The British Propaganda Corporation

On 25/09/201406/10/2014 By JacIn British Nationalism, Labour Party, Scotland47 Comments

In times of national crisis, when Britain is under threat or involved in overseas conflict, the BBC gives unquestioning support to the official government line. To all intents and purposes the BBC becomes the mouthpiece of the government, an agent of propaganda. This is understandable, it may even be acceptable, though what is less easy to understand is why a referendum on Scottish independence should have been treated like a war, or why Alex Salmond was put on a par with General Galtieri or Saddam Hussein.

And even when the referendum had been ‘won’ the BBC couldn’t drop its prejudice. On the day following the referendum gangs of Loyalists roamed the streets of Glasgow, attacking peaceful Yes supporters and burning Scottish flags. Many of these thugs – some giving Nazi salutes – had come over from the Six Counties, others had come up from England. Yet the BBC reported it as two groups – one pro independence the other pro Union – both intent on violence. If they’d believed they could have got away with it I’m sure the BBC would have portrayed the pro-independence students and families as the aggressors. It was left to the Herald to give the truth, even identifying a Rangers supporters group involved in organising the violence and encapsulating what really happened in George Square and nearby streets with the memorable phrase, “The heart of Glasgow had gone from Woodstock to Belfast in the space of just one day”.

Of course no one at the BBC would admit to it, nor would anyone in the Conservative Party, or at The Times, or in the Tesco boardroom, or on the trading floor at Deutsche Bank, but those thugs that terrorised central Glasgow last Friday night – violent and malodorous though they might be – are allies, for they’re all found in the great Unionist spectrum. This explains why the BBC and the rest of the London media deliberately misreported those events in Glasgow.

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If the Scottish referendum presented a very real threat to ~~England’s prestige~~ this wonderful United Kingdom, then it follows that potential or lower level threats must also be dealt with, using the same agencies, primarily the BBC. Yesterday the BBC produced the results of a poll that purported to show that only 3% of people in Wales favoured independence. A quite remarkable finding when compared with other recent polls.

Polls this year by ITV Wales put support for independence at 14% in May and 17% in September. Another poll in September, this one by Face for Business, suggested that support for independence was as high as 29%. Now it would be easy to dismiss this last poll as being wrong . . . though few did, for it seems to have been ignored by the media. I was tempted to dismiss it myself, until I looked into it a little more and found that it provided a breakdown by age group, so I made a comparison with what has been produced for the Scottish referendum by Lord Ashcroft Polls, and the concurrence is quite striking.

The little table I drew up unsurprisingly shows that there is more support for independence in the younger age groups, while it falls off dramatically in both countries after the age of 55. Though the fall is greater for some reason in Scotland, where among the 65+ support for independence is 46% of the highest independence supporting age group, while in Wales it’s 51%. This is strange, even more so when we consider that so many English people retire to Wales. (In the area where I live they make up two-thirds of the 65+ age group.) And even if the FfB poll is all to hell, I still don’t fully understand why support for independence in Scotland declines so dramatically in the 65+ bracket.

Whatever the answers, we have to remember that opinion polls are not simply produced to tell us what people are thinking, many are designed to influence how people think, and this explains the BBC poll. Also, to provide ammunition for the defenders of the UK State who, in Wales, love to trot out the lie that, ‘only between five and ten per cent want independence’. (Hang on, is this why the Face for Business poll was totally ignored?) The only way to establish how many people in Wales want independence is to ask them the same question that was asked in Scotland last Thursday (with Wales substituted for Scotland) – ‘Should Wales be an independent country?’ That’s it, one simple question. Anything else, involving multiple choice or ‘answer-guided’ questions, is unacceptable and designed to confuse and mislead.

Among those making political capital out of the BBC’s propaganda poll was Councillor Pearleen Sangha of Swansea (well sort of, as I’ll explain). She re-tweeted @PearleenSangha enthusiastically that within a margin of error there could be nobody in Wales who wants independence. Even making allowances for the fact that Ms Sangha doesn’t know Wales, not even she believes that. But it’s not about what people really believe, is it, we’re talking propaganda here. Councillor Sangha is a staunch defender of the Union, and was up in Scotland for a few weeks campaigning for a No vote. Though seeing as she’s from the USA I can’t help wondering if she’s a UK citizen, and if not, should she have involved herself in a constitutional issue like this. Although nominally a Swansea councillor Sangha is now working for the Labour Party in Cardiff, so her Uplands constituents see very little of her these days. Though perhaps they don’t notice, for even when she was in Swansea she was strictly a Monday to Friday and 9 to 5 councillor. That’s when she was there, because she also likes to take lengthy trips home to California, and being a true party girl, she never misses a Labour conference or knees-up.

UPDATE 27.09.14: I’m told the Evening Post ran a story today (can’t find it on the website) in which it queried Councillor Sangha’s status. She claims to have resigned as a councillor in July and informed the party leadership, which was then (the recently departed) David Phillips. Yet no one else seems to know about this, certainly no by-election has been called. But despite what she told the Evening Post, on her Twitter account Cllr Sangha is still describing herself as a Labour councillor for Uplands! (Click to enlarge.) Lending weight to the suspicion that she is still, officially, a councillor – even though, due to her long absence and appalling attendance, record she shouldn’t be – is the fact that her council e-mail address is still receiving mail. In addition, she is still listed on the council’s website as a councillor. So what’s the story here?

28:09:14: A story on the Evening Post website today tells us that “Uplands councillor Pearleen Sangha steps down from her post”. She is quoted as saying “It is with regret that I have formally tendered my resignation as a Swansea councillor”. Which I take to mean that she’s resigning now, following the recent attention. Though she claims she decided “some time ago” to resign, perhaps at “the end of July”, when she says she informed the “leadership” of her intentions. (‘Leadership’ suggests more than one person, so who exactly did she tell?) She also wants us to know that she has not received her councillor allowance since then – good for her! Though the problem is that she went AWOL long before July, so it looks as if she was getting paid her councillor allowance while she was no longer in Swansea, no longer attending council and committee meetings, no longer serving her constituents. It has been obvious for a year or so that Pearleen Sangha was not doing her job as a Swansea councillor, but the local Labour Party allowed this situation to persist, and for her to collect her councillor allowance – simply because she is working full-time for the party, in Cardiff. What a squalid arrangement! What contempt it shows for the city of Swansea and its people. Yet another example of the Labour Party putting its interests first.

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Robert Burns wrote a damning indictment of those who sold out his country’s independence in Parcel of Rogues; perhaps it should be updated, or maybe someone should give us a new song for the twenty-first century.

Any new ‘Parcel of Rogues’ would have to mention the British Propaganda Corporation, and the London newspapers . . . you know, those ‘journalists’ who’ve been tapping phones, and bribing bent London coppers, like the ones involved in the murder of Daniel Morgan. And we mustn’t forget the noble and upstanding politicians, most of whom seem to be fiddling their expenses. Sticking with politicians, let’s remember ALL the parties opposed to Scottish independence – Labour, Tory, Lib Dem, Ukip, BNP, National Front, Britain First, and a host of even smaller, loonier parties; plus of course the Unionists and Loyalists across the water. Finally, there was Carwyn ‘the veto’ Jones. Then there’s the supermarkets, the supermarkets that rip off Welsh farmers. And how could we forget the banks, for all of them were opposed to Scottish independence because they feared being properly regulated, as they are just about everywhere outside of the UK and the USA. Have you noticed that the bankers who end up in court are not the ones who nearly wrecked the Western economy but ‘rogue traders’, in other words, those who lose the banks’ money! Then there’s the oil industry, ‘Scottish oil running out’ they screamed . . . then four days after the referendum we learn that they got it wrong. But of course, this was unknown before referendum day! These are just some of the turds to be found floating in the cess-pit of modern Britain, the most corrupt and unequal society in Europe.

If the people of Scotland had known the truth, if they could have relied on an impartial and unbiased media, then Scotland would today be on its way to independence. That’s why Britain’s elite so desperately needed its propaganda machine and its foot-soldiers. But it was so blatant, so clumsily done and so easily exposed, that the backlash has started, and Scotland will be independent within ten years. The changes Britain will see in the coming decade will not end with Scotland. Fasten your seatbelts!

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Beginning of the End

On 23/09/201413/05/2021 By JacIn Scotland21 Comments

The Scottish independence referendum was ‘won’, Alex Salmond has resigned, ‘Loyalists’ roam the streets of Glasgow attacking Yes supporters and burning Scottish flags . . . danger over, what was all the fuss about? That, I’m sure, is how the less sophisticated among us will interpret – and be encouraged to interpret – the events of the past few days. They couldn’t be more wrong. After settling back into Chateau Jones, and collecting my thoughts, here’s my report, starting with a wee travelogue.

*

Don’t misunderstand me, I love Edinburgh, but in the murky weather my wife and I experienced there last week those big and imposing brown buildings can look ever so slightly oppressive. And if a few are somewhat architecturally overwrought then the Scott Monument is positively hysterical. I’ve looked at it from many different angles over the years and I can only conclude that the architect finished designing it before realising he’d only used up half the budget; so from then on it was a case of more knobs here, more fol de rols there, and let’s squeeze on another excrescence . . . to the point where the whole thing is so overburdened with adornments that it looks more like a Thai temple than a memorial to the man who ‘invented’ Scotland for foreign readers. (I have even read someone blaming Sir Walter Scott for the American Civil War. For being the most popular author in ante-bellum Dixie he stands accused of implanting the ‘chivalric’ outlook in Southern menfolk, and encouraging the ultimately destructive delusion that being true to these values would overcome the North’s greater wealth and superior manpower.)

That said, Edinburgh is a great city and a real capital. Princes Street, the Royal Mile and other thoroughfares were still swarming with people – mainly high-spending overseas tourists – at seven in the evening, stopping to have their photographs taken with pipers that could be found every hundred yards or so. (One of whom played Calon Lân for us!) Of course there was the tawdry and the kitsch, but if you’re from Canton, Cracow or Chicago then you may not recognise what is authentically Scottish (and nor will the people back home you’re buying presents for). Even the architecture is different. Look around Edinburgh, or any Scottish city or town, and you know immediately that you aren’t in England. Finally, there are the centuries-old institutions embedded into Scottish life, making devolution, and even independence, a natural progression for a nation in everything but a seat at the UN, whereas Wales has political devolution sitting top-heavy and almost unworkable on a country otherwise integrated with England through countless cross-border institutions and ‘Welsh’ civil servants taking orders directly from London.

*

My original plan for polling day had been to take the train to Dundee, but £60 each seemed too much to pay for just over an hour’s train journey, so I drove to Stirling. (Ah! that Cardi blood, coursing close to my wallet.) First stop, Bannockburn; then Stirling castle; finally, the Wallace Monument.

The equestrian statue of the Bruce at Bannockburn is big, and in its way it’s impressive; though I suppose similar, slightly overbearing statues to national heroes and liberators can be found from Bratislava to Bogota. Though the whole site was recently rescued from the realm of superheroes by the addition of a poem on a new timber ring atop the rotunda. Written by Kathleen Jamie I reproduce it for you here. The references to “mere transients” and “Small folk playing our part” tell us more of national struggles than huge and dominating statues ever can. (No, I’m not turning socialist.) Bannockburn was such a crushing defeat for the English and their allies that the only sizeable number of foot soldiers said to have made it alive out of Scotland was a detachment of Welsh spearmen, who had the good sense, or leadership, that helped them stick together and fight their way to safety.

The castle at Stirling overlooks the town and the surrounding countryside and is still used as a military barracks. It has regularly played a part in Scottish history, not least in 1314, for the English army the Scots defeated on the plain below was attempting to relieve Stirling castle, the last English garrison in Scotland. The arrangement agreed was that if the castle was not relieved by mid-summer then it would surrender to the Scots. Great though his achievement may have been, I suppose that for those of a leftward political persuasion Robert de Brus, being an aristocrat, does not arouse the same levels of affection accorded William ‘Braveheart’ Wallace, whose memorial was next on our agenda.

There is, fortunately, a minibus service to the base of the Wallace Monument from the car park and visitor centre below, but after that, you have to climb the 246-step spiral staircase. Which is not as daunting as it sounds due to the regular exhibition rooms you’ll encounter on the climb, these present welcome opportunities to get your breath back. The Wallace Monument is also in the Gothic Revival style but more restrained than the Scott Monument in Edinburgh. It was completed in 1869 and funded by public subscription from within Scotland and thanks to a number of foreign donations, one of them by Giuseppe Garibaldi. It stands on Abbey Craig, from which Wallace is said to have watched the English army (with its Welsh levies) taking up positions on the plain below before the Battle of Stirling Brig in 1297. An army that might have outnumbered Wallace’s forces by as much as five to one, making us realise what a great victory the Scots achieved that day.

*

Enough has already been said about the referendum and its result, so I’ll avoid adding yet another lengthy post mortem and limit myself to just a few general observations.

As the debate went on it became increasingly clear that ‘The Union’ is not some wondrous creation bestowing benefits on all, something to be defended from sacrilegious maniacs wishing to dismantle it; no, the Union is, more than anything else, about prestige – England’s prestige. For with Scotland gone ‘England’ would lose a third of her territory, and this would lead to all sorts of dangerous questions, such as whether ‘England’ should retain her seat on the UN Security Council, or whether, in the EU, ‘England’ – now situated, in population terms, somewhere between Spain and Italy – should still be counted alongside Germany and France. And then there’s those nuclear weapons on the Clyde – with them gone Uncle Sam would find a new best friend.

There is a minority in both Scotland and Wales that understands this, and buys into it, often for reasons of personal advancement. Then there is a much larger constituency that will support the Union because they can be persuaded it offers them more than independence can deliver, or perhaps they can be swayed by purely emotional appeals to ‘shared history’ or ‘standing together against the Nazis’. Support for this interpretation comes from a poll taken just after the referendum which shows, among other things, that 59% in the 25 – 34 age bracket voted for independence, but only 27% in the 65+ age bracket. The shared experiences, whether WWII or British Steel, are largely meaningless for most Scots under the age of 55. Then there’s devolution itself, which for many in the 65+ plus age bracket is something they’re still unfamiliar with, and perhaps uncertain about, whereas for younger Scots, for whom ‘the shared experiences’ belong to the distant past, having a Scottish parliament is normal and – as I mentioned earlier – makes independence almost a logical progression.

This threat to English prestige is the reason we saw political parties, media, banks, businesses, Orangemen and other elements that benefit (or can be persuaded to believe they benefit) from Greater England, unite to oppose Scottish independence. Equally obvious was the strategy of isolating Alex Salmond and presenting him as the sole advocate of the policy. For how often did we see anyone else interviewed? Would anyone know from the media coverage that the influential Scottish Green Party was supporting independence? Or that over a third of regular Labour voters were switching to the Yes camp? And where was Tommy Sheridan, or would his face on the screen have reminded viewers of the perfidy of the London media? No, the independence debate was all about that megalomaniac Alex Salmond. By comparison, there were countless rational and unbiased voices, urging Scottish people to vote No – in the interests of Scotland, of course – voices amplified by a complaisant media and supported by other reasonable voices such as those of Deutsche Bank warning that Scottish independence would precipitate another Great Depression.

Now there is a price to be paid for this unholy and unnatural unity prompted by blind panic when it was thought that Alex Satan might prevail. It’s falling apart now before our eyes. The Tories, under pressure from their own backbenchers and Ukip, have to hold out the prospect of English votes for English-only legislation if not a separate English parliament. Labour cannot accept this due to its traditional reliance on Labour MPs from Scotland (and Wales). But as I’ve mentioned, and as this poll I linked to earlier shows, 37% of those who voted Yes last Thursday voted Labour in the 2010 UK general election . . . are they going to vote Labour again in 2015? Given that we can reasonably assume that most of the Labour voters who supported independence belong to the younger age groups then it’s also reasonable to conclude that Labour is facing a demographic time-bomb in Scotland – yet Labour is the only party that can maintain the Union. Making Labour’s opposition to an English parliament understandable, but hopelessly optimistic, based on a flawed and outdated premise.

The tactic of isolating Alex Salmond may have won the referendum, but the longer term consequences are all positive for both the Scottish National Party and the wider cause of Scottish independence. The SNP is increasingly perceived as the only party that can stand up to the liars and the bullies down in London, a gang to which the #RedTories clearly belong. And this is not just me spouting off – since the referendum the SNP has signed up over 20,000 new members, giving it more members than the Liberal Democrats, a UK-wide party. We were told that the referendum was not about Scotland v England, and of course it wasn’t . . . but it is now, and an increasing number of Scots feel that the only party representing Scottish interests is the SNP.

Scottish independence is guaranteed within a decade, and it probably won’t need a referendum.

*

So where does all this leave Wales? Well, among the many promises made to the Scots was that there would be no revision of the Barnett Formula which sees Wales short-changed in comparison to Scotland and the Six Counties. So Wales looks set to gain nothing, although vague promises of extra powers have been mentioned. Carwyn Jones has, I believe, made a few statements. I say ‘I believe’, because no one listens to Carwyn ‘the veto’ Jones, whether in Wales, England, or Scotland. The man is a weakling and, consequently, a nonentity universally ignored. There may even have been contributions by some person called Crabbe, who’s about as relevant to Wales as Jones is to Scotland.

Though Jones’s predecessor had something to say in his weekly column in the Wasting Mule. If I understood it right, Rhodri Morgan knows that Northern Ireland does well out of Barnett because of the Troubles, and Scotland does well because of the fear of Scottish nationalism. There his reasoning cannot be faulted. But then he goes on to argue that Wales should also be rewarded because we ” . . . didn’t put the whole of the UK through the mincer via referendum or civil war . . . “. So, in other words, we should be rewarded because England has nothing to fear from us. Doesn’t this clown, after a lifetime in politics, understand how it works!

His argument may have self-destructed but it still says a lot about him, and his party. As I have made clear, I detest the Labour Party. I regard the Labour Party in Wales as nothing but quisling scum that have held Wales back for a century. There is no hope for Wales until there is no hope for the Labour Party in Wales. It would be easier to achieve that happy state if we had a party like the SNP. But instead we have a party most of whose leading members still dream of a coalition government with Labour in 2016. Which suggests to me that the Labour Party might not be the only obstacle to Welsh progress.

The End of Britishness

On 15/09/201406/10/2014 By JacIn Scotland23 Comments

The other night I watched Dewi Prysor on S4C, tracking down the Men of the North, telling us of Taliesin’s poetry, visiting the natural fortress of Dumbarton Rock, and trying to establish the relationship between the Picts and the Welsh (or, if you prefer, Brythons / Britons) of southern Scotland and north west England. Worth watching because a Welsh person who knows the history of our people (rather than the history of an area called ‘Wales’) will never regard Scotland as a totally foreign country, and nothing that happens as a result of the referendum will change that.

I’ve tried to explore a little of this history on my recent vists to Scotland. For example, after becoming aware of the separate Scottish version(s) of Merlin / Myrddin I made up my mind to take a detour to the village of Stobo, near Peebles, long associated with the legend. This Merlin is not the advisor and mentor to Arthur but bard to a local ruler named Gwenddoleu, and he was driven insane after witnessing the slaughter at the battle of Arfderydd in 573, becoming the wild man of the woods (Merlin Sylvestris). It’s conceivable of course that this ‘Scottish’ Merlin is the original for the later Welsh or Norman / Breton Merlins.

CLICK TO ENLARGE ANY OF THE STOBO KIRK IMAGES BELOW

As I say, on one of my trips I promised myself a visit to Stobo, but I missed the turning (the wife was probably nattering). So we drove on and arrived at our destination where, after booking in, I wandered about a bit and found, on land not far from the ruins of the abbey, old headstones, and the first one I read was dedicated to a woman with the surname Stobo. I don’t normally believe in ‘things like that’, but the coincidence did make me pause. And promise myself that I would definitely make the trip to Stobo.

Which is a rather out-of-the-way place, but well worth a detour. Stobo Kirk has some remarkable old stones and a little window showing Myrddin being baptised by Saint Kentigern. Though in Scotland Kentigern is more usually known as Mungo, patron saint and founder of the city of Glasgow. In Welsh he is Cyndeyrn, the founder of Llanelwy (St. Asaph). Not far from Stobo, along the B712, you can find the ‘Altar Stone’ opposite the entrance to Altarstone farm. This, it is said, is where the unbaptised Merlin would practice sacrificial rites and / or where he was baptised by Kentigern. (The rest of the stone may be in Stobo Kirk.) Despite the stories of this Scottish Merlin being confusing, and from a cultural context that has been lost, details were retained that probably meant nothing to those repeating them, especially following the adoption of Christianity. Such as the legend telling of Merlin’s triple death, which is pure Celtic, ritualistic and sacrificial. It was the death suffered by Lindow Man and many others whose remains have been found in peat bogs in Ireland and on the continent.

I’m telling you this to explain the affinity I feel for Scotland, particularly the south. Obviously I am supporting a Yes vote in Thursday’s referendum because as a Welsh nationalist I believe the referendum will have major implications for Wales; but there is another, perhaps atavistic, reason for wishing to see these old Welsh territories free of English rule.

UPDATE 20.09.2014: Something I left out of the original piece (because I didn’t have a photograph to show you) was the intriguing headstone in the graveyard behind the kirk. Having visited Stobo again on my visit to Scotland this week, I can now show you the headstone and explain – as well as I can – who the lady was it commemorates. (Click on images to enlarge.)

Rosamund Angharad Lloyd was of course Welsh; the daughter of an Edward Lloyd of Rhyl, though she appears to have been born at Aberpergwm, near Neath, in 1860. Her mother was (and here I quote): ” . . . Matilda Susannah, only dau. and heiress of Lieut.-Colonel Edward Smyth of Castella, co. Glamorgan, by his wife, Rosamond Matilda Bushe of Burcot, co. Oxford; born 17 February 1818; marr. at St. George’s, Hanover Square, London (by the Rev. Francis Llewelyn Lloyd, B. D., Senior Fellow of St. John’s College, Cambridge), on Thursday, 17 September 1857; marr. 1stly William Williams of Aberpergwm, co. Glamorgan, who died, aged 67, 17 March, and was buried at Aberpergwm 21 March 1855″.

Rosamund Angharad Lloyd was married on St. David’s Day 1881 to Edward Seymour Greaves, who himself had been born in 1849 at Tremadog, one of the Greaves family of Blaenau Ffestiniog slate fame. (You’ll see that Rosamund married twice, the second husband being Lord Henry Grosvenor. The Dukes of Westminster, perhaps the richest landowners in this island, are Grosvenors.) I’m not sure how many children Rosamund and her first husband produced but one was Owain E W Greaves, whose stone is next to that of his mother.

But I still couldn’t understand why mother and son were buried in Stobo kirkyard, for neither of Rosamund’s husbands had any obvious connection with Stobo Castle. Then I ran across this, which told me that, “In 1939 Stobo Castle was bought by Wenefryde Agatha Scott, 10th Countess of Dysart”, obviously the Wenefryde referred to on Owain’s headstone, and presumably buried with him. Since 1978 Stobo Castle has been a luxury health spa.

As I mentioned earlier, the Stobo area is associated with Kentigern / Mungo / Cyndeyrn, who is credited with founding the religious settlement that became the cathedral at Llanelwy / St. Asaph. (See the picture above of the window in Stobo kirk.) When Edward Lloyd died in December 1882 Letters of Administration were granted to his daughter Rosamund by the authorities at St. Asaph cathedral. Small world.

*

I say “English rule”, because this referendum has exploded the myth of ‘Britishness’, and if Scotland votes Yes then the very term becomes obsolete. We have, as former Newsnight economics editor Paul Mason has observed, seen the BBC placed on a war footing, casting off all pretence at impartiality and switching to propaganda mode, as if Scotland was Iraq, and Alex Salmond Saddam Hussein. We have heard big banks forecast plagues of locusts, and supermarket chains warn of frogs . . . the oil is running out . . . a nuclear-free Scotland could never join NATO (most members are nuclear free!) . . . Scotland will be offered Devo-max if she says No to independence (the same Devo-max No 10 wouldn’t allow on the ballot paper?) . . . lie after threat after lie. With humour provided by John Prescott, arguing that if Scotland says Yes we’ll never have Team GB to beat the Germans!

Perhaps it’s possible to be even more specific than simply saying ‘English rule’, for what’s really being protected is the interests and prestige of an English elite, one overwhelmingly concentrated in the south. As this report tells us. Judged on wealth, housing, health, crime levels, etc., the 50 most desirable places to live in Britain are all in southern England. Or to put it another way: Of the 50 most desirable places to live in the UK not one is in Wales, Scotland, northern England or Northern Ireland. What an indictment of a state in which we are all supposed to be equal beneficiaries of what it has to offer. Yet as I write this, London politicians and their local lackeys are telling the Scots they would be mad to leave this wonderful UK! They would be mad to stay.

It’s no different in Wales. Our Glorious Leader, Carwyn ‘the veto’ Jones, embarrasses himself every time he opens his mouth. Fortunately, few people in Wales pay him any heed, and none outside Wales. Moving lower down the Labour totem pole, I was struck by a letter in this morning’s Wasting Mule from Councillor Nigel Dix of Caerffili. (Click to enlarge.) Right-on socialist, our Nige; yet he sees no contradiction in lining up with bankers and big business to oppose what he sees as “nationalism”. It seems that Dix is not only unable to recognise propaganda of a very unsubtle kind, but also believes that the only thing driving the Yes campaign is Alex Salmond, the SNP, and ‘nationalism’. Pay attention, Dix! you might learn something. If there is a Yes vote on Thursday it will have been achieved due to Labour voters in Scotland wanting to escape the corruption and inequalities of the UK. Even if the Yes vote falls short of the 50.1% needed, hundreds of thousands of Scottish Labour voters will have defied the Labour leadership, and the party may never see them again. Think about that.

Tomorrow I shall head north; not to campaign or canvass, just to be there and savour the atmosphere of a nation’s re-birth; for make no mistake, nothing will ever be the same again, whatever the outcome of the referendum. Rest assured that I shall have more to say when I return.

AS I SHALL BE AWAY AND UNABLE TO ACCESS MY BLOG I MAY BE SLOW TO APPROVE COMMENTS. AND IF THERE’S A YES VOTE, WELL . . . I COULD TAKE WEEKS TO SOBER UP.

Rangers Refugees!

On 25/11/201325/11/2013 By JacIn British Nationalism, Ireland, Scotland13 Comments

For those reading this who are not football (soccer) fans, or may not be familiar with this kind of sectarianism . . . Rangers is a Scottish football club, based in Glasgow. It’s supporters are Protestant and are found mainly in Scotland and among the Scottish-descended Protestants of Northern Ireland (the Scotch-Irish). Rangers’ great rivals are Celtic, also based in Glasgow, but whose supporters are Catholic, mainly of indigenous Irish descent, Celtic’s fans are also to be found mainly in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Political divisions mirror the religious distinctions, with Rangers fans being supporters of the United Kingdom and sympathetic to the Unionists and Loyalists in the North of Ireland. They fly the ‘union jack’ and assorted variants of the Northern Ireland flag. Celtic fans wave the Irish tricolour and tend to support Irish republicanism. Games between the two clubs always result in some violence and often fatalities, in Scotland and Ireland.

Celtic and Rangers are the two biggest football clubs in Scotland and, partly due to their diaspora support, are among the biggest clubs in the world. Even though both are based in Scotland they have very little to do with that country, both sets of fans being more concerned with Irish history and politics, and the relationship with England and the Union. I give this background information to help you understand the video, in which Rangers fans express their opinions on independence and Scottish National Party leader Alex Salmond. It’s ugly, crude and incoherent.

Before dealing with the hyper-vocal star of the show, let’s consider some of the supporting cast. First, the group at the beginning, with the Saltcoats Loyal flag. The one on the right, perhaps the village idiot on a day out, wants us to believe that Alex Salmond has sexual congress with his grandmother. The remark is so crude and infantile, that the village idiot himself seems embarrassed by what he’s just said.

Then there’s the little crowd up close to the camera shouting “Fuck Bobby Sands, he’s deid”. Yes we all know that, he was an IRA prisoner who died on hunger strike in 1981. So what’s the point of saying it?

Or the older man in the company of the vociferous star, who occasionally makes a half-hearted attempt at restraining him. He looks like he’s been over-indulging on the Buckfast. Is he the star’s father, uncle, agent? And what of the guy on the touchline making the strange gesture – is it directed at the camera, or is it a comment on the performance of the star?

What we are seeing here is a set of inherited (possibly acquired) prejudices that stand firm against the buffetings of reality. Listen to the star saying that in Ireland ” . . . they’re living on the streets, mate”. Presumably in marked contrast to his Protestant brethren in the Six Counties, who’re living in the lap of luxury. Reality check: the Republic of Ireland recently overtook the UK in the Legatum Prosperity Index while Northern Ireland remains the poorest part of the UK. But these are just facts, and the people we see in this video have no interest in facts.

Proven by the same man’s “Rule Britannia, yer fuckin’ bastards” rant. Anyone who thinks the Royal Navy still rules the waves is not just living in the past, he’s so divorced from reality that he might benefit from psychiatric help.

Ruling the waves aside, everything comes back to Ireland. The bogey men have always been Irish Catholics, millions of them, all supporting the IRA, and bent on world conquest. Yet now there’s a new threat, in the form of the SNP and independence. This has necessitated a rethink, something that confuses those who prefer a world of unchanging, comforting prejudices. And while earlier centuries gave Loyalists some memorable songs the video proves that the new threat is something that, musically, they haven’t yet come to terms with.

To some extent I suppose these Rangers fans were set up, but no one put those words into their mouths. Which is sad. Partly because those opposed to independence must include decent and sincere people (so how do they feel about being on the same side as these morons?), and partly because there are Rangers fans who support independence.

Now all this could be dismissed as being of no concern to us because it’s happening in Scotland – I certainly would have ignored it – but then came the chilling climax, with the leading man promising that if Scotland did become independent he’d leave – for Wales! But why not Ireland? Almost everything that motivates Rangers fans is tied up with the history and politics of Ireland, or, more specifically, Northern Ireland / ‘Ulster’ / the Six Counties. Their Protestant Loyalist brethren are over there, beleaguered and in need of help. So why come to Wales, a country with which they have no connection?

The reason he gives for choosing Wales over England is that ‘England is letting in all those immigrants’. So we see that our star’s bigotry is not confined to the Catholic Irish. He thinks Wales could be more acceptable to his sensitivities because we have fewer immigrants. Which, by a strange coincidence is why many English move here. (But we mustn’t say this publicly – it makes us ‘racist’!) These final remarks also expose the linkages and overlaps I’ve marked on the map.

So why have I chosen these, what am I trying to say? Of course, the linkages between Orange Lodges, Loyalism and Rangers FC are obvious, others are perhaps less so. For example, we know that Loyalists support Rangers, but so do British National Party and English Defence League members.

There have always been links between Orange Lodges and English Masonic Lodges, often via Scotland. Ukip of course is just the golf club variant of the BNP, and well represented in Freemasonry. Back in the 1980s MI5 tried to reorganise the extreme Right and use it, much as the Italian secret service was doing in Italy at the time, using fascists to commit atrocities that were then blamed on the Left. The inspiration came from fascist refugee Roberto Fiore, friend and mentor to Nick Griffin. Then, during the Troubles, British intelligence and security forces worked closely with Loyalist terrorists.

The term ‘Poppy Fascists’ may seem a bit harsh, but this is no insult to The Fallen; nor am I mocking the ex-serviceman, or the old lady, selling poppies in your local supermarket. I’m using the poppy as a symbol for the unrelenting ‘Britishness’ offensive we’ve suffered in recent years, and shadowy forces that can coerce and intimidate the BBC and other News media – ‘Wear a poppy! or we’ll set the tabloids on you’. Which brings us to the final link or, rather, the London media more generally. The manner in which they deal with immigration, Scotland, Wales, the monarchy and a host of subjects, the way they’ll print anything given them by the police or the intelligence services, condemns them as a propaganda machine, not the independent and questioning media of a healthy democracy.

Let me finish this over-long piece with a thought that might sober up the cast of the video. By this time next year you could be supporting a Union of which Scotland is no longer a part! If that happens, don’t come to Wales, we don’t want you. We have mercifully escaped sectarianism and we don’t want to see it close-up, lashing out in its death-throes.

Though having said that, seeing as these people are undesirables with no local connections, ‘Welsh’ housing associations would almost certainly be fighting to give them accommodation. Perhaps they wouldn’t be the only ones helping Loyalist refugees to re-settle in Wales.

Miscellaneous Musings

On 18/11/201319/11/2013 By JacIn Scotland, Third Sector, Welsh Government12 Comments

SCOTLAND 2014

Another Labour big-hitter, former Lord Provost of Glasgow Alex Mosson, has said he’ll be voting Yes in the September 2014 referendum on Scottish independence. I think we’ll see many more such declarations between now and referendum day. I say that partly because leaving the big decisions with London is less attractive than in previous decades simply because the modern Labour Party is so little different to the Tories.

What’s more, with the reduction in the number of Scottish MPs there’ll be a consequential reduction in those MPs’ clout. The days of Scotland sending forty or fifty Labour MPs down to London to influence, if not control, Labour governments is a thing of the past. More and more Scottish Labour supporters are realising that their wishes – be it changes they want made, or services and benefits they want to retain – are more likely to met in Edinburgh than London. Yet devolving more power to Edinburgh will result in even fewer Scottish MPs – with London still retaining control over defence, macroeconomics, foreign affairs and some forms of taxation. When faced with that prospect many Labour supporters will view independence as the better option.

For as The Scotsman said in reporting Alex Mosson’s decision: ‘He (Mosson) said the historic vote next September is “not about the SNP, or Labour or any other political party”. A Yes vote would help boost Scotland’s self confidence, grow the economy and make society fairer, he claimed.’ Exactly. This debate has long past the SNP v The Rest stage. It’s about what’s best for Scotland. Between now and September 18th next year I expect many more Labour supporters to come around to the view that the best option is independence.

BEVERLEY! BEVERLEY! ARE YOU OUT THERE, BEVERLEY?

A couple of months ago someone managed to break into my blog and make a few changes, such as an image of steaming dog turds in the header. Nothing really damaging; it was as if someone was just letting me know they’d been here. I have since changed the Log In password to a load of gobbledygook that even I can’t remember.

Then, in the past couple of weeks, I’ve received a dozen or so e-mails addressed to Beverley@jacothenorth.net. All from banks, or Companies House, with one from H M Revenue and Customs. All official looking and all with attachments. As far as I’m aware there is of course no such e-mail address. I certainly haven’t set up one. So why would anyone else take out such an address? Odd.

But then, as I’ve said before, I am getting unwanted attention from a few sources, with others trying to impersonate me. One being ‘Jacques du Nord’, whose e-mail address is jaconorth@btinternet.com. I have sent an e-mail to that address asking why he or she is impersonating me, but of course I’ve had no reply. Another minor irritant is jaco the north, to whom anyone trying to access my old Google Blogger account is directed. But I’m philosophical about these things, they’re nothing that a bottle of Argie red can’t put into perspective.

Less easy to laugh off is news I received last week from my host (in Dyffryn Silicon, Aberaeron). It seems my blog came under attack on November 12. Many of my host’s clients complained that their websites were slow or at a standstill, with the answer to the problem coming from his server in Texas, who had “restricted” the service “to avoid a complete collapse”. The issue was that my blog had come under sustained attack in the hope of bringing it down. My host traced the culprit’s IP address given him by the server – 62.219.8.230 – to Israel. Which I find rather disappointing, given my support for Israel.

Still, I suppose it’s better than being ignored.

POWER TO THE PLONKERS!

Politicians, political commentators, anoraks, interested bodies, and Uncle Tom Cobbleigh an’ all have been getting excited about today’s announcement of further powers being devolved from London to Cardiff. Among these powers is the ability to set business rates and er, that appears to be it, apart from powers (after a referendum) over income tax. But this would be under a ‘lockstep’ sysyem, which would mean that reducing the lowest rate of tax would have to be applied, penny for penny, in the higher tax bands. Oh yes, there was also mention of borrowing. In other words, a poor country being allowed to go further into debt. But these new powers, we are told, make Wales more like Scotland.

Let me explain why it’s all a load of bollocks. Unlike Scotland, Wales is close to all the major English conurbations bar one. That one, the Tyne-Wear conurbation, is still 150 miles from Glasgow. To a far greater degree than Scotland, Wales suffers from cross-border institutions and ‘arrangements’. Unlike Scotland, Wales lacks her own legal system, education system, financial sector, media, cultural life and other features of nationhood that have, over centuries, created an indigenous middle class which, even though many of its members might oppose independence, will always defend what is uniquely Scottish. Which is why Scots live in Scotland, and we live in Englandandwales.

Giving more power to those buffoons down Cardiff docks is bound to result in that power being misused; is bound to make Wales poorer; and is guaranteed to lock Wales even more firmly into the Englandandwales framework. Let me explain. Thanks to the socialist culture prevailing here there is an obsesssive desire to prove how more ‘caring’ we are than the English, and especially them wicked Tories, to whom we must always send ‘messages’ . . . achieved by, um, voting Labour. The more power (and sources of funding) ‘Wales’ has, then the more freedom the aforementioned buffoons have to show the world what a bunch of altruists inhabit this little corner of Europe.

If the ‘Welsh’ Government has more power to make Wales more ‘caring’, then I can predict with certainty – based on countless examples from the past decade and a half – what will happen. Shysters will slip over the border to take advantage of the funding. The halt and the lame, the workless and the degenerate, will appear as if by magic. Englandandwales bodies will heap upon us fulsome praise for being so caring . . . then transfer their ‘clients’ and ‘service users’ to properties in Wales that our politicians have helped them buy. In short, we shall be taken advantage of. Wales will become both poorer and more English. But to even whisper that we are being exploited, or to dare question why another three busloads of ‘homeless’ ex-cons have turned up in Swansea will make us, not only ‘uncaring’, but ‘racist’.

Increasing the potential for such disaster by giving more powers to a bunch of left-leaning incompetents driven by the desire to please the Third Sector and get Brownie points off the Guardian is not only a mistake – it’s positively bloody dangerous! Which might explain why the UK government has given Carwyn Jones and his gang ~~more rope~~ more powers.

Scotland Referendum: Hold Tight And Enjoy The Ride

On 20/10/201321/10/2013 By JacIn Scotland14 Comments

I bought the Sunday Telegraph today and read Andrew Gilligan’s piece on the SNP conference in Perth. In fairness, Gilligan conceded that, “Fiscally, there is no question that an independent Scotland could afford to go it alone”, which, I suppose, is progress. Because it wasn’t so long ago that Unionists like him were insisting an independent Scotland would be a pauper state. However, the rest of the piece was the usual combination of slapstick and scaremongering.

By line five of the article the respected leader of the SNP had become “Tubby” Salmond, a condition he was trying to remedy with a diet devised for him by, wait for it! – an Englishman. I found myself asking, ‘Is the dietician’s nationality important?’ and the only answer I could come up with was ‘no’. Maybe it was all too subtle for me, and this was Gilligan’s way of telling us that the Scots need their benevolent neighbours to look after them.

Gilligan introduced more humour (but unintentionally, this time) by reminding us that Scotland’s only oil refinery, at Grangemouth, had suddenly been closed by “its Swiss-based multinational owners” leaving the prospect that Scottish oil “would have to come ashore in England” with all the revenue and other implications for Scotland. Plus the more immediate possibility of fuel shortages in Scotland. Possibilities that may have had Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells salivating over his kedgeree this morning, but if you think about it, then the very idea is silly. An independent Scotland could either buy or take over Grangemouth, or just build a new refinery.

Gilligan conceded though that whatever was happening at Grangemouth looked like a “cooked-up dispute” over pay and conditions. Half true (as he may have known). The dispute is definitely contrived, but the pay and conditions angle is a red herring and a pretext. It might help if we look at exactly who owns Grangemouth refinery. The company is called INEOS which as Gilligan says, is headquartered in Switzerland, but he neglected to tell us that its registered office is in the canton of Hampshire. The company was founded by the very unSwiss sounding Jim Ratcliffe, and the only others mentioned in the ‘Leadership’ section of the website are, Andy Currie, John Reece and Jim Dawson. So, while INEOS might operate in many countries it is most definitely an English company.

What we appear to have here, then, is an English company playing politics and possibly trying to influence next September’s independence referendum. With oil figuring so large in an independent Scotland’s projected finances INEOS could be saying, ‘And how are you going to get the oil ashore without the Grangemouth facilities – that we own?’ If so, then the only question remaining for me is whether the UK government, or any of its agencies, put INEOS up to this stunt, and perhaps even agreed to underwrite the company’s losses. With your money.

Now there will be many reading this who’ll dismiss me as a conspiracy theorist. If I am, it’s because there are a lot of nasty things going on out there, and some of the worst of them are done by loveable, fluffy democracies that spend so much time castigating regimes that are more openly corrupt and repressive. This, added to a certain experience of how the bastards operate, leads me to confidently predict that between now and the Scottish referendum we shall be entertained with dirty tricks, black propaganda and downright lies that would make a propaganda chief in a totalitarian regime blush with embarrassment.

What am I talking about? Well, let me give you one of my favourite examples. What comes into your head when you think of Cananda? Wide open spaces, Mounties . . . not a lot really; truth is, Canada comes over as dull and boring – ah, yes! but a model democracy, surely? Well, yes, until that is the Frenchies start being awkward, then the Canadian federal government, helped by big business, media and Uncle Sam pulls out all the stops to frighten the Quebecois into rejecting independence and / or parties promoting independence.

We’ve all heard the ‘money will flood out of the country’ argument against independence. Well in 1970 it was played out on the streets of Montreal, in what French speakers call a coup de theatre, and in this case, ‘le coup de la Brink’s‘. (Link to article in French. Difficult to find anything in English on this incident. Hardly surprising.) On April 26th, in the hope of deterring people from voting for the Parti quebecois in the upcoming election for the Quebec parliament the Royal Bank of Cananda – on the instructions of the federal government – sent a convoy of nine Brink’s armoured cars to Montreal where they were loaded with bonds and securities before heading off to Toronto.

Maybe it worked. Certainly the PQ vote was not as high as had been expected, or feared. Further, given the skewed electoral system then operating in Quebec the PQ got just seven seats despite winning over 23% of the vote. (Still think Canada is an ideal democracy?)

You want a Welsh example of underhand behaviour by a government? OK, try this. At the first Assembly elections in 1999, under the leadership of Dafydd Wigley, Plaid Cymru came very close to getting more votes and more seats than Labour. There was, understandably, panic within Labour ranks, so the Labour government in London had words with its friends in the media. One result was the arrival of the Welsh Mirror newspaper, nothing more than the English Daily Mirror with articles slagging off Plaid Cymru and regular scare stories and borderline racism from Paul Starling, who also wrote for the New Statesman. Soon Dafydd Wigley was removed, Labour came back strongly in the elections of 2003, the Welsh Mirror went back to being the Daily Mirror, and Paul Starling seemed to disappear.

Which is why I confidently predict that the Scottish referendum campaign will serve up a feast of dirty tricks, black propaganda, psycops and all the side dishes, maybe even some ‘false flag’ stunts. And if it looks like there’s going to be a Yes vote, then it’ll be a real blow-out. It should go without saying that the groaning board I anticipate will not be provisioned by the Yes campaign.

Jac o' the North

Category: Scotland