Ticking the boxes
The ducks are in a row. The boxes are ticked. Choose, indeed, any cliché you fancy. It only remains to name the day for the Glenrothes by-election.
Those ducks/boxes? Firstly, Gordon Brown has strengthened his authority by reshuffling his cabinet in a manner that disarms his critics, LBJ style (think tents, think externally directed fluid).
Secondly, he has dodged the prospect of a further by-election, this time for the Holyrood seat of Jack McConnell.
Thirdly, the SNP victor in Glasgow East, John Mason, has now taken his seat in the Commons, waved on his way from the Dear Green Place by John Prescott. (At least, I think he was waving.)
Glenrothes now beckons. Few expect that it will be on any date other than 6 November. But the writ has yet to be moved. By contrast with Glasgow East, there is a distinct absence of urgency.
As to Motherwell and Wishaw, J. McConnell's seat, it has now become embroiled in shabby manoeuvring or sharp politics: delete according to taste.
You know what's happened, of course.
Jack McConnell is no longer taking up his post as High Commissioner to Malawi in the immediate future.
Instead, he's going to be a part-time envoy for the PM, working on drafting a plan for building capacity in states recovering from conflict.
No need consequently to step down from his Holyrood seat. No need for a by-election.
As I advised listeners to the wireless, the motivation for this switch is primarily political.
Labour didn't fancy a by-election in Motherwell. Right now, Labour doesn't fancy a by-election anywhere.
However, there is an authentic background to the new post. Gordon Brown has espoused the concept of capacity building.
In a 2005 speech in Edinburgh, he advocated what he called a "new Marshall plan" for the struggling nations of Africa and elsewhere.
Mr Brown has pursued that issue since, notably with the United Nations. He has now asked Mr McConnell - who similarly has an interest in this topic - to draft recommendations which would go to the UN. It's a genuine challenge.
Still and all, this is an electoral wheeze. If you're one of Labour's opponents, you might find that scandalous. If you're one of Labour's supporters, you might think: smart move, about time the party stopped beating itself up.
Will you to Scone? No, cousin, I'll to Fife.
I'm 
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~11~RS~)
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"Still and all, this is an electoral wheeze."
True, but also either a poke in the eye for the unrepresented electorate of Motherwell & Wishaw or a gesture of contempt at the worth of the Scottish Parliament.
A bit of all three, I suspect.
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no not a smart move
a bloody condescending , manipulative and duplicitous move .....on two fronts, firstly , the people of Malawi were "oh so deserving of the ...ahem ...talents of Joke Mcconnell " now , because it suits Broon he is to be diverted away from this cause .......apart from the fact Jack got himself embroiled in a Gay rights issue before he had even take up the post ...
and not to point the hypocrite finger ...Wishaw getting a part time MSP ....aye its ok when liebour do it , but not when Alex Salmond does it....
well...labour you have just shown political niavety . You dont seriously think people wont see straight through this .
There will be another election and Jack WILL lose his seat then....
mind you , as long as he takes Brigid with him , he can go to Africa and stay there
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Um, forgive my screaming ignorance this afternoon but isn't Forn Affairs a "Reserved matter".
Can Jack please explain to his electors in Motherwell and Wishaw how exactly he represents their interests in Oor Pretendy Wee Parliament by taking on this "voluntary and unpaid" position in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office ?
Does he not have enough to do in representing his constituency ?
Whether you call it Sharp Practice, Smart Move, One over the Eck or whatever, it Stinks.
It shows a contempt for the people of Motherwell and Wishaw. He's here, he's not, he'll serve his full term, he won't, he's off to Malawi, he isn't.
It shouts that Broon and NuLab, now back under the manipulation of Mandy Prince of Darkness, are scared witless of another by-election.
Would another SNP MSP change the nature of Scottish Government ? Answer = No. The SNP would still be a minority administration and still face the same problems and issues getting legislation through.
To quote ,erm, somebody, can't remember who just at the moment....
"FRIT,FRIT,FRIT"
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Who is kidding who, Gordon Brown is moving wee Jack (8 jobs) McConnell sideways to avoid a "double whammy" by election defeat.
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Chiefy1723, post 3
Another SNP MSP would change the position in Holyrood significantly, because the SNP would no longer have to rely on support from the Greens, but only from Margo.
Labour can't have improved their chances in Glenrothes any by this further demonstration of contempt.
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Shockingly transparent and Jack is being used.
Worse, he is allowing himself to be used which I find very sad indeed.
I did have some respect and a grudging sympathy for having to fight Westminster while trussed up like a chicken.
No longer!
It is an utter disgrace and a blatant attempt to keep the useless Westminster Government in power.
Aided and abetted by a fawning media as usual, where is the press that fights injustice and duplicity?Where are the investigative journalists willing to draw attention to the wrongdoers no matter who they may be?
They sure ai'nt here in Scotland with three notable exceptions, one of whom has been blackballed by that well respected and impartial broadcaster ,another has vanished from the pages of the Sunday Herald and the last is still in print.
It is to our shame that we do not behave more like the French and take to the streets to protect freedom and free speech .
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Brian,
You should really stop winding up the nats. You know how excited they get and I can hear their spit bouncing off their screens from here.
If our elected representatives are deemed by our nationalist mob as "failing their constituents" by being overseas too often, maybe His Almighty And Perfect Greatness should refrain from his regular taxpayer-funded, business class jollies around the world and just get on with his job?
Maybe we should ban all our representatives from any office or role that will detract and distract them from representing their respective constituencies?
Just a few thoughts.
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The job is allegedly unpaid.
Will he receive expenses and if so how much??
He certainly isn't doing it for the glory.
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I find the SNP's 'professional' bloggers to be currently the biggest threat to any form of democratic discussion. Ironic that Salmond recently slammed 'bloggers' who don't agree with him over the AK47 councillor - when his party members daily abuse all message boards from the comfort of their bedrooms.
It seems the nation's democracy and future are in the hands of teenagers and the unemployable, who daily hammer the boards 24/7 with t heir deluded claims and insults, and who never seem to sleep. Now why is this? Other than the fact that some of them are not and never have been Scots. Posting their bile from far-off places such as Canada - yet daily they hammer the boards with their racism and other bile.
The fact remains that the SNP is a minority party who got there by cheating. Salmond's action of putting his name on every ballot slip and thus appearing as the candidate everywhere should have voided the outcome - which in itself was dubious anyway.
Pollsters and made up stories have kept them in vogue. Must be a slow news day for you Brian if this is the best you can offer. Seems to have been that way for months. Time will put itself right.
The SNP are proving themselves utter clowns, and spending money that they don't have (such as the claim to give P1 - P3 free school meals). It is easy to give away what you don't have or can't actually provide and then shift the blame on to others when it doesn't happen. All lies from people who play populist politics - because frankly they have no substance or real policies. The SNP are Amateurs who have the affront to refer to their minority administration as the government.
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6. "It is to our shame that we do not behave more like the French and take to the streets to protect freedom and free speech"
If we did that we'd have demanded that the 2007 election which put the SNP minority administration in power was declared void and that the additional 145,000 were given another chance to cast their vote honestly and fairly.
Further we would have demanded that the SNP who refer to themselves as 'the government' stand again on that ticket - since frankly they didn't! They are not an elected government, no matter how much the chubby egotist who runs the SNP would like to think so.
The SNP stinks as a party.
BTW, how the Labour Leader runs his party is really none of your concern.
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#9
Feel free to leave when Scotland becomes independent.
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I agree with DD #6
It is political manipulation, nothing less. I'm disappointed that Jack McConnell has allowed himself to be used in this way and can only think he saw his much-wanted Malawi job (and the Peerage) disappearing permanently if he didn't agree to do as Brown wanted to avoid a by-election.
I wouldn't bank on Brown ever giving McConnell Malawi. Brown doesn't like McConnell and treated him with disdain throughout his tenure as FM.
And talking of disdain, when you consider the extreme haste in calling Glasgow East by-election due, according to Brown, that the voters must not be left without an MP, the cynical lack of concern for Glenrothes voters, it is quite simply a disgrace.
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#9 and 10 Garbeaux
Accuracy is useful when making charges.Please continue your party political rant. It will make no difference to committed supporters of any party, but will probably alienate the uncommitted.
To correct your charge on free school meals, this was written into the Concordat between the Scottish Government and COSLA
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#10 Garbage
If as below you say this--
"BTW, how the Labour Leader runs his party is really none of your concern."
Then it naturally follows that how Alex Salmond runs his party or the Scottish Government is none of your concern so you can blog off until Labour get back into power in Scotland
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#10 Garbeaux
"BTW, how the Labour Leader runs his party is really none of your concern."
Whose concern?
Should Brian, as a political journalist, not comment? or do you think that the Scottish people have no concern as to how the main opposition party run its affairs?
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#9 Garbeaux
"I find the SNP's 'professional' bloggers to be currently the biggest threat to any form of democratic discussion. Ironic that Salmond ...."
Hello newbie. And I find it ironic that you begin what I hope will be your illustrious BBC blogging career completely off-topic and not even mentioning the issue at hand.
If you have anything to say about the thread topic: McConnell or the plight of his constituents, it's usual to get that out the way first before the daggers are drawn, otherwise you'll find your rantings treated with the disdain they'll deserve.
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#9 Garbeaux
Still bitter at the fact rigging elections doesn't work for Labour anymore?
How dare people disagree with your jobs for the boys councilor mates?
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Garbeaux. Your funny.
Are you sugesting that the 145000 that couldnt fill out a ballot paper would have all voted Labour. Thats a pretty worrying claim and just a little bit insulting to the average Labour voter.
Keep posting you made me laugh.
Everyone knows that the McConnell job is a joke but it has been forgotten as the economy has had to trancend day to day politics add in the employment of Mandelson and we can all see that without the economic problems Labour would be getting slaughtered in the press.
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Jack McConnells future is really something for Jack and the electorate in Wishaw to decide apon. Presumably they were happy with his previous performance, they relected him. He probably will have as much time to devote to constituency matters now as he did as First Minister.
The way some of our bloggers are responding it will now only be a shock if the SNP don't win Glenrothes. It's in the bag man! If I were a voter in Glenrothes I wouldn't like the presumption one little bit.
Again this sideshow is detracting from real politics. Today there was an excellent programme on Radio Scotland about Mental Health In Scotland. England have Invested £170m in therapy services for sufferers, Scotland has a woeful track record on this. Such is the way of devolution, we make our choices. But do we really want free school meals or the extra half dozen policemen, or any of the other priorities against help for those vulnerable souls contemplating suicide where we have a really high rate?
That is a real political choice and we should be debating that. It should be about real peoples lives
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Garbeaux:
I see we have someone here who must have lost their seat to the Scottish National Party. I see you are complaining against the SNP-supporters who post abuse online etc but are you not in the same boat as they are for the offensive comment you posted?
Besides you are discriminating against the Nationalists by not including the abusive Unionists or Pro-England comments we see on many websites. I see Unionists posting online all day here occasionally, are they also unemployables or are Nationalists the only one in that boat?
"Other than the fact that some of them are not and never have been Scots. Posting their bile from far-off places such as Canada."
How do you know that they are not Scots? How do you define a Scot? How do you also know that the person online is actually a Nationalist and not some Unionist stirring trouble?
"The SNP are proving themselves utter clowns, and spending money that they don't have (such as the claim to give P1 - P3 free school meals)."
I am quite sure that when councils accepted the funding deal they also accepted for this policy to be included if the trials were successful, am I right? I believe you are picking little bits of facts and neglecting the whole story.
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#9, #10....
Is Garbeaux French for Rubbish?
Dearie me...
The Scots electorate cant all be wrong my friend.... (judging by all the recent opinion polls)
Finally, we have a government (minority at that) who are prepared to put Scotland and her inhabitants first and not cow-tow to a Westminister parliament that has seriously failed us over the last 80/300 years(delete as appropriate)
I know that it must hurt to watch your beloved Political Party go to the wall in a completely undignified manner, but that's life, things change and one day our country will awaken and smell the sweet air of independence and adulthood...
The freedom to make our own decisions, good and bad, but ultimately our OWN decisions...
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The Guardian claims that the Nov 6 date for Glenrothes will be confirmed tonight. I suspect it will be more difficult for the SNP than the early summer polls suggested. No doubt a new Glenrothes poll will be out soon.
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Brownedov.
the poster at 9. At 5:25pm and10. At 5:33pm is not a newbie and is in fact a pro.
if you look at his sentances you will see a professional at work and are allready using standard blogging language - BTW.
he/she could be straight out of labour party headquarters or a former user returning under a different name.
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I wonder how long it takes him to get these countries to build trams as the way forward.
This manipulation for party political gains just shows how low the democratic/dictatorship union has become at westminster. I look forward to the day with independence we have more elected MSP's with no party connections.
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Charity begins at home and Gordon Brown should remember it.
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According to Channel 4 News, Labour have found some work for Murphy to do. He'll announce the Glenrothes by election on Nov 6 tomorrow.
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surely not a LABOUR MSP having time to do 2jobs like the first minister.can the labour party please explain how it is okay for them but not for snp msp.
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i believe that the malawi government told GB that they did not want jack o'scoundrel to be the high commisioner.
so since then GB has been scouting around for a post for jack the lad, as it was part of his payment to stand down as labour leader in the scottish parliament to make way for bendy wendy.
i bet now that GB wishes he had not interfered now with the demise of wendy.
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There now follows a lesson in basic mathematics for #5, agentmancuso
Current makeup of Scottish Parliament (129 MSPs => Majority = 65)
SNP 47
Labour 46
Cons 17
Lib Dems 16
Greens 2
Margo 1
Should Motherwell and Wishaw fall to the SNP, this would make it
SNP 48
Labour 45
Cons 17
Lib Dems 16
Greens 2
Margo 1
Or in other words, even with Margo, 16 short of a majority and still a minority administration and having to compromise and broker deals.
And like it or not, that's how the votes turned out. Donald Dewar, rest his specs, set the Parly up to make absolutely sure that Labour and the Liberals were in permanent coalition and that the SNP were reduced to bit-part players, God save The Union. In the unlikely event of a Tory Government, Labour would always have a power base to strike from.
I digress. My contention therefore is valid that, realistically, another SNP MSP does not change the landscape.
Back to Quantico, my boy. I can recommend a few good basic Maths primers.
HOWEVER, Should NuLab front up and pack Jack off to Malawi (and maybe even give Wendy time off for good behaviour so she can get off to her Professorship) , the POLITICAL damage that the loss of M+W (+/or Paisley North) to an SNP swing would be almost incalculable ON TOP OF a loss (to either Liberals or SNP) in the constituency next door to the UK Prime Minister.
You can almost hear Mandy sharpening the knives from here. Anyone for an internicine power struggle in NuLab ?
Incidentally, did anyone else notice that the Stock market went down today even more than it did on Black Wednesday ? If NuLab keep blaming Lamont for that, isn't it time that Broon And Darling held their hands up ?
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"Glenrothes by-election date set"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7655805.stm
Guy Fawkes MK2
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#23 vote_nat
I quite agree, but if you click on the user name you'll see only those 2 posts, so possibly one of the few NuLab posters on the newspaper sites. Nothing after 6pm so could be a NuLab worker bee.
Not a drone as it responded with a quote in #10, but could be a change of moniker from an "old" poster. The style doesn't ring any bells with me.
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Well at least Garbeaux, or garbage has brought some fun back into blogging...
The accusations about an electoral fix had me laughing almost as much as the night Magrat Curran's "fightback" turned into an utter rout - or was that a fix too?
I agree with Browndov #31 that he is indeed a Nu-Labour agent. Wasn't there something on an earlier thread about the dirty tricks department getting ready to counter-attack on the bogs?
And of course up he pops just before the announcement that the Glenrothes by-election will indeed be on November 6
Co-incidence... nah
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Hallo rerr! The sprog is sprung. Reports of the Glasgow East by-election result having been scrutinized, analyzed and verified, and having been deemed by the Pimploid authorities to accord with the improbable but occasionally accepted improbability theory according to which anything credibly deemed to be so improbable that to all intents and purposes it should be considered that it cannot possibly happen in a million billion trillion aeons is, virtually infallibly, thereby rendered so much less improbable that it now probably will happen, the primitiveness rating of your dotty little blue thing, otherwise and still not terribly appealingly known as the planet Earth, has been accordingly revised so that I am once more free to roam the galaxy in the spirit of enquiry, shining a beam of radiant light into the darkest recesses of rebarbative obtuseness, incompetence and dubious goings on. But enough of the Labour Party.
The Scottish Labour bubble having burst (I heard it bursting on the planet Pimple), one should allow the poor misbegotten apparatchiks a period of reflection to assess the cataclysm and at least try to pick up the pieces. Such a pity for them that there are so many pieces scattered about. I perceive that they have endeavoured to make a start, what with the putative next High Commissioner to Lilongwe, wherever that may be, having been confined to the Great Rift Valley of Wishaw and a party hack with no substantive career experience outside politics having been despatched to suppress the native revolt north of Hadrian's Wall. This could take some time.
Anyway, I heard on the inter-galactic grapevine that there was to be another of those incomparable if somewhat mystifying Scottish by-election things, which have attracted an equally mystifying cult following on my planet, and so have made a bee-line for the constituency. They said I should leave you poor souls alone, as you still were not ready for me yet. But you know how it is: as soon as they tell you not to do something, it is like a red rag to a bull. Anyway, I gather that numerous beyond enumeration are the Earthlings who have been missing me and wondering wanly what can possibly have become of me. So here I am.
Seriously, I was naturally sorry to learn of the passing of the respected legislator whose constituency this was and am troubled by what I have heard of the circumstances in which it occurred. For the present, however, my attention is focused on the constituency.
Without further ado, as you Earthlings say, I must just adjust my universal translator to take account of the dialectal-variability factor that I neglected to allow for sufficiently on my first close encounter with the aliens of Glasgow East. And what an experience that was. So, having established that the current by-election is in a place called Fife (which, unlike Gaul, is divided into two parts rather than three, a relatively upmarket part in the east and in the west the part where Glenrothes is), I have fed in various local expressions such as the disturbingly perplexing one about it taking "a lang spune tae sup wi' a Fifer" together with, for pronunciation purposes, a selection of local place names such as Kilconquhar, and St Monans (formerly St Monance until its SNP councillor got it changed back to its original form), which place names, improbable though it may seem, turn out to be pronounced locally, at least by some, in a way that you could not possibly predict in a million billion trillion aeons (Kinnuchar and Saint Mince, would you believe?). Accordingly, the universal translator is shutting itself down to sleep on the problem for a while. So I must too.
Toodloothenoo.
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I never thought much of Jack as a First Minister and I certainly don't think much of the party he represents, but on this occasion I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and wish him all the best in a part time roll that if he can make a difference in then he'll have achieved something worthwhile.
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#9 Garbeaux
Hi there Garbeaux. A few points, just to let you know that I'm not an SNP member but voted for them and sympathetic.
I might be considered unemployable but only because I've run my own company for some years, not because I don't work!
As for posting at odd hours, well, I also have a sleepless child who makes postin g patterns somewhat erratic.
But what's any of that got to do with the price of a loaf? I can't possibly see how that makes me or whatever circumstances someone else posts in a threat to democracy.
On topic now. I've met Jack McConnell dozens of times and he's a genuinely nice and committed man. He does believe strongly in his vision for Africa, Malawi in particular. And isn't someone who strikes me as interested in personal wealth out of all this. I wish him well in pursuing this line of work which he will be good at. However, the political fix that surrounds this smells bad because it's really "off".
Never mind that his constituents are being short changed, what about the Malawians? Don't they deserve soemone working full time for them now?
All three jobs should be treated seriously, MSP, special envoy and Commissioner. That means that each should be properly resourced by people committed to them. Not half arsed part time nonsense.
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brian you said that However, there is an authentic background to the new post.
brian naw there isnae.
its a made up post and if jack ever does a stroke of work for it i will be very suprised in fact it may be worth a wee foi request about his expenses seeing as the job is "unpaid and voluntary". Why didnt you explain that bit brian.
so its a case of
little jack mcconel
sitting in no 10 corner
eating his humble pie.
he pulled out a job
and gordon said
take it you clod, we are stuffed.
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SNP types come off it. When the SNP dips in the opinion polls I have no doubt that a certain Mr Salmond will play the same games. Then again the SNP are good at wanting things both ways. No signs of banging heads (SNP idea) together by Mr Salmond to sort out the rail strike! Maybe Mr Salmond is "frit" when it comes to dealing with Mr Crow!
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#32 Caledonian54
"Wasn't there something on an earlier thread about the dirty tricks department getting ready to counter-attack on the bogs?"
There were plenty of one-time NuLab posters just before the week-end on the NR threads, but it all went strangely quiet over the week-end. Funny, that.
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So, who's taking bets on how long it takes Ditherer Brown to guarantee all savings after the near breaking point in the markets today?
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#32 Caledonian54
Looks like we have another of the same ilk at #37, but at least it has the good grace to admit that NuLan are playing games.
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Notice Brian included a comment on John Prescott's reaction to the SNP boo boys or perhaps boo girls as there seemed to be more strident female voices than males - nice to see there is one politician who treats this type of person with the contempt they deserve and totally ignores the politically correct attitude - I thorouighly enjoyed it when he thumped the idiot who smashed the egg (not threw it as I have seen in some of the press who are trying to re-write history), into his face - keep up the good work John - you may not be the most clever of guys but your attitude in these instances is to be greatly admired.
As for jack McConnell's new post I think this is a major mistake but Labour are in a cleft stick and from what I hear from my friends in the Hamilton area any result from the surrounding district is likely to be as bad for them as Glasgow East.
When New Labour took power they drove away many of their core supporters, the very people who campaigned for them during the bad years, and this has come back to haunt them. Since then they have written off the pensioners other than the poorest and, as we are the people who always vote, they are now paying for that as well.
Just as long as the SNP deliver on their Council tax promises myself, and I suspect, thousands like me will continue to support them.
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does this make me a midnight blogger?
Try this for size...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMi776jah1w
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Noticed that McConnell said that "he had also received "considerable representations" from people in Motherwell and Wishaw asking him to stay on as an MSP. "
I'm sure he had, from every Labour activist and councillor (N Lanarkshire Labour Councillors could never be described as active).
Anyway, I'm now away to listen to a popular beat combo before cashing my Giro this afternoon, being an unemployable teenager. Or am I a 42 year-old IT Consultant working on a client database. I'm confused now!
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Had a long lie-in this morning - unfortunately only on US time!
A couple of interesting articles in this morning's Press which may indicate that the UK parties may have finally woken up to the new realities of Scottish politics.
Garbeaux posting from an out of date script It's a small point, but Murphy accepting that the term "Scottish Government" is OK to use seems to suggest that Labour is finally beginning to move beyond their "state of denial" at being out of Government.
Aunty Annabel may have pointed out some basic geography to Cameron - there is a tract of land between Leeds and the Scottish border! Regardless of which party is in power north and south of the border, in whatever constitutional structure, common planning for strategic issues like the high speed rail link to Europe will do nothing but good for Scotland.
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Old_nat .... Murphy 'He insisted Scotland was better off as part of the UK, the world's fourth-biggest economy and with a Scottish Prime Minister and Scottish Chancellor leading the world in finding ways through the current economic climate.' I dont think some of out friends down south will like that....will probably fuel resentment ..... also it must be true what AS said that we should be the best country in the world as opposed to the best small country in the world. .... a wee joke i know but obviously its gone to someones head when they think that were bigger and better than the States at handling the financial crisis .... i doubt if dubya listened much to GB.....
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oldnat your #26 seemed a trifle cynical for you, after all the man is only doing as management require him to.
I think with your #44 you are taking it at face value as I would suggest that despite his "Scottish Government" ploy it is either a red herring designed to make it look as if Westminister actually cares or he will be forced to apologise to GB for even considering using the term government when it applies to Hollyrood.
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Your quotation from 'the Scottish play' is very apt Brian considering it involves an unpopular leader who over reached himself, alienated the population ,was deserted by his toadies and was finally dethroned by honest Scots with a rightful cause.
Was this a rallying cry?
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#42 i laughed so much i nearly forgot to put the kids on the school bus ... pure class !!
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Mc Connel is now in a dark place , out of harm's way. Will he find himself with a cosy number in Malawi after the next election ? Very doubtful. All Brown requires him to do now is turn up at Holyrood when his vote is required. If Jack McConnel had an ounce of self respect and integrity he would have told Brown where to insert his " Marshall plan " and resigned. Why else is he hanging around, the best he can hope for now is a knighthood or a job with Glasgow city council. Neither would be deserved after the machinations he has allowed himself to become embroiled in. He certainly fits Burns' "rogue " , no love of country here.
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Most entertaining. The newly part-time Mr McConnell is to be berated for being part-time but apparently not Mr Salmond.
Part-timing your elected post is not acceptable in my book - for either of them.
And here's a wee thought. Is Jack going to receive another salary for doing this part time Envoy role? If so will he be disbursing it around his constituency through some "charitable" body in honour of his dear old mum?
I think we should be told.
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The moderators appear to be very sensitive these days so I will pick my words with great care.
My olofactory organs detect a whiff of medium sized rodent! "Garbeaux"...nice post, I almost believed it. Then I thought...hey, doesn't some highly provocative piece always pop up around 9 or 10 (pedants please check back-numbers because I can't be bothered) which then provokes a torrent of abusive counter-posts from the bedroom-based, lectures missing nationalist team. Could they really be posting this stuff themselves to "up the ante" and bring out their support?
Then I thought...hey "Garbeaux"...wasn't he a famous WWII double agent (different spelling I know) who deceived the Nazis over Operation Overlord and the V-Weapons? Could there be a link? Alternatively Garbeaux could be a very genuine person, in which case I apologise and have to say that I've read so much paranoia in Brian's blog that it's definitely catching
On that theme...I've just heard that when the BBC plays Bing Crosby's White Christmas, all the Unionist MSPs will retire to the roof of Holyrood to be evacuated by helicopter to aircraft carriers waiting in the Firth of Forth before the Viet-Nat storm the building;-)
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I just read Brian's previous blog and saw that I got a pasting from "the oil will last forever" people. By the time I had a chance to reply (work and all that) the blog seemed to have closed
Gt-cri....on reflection I may have been wrong. My neighbour has a friend who used to know a chap who worked offshore as a caterer and apparantly he said that there was loads of oil left. How silly of me...all those years studying and the professional experience totally wasted. I should have been offshore frying Mars Bars.
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51 For all we know you could be somebody here to rile up the SNP supporters yourself....besides my pc is in the kitchen and the last lecture i went to was at a UFO convention in Falkirk about 12 years ago !!! Surely there is no point in activists posting on here .... they have been very childish and will only read by a small amount of voters anyway ...so rather pointless other than to liven up the post.... cheers
ps Greetings_Earthling ..... i suspect i know you .... Work slow at the papermill in Aberdeen ?? Could be wrong and perhaps you are some Pan Galactic Traveller and if so apologies.
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#42 irnbru_addict
Highly amusing, if somewhat coarse.
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#53 Rabbiehippo
Doesn't keeping the PC in the kitchen mean that it gets covered in a thin film of grease?
I fear that you are correct. Originally I stumbled upon Brian's blog about Scottish Politics (it being a slow day on the Somerset County Council "Have yer Zay" site). At first I was outraged by some of the stuff, mostly a self-satisfied, mildly racist love-in by the self-convinced...I had to respond, if only to put a few people straight on issues of history, economics and hydrocarbon accounting...without any particular axe to grind.
I got shouted down by a sort of baying cyber-mob and buried in blizzard of partisan opinion. Frequently I was in receipt of numerous links to odd websites that apparantly backed up everything that my critic was trying to expound while exposing me a dupe of various big conspiracies. I responded that "while you shouldn't believe everything you read in the newspapers, they are a pinnacle of truth and wisdom compared to the internet".
Then the obfuscation started, with demands for documentary proof of any statement...and there was me thinking that this was a venue for good-faith opinion. The pedants were in town.
And then I found that I couldn't stop. I had to blog on this minority interest site. Scottish politics is quite boring really. I only dropped in originally because I used to live in Scotland, travel there frequently and still have many friends. So you could say that I'm interested, but even Brian struggles to write something stimulating half of the time. But the subject is largely irrelevant and each blog usually kept up its own private little dialogue of the deaf.
So what to do? I had to blog but couldn't think of anything sensible to say on the subject that I hadn't said before. Any attempt to raise the realpolitik of the independence issue was quickly moderated out. So I just resorted to zealot-baiting. Single issue types are generally very underdeveloped in the funny-bone department and provide a fertile ground for the odd tongue in cheek post. It's funny and depressing at the same time to see how many take it seriously.
So here I am chucking rocks...court jester or reality check on the self-convinced...who knows or cares. I'm reminded of an old Private Eye cartoon (sorry can't provide reference) in which, as so often, one dog is talking to another... saying "I used to write a blog, but recently I've just gone back to barking aimlessly in the dark!"
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#51, well......it takes an AngloPhoney to spot a phoney (Greetin Garbeaux) nice work. By the way you can pass that conspirecy theory about 'upping the ante' on to expat he's keeping count. Unionists on the roof, I suppose they could do with a night on the tiles.
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#55 'thin film of grease' hey maybe in your kitchen ... its probably just in your head that we live on fish and chips and deep fried mars bars..... but some of us scots are quite healthy thank you very much
Going by the length of your blogs id say you have quite a lot of time on your hands....perhaps your talents are wasted on here ..... aha i have it .. you are actually JK Rowling !!!! go on make the blogs interesting add wizards and dragons etc to the stuff you write .... or maybe its Mills and Boon novels you do and ive got your persona all wrong. Cheers
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#53 Rabbiehippo
I love your posts. You keep them short, succinct, yet still strangely unintelligible. Maybe the Buchan accent doesn't translate well into the written word;-)
I'm well aware that many Scots are healthy people. I ran in the Highland Cross 5 times and there were some were some tartan whippets in that for sure. The mars bars thing is a myth but can you still get those funny pies you used to see expiring in the heated cabinet in chip shops? But the general health issues facing the Scottish population are undeniable...in fact, possibly the only way that an independent Scotland will be able to punch above its weight in future;-)
I do know of Aberdeen paper mill but I think that you've got the wrong person somehow and I doubt I know you or vice versa. I can however confirm that I am not affiliated to any political party and I only blog under one name.
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57 RabbieHippo
Who knows, maybe I am JK Rowling minus the enormous fortune. The only dragon that appears in these blogs is the the "westmonster" referred to by people who believe that if they repeat something enough it will magically become funny.
Maybe JK, based the whole thing on the goings on in Edinburgh...you know, Westminster as the Ministry of Magic, Gordon Brown as the Minister for Magic and Des Browne as his Dolores Umbridge. Alex Salmond as Voldemort...vanished for years before resurfacing following some clever wizardry i.e. standing in every constituency. Tam Dayell would be Dumbledore...the one who asked the West Lothian "Elder Question", Wendy Alexander as Hermione "bring it on" Granger. This requires more thought.
If you haven't seen it before (loved the GB as Hitler video by the way), look up "Teenage Angst" on the Potter Puppet Pals. They have quite the curse for you...pantalonius poopicus!
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Anglophone.. the reason i dont bother with much punctuation or whatever is because to me this is simply a blog, not O level English (am i showing my age here or does it still exsist) and beside it probably gets binned after a few months.
The paper mill post was aimed at Greetings_Earthling that is unless that is really you .... there are a lot of funny (in more ways than one) on this blog ... anyway got to go ... cheers
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#52- Anlgophone espoused: "Gt-cri....on reflection I may have been wrong. My neighbour has a friend who used to know a chap who worked offshore as a caterer and apparantly he said that there was loads of oil left. How silly of me...all those years studying and the professional experience totally wasted. I should have been offshore frying Mars Bars."
Tee-Hee, I must remember to pass that on to my neighbour; the leader of the Sub-Sea Team, for a major field (I'll leave it to you to guess whether I'm being sarcastic, with the "pretty-major"). You'll have to take my word for his credentials, as I wouldn't want to bring him into this!
Your experience cannot be vouched for, unless, as others in your claimed discipline do regularly, you have authored papers in particular areas of your profession? We await the CV with breath held....
Funny how I don't seem to be able to find any claim by myself to have any informed prediction of how long I can be employed in the North Sea? Perhaps all those trips spent in the poorly-ventilated shaker-room, collecting samples, have robbed you of some brain-cells, if not your vitriol.
Anyhoo, the second-rate parliament-followers can quite happily rely on other people to provide anecdotal evidence to counter your own and, as you say, they don't appear to be ready to listen, silly neanderthals!
As posted on the "now-closed" blog you mention, I checked your contributions to all BBC blogs and can confirm you like to bait but cannot find any posts which can be proven by fact; beit from cyberspace, or in print. "Fights and empty-rooms", again!
We do have names in our parrochial little blog, for chaps of your ilk, normally pre-fixed by "Trip-Trap"!
To my learned fellow posters, I say don't rise to it, you're only encouraging him! Do what we do offshore- talk over, around and through him; he'll pour his tea down the sink shortly and go back to "work"- sniffing rocks!
;->
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