Scotland's future: Three scenarios.

Hugely impressive video of the choices facing Scotland in the run up to next years Holyrood election. Watch the video, if you think it manages to successfully summarise our options, then pass it on.



Scotland 2030 from 00:/ on Vimeo.

Freedom of Speech...between 9am and 5 pm...strictly

Rather enamoured to see that the Herald, have finally opened up their comments section on a trial run. The page for registration is here.

Hopefully, it remains open and is moderated in a sensible fashion unlike its previous version where opponents of Independence were allowed to smear, fear and disavow without recourse. Its closure was firmly blamed on the hitherto unnamed 'cybernats', without any analysis or fact. A few commentators with a pro-Union agenda ground it into the dirt. Here's hoping it works better this time and fulfils the promise of free speech .

The news that yet another oil field has been discovered in the North Sea, hopefully puts an end to the nonsense that the oil has peaked.


I truly heart the description of the oil technologist on the BBC Scotland documentary 'Truth Lies Oil and Scotland' describing in great detail, how they now have the ability to push the equivalent of a damp piece of spaghetti up Walter Scott's nostril, down through his intestines, down the stairs of his monument, out onto princess street and weave their way through the traffic until finally hitting the jackpot at Leith!



This news coupled with the belief that Scotland's renewable sector is potentially large enough to power half of Germany, surely adds succour to the argument that now is the time to have a devolved, combined Oil and Renewable Energy Fund, with which to address the legacy of lost opportunities in Scotland. The Fund Manager industry in Edinburgh, untainted by the recession and Banks bailout, are the perfect people to run it, and hopefully like in Norway it could have a humanitarian aspect to it...

The policeman isn't there to create disorder; the policeman is there to preserve disorder.

 As the Scottish media begin to get their collective knickers in a flap at the prospect of the thin blue line getting even thinner due to the impending apocalypse of Labour's recession that threatens to bring the country to its knees in a holocaust of untrammelled crime and pure mad mentalness, it might be an apposite time to ponder over the expected responses and blames that will emanate from certain quarters.

Without directly quoting  their brave local MP, the Dumfries and Galloway SubStandard manages to jump ahead of their bigtown counterparts and place the blame fairly and squarely on the shoulders of the local council and the Scottish Government. Chief reporter Craig Robertson, summarised the 'last minute item on the police committee agenda' as follows:  

138 support staff could lose their jobs. 

Officers would be taken off the front-line to cover backroom work. 

The structure of the force could be reduced from two divisions into one.

School liasion officers could be removed.


Drug and fraud squad officers could be cut.

Police stations might even be closed

The proposed cutbacks are as a result of the reduction in cash coming from the council and Scottish Government and are the clearest indication yet on how local policing will be affected.

Now Craig is a sweet young feller with a fascinating line in faux Liam Gallagher haircuts, flamboyant padded jackets and impartiality, particularly when it comes to SNP councillors sharing cars to meetings and claiming mileage for it, thus saving the tax payer two sets of mileage claims...However, in this case he manages to throw an awful lot of conjecture into a piece lacking detail, but jampacked with fear, naturally he doesn't mention that the original cut in funding is coming from...where? That's right the pocket money that the London parties dole out to the teenage parliament in Edinburgh.

The irony of course is that this last minute addition to the police committee meeting appears on the agenda at the behest of D&G's Chief plod Pat Shearer, who, when he's not thwarting crime as far afield as Annan and Stranraer, wears this splendid title; President of the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland, or ACPOS for short. Mr Shearer is no stranger when it comes to stirring the pot, particularly when it comes to protecting his members inflation proof pensions and deploying the begging bowl in a style worthy of Master O. Twist. He also presided over basic errors in arithmetic when his force accountant managed to count their pension contributions twice and added up his forces budget wrong. Pity he released these figures to the local media which resulted in near apoplexy from our Unionist friends. Only when the error was discovered was it passed it off as 'an honest mistake', of course this wasn't given as much coverage in the esteemed Substandard.

So far, so D&G. We we are told cutbacks are inevitable, Les Gray (no relation I presume) of the Scottish Police Federation warns this morning that 'People will not be safe on the streets'. Unison leaders cannot rule out 'industrial action'. Which makes me wonder whether there's a natural justice in bringing retired miners out of their care homes to 'police' any police industrial action. What goes around...

The reality is, that cuts are going to have to be made, the Scottish Government will get both barrels of the sawn-off shotgun of blame for a mess they are simply trickling down from our Lords and masters in Westminster. Then again, with crime stats supposedly showing us that recorded crime is at a 30 year low (aye right), the plethora of CCTV cameras (nope I've rarely heard of one saving a life or catching a crim) and fancy new police websites (goooo D&G, second best polis website in the UK, how many hits?) perhaps there are certain areas where the Police service might trim the fat, like every other organisation in the land. I'm not suggesting doughnuts should be cut, but some plod and their police dugs, could do with losing a smidge weight.

The perils of labour...

The average gestation period for a newborn baby is 280 days or 40 weeks. A pregnancy is considered full-term if the baby is delivered between 37 and 42 weeks. Pregnancy is never easy with mother suffering back pains, morning sickness, irrational behaviour, louping hormones, weepy moments followed by shouty psychopathic episodes that cause fear in all witnesses, then there's the need for attention, bizarre tastes in food and strange feelings of doubt and misgiving. 

All of which serves to remind me that the election for the next Scottish Parliament is a mere thirty-eight weeks away. 

We've already seen the first volley of irrational behaviour from the Labour midwife Douglas Maddox in today's Scotsman wherein he claims that according to unnamed sources the SNP are planning on ditching the Tartan Overlord and are seeking an National-Labour coalition headed by Mrs Nicola Sturgeon and Mr Ian Gray to keep out the nasty Lib Dems and Tories from controlling both Westminster and Holyrood. Yep, I checked April's about the eight month period, when mother is out of breath and regretting the night of lust and that one last glass of Lambrini.

No doubt between now and May 5th we'll see the button of fantasy politics being turned up way past 11. The trimester period about 12 weeks in is usually about the most worrying time for mothers, particularly the fear of miscarriage. So round about the end of November we'll see the beginning of some pampering behaviour. Scottish politicians will have already booked the Christmas party, recess is looming, holidays in the sun booked etcetera. To add further succour to the Labour, our matronly media will start to publish polls telling us that Labour are at last 20 points ahead in the polls and that anyone who was thinking of voting anything other than Labour is at least two rusks short of a healthy breakfast.

When parliament returns in mid January and nothing gets done until February, we'll start to see mother put on almost Bailliesque proportions of weight...

 

This is normally a time to relax take it easy, start planning for the newborns arrival at the end of term. Unfortunately Labour are bound to be in a bit of a flap, running around reminding elderly people of the importance of postal ballots, importing activists from down south, checking the veracity of what their candidates are saying on election pamphlets, confirming they live where they say they do and so on.

Prior to delivery, fathers expectation of fun with the nipple cream usually leads to a smacked dish and an overwhelming feeling of being left out of it all. That's where Gordon Brown comes in, no doubt he'll be wheeled around old folks homes, social clubs and empty shopping centres with Ian Gray, boring passers by with how he saved the world and how he can see Edinburgh from his house.

Come delivery day, no doubt the return to hand counting and the consignment to the bin marked 'useless' of those Neil Kinnock E-rig-a-vote machines will mean that the baby parliament will be delivered in the early hours. Given that by this time Labour will have had four years of positive matronly media massages and the SNP four years of shitty nappies, the electorate will finally have their say. Will it count? Will the establishment of civil servants, quangocrats and worthy Scottish journalists really want the reality of Labour out of power in Scotland for an eight year period? 

It's going to be a difficult pregnancy with lots of scares along the way, the powers that are will stop at nothing to return Labour to the potty, where they can continue to dole out dollops of largesse to their friends. 

My only fear is that the Parliament gives birth to something like this bundle of conradictions.

 

Reid about Scotland

Apart form a couple of annoying adverts these programmes are a fantastic reminder of Jimmy Reid and his insightful take on Scotland: Written by Jimmy Reid and Tom Nairn, Produced by Alastair Moffat and directed by Les Wilson. Oh I forgot title music by Jim Sutherland and other producer Seona Robertson and editor John McKenzie. Talk about a who's who of Scottish telly!

 

The Admirable Crichton

Today is the 450th anniversary of the birth of the good looking young feller above, who also happens to be one of the most remarkable Scots that few, if any of us have ever heard of.

James Crichton was born during the most volatile time in Scottish history, a period of religious suppression, conflict and civil disquiet, which still has reverberations in contemporary Scotland.

His birth on August 19th 1560, came on the very day that Mary Queen of Scots arrived at Leith, and a few days before the Parliament of Scotland, passed legislation abolishing Catholicism and replacing it with the Reformed church. 

John Knox and five of his tartan Taliban crew drew up a new confession of faith, which was presented to the Scottish Parliament, voted upon and ratified. On a roll, John Knox and his fellow fundamentalists had three acts passed in one day; they abolished the jurisdiction of the Papacy in Scotland, condemned all doctrine and practise contrary to the reformed faith and lastly forbade the celebration of Mass throughout Scotland, at pain of punishment by exceedingly gnarly public death.

Elizabeth the 1st of England rejoiced and Knox led a service of thanksgiving in the High Kirk, St Giles' in Edinburgh, denouncing the new young Queen Mary as a bit of a slapper, who wore inappropriate clothing, did a bit of risqué dancing and was known to be familiar with the more carnal sides of life. 

Crichton's father, Robert, was the Lord Advocate and had been loyal to Mary's late mother, Mary of Guise, his mother was connected to the Catholic Stewart family. So, not a good time to belong to the Catholic nobility in the early days of fundamentalist Scotland.


None of this, however, gives any clues as to why I regard James Crichton as a remarkable chappy. His father sent him off to Saint Andrews University at age ten, the following year all of his lands were forfeited and he was sent off to Edinburgh Castle to ruminate on the folly of supporting the rightful Queen. Young James cast this from his mind and  with a prodigious talent, in what was then truly a curriculum of excellence, flew through his studies. Already regarded as a bit of a child genius, aged 12 and under the tutelage of the highest regarded professor in Europe, Scotsman George Buchanan he passed his Bachelor of Arts degree. Two year later and shortly after his 14th birthday he received his degree as Master of Arts. Unlike today's students, he opted to avoid a gap year ripping off poor foreigners and continued his studies, soon he had mastered the sciences and philosophies and had added TEN languages to his masterful tongue.


As was the fashion of the day, his father (now out of the pokey) sent him off to Europe to further enhance his knowledge. According to Scottish historian Patrick Francis Tytler, he added mastery of riding and the martial art of its day, fencing. He became known as one of the most expert and fearless swordsman of his time. Add to this panoply of prodigious talent an ear for a tune, and the ability to carry a note and you had the all round renaissance teenager.


Fairly and excellently endowed he embarked upon his travels arriving in Paris at a time when the royal court enjoyed disputations in public where learned sorts could indulge in battles of wit on subjects modern and archaic. Crichton reared on a first class education and armed with that particularly Scottish tradition of a good flyte, leapt into cerebral warfare.
  
Sir Thomas Urquhart who had translated Rabelais into English, was Crichton's first biographer. He described how the young Crichton posted challenges to literary and philosophical warfare around the most prominent places of the city. He challenged those with questions to present themselves at the College of Navarre "in any science, liberal art, discipline or faculty, whether practical or theoretic; and in any one of twelve specified languages..."

A challenge of this complexity from so young a man couldn't fail to get the tongues wagging and soon it was the talk of French academia and the aristocracy. Come the day he slaughtered his opponents, he received the praise and congratulations of the most eminent professors at the University.What increased his triumph and embittered those he defeated was the nonchalance, the ease with which he batted away their questions and his utter disdain for preparation.


This was the making of him at the French court, soon he was conquering the ladies and winning jousting tournaments. His ability over many disciplines earned him the soubriquet, the Admirable Crichton. He finished his studies and left the University of Paris to join the French army, wherein he served for two years in the Civil War and became an experienced officer and rose to an honourable command. 


After two years in France, itchy feet overtook him and he travelled to Rome, where in front of the Pope he repeated his challenge, bettering the professors of Rome, Padua, Venice and Genoa.


Invited to Venice, where he began to publish poetry, an account from the archives of the Doges Palace contain the following tract by his friend the printer Aldus Manutius:


“A.D. 1580 (Register, Council of Ten and the Zonta or Junta of the Ten), 19 August.—A young Scotchman has arrived in this city, by name Giacomo Critonio (James Crichton), of very noble lineage (from what one hears about his quality); and from what has been clearly seen by divers proofs and trials made with very learned and scientific men, and especially by a Latin oration which he delivered this morning extempore in our college—of most rare and singular ability [virtù]. In such wise, that not being above twenty years of age, or but a little more, he astounds and surprises everybody. A thing which in like manner as it is altogether extraordinary, and beyond what nature usually produces, so ought it extraordinarily to induce this council to make some courteous demonstration towards so marvellous a personage; most especially as from accidents and foul fortune which have befallen him, he is in very straitened circumstances: Wherefore, it will be put to the ballot, that of the monies of the chest of this Council there be given to the said Crichton, a Scottish gentleman, one hundred golden crowns. Ayes, 22; noes, 2; neutrals, 4.”

Beset by money problems and according to various sources suffering from ill health, we next find Crichton in Mantua. Where he defeats a professional duellist/assassin, inspired by the newly created Comedia del Arte he writes a comedy and performs in it and is engaged as companion and preceptor to the Duke of Mantua's son Vincenzo Gonzaga. 

Italian sources describe Vincenzo as being insanely jealous of Crichton, not merely because of his prodigious talents but also the fact that the Admirable Crichton had replaced Vincenzo as the lover of the princes former mistress...

Accounts of the day record that Crichton was returning from a night of carnal shenanigans with his mistress, strumming his guitar, when he was set upon by a gang of masked villains. Besting them all at swordplay he unmasks their leader only to discover that he is Vincenzo, the Prince of Mantua. 

Affected by the deepest concern, Crichton drops to one knee and presents his sword to his master's son. Vincenzo, who was rumoured to be impotent, having sent an expedition to the new world to seek out a legendary aphrodisiac, took the Admirable Crichton's sword and plunged it through his heart, killing him instantly. Crichton was mere weeks away from his 23rd birthday.


The plaque below can be found inside St Bride's Parish Church in Sanquhar, near by his birthplace of Eliock.

All Points Bulletin. Should the Scottish Government invest to save games jobs in Dundee?

News has filtered through the ether that one of Scotland's leading game design companies Realtime Worlds has gone to the wall and called in the administrators. The business has been handed over to the frankly scary sounding 'Begbies Traynor Group', no doubt an amalgam of Irvine Welsh's favourite sociopath and a big mouthed football commentator. The sad news is that 170 staff in a lucrative, fresh faced, industry that brought a lot of kudos to Dundee, Abertay and Scotland have been given the usual ten minutes to clear their desk and get the chuff out of dodge, or rather Dundee.

The company recently launched APB, which was supposed to bring in exactly squiddly giddly gazillion dollars in revenue, after all some of the creatives behind Grand Theft Auto are behind this, Microsoft pumped it up as their must have game, it's had a global launch, massive investment and after some review issues and criticisms appears to have flopped.


My question is this, should the Scottish Government, mostly late middle aged men who couldn't tell Gay Tony and Mario the plumber apart, respond to the obvious pressure that will be put on them by the games industry and our national press to put Scottish taxpayers dosh into a games industry that glorifies violence, but hey has a potentially massive return? 
Is the imperative to save Realworld as valid as say trying to bail out the Dunfremline Building Society?

Personally, I'm thinking that David Jones who was behind GTA, Lemmings and Crackdown has a track record of his companies going tits up, seems to be a genius on the creative side but could perhaps do with a steadier hand on the management. Regardless of that, this is simply a horrible blow to a lightweight, hugely popular industry that yet again saw Scotland punching above her weight.


So what about it Tartan Overlord, what do your policy wonks say, sink or swim?

Too fat to give a f**k.

A begrudged venture into the Tescorpse in deepest Dumfropolis this afternoon brought me face to face with the gaping maws of an obese granny, daughter and grand-daughter who were taking up the entire central aisle as they debated the calorific contents of store brand low value Jaffa cakes versus the real deal flavoursome, but slightly more expensive are-they-a-cake-or-a-biscuit ones. As politely as I could muster, I uttered in a clear voice, "Excuse me" to the 20 plus stones of lycra clad tattoo that had successfully accomplished a breeding task and squeezed a mini me out between second breakfasts and her next appearance on the Jeremy Kyle show. Those that have met me know that I'm no midget, I'm a hefty lad too, but I felt compellingly anorexic squeezing past these benefit behemoths.

My appearance on their radar caused the grandmother to bring her hitherto well hidden Tourettes syndrome to the fore. In a movement that saw her face, neck and jowls turn and face me a good ten seconds before the rest of her wobbling mass arrived, "Fuck off yous" was the delightful refrain that belched from her engorged and pustulant lips. Perplexed I looked around to see if some other deluded shopper had tried to squeeze past, nope only me, perhaps she was seeing double or hadn't mastered the art of plurals...

I genuinely suppressed the urge to grab her by her gargantuine flappy necks and slam her head into her daughter and grand-daughters by now jabbering mouths. Thankfully, I thought of the long hours sitting in a police cell, the indignation of the tabloids and the inevitable jail sentence and recriminations from their extended family. Sighing I suggested they take their purchases to the Hippo aisle where their own kind wouldn't be subject to astonished looks or tuts of disapproval from the disillusioned or depressed. I was completely taken aback to hear a tweed clad elderly lady announce "Good for him!"

The whole encounter has left me weighed down with an unvented spleen, I feel the need to howl at the world and pound my fists against acres of soft malleable flesh to encourage through vigorous pummelling the notion that two packets of Jaffa cakes between meals is not a substitute for child care. I am so reduced to a state of nervous sensitivity that the sight of these disagreeable people has deeply impressed upon my mind. No doubt it will take several days to remove the imprint of their flesh, feeding and foulness from my mind. I fear that my life has been sheltered. This torment is too much for one man to endure. I have resolved to avoid the supermarket for eternity, unless I'm armed.

Precious Few Heroes: The case for Scottish independence

Well done to Jack Foster and Alan Hunter for this succinct, witty appraisal of the fucked-upness of Scotland.



Precious Few Heroes: The case for Scottish independence from Rough Justice Films on Vimeo.