Scottish Independence and the UK State

[brainpanhandler]

Disengaging entirely from politics in 3... 2... 1...

Time for a drink.

I feel your pain man.

When the lying, evil bastard that is the governor of my state won the recall election I have never been so crestfallen over an election outcome.

I'll raise a few for you. Prolly Kentucky bourbon, though.

[semper occultus]

Can anyone offer a good reason why this vote should have found itself balancing anywhere near 50/50?

What are the chances of that? And why is it so common....?

Perhaps the 50/50 is the critical mass of opinion which has to happen before the question is raised.

...funnily enough there was a letter in the tree-ware ed. of the Telegraph on exactly that but as its now been chucked out and it appears it actually wasn't that close anyway then not sure I'll be going to the local recycling bin to try and find it.......!

.....as regards what the Scottish equivalent of Florida is I'm scratching my head on that one....!

......most of these huge areas are pretty low in population though....you've got most of the people in the 2 major cities and with notably different socio-economic profiles : Edinburgh which is full of middle class financiers / lawyers & Glasgow which is decideldy working class, heavy industry to the extent there's any at all.....Edinburgh was 61% no, Glasgow 54% yes....

[gnosticheresy_2]

Salmond's gone

[MacCruiskeen]

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.

That. is. all.

Westminster funds terrorists, murders and tortures British citizens both at home and abroad, colludes with foreign powers to illegally surveil it's own populace, drives "Go Home" vans through immigrant areas, and starts illegal wars at it's whim. It is also a massive nest of pedos.

All of this is revealed, publically, and what do the Scottish people do?

Give it a renewed mandate to govern them. FFS.

Inspiring, isn't it. "Human nature. Marvellous thing." (Beckett)

Ach. I did not want to be quoting fucking Beckett today.

Well, so much for Scotland becoming a beacon to the nations. The Torquils and Sandys of our fine nation province united and did what they were always going to do (look to their fucking investments), and Project Fear successfully managed the rest. "Lord" Robertson & David fucking Cameron will continue to represent Scotland to the world. Their wars will be our wars. Their neoliberal cruelty and bullshit will be ours too. Business as usual.

Scotland has agreed to eat its fucking cereal.

Disengaging entirely from politics in 3... 2... 1...

We can continue to comment on American politics here. The future is spectatorship. Pass the remote.

I love shouting at the telly.

Ach, I'm really struggling to find anything funny about this at all, tbh.

Me too, Ahab. As you can see.

Westminster vows never to allow vote on anything that matters ever again

19-09-14



MPs have pledged that voters will never again be given the power to actually change anything.

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/politics/ ... 4091990824

^^Not a joke.

[MacCruiskeen]

From James Cook, Scotland Correspondent for BBC News:

James Cook Verified Account
‏@BBCJamesCook

Alex Salmond says when he asked David Cameron about the timetable for more powers, the prime minister said it was a meaningless process.

08:25 - 19. Sep. 2014

https://twitter.com/BBCJamesCook/status ... 7754331137

The United Kingdom: a scumbagocracy.

[conniption]

CrossTalk on #Indyref: Staying Together

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjIna98jshQ

[MacCruiskeen]

Nice, if a little predictable, to see the ugly team showing such dignity in victory:

Pro-Union demonstrators made 'Nazi salutes' in front of police officers as Scotland's referendum vote began to turn nasty.

Hundreds of demonstrators waving Union flags arrived at George Square in Glasgow, which up until recently had been the unofficial headquarters of the pro-independence movement.

Glasgow voted in favour of independence in yesterday's historic vote which threatened to split the United Kingdom.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z3DnuhTGOr

Scotland is famed for its natural beauties.

It is understood that some of the demonstrators are members of the far-right Scottish Defence League. Flags and banners associated with Glasgow Rangers were also spotted in the crowd.

Earlier, one middle-aged woman wearing a Yes badge attempted to make her way through George Square during the demonstration when she was accosted by a group of men in their 20s. The men spat at the clearly shocked woman and called her 'scum'.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z3DnzrFWwG

My country 'tis of thee.


Work as if you lived in the halcyon days of a Tory nation.

BBC Scotland reporter Cameron Buttle, who was at the scene, said Friday evening's confrontation started quickly with flares being fired and a "co-ordinated" charge from the Unionist side, who were singing Rule Britannia.

Some of the pro-Union side were carrying banners featuring Loyalist imagery.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-sco ... s-29288249

I have seen the face of the future, and it is a cardboard mask of our dear monarch:

[AhabsOtherLeg]

Disengaging entirely from politics in 3... 2... 1...

Aha, the plan is revealed.

It's only a temporary measure.

Worry not, I'll be back to aid the northern English regions in their suddenly-discovered quest for greater autonomy:





Thanks for your companionship in booze Brainpanhandler, though I must say you're not helping to increase our export figures or balance of trade much by drinking Kentucky bourbon, are ye? Sort it out man. Get a real whisky down yer neck.

Sorry to be so mercenary about it, but from this point onward we must first and foremost consider our Gross Value Added figures to the UK Treasury measured as a counterbalance to our prospective debt and deficit as an independent state - that's what nationhood is all about, apparently.

Shame really, but that's how it is.

Mac said:

The future is spectatorship. Pass the remote.

I love shouting at the telly.

Turns out that's all I've really been doing for the last three years. In effect.

Ach well. The better team won.

[Project Willow]

I love shouting at the telly (and Internet) too. So sorry for the loss, it was quite a disappointment, and more so to meet friends last night who thought the no vote better as otherwise a generation of Scots would suffer until various social benefit structures sorted themselves out. How short sighted.
Someone told me today there was evidence surfacing of vote rigging, direct that is, outside of the media mind fuckery. Has anyone come across these reports?

[seemslikeadream]

Scottish independence: Video ‘proves vote was rigged,’ say Yes voters
http://metro.co.uk/2014/09/19/scottish- ... s-4874786/

SHOCKING! More Blatant Vote Rigging During Scottish Independence Count In Edinburgh
Truth Frequency Radio
http://truthfrequencyradio.com/shocking ... edinburgh/

Sources warn of vote rigging in Scotland's independence vote
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/09/17 ... land-vote/

[AhabsOtherLeg]

I love shouting at the telly (and Internet) too. So sorry for the loss, it was quite a disappointment, and more so to meet friends last night who thought the no vote better as otherwise a generation of Scots would suffer until various social benefit structures sorted themselves out. How short sighted.

It's worse than short sighted, it's the direct opposite of the reality we now face (imo). A generation of Scots will suffer while the benefit structures sort themselves out - not because of independence, but because of continued union, and the Tory and Labour commitment to introducing the Universal Credit system.

How are they going to square the haphazard introduction of the UC system with (possibly) devolving control over Housing Benefit to the Scottish Parliament?

I know how they'll deal with this thorny issue in the end.

Nothing of real import will ever be devolved at all.

Someone told me today there was evidence surfacing of vote rigging, direct that is, outside of the media mind fuckery. Has anyone come across these reports?

Aye, on Facebook and social media.

Perhaps surprisingly, I don't really believe these claims myself, and would need to see much harder evidence than the shoddy and inconclusive Youtube vids that have been supplied (by persons unknown) so far, before I would even consider the possibility.

There were some weird incidents at the Dundee count, though, come to think of it. The fire alarm in the building was set off three times, leading to the count being suspended twice. But Dundee was a big win for Yes anyway.

@ IanEye - can't think of any council areas that were Florida-esque, but the numbers in Inverclyde were very close. Still wouldn't have won us the overall vote though.

I don't think we have been shafted by outside forces, tbh.

In adherence to our long and well-established historic traditions, we appear to have shafted ourselves.

[MacCruiskeen]

[seemslikeadream]

Scottish referendum vote-rigging claims spark calls for recount
Tens of thousands sign petitions wanting recount or fresh vote based on videos that purport to show evidence of electoral fraud

Esther Addley
The Guardian, Monday 22 September 2014 13.15 EDT

By mid-afternoon on Monday the number of names on change.org had topped 87,000. “We the undersigned demand a re-vote of the Scottish referendum, counted by impartial international parties,” reads the petition, which goes on to cite “countless evidences of fraud” documented during Thursday’s poll on independence.

At 38degrees.org.uk, a second petition had more than 62,000 signatories. “Investigate the vote counting procedures,” it demands. “Allow an independent re-count of all votes.”

“I have [seen] videos that look like cheating and also [too] many yes voters for the result to be no,” wrote one signatory, Zoe M. “Why [were] there Yes votes photographed on a No table?” asked Maxine B. “Why [are] there videos of votes being tampered with or moved around while the counter is seen looking around making sure no one was watching?” “I’m a NO voter and even I think this is rigged,” said Zeus M.

The then first minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond, may have called on his supporters to “accept the democratic verdict of the people of Scotland” on Friday, but for significant numbers of people, accepting that the poll was fair, and its result a rejection of independence, has proved impossible.

On Twitter and YouTube, in blog posts and Facebook groups, sceptics have been amassing what they believe is evidence that the referendum was rigged, and its result, therefore, illegitimate.

Many refer to a snippet of video in which a counting officer at the Dundee polling station appears to lift votes from a yes pile and place them under no.



Another widely circulated photograph from the Clackmannanshire count appears to show a yes vote, bundled with others, sitting in the no pile.


Others refer to footage that they claim shows a counting officer in Edinburgh writing on a ballot paper.



For many, the fire alarms that caused the brief evacuation of the Dundee count, and the fact that a Russian observer from a pro-Kremlin monitoring agency had claimed the ballot was fixed to avoid parallels to the situation in Crimea, were taken as further causes for suspicion.

Jim Sillars, the former deputy leader of the Scottish National party (SNP), used Twitter to distribute a video entitled “Exposed!” and call for an inquiry.


There was a faintly exasperated air at the office of the chief counting officer in Edinburgh over the rumours which, according to one observer, had “grown arms and legs” over the weekend.

All of the apparently suspicious evidence could be easily explained, said a spokeswoman, pointing out that the yes campaign itself had intervened on Twitter on Thursday night to reassure voters that there was nothing awry with the Dundee footage.


At times, uncounted ballots would be placed on tables that had yes or no signs attached before being sorted, she said. And piles that didn’t reach round numbers of 50 or 100 would be wrapped in a piece of paper on which the total number of votes would be written, explaining the Edinburgh footage.

In a statement, the chief counting officer, Mary Pitcaithly, said she was “satisfied that all counts throughout Scotland were properly conducted and scrutinised by thousands of people representing both the Yes Scotland and the Better Together campaigns, as well as international election observers, media and police. None of these people raised any concerns during the verification, counting and adjudication stages.”

Salmond may have claimed over the weekend that no voters were “gulled” and “tricked” into rejecting independence, but a spokesman said that neither he nor the SNP believed there was anything untoward about the count itself.

But passions, and suspicions, have been running high among some in Scotland for months, making the questioning of the poll perhaps unsurprising.

A YouGov poll conducted shortly before the vote found that 42% thought it was “probably true” that BP had conspired with the British government to conceal a major oil discovery off the west coast of Shetland, meaning that a visit to the islands by the prime minister, David Cameron, had been hushed up.

Sillars, meanwhile, had previously claimed that MI5 sleeper agents had infiltrated yes campaign groups to influence the vote, a claim supported by a quarter of those polled by YouGov.

In that context, despite the insistence that these are baseless conspiracy theories, many remain sceptical. “If there is even the slightest bit of doubt about vote rigging I want it to be fully investigated,” wrote Catriona Zappert from Glasgow of her reasons for signing the change.org petition. “I can’t believe the yes vote was so low, please recount and confirm the results are accurate or I cannot rest.”

[semper occultus]

...lot of chatter over the years of the extent to which the 1975 Common Market referendum was rigged....amongst the more Eurosceptic conspiracy element....maybe the SOP was dusted off for this one....

[seemslikeadream]