THE THINGS THEY SAY:

...or maybe said

There was, of course, uncontrollable giggling and laughter at Mrs May's Downing Street arrival declaration of desire for a decent society, of wanting to build a country which was not driven by the interests of the privileged few, but the many; the people just managing to get by and working around the clock just to make ends meet.

Yeah right, we tittered, once we had calmed down. Whatever!

And who could blame us if we thought that we had heard it all before?

Because many of us remembered the words of St Francis of Assisi uttered by the sainted Margaret:  ‘Where there is discord, may we bring harmony. Where there is error, may we bring truth. Where there is doubt, may we bring faith. And where there is despair, may we bring hope’ … 

Aspiration, no?

And then we recall that, in fact, where there was harmony, she brought discord; where there might have been truth, she brought ..well, error is an understatement (ask the miners and Hillsborough survivors, the steel workers and just about anyone who had a job in industry); where people had believed in stuff, she brought doubt and anxiety, and for anyone who wasn't very comfortably off or didn't have sharp elbows, well, they found that there was no longer any kind of hope.

The comparison with Mrs Thatcher was, of course, pretty obvious, because of their gender, I suppose. Britain's first and second female prime ministers were bound to be scrutinised for similarities. 

But we shouldn't forget that Cameron promised the same sort of crap and then delivered the exact opposite. (Even his Deputy Prime Minister admits this, although exactly why Clegg would boast about the fact that he sat on his hands and agreed to all this inhumanity, is quite belong my understanding. You'd think that devastating the Liberal Democrat representation in Edinburgh, Cardiff, London and Brussels would have been enough humiliation for any man. Still, when you have a book to sell...)

I can't find any reference to what John Major said when he arrived at Downing Street. Probably something about being not inconsiderable pleased to have been to see her majesty and that peas for dinner would be lovely, and would the staff ask Mrs Currie to leave now please. 

Possibly the Press treated it like an Angela Eagle Press conference.)

I couldn't be bothered to Google what what Blair said. It would have been something sickeningly insincere, or religiously fanatical, I have no doubt! 

Or maybe: Comb your bloody hair, Cheri?

Has the Conservative Party abandoned that name in Scotland?

Are they now the Ruth Davidson Party?

When Annabel Goldie stood down as leader of the Conservative Party's Scottish branch, because David Cameron and Fluffy Muddle wanted her gone (presumably because they couldn't walk all over her), there were two main contenders for her job.

They were Ruth Davidson and Murdo Fraser.

Murdo stood on a ticket on changing the party in Scotland, losing the toxic brand, and the automatic agreement with everything London dictated, and becoming a new, right of centre, distinctly Scottish party. Many in the party agreed with him. Many outside the party agreed with him. 

Ruth, on the other hand, was David's woman. She areed with every word he said and he used all the power he could muster to have her elected, including supplying her (allegedly), against the rules, with his own PR people. (Not that they are up to much.) 

Ruth disagreed with changing the name or the brand... She arrogantly asserted that the toxicity attributable to Mrs Thatcher should be water under the bridge. Why, she (Ruth) was just a girl when Mrs Thatcher was prime minister.

It was insulting, of course, to those who had lost their jobs, their futures, their dignity and their health becasue of Thatcher's ideological reforms, and it missed the point that the Tories became even more toxic under John Major. Indeed it wasn't until 1997, some 6 years after Thatcher had been shown the door by the Tories, that they reached the depths. In that election they had zero MPs in Scotland. In that respect they have recovered a little since then, having one MP... well, more or less. (As my old boss would say: Half a man is better than no man at all!)

Ruth showed herself as an arrogant and immature 33 year old who needed to do some growing up. But with the help of David Cameron she was duly elected and led the party to its worst result in 100 years in the UK elections of last year.

Well, now she has grown up. And there's an irony in the fact that she isn't  any longer talking about the Tories at this general election. The toxicity has still not gone away, so she's selling herself.

Ruth Davidson for opposition. Quite apart from the fact that conceding defeat some 3 weeks before the election is pretty disturbing, it seems that she has come to the conclusion that she was wrong and Murdo was right.

Murdo must have a warm satisfied glow.

Ruth is counting on being the second party. The official opposition in parliament after the May election.

By pinning her party's fortunes so firmly to her own identity, she must realise that any failure in this regard is likely to fall fair and square on her shoulders

If Kezia Dugdale remains the leader of the opposition for the next five years, will Ruth fall on her sword?

THOUGHTS ON SATURDAY

Labour's Scottish Accounting Unit has been holding its conference in Edinburgh today, and the big boss flew in from London to speak.

Some Silly Billy put the election poster for
 a non-existent party in a very
unfortunate position.

I was a bit surprised at that. After all, Jim tells us HE is the boss and NOBODY tells him what to do. And he proved it by declaring that, in Scotland, he would vote for free tertiary education and in England (where he is aiming to be an MP for at least a year), he would vote for £6,000 pa fees. 

Anyway, inconsistencies apart, the imperial leader arrived and made a speech.

Strangely he failed to do what his Scottish colleagues (many of whom may be looking for jobs in a few months) asked him to do, which was rule out a coalition with the SNP. 

In one of these odd quirks of fate, Mr Cameron called upon him to do the same thing, which I suppose shows that there is a great deal of common ground between the Eton Boy and the average Labour Backbencher. 

I'm pretty sure they needn't worry about a coalition with the SNP. I doubt very much that it will never happen. 

What could occur, and might ensure that Mr Miliband is the next prime minister of the union, is that the SNP could agree to support Labour on a variety of measures where they had common cause, where it was in the interests of the UK and of course, particularly, where it was in Scotland's interest.

It seems to me that unless you are an adherent of the Willie Bain school of confrontational politics and cutting off your nose to spite your face, that would be the sensible thing to do. 

Willie Bain. Labour Philosopher Extraordinary.

For the uninitiated, Mr Bain, one of the great political thinkers in his own bedsit, declared that Labour would never vote for anything that the SNP supported, on the basis that ...well, the SNP supported it. 

Even if it was straight from the pages of the Labour Manifesto, they would still vote it down. Mr Bain's intellectual processes are clearly way beyond my understanding, or even that of Munguin, so we can only stand and stare, without comprehension at his theories. And we do.

However, Mr Miliband, who isn't in charge of Scottish Labour, because Jim is, trotted out the tired old line about Vote SNP, get Tory, clearly unaware that Scotland has, for 35 years, voted Labour and, for all but 13 of these years, got Tory anyway, and may just be getting a little fed up with it. It's simple Mr Miliband. 

There are 650 MPs in the Commons, Scotland elects 59 of them; Wales 40; N Ireland 18, and England 533. So, which country do you think chooses the government of the day?

Miliband said Scotland couldn't afford the Tories. He simplified it for us. He said, its old, its young, it poor, its NHS, couldn't afford the Tories.

Wait a minute... Its NHS?

WHAT? 

Didn't they tell us, only 6 months ago, that the NHS would only be safe within the UK?

They surely must have realised at that time that it was always possible that the Tories could win a general election, if not this time, next time or the time after... and, well, he just said it. The NHS in Scotland is not safe with a Tory government in the union. 

Does that then mean that they lied to us? Alistair Sweetheart and Gordon Clunking Fist Ex-Politician Millionaire Brown lied?

Surely some mistake.

Talking about coalitions and the Willie Bain philosophy of political thought, how does Mr Miliband feel about Mr Baker's slimy call for the Tories to go into coalition with Labour to keep these damned Scots out. We know that some Labour MPs agree with that, although Maggie Curran isn't one of them. She went so far as to block me on Twitter when I questioned her.

Mr Baker (St Paul and Oxford), who apparently now goes under the title of the Baron or Dork, and is one of the sleeping partners, snoozing on the red leather benches made for aristocratic bottoms, seems to think that it is the only way to keep the UK together.

Too much vintage champagne, good port and quails' eggs at the tax payers' expense, methinks. Or perhaps just distance from any kind of reality.

Hic...hic sunt nobiles

Seriously Mr Baker, your sort told us that we were an important, if somewhat stupid and feckless, part of the Brit family, and that we were all better and stronger together, pooling and sharing, in this green and pleasant land. And we, or at least some of us, took you at your word.

And now you want to do deals with your 'old enemy' to stop us from having a democratic say in the running of the union of which we were persuaded to remain a part. 

If there are a substantial number of SNP MPs elected in May, that will reflect the voting in Scotland, according to your preferred electoral system. Surely, even under a lordly Tory definition of democracy, these MPs have some rights? Perhaps you think not as many as your noble self, elected by...the Queen. 

When the Tories, or Labour, are incapable of forming a government alone (as they were in 2010), then one of the parties will require the votes of MPs from other minor parties to pass legislation. 

Minor parties represent people in the UK too, even if they are only Irish, Welsh or Scottish people. 

The Tories have just worked with the Liberals, a minority party with only 57 MPs. Why, if Scotland is an integral part of the UK would the SNP be different?

Another out of touch remnant of Thatcher

I wonder if you are aware how this comes across to Scots. I'll tell you how I see it. You appear to want us to stay with you as long as we don't exercise our democratic will, and accept the failing two-party system, which is overwhelmingly English oriented. 

Leave governing to you lot, and get on with whatever it is we do up here.

Let me tell you, your Nobleness, that's the fastest way I know to a second referendum on independence. And I suspect Wales, Northern Ireland and Cornwall too, if you gang up of all of us!

SNAPS ON SATURDAY

Even if you are not a fan of Jean-Claude Juncker or even the EU
 it is always refreshing to see pomposity and superiority
get its own rewards

You'd think that the best education that loads of money can buy
would have equipped Mr C with the knowledge of the constituent 
members of the kingdom
of which he is supposedly the senior minister.

What a week... humiliated, right, right and centre

What an exciting future on offer.

What a good use for a waste of card.

From the arch unionist...

I doubt if they do... Put education in the hands of the UK
and it becomes the most expensive in Europe

You have been warned...

And again...
while the Westminster crowd continue to indulge themselves

Like this flipping person...

And this beauty....

Stables no less...

Slim Jim too

Oh well, that's it. We can't have America upset.
But don't worry John. You're not prime minister any more.
It won't be you that get's the spanking.
It will be the Eton Toff. They are used to that.

I bet Selfridges sacked him for being useless.

Pimp my non existent Perugia university degree...

Cabinet Meeting

It's this pig again. (Apologies to pigs everywhere).

Safe as houses now.

And he still won't debate with people. He prefers to sell his boring book.

Yes, it's true ...I am fixated with him...
or at least with his wickedness.

The cheering thing, I suppose it, that there are kids who care enough to help
their starving friends in this third world oil rich nation.
If it's the people versus the government, then at least we will stick together

At long last, a partial acceptance that it's HIS fault
and the fault of his clique

Ahhhhh....socialism

True Tommy...

And maybe it's getting through around the country

Odd that...

Odd that too...

Odd that we never heard the truth...

From the old (even if he was attacked by some mad banshee of a woman)...

...to the younger...

...to the even younger.

And I'm not into celebrity endorsements.
"Sir" Sean can think what he likes; David Bowie too.
They are as entitled to an opinion as I am.
But Ucock keep force feeding us on their celebrities like Susan Boyle
and Jimmy Crankie who
are going to, or if they had a vote would, vote no.
It doesn't hurt to point out that Elijah, Paolo Nutini, Irving Welch,
Brian Cox, Annie Lennox and even Noel Gallagher are among those for YES.