Keeping the Faith

This morning on BBC Radio 4’s “Today” Andy Burnham was being interviewed on NHS issues. At the end of the piece Sarah Montague asked him if Labour were not due an apology to Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP for the manner in which the party had used the “leaked memo” as a mode of attack. Fundamentally his reply when broken down into its key aspects was:

1. No.
2. If any apology is due it’s from The Telegraph.
3. We responded in good faith.
4. Anyway, it’s an election campaign.

I was particularly struck by his repeated use of the “it’s an election campaign” line of justification and that exact quote, “we responded in good faith,” is just about as hypocritical as it gets when it is now known that Labour was briefed on the Telegraph piece before it was released.

So by Andy’s logic it is OK to smear someone and continue to do so even when the basis has been wholly discredited; the only apology is ever due by the the originator of a smear and not by those who would wilfully continue to parrot it days after that discrediting as they are not responsible; you can repeat ANYTHING that you hear “in good faith”; all is fair in an election campaign.

So that’s Labour’s election campaign modus operandi firmly established then.

I have to admit that up until this morning’s interview I regarded Andy Turnham as one of the more decent of Labour's leading lights and I told someone exactly that only a couple of days ago. More fool me...

But let’s return to what politicians do in the name of good faith. US President Martin Van Buren declared, “The United States have fulfilled in good faith all their treaty stipulations with the Indian tribes,” so whatever Andy Burnham might consider an apt definition is not a new corruption of civility.

The CyberNat is Dead - Witness the Rise of the CyberNOT!

For such a long time the CyberNat has been regarded with disdain, even disgust, and I am no great supporter of anonymous online abuse in any form as that is utterly gutless.

However we are all aware of the far more poisonous mirror image of the the CyberNat - let's call this particular animal the CyberNOT.

Every pro-Yes article that is published attracts the CyberNOT troll with a vengeance and the level of debate drops to sub-basement level immediately. The CyberNOT is far more insidious than anything I've come across in the mainstream media and, frankly, is almost Talibanic in its quest to obfuscate in any way beyond reason. The quasi-religious zeal in which Yes arguments are attacked and scorned is beyond anything that I have witnessed or been party to.

I bring this subject up as I have found myself the target of CyberNOT abuse simply for having the temerity to express an opinion or two in an open and transparent manner on a public forum. Cut-outs - anonymous temporary Facebook accounts - will happily send obnoxious private messages and then disappear as fast as they arrived on the scene. Brave behaviour.

There are other silly little things as well which are not necessarily conducted by cut-outs. Last October my Yes Tallinn account was messaged by someone with the following:

"What is your real interest in Scottish Independence? My husband works much of the time in Estonia and has not heard of you." 

Well, let's set out a few simple facts. Estonia is a country the size of Switzerland. Tallinn is a city with the population of Edinburgh, Bristol or Belfast. Is it incumbent upon me to go out and make myself known to every foreigner who turns up in the country? As a Scot I am familiar with the supposed tiny nature of my own country: "Oh you're Scottish? You must know Jimmy. Where's he from? Scotland of course. I don't know the town but it's Jimmy. You must know him. Red hair..." Sound familiar? No, I do not hang out in the ex-pat bars in the square mile of Tallinn's Old Town and I visit that part of the city probably less than half a dozen times a year. It's like imagining that someone who lives in Edinburgh MUST spend all their time down the Grassmarket if they would really exist to the wider world.

As it was this particular messager was not abusive, but doubting someone's motives or ambitions simply because her husband has not heard of me is less than substantive as an argument. I am not going to name that messager as that is a pointless exercise which stoops as low as the CyberNOT  Instead I openly engaged that person with a selection of information but sadly (or predictably?), up to now, she remains silent.

So brothers and sisters of Yes, I implore you to be lucid, transparent and reasonable in all that you write, disseminate, or otherwise share. Keep it clean and keep it honourable. Engage the CyberNOT  But always, always, always be better than the CyberNOT  He is scared, his arguments are built on sand, his only defence strident voices and he will always try to shout you down. We are better than the CyberNOT  We have the arguments to win the battle. It is for this very reason that the CyberNOT is on the rise.

I'll say it again and again until I'm blue in the face (saves on saltire face paint, eh?) keep it clean. Keep it concise. Don't invent stuff just to sound clever. State your source whenever possible. Remain reasonable, even in the face of the CyberNOTic Taliban, If you are at a loss you could do a lot worse than go back to first principles and read McCrone again - that will re-energise you.

Get out there and engage and always remember that if we stay out of the gutter then we will always be better than the CyberNOT. Always. 100% of the time.

The face of intolerant Scotland - public enemy no.1! Aye, on the left...

But if that's not enough to bear I hear only this morning that Iain Lawson has had a run in with the uber-CyberNOTs – the CyberStasi. I'll leave it him to explain:

"Just been "moderated," polite word for censored, by the Herald for merely pointing out that the two academics involved in the Treasury document have now accused the Treasury of grossly misrepresenting their work and that therefore the Treasury paper can no longer be classified a serious research paper and should now be classified as propaganda and that responsible media organisations, like the BBC and others should report it as such. Such is life in Soviet Scotland these days. Postcards from the gulag later."

This must be seen to be rather sinister as Jim Naughtie openly mentioned this on the Today programme on Radio 4 this morning and although probably not as incisively as Iain he laid it out that there would be refutation and a case of "he said, she said." Why would the Herald need to try to gag something which is already out in the open? 

What are little boys made of?

What are little boys made of?
What are little boys made of?
Slugs and snails and puppy dogs' tails,
That's what little boys are made of.

What are little girls made of?
What are little girls made of?
Sugar and spice and all things nice,
That's what little girls are made of.

What are No voters made of?
What are No voters made of?
Austerity,
Zero hour contracts,
Part-time jobs,
Food banks,
EVPs,
Benefit cuts,
Exorbitant utility prices,
Highest petrol prices in the EU,
20% VAT,
The Bedroom Tax,
The democratic deficit in Scotland of an unelected Tory government,
David Cameron hiding polls that tell the truth,
Child poverty reaching heights not seen since the Victorian age,
Standard Life coming out with the same crap they came out with in 1979 to scare people,
A Chancellor who lies through his teeth at every turn,
The natural resources of Scotland being used to make billionaires in London,
Tax avoidance schemes made to benefit the big corporations being let off with billions of tax so Tories can sit on their boards,
Inheritance tax threshold frozen as it was only a Tory campaign promise to raise it after all,
The likelihood of another coalition government but this time between the unelected UKIP and the unelected Tories in Scotland,
Pensioners freezing their butts off in winter because Westminster doesn't care,
The Royal Mail being sold to the Chancellor's buddies for a fraction of its true value with 85 % of MSPs opposing it in Scotland,
Nuclear weapons based less than 20 miles from our largest city,
That's what No voters are made of.

Scottish Labour Legalises Prostitution

Wendy Alexander initially appeared to have the potential to be the "great white hope" of Scottish Labour and she seemed to be really ready and willing to engage on the issues and not just lap up the party line à la London. Her "bring it on" exhortation gave momentary belief that the lines of political communication might be open and Scotland might be able to engage in a unique debate. That candle of hope was snuffed out after only a very brief flicker as normal service was resumed by Gordon Brown announcing three days later that she was not, in fact, offering Labour's support for an immediate referendum. I still genuinely believe that Wendy Alexander came from a position of best intentions - or at least as good as that can get from Scottish Labour.

Iain Gray was almost so perfectly named. A rare beast in modern Scottish Labour in being someone with a good experience of the real world having had an education in physical sciences and then working as a teacher before extensive charity work. But oh so dull.  A complete personality vacuum. He had no ability in debate and looked more and more cross as arguments eluded him. His final humiliation was the infamous Subway incident when he failed to handle a band of hecklers at Glasgow Central Station, during the 2011 campaign trail. Instead of addressing the group he turned tail and ran. That was that.

After the slaughter of the Scottish Parliamentary Election of 2011 Gray jumped ship and the paucity of choice was there for everyone to see.

Johann Lamont floated to the top of the murky pond of what remained of Scottish Labour's Holyrood talent. One glance at her CV and only a brief listen to her oratory will confirm to anyone that she is a return to the world of the old Labour "apparatchik" with no frills and no skills other than being able to rally the votes of the comrades. That she also looks the part is a bonus! But she undoubtedly remains in the ranks of the apparatchiks and clearly not in the "nomenklatura" as she has been outmanoeuvred by almost everyone on the SNP front bench since her appointment as ScotLab Commissar-In-Chief, so deftness in argument or debate is certainly not her forte.

Lamont can be seen as someone who is the policewoman of party policy in Scotland and the person to wield the stick with which to attempt to beat the SNP at every turn. "Attempt" is the operative word here as Alex Salmond, Nicola Sturgeon, John Swinney et al are nowhere near as leaden-footed as Ms. Lamont and if she has managed to inflict even a glancing blow of late it has been through accident and not any great skill.

How ironic that Lamont was elected on the back of a speech in which she told party delegates that, "We must listen and learn, show humility and seek again to talk for and to people's ambitions and concerns. Our real challenge is that we in Labour lost our way, lost our confidence and lost Scotland." Since 2011 Labour in Scotland has exhibited the same failings and that is in no short measure due to the conduct of Johann Lamont and her closest cabal.

These are people who have no sense of political decency. You ask a question to Lamont or her ilk and you need not expect an answer. Now that is not uncommon for politicians as we all know but Johann Lamont has been repeatedly asked for her views on nuclear weapons on the Clyde since her ascension to party politburo boss, coloured by her outspoken views against these WMDs when she was a junior politician. The silence is deafening. Utterly deafening. She doesn't even have the decency to turn round and say, "OK, I've sold my principles down the river for the greater cause." Some might even respect her for that in a perverse way but she doesn't offer that opportunity as she is from the school of Scottish Labour that does not sanction cross-examination.

Her acolyte, Jackie Baillie, is another of those who will not be questioned. She is quite happy to jump to her feet at Holyrood and spout smug falsehood after smug falsehood in her attempt to score points for ScotLab when she just, in fact, comes across as clueless and out of her depth. Others in the opposition team are too nameless to bother with as there is no depth.

Enter stage left one Douglas Alexander, brother of the aforementioned Wendy. I don't know what it is but I instinctively want to like Douglas. He is reasonable, he is conciliatory, he is thoughtful....

Oh hang on, that's the whole point isn't it?

That nice Douglas Alexander

Alistair Darling has been so negative and damned useless that the next Tory placeman has been called up. And let's not dress it up in any other way. Douglas Alexander is the new Tory spokes-spiv in Scotland. "Wanna buy a pair o' nylons love?" A purveyor of soiled goods. He will dress it up in any way that we might be expected to be able to swallow it. The Tories themselves realise that they have no constituency in Scotland so Labour allow one of their brightest to be co-opted to the cause for the duration.

Any port in a storm for Dougie Alexander. He is undoubtedly a capable political operator and he has a very convincing way about him. He sounds so plausible...

Hold on! We're at it again!

Better Together have taken a guy who comes across as so sincere that he looks like he is about to burst into tears at any moment because he feels your pain. Are we supposed to like Dougie boy because he's sweet and lovely or are we supposed to buy into his Labour/Tory doublespeak?

We all know what the so-called oldest profession in the world is reputed to be. ScotLab is providing a procession of professionals who pretend with one side of their face to be deeply concerned about Scotland but at the drop of a hat sell themselves to Conservative Middle England. Enough of this shameless harlotry! There is nothing honourable in dancing with the devil.

ScotLab and London Tories discuss issues of mutual interest

Scottish Labour is prostituting itself to Tory Mammon and that is one liaison too far. So, to Douglas Alexander, Alistair Darling, Gordon Brown, Jim Murphy and the rest of so-called Labour's Tory placemen, if you wish to sell yourselves then that is entirely up to you, but please do not expect Scotland to sell its soul for the sake of your careers. You have lost any credibility that you had and the miracle is that so many in Scotland have not seen through you all yet.

Scottish Labour, the lie that just keeps on giving. Time for a quickie love? Wink, wink, nudge, nudge...

Split Personalities AKA the Politics of Deceit

For me the critical thing to emerge from the referendum preamble is the entirely schizophrenic nature of the so-called major political parties – how they represent themselves to a UK-wide audience and then how they offer a completely altered image in Scotland.

The Conservative Party really doesn’t try very hard at all in Scotland as they know that the less said the less collateral damage caused. They realise that popping up north of the border is counter-productive and David Cameron himself is running scared when it comes to the matter of debate with Alex Salmond. “But it’s a matter for the people of Scotland” smiles Cameron refusing to be drawn into the debate but then spreading bad faith wherever he ventures and denigrating the Yes campaign at every turn.

The Russian news agency Itar-Tass reported on December 31^st that "Great Britain is extremely interested in the support of Russia, as holder of the G8 presidency, in two vital areas in 2014: the Afghan pull-out and the Scottish independence referendum." The Russian journalist added that although the referendum might "look like a UK domestic matter", it had, according to his UK Government source, the potential to "send shockwaves across the whole of Europe". The Sunday Herald published an article about this on January 12^th. This story has been attacked by BT supporters as unsubstantiated but the BBC News website referenced the story on January 19^th and there has been no official denial from London. Taking into account many other reports of UK diplomats being tasked to drum up support for the Union abroad to the detriment of the Yes campaign then we have to consider that Itar-Tass is accurate – David Cameron is more inclined to connive off the record on Scotland with Vladimir Putin than he is to debate on the record with Alex Salmond.

But of course it is Alex Salmond's conduct that is microscopically examined and condemned by all and sundry. The Unionist bloc smile and say of the Itar-Tass report, "It didn't happen..."

Shocking!

The LibDems posture with an amazing degree of arrogance on the Scottish stage which is pretty amusing for a party that will, in all likelihood, finish 5^th in Scotland in the May Euros. Danny Alexander pretends to be an economic colossus when in reality he might have just, possibly, been an adequate Scottish Secretary. He was promoted way beyond his pay grade very early in the life of the ConDem government. He seems to be an affable enough chap but let’s not mistake geniality for competence.

Michael Moore has been seen off with Alistair Carmichael now as the third Scottish Secretary of this government and on the basis that you can only stretch a limited number of MPs in so many directions he would seem to be the last one for the time being. That’s fine. He’s a gift. Bob Smith's a genuinely nice bloke but he's recently had to face up to health issues so I doubt that there will be any role for him.

But as a party they pretend to still be relevant in Scotland when that ship has long since sailed. In the UK context they are fumbling from one mess to the next but in Scotland they are this bullish group, not discernible in any way, shape or form, from their Tory sugar daddies.

However the Tories and their coalition pets are a mere appetizer on this menu of political schizophrenia.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Labour Party.

Ed Miliband and his acolytes pitch themselves to England as a progressive liberal party of the centre but in truth they are barely discernible from the Conservatives. The so-called Bedroom Tax, a staggering assault on the poorest in society, was not opposed by Labour and, in fact, many Labour MPs did not even turn up for the vote at Westminster. This is the party that promises to follow the Conservative line on benefit caps. This is the party that will now not rule out an in-out referendum on EU membership because the Tories have promised to have one. This is the party that pledges to continue George Osborne’s austerity rout.

Move north and cross the border into Scotland and we have the same Ed Miliband telling the party faithful that Labour will outflank the SNP as the true party of social democracy. Make up your mind Ed. Are you going to punish the most vulnerable in society or are you going to be their saviour? Or are you really going to offer this split personality model of Labour and hope that nobody notices? The tame media have never been too quick to pounce on Labour’s inherent hypocrisies so the party might believe that they can get off with this one for a while.

At the end of April Alex Massie writing in The Spectator described Miliband as some sort of PG Wodehouse composite character and arrived at the conclusion that he is, “Clever enough in a droopy kind of way but, ultimately, a gawd-help-us kind of fellow.”

A couple of gawd-help-us kind of fellows

Ed, we’ve noticed.

Massie continues, “I dare say Miliband’s belief that Scottish independence would be a bad idea – for Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom – is sincere. That this belief is in his own narrow, strategic, sectarian interest is beside the point. And, sure, we all know that Labour-minded voters in western and central Scotland are a vital constituency in the referendum campaign.

“But I rather approve of Miliband’s simpering, no, thunderous warning that an independent Scotland might be the kind of rogue state in which taxes were cut. I’d like to believe in it a little more than I do. Time – and hard learning – might bring us to that point but not before an awful lot of expensive mistakes had been made.”

Massie goes on to point out that, “Miliband’s position is spectacularly incoherent.”

What Ed fails to highlight is that the specific tax cuts being considered are in the corporate realm – to make business more competitive and to help create jobs. Does anyone in Luxembourg or Ireland or Estonia agree that lowering corporate tax rates is somehow defining of a rogue state? If that would be the definition then Estonia is the rogue state to end all rogue states with 0% Corporate Tax! To quote dear Margaret Curran, “Drivel!”

Ed, we’ve noticed.

Labour claims to be the party that offers answers to all the ills of the UK. The ills that have been heaped on the country by cruel, uncaring governments. But in the past half century there has been coalition government for 4 years, Tory rule for 22 and Labour themselves have had the longest run at power with 24 years in charge. Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and Alastair Darling trashed the economy. That’s the same Alastair Darling that leads Better Together, that’s the same Gordon Brown who last week came north to preach on pensions. Are we so stupid as to be duped by these people? Again? The same people who claim to have all the answers in Opposition have held the reins of power for the longest period of anyone in the last half century and have spectacularly failed to deliver... anything!

Ed, we’ve noticed.

This is the party that at a local government level is delighted to form coalitions with the Conservatives just to keep the SNP out.

Ed, we’ve noticed.

Spot the difference - answers on a postcard please

The schizophrenia within the Labour Party is tilting towards certifiable insanity.

The level of deceit from Labour is abject and utterly craven.

Let me affirm here and now. We are not that stupid. We have noticed.

The parties of Westminster have blurred into differing shades of the same basic colour. There is nothing to define them as any one being different from the other. Yet in Scotland they claim an entirely different reality. Enough.

Opportunities (Let's Make Lots Of Money)

Phil Lawrence, Tallinn, 13th February 2014

So it’s official. All the Queen’s horses and all the Queen’s men have decided that Humpty Dumpty (AKA Oor Eck) should have a great fall and unlike in the nursery rhyme they will be the perpetrators, not those rushing to the aid of the afflicted. Gideon, Edward and Danny have closed ranks and decided that we are not worthy of continued use of our own currency.

Giddy George delivered his message today with relish and a self-satisfied smirk as his blood brothers from the other Unionist parties regurgitated potted versions on his theme.

Barely had the hot air subsided when no less a figure than the Research Director of the esteemed Adam Smith Institute, Sam Bowman, was waxing lyrical on the benefits of using the currency without formal agreement pointing out that, “An independent Scotland that used the pound as its base currency without the English government’s permission, with banks continuing to issue notes privately and private citizens free to choose any currency they wanted, would probably have a more stable financial system and economy than England itself.”

Bowman then noted, “It’s up to Scots to decide whether they want independence, but the Chancellor’s announcement today should be seen as a feature, not a bug.”

What? Wow! That wasn’t in the script! Who are these upstart Adam Smith chappies? Well they just happen to be the Libertarian think tank that largely sculpted a great deal of Thatcherism, especially in privatization policy, and a big chunk of Tony Blair’s populism. OK, that’s not the best recommendation north of the border but if one thing’s for sure it’s that the Adam Smith Institute knows what will fly and what won’t.

So we should have the pound without the benefit of policy input. It’s the same way that some Latin American countries use the US dollar and a number of European states outside the EU have adopted the euro.

This is a good option for any country looking for short- to medium-term stability WITHOUT having to spend in shoring up the value of the currency. If there is a run on sterling – and there will be – then Scotland can detach itself without drama or fanfare and then our commodity-backed currency (Scottish Crown, Merk, Pound or whatever) will find its own par at the inevitable higher level. Look out NOK!

I just always saw the currency union as a bit like Devo-Max – a halfway house measure that was neither fish nor fowl. I'm not unhappy to see it being undermined but I suspect that this may have been the idea all along... You have to smoke out the objections as early as possible.

Along the way several major Yes policy announcements have stunk to high heaven from my standpoint but they have been seen to be tactical markers thrown down that Project Fear should skip around. Of course they don’t do that and just steam right through the middle thereby proving that Bitter the Gither is completely reactive with not one proactive notion in their combined head. They don’t predict, they only lash out. They don’t get subtlety and can only bludgeon. That’s ideal for Yes as they can set the agenda. 

Even subliminally?

Consider this. It is only in recent weeks that the Yes campaign has ramped up currency union as probably the prime issue. Was this all about timing? Was this designed to get the Unionists fixated on the Sterling Zone and cause them to shoot their bolt? Alex Salmond is not just the best parliamentary debater alive in the entire UK today, he is probably the best long-term strategist as well.

The more I think about it the more I hear the playground chant, “You fell for it! You fell for it!” Did Gideon et al fall for it? I’m inclined to suggest that this may be the case.

In some more smoke and mirrors I also can imagine that what we saw today was pounced upon by the Unionists for another altogether different purpose. I smell a rat and his name is Nigel. This is not just all about Scotland. The Establishment is closing ranks to save their skins in England. This is designed to appeal to Middle England as UKIP look likely to win the Euro elections in 3 months time. It seems directed at one audience but resonates with another. Tactically, at face value it might be regarded by some as smart. Strategically it is a disaster.

Am I giving Oor Eck too much credit? Did the stars just align themselves all on their own? Or was there a wee boost somewhere?

So at the end of today where do we stand? The Unionists have probably been enticed to blink way, way, way too early with the Adam Smith Institute – one of the leading free market research establishments on the planet – patting Scotland on the back. Add to that the previously stated view of the US Federal Reserve on “borrowing” a currency being that we will, “consequentially have far more prudent and stable financial systems than if they were part of a formal currency union.”

All in all not too bad when the media were waiting for Gideon to tap in his open goal. Hmmm, maybe cricket’s his game. Or maybe he’s a wet bob? (That’s public school jargon for a rower, don’t you know?)

I am inclined to believe that Eck is less Humpty Dumpty and more Little Jack Horner – he put in his thumb, and pulled out a plum!

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All the cloak and dagger stuff in the past 48 hours has made me think again and again of card-playing analogies. Here’s a few commonly used terms and how they apply today:

George Osborne – the Dealer (who oddly lays all his own cards out face-up!!!)

Ed Balls – the perennial Joker

Danny Alexander – the Busted Flush

Perm any 2 from those 3 – a Low Pair

Alex Salmond – Full House