Sancho Swinney Rides Again

John Swinney, having failed to achieve his key policies of LIT or SFT, is resorting to the old distraction strategy. He has resurrected the old faithful "oil fund" bandwagon. The bold steed Oil Fund is a trusty mount from which to rally the SNP faithful when all else fails but, viewed in reality, it's a spavined old nag with knock knees and a mouldy main.

In most years, to achieve the level of spending in Scotland that is achieved using the Barnett Formula, an independent Scotland would have nothing left to invest in its mythical oil fund. It's our old Nationalist friend again: spend the same money ten different ways and never mind the harsh realities.

Look here....

Mr Swinney is, it seems, also misrepresenting (if that's the word) the findings of the Calman Commissoin, much to the disgruntlement of Lord Calman himself....

and here

Look here....

It's no' Cricket. And we don't hate the English...

t's no' Cricket. And we don't hate the English...
What a bunch of narrow-minded, whingeing, moaning, greetin', prats are the SNP. If you think that's a bit harsh, see what you make of this:http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/39Over-the-top-Ashes-coverage.5452103.jpApparently SNP MSP Sandra White is enraged at the amount of cricket on TV in Scotland.... That's right cricket, y'know yon English game that no self-respecting Scot would dream of watching, never mind playing because.. well... it's English isn't it. Not that we're racist or anything like that, mind you. But you have to admit it is English (except it's played on every continent by white, black, brown, yellow and people of all colours, creeds, races and religions you may wish to name....)....Aye but, the English play it...But, wait a minute, interest in and participation in, cricket has increased in Scotland in recent years. Latest figures show that 18,000 pupils across Scotland play cricket while there are 12,000 members playing at club level. I'm sure the 2005 Ashes series had a lot to do with this increase in popularity. Whatever. Ms White is so unhappy at us watching English cricket that she has lodged a motion in the Scottish Parliament moaning about the "airtime given to the series on terrestrial channels".Actually, the Test series is being broadcast live on Sky Sports, there is no live coverage on terrestrial TV where coverage is limited to highlights and news reports. The watching of the series is voluntary. In fact as its on Sky, you have to pay extra for the privelege. But the SNP attitude is always: why let the facts get in the way of a good grievance..??Anyway, she was supported by her SNP colleague, Bill Wilson. The MSP for the West of Scotland argued that the coverage was as incongruous in Scotland as World Cup campaigns by the England football team.Four years ago, SNP MP Christine Grahame dubbed prominent BBC news coverage of England's Ashes victory as "insulting" to the world's poor and starving. She got her comeuppance in a Times article which pointed out that the audience for the 2005 ashes in Scotland amounted to more people who had voted SNP at the 2005 election... here....http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6670424.eceSeriously folks. How can it be that such boneheaded, ignorant, prejudiced, downright bitter, thinly-veiled anti-English nonsense can get any traction at all in a so-called major political party? It's a disgrace that such beliefs are held and sentiments expresed by our representatives. Heaven help us if they ever actually get to run the country..........
Posted by Braveheart at 06:10
Labels: Cricket, Scottish Politics, SNP

4 comments:
Anonymous said...
Why don't you Labour Party trolls in the Scottish Parliament Labour Group do some work rather than spend your days writing this crap. No wonder you are in terminal decline.
14 July 2009 09:27

Braveheart said...
Hello anon.Don't know who you think I am, but you're way wrong man.Usually the cybernats on these blogs start kinda friendly like, trying to address the post with their barrage of prepared positions and rehearsed arguments. Then, as they begin to lose the argument they get a bit shirty, then finally aggressive and nasty. You've gone straight to the aggressive and nasty. Suppose it saves time. I was going to delete this comment because it says nothing, doesn't address the subject, is pretty pointless and is unduly aggressive.Then I thought: well, it's the normal SNP position. So I left it in.If you actually want to address the point about your MPs and MSPs knee-jerk anti-English bile, please do so. If not, well, nobody will be surprised. After all it's the standard position for the standard SNP supporter.
15 July 2009 00:44

Jim said...
Although I agree with you entirely on the cricket and the poverty of spirit displayed by the named SNP MSPs, will you be pointing out the weaknesses of all politicians or will this be a blog entirely devoted to anti-SNP rants?I'm fairly comfortable with an Independent Scotland, a Federal UK or even a prosperous Scotland within the union - I just aspire to a better Scotland than we currently have. I'm pretty comfortable with the SNP running the show, but I do wish there was a more constructive opposition. Jim
29 July

Spending our money for their ends... again..

The SNP doesn't seem at all shy at spending our money for their party political advantage. In an earlier post I pointed out that the so-called National Conversation is really an SNP campaign masquerading as a public consultation and paid for by the Scottish taxpayer not, as it should be, the SNP. And the re-branding of the Scottish Executive as the Scottish "Government" which, although it has no legal force, cost us (not the SNP) £100,000. And the Homecoming advert, cost £200,000, but no plans to show it abroad to attract any "homecomers", just a bit of subliminal SNP advertising, to be shown in Scotland.

Now Alex Salmond is to be investigated by Parliament for claiming legal expenses incurred by the SNP agianst his personal Parliamentary expenses.

http://www.theherald.co.uk/politics/news/display.var.2519747.0.Probe_into_Salmonds_use_of_expenses_in_bid_to_impeach_Blair.php

On the face of it, asking for a QC's opinion in the hope that you might get some ammunition to attack your political opponents looks like something you pay for yourself. If you get the opinion you want, you can then think about getting the taxpayer to fund court or criminal actions. But if you get an opinion you don't want, too bad. The risk has not paid off, you've wasted your money. And that's the point: it should be the SNP's money at risk, not the public's.

It seems Alex Salmond thinks differently. So are we to assume that, in an independent Scotland, political parties could go on fishing expeditions in a shoal of legal opinion, hoping to net something that would discredit their opponents. If you find it, so good. If not, never mind, the Scottish taxpayer will foot the bill. Not exactly the type of moral climate I would like to see. Nor anyone else, I would suggest.

What Price the "Nationalist Conversation"?

The Herald has a report today on the cost of the so-called "National" conversation. It appears that you and me have been charged £500,000 by Alex Salmond so that he can travel around Scotland on an SNP publicity campaign.

If the national conversation was truly national it would be between all the politicians and the people. The SNP version, surprise surprise, consists of SNP politicians travelling round the country speaking to small groups in church halls and community centres. Nothing wrong with that, you might say: political parties should take their message to the public. And you would be right, but the corollary is that political parties should use their own money to spread their own message, they should not use taxpayers money to spread party political propaganda.

Think of the uproar from the SNP if the other parties were spending taxpayers millions having rallies in support of the union of the UK. The volume of the whinging would be deafening....

Of course this SNP administration has a history of using public money for party political ends: think of the re-branding of the Scottish Executive (the legal entity) as the "Scottish Government". There is no such formal or legal body as the Scottish Government, but it cost us £100,000 just to change the headed notepaper at Holyroood so SNP Ministers could use the word "government".

Or the so-called "Homecoming", the centrepiece of which was an advert, made at a cost of £200,000, which has been shown more often in Scotland than anywhere abroad. Indeed it was only shown on the American Public Broadcast Channel after it was revealed that there had been no plans whatsoever to show it at all in the USA.

It is interesting that the SNP can fail to build even one school in two years, fail to deliver its SFT and its LIT, and all the other policies it has failed to deliver, but yet be so efficient at spending our money to subsidise its own party political campaigns.

Isn't that type of behaviour, in honesty and when done in other countries, called political corruption?