Best Of

Somewhat belatedly, it is time to go and get the Christmas tree. Then put some decs up. Our son is coming home in the early hours for Christmas. Looking forward to that.

This has been a very unhappy hear for me in politics. I feel an orphan. I have nothing but contempt for the SNP government in Scotland and I am in despair about the Labour government in London. My enthusiasm and even interest has waned sharply. I may have a break from PB for a while.

We're in a dull phase right now.

That's certainly part of the problem. Sometimes, as with the bug going round at the moment, the only answer is to hunker down and wait for nature to do its thing. The current personnel aren't ideal casting, sure. But if the alternatives are worse, what are we to do?

The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Besides, how did we get here and then get out? Part of the problem, I'm sure, is that we're demanding leadership qualities that go well beyond what we have any right to demand. Since Blair, we've had seven PMs, all of whom failed fairly unambiguously and fairly quickly. What was the sliding door moment where we could have avoided all this?

If David Cameron had not called and lost the Brexit referendum, we'd not have had Theresa May and Boris, and Nigel Farage and Dominic Cummings would have left the stage. So it's Ted Heath's fault for taking us into Europe.

If Alfred the Great hadn't fought off the Vikings, we'd have the Norwegian Sovereign Fund instead of all our national debt.

The last PB post by TSE was 'Will this bug John Swinney and the SNP until election day?', and here is the thing while TSE used a humourous play on the latest SNP scandal, it should have been a far bigger story here with far more scrutiny because of the implications for the Holyrood Parliament. But it won't be because frustratingly it involves a really shocking scandal that involves one of our devolved governments...

So the PB thread like the UK main stream media totally ignored it, literal tumble weed here and elsewhere, special shout out to SkyNews for mentioning it but doing sod all else to investigate it. Now just imagine if this had been a governing party at Westminster where now THREE female elected MPs had been reported to have had their offices bugged by party staffers?! I have no doubt that the Westminster Lobby would have been all over the story and it would have been wall to wall coverage in the 24/7 News channels, especially when the original breaking story reported that the male aid who bugged one female MSP had since moved to work for an SNP MP?!

Sorry TSE but I was really annoyed when you almost affectionately made fun of and dismissed this shocking scandal, and it is incredible serious story that should have resulted in not only a Parliamentary investigation, but a Police investigation too. I said early yesterday that Holyrood was not only broken, it really is not fit for purpose and that matters with a big election looming there in May next year and I stand by that claim today more than ever. But again I was just so saddened and frustrated at the lack of response here or in the media, not even the most basic questions asked. And to say this scandal stinks is an understatement, no one has asked why or to what end these female SNP MSPs who remain anonymous were bugged, but the Scottish Sun is reporting it suggests internal SNP infighting.

But the cynic in me after 18 eighteen years of this appalling SNP Government did have one question, why did it take until yesterday for this breaking story to finally see the light of day just as Holyrood went into Christmas recess and both politicians and political journalists departed to go on their festive holidays until the New Year.. Its almost as if this story finally having to break was stage managed so it would hopefully get the least attention or any proper scrutiny by the Holyrood Parliament, the local media or the public. This is how the SNP operate, totally secretive and utterly ruthless in their media management and so cynically in their media operation but they get away with it time and time again because Scotland is deemed a side show despite the fact that they control so much of our public services up here and including taxation when it comes to budgets but we like Wales and NI are totally failed by the UK media!

And the PB crew fell for it yet again yesterday because they were not even interested.... Oh to be a female MSP in the work place at Holyrood right now!