hold dear.
Now there are hard-hearted right wingers in Scotland, in the Tory Party and the leadership of the Labour Party, who wanted everything that is coming in terms of neo-con policy prescription. Those No voters who are wealthy and successful and want to get ahead further on the backs of the poor, made the correct intellectual choice to achieve their ends. They are deeply unpleasant sociopaths, but they are not stupid.
But those No voters who voted No because they believed a fair and caring society was achievable within the present structures of the UK, are so stupid I am astonished that their cerebral cortex can transmit a signal that sparks respiration. They are probably not capable of ever noticing their error.
I am not going to reach out to you, No voter. You are either evil, or quite extraordinarily thick. You will forever be a long way beneath my notice. This will be the last thought I ever give you. To quote a great line from Casablanca:
Peter Lorre: You despise me, don’t you Rick?
Humphrey Bogart: If I gave you any thought, I probably would.
Cracking graphite blocks: problem applies to all the AGRs, I think they’re all still being kept running, in England too, despite the cracks which are widespread and huge.
There was spanking new oil-fired power station up the hill from Hunterston, at Inverkip, which hardly seen any use, then the valuable bits, the generating parts of it were sold off after sometime a few years after privatisation, it was said to China, at knockdown prices. It could have been converted to burn coal or gas. After that the place was left unsecured, but still with external electrical power, working lights and phones and stuff, and was open to ‘urban explorers’ and scrap metal merchants to reduce the place to a shell, beyond all repair.
I thought Torness was offline these past months with ‘technical problems’, now Hunterston too and trouble at Longannet coal station too, where connection costs to the grid are outrageously unjustifiably high, whereas power stations down south are subsidised in full for their connection costs to the grid. Another illegal coalition scam targeting Scotland, with the sniggering smirking Labour party swine in on the stunts. With Westminster parties and government like this who needs external enemies, this coalition and NewLab make ISIS look reasonable sorts. Buy Fork Handles.
These nuclear follies will be the death of us all, shut them down for good.
Society has to be based on principles like human rights which have precedence over any vote and can’t be voted out.
Nice in theory. But we can see how that works in the USA. The Fourth Amendment, for instance, provides that –
‘The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.’
The introduction of terrorism legislation (which prosecutes no acts not previously legislated against under other headings) has effectively made a nonsense of this amendment. The question being, what checks and balances can possibly prevent a malicious or stupid administration circumventing any Bill of Rights?
These nuclear follies will be the death of us all, shut them down for good.
Sure. The cracking in the graphite moderator blocks at Hunterston is in previously unseen positions ; they’ve already had their lives overextended, the AGR’s were a policy decision right down there with Concorde in the first place, and we still don’t have a clue what to do with the waste. No-brainer. However, if you shut them down, the lights will go out. This is a UK-wide problem; it results from the privatisation and fragmentation of what should have been a unitary national utility, subject to oversight in the light of government policy, and probably all you can do about it is buy a private generator. Which will speedily highlight your personal need for saving energy, btw.
Get well soon.
Ba’al Zevul – The American loyalty to the Constitution is a good example of what I’m talking about. Highly effective in the toppling of Nixon – it worked. You can’t have an unchecked executive or an unchecked electorate.
“Buy Fork Handles.” Great writer Ronnie Barker. Great actor too.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/674935149263500/?fref=ts
But Scotland and the UK in general are not going to be as badly affected as NATO’s puppet state of Ukraine, which is virtually bankrupt and “on the brink of committing economic suicide” with unbearable taxes on the energy companies (or so they say).
http://oilprice.com/Energy/Natural-Gas/Will-Ukraine-Commit-Economic-Suicide.html
Tell that to the CIA, Je. It’s a good example of what I’m talking about, too. The Constitution enabled a lying, bugging President to be removed by his political opponents, for whom his actions were a godsend, and who had the power to enforce it. It does not hinder Guantanamo, though, or proven, extensive, constitutionally illegal, surveillance of the public, or the long-established disregard of the various echelons of the US police for human rights. And probably murder is often justified in terms of the right to bear arms…
…probable murder…
“POLICE have been called in to investigate allegations Better Together agents breached election law by viewing postal votes to discover how well the No campaign was doing in the weeks before the referendum poll closed.”
Will they be investigating the Yes campaigners who did the same or is it one law for Nationalists and another for everyone else?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKihNnw8B_c#t=33
Craig, I should have said straight off, (apologies for not saying it sooner) that I do hope you feel better soon. Sincerely. Flu can be awful, and it challenges one’s sense of optimism.
For the avoidance of doubt, can I just make it clear I am a strong Yes voter, aye been! Like many Yessers I have been through hell and back these last few weeks that 55% turned out in their droves to vote No. I veer between pity, anger, despair, hope, and utter contempt in respect of these No voters. Like you, I am trying to understand why so many voted No. I agree with many others that ad hominem attacks and making them our enemies is not going to advance our cause, but the No mentality is certainly our enemy (if we can separate the mindset from the individuals in whom it has settled).
Certainly analysis showed that the English (400,000) voted No almost 3:1. Some say, 4:1. Over 65s (nearly 1 million) with less access to the internet and stronger memories of when being British meant something you could be proud of, voted 73% No. If Yes had been stronger in these groups by even 10%, especially the elderly, then Yes would have narrowly won.
But my post about Carol Craig and her Wake Up Scotland blog was meant to proffer some balance to your question that No voters are thick. Clearly Carol is not thick. But neither is she as clever or objective as she thinks she is. My own view is that No won because large parts of Scotland still view being British positively. They believe in the British state to secure their comfort not the Scottish state. Their primary identity is British not Scottish. I think there are some amongst this group who do feel more Scottish and British, and here there is hope, but they still trust the British state to protect Scotland, and yes, you could certainly argue these people are thick, though perhaps willfully blind might be closer to it. I would put Carol in this category. She tries to come up with ‘objective’ reasons why independence would be a disaster, but the simple fact is that there were a vast number of imponderables that neither she nor the Yes side could have answered.
Yes was a leap in the dark, and clearly it was premature for the 55%. Many in this group were saying ‘No, not the now’ rather than ‘No, not ever. No way!’ Only a minority, perhaps 20-25% were in that latter category. And the actions of Brown and The Vow muddied the choices people felt they were presented with. For this, I will never forgive them.
But to get back to Carol and her blog followers, what really annoys me is their pompous pretence of objectivity as if emotions and identity were present only on the Yes side and missing on the No side. Carol if she is honest with herself feels more British than Scottish. This goes for others like Kenneth Roy. They have been interested in Scotland as a peculiar region of the UK. In a word, their Scottishness is parochial
Ba’al Zevul – you’re agument is that one example you’ve chosen doesn’t work as well as you think it should. How does that undermine the general assertion that society has to be based on principles not a free for all on all values? If you found a hundred examples you weren’t happy with it still wouldn’t undermine that general point one jot. Saying something hasn’t been applied well enough is an argument for it – not against it.
BrianFujisan 6 Oct, 2014 – 3:50 am
“POLICE have been called in to investigate allegations Better Together agents breached election law by viewing postal votes to discover how well the No campaign was doing in the weeks before the referendum poll closed.
http://www.heraldscotland.com/politics/scottish-politics/elections-watchdog-calls-in-police-over-no-camp-postal-vote-claims.25423662“
I still haven’t had a reply to this query emailed to the Electoral Commission for Scotland on Sep 22. Note that when I Googled Ruth Davidson’s remark, I came up with another Tory saying almost exactly the same thing:
“I still haven’t had a reply to this query emailed to the Electoral Commission for Scotland on Sep 22. Note that when I Googled Ruth Davidson’s remark, I came up with another Tory saying almost exactly the same thing:”
As did Humza Yousaf which suggests to me that both sides were doing it.
Was it both sides you wanted to see prosecuted or just the No campaigners?
Saying something hasn’t been applied well enough is an argument for it – not against it.
It is neither. But if there are grounds for thinking that it inherently can’t be well enough applied, that’s a cue to look elsewhere for solutions.
I am saying that however worthy the intention, (“nice in theory”) I am looking at an advanced state where the theory is not matched in practice. I take an obvious example of this: the entire field of US constitutional law is well beyond my reach. And I ask how a Bill of Rights-or even part of it – can be immunised against corruption and compromise, given human nature. If you can answer that convincingly, I’ll shut up.
I AM A nZII
Mr Murray,
First of all get well soon. Your health is important to you, your family and a lot of other people who read your blog on a daily basis. Do not take everything so close to your heart. This is politics in which those with access to administrative resources (money, media, well established networks) will always have upper hand. As I was pointing out again and again majority of people in the UK (including Scotland) care most about their personal finances. Most of the people in the UK are apolitical. They care less for those who govern them as long as at the end of each month they have paid their mortgage, utility bills and had enough for groceries. As long as establishment provide this they are safe. And those like you who would want more and better for the people will always meet fierce forces. There are of course some number of people who (mostly have no mortgage or career prospective) feel to join forces against establishment but as long as these people are in minority the establishment is safe. UK has always (with exception of very short time in 1950th) was unequal society and it will remain as long as establishment give those serfs (with mortgage) enough to cover day to day expenses. This will guarantee that serfs are compliant with the establishment rules, which dictates that people at the top with get the cream and whatever is left goes down the societal ladder.
Good luck Mr Murray. And please remember that you must put your family in the first place as they are the ones who suffer the most when you are unwell.
“Was it both sides you wanted to see prosecuted or just the No campaigners?”
Where did I mention anything about prosecuting anybody? I saw the interview with Davidson on the BBC on referendum night. Her comment seemed strange, but I assumed she was on safe legal grounds otherwise she wouldn’t have said it. Then someone else on this blog mentioned it so I googled to see if I could find the rules. I couldn’t, so I emailed the relevant authorities, as you constantly (like a broken fucking record) tell us to do.
And in the addition to this:
Some of you might have heard that Gulnara Karimova has been placed under tight house arrest. Some sources suggest that she is detained at home without being allowed to even step outside of her house perimeter. Some sources point onto changes in direction of Uzbek politics (establishment cleaning up and prepares to post-Karimov era) and other suggest that Karimova is being intentionally made decedent, so that in few years left before the election she could distance herself from all these corrupt politicians and come back to the top as a reformer. Surprising is that despite being made unflavoured person on public she still enjoys support of some of the most powerful people in Uzbekistan including Vice prime minister Azimov who has direct access to billions of public money placed on hidden accounts abroad. Some suggest that union of two Rustams (Azimov with money and Innoyatov with SNB resources) will guarantee victory to anyone whom they decide to support.
Habbabkuk (La vita è bella) !
5 Oct, 2014 – 8:30 pm
“That might just be because Abon1 remembers your reaction…”
___________________________________
Stop answering for other people Habbabkuk it is the height of bad manners.
Fred ..Grow Up..You Want My Son in the Army to protect you…And FCUCK The ..Lets BOMB
Uzbek:
May I suggest that Karimov employs Tony Blair Associates to advise him on governance (references available from Messrs Karimov and Aliyev)? Mr Tony can be guaranteed to broker funds from humanitarian organisations like JP Morgan and BP, putting Mr. Karimov in a position to buy out his opposition, or secure its demise. Mr. Tony will further guarantee to make muffled noises on behalf of outraged human rights interests, while actually doing or saying nothing which will imperil Mr. Karimov’s freedom of action. Gulnara can meanwhile be employed by Mrs. Blair to sing songs on behalf of underenfranchised lady professionals as a prelude to Mrs Blair’s lucrative speeches. Possibly on a percentage basis; in any case, she will no longer be a threat.
Mizoram’s Zoramthanga (who? what? where? Google it) some weeks ago was under the clear impression that he would be meeting Mr Tony in person. This was not to be. A Tony Blair aide, no doubt drawing on Mr Tony’s spectacular success in mediating between Israel and Palestine, is advising Mr. Zoramthanga on a complex struggle on the Indo-Burmese border.
I imagine BP will be interested.
http://zeenews.india.com/news/north-east/mizoram-ex-cm-zoramthanga-meets-tony-blairs-peace-team_1480061.html
Sadly Craig I came to the conclusion that we have some of the stupidest people on the planet living here. I am quite certain Fred for instance if he were English in England being asked the self same question would not have hesitated one second,he would have said YES.
Fred has not obviously experienced what we, my Husband and I have had, being jeered at on a bus at the Vasa Museum by what should have been my countrymen and women, you know those who could afford to go on a cruise round the Baltic, not your typical football supporter simply for saying we came from Scotland, after most of the Bus had answered the guide with the fact that they came from England. Funnily enough forty years before my Husband and his father were similarly jeered at in a Pub in Torquay, how our friends in the South just love us. It is an experience we will try not to repeat, but it was hard to leave the dining table this year and leave a people with the idea that Scotland was a basket case who contributed nothing, and I do mean nothing to the Union. To have interrupted would have merely confirmed we were rude.This statement was made by an Englishman to an American who was obviously not interested but this Englishman heard our accents and obviously thought we may take him up on it, well Fred I never give battle at a time of my opponents choosing and I suggest we now do the same.
I am willing to say that some of those who voted NO, were persuaded by the media, by cheating politicians, goodness we have enough of them. Many though vote according to tribal voting, I always voted Labour, my Dad did and I do, it wasn’t an election but Labour turned it into it.
I also would bet on the fact that Fred (not much of a Scots Name that, Fred) moans constantly about thieving Politicians, but voted them in back in. Yes Craig we do not have an educated electorate, we have a stupid one and Socrates was right all those years ago, some people should not have the vote.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2779244/Cherie-Blair-son-Euan-landlords-block-650-000-Victorian-era-block-flats-rubbish-hasn-t-collected-weeks.html
Note the tenant who hasn’t yet twigged that her tenancy will be ending shortly. Note also: Euan Blair may well be standing for election in Bootle in May. For the Labour Party. You’ve got to laugh, haven’t you?
“Sadly Craig I came to the conclusion that we have some of the stupidest people on the planet living here. I am quite certain Fred for instance if he were English in England being asked the self same question would not have hesitated one second,he would have said YES.”
I oppose Nationalism and Nationalists as where I am and Nationalists like you are the reason why.
Anon1, you quoted an unnamed “academic” (5 Oct, 2014 – 11:07 am) as saying:
“The ECHR long ago surpassed its original purpose and has become, in the words of one academic, “A ravening monster that, without the slightest legitimacy, overrules scores of national laws and regulations”.
I have asked you twice for the identity of your “academic” and a link to the quote.
Twice you have ignored me.
That suggests that, either you made the quote up yourself or you don’t want to identify the individual because he’s a raving lunatic of the swivel-eyed loon version and perhaps a UKIP supporter.
Please have the courtesy to answer.
Note to Habbabkuk; keep your neb out.
“Messrs Karimov and Aliyev” – should read “Nazarbayev and Aliyev”, of course. Still, one benefactor of his country is very like another supreme leader.
Ba’al Zevul
Landowners establishment is nothing new. As Mr Murray pointed out there is at present very little if any difference between political parties. Greed is much more powerful than principals. Once again serfs will pray for the health and well being of their landlords not to mention money they will contribute to the landlords pockets.
What a wonderful society we are building.
Ba’al Zevul
Yes, Blair senior has amazing skill. He can smell money on another continents and offer his great political wisdom for exchange of some of them. Some say money do not smell. And here is justification for this wisdom.
Here is the electoral commission handbook. The do’s and the don’ts….
http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0013/142006/Polling-station-handbook-SLG.pdf
It is difficult to look at the process that I personally witnessed and then heard from other participants, together with what we’ve seen and heard on television and come away with any other impression other than it was a shambles that any banana republic would’ve been proud of.
There was wrong doing because the procedures were not followed.Ballot boxes were not transported properly,seals were not checked,regular counters were given the evening off,the 750,000 postal votes were sent to England,and then we have Ruth Davidsons faux pas.Suddenly we’ve gone from 10 years of oil to 120,and fracking rights have been granted to the guy who fed us the lies.
Good post Helena.Fred isn’t a Scot,he just lives in Scotland.He dislikes the place and the people and lives in fear on a croft where he reads Craigs blog from morning to night spouting his contempt for anything Independence oriented and glorifying the Nationalism of Westminster and the City.Despite his anti Scottishness he stays put and neglects his croft in all weathers glued to the internet.He curses those that disagree with him,which are the majority on this blog and not long after I post this he shall appear and call me a nazi and where to go.