My friend Mike Arnott of Dundee TUC has done more than anybody to record the story of the outstanding Dundonian contribution to the early war against fascism; seventeen men from Dundee died in the International Brigade.
I wonder what they would think about the alliance between the right wing Spanish “Popular Party” and the Tories plus, reportedly, New Labour to plan a demand for the expulsion of an independent Scotland from the European Union?
New Labour’s commitment to keeping Trident in Scotland, to ending free prescriptions and to imposing university tuition fees makes it, I suppose, unremarkable that they would feel comfortable in this company.
The Tories have today denied that they have made any formal deal on a united front against Scottish and Catalonian independence, while acknowledging that meetings between the Scottish Tories and the Popular Party have taken place. (To discuss what else, one wonders? Property prices on Tory retirement homes in Spain?)
Between this and the latest from the chair of the Scottish Affairs Committee (Labour’s Ian Davidson)calling for partition of Scotland post-independence, the Scottish Independence debate gets more and more bizarre:
http://tattie-scones.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/labour-mp-ian-davidson-calls-for-break.html
Beyond belief. They must think we’re going to win the referendum if they’re planning their retaliation already.
I was of some little service to the sculptor who made this piece (I had friends who were welders). ¡No Pasarán!
The Unionist trump card after fearmongering is of course sectarianism, on the Northern Ireland model. The climate for the RC minority has been such that wholesale migration/ethnic cleansing of a wedge, eastwards, from Ayrshire, through Renfrewshire, Glasgow, Lanarkshire, Lothian has already taken place. Jobs For The (Billy) Boys. Not so much the dregs of the Orange Lodges, but the Masonic lodges are the nerve centres of the networks driving this.
Craig,
This explains a lot.
“During the Vietnam War, Sweden was an independent country with a moral conscience, and Sweden gave sanctuary to US war protestors who refused the draft. Washington realized the cost to itself and purchased the Swedish government in order to prevent a reoccurrence of moral conscience on the part of any Western government.”
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2012/09/10/the-declining-west-tragedy-comedy-paul-craig-roberts/
Everyone here in Catalonia is watching the Scottish situation very closely, to the extent that would no doubt surprise the average Scot. Nothing about this secret deal surprises me – the dark forces of Unionism are hard at work here too.
.
At least we’re allowed to get news from Scotland – every news agency in this country is pretending nothing is happening in Greece…Which is Rajoy’s style – simply pretend the internet doesn’t exist.
@ Craig,
“New Labour’s commitment to keeping Trident in Scotland, to ending free prescriptions and to imposing university tuition fees makes it, I suppose, unremarkable that they would feel comfortable in this company.”
You, more so than the average poorly informed member of the sheeple, are well aware that there is little real difference these days between the Labour and Conservative parties on the major issues. The policy approaches hardly differ and these days the directions that they head in during their tenure do not diverge. Bears great similarity as with the Democrats and Republicans in the US. The subterfuges of the parties are really variations on the same theme of deception and corruption.
PERFIDIOUS ALBION
> New Labour’s Franco Adventure
Something like Maggie’s Desert Island Discs pick? –
– Comic Relief Special – English –
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5p_0cayp5s0#t=00m37s
(ER, Shome mistake shurely? / Shurely you can’t be serious? etc Ed.) –
– “I am serious and don’t call me Shirley.” – Airplane –
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qo7qoonzTCE#t=00m08s
TORY (AND NEW LABOUR ?) B’STARD MP
Hague’s Assange Ecuadorian Embassy near-invasion –
> Were the UK(‘s US Empire) Poodles today as duplicitous as during the last eight centuries they might themselves have ensured Julian Assange’s safe delivery to Ecuador … and then said “Oh, Sorry” to the US Empire and let the (Neo-Con Nazi wide-stance) US Empire Buggers lump it.
> Maybe they need a reminder of how it’s done. Perfidious Albion – enter Alan B’Stard MP! –
The New Statesman – ‘A Good Start’ (*) (ER, ‘Special’!) – Superb, but only in Spanish
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rywoDqqHfBI#t=00m44s
(*) After What do you call a thousand US Empire Neo-Con Nazis at the bottom of the ocean? ; )
There _was_ a reason that the old bat referred to New Labour as her greatest achievement. And it wasn’t for the good of the English or Scottish peoples.
For the good of the English elite, the good of the US Empire elite and (possibly) the good of a few Scottish sell-outs to the English / US Empire.
No change there, then!
UK – US SLAVE RACE – WHO KNEW?!
RAY MCGOVERN
UK SUBSERVIENCE TO THE US EMPIRE
“Ecuador’s move to grant Julian Assange political asylum has shown the true face of the current world order, highlighting more clearly than ever the line between the American Empire and the rest of the world, former CIA officer Ray McGovern told RT.”
‘Not even in the Cold War’s darkest days: International law scrapped in anti-Assange crusade,’ – Ray McGovern with RT, 16th August 2012 –
– http://rt.com/news/assange-asylum-cold-war-883/
Previously –
Robin Ramsay of UK Lobster points out that as the UK is now utterly subservient to the US, it has become absolutely taboo to mention this reality. But there is _no_ independent British government, there are _no_ independent government ministers and there will be no independent British government, or independent government ministers.
The UK is as absolutely and completely occupied by the US Empire – whether by the Neo-Con Nazis of Obama or by the Neo-Con Nazis of Cheney – as France was in WW2, with almost no troops required!
“Tell them we’re ‘Allies’ and they, apparently, just roll over!”
– On Craig Murray interfering with the US War of Terror in Uzbekistan by pointing out that relying on the confessions of muslims being boiled to death on Tony Blair’s say so might not provide sound intelligence. And/or be illegal under British law …
– On Lockerbie and the release of Libyan patsy al-Megrahi, rather than confim English and Scottish judicial integrity to be the utter farce that it is under the US Neo-Con Nazi Empire. Which fact was about to shouted from the rooftops to the world via al-Megrahi’s appeal.
See Lobster #58, ‘The meaning of subservience to America’ – Page 87, Issue #58 –
– http://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk/issue58.php
REAGAN AND THATCHER – ‘GONE WITH THE WIND’ – 80s AGITPROP POSTER
Thatcher, Reagan and Reich-wing Fascists, using the methods of the Nazis. No change there, then! –
– The ’80s agitprop ‘film poster’ of Margaret Thatcher in the arms of Ronnie Raygun, with a mushroom cloud in the background. (“She promised to follow him to the end of the earth. He promised to organise it!” “The most EXPLOSIVE love story ever.” “Directed by Hank Kissinger,” etc. etc. Back when Britain had a left wing. With teeth!) –
– http://www.vinmag.com/online/media/gbu0/prodxl/AP1063-gone-with-the-wind-anti-nuclear-poster-1983.jpg
Or – http://tinyurl.com/83hvctt
More – see comments to ‘America’s Vassal Acts Decisively and Illegally: Former UK Ambassador’ – Craig Murray, 16 August, 2012 – ICH –
– http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article32198.htm
A very succinct yet intuitive comment by Craig I thought. I get the feeling that Craig knows a little bit more about secret meetings than he is willing to admit right now.
Poor old Spain, once such a proud Empire. All they have left is the Scottish fisheries, gifted to them by blackmailed paedophlles.
The best gift that an Independent Scotland could have is freedom from the EU and it’s deviant rulers.
PERFIDIOUS ALBION – 2
US (and UK) EMPIRE MURDER AND TORTURE TO DEATH
John Stockwell put it as clearly as anyone could. –
“I don’t mean to abuse you with verbal violence, but you have to understand what your government and its agents are doing. They go into villages, they haul out families. With the children forced to watch they castrate the father, they peel the skin off his face, they put a grenade in his mouth and pull the pin. With the children forced to watch they gang-rape the mother, and slash her breasts off. And sometimes for variety, they make the parents watch while they do these things to the children.” These are not just words. It is also real. Real mothers. Real children. Real fathers. Real death.
“We do not parachute teams into the Soviet Union to haul families out at night and castrate the father with the children watching, because they have the Bomb, and a big army, and they would parachute teams right back into our country and do the same thing to us – they’re not scared of us.”
– Video – John Stockwell – “Third World War” – Forty years of Secret Wars of the C1A – 6 million killed –
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3ioJGMCr-Y
John Stockwell
– http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Stockwell/John_Stockwell.html and
– http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Stockwell/StockwellCIA87_2.html
‘America’s Third World War – 6m to 20m Killed,’ by John Stockwell –
– http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4068.htm
Wiki – excellent links – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stockwell
Johan Galtung – the US empire has murdered 12m or 16m in forty years. “The difference is between overt murders and including covert murders by the US.” In illegal wars and genocides. –
‘How would we know that the Empire is dead?” – Johan Galtung –
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRXmk7piHXY
PSYCHOPATHS R’ US DEPARTMENT
Duane Claridge of the CIA Department of Operations — ‘Torture, Murder and Genocide R’ US’ — reveals his inner psychopath to John Pilger – Gunning down protesters – Same old same old – John Pilger – Torture, Murder and Genocide is _so_ American – War on Democracy –
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5L1VdlktOw#t=00m40s
Witness to summary executions by US forces in Panama – Tell US that this didn’t happen, is not happening today in Iraq, Afghanistan and now Egypt. Because reports say that is _exactly_ what is happening. – The Panama Deception. – @ 45.08
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfWz20nDAyI#t=42m27s
Venezuela coup – US coup elements assassinating protesters with high-powered rifles and claiming that it was the Chavez government firing on their own people. No change there, then!
– Also notable are the ultra-right wing — barking mad / lying-through-their-teeth — TV stations who claimed that the Chavez government was firing on their own people.
John Pilger’s War on Democracy documentary cuts away to show that those firing on the crowds were elite police units — part of the coup –, assassinating civilians so that the right could blame it on the Chavez government. The crowd is firing back at empty streets and the coup’s gunmen. The right wing N_zis cut the TV footage to show the opposite, naturally. As seen in every US coup since forever … (Teheran’s Neda for one). –
@ 23.00 – John Pilger’s ‘War on Democracy’ – Vimeo –
– http://vimeo.com/16724719
UP THE USUK EMPIRE
– http://www.amazon.com/Anne-Taintor-Inc-01440-Magnet/dp/B003MZ1P4A/
PERFIDIOUS ALBION – 3
Your near neighbours’s history offers a few pointers for how independence is gained. The, ER, traditional method. –
– Gratuitous GPO 1916 clip – ‘Michael Collins’ –
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aq7bcY9tuao#t=01m52s
– Get Collins – The Intelligence War for Dublin (*2) –
– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klBhafk463E
“You may not like the IRA, but they are the reason you are writing from Dublin, Ireland and not Dublin, UK.” HA! –
Of course things have moved on since Michael Collins and Co. ‘invented a new form of warfare’. Now the Empire – US _and_ their UK satrap – get their (murderous / genocidal / torture-to-death) digs in first.
As Craig Murray has told us about Uzbekistan. Where those rendered for torture have never been seen again. So they were rendered for extermination. USUK Nacht und Nebel.
Is Scotland likely to have an easier time of it?
See Afghanistan 1, 2, 3 (UK) and Iraq 1, 2 and 3 (UK) for a few clues!
With the old genocidaire himself – Churchill – in favour of dropping poison gas by air to instill a healthy fear in the tribes of Iraq, circa 1920. –
– http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHU407A.html
The odds that the UK elite will let Scotland democratically choose independence? ER, A Snowball’s chance in hell. imo.
SO. Tiocfaidh ár lá – Scotland ? –
Noam Chomsky on why some countries, and some groups, ‘get it’ and others have a much harder time. “The Irish Sea is a Chasm (of understanding). It all depends who has been living under the whip for eight hundred years and who has been holding it.” –
Noam Chomsky – ‘Rebel Without a Pause’ – 911 – @ 51.00 –
– http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4366784807223792419#
Tiocfaidh ár lá Scotland ; ) –
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiocfaidh_ár_lá
http://melaniephillips.com/america-goes-into-the-darkness
What planet?
Blair & University College London:
.
http://act.stopwar.org.uk/petition/9
Its important the Scots stick to a pre post Iran war referendum timing in order to carry the vote easily. Just the oil in the depleted fields that can now be exploited further with new tech, is by itself enough to found a very healthy Sovereign Fund for the 6m Scots, let alone a claw back of the producing oil fields demarcated to England by Anthony (Charles Lynton) Blair – the stooge easily recruited by the CIA, back at Oxford due to his “bad” public toilet habits.
If following an independent, withdrawal from Europe may inhibit Scotlands ability to rehabilitate. From what I can see it will be a long hard withdrawal.
But by fuck, it will be worth it.
Get a job and do it!
Jay: A classic Mad Mel. Congratulations and thanks for brightening my day.
Uranus, for sure.
The notion that the EU would expel an ‘independent’ Scotland is a bluff. It is nonsense.
Re. topic: unremarkable that the Tories, having utterly fouled their nest in Scotland, should be seeking allies abroad. On the bright side, they obviously consider Scotland to be an asset worth retaining in their sphere of influence. Which supports the case for economically viable independence.
I suppose also that, seeing the SNP connecting with other nationalist movements abroad, antinationalists are entitled to connect with antinationalists? Deplorable, but hardly devious…
I see a parallel between the military overthrow of the Spanish Second Republic by Franco in the 30s and the right-wing coup in Chile in 1973. Both eventually gave way to democracy.
There would be no point in Scottish Tories making a formal deal with Spanish nationalists, since it could not influence the electorate in Scotland but might backfire on Scottish Tory interests. As to what the discussions were about, preventing Spanish local authorities from confiscating retirement homes could well have been on the agenda, but not being wealthy enough to own a home, I wouldn’t know.
I’m sorry Craig, you seem to be getting more and more fanatical over the independence issue all the time.
Our politicians are corrupt? Tell us something we didn’t know. However there is an ex oil economist for the RBS who is just as corrupt as the rest of them but your rose tinted glasses seem to be preventing you from seeing that.
We know that there were many brave Scots who fought against Fascism both in the Spanish Civil War and WWII, as there were many brave English. There were also people like Douglas Young and Arthur Donaldson all too happy to form an alliance with Hitler in the hopes of an independent Scotland should Germany win the war.
We have two years to wait for a referendum and I am seeing more and more attempts to incite tribalist hatred of the English in an attempt to influence the vote all the time. I feel soon there won’t be enough distance between an SNP supporter and a BNP supporter to slide a postage stamp through.
How can Scotland be expelled from the EU? It isn’t a member of the EU, neither is England.
Pertinently, the actions the lab/con/fascists alliance propose would be following a ‘yes’ vote in the referendum i.e. against the democratically elected government of an independent sovereign nation, Scotland. Ergo we have Scottish politicians actively conspiring with representatives of a foreign power against their own country.
I believe the dictionary definition of this would be TREASON!
@Kempe : it’s of course not a matter of “expulsion”. The fact is that an EU memeber state breaking up would create a situation for which there is no precedent (in EU membership terms). As you know, Czechoslovakia broke up before the 2004 EU accesssions and the EU negotiated accession with two separate states (the Czech Republic and Slovakia). No doubt lawyers (including in the EU institutions) will be hard at work on this one in the months and years to come.
Everybody of my generation must have known somebody who volunteered for the Spanish Civil War. Laurie Lee did not volunteer, but ended up in the midst of it anyway, recounted in ‘As I walked out one midsummer morning’. His other Spanish book ‘A rose for winter’ is an equally good read.
“One of our recent presidents who was not rich ended up with $36 million shortly after leaving office, as did former UK prime minister Tony Blair, who served Washington far better than he served his own country.”
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2012/11/07/the-special-interests-won-again/
Fred
Couldn’t agree more – perhaps Craig forgets that Franco himself wasn’t beyond a little nationalism/jingoism. The historical precedents for nationalism and flag waving are not very good – and it is difficult to think of situations where they have led to progressive politics.
The argument is whether an independent Scotland – which would be a ‘new’ state – would have to apply afresh to join the EU. I can see that there is an argument to be had; and rulings to be made. The supplementary question is just as interesting though: if the UK is split into two parts surely the remaining part – which is clearly no longer the “United Kingdom” – is also a new state in the same sense and it should not be clear that England, Wales and N Ireland should remain in the EU without reapplication. Now if that were the case, I can see Eurosceptics deciding to support Scottish independence because it could be a quick route to the departure of – let’s face it – England from the EU. It’s quite possible that after the decalaration of Scottish independence, the result would be Scotalnd in the EU and England (with Wales and N. Ireland) out because they have no stomach for the humiliation of reapplying.
sorry to be off topic, but has anyone heard of this British Council story(at end of the article)…i can’t find anything online:
8 Nov: Sun: What does Ripper know about Savile?
More links between killer and paedo emerge
Abuse sackings
***Two staff at the British Council charity have been fired in recent years over child abuse claims abroad, Ministers said yesterday.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4633112/What-does-ripper-know-about-savile.html
Oddie
Probably as much “Truth” in there as there was in the Hillsborough headlines.
Instead of speculating we should be waiting for the result of the official whitewash.
@Guest That will be Clinton I suppose that Paul Craig Roberts writes about as having $36m after he left office.
This is a good record of his activities in Haiti particularly after the earthquake and how he ripped the people off. Another psychopathic monster like his pal Tony.
http://dissidentvoice.org/search/?cx=004699754223191941067%3Adjkep-0myaa&cof=FORID%3A11&ie=UTF-8&q=clinton+haiti&sa=Search