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| Oh how modest... not a word about your porn? |
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| Just the kind of thing your average politician doesn't want to see. |
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| Dunno whether that's down to the low murder rate, or the propensity of the DWP to get it wrong. |
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| In our United Kingdom we seem to celebrate mainly English history. |
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| This is true. |
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| It's when you have to honour the pigs that it gets really tiresome. |
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| Well, you have to prove to the DWP that you are trying. |
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| Yes, but these things don't make Dave look big on the international stage. |
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| So, getting it in perspective, it isn't exactly an empire, is it? |
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| If only you were still PM, Mags, we'd be independent. Or maybe not... |
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| The reality is of course less spectacular. There are a variety of reasons that operations don't go ahead. Not least that people pull out at the last minute. Fail to show for elective surgery. |
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| This is an example of Labour running the health service in Wales. |
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| But we all know that no matter how well they do, the press will always conclude that the SNP are bad. |
Excellent "random thoughts". The last one is now my laptop background.
ReplyDeleteWow... Munguin is flattered!!!!
Delete:)
Thanks
One of the major problems is we kept according credence to organisations that really didn't, and don't, deserve it.
ReplyDeleteThe Trade Unions are still held up as representing the working classes while only around 14% of workers are in a TU.
When a Labour Government was in power it continued to represent the same groups as the Tories, at least behind the scenes.
We did see a way of changing the status quo in Scotland but Labour worked hard to keep it, while telling us they would change it.
They worked with the Tories in the same way as Labour Governments worked Tory interests.
No one really represents the working classes, which is a shame really, because in the end that way lies trouble.
DeleteYou can put people down for so long, and with no one standing up for them it is bound to happen.
But when the group gets to big, or the put down goes on for too long something has to give.
Labour did work hard to keep the status quo, and in doing that actually changed things for the worse for themselves, when Dave outwitted Brown and introduced EVEL.
As Dan says, that last one is a cracker; very revealing.
ReplyDeleteBrown outwitted by Cameron, how embarrassing and depressingly true. Too busy saving the union/world banking to see he was being played, like the haddie he is.
LOL yes. Brown, the experienced politician, who, as you say, saved the word, versus Cameron, the pampered rich boy who never had to save anything... and Cameron won.
DeleteHow dim do you have to be to be bested by Cammy?
It's not so much that he's dim, but he believed all the sycophantic toadying shysters around him, and got caught up in his own self importance, mixed with a belief in his very own manifest destiny.
DeleteIn a word, twat.
Yes, but at that level, not to be aware that Cameron and his (wo)men were lying and sneaky was plain stupid. I could have told him that Cameron was lying.
DeleteHence the last sentence, he he he.
DeleteHave you seen Kez is for independence? Over on Wings.
Off to look now. :)
DeleteWell, it would seem that that's what she's saying.
DeleteMaybe she has realised that that is where the country's going and if she wants to be a part of it, she has to get on the bus.
Maybe Jeff gave her a talking to over Christmas!
Absolutely love the last one. Is this (going to be) part of a poster campaign? Really ought to be and would most likely deserve a cracker of a crowdfunding campaign.
ReplyDeleteI agree. In December the figure was even higher, which is amazingly good for winter.
DeleteOoh, a wee bit unfair about Desmond. After all he does provide *ahem* educational material to the masses and provides a extra business for opticians.......
ReplyDeleteI've decided this year to stop being too serious and start taking the piss out of everyone (well, apart from Munguin of course).
zog
Taking the piss out of Munguin is something to be avoided at all costs. Believe me, I've tried it with catastrophic results. :)
DeleteI'm not sure it is possible to be unfair to Dirty Des, as private Eye calls him.
Great piece on NHS Scotland performance. Yet, the print media continue to get away with these distortions with impunity. Sooner or later, the SNP must take action. Sensible people will dismiss these headlines. Even more sensible people won't even look at these newspapers now, but for some the headlines will reinforce their negative opinion of the SNP. And I would think these are the very people whose opinion needs to be swayed before the "next Independence referendum".
ReplyDeleteNot sure what can be done Brian.
DeletePeople largely judge the NHS (and other services) by the quality of care they and their families or friends receive.
In most cases that is extremely good. There are exceptions of course.
Certainly we are reading nothing but bad stuff about the English system at the moment (although clearly the Welsh one is even worse). But in truth I bet that most of the patients in England and Wales are happy with their treatment.
If we want a better health service we must pay more for it.
In France, Germany, Belgium, they spend 11% of GDP on health. Britain provides 9%. I don't know what NHS Scotland spends though. It would be interesting to find out.
Of course a seizable amount of what is set aside in the UK is spent on paying back PFI arrangements rather than on patients, and our shortage of trained staff means expensive nurses and doctors have to be hired from agencies, or flown in from abroad.
I just heard that there is a dire shortage of GPs in some places in England, meaning that doctors are overtired leading to mistakes. We have to accept that more has to be spent if we want to have the same standard of health care as Europe.
Still bombs don't buy themselves.
Tris . . . thanks, I didn't express myself clearly here. I mean that the SNP have to find a way to counteract the distorted publicity being propagated by the print media. Of which the NHS is a good example - as you point out. Of course, it's not the only example, in fact the list is endless.
DeleteI've expressed my frustration to my SNP MP, both face to face and by email. He gives a strong impression of not being overly concerned with media attitudes, but maybe that's masking some grand plan, currently under wraps, but I doubt it. I think the answer is that the SNP just don't know what to do about it, perhaps hoping in the long, long, long term, they can change media attitudes.
I doubt if that's possible Brian.
DeleteThe media is largely owned from London by people who often don't even live in the UK!
From Russia to France, to the USA to the Channel Islands (Sark), they don't have any personal interest in how the UK runs, or how Scotland runs. They have a view of how they want it to be. Largely conservative, largely not in Europe, but running the world with the USA. And most certainly not missing a part.
In other words, unionist and conservative.
Once upon a time decent journalism required that while the opinion pages carried the voice of the paper, the news pages carried news. At least in the "broadsheets". In the Sun and Mirror, it was largely tittle tattle about the rich and famous.
Now the news is contorted to suit the wishes of the multi billionaire owners... and you can bet that their desires are nothing like ours.
Even in the Daily Telegraph, under the Barclays, the paper has become a Tory news sheet, embarrassingly reduced from its once serious status to being a tittle tattle sheet. I'm expecting there to be a 'page 3' any day!
It's not just the SNP that suffers, though. Look at how they have demonised Corbyn for being a tradition Labour man, instead of a Tory lickspittal, like Blair and Brown.
There's no doubt that the papers are waning in influence. I wonder that anyone under 35 ever looks at them other than in the hairdressers waiting room.
I think they will be gone by before their attitudes change.
But we should remember that the press that the SNP suffers at their hands doesn't make any difference to voting intentions.
I remember an old D C Thomson employee telling me that no matter how hard the Courier, Telegraph and Journal pushed the Tory line in their pages, Dundee voted solidly Labour over 50 years.
Thanks Tris - I'm familiar with those ownership facts and that argument. I know many in my age group (50+) who sadly, still read the Daily Record, and take opinions from it. Similarly, but less so perhaps, the Daily Mail. I would argue that the distortions they print do influence people. They reinforce the anti SNP negative views held by their readers.
DeleteOtherwise, why do they print such abominable stuff? Why do you and others - WoS, Bella - denounce them?
On the other hand I am surprised and disappointed that the SNP do not openly champion sites such as yours and others I've mentioned. Were any of you invited to the SNP's Media event at Christmas? Were the Dailies invited? The answers of course are 'no' and 'yes'.
It's a real puzzle to me.
Thanks Tris - I'm familiar with those ownership facts and that argument. I know many in my age group (50+) who sadly, still read the Daily Record, and take opinions from it. Similarly, but less so perhaps, the Daily Mail. I would argue that the distortions they print do influence people. They reinforce the anti SNP negative views held by their readers.
DeleteOtherwise, why do they print such abominable stuff? Why do you and others - WoS, Bella - denounce them?
On the other hand I am surprised and disappointed that the SNP do not openly champion sites such as yours and others I've mentioned. Were any of you invited to the SNP's Media event at Christmas? Were the Dailies invited? The answers of course are 'no' and 'yes'.
It's a real puzzle to me.
Of course, Brain, there are people who get their views from the papers, but I suspect that many of them are people that would never be convinced of any other argument. I know a few people, neighbours, who read the Daily Mail, and occasionally they share their views with me... I can see them in print in my mind's eye under the Mail or Express banner.
DeleteEU bad (of course in part it is, but they are totally unaware of the good that the EU does). SNP bad (and of course it's far from perfect, but they seem to have no idea that there is much that is good). Corbyn bad (and of course he has his faults, but at least he actually represents working people, which most of them are!!!)
I think that, in the absence of a Scottish press and thanks to the platform the internet gives us, bloggers (and I'm flattered to be included in company you place me) try to do to a wider audience what we have always done to the people we met with BBC/Daily Mail/Daily Record mindsets.
I don't know if we've ever convinced anyone on here, but in our humble way, we try... Just like I've no idea of whether or not I've ever convinced my neighbour (let's call him Ronny, coz that's his name) just how incredibly silly and groundless some of his arguments are. (Seriously you'd fall about laughing!)
He agrees with me at the time, but probably goes back inside and thinks that I'm some sort of daft woolly headed "liberal", not to believe in the royals and the empire adn the absolute rightness of being British.
To be honest Brian, I'd never want the site to be championed by any political party. I know some SNP people read it, at least on occasions. But my view and the SNP view do not always coincide, and I like to be free to say what I will.
I believe from what I've read that a far bigger player in this game, Stuart Campbell, is not a member of the SNP, has never been, and doesn't seek their blessing (although I'll bet most of their MPs and MSPs, not to mention MEPs read Wings avidly every day. They'd be daft not to).
I'm not sure if I would have gone to a Media Event, although I doubt that Munguin's Republic would have got an invite. Bigger bloggers may have done, but I suspect most wish to remain free of party affiliation
Sorry I am late to this discussion due to being told to get off the computer by my NHS physiotherapist.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you Tris that people form their opinions on how the NHS et are doing and in my opinion they are dong very well. As one of those statistics on A&E last September I was treated immediately and this was on a busy day. I was referred to Physio within the week of Fife being informed of my accident, Since then I have had very good assistance and was seen by my new GP on Hogmanay on a routine appointment when I expected to have to wait until after the New Year. Now I am seldom ill but I have another experience which happened in 1998 on what was Westminster's Labour Party Watch. I had a wart which had been looked at in 1995, it started to look very bad indeed. I made an appointment with my then GP to have it looked at in the Royal Infirmary Skin Clinic. It took 10 months for that appointment, turned out to be a Malignant Melanoma and one of the reasons I am here is that it was a shallow one. I do not want the incompetence of Labour anywhere near out NHS or as has been suggested SHS, and I think I may be one of the many.
In mid-2013,due to the alertness of a very competent GP,I was diagnosed with oral cancer in its early stages.Within 10 days I had biopsies,scans and was admitted to hospital for what turned out to be a long and very complex operation.I will not go into detail,suffice to say i was on the table for over 10 hours.I fully agree with your assessment that this would not be possible under a Labour Government in Holyrood as their running of NHS scotland was a shambles.
DeleteYes, Helena and Hootsman. It is much better today.
DeleteWhen the Tories were running the health service here (ore 1997) I was told to go home and stop making a fuss, and no I couldn't have a sick note...as, wait for it, "only women took time off for a touch of flu".
He was a locum, an ancient fellow, of military bearing. I was too sick to argue and went home, and after a few days back to work, where I suffered miserably for months.
Long after it was discovered that I had had glandular fever.
He could have killed me. Incompetent old sexist buffoon.
I noticed a tweet today from Shona saying that she was willing to meet with Hunt to explain to him how to avoid striking junior doctors.
Delete