There have been delays. I’ve been impatient but not that impatient for Indyref2. It’s only been 6 years and the opinion polls have only this year started to move consistently in favour of Yes.
Macwhirter, one of the several male commentators with a thing about the First Minister is at her again this morning. It’s been noted here recently:
Is the First Minister serious?
I’ve just posted a Twitter poll to 4 906, many of whom do not seem to be uncritical SNP loyalists. Only 75 votes were in as I wrote this but 76% of them say ‘Yes.’
Macwhirter concludes:
In the absence of a radical populist like Alex Salmond, a history-maker, it is hard to see this First Minister ever taking the risk of forcing a referendum. Salmond made the political weather, secured the first “impossible” Holyrood landslide in 2011 and then delivered the Edinburgh Agreement. We may never see the like again. A second independence referendum is beginning to appear a bit of a unicorn: a phenomenon much talked about but never seen.
That surprising tribute to Alex Salmond is correct but that was then and this is now. I’d like to see him in a key role in the Yes campaign and soon after in a top international, perhaps diplomatic, role. He has the knowledge for Foreign Secretary or Ambassador in London.
But, the FM is hugely popular and has demonstrated unparalleled skill in handling the pandemic. Non-partisan historians will, I feel sure, judge her very kindly. She can do this. Let’s not mistake canniness for lack of commitment.
Talking-up Scotland / Scottish media fact checking is like shooting fish in a barrel 
Me thinks tis indeed it is a bit of a Unicorn
But the latter applies to Macwhirter himself that is the Unicorn
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Perhaps for historical reasons,journalists like Macwhirter spout this stuff.
You cannot judge every politician by those who serve the Westminster establishment.
Our FM has integrity and honesty and means what she says,unlike the vast majority of Unionists politicians.
“No,nevarr,nevarr,nevarr” comes to mind.
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(Posted this on Peter A Bell’s site).
Without wanting to detract from the enormous debt the Indy movement owes Alex Salmond, he didn’t deliver an indyref. David Cameron called his bluff and foisted one on him before he was ready.
Salmond’s strategy was no different to that being pursued by Sturgeon. In 2007 he said he would build support for independence through demonstrating good government before calling a referendum. In 2011 he said he would only go for a referendum at some unspecified point in the second half of the Parliament, after more powers (again unspecified) were returned to Scotland. Whether it would ever have happened is one of history’s “who knows”. I doubt he would have called it without being confident of winning it from the get-go.
Why should Sturgeon be vilified for following Salmond’s strategy almost to the letter while he is effectively lauded as the leader she should be emulating …. which she already is?
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Lots of people using the Wings narrative without of course admitting to the source. It’s a pity we have reached a black or white situation which seems to say if you support Alex Salmond you have to revile Nicola Sturgeon. Neither is perfect, but neither is Wings the arbiter of indy opinion and there’s plenty folk willing to let Nicola lead just now.
As Shakespeare said
“Life’s but a walking shadow; a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”.
We are all convinced our own views are the right ones and we take to twitter etc to try to be heard. For all the sound and fury few folk seem to have a cast iron alternative to our current path so maybe we just need to let it play out as it will.
A desire for independence isn’t owned or dependent on any single person, not Nicola, not Alex, not Stuart, not you, not me. Just wanting it to happen, no matter how long or how strong our feelings, won’t get us anywhere. When enough of us set aside our differences for a common cause we will get there and hopefully we will have someone with the talents of Nicola or Alex at the helm to see us through
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McWhirter seems more interested in covering his arse than serious analysis these days.
Why does he not look at things from the other side of the telescope?
What happened to “consent of the governed”?
Why did May offer labour another EU referendum only THREE years (in 2019) after the first?
Why has Ireland the constitutional and legal right to self-determination and referenda every SEVEN years? ——–Well, we do know the answer to that.
Is that what “journalists” in Scotland are desperate for? The Ulsterisation of Scotland? Scottish journalists really are the scum of the earth!
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As I have warned before, this is going to get very dirty indeed. The main weapon the British Establishment have in their armoury is, through their almost complete domination of the M.S.M , a policy of creating dissent in the independence movement. Was it Benjamin Franklin who said, ” If we do not hang together, we will undoubtedly hang separately”?
These collaborators in our midst, bought and paid for, in most cases, with non-dom billionaires money, will stop at nothing to try to prevent us gaining our independence. These people, ably assisted by the British Government’s news propaganda channel, the B.B.C, alongside the dark forces that exist, will attempt to sow dissent amongst us. Don’t fall it, don’t believe it. They are false flags. Stick together, and after we gain independence, then we can start discussing the way forward.
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MacWhatter scribbles:
“It is hard to see the First Minister ever taking the risk of forcing a Referendum”
What makes him think this is the case?
This political commentator seems to have forgotten that in March 2017 Nicola Sturgeon launched a 2 year campaign for an Independence Referendum in 2019.
If the FM had the nerve to go for Independence in 2017, she’ll have no problems going for it again with the polls showing majority support for Independence and the SNP support at record levels.
McWhatter isn’t so much a political commentator, more a tool of the Westminister establishment trying to pull the wool over his dwindling audience.
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These jobsworths BritNat story tellers write their own opinions and hope people will believe them as fact because they are paid to do it. Fewer people are falling for their cr*p.
Past couple of days have seen the daily rags on the shelves while on my late evening shop ( before they pack em away to be recycled!) and there are piles of them, it honestly looks as though most of them are not selling. Question is, unlike other businesses, they seem to keep going no matter what. Dirty rags, dirty money backing them, but not for much longer.
The gas lighting from the BritNats will continue apace though, now that independence is the go-to preference of the people of Scotland. Just my opinion. 🙂
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Yup the usual culprit propaganda sheets aren’t selling . . . But the Nationsl is. . .
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845 votes, 73.8% Yes
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Iain ‘interviewed’ Alex at the Wigton book Festival a few years back and it was obvious that they were well acquainted. I would not be surprised if the recent trial is the root of his animosity towards the FM.
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Iain Mcwhirter was anti independence in 2014. One of those folk who, when it suits them, fein support for, but when you listen carefully, their language is that of someone who sows doubt, dropping in wee snippets of ‘what if, why would they, how could Scotland survive at all without the lovely union’, etc.
Some are fooled, but most now are not thank goodness.
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Reverse psychology
First we get Ruth Davidson saying don’t call me Baroness Davidson when we all know there is no gift she would ever value more
Then we get Mcwhirter praising Alex Salmond when for a decade he has hated him and still does
Then we get Mcwhirter just a couple of days after Nicola Sturgeon announces that the Scottish government has started the legal necessities for arranging a Scottish independence referendum
saying a Scottish independence referendum won’t happen because Nicola Sturgeon is not committed
Oh yes the British state is issuing instructions to its propaganda wing telling them what to say coordinating comments we are all supposed to believe are not linked
They are still using the same old same old cons
Too many of us are on the ball now and see it for what it is
Mcwhirter must be embarrassed by it
He deserves his demise foolish rogue
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On Alex Salmond of course there should be a role for him in the independence movement, whether or not he’d be welcomed at a higher level than the grassroots movement after that disgraceful trial, is at best debatable.
As for Sturgeon holding an independence referendum post next years elections, one can only hope that the stars align for us on that, before the power grab and the negating of our parliament begins by Johnson.
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The 2014 referendum was a Westminster referendum held in Scotland under the control and interference by Westminster whenever it chose, it was a referendum that was never intended by design to return a YES majority, a bit like the Scottish parliament, the increased support for Independence during that time was an unforeseen fluke and was duly stopped in its tracks by the Westminster VOW that they didn’t even know about until the Daily Record informed them of their plan, once again being *allowed* to break the rules on referendums at will, 2014 was never Scotlands referendum it was engineered choreographed and presided over by the UK government with the assistance and scheduling of the BBC and the complete British media, why would any person or country wishing its freedom co operate with rules like that
Nicola Sturgeon said in a very important statement after that loss “I don’t want to just hold a referendum, I want to win one”
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