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59 thoughts on “Independence Live Interview

  • reel guid

    May told Scotland today that we have to leave behind the “old tribal politics”.

    The Tories and fellow travellers UKIP stirred up, and continue to stir up, xenophobia over the EU. They’re playing the anti-immigration card. The Scottish Tories are playing the Orange card to get votes. Old or new, the purveyors of tribal politics are the Tories.

    • Habbabkuk

      Do you happen to know roughly how many EU-27 nationals are living and working in Scotland at the moment? Which are the areas of highest concentration?

      • reel guid

        I’ve seen different totals given. But it must be tens of thousands. Edinburgh has a lot of EU nationals.
        Why do you ask?

      • Harry Vimes

        Glad to be of assistance.

        Apparantly this interweb thingy has this facility known as a search engine where it’s possible to enter a question or information query and it produces a page full of links you can go to to find out all sorts of amazing things. The beaty of it is that even the most terminally obtuse or bone idle wasterel can get to grips with it using only a minimum of gumption.

        I’ve made a start for you old boy. Try here:

        https://fullfact.org/immigration/eu-migration-and-uk/

        • Harry Vimes

          For the sake of accuracy and to clarify, the use of the term “search engine” in the 20:23 post above, rather than using a ‘popular’ brand name ( in much the same way that Hoover has come to refer to vacuum cleaning), is deliberate. The point being I would recommend an alternative such as ixquick or DuckDuckgo.

      • Muscleguy

        There are about 190,000 EU nationals in Scotland. To put that in context the gap between No and Yes last time was 256,000 people. So, IFF a very significant proportion of the EU nationals, in their own naked self interest in terms of remaining in the EU were to vote Yes then we would be a significant amount closer to being independent.

        There aren’t enough to completely swing it, unless, the polls giving us close to parity are true AND the pollsters routinely do not include EU nationals (they can’t vote in UK general elections for eg which ruins the overall numbers) THEN they could be our secret shock troops of IndyRef 2.

        We had the Catalans onside and quite a lot of the French last time (the Auld Alliance is not forgotten).

        In the very latter stages of the campaign when we were just leafleting homes, we found a street up the hill from the centre of Dundee which was simply a forest of flags on both sides of the road. About half were Catalan flags and the rest the usual assortment of Scottish flags: Yes Saltires, royal standards etc.

  • Sharp Ears

    What does the Tory manifesto pledge on foreign policy? Not much, say critics
    18 May, 2017
    Photo HMS Belfast R Thames LOL
    Brexit, soft power, redefined aid and warship-backed free trade – all of these featured in the Conservative Party manifesto launch on Thursday.

    However, responses to on going conflicts and strained world relations were conspicuously absent.

    RT takes a closer look at Prime Minister Theresa May’s foreign policy and defense priorities.
    (Link to the 88 page Tory manifesto)

    “We want fair, orderly negotiations, minimizing disruption and giving as much certainty as possible – so both sides benefit,” the manifesto states.

    Unsurprisingly, Brexit features prominently in the Tory manifesto. Despite May’s past support for the EU, the Conservatives have worked hard to position themselves as the party of Brexit.

    The manifesto sets out the government’s wish for a “frictionless” divorce which will benefit “both sides.’
    However, should they be elected on June 8, the Tories appear determined to achieve a hard Brexit, and to do so “within the two years allowed by Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union.”

    /..
    https://www.rt.com/uk/388849-tory-foreign-policy-manifesto/

    A video on the link asks ‘Why isn’t May talking Syria during #GE2017 campaign?’
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=9&v=Sl7Xfa7Uq0g

    There are also tweets from Emily Thornberry and further commentary.

    • Habbabkuk

      What is RT’s general line on Brexit?

      I would imagine positive since the Russians would, I suppose, view any weakening of the EU rather favourably but it would be interesting to hear from anyone on here who watches RT regularly.

  • Tony_0pmoc

    Craig Murray in fine form and looking very well. Watched a bit of it – about the atrocious state of the UK media about 40 minutes in. Good to see your mate Julian Assange has finally got back to the Ecuadorian Embassy and appeared. Has he had his hair cut since his Twitter pic this morning?

    I am still not convinced I haven’t met you – but maybe you have a double or a twin brother.

    Tony

      • JOML

        Well, I’m enjoying a double right now, before heading out to take in some good music. ?

        • JOML

          Just a disgrace the U.K. is denying Assange the same freedom, but I suppose they are only following their instructions.

    • Habbabkuk

      Former Greek Economics minister Yanis Varoufakis used to ride his motorbike to the office (and indeed almost elsewhere) wearing a leather jacket.

      • glenn_uk

        Indeed – he rides a Yamaha XJR1300, which is the ‘naked’ (without a fairing) version of the FJR1300. A pretty damned big and heavy bike – I owned an FJR1300 until just last year. He’s not exactly a big fellow, so it takes some serious nerve to ride something like that.

        • Tony_0pmoc

          I gave up bikes in 1978. Whilst my Suzuki GS750 could do 0-60 in 3 seconds, it was rubbish at going round bends. I also could pull far more g in a glider, and it was great at going round bends, and there was usually far less to hit, except sometimes the thermals got a bit crowded.

          • glenn_uk

            Things have come on a bit since 1978, Tony. Not only are the bikes far better designed for stability and speed, tyres have vastly more grip, and are shaped precisely for hard cornering – take a look at this short video:

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5_Zc2mpBX0

            That shows the riders getting the _elbow_ down to the ground, not just the knee. Tyres for sports bikes these days have a softer (more grippy) compound on the sides, and harder (more long lasting) on the middle.

            Take something like a new GSXR600 out for a blast – I don’t think you’ll find it a boring experience!

        • Tony_0pmoc

          Glenn, someone deleted your comment. It seemed perfectly innocent to me. Anyway, I am not ready to kill myself just yet by riding such a heavy beast. (RIP Chris Cornell). I prefer my push bike now – particularly on the rare occasions I get gout…Usually fixes it in less than 30 mins.

          • Alcyone

            That’s right, glug away, then fix it.

            And Craig again, glorifying alcohol-very irresponsible. Look i know one man’s meat is another man’s poison, but for God’s sake, isn’t any thing a private matter anymore?

          • Tony_0pmoc

            Glenn, Your deleted comment is back. Great American video by the way, but I reckon Barry Sheene could do that.

          • Tony_0pmoc

            Alcy one, You brought up the subject of alcohol. Do you have a problem? I suggest you do not do it at all before riding a powerful motorcyle or flying a glider – or at all if it ever causes you to be violent.

            If you are going to take dangerous machines to the limit – you need a completely clear head and need to be reasonably physically fit. It takes all your concentration. Your mind and body need to be close to 100%. You will not achieve that on any drugs or alcohol. They will seriously degrade you….except maybe nicotine and caffeine. I certainly wouldn’t recommend anything else.

            Tony

          • Alcyone

            Hey Tony, i neither drink nor drive nor need either, so why are you telling me all this?

            Take care of your gout, you know it’s seriously affected by alcohol.

  • berlingooner

    I see Alisher Usmanov has just made another, thankfully unsuccessful, bid to buy my club. Amazing how few fans seem to know about this guy’s murky past – and even more amazing how other major shareholders have, publicly at least, voiced such little concern.

  • Clark

    ADMIN!

    The video won’t play from Ubuntu 16.04.1 / Firefox Live session. The image appears and I can open the comment sidebar.

  • giyane

    Maybe the 9 to 1 population ratio between England and Scotland might change if all those slightly left-leaning voters for leaving the neo-liberal EU find your doom and gloom about USUK synchronisation to be true.
    Did the Pilgrim Fathers think they could ever leave the dog-turd of UK imperialism or is it that the same dog-turd of Zionism that corrupted the old empire, has now corrupted the new?
    A very interesting, very intensely political discussion. Thanks for sharing it with us too.

  • Alcyone

    In case you missed this, this is history in the making:
    http://news.sky.com/story/julian-assange-i-cannot-forgive-terrible-injustice-10884606

    I have to say, politics aside, Assange has class:

    He uses the term ‘no money’ wrt his legal team, rather than ‘free’, which is pretty cheap.

    He also stated that Mannings freedom this week was an even greater freedom than his today.

    People here who vent extreme envy, bile and bring offerings of stale news should note that as long as they are alive and kicking they can imbibe and learn. Assange doesn’t strike me as a natural speaker, but he covers all bases very rationally.

    • Clark

      In English, we have the one word ‘free’ with ambiguous meanings. The Spanish word ‘gratis’ means ‘without payment’, whereas the French word ‘libre’ means ‘without restriction’, ie. ‘free as in freedom’

      It’s like the difference between free beer and free speech.

  • Alcyone

    All this talk about alcohol, folks, I’ll let you into a secret: The Universe is truly a magical thing of many dimensions. You use it (alcohol, drugs etc.), you lose it. The ‘it’ being clarity, a necessary state prior to the vitality of connecting to, or staying connected with, these other dimensions. IOW, there ain’t no backdoor to heaven.

  • Tony_0pmoc

    I had never heard of Jeremy Corbyn, except when Craig Murray mentioned him.

    Now, whilst I don’t agree with many of his policies, he is the only leader of a UK Political Party who is making any sense.

    I may actually vote this year. The Liberal Democrats got the message directly from me..and sent a letter addressed in the Christian names of my wife and son – as if they were a couple. It cracked me up. I thought about voting Tory just to get rid of him. I simply can’t stand lying hypocritical politicians when they reach a position of power – and they change from anti-war to very pro-war.

    But I can’t vote Tory – it would be like voting for the Devil.

    Currently checking out our local Labour Candidate.

    I may go and meet her. She seems a nice girl, and she has some experience in local government.

    Tony

  • Habbabkuk

    re number of EU (EU-27) migrants in Scotland.

    ” it must be tens of thousands.” (reel guid)

    “There are about 190,000 EU nationals in Scotland” (Muscleguy)

    “I’ve made a start for you old boy. Try here:

    https://fullfact.org/immigration/eu-migration-and-uk/” (Vimes)
    ________________________

    Thanks to all of you.

    In answer to reel guid’s question, I was just wondering whether the England and Wales / Scotland ratio of EU immigrants corresponded to the England and Wales / Scotland population ratio, and what is the percentage of EU immigrants in the population of England and Wales on the one hand and of Scotland on the other.

    Apparently there are something like 2,3 million EU-27 immigrants in the whole of the UK at the moment.

    • glenn_uk

      H: “Apparently there are something like 2,3 million EU-27 immigrants in the whole of the UK at the moment.

      According to Private Eye, there are 1.2M Britons in the EU mainland, and 3M European counterparts here. Err.. by “here” I mean my “here” – Britain, not your “here” obviously. 😉

      • Laguerre

        The figures are certainly false. E.g. I Brit, am a resident of France, but am registered nowhere, the need for a carte de séjour having been abolished in 2003.

        • Habbabkuk

          I know that EU nationals no longer need a carte de se’jour if they are resident in France (although these are available on demand in many places for reasons of convenience).

          But you can’t say your presence in France is not registered – I assume you are registered for income tax and social security purposes.

    • Tony_0pmoc

      We’ve already voted for that.

      We are Out of The EU

      We made the Decicison. If You Don’t Like It…

      Tough

      It will not make the slightest difference whatsover to the average person living anywhere in Europe…If you are a Brit living in Spain – who several friends of ours are – and vice versa……The rules may actually end up simpler…as The EU/USA Dictatorship slowly dies.

      These unelected EU bureaucrats are not helping you. Even our elected politicians make more sense – at least they went through some of the process of democracy even if that system too is totally corrupt…but at least they went through the motions..

      I wouldn’t mind your Centralised Dictatorship so much – except you guys are completely and utterly totally useless.

      The EU is total disaster. Haven’t you noticed?

      Are you Blind???

      It only benefits the rich…whilst the poor are sent to hell.

      And in response I have bought it (not read it yet but I will)

      “And the Weak Suffer What They Must?” by Yanis Varoufakis

      Tony

      • nevermind

        Sorry, Tony, you are not out yet, your farmers still receive their EU subsidies, we are still trading with it and are getting some 40% of our GDP from these sales. We still have much EU capital investing here and we still have many EU citizens working in our public services, such as the NHS, social care, agriculture, IT. The negotiations have stalled until 8th. June, sadly, it has made for zero commitments regards to the rights of EU citizens living here in the UK, many of them longer than they lived in their countries of birth.

        That the EU is a total disaster is down to successive UK politicians not wanting to change it, doing next to nothing, taking the money from the EU and sitting on the fence. UK politicians agreed to this level of undemocratic practices, appointed Commissioners, the lack of financial probity.

        Fact is that voters here did never made much of EU democracy and relied on lazy, all mouth Farrage to bust it open for them, to break up a 50 year relationship.
        But then you don’t much care about anybody else but yourself, Tony, that this is highly undemocratic to all those EU citizens living here in uncertainty does not faze you. What a sad pity.

    • Harry Vimes

      How many of these EU nationals are students here on a temporary basis?

      How many non EU nationals are there in the UK – or Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland – compared to the number of EU nationals?

      How many of the EU nationals living here are from the former English colony of Ireland, which is also an EU member?

      How many jobs have been lost to UK nationals over the past forty years from the free movement of capital compared to the number of jobs lost to UK nationals from the free movement of labour.

      It’s a good game this isn’t Hab, old boy?

    • Harry Vimes

      This seems to be a good game. Given this is a democratic blog, unlike say the Guardians CIF, it seems reasonable to surmise that anyone can play. Let’s see if that assumption is correct?

      OK. My turn.

      1. How many EU nationals living and/or working in the UK are from the former colony of the RoI?

      2. How many of the EU nationals living here within the yearly statistics are students resident here until their studies have been completed?

      3. How many non EU nationals are living and/or working in the UK compared to EU nationals?

      4. What are the relevant numbers above for the different nations of the UK -England, Scotland, Wales and NI?

      5. How many jobs have been lost in the UK over the past 40 odd years arising from the free movement of capital compared to the free movement of Labour?

      6. Which factor has had the larger impact on wage levels in the UK; free movement of capital or free movement of labour?

      Bonus question.

      7. Why is it that a post containing the most of the above questions is removed from this thread whilst another post elsewhere on another thread on this site calling other people “cnuts” is allowed to remain?

      Lack of consistency undermines credibility and confidence in the system.

  • glenn_uk

    Speaking of Private Eye, it quoted the following:

    “Today… [the Nazi party] stands again before us, free through the whole Reich, stronger and internally more stable than ever before.”

    – Conclusion of Mein Kampf, Author: Adolf Hitler

    • Brianfujisan

      Been a Lot of Seth Rich stuff Resurfacing. after being named as the wikileaks source

      and now Craig becomes 007..Very brave.. But as Craig says in the Live feed, No more talking about it From himself

      Oh, and a new Weapons contract for $360 Bilion to saudis.to help target Iran.???

      • bevin

        It is shocking the speed with which the poor of Arabia are being looted by this transfer of public wealth to corporations in which the Royal family are large shareholders. Arms contracts have become the money laundering devices of choice for Gulf kleptocrats.
        I sometimes wonder whether the sauds do not get a little impatient at the lack of initiative shown by local revolutionaries: they would far rather be wealthy exiles doing what they please and telling the wahhabi clerics to get lost, living it up in Macau or Cannes, Florida or, that land of damp dreams, Mr Epstein’s Virgin Islands.

  • Tony_0pmoc

    Izvi nokuti Craig Murray – nokuti ini ndine hombe kuremekedza. Sekuru vangu aiva Chirungu Wenyika uye jendurumani. Akapedza nguva yakawanda youpenyu hwake muna Africa – kunyange akanga vachishandisa Brighton inova apo nemuzukuru wangu vakasangana naye husband..He munhu completly yakanaka murume – uye yedu inotevera kupemberera mhuri achava Wedding wavo. Vatowana 4 vana Birmingham, England.

    Tony

  • giyane

    This is UK neo-liberalism which Craig claims is much more toxic than EU neo-liberalism:

    The self-employed, working 24 hours on paper at minimum wage, receiving Family tax credits to top up earnings, is the standard way small companies can afford to pay full-time staff.
    The only problem with this model is that the government can’t afford to close it down because the unemployment figures would be the highest in Europe, and it can’t afford to pay for it without borrowing, placing the burden on either the next generation or the next colonial victim of neo-liberal illegal proxy war-crime.
    Tax credits is a Ponzi scheme and a subsidy to capitalism. Wealth filters up to the rich, who don’t have to pay proper wages. The money that filters down to the poor is QE-ed, paper money , highly-leveraged from real money borrowed from Saudi Arabia, giving the Saudis carte-blanche to wreck the Muslim world.

    EU neo-liberalism substitutes subsidies for tax credits, but is otherwise exactly the same.

    I would venture to suggest, along with RobG, that this EU neo-liberalism is as fascist as you can find, because the state is entirely responsible for the whole economy, and it can only survive through colonial adventurism. When Craig says he is an internationalist, yes in the Walrus and the carpenter sense of the word and shedding a bitter tear for the remaining Muslim nations NATO is planning to destroy using its proxy armies of ISIS and Al Qaida:
    “It seems a shame,” the Walrus said,
    “To play them such a trick,
    After we’ve brought them out so far,
    And made them trot so quick!”
    The Carpenter said nothing but
    “The butter’s spread too thick!”

    “I weep for you,” the Walrus said:
    “I deeply sympathize.”
    With sobs and tears he sorted out
    Those of the largest size,
    Holding his pocket-handkerchief
    Before his streaming eyes.

    “O Oysters,” said the Carpenter,
    “You’ve had a pleasant run!
    Shall we be trotting home again?’
    But answer came there none–
    And this was scarcely odd, because
    They’d eaten every one.”

  • Aubrey

    Great interview! Very informative! Hard time with the sound at the beginning, thought it will go like that all the way. Glad you fix it and the rest sounds right.

  • Dave

    When Powell made his warning against the Race Relations (inverted Nuremburg) Act there was little immigration and now there is. And yet for some any objection to immigration no matter how many is “racist” and illegal. Scotland has a population of about 6 million. London has a population of about 9 million. Without any control on numbers and type entering Scotland, then Scotland could look like London and if that’s the aim of independence, well London got it without being independent. Or do SNP voters think independence means something different?

  • John Spencer-Davis

    Please consider making an emergency contribution for this lady and her family, reported on by Skwawkbox. Apparently their benefits have been suspended.

    “Pro-Corbyn blogger @Rachael_Swindon is one of the most tireless campaigners for Labour, Corbyn and a fairer society that you’ll ever find.

    “As well as blogging and creating some of the strongest memes to support Labour’s message, she is a full-time mother of two kids who also cares full-time for her disabled husband, who recently took a turn for the worse.

    “As a result, she and her family are in the support group of ESA and PIP, which allowed them – just about – to scrape by, except when the DWP screwed up.

    “Until now.

    “Because of her effectiveness, Rachael has angered right-wingers both inside and outside the Labour party. Because she has a ‘donate’ button on her blog, in case the occasional donation comes in to help eke out meagre benefits, someone made a malicious report to the DWP, triggering an investigation.”

    https://skwawkbox.org/2017/05/20/emergency-appeal-malicious-attack-on-pro-jc-campaigner/

    You won’t be doing anything wrong. Please find an explanation here:

    http://www.entitledto.co.uk/help/benefits-charity

  • gt-cri

    Craig, I did enjoy it and would recommend more collaborations with Indy Live. Your impatience matches my own but I can understand those who favour a more gradual and perhaps more cohesive approach. The inner conflict, due to “the cringe” is never far from most Scots’ personalities!

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