Kenny MacAskill

Department of Justice

St Andrews House

Edinburgh

 

Dear Kenny

I keep reading how the SNP wants Scotland to be like any other normal country. In that case should you not act accordingly and take in for immediate questioning the Rev. Stuart Campbell?

This man is running a scurrilous and scabrous website http://wingsoverscotland.com excoriating Scottish society under the guise of being some kind of servant of God. This is clearly a cover for a vengeful campaign of undermining our society and possibly helping to overthrow the established order.

It is my belief that in almost every country in South America, Africa and Asia, this type of anti-state propaganda would result in detention and re-education – at least. Can his email account be closed down, for example? In Russia, they would trump up criminal charges and have him arrested. Some people find his activities funny but if they think he will stop after a Yes vote they are clearly deluded. This man is a determined anarchist opposed to whatever government is elected.

Could his church – some dubious tiny sect, I suspect – not be threatened with a tax investigation until he is forced to desist?

All sorts of people from across Scottish society are accessing this dangerous mind-altering material and are reported to be enjoying it. Is that what you intended when you took over the Justice Department, that the righteous and self-regarding should be humiliated in a public forum? I am today writing to the leaders of the established churches urging the formation of an ecumenical front that might lead to excommunication. Unless this seditious platform is closed down, the rest of us will be forced to labour in his shadow.

I understand the Unionists are also ready to back a move against him. Their suggestion is that all Yes banners and posters will henceforth be deemed to be answering the question: Should the Rev be detained immediately? Rather than the conventional: Do you want independence?

What do you think? If you do close him down, could you add a government-approved note with a link referring people  to the following site instead…https://derekbateman2.wordpress.com.

Kind regards

Derek Bateman

In an unprecedented move Better Together has become the first political campaign group to launch its own loyalty card. Members will be able to top up with points every time they salute a Union Jack, hum God Save the Queen or buy tickets for the Proms.

There will also be awards for buying merchandise including tee-shirts with images of William Wallace with the slogan: “He’s Not a Hero – He’s a Virus.”

A spokesman said it was the next logical step for a group used to retail politics. “We offer everything, just like Tesco,” he said. “The only things we don’t peddle are national self-esteem, personal dignity and pride. But you can get these at other outlets.”

Better Together trades on its wide range of policy options and even includes a left-wing party arguing to keep a right-wing party in power in order to impoverish the low-paid and retain weapons of mass destruction. “We believe this is a pretty unique combination of political positions not available in any other self-respecting democracy in the world,” said the spokesman. “So it’s natural we should try to cash in on it.”

Points can also be earned at specially staged events including the Edinburgh to London Marathon which has the unique feature of participants running on their knees. “This is actually easier than it sounds,” he said. “Labour MPs have been doing for decades. We have a group of them led by Alastair Darling who will be in charge of training and conditioning. Not many people know this but Alastair has kneecaps like cricket balls developed from years of energetic crawling.”

The card can be redeemed in a number of ways from the lowest prize range (meet Ruth Davidson, enjoy political insights from David Mundell) through to workshops on how to demean your own country and courses on treating oil as an economic catastrophe – conducted by Professor John McLaren of Glasgow University.

At the upper end of the range there is a personalised game of Monopoly which has all of Alastair Darling’s houses on the board and contestants compete to see who can identify his main residence first. The Collect £200 square is renamed  Collect £200,000 in Outside Earnings and the Go to Jail square has a picture of Jim Devine. Next there is a weekend sharing in policy development ideas with Scottish Labour attended by Johann Lamont and Paul Martin. (Now reduced to coffee and a chocolate shortcake slice in Greggs from 1.00pm to 1.15 pm on Saturdays.)

For platinum members there is an exclusive offer to a drinks reception with a Bosnian war criminal. There are number to choose from and each will describe in detail how he organised mass murder and torture. Those with most points will also become Friends of Vitol with access to African dictators and the Full New York Court Experience in which they plead guilty to grand larceny for paying kickbacks to Iraqi officials for oil bought under the UN oil-for-food relief programme.

“We’re really proud of this because you get to know what it feels like to be helping Saddam Hussein stay in power and crush his own people who opposed him. Then you get the thrill of getting your just desserts and paying fines of $17.5m,” said the spokesman. “We think this will really appeal to No voters who want to crush a similar freedom movement among a minority in Britain, an oil rich country run by a brutal cabal.”

Friends of Vitol will receive a platinum card embossed with Brian Wilson’s signature inside a Harris Tweed wallet.

“If anybody has any other ideas for rewards of Better Together Loyalty Card Holders they can email this blog site,” he said.

 

 

 

Labour and the Liberal Democrats have formed an alliance to produce a new political movement. It is headed by Alistair Carmichael and Johann Lamont who have devised the thinking behind the idea which they are calling New Reality.

The pair have been coordinating their statements since Carmichael took over as Scottish Secretary and say the first signs that it is working appeared yesterday.

In the Press, Carmichael claimed that Grangemouth had been saved by the Union against all prevailing information while at the same time on television Lamont was stating that she never said Scotland was a “something for nothing country”.

An insider said: “There is no doubt that these two moves took Scotland by storm and represent a completely new way of doing politics. Instead of the conventional view that Johann did indeed say it, she now creates a new reality that it never happened in the first place, thereby changing the whole agenda. Alistair then also overturned the same tired old view of two governments working together in order to claim all the credit for the Union despite the evidence to the contrary.”

New Reality is believed to be a spin-off from Better Together and is using its specialist software developed by David Ike Digital which turns clearly true facts into something meaning the exact opposite. It also incorporates an automatic “scream” factor designed to both confuse and then frighten the reader.

The result is that people who are convinced that something is true are so stunned by what the software industry calls AFBL* technology that they immediately believe the opposite and then contradict other people who also thought it was true.

“This could revolutionise public affairs,” said the spokesman. “It means for example that Labour can instantly erase all trace of Iain Gray being Scottish leader. That of course is retroactive whereas when this was first developed by Tony Blair it was pre-emptive allowing him to change the truth in advance of going to war.”

For the Lib Dems, New Reality allows them to state that Nick Clegg never did promise to abolish tuition fees. It is believed to have been applied to Charlie Kennedy’s drinking problem in order to eradicate it from the record but met its first failure. “It was a step too far,” said the party. “However, on the bright side it did report that Jeremy Thorpe was an ordinary bloke who played dominoes at the miners club, read Page Three and shared roll-ups with Norman Scott.”

*A Fucking Big Lie

Vans with slogans telling foreigners to Go Home are to be deployed in London after Scottish independence. The Border Agency has recently agreed to remove the vans which have caused widespread offence to immigrant communities but it has now been revealed they will be stored and brought out in the event of a Yes vote next September.

London Scots, of whom there are several hundred thousand, will find the vehicles in their streets, displaying a constant reminder that they are only in England under sufferance and should register to become English or return to Scotland.

The Home Office justified the plan saying it struck the right note for English people who were happy to have immigrants in their midst so long as they were there legally.

“The sad fact is, and this is being confirmed throughout the referendum campaign by Unionist politicians including Labour, that Scots will be foreigners in England. As such they should be treated the same as anybody else seeking to make a life in this country rather than their own. That is the consequence of being foreign.”

Scottish-born staff working for UK companies will receive forms asking for details of residency and offering them the chance of surrendering their Scottish national identity to be replaced with an English passport and voting rights.

“Of course, they will have to meet the criteria,” said an official.  “They can’t just say they want to be English. They will have to answer questions about English history – kings and queens, that sort of thing – and display a thorough understanding of how English taxpayers have financed their country of origin. They will have to denounce the aims of the independence movement and Mr Salmond. We don’t want some unassimilated presence in our communities which can be used against this country’s national interest.”

The vans will have on their sides the message: In the UK Illegally? Go Home to Think Again…or Face Arrest.

Protestors said the message might provoke retaliation from English people who resented Scots in their cities. “What else can you expect when the elected government makes plain its revulsion at these foreigners in our midst?” said a spokesman for the English Defence League. “They’re making it clear they don’t want these immigrant types in this country and since they are also making it clear that Scots will be foreigners, the same applies to them. That’s what happens when the government follows racist policies that we support.”

There was confusion about how commuting Scots, like the broadcaster James Naughtie, will be regarded. With homes in both countries, he may be able to claim dual nationality. A spokesman for the Scottish government said it was not automatic that someone in that position would qualify for a Scottish passport. “The point is that people who have made a career out of being both Scottish and British will have to make up their mind,” said a spokesman. “We’re not sure what Jim would choose. But the British are making clear that if you remain Scottish in England and therefore foreign, you will be arrested.”

Mr Naughtie was on the shuttle and could not be contacted.

It’s emerged that secret plans have been devised by the Scottish government for the population to live in Iron Age crannogs when society breaks down after independence. It is feared that extreme poverty will drive people into the countryside and there will be a return to ancient ways.

Government officials have been covertly making a study of the Loch Tay Crannog in Perthshire to see how it could be modified for modern use. Surveyors wearing animal skin costumes to blend in with the guides have been observing how visitors interact with the wood and stone-based environment.

Families are shown how to operate 2500-year-old primitive tools to make their own clothing and learn how to make fire. Staff at the visitor centre said details were supposed to be secret but that a steady stream of SNP dignitaries have been arriving to be shown what to expect when Scotland returns to the Dark Ages. “We had a party of MSPs,” said one. “But they were useless. They kept asking where the bar was. It was decided that they would be put beside the others unlikely to have the wit to adapt and they shouldn’t be used for breeding to continue the species.”

Staff were impressed by Alex Salmond who made his own deer skin cape and wore a leather helmet topped with horns. “He really got into it,” said one. “While the others struggled to get a spark on to the bracken to make fire, he just moved his hands over it and said: “Let there be light…and it worked.”

Crannogs once littered the lochs and coastal areas of Scotland but so far none have been discovered in what is now England. The SNP says that shows there was a more communal approach to society in ancient Scotland and people protected each other reflecting different social values from the short-sighted and acquisitive tribes in England.

However a row has broken out over who should have access to crannog living while gangs of the dispossessed roam the country seeking food and shelter and laying waste to the towns and cities. Some believe that room must be found for Better Together people as well as nationalists. Others say they should stay and take their chances or emigrate. Closely confined living and sharing with domestic animals is likely to lead to friction in which those who warned of the collapse of society will be targeted.

In Glasgow there are questions over denominational crannogs with some pointing out that Columba was Catholic and others claiming that the new crannogs were reformed. Meanwhile the issue of funding surfaced with the SNP insisting that everybody was entitled to a universal service free at the point of delivery while critics say fees should be paid to avoid getting something for nothing.

 

Yes Scotland said there was nothing to fear from the crannog project. “People are yearning for a more natural and healthy way of life,” said a spokesman. “This gives them a healthy option of outdoor living, getting in touch with nature and not eating fatty foods and fizzy drinks. It meets our Healthy Scotland targets and solves obesity. Those who remain overweight will soon lose it running around after sweetie papers for something to eat.”

Better Together insisted a special luxurious crannog be set aside for Alastair Darling as he chose not to mix with lowlife MSPs and was used to higher standards at Westminster. “Actually Alastair has asked for two crannogs in case he gets confused about which one is his main residence.”

The whereabouts of blogger Derek Bateman Broadcaster are still unknown after he failed to return from a break in the Perthshire hills. His agent issued a statement on his behalf thanking all for their concern and confirming that a stockpile of blogs prepared before the trip will be posted in coming weeks.

“We’re getting used to the idea that he may not be coming back,” said the statement. “There’s still a lot to do and we’re busy editing material he was writing for future publication. Some of it alludes to his suspicions of spying and seems very pertinent. Some show anxiety about the BBC. ”

A spokesman for the Yes campaign said it was a pity he had not re-appeared since his blog about being abducted by aliens had made a telling contribution to the debate. Better Together said: “Some people should learn what is good for them and have the decency to respond when unaccountable forces are trying to tell them something. If you’re outside in the wilds you might catch a virus. Like Scotland, he needs to learn the lesson.”

There were complaints when Ian Davidson MP tweeted that he had been bayonetted.

The blogger’s agent confirmed that the holiday competition was going ahead as planned. “Many people entered into the spirit of it and I’m sure he wouldn’t mind me picking a winner,” he said. “If GP Walrus gets in touch at derekbat1@gmail.com and provides an address, he will receive a prize purchased at the Crannog Centre on the day of disappearance. He would have enjoyed all the entries but the plausible BBC reports in the winning entry later corrected by Newsnet were excellent and Kenmore Quarrie a touch of genius.”

In the absence of the main blogger there is a guest contribution by Ian Davidson (Lab) of Glasgow.

“I think the SNP is on to something. I’ve always liked the way they look at things and their ambition for Scotland and although I’m a lifelong Labour man, I respect what they do and say. If I didn’t have a place in Labour, I would definitely join the SNP and do my best for an independent Scotland. Sometimes things I say get taken out of context and when I see them in print I think how awful the look. But really, I extend the hand of friendship to all nationalists and wish them well in their big project. I am a Unionist myself but I could be persuaded to Nationalism if I sat down for a heart-to-heart with Alex Salmond. I think he’s much misunderstood, a bit like myself and I reckon we could become firm friends if I didn’t have to toe the party line. In fact, if I got the tipped the wink, I might move over to the Nats before the referendum and might put myself forward as one of their candidates. There are many moderate people in Labour like me who are seen as hardline but in fact are totally open-minded. So I extend fraternal greetings to Yes voters everywhere and wish them every success. May the best man win, as the saying goes. That’s what I believe anyway, unlike my namesake, the MP for Glasgow South West.”

I’m taking a break for a few days…heading to Perthshire to a rural retreat…and won’t be near the Big Mac, so no posts for a wee while.

Just a word of warning though…you’ll remember I had contact from GCHQ some weeks back and some odd things have happened with my email ever since…probably my imagination…but I came across some lines of text I had already deleted and yet there they were in my inbox, almost as though someone had access to the account. Then when I was writing a post, I left the screen and when I came back some private stuff had appeared from a previous email. Weird. Any theories?

If you’ve nothing better to do – apart from campaigning to save our nation – you might want to try a competition.

When I was a bit anxious about GCHQ taking an interest, I had a daydream about coming to a sticky end in the wilds of Perthshire. I mean, it’s the perfect scenario, isn’t it? An outspoken troublemaker burning bridges with respectable Scotland by embarrassing the BBC…blogging about overthrowing the British state less than a year before the big vote…establishing a radical, left-wing government…removing nuclear weapons AND with  a history which includes being interviewed by Special Branch about the Scottish National Liberation Army…and armed with a secret file of yet to be released detail about the inner workings of government…suddenly, without explanation, missing in the wilds.

Maybe you’d like to fill in the blanks in the story. To help, here are a few clues. I will be in Kenmore. I will go riding, play golf, visit the Crannog Centre, take a boat out on Loch Tay, go up Ben Lawers and, unusually for me, will have a whisky or two. If you can conjure a few sentences of what might happen, how and who might be guilty, I will present a Perthshire prize to the best entry. Good luck. I plan to blog on my return. (God willing…!)

Yours, Derek.

powering down the Mac

 

 

 

*****+++++++++=========^^^^^^^^^^@@@@@@@@*********

………..ECHO +CONTAB+ VICTOR SLAB——-SECRET——INT/SEPT email target alba…..

pse read following delta bravo……

John and Pete. Hi. This is Derek…. I’m sending via secure account. I think the party conference is great cover. I’m posting that Iwill be in the area on a break. Kenmore. We meet as usual on lower slope ontheBen, western side.use pub car park. Thank god the guerrilla stuff is over. I’m still sore from crawling through undergrowth with walkie talkie sweating from that bloody balaclava! I take it this is learning to live off seeds and grubs after Indy Day One? Fire-lighting..living rough etc like in the andy Mcnab books?

Is our cover the same if climbers appear? Quick change into birdwatchers? Imagine if it’s a constituent and recognises either of you…John, you’ll need to be back for the speech. Remember to take off the wig thistime! FFS. You two sure things will e this bad after a Yes? Plan still to spirit FM away into the cave like Bonnie P Charlie? Can oil not be converted into grain so Scots can live off bread until IMF/Red Cross arrive? I’d rather Plan B and take over castles of  the wealthy..maybe eat Tories. OK. Must go and find face camouflage. See you there. Alba Aye. Delta Bravo….

I haven’t posted for a couple of days* because I was sitting here about to write when everything went wobbly as if my eyes were loose in my head, my body felt as if I was on a rocking boat and I was trying to walk the deck against a headwind. Then it all went black.

When I came to I was lying spread-eagled in a kind of shallow bath and my whole body was pulsing with an indescribable pleasure so much so, I was fighting not to be moved. My brain was humming with exciting thoughts and I was grinning inanely.

A figure materialised beside me, a beautiful, undulating presence I recognised as a woman, perfect in every way, and completely naked. As I watched her, red lipsticked mouth seemed to push out from her face and came down close to my ear. In a deep honeyed voice she said: “We brought you to our planet to learn all about Earth. Tell me about your world.” Through my ecstasy I realised: I had been abducted …by aliens.

Buzzing with joy I told her how the land of my home was full of people who loved each other and wanted everyone to live happy fulfilled lives. But when we sent our representatives to the place where the Leaders decided our lot, they forgot where they came from and forgot their people and were seduced and softened by blandishments and misled by the unprincipled so that they only made themselves and some of their friends happy while everyone else lived unhappy lives.

“Why do you not get rid of them, these betrayers?” asked the lips.

“We try,” I said. “But there are many more humans living in other places who don’t agree and they have more influence than we do. So we cannot change our lives.”

“Then you must get rid of those who let you down and remove yourself from those who frustrate you. We think of you humans as intelligent beings. Are we wrong? Why do you choose to live unfulfilled lives? Are you afraid of standing up for yourselves?”

She told me I had been selected because I sat at the centre of a nexus of intelligence and information, so was I the Leader?

“No,” I said. “That’s just the flow of emails to my blog. I really sit alone in a basement in a place called Maryhill and am very distant from the Centre.”

Suddenly a sound filled the room…a woman’s voice with music… “aaalright, aaalright, Shout, Shout….” It was Lulu! The sound merged into a crowd chanting… “Thistle, Thistle.” She was summoning up Maryhill to her planet.

“So, you are not the Leader or even a follower?”

“No, I am actually one of an eccentric fringe who have an irrational pride in the place of their birth so if you want to find out what most people really think, I can direct you to someone called Alastair.”

In an instant my beautiful inquisitor vanished and morphed into a slavering green creature with shark’s teeth, howling horribly.

It all went back again and when I awoke I was here in my director’s chair in front of the Big Mac and my keyboard was pulsing with a strange light. A power took over my hands and this post is the result. (Hopefully back to normal soon.)

*The equivalent of an alien lifetime.

Scotland could not have withstood the effects of Union without the support of England, according to Better Together. The No campaign group has been examining the history of events around 1707 and has concluded that without England no Union was possible.

“It really is stark,” said a spokesman. “We put our best brains on this and found that, just like the banking bail-out, Scotland could only have achieved Union by pooling resources and coming together with England. This is a lesson from history the Scots need to learn.”

Researchers discovered that beneath the conventional wisdom of a happy uniting of nations there lay a darker secret – that Scotland would have been left on its own in non-Union, or what No campaigners call “isolation” – if England hadn’t helped out by offering to be a partner of last resort. “England brought the clout of being a major world power ready to take Scotland’s hand otherwise Scots would have been forced to unite on their own with themselves, instead of creating the greatest Union in the history of the world. You really would think that Scots would show some gratitude for being rescued in this way. They were allowed entry to London and were pretty much treated as equals by people who only took from them their profits and financial benefits in return. I hope this all makes sense.”

Meanwhile the new Scottish Secretary Alistair Carmichael has called for an end to derogatory language in the referendum debate. “I am sick to the scrotum of nancy boy nationalists and their whining camp followers lying through their teeth about wanting to be free and float off into the North Sea,” he said. “We need to tell these yellow belly traitors that this is a great country that wont be hijacked by lying, cheating spivs and perverts whose brains have shrunk through years of resentment and hostility. Let’s get this debate up to a more mature level.”

He said he wanted to follow the example of Johann Lamont who, he said, had dignified the debate by calling universal benefits “something-for-nothing” and nationalism “a virus”.  “That’s just calling it like it is, not name-calling,” he said. “A virus is something any of us might catch but when Yes campaigners respond by saying they are Yes Positive that crosses a line. It suggests that people might get AIDS or something, which doesn’t happen to Lib Dems who are all respectable. From now on I won’t tolerate any derogatory or threatening language and if I hear any I will prove I am a bruiser by bruising those saying it.”

He said: “My message is: No threatening language or you’ll get a head-butt, a knee in the balls and my boot scraped down your shin, you nasty quisling Nat creeps.”

Other Lib Dems are also to become more aggressive. Tavish Scott will no longer answer to this nickname of Pollyanna given because he’s hopelessly unaware of his own shortcomings and is glad about everything. Instead he will be known as Skullcrusher after a powerful beer brewed in the Northern Isles.

Willie Rennie will also cease to be known as The Midge and renamed Godzilla. He will wear an artificial hairy chest under his shirt at FMQs and Cuban heels. Sir Ming Campbell is renamed Grim Reaper and has opted to stop sipping sherry at St Andrews University receptions in favour of Buckfast poured from a quarter bottle in his jacket pocket. Danny Alexander’s nickname of Swat – for appearing still to be a schoolboy unaccustomed to long trousers – is changed to Dr No.

It’s expected that a new slogan will be devised. Instead of Vote Liberal for a Fairer Britain, backroom staff are working on a version of: We’re Liberals, We’re Democrats but We’re Also Badass Bruisers, Baby…Don’t Fuck With Us, Dude.

I was trying to think of something funny to write this morning and realized I didn’t have to. I was reading up on “Mike” Moore when I came across this from the Liberal Democrat Voice – The most-read website by and for Lib Dem supporters. Not paid for by trade unions or millionaires – written by Caron Lindsay, a journalist with her finger on the Lib Dem pulse…(favourite quote: “There’s still a faint pulse there but it’s fading fast. Quick, get the defibrillator!”)

Caron writes:

It can’t be much fun being Alex Salmond these days.  The euphoria of May has subsided, and he’s realised that there’s nobody else to blame for his majority Government’s actions.  On top of that, wherever he looks, he sees the grin of Wilie (sic) Rennie,  ready to highlight any example of anglophobia, of dodging, delaying, ducking and diving. The Scottish Liberal Democrat leader has had accolade after accolade in the press for providing such high quality opposition to the SNP bulldozer. (my italics)

There’s another Liberal Democrat making Salmond’s daily life uncomfortable.  They don’t come more reasonable than Mike Moore, Secretary of State for Scotland.   Moore was an accountant before he became an MP. Precision and detail are what he does. He’s on a mission to nail Alex Salmond’s independence jelly to the wall, this week posing six questions  for the SNP to answer.

I caught up with Mike recently, just as he was finishing his 15th Summer Tour of his large Borders constituency. He talked for quite a while about the diverse communities on his patch, recounting every issue raised in each place. It’s clear he thrives on getting out and meeting people.

It’s as well Moore has a huge capacity for work, given that his position as Scotland’s champion in the UK Government requires him to, as he says, “fight like hell”, for Scotland across virtually every area of Government.

Mike Moore will never be anything other than reasonable and measured. He compares well to a First Minister full of bluff and bluster. His skilful (sic) advocacy for Scotland within the Government has already brought changes for the better.  In the constitutional debate, he and Willie Rennie will make a formidable team, keeping the argument real and practical, but also fresh with new ideas for further devolution not just to Edinburgh but beyond, to communities, giving away power wherever they can.

(I can’t think why they ever got rid of him, can you?)