THINGS NOT GOING AS INTENDED.

I was initially very angry about the “threat” from seemingly six SNP MSP’s that if the membership elected anyone other than Humza Yousaf they would vote against the newly appointed leader perhaps even electing Anas Sarwar or Douglas Ross as First Minister.

Despicable, cowardly and disloyal to their Party? Sure, but it’s also a giant bluff.

It will never happen because to do so they would have to do it visibly. They would no longer be able to hide behind anonymity as their votes would be visible and recorded. They would instantly lose the whip and face dismissal as Party members.

This is the cowardly, dishonest and unprincipled caucus in the Parliament, a bunch of over privileged troughers tied to the gravy train which is always attractive to those who consider themselves talented and important, when in reality they are thick and irrelevant.

They are a burden to Humza’s campaign, and here I am doing him a favour by suggesting he knew nothing of his supporters little jape. Alternatively if he knew anything about this he needs to rein in his supporters. They are doing him no favours.

It is not the only mistake in his campaign. Others panicking when he was trailing well back in third place in the National readers online poll resulted to using bots to alter the voting system. This transformed his fortunes dramatically altering the one vote every 90+ seconds he was getting before the bot support, to an amazing 1.6 votes per second.

Subtle this was not. Very quickly he soared into the lead sometimes recording as much as 77% of the new votes being lodged, a huge increase on the 19% he recorded on day one.

I think they hoped nobody would notice but as the votes quickly totalled many times the entire circulation of the newspaper concerned, and by many multiples, just about everybody did. Concerned about getting caught I suspect they started using the bot for the other candidates as well seeking to make it a bit more believable but it was already far too late.

Mr Yousaf’s supporters were also at the forefront of the bullying campaign against Kate Forbes over her personal faith. It was despicable politics and did him considerable harm as properly conducted polls, compiled during the height of these attacks put Kate Forbes comfortably in front. Also interesting the latest poll is showing support for Ash Regan now also beginning to advance.

Now you would think that Humza would want to move on and get away from the personal attacks on Kate Forbes, a tactical move that he must surely be regretting as it allowed her to be seen as principled and honest, to the point where even the organisation representing his own faith came out in support for her principled position.

So when a former Minister came out and directly challenged Hamza’s version of why he had missed the vote on same sex marriage Humza should have said anything to lessen the damage short of lying. But no he lied. The result, what would have been a one day problem grew legs and the media, sensing blood, repeatedly asked him about it. Again he lied, this time these lies brought another two ex Ministers into the fray as they spoke to journalists confirming that it was Alex Neil’s version of events that was truthful. They say it is not the initial act that proves the most damaging but the lies and attempts to cover up that results in a disaster and that is what happened here. Who will put any trust in anything he says now?

It has taken less than a week but he now looks like a lame duck candidate and he has to now worry to look on as the next stage of the leadership race looks at each candidate’s record in office. I would suggest this will not be a pleasant experience either as he has more than a few problems defending each of the departments he has run from Transport, through Justice to Health. What they all have in common was they all had serious problems when he was their Minister.

Ash Regan has said one of her first priorities if she wins is “to put the right people in the right job”. What she means is she will end the “pals cabinet” that has led to poor Government as lightweight Ministers like Shirley Anne Somerville and Humza himself have been promoted way above their abilities. This has undoubtably led to the well deserved reputation of competency under Alex Salmond’s SNP to be lost. He filled his cabinet with the talent, the most capable, not always his closest allies. That is why it worked.

Now we don’t know for sure what the leaked emails will reveal but I would guess the only one of the three candidates that has anything to worry about is the appointed “continuity” candidate. Only a week ago that must have seemed a good tag to have, not so much now as he will be expected to defend whatever revelations are uncovered.

In conclusion as I was writing this article two things happened, the first was an Interview on STV News where Humza was calling for an end of discussion on religious beliefs, a clear sign he knows the damage it has done him rather than the intended target and then I watched the end of the blockbuster film Chariots of Fire about the Scottish Athlete who refused to run in the 100 metre final at the Olympic Games because it had been scheduled to be run on a Sunday and that was against his personal faith. He did run in the 400 metres and won the Gold. On his return he joined the missionary service and died tragically in China just after the end of WW2. As the film narrated all Scotland mourned his death. His name was Eric Liddell, a man of firm principle and faith, and he died a national hero.

Somehow, after the week we have just had, that seemed very appropriate and uplifting. I certainly found it so.

I am, as always

Yours for Scotland

BEAT THE CENSORS

Regretfully there are some among us who seek to censor what others read. Sadly within the YES movement there are sites which claim to be pro Indy but exist to only promote one Party and will not publish articles which come from bloggers who don’t slavishly support that Party to the exclusion of the rest of the YES movement. I ask readers who support free speech to share articles from Yours for Scotland as often as possible as this defeats the effectiveness of the censors.

FREE SUBSCRIPTIONS

Free subscriptions are available on the Home and Blog pages of this site. This allows,for an email of each article to your Inbox and that is now how several thousands get my articles each day. This avoids problems that some have experienced gaining access from Twitter and Facebook. You will be very welcome to choose whatever route works best for you.

SALVO

The work and important development of Salvo has been a beacon of hope in 2022 and as it develops Salvo is creating campaigning hubs throughout Scotland. Salvo will join  with Liberation.Scot and as the campaigning arm of Liberation we are looking at very effective campaigns kicking off very early this year and introducing some new campaigning methods as well as those that have worked well in the past. This requires money so all donations to this site, once the running costs are covered, will go to support the work of Salvo/ Liberation. I think you will see it well used and effective.

LIBERATION.SCOT

We are seeking to build Liberation.Scot to at least 100,000 signatures just as quickly as we can. This is part of our plan to win recognition as an official Liberation Movement via the United Nations. We intend to internationalise our battle to win Independence and through the setting up of our Scottish National Congress will prepare and develop our arguments to win progress in the International Courts. Please help by signing up at Liberation.Scot. It is from those who sign up to Liberation.Scot that the membership of the SNC will be created by ballot.