I can't decide if, when he labelled the SNP Conference a "hate fest", Tom Harris was smirkingly thinking to himself 'this'll wind them up' or whether he was genuinely believing what he was writing (with hopefully ironic vein-throbbing ire).
A 'hate fest'? A 'hate fest' for goodness sake! It's such an odd choice of phrase.
I was in attendence at the SNP Conference (as it is otherwise known) for only two of the four scheduled days so does that mean I was part of a 'dislike gala'?
Another thought that springs to mind is why do so many people out there, of all parties, find it so difficult to contemplate that there is more than one decent party to choose from? Where's the credit where credit's due? If most parties spend most of the time trying to find the middle ground that is fast becoming the size of a 5 pence piece then surely there can't be that much between them. Certainly not enough to call one odious and hateful . (Are Norway and Sweden "odious" because they refuse to create a Scandinavian state?)
I think I would even struggle to call a BNP Conference a 'hate fest'. Genuinely. People are entitled to all opinions, all views and if we disagree with those views then we have a certain incumbency to argue our opponents into submission or agree to disagree, hence why all arguments this weekend that the BNP should never have been allowed on Question Time fall down in my eyes.
I tell you what though, if opponents of the SNP, particularly visceral ones in the shape of Tom Harris MP (and, while I'm on the subject, perhaps even Yousuf Hamid), think the party of the Scottish Government are going to quietly slip back into the mid teens of support once the Scottish public belatedly sees the light then they have another thought coming.
I know I am biased but the ideas and goodwill bursting out of the SNP is very impressive indeed and the regularity with which they hit that thin line between too-right and too-left with their policies is certainly the reason they get my vote.
This weekend saw delegate after delegate taking to the stage to push a resolution or a motion with an eloquence and a sense of purpose that makes you sit up and take notice.
Personally I just go to Conferences as I am interested in how they work and you've got to pass the time somehow; I'm not looking for political advancement nor realising the independence dream but male or female, white or non-white, gay or straight, young or old, these SNP councillors and MSPs who are looking to get ahead and take their country with them are not only clearly on a mission but they have the bit between their teeth.
The sense of purpose is streamlining them and there is a pretty awesome pool of talent sitting underneath the Swinneys, Salmonds, Sturgeons and MacAskills waiting to be drawn upon.
Tom Harris & co, underestime them at your peril...
(NOTE - Sunday Times columnist Joan McAlpine discusses Tom's description on her Go Lassie Go blog)
Salmond vs Trump
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I have a feeling it's because Glasgow South isn't nearly the Labour fortress some try to make it out to be and Tom Harris knows it full well
I remember making a few comments on here in the early days of Yousuf's blog about how positive and forward looking the wee guy was, and if only more of the New Labour supporters were like that they'd be in a better shape.
Now look at him...I suppose that's what a few hours in the company of Frank McAveety does to you.
And, as has been noted above, the fact that the SNP won in Harris' constituency at the Euros seems to have him rattled. Good.
I remember having the same thoughts Sean.
I just get the impression he's losing sight of his early healthy ambitions by being immersed too early in the party machine. I gues it must be difficult to step back from it all occasionally and reassert one's own beliefs, regardles off what party one is trying to advance their career within.
There's no doubt though, Yousuf's blog is fast becoming car-crash tv and it really is a damn shame.
Yikes! I have to say I don't think I have a 'visceral hatred' of the SNP and I certainly don't under estimate them I simply think that they will be squeezed in the General Election.
"I simply think that they will be squeezed in the General Election."
So do I, looking in on the SNP conference, I would simple say it appeared very inward looking and negative. So much so, I have been genuinely gobsmacked at the about face from the positive campaign run in the 2007 Scottish elections.
The sheer contrast from that pro buisness and investment stance, to the lets park our tanks on Labour's lawn and stake a claim to the public sector gamble is quite something.
As is using the future of our country and its relation with the rest of the UK as ransom for unrealistic demands during this recession. Breathtaking to hear the expression 'hung by a Scottish rope'.
But to put the idea of a hung Parliament to the forefront is to tell the public that its all to play for among the big two parties, not that its worth a punt on the SNP instead. Bizarre.
My prediction, I expect the SNP polling figures to droop on the back of the publicity of this conference, no bounce, not even a dead cat one.
Can't argue with much there Fitalass, fair comment all in all. I certainly can't very well speak for people outside the SNP bubble.
Well, I can speak for one person who said to me yesterday that they particularly disliked the 'hung on a Scottish rope' line.
It makes me cringe too, no wonder it's been changed to the more palatable (though not entirely cringe-free) Westminster dancing to a Scottish tune.
I wonder if the SNP are trying to win an election and win favour for independence with one soundbite and just getting a bit wrong...
Anyway, stop changing the subject, let's get back to Tom Harris-bashing...! ;)
Yousuf, fair enough, the 'visceral' wasn't meant your way but hopefully you're taking the constructive criticism onboard. And in good faith.
Now maybe you can understand why i never follow blogs such as Scottish Unionist and Tom Harris.
They are the cringe of politics and can not come to terms with civic nationalism.
I think that many SNP supporters like me have become inured to the insults fired at the SNP by the three unionist factions to the point where it's just water off a ducks back but it's only when you stand back that you recognise the level of hatred that is directed towards the SNP.
"Hate Fest".
This didn't come from some skin-head wrapped in a union-jack or a unionist poster who would be writing in green ink if they still used paper, it came from a Labour Member of Parliament.
It's a subjective opinion but I've noticed that the invective level has been turning up recently, especially with the SNP's request for the broadcasters to follow the legislation and their own guidelines on political impartiality during an election when considering a party leader's debate broadcast in Scotland.
The co-ordinated call from Labour, the Lib-Dems and the Tories for a Scottish debate to try and muddy the waters over a party leaders' debate in Scotland allied with the Orange Order throwing their bowler hat into the ring with Labour shows that the artificial left/right divided between the unionist parties is blurring and even unionists on different sides of the sectarian divide in Scotland are coming together to try and save the Union.
This quote was in the Scotsman
Michael MacMahon, the Labour MSP for Hamilton North and Bellshill, and a Catholic, said that he welcomed the support. He said: "I have a good relationship with the Orange Order. They understand the importance of the Union and they understand the threat."
You couldn't make it up. I think that "Hate Fest" is going to be mild compared with what's going to come in the run up to the election.
SNP voter I may be, but I can't help agreeing with some of what Fitlass says. All that "Scottish demands", "hung by a Scottish rope" nonsense is exactly the sort of thing which will put floating voters off. The tone is all wrong - slightly threatening, even - and it's a far cry from the positive message which won the 2007 elections. Quite what the point was of bringing up Megrahi again, I'm not quite sure.
They also need to have a rethink about their party political broadcasts. I thought the "keep on" keepie uppie one was bad but the "vote SNP and you too can confuse Londoners walking past the Houses of Parliament by shouting 'Scotland' loudly from a Scottish mountain" broadcast was a combination of cringe worthy and hysterical. I'm half expecting the next PPB to be 5 minutes of the saltire photographed from various angles with the flashing word "SCOTLAND" superimposed (accompanied by obligatory cheapo Celtic muzak, natch).
Ach, well.
http://www.ianhamiltonqc.com/blog/?p=387
"There was a time when demonstrations of our national identity were necessary. These times are long past. Scotland’s identity is secure.
"A free Scotland must have fewer kilts and no poor."
Hate fest? Anyone's who's pro-SNP must hate England. Obviously.
regarding hate, i thought with griffin on QT i would throw in a wobbly one.
very open to sensible comment.
(i hope i do not come across as some mad right winger here.)
with an additional 2.2 million immigrants foreign born coming to the uk since 2001, a 55% increase in OFFICIAL figures in 8 years, that equates in voting terms to an extra million votes in the bag for labour in primarily urban centres at the next election.
in my worlings out that is a boosting of labour's vote from 25% to around 29% at this time in the uk.
do the sums, based on 65% take up to vote and of those 75% vote labour. anet gain to labour of a million votes is about right. which is 4% of the voting population.
therefore, the fact london's immigrant population plus the benefit claimants votes for labour and the "locals" do not makes for interesting and polarised elections. and as well as inner london we could say many others where labours vote wil hold up spectacularly, such as leicester, manchester and bristol (east)
i cannot comment fully on this outcome and percentages in a scottish seat context, i have no raw data, and scotland has been far more favourable to immigrants who wish to come here and become "one of us", however this elephant in the room aspect plus the protestant-catholic dramas and the perceived anti glasgow tirade from labour shows that this by election is going to be very nasty indeed, and a precusror to a wider manipulation of the media on these issues.
and if or shouyld i say WHEN labour bring religion and race into the election it will be doing so to try to try to stop defections to the bnp as much as trying to stop defections to the snp here in scotland.
whilst mccain won the white vote he lost the new immigrant hispanic vote. and lost overall. so the new voters need to be either grovelled to on their terms or opposed fully so that further polarisation to bring the middle ground back to the labour party can be tried.
sitting on the fence is not anm option. the issue is too volatile.
labour needs the new voters so cannot do anything to antagonise them, but it does explain why UKIP polled so well as people required another voting option and outlet, not just to whinge about europe but about immigration and cultural changes per se.
with UKIP being told an accidental removal of a valid donor from the electoral register should cost them 360k and effectively almost close them down, whilst labour and tory and liberal party all have donors whose actions were illegal in the true sense of the word, the pressure on democracy to find a workable solution to vent one's feelings is as hard in the uk as it is in afghanistan.
even further off topic, canal + had a great programme showing where the money REALLY went. not one school of the 680 claimed to be built has been, at least nobody could find one to show the film crew. and i simple terms a group of 200 people (pollies and miltary)have taken all the money and that is why the locals now support the taleban again. based on that program and the inherent corruption when the local people are starving who could blame them.
G Campbell, I am a Scottish Tory, but also a political anorak. And when I was making those points, they were entirely genuine. Unfortunately, because of my political leanings, I get accused of being a partisan Tory and therefore my observations are just cos I don't like the SNP. Not true.
I won't vote for them because I am as attached emotionally to the Union as they are to independence. But I was entirely relaxed about them becoming the party in power in Holyrood in 2007, had high hopes of a real change to tackling the problems we face in Scotland. And I think that many others did too.
What I cannot understand, and I have been grappling with this over the last few weeks, is the change in such a successful and positive strategy to one that is entirely negative, and I dare I say quite threatening at a very dangerous time for the UK economically?
I have noticed genuine anger from some voters who lent their vote to the party back in 2007, they feel let down, and its a case of now wondering why they voted for the SNP to boot out Labour when the SNP now aspire to be the Tartan Labour party?
They seem to have abandoned the voter rich area's which helped get them into power back in 2007, and all in aid of trying to go after the Labour vote in their heartlands?
The Tories went to great pains to avoid a tone of triumphalism at their Conference, but the SNP leadership seemed hell bent in embracing just a theme. If I am honest about it, it feels like the SNP let me down and I didn't even vote for them. The Scottish rope and Scottish tune stuff was really aggressive and arrogant.
To sum up their conference. Lots of rhetoric, but all about the aspirations of the SNP, nothing in there to encourage the aspirations on the ordinary Scottish voters. And I doubt that the leadership team even noticed that fact sadly.
And the PPB was absolutely dire, kids were laughing and called it cringe worthy. Anyway, it will be interesting to see how it all pans out, but I genuinely think the SNP might have made a major mistake. I maybe wrong, we shall see, the GE is coming soon enough.
fitalass, the reason the snp can be triumphalost when the tories cannot be is because the snp are actually in power.
i assure you when the tories are in power in london they will not be slow in being triumphant!
as i said elsewhere this campaign will get dirty, the difference is this time the snp will not just take it. the picture of a noose around scotland's neck being portayed as the snp approach to scotland as the sun suggested in may 2007, along with financial armageddon.
i think we k
now who played the part of beelzebub in the economy and it was not the snp.
being a minority concensus government there is only so much one can do. as cameron would find out if he was in a hung parliament!
Fitalass, the idea if you accusing the SNP of being negative when Annabel Goldie has been acknowledged even by people who previously liked her as "scraping the barrel" over Megrahi and Qatar, is just hilarious.
After the euro election results, to have a Scottish Tory dimissing the SNPs chances of even achieving a dead cat bounce is just surreal.
You're as entirely relaxed about the SNP government as I am about being held by the ankles over the Tay bridge but well done on spreading doubt and uncertainty about the SNP. That's where unionists truly excel.
Tom Harris knows he is in trouble in Glasgow South.
The SNP came within 1,800 votes of beating Labour in the Glasgow South area in 2007 and did beat Labour in the euros.
His underlying problem is that he has no idea how to engage with the SNP even in the sense of attacking them because he has become entirely Westninsterised.
He cannot engage the SNP in a debate about SNP policies because he doesn't really know what they are so he just accuses us of hating the English.
"Fitalass, the idea if you accusing the SNP of being negative when Annabel Goldie has been acknowledged even by people who previously liked her as "scraping the barrel" over Megrahi and Qatar, is just hilarious."
I missed that, as far as I could see she simple disagreed with the decision, doesn't automatically make her position a negative one. And certainly not on the scale of the current SNP strategy.
"You're as entirely relaxed about the SNP government as I am about being held by the ankles over the Tay bridge but well done on spreading doubt and uncertainty about the SNP. That's where unionists truly excel."
Ah, and here we come to the real problem you have with my comments.
Grow up, being in power means you are scrutinised and questioned, that is exactly how it should be.
And I was quite relaxed about the SNP victory in 2007.
What nonsense Fitalass. Annabelle Goldie did not "simply disagree with the decision".
She tried to cast doubt on the process and on the integrity of the individuals concerned - not only the Justice Secretary but the prison governor, medical officer etc.
Disagreeing with a decision is fine but if you are going to attack the integrity of individuals without any real basis for doing so you are playing dirty.
A stupid and unpleasant tactic and quite out of character for Ms Goldie I would have thought.
Wow, Harris really is losing it over on his blog now.
Still, it beats his X-Factor posts.
Indy, followed the case very closely, and it would seem that many mistakes were made by MacAskill, not least visiting Megrahi personally.
C'mon, the whole thing stank from high heaven. And the bottom line is that neither the Labour government in Westminster or the SNP in Holyrood wanted to leave this man in jail for a whole raft of not so ethical reasons.
The fact that MacAskill tried to turn himself into the preacher on the Mount over it was quite distasteful, nearly as off as Brown scuttling around hiding from the issue altogether.
The Ghandi quote by Salmond didn't help either.
I love the word integrity, much overused when it comes to discussing politicians methinks.
Harris is obviously losing it, remember there were moves in his CLP to have a vote of no confidence in him, which were ruled out of order a few months back. Plus he won't be getting much help from Labour HQ for his campaign after calling for Brown's head.
Probably seen the latest canvass returns and feeling a bit jittery as a result.
Fitalass, I think you started off making some reasonable criticisms of Team SNP but you've let that head of steam take you too far I fear. Obviously if we revisit the Megrahi decision we'll be here all week but 'stank to high heaven'? Come on, whether you agree or not, at least recognise it's a fairly standard decision that Kenny had to take. Incidentally, Mr Harris isn't half making a hash of putting this 'hate fest' debacle. Some car-crash blogging over that way at the mo...
Fitalass wrote: "The sheer contrast from that pro buisness and investment stance, to the lets park our tanks on Labour's lawn and stake a claim to the public sector gamble is quite something."
I agree. I'm one of those who switched to the SNP at the last Holyrood election and also in the Euros. I'm now reconsidering whether to continue that support in the General Election. The last thing we need here is a tartanised version of Labour's nanny state, and increasingly that's what we're getting. We need a Scotland that supports both individual and economic freedom. I'm reasonably relaxed about getting those in a context of national independence. But the SNP will blow it if they fail to realise that people are getting exceedingly angry about state nannying and also that we have no viable economic future without scaling back the state sector in a very big way.
Fitalass it may seem to you that many mistakes were made but in fact they were not.
Visiting Megrahi for example. Kenny MacAskill had no choice but to visit Megrahi under the terms of the Prison Transfer Agreement negotiated behind the backs of the Scottish Government by Tony Blair and Colobel Gadaffi.
I do not suggest that recognising someon's integrity means that you have to support their decision or the manner in which it was announced.
However when you raise suspicions over the medical evidence for example, as Annabelle Goldie did, she is not simply accusing Kenny MacAskill but also the Chief Medical Officer of the Scottish Prison Service. If you are going to do that better be damn sure of your facts - and she wasn't.
"Visiting Megrahi for example. Kenny MacAskill had no choice but to visit Megrahi under the terms of the Prison Transfer Agreement negotiated behind the backs of the Scottish Government by Tony Blair and Colobel Gadaffi."
That is not true and you know it!
MacAskill had a legal obligation to hear Megrahi's representations, he did not have to meet him personally!
So yes, he did have a choice, and he choose to visit him personally in jail while having a chat with the US relatives via video conference. Not apparently worth a return flight for a proper consultation, in say New York.
As I said, I followed this closely, and it was a very emotive and contentious issue. It crossed party political lines as well, something that Jeff should bear in mind when I made my earlier comment.
I think that he handled badly, and then compounded his errors by trying to play Preacher on the Mount over the decision.
On the claim of undermining someone's integrity, whether it be a politician or a civil servant etc is a tired one. What you really mean is that the opposition should not dare to question or scrutinise a decision made by those in power.
Its a tired and over used one by the way, Labour dined out on it for 12 years already.
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