Oh dear

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 girlymonkey 09 Feb 2021

Johnson has announced that he is "very confident" in our vaccines. 

I was feeling quite optimistic until this bit of news! 

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 Blue Straggler 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

I thought you declared that you had a skill at being enthusiastic about everything. You know what they say about a stopped clock. 

4
OP girlymonkey 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Blue Straggler:

> I thought you declared that you had a skill at being enthusiastic about everything. You know what they say about a stopped clock. 

Oh yes, very enthusiastic about my hatred of Johnson!!

Stopped clocks; I think they say they are useless?! 😜

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In reply to Blue Straggler:

I first learned about stopped clocks from Spike Milligan's Puckoon.

In reply to girlymonkey:

> Oh yes, very enthusiastic about my hatred of Johnson!!

> Stopped clocks; I think they say they are useless?! 😜

You're one of the many full-on lefty types on here; I thought "hate" was off the menu -- a crime even in many cases just to use the wrong words to the wrong person. So, I'd be interested if you could expand a bit on this hate you have towards the elected PM of our democracy during a time of national crisis. Do you think it appropriate, on reflection, to post you "hate" him? I realise it may have just been a not-too-serious off-the-cuff response, but maybe not, and yes I realise you are legally free to say you "hate" him as he doesn't tick any of the boxes which say you can't. There again, perhaps if you analyse this very very carefully you may be getting close to the mark in spirit, if not in law. You posted in another thread that you were unaware, until recently, of something that I thought was fairly common general knowledge. Nothing wrong with that, we're all learning as we go along (hence this post), but considering that recent hole in your knowledge, have you tried factoring that in to your decision to "hate"? Perhaps there are things you aren't aware of or don't understand which might change that decision? 

Whilst I'm on the subject, although I have many lefty-friendly opinions myself, this extreme cultural hatred of anything Tory seen amongst people on this forum and within the more Corbyn-leaning element of Labour party I find a real good reason not to vote Labour. For most reasonable people it comes over as bad as Trump and the QAnon nutters. 

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 marsbar 09 Feb 2021
In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

The man has overseen the death of 100000 + people while giving contracts and tax payers money to his mates.  He was too busy with his personal life to chair cobra meetings.  

I think you are confusing hate from prejudice with hate for a reason.  

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In reply to marsbar:

You post a reply like that and it's hardly worth the effort to respond.

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 Richard Horn 09 Feb 2021
In reply to marsbar:

Macron has overseen the deaths of 80,000, is he hateful or mere dislikeful? I think Italy is pretty much on a par with UK in mortality rate so Conte must be really bad? What about Sanchez?

... and what would your opinion be of Corbyn hypothetically if he had been PM and assuming (very likely) we still had 100k deaths?

Post edited at 09:59
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OP girlymonkey 09 Feb 2021
In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

It was indeed a slightly off-the-cuff remark.

I largely ignore him as an irrelevance, but given his track records for this pandemic, and indeed Brexit, I found his statement worthy of a slightly cheeky comment which I think most took in the right sentiment! Obviously, the efficacy of the vaccines is something I will listen to the scientists on!

However, I do not consider him to be democratically elected to run my country! He was very definitely not elected by our electorate!

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 Bob Kemp 09 Feb 2021
In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

> You're one of the many full-on lefty types on here; I thought "hate" was off the menu -- a crime even in many cases just to use the wrong words to the wrong person. So, I'd be interested if you could expand a bit on this hate you have towards the elected PM of our democracy during a time of national crisis. Do you think it appropriate, on reflection, to post you "hate" him? I realise it may have just been a not-too-serious off-the-cuff response, but maybe not, and yes I realise you are legally free to say you "hate" him as he doesn't tick any of the boxes which say you can't. There again, perhaps if you analyse this very very carefully you may be getting close to the mark in spirit, if not in law. You posted in another thread that you were unaware, until recently, of something that I thought was fairly common general knowledge. Nothing wrong with that, we're all learning as we go along (hence this post), but considering that recent hole in your knowledge, have you tried factoring that in to your decision to "hate"? Perhaps there are things you aren't aware of or don't understand which might change that decision? 

I look forward to your explanation of these hidden factors which mean Johnson deserves our admiration and love. 

> Whilst I'm on the subject, although I have many lefty-friendly opinions myself, this extreme cultural hatred of anything Tory seen amongst people on this forum and within the more Corbyn-leaning element of Labour party I find a real good reason not to vote Labour.

You appear to be conflating hatred for Johnson with ‘anything Tory’. 

>For most reasonable people it comes over as bad as Trump and the QAnon nutters. 

Equating hatred for the Tories with the extreme irrationality of the QAnon people is making a bit of a jump isn’t it?

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 wintertree 09 Feb 2021
In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

> You post a reply like that and it's hardly worth the effort to respond.

You post a reply like that and it’s hardly worth the effort to respond.  

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 ScraggyGoat 09 Feb 2021

The original post just sums up the current tribalism in British politics, and lack of critical thought.  If you were to looking in from the outside, with no emotional connection it would be very hard not to come to the conclusion that British politics is completely broken.

Westminster; ideology trumps pragmatic governance, large amounts of highly questionable chumocracy going on, no sanction for Ministers or PM lying or misleading parliament, ineffective opposition. Has starved local authorities of funds to the point of collapse.

Holyrood; ideology trumps pragmatic governance, evidence is pointing towards a criminal conspiracy at the heart of government, government has been deliberately ineffectual to bolster ideological ends, little (current) sanction for parliamentarians lying, ineffective opposition. Has starved local authorities of funds to the point of collapse.

Stormont: Has spent years suspended....though might be beginning to get its act together.

Welsh assembly: I don't know enough to comment......

Yet the OP is so taking issue with Bojo making a comment on a vaccine, the effectiveness of which is entirely outhwith of his control.

I'm very much reminded of Douglas Adams sketch 'Take me to your lizard', 'Why do you want to met our lizards', 'Lizards our or leaders', 'why on earth do you vote for lizards', 'if we don't vote the wrong lizard might get in!'

Post edited at 10:08
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 the sheep 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

> However, I do not consider him to be democratically elected to run my country! He was very definitely not elected by our electorate!

As much as i think the bloke is an arsehole and a despicable piece of humanity, he and his party were voted in. 

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OP girlymonkey 09 Feb 2021
In reply to the sheep:

Not up here he wasn't! Scotland very conclusively did not vote for him!

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 Rob Exile Ward 09 Feb 2021
In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

I'm not so keen on 'hate' either but I think there's a few Tories who have been breathtakingly wicked over the last few years: wicked in what they have done, and wicked the way they have brazenly lied about it, without shame, without remorse, without any concern whatsoever whenever they have been caught out. It has diminished us all, it has made 'proper' politics - where issues are discussed, different views propagated, outcomes evaluated - very difficult, where the shoutiest voice - backed by 5 media giants - gets the last world, whatever fantasy they happen to be peddling (foodbanks are good; easiest deal in history; over-ready; no Irish sea border; £350 million a week etc etc etc). The list is endless, I've never seen anything like it, even Alastair Campbell had his limits.

When these lies have direct effects of us - my daughter's derailed career, our retirement plans, pandemic excess deaths, return of  tension in NI, it's not surprising if emotions run a little high.

Post edited at 10:23
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 Neil Williams 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

He's a muppet and probably best ignored, but that doesn't mean everything he says is false.

 wintertree 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Richard Horn:

> ... and what would your opinion be of Corbyn hypothetically if he had been PM and assuming (very likely) we still had 100k deaths?

That's hardly an excuse is it.  The comparison isn't with what Corbyn might have done but with what Johnson could have done.  He claimed he did everything he could.  That is not very compatible with the advice from scientists, that he was so slow to act on that we've doubled the total deaths in a couple of months and produced a new variant that's forced us back to school closures and stay at home orders.  That is not very compatible with his early lack of engagement with COBR.  

I think a lot has changed for the better in the last 6 weeks or so in terms of how the government are approaching things, but that doesn't change the past.

Post edited at 10:13
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OP girlymonkey 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Neil Williams:

I guess I was mostly amused by the idea that the media would report this confidence from him like it would reassure us!! Public trust in him is so low that I can't see it reassuring many people at all. If they felt the need to reassure people about vaccines, at least use someone people trust! It is usually safe to assume that most things he says at least have a level untruthfulness, if they are not entirely false!

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 Rob Exile Ward 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

I genuinely don't think he knows when he's telling the truth or not - it simply isn't a thing for him.

God knows how he was brought up, we've never had corporal punishment in our family but all the kids always knew that telling lies was seriously bad news.

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In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

> You post a reply like that and it's hardly worth the effort to respond.

If the Tories don't want to be hated all they need to do is not f*ck so many people over, maybe lie a bit less, steal less public money for their friends and sign off on an s30 for Scotland if Scotland put in another SNP government.

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 mondite 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Neil Williams:

> He's a muppet and probably best ignored, but that doesn't mean everything he says is false.


Its a good default starting position though.

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In reply to Neil Williams:

> He's a muppet and probably best ignored, but that doesn't mean everything he says is false.

'Everything he says is false' is a pretty high barrier.  A substantial fraction of what he says is false.

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 Rob Exile Ward 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

The stuff he says that happens to be true is usually by accident.

5
In reply to ScraggyGoat:

> Holyrood; ideology trumps pragmatic governance,

It absolute does not.  The reason the SNP keep getting elected is that they have been a relatively efficient and pragmatic government.   

> evidence is pointing towards a criminal conspiracy at the heart of government, government has been deliberately ineffectual to bolster ideological ends, little (current) sanction for parliamentarians lying, ineffective opposition. Has starved local authorities of funds to the point of collapse.

The whole thing is a total storm in a teacup getting stirred up by unionists MSPs who think they are going to lose their seats in May.  They are arguing about whether a meeting about a now settled court case was held on 29 March or 3rd April 2018 and whether it was party business or government business.   In the middle of a pandemic and Brexit crisis who the f*ck cares.  Someone like Sturgeon probably has many meetings every day.

The enquiry keep demanding documents they know are legally protected because they are from complainants in a sex assault.  When they finally compel the cops/crown office to show them the alleged conspiring in Whatsapp they notice it is actually group of traumatised women giving each other emotional support and immediately decide not to publish.  So they ask for something else.   Whatthey actually want is a document to be refused so they can construct a bullsh*t conspiracy theory about what is in it.

The thing the conspiracy theorists can't answer is the obvious question - what possible motive would Sturgeon have for stirring up a sex scandal about a retired party leader.  Salmond was no threat to her, he was out of politics and pursuing other interests.   The obvious answer is she was determined to have the allegations investigated because she knew both Salmond and the women making them and thought they were quite possibly true.   This is why I think Sturgeon is going to come out of this looking good.  There's a very simple explanation for her actions which most people will see as reasonable and responsible.

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 Neil Williams 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

> I guess I was mostly amused by the idea that the media would report this confidence from him like it would reassure us!! Public trust in him is so low that I can't see it reassuring many people at all. If they felt the need to reassure people about vaccines, at least use someone people trust! It is usually safe to assume that most things he says at least have a level untruthfulness, if they are not entirely false!

Yes, it probably helps the cause if Whitty, Van Tam etc say it, but not Bozza!

 skog 09 Feb 2021
In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

Fascinating that you've noticed someone's politics being of the left, then made up your own definition of what being lefty means, then criticised them for not meeting the definition you made up.

In reply to the thread:

Fuxake, she just made a light-hearted comment about how BJ saying he 'has confidence' in something really isn't very reassuring!

It's almost as if you're all going cabin-crazy for some reason! 🙂

Post edited at 10:53
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 ScraggyGoat 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

So Anne Harvey, Craig Murray, Robert McAlpine, Joanne Cherry et al are all Unionist MSP's.........................and the Harassment Committee are being hounded by legal threats purely to prevent contempt of court, and since its a self-help whats app group, why are senior figures included?  Furthermore lets just ignore reporting elsewhere, and just pretend it doesn't exist. 

Come off it Tom your analysis doesn't pass basic scrutiny, and is a simple 'nothing to see here move along please' ploy, when there plainly is a very rotten smell.  It doesn't matter whether Alex was a threat, it matters whether he was perceived as a threat.

I for one want to go to the polls in May to perform my democratic duty in an informed position...don't you?

1
 Neil Williams 09 Feb 2021
In reply to mondite:

> Its a good default starting position though.

I don't think it is at all.  I think the principle that everything he says should be ignored because it may be randomly true or false is the best basis.  Going beyond that is blind political prejudice.

He simply says what suits his cause regardless of whether it is true or false.

People should have confidence in the vaccines to counter the dominant UK strains, and in the researchers being able to produce boosters to counter the new ones.

Suggesting that's false just because Bozza said it is every bit as bad as any other bit of anti-vaxxing, and will be seized on by anti-vaxxers (as they seize on anything they can) so please don't do it.

 Cobra_Head 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

> Johnson has announced that he is "very confident" in our vaccines. 

> I was feeling quite optimistic until this bit of news! 


That's usually the final nail in the coffin.

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 Harry Jarvis 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

> It absolute does not.  The reason the SNP keep getting elected is that they have been a relatively efficient and pragmatic government.   

> The whole thing is a total storm in a teacup getting stirred up by unionists MSPs who think they are going to lose their seats in May. 

That rather ignores he act that it is Salmond who is accusing Sturgeon of misleading Parliament. Whatever else is the case, the fact remains that all this is a result of the actions of SNP MSPs and officials. Trying to divert attention onto Unionist MSPs is to ignore reality. 

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In reply to ScraggyGoat:

> So Anne Harvey, Craig Murray, Robert McAlpine, Joanne Cherry et al are all Unionist MSP's.........................and the Harassment Committee are being hounded by legal threats purely to prevent contempt of court, and since its a self-help whats app group, why are senior figures included?  Furthermore lets just ignore reporting elsewhere, and just pretend it doesn't exist. 

Craig Murray is a conspiracy theorist who makes a living from a website and needs a scandal to generate clicks and donations.  Sometimes there's a grain of truth in what he says but he pushes it a bit.  His previous thing was the Assange trial but that's pretty much fizzled out now the judge that Craig was railing against for months actually ruled Assange wouldn't get extradited.  This is the new money maker.

> Come off it Tom your analysis doesn't pass basic scrutiny, and is a simple 'nothing to see here move along please' ploy, when there plainly is a very rotten smell.  It doesn't matter whether Alex was a threat, it matters whether he was perceived as a threat.

Nobody perceived Salmond as a threat.  He was long gone, joining Russia Today lost him credibility, he wasn't in great health and according to his own testimony was looking at starting a business unrelated to politics.

Sturgeon knew Salmond for years she was also the boss of the civil servants who were complaining and would have many female friends in the SNP.  This was at the time of #metoo and she is a feminist.  If Salmond had a reputation or form she'd know.  She seems to have believed the allegations or at least felt strongly they should be investigated and there should be no cover up even if there was a political cost.

If she hadn't pursued them it is very likely there would still be a witch hunt against her but it would be for covering them up.

> I for one want to go to the polls in May to perform my democratic duty in an informed position...don't you?

Personally, I don't give a sh*t about historic and now settled sexual assault cases involving retired politicians.

I care about the mishandling of Covid by the Tories and exports to the EU being down 68% in a month. and the effect on my family and business of Brexit.   And I really want Scotland to get the f*ck out of the UK.  I've wanted that since I was 15 and putting 'It's Scotland's Oil' stickers on lampposts.  We've been denied independence by a series of lies, fraud and coercion and it is now closer than it has ever been.

After independence Scottish politics will reconfigure.  There will be Scottish left and right of centre parties and we'll be a normal modern country with our own parliament elected by PR.  Sturgeon isn't going to last forever, no politician does,  but independence can.

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 mondite 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Neil Williams:

> I don't think it is at all.  I think the principle that everything he says should be ignored because it may be randomly true or false is the best basis.  Going beyond that is blind political prejudice.

Unfortunately he is the PM so he cant really be ignored. Treating anything he says with a great deal of scepticism isnt political prejudice its just based on evidence.

He has a habit of being the most enthusiastic when he is on the most unsafe ground.

1
 Neil Williams 09 Feb 2021
In reply to mondite:

There's scepticism and scepticism.  Checking your facts, assuming neither true nor false until you have done so = sensible.  Assuming it's wrong just because he said it = blind prejudice, which in this case is VERY harmful as there's enough anti-vaxx garbage out there to start with without creating more of it.

 ScraggyGoat 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

Evaluate the source, the content and the context. Don't just fall into the trap of dismissing the source because of your own bias or previous history, thus assuming the content unreliable...............and then skip the context completely.

Why would Craig Murray lie in an affidavit, and then challenge the court to acquire the evidence (which in your view would) prove he was lying, and thus compound his situation and likely sentence.  Which if we take your view of his motivations to be completely financial would result him being in jail, discredited and unable to earn anything.........

This is before we move on to you ignoring others whom have alleged the same providing partial corroboration, and in Anne Harveys case also willing to provide an affidavit which if proved false would not only result in losing her job, but prevent her from returning to her former career as a solicitor.

Sturgeon isn't going to last forever..........its in the balance if she will last till the election at the moment. 

You might need to start dusting down your mantleshelf to make space for another fallen idol.............

Post edited at 11:53
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 scratcher 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

> And I really want Scotland to get the f*ck out of the UK.  I've wanted that since I was 15

Since yesterday then

x

3
 Offwidth 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Richard Horn:

France and Italy define covid deaths more broadly, Belgium more broadly again. On fairly compared measures of per capita covid deaths the UK tops the chart of western countries (in the actual list of fair comparisons we are only behind Gibraltar and maybe San Marino... but I have no idea how they classify covid deaths).

I don't want to defend the leadership of other EU countries, especially as all the hard hit nations could have done so much better, but they didn't have the two weeks extra notice we had in March, they had flu issues when covid hit (and we didn't), they don't have the potential extra protection of being an island nation, and from phone data around the first lockdowns had a much bigger issue with the middle classes running from major cites to escape restrictions. I don't hate Boris but I think he has been an utter disaster in this pandemic and I see other leading conservative voices like Jeremy Hunt as being consistently sensible.

Post edited at 13:27
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 mondite 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Neil Williams:

> There's scepticism and scepticism.  Checking your facts, assuming neither true nor false until you have done so = sensible.  Assuming it's wrong just because he said it = blind prejudice

Nope assuming a professional liar is lying is a sensible approach especially when known for engaging in hyperbole when most insecure.

2
 Neil Williams 09 Feb 2021
In reply to mondite:

He's not a professional liar, i.e. lying for lying's sake.  He just says what suits him, which sometimes will be the truth and sometimes will not.

Personally I would generally give something he says as having a 50% chance of being accurate, but a near 100% chance of serving his purposes.

In this instance, the vaccines are protective (other than of some variants), are safe and you should have one.  So he spoke the truth.

Post edited at 13:46
In reply to ScraggyGoat:

> Why would Craig Murray lie in an affidavit, and then challenge the court to acquire the evidence (which in your view would) prove he was lying, and thus compound his situation and likely sentence.  Which if we take your view of his motivations to be completely financial would result him being in jail, discredited and unable to earn anything.........

Being controversial is his thing.  I used to quite like Craig Murray.  I read his reports on Assange and what was happening in court and based on them thought the judge was acting completely unfairly and it was a sham trial.   Then, the allegedly extremely bias judge ruled that Assange shouldn't be extradited and I started to think maybe Craig Murray was full of sh*t.

The thing that is missing for me in all the conspiracy theories about Sturgeon and Salmond is the absence of any credible  motive beyond the quite reasonable one of wanting serious allegations to be investigated.  My guess is when she gets called before the committee she'll say she was acting in good faith because she thought it was possible he'd done it and she'll come out stronger.  Taking action to ensure the workplace is safe for women is not a vote loser.

> This is before we move on to you ignoring others whom have alleged the same providing partial corroboration, and in Anne Harveys case also willing to provide an affidavit which if proved false would not only result in losing her job, but prevent her from returning to her former career as a solicitor.

Anne Harvey says in her opinion an incident where Salmond bumped into a woman years ago was nothing untoward.  The woman he bumped into says otherwise.

What I take from this is that Salmond bumped into someone years ago and the person who was bumped into feels differently about it than someone else who saw it happened.   I assume Anne Harvey is telling the truth about what she saw.  I don't know anything about the other woman - maybe Anne Harvey didn't see everything, maybe there were other events before the bump which put it in another light, maybe she's over reacting to a small incident, maybe she's got some other agenda. 

I really don't care about the finer details of somebody bumping into somebody years ago at a time when tens of people are dying every day from Covid and industry is devastated by Brexit.  It isn't a reason for the first minister of Scotland to resign.  As long as she does as good a job on handling covid and brexit as is possible with the powers and resources she has available and works for independence she's got my vote. 

Post edited at 14:11
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 Tringa 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

I have to declare my position. I have no love whatsoever for this government.

However, I can't imagine even a staunch supporter can be happy about the way Boris conducts himself sometimes. I feel he is often Trumpian - say anything that looks good/makes him look good.

The roll out of vaccine(s) looks like the only part of the Government's handling of the pandemic which appears to be going well, but I would be much happier to hear it from the experts than politicians.

Dave

2
In reply to Harry Jarvis:

> That rather ignores he act that it is Salmond who is accusing Sturgeon of misleading Parliament. 

As I understand it the misleading parliament thing is about whether a meeting was on 29 March or 2 April 2018 and whether it was SNP party business or Scottish Government business.

I have a hell of a lot fewer meetings than Nicola Sturgeon and I couldn't tell you what I was doing on 29th March 2018.   Yes, she should have diaries and so on but people make mistakes and in the scheme of things who the hell cares about three days.  I certainly don't.  They both say there was a meeting.  Doesn't surprise me in the slightest.

As for SNP party business or Scottish Government business clearly a meeting like this could be either or both depending on what people said.  One party might think it was going to be a party business kind of meeting only for the other party to start talking about things which would make it a Scottish government kind of meeting.  And if they then told the other party they weren't going to discuss those things is it still the first kind of meeting or did it become the second kind of meeting.  Basically, who the hell cares.  Only somebody with an agenda.   It's a grey area, matter of opinion kind of thing.

And as for Sturgeon not telling Murrell some stuff and him just accepting it.  I don't find that surprising at all.  She was a lawyer and is now FM of Scotland people married to lawyers or senior politicians are used to their partner not being able to discuss some things.

6
 Harry Jarvis 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

Once again, you evade the point. You claimed the affair is a storm in a teacup stirred up by unionist MSPs, yet it is the former SNP FM making the accusation against the current SNP FM. I fail to see what unionist MSPs have to do with that. 

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

> Once again, you evade the point. You claimed the affair is a storm in a teacup stirred up by unionist MSPs, yet it is the former SNP FM making the accusation against the current SNP FM. I fail to see what unionist MSPs have to do with that. 

They are milking it for their own benefit.   A year ago they were out for Salmond's blood, they lost that so now they are out for Sturgeon's.  They don't care about Salmond or the women who complained against him and are legally protected from being identified, they just want to damage the SNP enough to cling on to their seats in May.

5
In reply to Tringa:

> However, I can't imagine even a staunch supporter can be happy about the way Boris conducts himself sometimes. I feel he is often Trumpian - say anything that looks good/makes him look good.

And, just like Trump, that's exactly why his staunch supporters like him...

 Harry Jarvis 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

> They are milking it for their own benefit.   

That may be so, but they did not dream it up out of nothing. It is a guddle of the SNP's making. 

> A year ago they were out for Salmond's blood, they lost that so now they are out for Sturgeon's.  They don't care about Salmond or the women who complained against him

You don't care about the women who claimed against him, so It seems you're on the same side as them in that regard.  

> they just want to damage the SNP enough to cling on to their seats in May.

Of course they do. That's politics. What do you expect the to do? Of course, they wouldn't have anything to act on if it hadn't been for Salmond's behaviour. 

 ScraggyGoat 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Harry Jarvis:

The Committee is clearly hamstrung both legally by contempt of court risk, severely hampered by terms of reference, definitely obstructed by its own Gov. and now also worryingly split down party lines. I'd be surprised if it came to a resolution, and is far from the proclaimed 'clear and transparent' process that was promised.

The only way forward I can see is that Salmond makes direct accusations so stridently in a press call, that Sturgeon either has to sue him, or resign.  It clear that the current status quo limbo isn't viable. 

Its built up too much momentum and will drag one or both of them down, and Salmond hasn't really any further to fall, Sturgeon looks to be in denial about how marginal the pro is, the top out is covered in slime and the longer she clings on the more her Green Party belayers will extract in payment for their services.

Post edited at 16:27
 jimtitt 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

> Johnson has announced that he is "very confident" in our vaccines. 

> I was feeling quite optimistic until this bit of news! 


Ignoring all this stuff about a couple of nonentity polititians Boris's announcement is just trying to bolster confidence as countries start to take action due to the reported Astra Zeneca vaccines ineffectiveness against the S.A. mutation of Covid. We shall see!

 Maggot 09 Feb 2021
In reply to jimtitt:

I would take a vaccine that prevents death or a serious case of this disease than nothing at all any day of the week.  You carry on debating its (possible) ineffectiveness based on a tiny study as long as you like, whilst millions go without any protection.

1
In reply to ScraggyGoat:

> The Committee is clearly hamstrung both legally by contempt of court risk, severely hampered by terms of reference, definitely obstructed by its own Gov. and now also worryingly split down party lines. I'd be surprised if it came to a resolution, and is far from the proclaimed 'clear and transparent' process that was promised.

They should just f*ck off and go home.  Their fishing expedition reached its natural conclusion when they got the WhatsApp messages and decided there was nothing in them.

> The only way forward I can see is that Salamond makes direct accusations so stridently in a press call, that Sturgeon either has to sue him, or resign.  It clear that the current status quo limbo isn't viable. 

Salmond is trying to get stuff on the record which would reveal the identities of the complainers without the Crown Office coming after him and the MSPs saw through it.  No doubt he is very angry with both the complainers and Sturgeon but he's snookered by the Crown Office insisting the complainers identities cannot be revealed.

I think the status quo is viable because once the circus is over people will lose interest.   We are in the middle of a pandemic and a Brexit crisis.   Plenty of more important things happening.

7
 Robert Durran 09 Feb 2021
In reply to jimtitt:

> Ignoring all this stuff about a couple of nonentity polititians.

I would hardly call a politician who is the First Minister of Scotland and quite likely to be absolutely instrumental in the actual break up of the country a ninentity.

Post edited at 16:51
 ScraggyGoat 09 Feb 2021
In reply to Robert Durran:

ninentity - is that a combination on nonentity and nine years if found guilty of a criminal conspiracy?

 Harry Jarvis 09 Feb 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

> I think the status quo is viable because once the circus is over people will lose interest.   We are in the middle of a pandemic and a Brexit crisis.   Plenty of more important things happening.

That doesn't appear to have been much of a concern to Salmond, who seems to have made it his main priority to bring Sturgeon down. Strange days. 

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

> That doesn't appear to have been much of a concern to Salmond, who seems to have made it his main priority to bring Sturgeon down. Strange days. 

Strange days in some ways but if #metoo teaches us anything it is that there were plenty of guys around who treated women improperly in the workplace, from being 'handsy' or 'tactile' to much worse.   

My guess is a guy who is sometimes inappropriate with female colleagues - even if the behaviour does not cross the line into criminal offences - leaves behind a trail of angry women.  And if it catches up with him and someone complains to the cops about behaviour he thinks was OK he's probably going to be pretty angry with whoever complained or facilitated the complaints.

6
 phizz4 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

A stopped clock is correct twice a day, while one that constantly loses or gains a few seconds or minutes every day is rarely correct!

 Point of View 09 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

> Not up here he wasn't! Scotland very conclusively did not vote for him!

A very large number of people in Scotland did vote for him (myself included). And, based on his current record (which doesn't seem to me to be any worse than most other European leaders), I will probably do so again next time.

4
 SenzuBean 09 Feb 2021
In reply to wurzelinzummerset:

> You're one of the many full-on lefty types on here; I thought "hate" was off the menu -- a crime even in many cases just to use the wrong words to the wrong person.

Paradox of tolerance innit

In reply to Richard Horn:

> Macron has overseen the deaths of 80,000, is he hateful or mere dislikeful? I think Italy is pretty much on a par with UK in mortality rate so Conte must be really bad? What about Sanchez?

> ... and what would your opinion be of Corbyn hypothetically if he had been PM and assuming (very likely) we still had 100k deaths?

It's absolutely ludicrous to think that Corbyn would caused anything like 100,000 deaths. This level of death has been caused by Boris Johnson's malicious "herd immunity" policy in order to be seen as the saviour of capitalism by carrying on with business as usual in the face of a deadly pandemic.

On 15th March many European countries were going into lockdown while Johnson was just asking the people with CV19 symptoms to voluntarily self isolate. Corbyn wanted to know why Johnsons scientific advice was different to that of every other European country? We eventually locked down on 23rd March. Doubling time of cases was 2-3 days at that time so that 8 days delay in lockdown would have caused the eventual total number of deaths to be 8 times higher than it ended up. The UK death toll from the first wave was about 60,000 so we can say straightaway that Corbyns approach would have reduced that to 7,500 deaths.

In April 2020, Corbyn was drawing attention to the WHO who had told us to "test, test, test". The countries who have successfully handled the pandemic have followed this approach - they locked down early, got cases to very low levels, and kept a lid on the spread by a mass testing programme. 

On 10th May, even though case numbers in the community were still quite high, Johnson told employers that there would be a change of emphasis and workers should be actively encouraged to return to work in order to prop up service businesses in city centres. Corbyn said there should be no return to work until safe, people must come before profit. Johnson was forced to reverse this lunacy after case numbers began to rise exponentially again. 

In September Corbyn drew attention to the growing number of CV19 outbreaks in schools fuelling the next wave of the epidemic and said that the resulting deaths will be the responsibility of this negligent government. 

You can add that if Corbyn had won the 2017 election then the NHS would have had three years to recover from years of Tory underfunding. The NHS was in crisis before the outbreak and the 2017 manifesto had pledged £30 billion in extra funding to make sure the NHS has safe levels of bed occupancy and staffing levels and a properly resourced ambulance service.

However you might want to criticise Corbyn, it's safe to say that 10's of thousands of lives would have been saved by a Corbyn government.

Post edited at 00:38
4
 GrahamD 10 Feb 2021
In reply to cumbria mammoth:

Pointing stuff out doesn't mean he would have been effective at actually doing anything about it.  For all we know he might only have got his policy steering sub committee sorted by now.

4
 freeflyer 10 Feb 2021
In reply to jimtitt:

> Ignoring all this stuff about a couple of nonentity polititians Boris's announcement is just trying to bolster confidence as countries start to take action due to the reported Astra Zeneca vaccines ineffectiveness against the S.A. mutation of Covid. We shall see!

Pretty much this, it's all about messaging. However Johnson did manage to phrase his contribution so it was nearly a lie - "I am very confident that the vaccines are effective ... etc".

Contrast that with JVT who said "ignore the media stories and take the vaccine because it will protect you in the short term". (I am paraphrasing). Definitely not a lie and the best spin to put on current events. I know who I'd rather listen to.


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