Moore’s Cynical Ploy is Only the Beginning

So, London’s man in Scotland (actually he seldom leaves London) has said that the forthcoming referendum on Scotland’s secession from the United Kingdom will only be an advisory vote.

According to the Governor General, Michael Moore, there will have to be a second vote on what has been sorted out between the two governments.

This is a wonderfully cynical ploy.

Scotland votes for independence and then agrees to give the unionists the chance to make the separation so unattractive that it can undemocratically pressure people into changing their mind. I’m not so sure that this is what any sensible government in London would want to do. Quite simply, they wouldn’t get away with it. But when one hears this sort of thing from Moore and Cameron saying he will defend the UK with “every fibre of his being” one has to wonder just how far they will go.

It is a rather desperate position to take so early on and has more to do the growing irrelevance of Moore’s office. This can be seen in the stance he has taken on the transfer of powers to Edinburgh. He refuses to give any more powers to the Scottish Government other than those deemed suitable by the unionist parties in the Calman Report.

It is still those rejected by the Scottish people that are making crucial decisions that affect their lives.

It has been said before but it is worth saying again – as far as the unionists are concerned the Scottish Parliament must never be allowed to succeed. It must be kept down and held back at every turn.

Moore might want to consider this. The SNP are the only majority Government within his beloved United Kingdom. He might also want to consider that as a Lib-Dem he is the Secretary of State for Scotland only because the coalition wouldn’t dare give the job to a Tory. 

Unlike the coalition, the minority government in Wales or the manipulated administration at Stormont, Scotland has the only government that can claim with any veracity that they have a mandate from the people. No matter how much this sticks in the craws of the unionists, it is a fact that they ignore at their peril.

Moore’s statement, unlike the Scottish Office, shouldn’t be seen as an irrelevance. It is the start of a concerted unionist campaign which will attempt to muddy the waters and disparage independence at every opportunity. Fair enough that is their job.

However, they will have to come up with something better than this.

If the Scots vote for independence, then Westminster would do well to accept it. Because, unlike 1707 the vote will not have been taken by a “Parcel of Rogues”. And they might just find  it a wee bit harder to bully and bribe their way round this one.

Blatter Goes Completely Bonkers as he Gives Kissinger a Job

As the election for the presidency of Fifa resembled polling day in Zimbabwe, it comes as no surprise that Sepp Blatter will not initiate an investigation into Qatar’s award of the 2022 World Cup Finals.

However, if the ethics or solutions committees wish to go against El Presidente and hold an inquiry, he has told them that he would not block it. I don’t really think, as it stands, the investigation to be held in Miami led by an ex-FBI man will lead to much.

But, if they did do the job properly he has just installed the very man who might just make them disappear.

In response to the allegations of corruption in Fifa, Blatter has come up with the great idea of co-opting Johan Cruyff, Placido Domingo and Henry Kissinger onto the board of the solutions committee.

Fair enough, Cruyff has a CV that most people will find acceptable. A legendary and thoughtful player and a successful manager. As with Platini, he can be seen as an antidote to the third-rate footballers come politicians who have, at present, all the ‘good jobs’.  

Domingo, on the other hand, is a man who sings at football tournaments. Blatter obviously thinks that this gives him a greater insight into the running of world football than the millions of other laymen or women around whom he doesn’t know.

But it is surely the appointment of Richard Nixon’s right hand man, Henry Kissinger, that will raise a few eyebrows within the family of football.

As National Security Advisor and Secretary of State, some may say he had a “chequered career”. But I’m not sure if that is the way he is thought of around the world, especially in Chile, Argentina, Cambodia, Timor-L’este (East Timor) and Bangladesh, to name a few. Nor am I convinced that the man who referred to Indira Ghandi as a “bitch” and all Indians as “bastards” is thought of with any affection that country.

He has avoided legal summons by investigators in France, Chile and Argentina. There have also been calls for his prosecution for war crimes, crimes against humanity and for offences against common or customary or international law, including conspiracy to commit murder, kidnap and torture.

On the hand though…

For those that remember it, Kissinger was appointed to the board of the North American Soccer League in 1978. This league was top heavy with over the hill and overpaid mercenaries from ‘footballing countries’. Poorly thought out and badly administered it folded in 1984.

That then is qualification enough for Blatter.

When he asked to be left to “sort it out”, I had high hopes of the ridiculous. But old Sepp has surpassed even my wildest expectations.

An opera singing crony is one thing. A man who is considered by millions to have conspired in the sort of crimes that sees a Serbian end up in The Hague should end once and for all any suggestions that Sepp Blatter is in touch with the real world.

Lib-Dems U-Turn on Minimum Pricing

New Scottish Lib-Dem leader Willie Rennie, is the first of unionist cabal in the Scottish Parliament to jump ship and do a u-turn on the minimum pricing of alcohol. Whether this has more to do with kicking his party got at the election or an epiphany on the road to common sense, I’ll leave for you to decide.

One thing though, it’s high time that this peculiarly Scottish and irrational opposition to minimum pricing came to an end.

During the last Parliament the SNP proposed the introduction of a minimum pricing policy for alcohol. This was roundly supported by health experts, the police and the judiciary. The unionist opposition however, opposed and defeated it. They did so, not only in the face of qualified advice, but also, in case of the Tories and Lib-Dems, contrary to what their UK leadership was advocating.

For while the Scottish Tories were claiming that high prices would not solve alcohol abuse, their masters south of the border, in the shape of Chris Grayling and Iain Duncan-Smith, were outlining proposals to ban cheap supermarket drink deals in England and Wales.

The LibDems were also put in an embarrassing position with their spokesperson Robert Brown attacking minimum pricing in Scotland whilst the UK party’s shadow business spokesperson, Lorely Burt, was calling cheap supermarket booze the “biggest problem” and reiterating” her party’s support for minimum pricing.

Both these parties will hope that we don’t remind them of how foolish and petty they have been.

As for Labour?

Well their big idea, after a study designed to do nothing more than back their stance, was to ban the non-alcoholic Red Bull. Caffeine, rather than cheap cider and vodka were what blighted the streets of Scotland according to them. What was next? The banning of coffee mornings and machines in public places?

They’re opposition was only ever based on one thing. Their irrational hatred of the SNP.

It surely could not have been because they felt that their supporters were the ones who were buying the cheap booze.

The truth is that all three voted against this in fear of it being successful. A successful Scottish Parliament, passing laws that benefit the people of Scotland, is anathema to the unionists. They work in concert to belittle it, continuously trying to bring it down to the level of a village council. They have treated the Scottish Parliament with contempt. And they’ve paid the price for that.

When the Labour long knives are put back in their scabbards and if there is a Tory left to replace Annabelle Goldie, then they too should cut the crap and do something worthwhile for Scotland. Rather than portraying the country, its Parliament and its people as some Mickey Mouse entity that would die and wither if removed from the teat of the Union.

The unionist parties and their mouthpieces in the media will look stupid over this. We can only hope that in the future we don’t forget who they are.   

Since the defeat of minimum pricing in the Scottish Parliament the UK Government has announced similar plans for England and Wales, as have Stormont ministers in Northern Ireland.

Hamza al-Kateeb – 13 Years Old and Tortured to Death in Syria

If President Bashar al-Assad's and his security forces are known for anything, it is that they are and always have been, torturing, murdering bastards. In recent weeks however, they have shown the world that, even by their standards, they are psychopathic scum that seem to be totally out of control. They have opened fire on ambulances. They have gunned down unarmed teenagers. They have even shot at children on a school bus. Now they have brutally tortured to death a 13 year-old boy, Hamza al-Kateeb.

Hamza al-Kateeb loved when the rain filled farmer's irrigation channels enough for him and his friends to swim in. He raised homing pigeons. And though not from a wealthy family himself, he was acutely aware that there were others less fortunate than him. He would often ask his parents for money to give to the poor.

However, in the hands of President Bashar al-Assad's security forces, in this case the thugs of Airforce Intelligence, Hamza found no such compassion, his humanity degraded to nothing more than a lump of flesh to beat, burn, torture and defile, until the screaming stopped and his young life ended.

Hamza was arrested during a protest in Saida, 10km east of Daraa, On April 29. That day was dubbed "The Friday of Ending the siege on Deraa", the border city where the torture of children had lit the spark for the Syrian uprising and where Maher al-Assad's forces lead the assault on a civilian population that killed hundreds.

  

The child had spent nearly a month in the custody of Syrian security, and when they finally returned his corpse to his family on Tuesday 24th May it was horribly disfigured by the scars of unbelievably brutal torture.

Hamza's mutilated, castrated corpse had lacerations, bruises and burns to his feet, elbows, face and knees, consistent with the use of electric shock devices and of being whipped with cable. Both techniques of torture much favoured by Assad's henchmen and well documented by Human Rights Watch as being used in Syrian prisons during the bloody three-month crackdown on protesters.

Hamza's eyes were swollen and black and there were identical bullet wounds where he had apparently been shot through both arms, the bullets tearing a hole in his sides and lodging in his belly. On Hamza's chest was a deep, dark burn mark. His neck was broken and his penis cut off.

Make no bones about it; I want you to see what that murdering bastard al-Assad is doing in Syria. I want you to imagine the suffering of this innocent child so that scum like al-Assad can stay in power. I want you to consider what is happening in Libya and ask why the people of Syria  are not being offered the same protection. I want you to consider why the world allows such fucking scum as al-Assad and his sick bastard lackeys to live.  

Facebook    

                           

Shame by Association Is a Fallacy.

Billy and Tim are sectarian bigots. Billy and Tim are Scottish. Therefore, all Scottish people are sectarian bigots. The fact that the people involved in the attacks on Neil Lennon are Scottish is as much an irrelevance as is the colour of their hair. The idea that the actions of an individual should result in the collective guilt and “shame” of the many is an “Association Fallacy”. It is one that nobody should agree with. And its time for the vast majority of people in Scotland to reject this argument.

Background: A series of threats has been made over time to Neil Lennon the manager of Celtic Football Club, some players and three prominent fans. These have taken the form of bombs and ammunition being sent through the post. These parcels have been posted from Scotland and Northern Ireland. It is generally accepted that this campaign is motivated by religiously motivated sectarianism. Lennon was also attacked by a spectator during a game against Hearts at Tynecastle. In some quarters this has been deemed to have brought shame on the country as a whole.

Celtic chief executive Peter Lawwell has said that the attacks, threats and intimidation directed at his club is “Scotland’s shame and its high time Scotland addressed it.”
(For those, and without doubt that’s the majority who live and breath on this planet, “Scotland’s shame” is the much loved accusation levelled by Rangers and Celtic fans against each other in their endless battle to secure the moral high ground. The use of the phrase by Lawwell should therefore be seen as calculated.)

Lawwell is not alone in the opinion that these incidents should be seen as shaming an entire nation. The question asked on BBC Scotland’s phone-in programme “Call Kaye” the morning after the Tynecastle attack was, “Are you embarrassed to be Scottish?” The usual suspect package of football writers and pundits turned historians and social commentators, “look at me” journalists and politicians with season tickets for the band wagon have been unable to order a pie and Bovril in the last few days without telling the rest of us that it is somehow our fault. And no one has made this clearer than the former Secretary of State for Scotland Jim Murphy who wrote, “There are too many sectarian morons in Scottish football, but it is part of a dark underbelly that shames Scotland.”

This is based in the belief that we, including Lawwell, Murphy, et al, are somehow accountable for the actions of other individuals by association. In this case, the entire population of a country is held responsible for no other reason than that they are the population of that country.

Collective guilt, or guilt by association, is an idea that has roots in the Old Testament in such stories as “The Food”, “The Tower of Babel”, and “Sodom and Gomorrah”. However, it is an idea that most advanced systems of criminal law dismiss in favour of the principle that guilt is personal. That is the position in Scotland.

For any group to feel collective shame there must be an acceptance of collective responsibility and guilt. As such, in this case, it can only belong to a sectarian ingroup. It is doubtful, though not inconceivable, that any individual within this ingroup will view the actions as unjustifiable. However, no one outwith that ingroup can in anyway be held accountable for their actions.

Murphy’s assertion that the ingroup is the entire nation and that we collectively give approval to sectarianism is a sweeping generalisation to say the least. It may come as a surprise to Glasgow-centric commentators but, the vast majority of people in Scotland live in communities where sectarianism is not an issue. In fact for many, religion is an irrational irrelevance in their lives. There are lawmakers, law enforcers and courts to punish lawbreakers. That is how it works in a democracy. And it works that way to allow decent people to get on with their lives without having those lives sidelined by the actions of some religiously motivated retards. They quite rightly refuse to be dragged into the cesspool of intolerance that is the result of ignorance and superstition.

Sharing a social, cultural and national identity with other individuals is so inclusive that it is unreasonable to consider it in terms of an “ingroup”. Holding all Jews responsible for the death of Christ, all Germans for the actions of the Nazis, all Roman Catholic priests for a child abusing minority or all Muslims for the actions of extremists are a few examples of this. It is not difficult to see that such arguments are not only irrational but also irresponsible. Indeed, in recent times, we have been told, ad infinitum, not blame Islam for the actions of a few. No talk of a “dark underbelly” there.

There may be those in Scotland who do feel shame for some misguided reason. However, I have in the last week, taken a seriously unscientific vox-pop survey and found no one who agrees with the “Shame on Scotland” team. When asked “Do you feel ashamed by the actions of these people?” the answers were unequivocally “No. Why should I?” One other thing that they also made clear was that they found the idea that they should be held responsible to be ridiculous and offensive.

As distasteful as the attacks on Neil Lennon are, the responsibility, guilt and any shame lies with those who carried them out. No one else. And certainly not an entire nation.

And it is time the majority made this clear.

While the World Service is Cut – BBC 3 Carries on Regardless

As the cuts to  the BBC World Service results in an estimated audience drop of 30 million listeners BBC 3 continues to stimulate the intellect of Britain's youth with educational works such as “Snog, Marry or Avoid.” – a make-under concept where six inches of make up is chipped off some Oompa Loompa munter in an attempt to make her look normal. Then a decision is made as to whether you would give her one or run a mile.

This week saw the BBC World Service (WS) ended its radio broadcasts in Spanish to Latin America. Launched in 1938 to counter the propaganda of Nazi Germany and fascist Italy, many might say “So what.” But, along with the other cuts being made at the WS, this will see the audience drop by an estimated 30 million listeners. They'll go somewhere else for their news in English and that means in many cases a return to news sources that will range from the obviously biased to downright lies. And remember that the WS is important in those very areas of the world where there’s not so much a manipulation of the media rather, an outright control.

No matter what we in the UK might think about the BBC and any perceived political agendas and bias, they are by far the most and in some cases the only reliably independent and unbiased news source in many part of the globe. The news will still be available via the internet and mobile phones. But as we’ve seen of late, access to these services can be easily removed by Governments when they feel threatened.

During the Falklands War the WS journalist came under intense pressure from the then Conservative Government for retaining their objectivity.

There’s not much that BBC can do. The World Service is presently funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and they've cut the budget by 16%.

However, starting in 2014, the World Service will be funded by the license fee and if this had been the situation at present there might have been a strong case to make cuts elsewhere.  

An obvious candidate for the knife at any time is the piss-poor BBC 3.

Does anyone know what this channel's remit is?

A fanciful description can be found on their website. Decide for yourself if you think they are talking about the same channel.

Sure, we get the usual bollocks about high quality thought-provoking and original programmes but, originality doesn’t equate to quality. Not on this channel anyway. Neither is much of it innovative.

What we get under the banner of education and learning are programmes where a celebrity slapper shows some budding celebrity slappers how to put their make-up and clothes on so that they too might someday marry a pot-ugly but extremely rich footballer. Much of their so-called educational programmes are nothing more the now commonplace voyeuristic nonsense that veers from the extremes of physical disabilities to drunken tossers spewing up in the street outside some Spanish night club.

This can, is and has been seen on any number of commercial channels ad nauseum.

“The Lock Up” – drunks getting locked up.

“The World’s Strictest Parents” – where they send a couple of dysfunctional teenagers, who have promised to play up to the cameras, to spend a week with the Hitler family in Texas.

“Hotter than My Daughter” – a makeover series where a teenager is tarted up to look as daft as her mother.

“Snog, Marry or Avoid.” – makeunder concept where six inches of make up is chipped off some Oompa Loompa munter in an attempt to make her look normal. Then a decision is made as to whether you would give her one or run a mile.

Now as none of the above shows are scripted, they and many more, fall into the category of factual programming and that means educational. If one of the drunks sings you can bet they’ll file it under the “Arts”. This one supposes makes them intellectually stimulating. (A check of the programme categories on the i-player shows this a common ploy right across the BBC.) And if one of the inebriates promises never to drink again then that will no doubt be seen as fulfilling the channel’s rather Orwellian idea that they should have a role in “Sustaining citizenship and civil society”.

BBC 3 can claim no more than a handful of quality programmes. The “Mighty Bush” aside, much of that quality depends on repeats of BBC 1’s DR Who and American animation from the stable of the excellent Seth McFarlane which can also be seen elsewhere. It is not just an example of youth led television at its worst; it is an example of any kind of television at its worst. Furthermore, the fickle teenage audience that it is aimed at is greatly enhanced by its ability to reshow popular programmes from BBC 1. but because they target a specific age group they can claim success from meagre viewing figures.

The channel quite rightly continues to receive criticism from others in the industry for promising all sorts of things to get on the air and then doing whatever they like. Even after this they carry on regardless. How they get away with it remains a mystery. But, if they continue down the road of aping commercial television then their claim to the license fee will become increasingly hard to justify, if it can be justified at all. While ITV, SKY and the rest can happily go about their business on the basis that it is only TV, the pretentious guff that that emanates from the BBC will remain just that as long as they make the kind of mind-numbing crap that is BBC 3. 

On the other hand, the top brass at the Beeb get paid enormous amounts of cash to run the corporation which the rest of pay for, with the exclusion of teenagers of course, so they must know what their doing.

Chaytor – Eat Your Porridge and Shut Up.

First of all they attempted to avoid being tried in court. Spouting nonsense that because they were MPs they should be somehow be tried by their fellow crooks. But the best is kept for last.

After pleading guilty to dishonestly claiming Parliamentary expenses and getting a mere 18 moths in the pokey, which will mean he’ll be out in about half of that, former Labour MP David Chaytor has the nerve to appeal his sentence.

Chaytor, like the rest of his cronies in Parliament, was big on law and order and pandering to the “crime and punishment” agendas of the tabloids, while all the time he was stealing from the rest of us.

Using a defence of crass incompetence, most of them managed to get away with it. But, they never convinced the public that they were sorry for anything - other than getting caught. And of course many of them still can’t see that they’ve done much, if anything, wrong. When they did, they somehow thought that they shouldn’t be punished.

In a position of trust, they abused it. And if Chaytor thinks that his sentence is disproportionate to his crime then a kick up the arse with a size 10  reality boot is in order.

He might want to consider that had his sentence had been decided by public opinion the key would have been thrown away.

So he would be better to shut up, do his time and then just disappear from public view.

Forever.