There are strategies and strategies. Some strategies are open or transparent – the ones where you want your people, whoever they are, to understand what you are trying to achieve and how you intend to get there. Then there are closed strategies, sometimes called hidden agendas. There can be a number of reasons for a hidden agenda.
In the case of the Scottish vote in the General Election 2015 it is clear from experience there must be a closed strategy. The sheer volume of dirty tricks used against the YES campaign taught us, if nothing else, that there are dark forces against us. Their actions will be covert and their strategy will be unseen.
What I am trying to say is that the SNP has an open strategy for the General Election, but it will also have a closed one. I can only guess what that might be. But I won’t.
However, I will present a view of the General Election that I know many are on side with. The powers that be (against us) will pay no attention because … who am I?
There are two parts to my view. The first is very simple – I want to see an SNP landslide. Some predict as much as 56 MPs from 59. I want to see 59. I would settle for 30 giving an unfettered and unequivocal majority of SNP MP to make up a nice pair with the majority MSP. If I was playing cards with Westminster I would call this a ‘Royal Flush’.
If SNP achieve less than 59 MPs then I would wish for the difference to be made up of Green MPs, Scottish Socialist or Indy Labour MPs. Just so long as we have 0 Westminster Labour, 0 Westminster Conservative and 0 Westminster LibDem MPs. Add the 3 together and I make that 0 Westminster party MPs. I would say to the Conservative and LibDem candidates, ‘Scotland is no place for your political ideology. To the Labour candidates I would say that Scotland will never be place for your political double dealing, perversion and corruption of honest politics.
The second part of my view would be a total wipe out of Labour from politics in the rest of the UK. It may be there is a place in parts of the UK for Conservative and LibDem ideology. However, I am sure the vacuum created by the demise of the ‘Despise’ party would suck in a new socio-political movement. Perhaps Scotland could have provided the blueprint. Scottish socialism does not tend towards communism. It tends towards a society based on human values. Many people who have lived in Scotland for years will have experienced those values. We are not soft touches, we do not tolerate chancers but we do care about each other.
My personal view would be another term in office of the Conservatives with whoever may form an effective opposition – as the Labour Party failed to do. This may be a mix of Greens, Unionists, LibDems, UKIPrs and Indys. By contrast, Scotland would be running with a majority SNP MPs and MSPs.
I take this view because I do not believe that the people of England, especially London and the South East have become pissed off enough yet with their political leaders to demand a radical change. That said, I think they are getting very close. I think Wales are very very close and I think Plaid Cymru are just a whisker behind the SNP. I think Ireland are still quite a way off.
Some might say that my hope for the eradication of the Labour party is a bit extreme? I don’t think it is. Scotland was really the home of the Labour party. Many people in the current Labour party recognise that Blair, Brown, Mandelson and Campbell ruined Labour irretrievably when they invented New Labour. When I talk about eradicating Labour, I am actually talking about New Labour. Out of the ashes will come original Labour, as has already happened in Scotland. So there is hope!
Consider this. The Tory’s will shaft the ordinary person – they are hard wired to do that. The ultra right wing Tory’s will really really shaft the ordinary person. But to mega shaft the ordinary person, that takes something as vile as New Labour. I have blogged relentlessly about their performance. When they swept to power on a pack of lies, Blair immediately got to work on repealing clause 4. He called the party social democrats and moved their politics to the right of Genghis Khan. He dragged the country into illegal wars on the back of his ‘poodle and master’ relationship with Bush and relied on Brown to bankroll the lot. In the background, Mandelson and Campbell were the masters of spin. They turned political correctness into a form of social engineering that would have made George Orwell wince. They set about altering the demographics of the UK through a stated, written down policy of mass net immigration in the hope that would guarantee their continuance in power for at least forever. Brown, as we all now realise, was a deluded individual. Having watched his master Blair wield power at the spin of a pen he wanted some of that. He never thought for a minute that he was simply nowhere near up to the task. Nevertheless, Brown set about impressing ‘whoever he felt he had to impress’ but selling off most of our gold at a bargain basement price to get the banks, caught out by the Carry Trade, off the hook. He absolutely ruined the private pension industry forever through sheer stupidity and greed and he quantitatively eased the UK into massive debt by injecting the proceeds into the financial markets where it enjoys a shelf life of a couple of weeks. Of course, there was a global banking crisis – and nobody can deny that. When we say global we don’t mean this is where it came from – we mean this was the extent of Brown’s mess. It is now common knowledge that the UK has total debt just north of £1.7 Trillion. I like to put it slightly differently and say our total debt is £1.7+ Trillion, Gordon.
THIS IS WHY I WANT NEW LABOUR ERADICATED FROM POLITICS, FOREVER
Some people say, and the media especially say, that the SNP are simply looking for an opportunity to re-run the Referendum. They are all missing the point. Some factions in the UK or should I say Westminster make a great big thing about Scottish Independence. Why so? Well, because Scotland is a very rich country and for those in power who make fortunes out of exploiting others, and Westminster is and represents many of those interests – this was their big cash cow legging it off down the road. Basically, these are the people with their hands in our pockets up to their armpits.
By contrast, the majority of English people don’t give a monkey’s about Scottish Independence. Many are persuaded by the hype from the ruling classes that the Scots are a nation of scroungers and nasty ‘Nats’.
The truth is, Independence for Scotland is NO BIG DEAL. Scotland is one of the oldest places on earth – and it has only been in the UK for a few minutes on the geological clock.
As oil prices have dipped and it may be many years before, and if, they ever return. The world’s direction of travel is moving away from oil and technology is a major player. I have a little 1946 Morris 8 series E with an 850cc engine. It will do about 15 miles to the gallon. I also have a big Merc turbo-the latest Blu-Motion versions (not mine) at 3,500cc will return as much as 80 miles per gallon. The way cars are going, we are not far from the ‘sealed for life petrol tank’. When the fuel runs out we change it, the car that is – you may laugh, but we are heading in that direction. Just imagine a car that runs on political bullshit – for me this would be as close as you get to perpetual motion.
OK, so oil is worth buttons. They are telling us Scotland cannot support its own electricity needs, everything else is closed down, Trident is leaking all over the Gareloch peninsula and our NHS is bursting because we fry everything to bits. If we held another referendum – but this time the only people who get to vote are the English – we would be so out. Our independence day would be the following morning and they would let us keep the pound. You think I am joking?
England has a hell of a lot going for it. England would benefit greatly from a proper grown up relationship with its neighbours. However, there is a pride in England that tells them they want to go it alone. They don’t need us. And in a sense that is true.
Independence was only ever a big deal because it suited some people to make it a big deal. If on the other hand we could simple apply for independence on an ‘Application to become and Independent Nation’, form from the Post Office we could have done that and nobody would have noticed.
Some time later in a pub in London somebody might say, ‘I see the Scots got their Independence’. And the reply would be, ‘Oh, I missed that, when was that then? – are you getting the beers in Dave?’ Anyway, what were we talking about before?
The referendum was some time ago now. Well I say it differently. The referendum was not on the 18 Sep 2014. The referendum started on the 18 Sep 2014 and it will continue until whenever? it could be 8 May 2015. One thing is for sure. When the peoples of these islands realise that it is not a big deal for these islands, it is just a big deal for the people of Scotland.
I don’t care how it happens. I don’t even care when it happens, I just care THAT it happens. And if that means that the ruling classes say, ‘for Christ sake, just give them their independence and let’s get on’. Well, that will do for me, too.
Pride isn’t the journey, it’s the destination!