By an amazing accident of timing, the Westminster Select Committee on British Affairs has today published a report saying Scotland will have no currency at independence and may have to barter. The Committee consists of Conservative, New Labour and Lib Dem MPs.

The Scottish Sun has run the currency scare on the front page for the last three days. Labour, Lib Dem and Tory leaders all asked nothing else at First Minister’s questions yesterday. The media and Holyrood frenzy could have been sparked as reaction to the TV debate. But what the publication of the Westminster report today shows is that this massive currency scare has all been pre-planned by Tory, Lab and Lib-Dems with heir media allies for some time. This is their big push keep Scotland’s resources.

What is increasingly plain – and I warned before the debate – is that the conduct of the entire “debate” was a part of this co-ordinated plan, pre-determined to allow the media to declare the currency issue is the only one that will decide the referendum. Salmond was grilled on nothing but currency for twelve minutes, and then the chairman picked out members of the public from the IPSOS/Mori selected audience pre-primed with questions about … currency.

Audience members had had to fill out forms for selection indication if they were Yes or No voters. They were then asked again at the door, and many Yes voters who had been invited were excluded. No voters were seated in a selected central area where the questions were taken from. Better Together staff were present briefing their questioners.

This really is a major test of the power of the mainstream media. There is no currency question. A very large majority of the countries in the world became independent in the last seventy years. Countries with far weaker economies than Scotland
support their own currencies. I have personally in travelling had at least 40 different currencies in my pocket. All over the world, what matters is not the unit of denomination, but how the money is distributed and used.

Scotland like Denmark could have its own currency. It could keep the pound either in a formal currency union or not. It could join the euro. As an independent country it will have the choice – and if the English want to burn the choice of formal currency union, that will not sink Scotland by any means.

Currency is not the be all and end all of independence. But what we have is a concerted effort by the Westminster politicians and the entire media to convince people that it is. Will this work? Or will they stand against the raw aggression and hatred now pouring out from the British nationalist camp?

I am starting to look forward with eager anticipation to the Ryder Cup. The European team is looking very strong, and Paul McGinley’s selection choice is absolutely fascinating. At present, it appears that he might have to choose three from five out of Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter, Luke Donald, Stephen Gallacher and Miguel Angel Jimenez.

The nine automatically selected on current standings would be
Rory McIlroy
Victor Dubuisson
Sergio Garcia
Henrik Stenson

(The top 4 in the European money list)

Justin Rose
Martin Kaymer
Thomas Bjorn
Graeme McDowell
Jamie Donaldson

(The top 5 in world rankings not pre-selected through the first list)

On the European money list, the three next ranked players not in are

Ian Poulter
Joost Luiten
Miguel Angel Jimenez

On the World ranking list, the three next players not in are

Luke Donald
Stephen Gallacher
Ian Poulter

Of course the current USPGA in particular and other remaining tournaments might change things, but not that much. Jamie Donaldson might slip out of last automatic spot on the European list but barring peculiar events would be saved for the team by his position on the world list. The most vulnerable automatic qualifier position looks to be that of Graeme McDowell from the world ranking. He is benefiting from the world ranking’s crediting of historic performance. He needs a good performance or two to stay in. If he slips out, on current form he is not an automatic pick. My own view is that McIlroy can play with any partner.

Westwood leads the USPGA this morning on 6 under. Only winning things now will get him an automatic slot, but I think that he is showing sufficient form for him to get a captain’s pick. That may be unlucky for Miguel Angel Jimenez, as massive experience should not be criterion for all the picks. Poulter at the moment is just short on both lists, and I think McGinley would be nuts to leave him out with his Ryder Cup record.

The crowd is Europe’s “thirteenth man” and I think that will get Stephen Gallacher a pick if needed, ahead of Donald, Jimenez or Luiten. Donald just does not have enough recent form, barring a spectacular resurgence. Jimenez would let nobody down and would be tough to leave out – and the four times he has been on the team, the team has won! But if a realistically qualified home player is available, there should always be one in the team to be roared on by the crowd. Home advantage really does lift people in sport.

There will be changes in the points tables, and form will be important in the next few weeks. I shall update these early musings closer to the selection date.

The No campaign is convinced it has won the referendum over the question of what currency will be used in an independent Scotland. Being convinced they have won, they are starting to show their true feelings.

Everybody in Scotland should read the comments section on this report by the Labour supporting Guardian. That truly horrible, sneering tone is a foretaste of what is in store for Scotland if it votes No in the referendum.

States have currencies. Ireland, Norway, Iceland, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, all have currencies, some unique and some shared. Scotland might keep the pound. Otherwise the Scottish economy is perfectly strong enough and Scots perfectly capable of taking another of the many available options. It is entirely a media construct that this is the issue that can halt independence – a construct initiated by George Osborne in cahoots with Darling and their media lackeys.

What is undeniable is that these people actually would act with deliberate malice towards an independent Scotland. The hatred of the Scots is there for all to see. This is not the Telegraph or the Mail. It is the Guardian. Read the comments and judge of their tone and intent. Do you really want to get down on your knees before this hatred, and surrender?

David Aaronovitch is the very first name on the “Let’s stay together” list unveiled today. That’s Aaronovitch, Murdoch employee, unrepentant propagandist for the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and the bombing of Libya – and look how those turned out – and arch media Zionist. We know why he wants to keep the Union together. For exactly the same reason that Baroness Warsi resigned – because Westminster foreign policy is under unshakeable Zionist control

It is a diverse list. But there is one thing all of these people have in common.

They are all much wealthier people than the rest of us.

Almost all of them of them have their main home in South East England. No wonder they want to keep the UK scam going, and Scotland’s resources funnelling down there.

A large number of them get their high salaried living from the (ahem) “neutral” BBC.

There are 210 names on the list. How many can you find whose main residence is not in South East England, and where is it?

Currency Union

There are over 200 nations in the world. Many became independent in the last thirty years, a large majority became independent over the last seventy years. Most have their own currencies. Some share a currency.

If every other country in the world can manage its currency options, why Better Together are allowed to pretend this is an insuperable obstacle for Scotland is beyond me. Are we uniquely stupid or lazy or incompetent? In fact Scots founded the Bank of England and the Bank of France (John Law).

The media has deliberately built u a non-question into “the thing that will stop Independence”. Yesterday Darling was allowed to bang on about nothing else for 12 minutes and then the pre-selected audience questions were on the same subject. This is a media propaganda construct not a real problem.

The problem is not the currency money in which is denominated – it is the fairness of its distribution we should be addressing.

The Scottish government’s preference is to enter a currency union with rUK. The strong attraction for rUK in that is that it avoids economic dislocation. Also it gives a strong hydrocarbon element to the economies underpinning the currency. Without Scotland sterling outflows in times of high oil prices could become a real problem for rUK.

So Salmond’s view is the rUK will agree to currency union, and there is no point in having a hypothetical argument based on an artificial Better Together propaganda construct that they will not.

My own view is that Scotland would be much better off with its own currency anyway, or could join the Euro. Either is a good option. But these are all perfectly possible post-independence options – none of them is a reason not to be independent.

Tuition Fees

Once Scotland is independent, it will have to treat all its fellow EU citizens the same on fees, including English students who currently – at the insistence of the UK government – have to pay.

Scotland will probably have to introduce some level of tuition fee post independence. BUT

a) There is no EU rule against giving student grants based on residence. So the Scottish government can give Scottish resident only students grants to pay their tuition fees. There can still be no net cost to Scottish students. This is what other EU countries do.

b) There will be no call for fees to be as high as the terrible 9,000 pounds a year charged in England. Tuition fee levels may perhaps be a third or half of that – with Scottish students given grants to pay the full amount. If the cheaper fees lead to a great rush of bright English students to Scotland, that will in the medium term give a great boost to the Scottish economy. Many of them will stay for the exciting new economic opportunities a dynamic independent Scotland will bring.

Oil

Mineral resources are the inalienable property of the State on whose territory – including continental shelf – they lie. Agreements made between oil companies and the UK for exploitation rights on Scotland’s continental shelf will be honoured on the same terms by the Scottish government. The tax revenues will come to Scotland instead of to the UK. There is no dispute over this whatsoever in legal or academic circles. It is an utterly ludicrous piece of false information to claim otherwise, put out by Better Together. The only dispute will be over the precise settlement of the maritime boundaries with England. But the area of dispute is in the region of whether 88 or 92% of British hydrocarbon resources are Scottish.

Excluding oil, Scotland’s GDP per capita is 98% per capita. The extent of the “oil bonus” on top indeed varies with the price of oil, but the total is certainly never going to give GDP per capita below that of rUK. Proven oil reserves will last a minimum of 50 years. What happens after 2070 when oil starts to run out is a problem which will face the entire world, not only Scotland. In the meantime, it is better to have it than not to have it.

PENSIOOOOOOOOOOON!

I became deeply ashamed of being a British Ambassador when face to face with our complicity in torture and involvement in extraordinary rendition. I am ashamed of Britain’s acquiescence in the genocide of Gaza. I am ashamed of food banks and benefit cuts, of tuition fees and the massive and growing gap between rich and poor.

This morning I am deeply ashamed of some Scots.

I have no doubt whatsoever Scots will be economically better off in the short, medium and long term in an independent Scotland. But that is not the point. There is more to life than money. Those people holding pikes at the battle of Stirling Bridge were not rich men – their lives were harder than we can easily imagine. They fought for “freedom, which no man gives up except with life itself”.

HANG ON NOW ROBERT WILL THEY LET US KEEP THE POUND?

SHOULD WE NOT CHANGE THAT TO FREEDOM WHICH NO MAN WILL GIVE UP EXCEPT WITH LIFE ITSELF, UNLESS HE DOESN’T KNOW THE EXACT TERMS OF THE CURRENCY UNION?

Now’s the day, an now’s the hour:
See the front o battle lour,
See approach proud Edward’s power
-Chains and Slaverie.

‘Wha will be a traitor knave?
Wha will fill a coward’s grave?
Wha sae base as be a slave

ACTUALLY I DON’T MIND BEING A COWARD SLAVE IF THERE’S A COUPLE MORE QUID IN IT

BUT WHAT IF WE HAVE TO HAVE OUR OWN CURRENCY? AND DOESN’T BRITAIN HOLD TITLE TO ALL OUR MINERALS? I AM A MAGISTRATE WHAT ABOUT MY PENSION?

The debate format seemed modelled on the Jeremy Kyle show, and pitched to the same intellectual level.

Stripping out pollsters’ unionist weighting, Yes just went from ahead to further ahead.

Poll before debate 58 – 42. Who won poll after debate 56-44. Yet media claim Yes went backwards!

The 2010 debates were much better than this in terms at least of allowing for sustained passages of thought. Whether the thoughts were any good is a different question.

I was imagining myself as a participant in tonight’s debate and the impossibility of developing any coherent arguments within the fractured format. Which of course helps those simply stating a negative rather than building a positive.

Well, that really was pretty awful. At no stage did either Salmond or Darling get given the space or opportunity to string a decent series of thoughts together. The selected questioners from the audience were overwhelmingly unionist to a degree that was absolutely ludicrous. The presenter constantly displayed aggressive body language towards Alex Salmond.

STV’s political correspondent said that the questions showed that pensions and currency were the dominant issues – given that STV chose the questioners and questions, it only shows that STV want those to be the issues.

Alex Salmond did get across the need to get rid of nuclear weapons, despite the questioning being organised to keep away from that subject.

I don’t imagine any genuine floating voter learned a lot. But the entire format and context was designed to make sure they didn’t learn a lot

Alistair Darling’s closing statement came over as though he didn’t actually believe it at all

The very next question comes from a No voter. Haven’t seen a question in twenty minutes from a Yes voter.

Four straight pro-unionist (and extremely ill-informed) questions from members of the audience obviously pre-selected by the chairman. Salmond given no chance to reply and then a pat question put to Darling.

I am truly astonished by the debate format, designed to leave no time at for consideration – or considered answers – on any of the questions and to ramp up the speed and sheer hysteria of the programme. The cutting aside to the “spin room” and that really horrible shoutey New Labour numptie woman. Also a very strange absence of the Tories, who are financing the Better Together campaign, and the other unionist elements.

In a format which seems designed to make sure nobody ever gets more than ten uninterrupted thought to develop a reasoned line of argument, and of which the express purpose appears to be simply to make people believe that the independence referendum is just a high volume slanging match between unreasonable people, it is Alex Salmond who comes over as calm and more thoughtful (not to mention polite) and Darling who comes over as the impassioned and rather snide one – contrary to advance billing.

I shared a platform in Dewsbury with Baroness Warsi’s current husband in a meeting against persecution of British Muslims through “anti-terror” legislation. While that particular persecution was under the New Labour brand of Conservatives, and nothing has changed under the official Tories, it nonetheless always seemed slightly strange to me that the family has such strong and sensible views and yet the Baroness, who has described her husband as her “political rock”, is a Tory.

I offer this thought as some background to the principled and highly praiseworthy action of Sayeeda Warsi in resigning from the Cabinet over Britain’s acquiescence in the appalling massacre of Gaza. A politician who believes in anything other than their own career and bank balance is a rare thing indeed today. I offer her my congratulations and sincere good wishes for the future.

I am much looking forward to the Salmond/Darling debate this evening. The media have already been playing the expectations game for all they are worth, so that if Darling does not actually wet himself during the debate and then fall flat on his face and break his spectacles while attempting to remove his soiled trousers, they will all be able to claim that he performed better than expected.

Attempts to skew the agenda by Better Together are frenetic this morning. We have Cameron, Clegg and Miliband all signing a pledge to give Scotland (unspecified) new tax and legal powers after a No vote.

Oh look, here’s Nick Clegg signing another pledge about what happens after a vote.

Nick Clegg is always signing pledges. He must be a really honest man.

We also have a new think tank called Fiscal Affairs Scotland, pontificating on the state of Scotland’s public finances this year. Personally I am deeply suspicious of all these new think tanks and lobby groups which keep springing up. Fiscal Affairs Scotland appears on a google search not to exist at all, beyond the report released today. Nor can I find this report online. But there is a remarkably fair summation of it in the Scotsman, under the heading “Independence: Economists Criticise Both Sides”. This states that “Scotland’s finances could be facing anything from a deficit of £10.8bn up to being £1.9bn in credit – meaning Scots would be £1,033 better off or £1,324 poorer.”

It should be noted that this relates to 2016 only, and includes a substantial estimate for the one-off costs of setting up a new state. There are numerous reasons to believe Fiscal Affairs Scotland’s estimate deliberately pessimistic, but for the moment it is the media treatment of the report which interests me.

Better Together immediately rushed out a press release stating that the report said that Scots would be much worse off after independence, and lazy and complicit “journalists” simply copied and pasted the Better Together press release without bothering to look at the report. This from the Guardian’s unionist hack Severin Carrell:

Better Together seized on a new analysis of Scotland’s likely finances in its first year of independence, mooted as 2016 by Salmond, from a recently launched thinktank Fiscal Affairs Scotland. The paper found that Scotland’s deficit would be worse than the UK’s by up to £900 per head unless oil revenues doubled over current forecasts or Scotland took only half its expected share of UK debts.

Jackie Baillie, Scottish Labour’s shadow health secretary, said these findings added to the pressure on Salmond to defend his economic predictions for independence in tonight’s debate. “Expert after expert lines up to explain the threat of separation to our public finances, Alex Salmond will have to explain why he is right, and they are all wrong,” she said.

Carrell was too lazy, stupid and downright unethical to even bother to ask anyone from the Yes campaign for a comment.

There will be an even more intrusive media attempt to frame tonight’s debate in Salmond’s favour. An opinion poll by IPSOS/Mori will be released by STV at the start of the debate.

IPSOS/Mori has been consistently unionist friendly in its poll results. These differences between pollsters are not coincidental. They do not take random samples of the population and then tell us how that random 10,000 people break down. They radically adjust their sample by “weighting” to reflect the age, social groups and geographical distribution of the population. So, if you ought to have 20 retired people living south of Edinburgh in your sample but you only have 4, then you multiply the results of those 4 by 5 to weight your sample.

This is where it gets particularly murky. One of the key factors they weight for is political allegiance. So they weight your answers according to their own prior view of what they think the actual distribution of political views ought to be. I am not making this up.

They do this by prior vote weighting. So if 28% voted Labour at the last Holyrood election, their panel has to include 28% who voted Labour at the last Holyrood election or votes be weighted accordingly. But get this – they do not just take your word for how you voted at the last election, they then adjust this to account for “false memory” and “shy votes” – wanting to remember you sided with the winner, or being ashamed to say who you voted for.

The net effect is that the samples have deliberately boosted numbers of Labour voters in them. Pollsters generally adopt a “panel” approach. Having identified their voters and applied their weightings, they just keep asking the same voters again so they don’t have to recalculate the weightings. So they create a Labour-biased panel, and then stick with it.

In Scotland they have a history of being spectacularly wrong. At the 2011 Holyrood elections the pollsters on average overestimated the Labour vote by 6% in their final polls.

The excellent “Scot Goes Pop” website dissects the shenanigans of the opinion poll weightings in great detail, poll by poll.

Anyway, ALex Salmond will have to face “IPSOS/MORI says you are twelve points behind” and be on the back foot right at the start of the debate. There is worse. Commenters on Wings Over Scotland and Scot Goes Pop who are part of the IPSOS/MORI panel have reported that for this survey they were asked twenty questions on subjects like oil revenues and the NHS, which were heavily biased towards the No camp. “On a scale of 1 to 10, How worried are you that an independent Scotland would not be able to afford basic pension provision.”

On top of which, at STV’s invitation IPSOS/MORI has selected the audience for the TV debate to reflect IPSOS/MORI’s view of the composition of the Scottish public – ie heavily Labour and unionist. ITV have done everything conceivable to load the deck in Darling’s favour. Let’s see how the game unfolds.

Who should an independent Scotland invite to pay the first State Visit to the country after independence?

I intend to do a series of posts at intervals over the next few weeks on some of the diplomatic needs of an independent Scotland. Before tackling some of the weightier questions, I thought today I might look at the exhilarating question of who Scotland should invite to pay the first State Visit after independence.

A State Visit is made by the Head of State to another Head of State, as opposed to just the Head of Government (so monarch or President as opposed to Prime Minister). Head of Government visits are quite frequent, but State Visits are generally just a couple a year. The recipient state extends the invitation, though it is not unknown for a message to be sent to indicate that an invitation would be welcome. A reciprocal visit the other way usually follows within a year or two.

State Visits are affairs of great pomp and pageantry, but also the highest level of expression of political amity. Behind the parading and banquets is a huge amount of government to government diplomacy and of trade and business discussion.

The first State Visit to an independent country is a matter of huge symbolism. So who should Scotland invite to be the first Head of State to greet their Scottish counterpart as an equal, after over three hundred years?

Fortunately we can rule out WENI (Wales, England, Northern Ireland), as the issues involved in the Queen visiting herself are over-complex. I expect the Prime Minister of WENI will pay the first Head of Government visit, as the relationship will be extremely important to both countries. But State Visit, no.

The same consideration rules out other countries which have the Queen as Head of State. Otherwise New Zealand might have been a good choice. A similar size to Scotland, a thriving democracy and a population very heavily of Scottish descent.

I think we can rule out the United States too. The US will probably need to back up the Tory Prime Minister of WENI by pretending to be hacked off about the relocation of Trident missiles from Scotland (in fact the US really finds Trident more a distraction than a serious part of the arms equation. Trident is of no interest to anybody except the Westminster politicians it makes feel important). But Scotland’s strategic position in the North Atlantic will remain vital to the USA, and post independence may increase the heritage awareness of the massive number of US voters of Scottish descent. So an early State Visit for the USA, but not the first.

One way that Scotland can immediately mark a more moral foreign policy than WENI is by recognising Palestine, now that its statehood has been accepted at the UN. Palestine should be invited to open an Embassy in Edinburgh, as opposed to the “Mission” it is permitted to the Court of St James. An early state visit to Scotland by Palestine would be a great event, but not I think the very first such visit, which Scotland might need to promote its own interests as it embarks on the path of statehood.

Much the same goes for other countries with which Scotland has a close historical connection, of which Malawi has very close links. But the human rights situation there is deteriorating.

Norway is a country with strong historical links to Scotland. Its management of oil wealth is viewed as the best practice example. It shares a key maritime boundary. A good relationship with Norway will be essential to Scotland.

The overwhelming interest must be for Scotland to use the honour of the very first State visit to cement a relationship with one of its key EU partners.

Ireland is an obvious candidate, Scotland’s sister nation. But nobody wants to stir the sectarian divide and further alarm the benighted bigots of the West coast. So I don’t think Ireland will be high on the list.

Scotland’s EU neighbours in Scandinavia – Denmark, Sweden, Finland – are those with whom Scotland is likely long term to share interests and a voting bloc. These relationships will be essential.

Italy and Poland both have a great many human ties to Scotland. It has been estimated that 25% of all Scots have some Italian blood, like my good self. Poland is sending its second wave of welcome immigrants, seventy years after the first, and has strong historic links through the Baltic trade.

But in the end Scotland’s interest must be best served by inviting the first visit from one of the most powerful European states, either Germany or France. There is a wealth of historical and emotional resonance for France to be first in the queue. The French may not remember the Auld Alliance as readily as the Scots, but they are ready to play a helpful role on Scotland’s uninterrupted EU membership. I would opt for President Hollande as the first state visitor to Scotland.

There are many reasons why it is a bad idea to have a monarch, not least the entrenchment of an aristocratic elite and the sheer insult to democracy. But having a Head of State who is also Head of other States whose interests are different is a limiting factor. The Queen dislikes State Visits immensely. She only receives 2 a year for the UK, 4 at most, and getting her available to host them for Scotland will be difficult. Just a minor one of very many reasons we need a Republic.

A jarringly inappropriate nationalistic speech from Prince William hit entirely the wrong tone and drew desultory applause at the commemoration ceremony for the start of the First World War, in Belgium today.

William’s whole attitude was based on the ludicrous jingoistic myth that there was a “right” and a “wrong” side in the First World War. This attitude pervaded the entire sickening performance. More than once he said we were “grateful” to Belgium for its “staunch resistance”. He mentioned the execution of Edith Cavell and the burning of the library of Loeven, with no balance of the equal war crimes on the other side.

In the dreadful nationalistic war between rival Imperial powers, the Belgian Empire was probably the most evil of all. To commend its resistance is ridiculous. Joseph Conrad’s great “Heart of Darkness” and “Congo Diary”, and the formal revelation by British Consul Roger Casement of the dreadful enslavement and abuse of the Congo population to provide vast profits to the Belgian crown, provide lasting testimony to the malignity of the Belgian Empire.

William referred to Cavell’s execution: he did not mention the execution of the heroic Roger Casement by the British, another key incident of the First World War.

The First World War was a terrible, terrible event. The millions of soldiers may have been activated by motives they believed to be noble, but the cause of war was the rival desires for aggrandisement of the very rich who ran and profited from the Empires. The Second World War was a fight against the evil philosophy of fascism, but there was no such cause for the First World War, which was simply a clash between Empires, and whose vindictive conclusion laid the foundations for fascism.

Commemorations which play to the “good side” “bad side” myth are uncalled for and should be widely condemned. That we still have a monarch-led elite which cannot admit the First World War is wrong is ludicrous. William stands baldly revealed as a reactionary ass.

While Gaza writhes in agony, Middle East Peace Envoy Tony Blair’s private jet last week was in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. Two months earlier Blair had certainly visited Las Vegas and Los Angeles on the same journey. In Las Vegas Blair was paid a large but undisclosed sum to attend a conference of hedge fund managers. His meetings in Los Angeles were “private”.

I have been unable to discover whether Blair was on his jet last week, or it was Cherie shopping or Alistair Campbell following up on the “business opportunities” for Blair from the July meetings. But he was not evidently in the Middle East. Just before the jet left for the USA he was in Britain hosting a lavish and deeply tasteless birthday party for his wife, two months before her birthday.

Yesterday the Guardian announced Blair’s new role as adviser to the Government of Azerbaijan, to add to the money he gets from advising Sisi of Egypt, Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan, numerous Gulf despots and any other dictator who does not realise that the Blair brand has become even more toxic than their own.

Blair’s attendance at the July conference of hedge fund managers was appropriate, as they are the epitome of the heartless irresponsibility and short term financial outlook of the new capitalism which Blair so heartily embraced. His fellow guest speaker at that conference was Francis Ford Coppola. I went to bed last night mulling this article and the aptness of combination of Tony Blair and Apocalypse Now.

Then I woke up this morning to the news that after twenty years of peace fighting had broken out between Blair’s brand new client, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. The man really is cursed. Perhaps once you voluntarily brought so much war and terrible death, there is no way to stop. Apocalypse Blair. He should rename that private jet The Four Horsemen.

There is a concerted media ploy to change the narrative on the massacre of hundreds of women and children in Gaza, on the grounds that it is Hamas’ fault for breaking the ceasefire. The Israeli account of the ceasefire breakdown is parroted relentlessly.

I have put some effort into discovering why the ceasefire broke down, including contacting sources in Gaza itself. What is plain is that there were multiple incidents shortly after the ceasefire deadline, of violations by both sides. This is actually normal – such ceasefires usually take a few hours to take hold as fighting in hot progress and operations under way get stopped. At leasy eleven Palestinians were killed by shellfire in the first hour after the ceasefire.

The media has however focused solely on a single incident, that which featured missing Israeli Lieutenant Goldin. What appears to have happened here was that the Israelis were continuing with their destruction of tunnels, as the ceasefire provisions allowed. They came across a group of Palestinian fighters sheltered in the tunnels, and not surprisingly the Palestinian fighters did not interpret the ceasefire as meaning the Israelis could kill them but they were precluded from fighting. In the ensuing firefight some on both sides were killed and injured, while Lt. Goldin has disappeared.

Incidentally it is worth noting that my information is that Hamas’ statement that the incident was a deliberate ambush, and occurred before the ceasefire, is also untrue.

The Israelis immediately called in massive shellfire and missile attack. It is not improbable Goldin was killed or wounded in the firefight – or possibly just hiding – and he and his body destroyed by an Israeli shell or missile. It is a sad norm of warfare that sometimes there is no recognisable body.

Why we are supposed to be more concerned about Goldin than about the twenty Palestinian children who have been killed since he vanished, is beyond me. But you see, killing those children is now OK again, because Hamas broke the ceasefire. The media have a nice narrative mapped out for them – and boy, are they milking it.

Baroness Cox is a prominent supporter of organisations which actively and openly promote the ethnic cleansing of all Palestinians from Gaza. She was incredibly given an Honorary Degree by the University of Dundee in 2006. I call on the students and academic staff of Dundee University to campaign to have this award stripped from her.

It is a matter of shame to me that my University has honoured a woman whose primary political activity is as a promoter of genocide.

Baroness Cox’s support for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians is persistent and consistent. She is the deputy head of the Presidium of the Jerusalem Summit, an organisation which states that:

“The establishment of a Palestinian state must be removed from the political agenda”

The Jerusalem Summit calls for the deportation of all Palestinians from Gaza.

This is not an accidental association of Baroness Cox. She also is a key member of the Israeli Institute of Strategic Studies, which also calls prominently for the ethnic cleansing of all Palestinians from Gaza:

“The only durable solution requires dismantling Gaza, humanitarian relocation of the non-belligerent Arab population, and extension of Israeli sovereignty over the region.”

This is not an issue of freedom of speech. Genocide is in process in Gaza today. To support genocide is not a legitimate academic position within the realm of free debate. Dundee University must end its honouring of Baroness Cox, or be seen as endorsing the legitimacy of her views, which all decent people find obnoxious.

Where is the British Ambassador to Israel Matthew Gould, who has put so much effort into promoting himself as a self-proclaimed “Jewish Zionist”? What has he to say while the people in Gaza are being massacred even as they shelter in UN facilities?

Well two days ago he was attending the swearing in of new Israeli President Rivlin, together with a British delegation of weird right wing folk, including Baroness Pauline Neville Jones, favourite “security expert” of the BBC, Stuart Polak of Conservative Friends of Israel, and New Labour public school and Oxford right winger Paul Spellar.

But surely the British Ambassador to Israel has spoken out in public about the terrible carnage in Gaza?

He most certainly has. Gould has reflected the massive indignation of the British people by stating that:

“This was a conflict triggered by Hamas raining down on Israel hundreds and hundreds of rockets fired indiscriminately at Israeli towns and cities. Israel has a right and even an obligation to defend it citizens.”

Gould paid a pro-Israeli propaganda visit to Sderot, the Israeli chosen destination for media reports about Hamas rocket attacks, and the place where Israelis hold parties to watch people being blown apart in Gaza. Gould spoke of having to take his own family into the bomb shelter in Tel Aviv when sirens sounded from Hamas attacks.

Matthew Gould was a long term collaborator of Adam Werritty, having held meetings with him over a decade in Tehran, Washington, Israel and London, at most but not all of which Liam Fox was also present. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office refuse to list these meetings or say who was present and what was discussed, even though Gould met Werritty including when Gould was Private Secretary to both David Miliband and William Hague.

I have no hesitation whatsoever in stating that what is happening in Gaza is a part of a continuing process of deliberate genocide of the Palestinian people by the Israelis. When I have previously stated this, some commenters have taken issue with the word genocide. I see no other word that fits.

This chilling article by Martin Sherman, Head of the Israeli Institute of Strategic Studies, calling for Gaza to be ethnically cleansed of all Palestinians, should open the eyes of some of those who refuse to see that Israel is no longer a morally defensible entity. The 3,600 Facebook shares of this evil are evidence of how the madness of fascism has overtaken the citizens of Israel.

This banner on Herzl Boulevard expresses what has become the catchphrase for the extermination of Palestinians “There are no innocents in Gaza“. This justification of the extermination even of women and children should evoke parallels for Jewish people which are too obvious for me to emphasise. Yet this extraordinary slogan, justifying genocide, is supported and repeated by huge sectors of the Israeli populace.

I wonder how long it will be before we hear it from Matthew Gould?

I just saw the British Prime Minister do something, so appallingly tasteless I could not believe it was happening. BBC News just showed a dawn raid by immigration officers on a well-kept home. So far, so tasteless.

Astonishingly, once the evil foreigners had been herded up and taken off to detention camps, where they risk being beaten up or raped, Teresa May and David Cameron arrived, and posed in the victims’ kitchen for trophy pictures.

I thought that what Blair has done since leaving Downing Street had debased the office of Prime Minister to an astonishing degree. But, posing for a stunt in the neat and clean kitchen of some poor immigrant, David Cameron had plumbed levels of tastelessness that again make me realise that the UK has become a country whose values I no longer recognise. The disgusting complicity of the BBC in filming this stunt is equally astonishing.

Are there really so few people left who have the slightest idea of what constitutes decent human behaviour?

On 8 June this blog broke the news that not only did Obama make his statement of support for Unionism at the request of No.10, but that the BBC was in on the set-up and had been briefed by No.10 and the FCO to ask the question.

I have this from an impeccable, eye-witness source. But I nevertheless set out to double confirm the story by checking with No. 10. 52 days ago I sent them a written question, to ask:

“Whether the BBC journalist who asked President Obama the question about Scottish independence, had any prior briefing or discussion with any government minister, official or other employee.”

Answer came there none. After a series of reminders I finally today received a “reply” from the Scottish Office, nearly two months later. This bears no relation whatsoever to the question I asked, and does not even refer to the question I asked.

non-answer

(if you keep clicking on non-answer when it comes up, eventually you get to it).

Personally I have always been 100% certain that my source could be trusted and the BBC were indeed actively involved in setting up this unionist stunt. The extreme delay and evasion in replying to my question only goes to confirm this.

The revelation that undercover Met officers spied on the family of Jean Charles De Menezes after they murdered him, leaves me utterly appalled.

You have to consider this in the context of the lies that the Met assiduously spread about De Menezes – that he entered the tube without buying a ticket, that he vaulted the ticket gates, that he ran away from officers, that he was wearing a bulky jacket.

All of these were lies. In truth the poor man had entered the tube normally and legally, walked calmly and sat down with a free newspaper. He wore a short tight denim jacket. Then totally without any cause or justification from his actions whatsoever, his murderers shot him multiple times in the head. Just because his Brazilian complexion looked a bit Arab.

I can think of no category of lie worse than that told by a murderer against the reputation of their victim.

The police did everything they could to mislead the media, planting lies and encouraging stories they knew to be untrue. Personally I find it extremely suspicious that numerous CCTV cameras were found not to be working, and have little doubt that the police destroyed that evidence.

There can be no other motive for spying on De Menezes’ family than either the hope of gaining information to feed to the media to discredit the man they murdered, or to attempt to pervert the course of justice.

They did not have to worry – their were plenty of others to pervert the course of justice for them, including the DPP and above all, Sir Michael Wright, as disgusting a piece of scum as ever sat on an English bench, who directed the inquest jury that they could not return a verdict of unlawful killing. (I was delighted to find that, when I googled Sir Michael Wright, my article on him came high on the first page. Is that result tailored by Google for me, or is it general?)

The recent revelation that the Met spied on Menezes’ family sparked very little public interest. It should. It is a still more appalling outrage than the Murdoch press hacking Millie Dowler. At least the Murdoch gang had not actually murdered Millie Dowler themselves. The De Menezes family were being spied on by their son’s and brother’s murderers.

“You have had to live with the missile threat from Gaza for fourteen years now. But now you face a new threat, the tunnels Hamas have built running here from Gaza. How concerned are you about that?”

Incredibly, that really was a question asked by BBC journalist Stephanie Bell of an Israeli man, just broadcast on BBC1. So far over 600 Palestinian civilians have died compared to two Israeli civilians (one of whom was a Bedouin who as a matter of policy are denied air raid shelters). Yet the BBC continues to pump out the narrative that the “problem” is Hamas attacks on Israel.

There are many other more interesting questions Stephanie Bell might have asked. Here are some:

“Do you ever wonder about the lives of the Arab families who lived here before they were removed by force? Whether any of them are now living in Gaza and under those bombs and shells”

“Do you honestly believe that this land is yours because God said so?”

The BBC had also been reporting as credible Israel’s appalling denials that it massacred those families in the UN school, and completely unsubstantiated claim it was stray Hamas fire that did it. The UN have confirmed that Israel has regularly been hitting UN schools and medical facilities.

In my 55 years of life, I had never until yesterday seen a flag which was a saltire on one side and a union jack on the other. Yet last night thousands of them were distributed free at the Commonwealth Games opening ceremony. I have been told they are being given out at the swimming today, and possibly at other venues too.

Such flags do not normally exist. They had to be specially commissioned, and somebody had to pay for them. Who paid for them? Is it public money?

There is no doubt why these unique flags were commissioned, and why they are being given out free at considerable expense. It is to provide TV images of Scotland combined in the union, and to make sure that Scottish medals are greeted with media images of union jacks being waved with the saltire.

In the context of the referendum, only a hardened liar could claim that these unique flags were commissioned without a view to the campaign. This is enormous hypocrisy by the unionists, who have been bombarding the media for weeks with warnings to Yes supporters not to “politicise” the Commonwealth Games.

The BBC informs us that “political flags” are not allowed inside games venues. So saltires with a Yes will be confiscated. The BBC report states:

Well hold on, some flags will not be allowed to fly. Political flags.

Both sides of the independence debate have agreed not to use Glasgow 2014 for political gain anyway.

But even if you wanted to, well, it’s against the rules.

Glasgow 2014 Venue Regulation 6.18 states that no flags are allowed to enter a venue – or the vicinity of any Games venue – if they are normally associated with causes, affiliations or organisations.

Nobody can possibly argue that, at this time, a Union Jack combined with a Saltire is not an image strongly associated with a cause or association. So the rules are being quite deliberately broken, and somebody is funding that breach and doing it on a massive scale. It is vital that we know: who is paying for these flags?

Actually I am not sure why union jacks are allowed in at all. The rules are very clear. If you try to take in a Palestinian flag or a Dutch flag it will be confiscated. Again, to quote the BBC:

You are not allowed, however, to bring the flag of a country not competing in the Games

The United Kingdom is not competing in the Games. So there is a very respectable argument that union jacks should not be allowed in at all.

What is absolutely certain is that the two-faced union jack and saltire flags are very strongly associated with a political cause or affiliation. If they are allowed in, then Yes saltires should be allowed in too.