Sunday 23 September 2018

Is It Just Me?

I have followed different Facebook, normal media and blogger trails today and I am left just wonder how stupid Unionists are?

On BBC I watched as a hostile BBC interviewer tried to tell an expert on trade deal that he was wrong because the "British People" had voted to leave the EU. He pointed out the easiest trade deal would take two years if Canada or Australia played ball. He made it clear, outside of the Commonwealth, trade deals would take a minimum of ten years with all the penalties of trade surcharges and add on costs UK SME's and multinationals will incur simply to deal with customers in the EU, let alone the rest of the world. Instead of stopping and asking real questions on the real cost of Brexit, the stupid interviewer carried on on their inane Tory scripted questions on the "democratic will of the people of Britain". The expert continued to tell her in a calm voice that the UK Government's promise on a post Brexit trade was total bullshit, like Teresa May she was unable to change her view, it was totaly cringe worthy.

I then followed Richard Leonard's attempt to to make Labour's fastest U-turn on a future Scottish referendum vote with him telling reporters he was going to make the "SNP Toxic" at the Labour Conference, a Labour conference where he is so insignificant he does not even have a platform.

I listened with interest as Tory MP and gook after Tory MP and gook tried to tell us the Brexiteers had the EU on the ropes and they would come to see "Tory sense on the issue " as opposed to the reality that the Tories and their Brexit supporters are the laughing stock of Europe and are now in a hole so deep they will not see day light until they hit New Zealand.

Then I found an article on the parlous state of the armed service close to my heart, the Royal Navy, which since 1977, when I joined as a Sub Lieutenant, has been hollowed out to the point there can be only two Type 45 Destroyers at sea at any time, if all six are actually operational. This means the new carriers will not have an effective close anti surface or air protection, given there are only potentially five frigates operational for anti-submarine close protection at any one time. Please tell me, just how can the Tories and their Unionist supporters claim Scotland is better defended by staying in the UK Union when the reality is the Spanish Fishing fleet could strip UK waters of all white fish with no naval presence available nor air surveillance, thanks to other Tory cuts on maritime aviation assets. Yep, after Brexit I am certain the Tories will not be able to protect the UK fishing industry from predation by the rest of Europe's and Russia's fishing fleets. I just do not know how with out ships or air surveillance. Maybe they will bring back privateers and "letters of marke" to do the job the Royal Navy Fishery Patrol used to do.

Then there is the small issue of major employers like Jaguar, Honda, Nissan getting ready to bugger off and the inevitable destruction to their UK suppliers and the knock on effect on ordinary people, many who bought the anti-EU / immigrant crap in the first place from their Sun, Mirror or Daily Mail.

Then there is the small problem of the growing exodus of financial companies from the "City of London", the continuing drop in value of the pound sterling, the 12% reduction in the UK's GDP and the reduction of UK wages by 15% in real terms since 2010. There is the worse state pension in the EU to consider and yet Scotland is "better off in the UK Union" according to the Leonard's, Davidson's and "What's his name?" of the "What are they called again?" party.

Is it just me but how long can any thinking individual in Scotland believe the shite we are being fed from Westminster from the Tory, Etonian clique who are robbing Scotland and the rest of the UK's taxpayers blind while running up a massive Trillion pound national debt as they go, that the UK is the best deal for Scotland?

Thursday 13 September 2018

Hello Darkness, My Old Friend.

For some reason I found myself humming the "Boxer" by Simon and Garfunkel when the following words just popped into my head:

".. for a pockets full of mumbles; such are promises.
All lies and jest;
But a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest"


Then I thought, Peter, that describes the Brexiteers and the hapless Tory Government's present position. All they have left to offer the UK as a whole and Scotland, in particular, is a pocketful of 'mumbles' - 'all lies and jest'.

The problem remains in Scotland is while fewer and fewer are listening to the 'mumbles' there are still too many hearing only what they 'want to hear', many have a big hurdle to cross as to agree the promises have no foundation means they have to give up on their certainty of the "Union" being best for Scotland, give up on long held beliefs based on their view of Westminster as a kindly hand, looking out for Scotland's best interests as Scotland could never manage to look out for itself.

They cling to the belief the EU is the bogeyman who wrecked farming, fishing, closed down UK manufacturing and caused the collapse of their pension funds with all its red tape. Now all that is left is the financial sector in the 'City of London' and now even that is under threat from EU regulations on tax havens.

It is this intense isolationism in the face of all the evidence which stuns me. It was Thatcher's government which destroyed the UK's industrial base, Ted Heath's Tories sold the fishing industry down the river, as did Thatcher and Major's Tory Governments for behind the scenes "deals" in Brussels. It is the current Tory Government of Ms May which as skimmed off EU funding which was supposed to come to support Scottish Farmers on marginal lands. £160 million has been pissed against the wall by Mr Gove and his chums at DEFRA for no apparent benefit to farming, full stop. Then there is the most, I struggle for a word to define the criminality of successive Westminster Governments since 1972, appalling robbery of all. Just why is Scotland (which produces more oil and gas than Bahrain or Qatar) seeing such levels of poverty in what is a very rich, small nation. Just why is Scotland being made to pay for Crossrail, London's new sewers, HS2 or the Heathrow extension, all of which have negligible, if any, economic benefit for Scotland?

Why are we paying for a nuclear weapon the Scottish people have rejected and want out of Scotland? Not only our supposed "share" of the new weapon's estimated costs but what ever the actual build and operating cost comes out at. The project is already in difficulties because the launch tubes so far delivered have been found to be faulty and returned to Lockheed-Martin delaying the build. Let alone the fact the USA stops any up dating of the Trident system the UK is "purchasing" in 2025 to concentrate on its joint services nuclear program. The USA expects all its Trident systems, currently embarked, to be decommissioned by 2050. This leaves the question of whether the USA will keep the current Trident targeting satellites in orbit after this date. More "pockets full of mumbles".

Even the most Brexiteer, isolationist Unionists can see the fundamental truth that Scotland is being robbed and ruined to prop up Westminster's failed state but they just can not let go of the idea that an independent Scotland would do no better,  in their view, Scotland would do worse. 


"Hello darkness, my old friend.." indeed.