Gordie’s been intervening again. He didn’t bother intervening during the recent Holyrood election because even he could see that his party was going to tank, and not because Ruth Davidson was sitting on it posing for a photo shoot for the Scotsman. His old seat of Kirkcaldy has turned into an SNP stronghold and what’s left of the Labour party in Scotland couldn’t rustle up the couple of cooncillors and the three pensioners who’ve been party members since 1945 that the Scottish media likes to tell us counts as Gordie meeting the public. His no-show certainly wasn’t because he was feart he might be asked difficult questions about how his vow has been working out, because this is the Scottish media we’re talking about here.
The Scottish media holding Gordie to account, oh how we laughed. They’re far too busy taking photies of Ruth on the back of a coo and claiming that Scotland’s politics have been Ulsterised. The Ulsterisation of Scottish politics is difficult to distinguish from its near anagram clusterfuckisation, that being the contribution of the Labour party and their particular political specialisation. Find a foot belonging to a Labour politician and the party will already have shot itself in it. It’s a bit like kneecapping, only self-inflicted. Ulsterisation is exactly the same as blusterisation, it mostly consists of false Unionist claims and media hot air, but it comes with added bull. That last being courtesy of Ruthie’s photo op partner who is apparently the new list MSP for Tayside. The Tories like to claim that independence supporters are like sheep, but they have got the cattle vote sewn up.
But back to Gordie. This time Gordie’s intervening in the EU debate from the safe distance of somewhere in London where no one cares about his vow, his vainglorious claims to have saved the world and Scotland, or about how he’s prone to wearing a hole in a decent piece of Axminster. Although to be honest, the state of the carpet weighs more heavily on the mind of your average Unionist politician at Westminster than the state of Scotland does. That’s unfair of them, since Westminster walks all over Scotland on a regular basis you’d think that they’d give us at least as much consideration as a shag pile. The nearest Scotland gets to a shag pile in Westminster is when they all pile in to screw us.
Anyway, despite what all the papers are trying to tell us, Scotland’s new parliament is of a decidedly pro-independence hue and is dominated by politicians who are about as convinced that Gordie’s vow has been fulfilled as they are that Ruthie is going to make a positive and helpful contribution to the new Scottish parliament instead of screaming SNP bad every Thursday. Mind you, that’s what she thinks holding the SNP to account means, that and getting her photie taken for the papers with something bovine. You know, like Jackson Carlaw.
Another reason Gordie has been steering clear of Scotland is because advice from the man who did more to destroy the Labour party in Scotland than Maggie Thatcher doesn’t really go down well in working class communities north of the border. Leaving the EU will provoke a race to the bottom, said the man who along with Tony Blair presided over a boom in zero hours contracts and whose lasting contribution to politics is to lumber future generations with a mountain of PFI debt to pay for shoddily built schools that will have collapsed long before the debt is paid off. There are carpets which have lasted much longer than buildings built under Labour’s PFI programme.
The truth is, at least according to opinion polls, Scotland doesn’t need to be persuaded that it’s better to remain a part of the EU. Scotland has always been one of the most outward looking and European minded parts of Britain, that’s what comes from being a small country which has a land border with a much larger and more powerful neighbour. Small countries are always more international minded than large ones if only for the simple reason that when you come from a small country most of the interesting places are somewhere else. Gordie’s intervention is probably as useful to the Leave campaign as Boris Johnson coming here to tell us why we’re better off out of the EU with him as the next Prime Minister is to the Remain campaign. We don’t need Gordie to promise that he personally will hold the EU commission and parliament to account to make sure that they’re nice to the UK, because we’ve heard that kind of thing from him before. It didn’t work out too well then either.
For Scotland Brussels is a useful counterweight to the gravitational pull of a Westminster which sooks up all our resources, our capital, our skills and our talents and in return we get ignored and sidelined, a cultural cringe, and some guy who produces graphs showing that we’re poorer than Greece. That’s the kind of value for money that you normally only find in a Labour PFI scheme. If Gordie really wants us to remain a part of Europe, probably the best thing he can do would be to shut up and go and crawl back under the rock he’s been hiding under since Labour got pumped in 2015. Because if he is insistent on showing his face, the very least he could be doing is to fulfil his promise to ensure that thon vow of his is carried out.
From swearing blind that Scotland is the most devolviest country in the history of devolution, which isn’t saying much since devolution is a constitutional arrangement found only in the UK since the late 1990s, Labour is now admitting that perhaps they really should be arguing for real Home Rule after all. So much for Gordie’s vow then. Seems we’re not the most devolviest devolvement in the history of devolving after all. Well who knew? Apart from just about everyone in Scotland who voted for independence and a large chunk of those who didn’t.
The next best possibility for an independence referendum would be for England to vote to leave but Scotland to vote to remain. Gordie’s intervention probably brought that a lot closer to reality. He should get back under his rock.
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Wee Ginger Dug 
I hope you haven’t invoked the hulking walker to take a trip northwards! Couldn’t bear that 🙂
I doubt we will see that fucking tractor come back north and face the music any time soon. in fact who would hold the backstabber to account anyway, the MSM or the BBC, nae chance.
It will take an independent Scotland to hold Brown, Darling and the rest of the backstabbers to account.
great stuff the wee dug is producing just now.
That Carlaw line is absolute gold. 😀 LOL
I knew Broon was going to intervene right enough. I saw impact tremors in ma coffee mug and froze. Its rumoured he cannae see you if you stand perfectly still.
As for Labour’s other rumour of a road to Damascus moment on devo max? As I posted last thread. There may be a bit of a credibility issue there.
Lord (for)Foulkes(sake), billed as Kezia’s ‘mentor’, (she did his photocopying for him?) in today’s Dead Tree Scrolls, is advocating federalism now, and urging The PFI rubble of Labour building blocks down this path.
In years to come historians will wonder why we let this bunch of freeloaders and chancers hijack the Labour Party and turn it into a neo conservative Imperialist war machine, whose sole function was to enrich the Blair Team while civic society rotted and died at the hands of the SE Establishment and the Finance Masters of the Universe.
Where are they all now?
Working for the Man, coining it in while Scotland suffers, ruled over by our neighbour to the South.
Why the hell are we still sending our wealth South, to be allocated some of it back by 580 foreign MP’s, and a House of Lords for whom we didn’t vote?
I demand full Independence. I dare Gordon Brown to tread North ever again to lie to and frighten our frail and elderly, and spew out that ‘pooling and sharing’ shite one more time.
I doubt that either he or Darling or Carmichael would ever appear in public up here ever again.
They have made their millions on the back of the suffering of our poor, our children our frail and our elderly.
At least we know where we are with Ruth and her chinless anonymous bunch of ‘LisTory’ Boys:
They openly pursue policies that reward the rich and impoverish the poor; just like Chancellors Brown and Darling did before while Blair was spending £30 billion killing Iraqi citizens, but in the Blue Tories case, without the pretence that they are on the side of the Scottish people.
Roll on.
Paul’s writing is pretty damn fine. But this comment comes pretty damn close.
Sandy, ur2kind.
I note that the Record is now ‘monstering’ Henry McLeish, who is also jockeying for position on the Born Again Home Rule Scottish labour bandwagon.
Dugdale must still be in a darkened room breathing into a paper bag, with McTernan and MacDougall on 24 hour shifts rubbing her back and cooing ‘Calm down, calm down,’
Apparently Henry, and Jack McConnell for that matter, are on an index linked £34k p.a., ex FM pension for life, with the New Labour Mirror Group reminding us that McLeish served for a only year as FM only before resigning over the ‘muddle’ in his expenses over failing to declare revenue from renting out part of his official office space; ‘Officegate’ it was imaginatively dubbed , if memory serves.
Why do I suspect that the path is being cleared for Brown to step up to the plate and peddle Home Rule for Scotland, not quite Federalism, but semi, demi, nearly, Devo Plus, but not just yet, perhaps maybe, possibly, following a Constitutional Convention Chaired by Lord FFFFFoulkes in 2025, or some such Fabian tactical date in the dim and distant when all we Nats have died off.
Next time, Home Rule , honest.
Please ‘listen’, please, please, purty please.
And now for something completely diff. dead parrot as well.
IRA alert red herring to deflect from Conservative election fraud.
Mibbees aye , mibees naw
Dante reserved a special circle in the Inferno for Tories of all 3 colours, where they can spend eternity talking shite to each other (The Tories that is, NOT Dante).
I agree with some of the other posters here. You are on a roll.
Brown really is a perfect example of where Labour went catastrophically wrong. The man lacks a moral compass. He views the electorate as sheep who should do his bidding. I think he has got that a tad wrong, these days we are a herd of cats.
Paul, I saw in the news that Gordon had been making a speech for the Remain side, so I came straight over here expecting you would have given his latest intervention the Wee Ginger Treatment. As always, you did it to perfection. Thanks.
What struck me about his interview was how dated he sounded. The caravan has certainly moved on esp in Scotland and his relevance is zero. I also got the clear impression that he is a man full of self importance without any reason to feel that way. A bit creepy really.
Oh dear, Labour have had a bit of a shock down in Wales. If you want a laugh google ¨Welsh Assembly First Minster¨ or similar. I mean, who would have thunk it? 🙂
But wait. It gets better
“The biggest issue that faces Scotland currently is the uncertainty over the Scottish Government’s inability to rule out a second independence referendum, which they could quite easily do.
“I look forward to the First Minister, if she is re-elected to that post, setting out clearly that we aren’t going to have a second independence referendum.”
Paddington Mundell Esq. (Late of Peru)
Aye, apparently Mr Cameron raised the spectre of union break up in his EU deliberations and not unexpectedly the SNP replied during Scottish questions by pointing out he may be right about that and counter to expectation in some quarters pled for the govt. to dump the project fear approach to the IN campaign. Mundell’s answer is as pasted above.
Aye, according to the creepy, yet remarkably fluffy Grima Mundell, its easy peezy lemon squeezy to tell the serfs this’ll happen and that won’t.Which y’know, for a SoSfS is rather surprising that he doesn’t know the law of his own land. Scotland is a popular sovereignty supported by the Claim of Right. In Scotland the people ARE the employers and the public servants, well, servants.
Now happily our First Minister is well aware of this and equally happily, happens to agree wholeheartedly with that state of affairs. THAT wee statement of Mundell’s however is the true face of UK conservatism.
Parliament you see, knows best. Parliament leads, it demands, it commands, it does not reflect or represent. It has no need to. Its members present the public with a limited choice of party, with a limited choice of policy and people are forced to choose the lesser of two evils. Its media ensure that this polity is ingrained, that order and stereotypes are enforced. You conform to this or that and we’re fine. You question or complain, you find you may become an undesirable. You’ll be poor, a scrounger, a benefits junkie, a tartan Stalinist, a devotee of her satanic majesty Sturgeon (latterly his satanic badness Salmond) and probably eat killie pies whilst sacrificing kittens to dark powers.
No, its not as easy as that in Scotland Mr Mundell and any First Minister who tried to implement a political ban on the sovereignty of the Scottish electorate would have a seriously bad day at work shortly after making such a move. Ask Kezia how working for the Tories on the constitution destroyed Labour. Labour won a referendum for you and then promptly were destroyed at the ballot. The Tories today have 31 MSPs by attracting hardline unionist votes away from what isleft of Labour. What they aren’t so forward about stating though is that 24 of those are list MSPs who also stood same day, on the constituency vote and were resoundingly rejected by their constituents.
To be frank to Mr Mundell, the Tories made an issue of the constitutional issue throughout the entire Holyrood campaign. It was the centre of their entire strategy. The Scottish Government ran their manifesto on policies for government barely even mentioning the term referendum by comparison.
Mr Mundell’s party started this particular rammy. He may come to wish they’d kept their ‘superior’ mooths firmly shut.
Mundell spent most of yesterday’s Scottish Questions farce staring at the clock above the Speaker’s head, and his body language clearly betrayed that he was wishing that it was all over.
The Tories have got wise.
Now that there are 56 SNP Members, they’ve had to stuff the Labour and Tory benches with ‘non Scots’ MP’s, otherwise Mundell, Murray, and the barefaced Carmichael would get swamped, and presentationally, it would reflect the reality of Scotland 2016: i.e., we resoundingly rejected the Red Blue and Jaundiced Tories at the ballot box May 2015, yet this bearded quivering little man holds power and authority over Scotland, and all things Scottish.
Heads Up, Mundell, it’s none of your business what we Scots intend to do in respect of another Indy ref. You are a WM MP allocated the biggest non job in politics, the pointless SoS for Scotland.
I cannot hazard a guess what you do all day at the Scotland Office. Whit ur ye managing? We have a whole Parliament Up Here now. You are not needed, or wanted. Nowhere is Mundell’s pointlessness more manifest than during this Scottish Questions debacle.
It is clear from the constant nervous timbre in his voice, his Fear/Flight tendency to look down at his lectern when defending his right wing fascist Parliament, and his almost coiled foetal body posture tells me that he is a man constantly under the cosh; his own cosh. He’s just not up to it, if indeed there was any ‘it’ in the pointless SoS non job to be ‘up to’.
Ruth will attempt to spend the next five years obsessing about the SNP obsessing about another Refrendum.
Beats admitting to the protracted Tory Plan to lay waste to Scotland the colony.
Y’er on a roll Jack. That’s a brilliant portrait.
If only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noon day sun, Saor Alba, then, in tropical Glasgow, I must be that mad dog.
Although this insignificant man’s feigned haughty arrogance is getting to me in the heat, it clearly is a poor attempt to mask a profound self doubt and loathing.
He seems to live in the constant fear of being found out. Perhaps he has a recurring nightmare of walking down Dumfries High Street in broad daylight naked from the waist down?
The Tories were badly shaken by the Referendum Result, and the UK GE whitewash.
The number one priority for all Tory WM Parties is to emasculate the Scottish electorate. Take away our democratic rights.
Keep wages low, engender fear and uncertainty in the workplace, erode employment rights, Human Rights, EO Laws, expand a low skill low paid zero hours contracts workforce, fill the HoI polloi with fear and dread about their financial security, reduce in work benefits to ‘hard working families’, and the disabled, cut public services, government departments, and LA funding (via the SNP then Ruth can blame the NATS), and boast that the Big Society, foodbanks, Hospice Shops, Lenny Henry Charitythons, and the Simon Community will pick up the slack.
Pay day loans at 1274%, a credit card at 35% so that you can buy a new cooker on tick, and lots of buy now pay the earth in 12 months time deals completes the circle of virtual slavery for millions of our citizens.
There’s no democracy if people are that poor and frightened that they dare not challenge the Big Boss
Now that Ruth’s off her high horse, we no longer need to blame WM for everything.
It was , is, and will be her fault.
No he never looks comfy these days does he?
To be fair, nor should he. 🙂
Superb commentary
Brilliant stuff again, proof if needed why Scotland needs the dug. However I must take issue with the comparison of bovine and Jackson Carlaw. I feel it is unfair……tae the coos.
I passionately hope that the UK votes to remain. My heart sank on the news of Gordie’s intervention, deeper when I read what he said. Ashtrays on motorcycles have a more practical use.
Many years ago at Edinburgh Zoo on a hot summer day whilst watching a clearly stressed out polar bear pacing up and down in it’s pit I wondered if there was a humane solution for this intelligent animal’s suffering. Gordy on the other hand makes me wonder if there’s a humane solution for the suffering of the intelligent viewer.
Please Gordy… JUST GO!
“He should get back under his rock.” I’ve nothing against a bit of badinage, WGD, but in this case you go a bit too far. You do a great disservice to the likes of slugs, slaters who live under rocks and perform the useful function of clearing up rotting rubbish. Mind you, maybe we should put Gordie under a rock and let the slugs and slaters get on with their job.
I wonder how much Boris and IDS are paying him?
His “intervention” must be worth at least an extra couple of million leave votes in the “home counties” where the man is detested utterly.
That is even more utterly detested than up here!
Was that Ruthie Tank Coomander who is now ic of something or other?
A few thoughts on the notion of “Ulsterisation” in Scotland.
Let’s look at who is using that phrase. Is it anyone in favour of independence? No.
It’s the pro-UK press and the whingeing remains of Bitter Together.
See it for what it is – another attempt at “Project Fear” – try and frighten people into the idea that Scotland will turn into 1970s Northern Ireland if we don’t all stop talking about independence.
The use of Ulsterisation by the media and their political pals is nothing more than “bottom of the barrel” scaremongering. It’s utterly insulting to the people of Scotland and an abominable attempt to undermine the democratic discourse of an enlightened and informed electorate.
In short it is utterly shameful and needs to be called out for what it is.
Er…
Observing facts is not the same as promoting them.
I have only really discussed the vote last week with two friends both like me Independence supporters since the early 1970s.
We all think that politics in Scotland are now polarizing along Nationalist v Unionist lines and the prime movers are the Unionists. Therefore similar but not identical to NI.
So I’m afraid you do not speak for all Independence supporters.
I only ever speak for myself and presume nothing.
But I do think the phrase is being deliberately used, in some quarters at least, to stir up images of another time and place which have no place in modern Scotland.
They are not simply observing facts – they are trying to stoke flames.
I don’t think Steve has ever claimed to speak for all Independence supporters.
Where do you see this JGalt? I don’t see it.
Actually Steve I don’t agree that use of the term Ulsterization is scaremongering as such. I think it is a threat.
In Northern Ireland Ulsterization was associated with ‘criminalization,’ and ‘normalization,’ . All these British policies shared the common goal of changing public perceptions of the nature of the conflict. Consequently, the Northern Irish conflict was labelled in one-dimensional ‘criminal’ and ‘terrorist’ terms.
No wonder Scots feel affronted at the use of the term, particularly as the Scottish Independence movement has never, ever been associated with any violence whatsoever.
Yes – you might be right so fair point.
Either way the use of the term in reference to Scottish politics is distasteful and unpleasant not to mention deliberately provocative.
Steve I understand where you are coming from, however I and others still see similarities developing.
The unionist vote needs to consolidate and is doing so.
We are on the same side, we need to think about this rather than just dismiss it.
No television so no fear of seeing bellowing Brown – regardless of where he decides to roar.
But thanks to WGD and friends I can keep up with all the news.
‘we’ll all be murdered in our Heads’. I paraphrase.
The Slithy Toves who sell this violent inferred threat should be locked up for inciting hatred and promoting violence. Their shock troops are the barrel necked Loyalists who invaded George Square…
They won’t of course be brought to book, because they are forelock tugging Scottish MSM Unionist mouthpieces.
An excellent piece of character assassination from the grassy knoll of Barlanark, Paul, except Gordy doesn’t really have a character now, he’s just a mass of brazen self-interest, meaningless sound-bites and delusions of relevance. Shame, when he was a young man he seemed to have ideals, but I suppose he was easily bought in the end, and the welfare of Scotland was never his first priority.
I was just recovering from seeing him and the wry-mouthed and luscious Laura Künssberg last night, which quite upset my delicate stomach, and then you had to utter the dire words “Jackson Carlaw”. Oh, dear Goad, where’s my pills?
Incidentally, Laura K….. A nasty piece of work, but she has the full backing of the establishment. Hey presto! And the petition is gone! Who said 38 Degrees was kosher?
Don’t worry, though, the British Labour in S______d party is now going to start thinking about Home Rule.
Oh, Henry, Henry, that’s so 1913, love….
I might laugh if it weren’t so pathetic. I’m so fed up I’m going out to Cuprinol the fence. And it’s a big fence.
PS: no gravatar yet, Saor Alba? Get on with it!
Sorry tintochiel, but I cannot get my username or password accepted.
Re-read Tom Sawyer first before you tackle the Fence, Tinto.
You may recall that as a punishment for skipping Sunday School to go fishing, Tom’s Aunt Polly ordered him to whitewash (the Cuprinol of its day?) the fence.
Tom managed to convince his pals that it was such a privilege to paint the fence that they eagerly offered him their keepsakes and trinkets to get to paint a bit of the palings, while the bold boy watched on.
Rather like the Tories did to Scottish Labour and the Dim Libs during the Referendum bunfight.
The Red and Jaundiced Tories did all the dirty work, while Ruth and the gang sat back and smirked.
Tinto! No answer. Tinto! No answer. Where is that boy?
Great stuff. Whatever you’re on I want some as well.
Absolutely brilliant metaphorical description.
Wonderful to read thanks.
Well, if you want to see a lovely big photo of Gordy, just pop up to Bristo Square in Edinburgh where they are doing god knows what to keep the skateboarders away, a full scale, (well hidden by massive boards), overhaul. On the main board he is there, in your face, a huge photo of him, because it’s the university, it really really pisses me off when I go past it. It should be transported to london.
So he creeps out of the woodwork again to try to appear important, does he not realise he must be one of the most despised people in the land by people of all hues of politics!
Nightmare last night, that the unionists were getting together in coalition, and so we were all waiting on something, a vote I think, jeezus.
Greasy hair, needing a haircut, collar of his shirt curling up, tie all over the place, running from side to side.
Just what we needed to convince us of his ideology.–not!
It’s always reassuring to see El Gordo intervening again for the first time, and doubly reassuring to hear the BBC using the words “for the first time”. In an ever-changing world, it can be comforting to have some never-changing constants. It’s just a pity that it’s money-hungry Brown and his media familiars who are the constants.
I’m shocked at you, dug. England is only a small country as well, barely bigger than Scotland. And if you include the north sea the gap is even smaller. I’ll give you population though. That fat bloated land isn’t going anywhere soon.
Jack: I laughed at your post. It is so long since I read TS it actually brought back some happy memories. I liked your metaphor: too close to the truth, eh? Well said.
Anyhow, half way along my fence I came upon two dudes just sitting there glumly, looking at a faded photo of Kezia. Had to tell them to take a hike. Who are McKenna and MacWhirter? Sound like an undertaking firm….
Sorry to hear of your problems, Saor Alba. It’s rather strange they won’t accept your info. Perhaps, as a vile cybernat, GCHQ are messing with your mojo, but I’m just paranoid 😯 .
Only joking, btw. Some great comments btl today.
Tinto, I’ve just made a big pot of minestrone, and my Everlovin’ and I will have a big bowlful later on out in the cool cool cool of the evening later on with thickly buttered panini, and glass or twa of vino rosso.
I’ll close my eyes and drift off to the Med. This weather’s been magic.
My back yard is my sanctum sanctorum.
If it were my fence right now, it can wait.
Don’t know what a ‘gravater’ is, guys. I’m guessing it’s a wee photie with your post.
Unreconstructed Luddite, that’s me.
Andiamo, mangare !
Buon appetito, Jack.
E la libertà per la Scozia? Non c’è dubbio!
And a gravatar IS a wee foatie. You should see John King’s (jdman)! A classic.
Did someone call for a rat?
Oh well i bet Broon has changed a good few minds as how to vote in the upcoming referendum , Brown on one side and Duncan Smith on the other gee wiz we are spoiled for choice , experience tells us to oppose anything these to chancers want , as much as i detest Broon , Smith needs treatment preferably in Belmarsh or some other secure establishment .
Is there a third choice that dosnt involve agreeing with either of those two ?
I love you all you intelligent and funny people