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Severin Carrell @severincarrell
.@KeithBrownMSP launches @theSNP deputy leadership bid: says @NicolaSturgeon decides who gets to be #DFM. He's up against @StewartHosieMP
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CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!
And now? (Not the White Paper thread)
(693 posts)-
Posted 9 years ago #
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Cyclists,
May I make a plea for leniency on behalf of those who had high-profile involvement in our recent affair?
I only knocked a few doors and made pseudonymous arguments on-line, but my soul is tired and I sometimes say things that are intemperate or even unhinged.
Mr Sillars has been through the machine, along with the First Minister and Ms. Sturgeon. I'm surprised that none of them have been sectioned as gibbering wrecks. Let's cut them some slack for a couple of weeks?
Posted 9 years ago # -
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Pat Kane @thoughtland
UKLab: Scaring pensioners about post-#indy a week ago. Seeking to scrap their winter fuel allowance & other benefits today. “Reconcile”?!----
Posted 9 years ago # -
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Patrick Harvie @patrickharvie
More @scotgp memberships keep rolling in... we're fast approaching 6000 members! Come and be one of them - http://www.scottishgreens.org.uk/join-donate/----
Posted 9 years ago # -
Mr Sillars has been through the machine, along with the First Minister and Ms. Sturgeon. I'm surprised that none of them have been sectioned as gibbering wrecks. Let's cut them some slack for a couple of weeks?
What happened to:-
politics became too important to leave to the politicians
Just so. Met up with my local Yes group on Monday, and the quality of discourse made the utterances of our soon to be ex- member of parliament look like the gruntings of some kind of brain damaged ruminant.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I'm assuming you are both referring to Jim Sillar's various outbursts in the media.
Mr. Sillars is a former politician. He is not an elected representative. His views may resonate with some elements in the SNP, I don't know, but as far as I am aware they represent no-one but him.
I have some sympathy for him: he not long ago lost his wife Margo, and now will not see his dream of independence, perhaps not even in his lifetime.
He still sometimes has interesting things to say. The idea that he speaks for the Yes movement or even his own political party is perhaps stretching credibility however.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The idea that he speaks for the Yes movement or even his own political party is perhaps stretching credibility however.
Well that is a good point. No yes fan needs to feel they need to defend him or agree with him, just because he is pro yes.
I have only just heard of him recently so have no idea what sort of a person he was "before" either the referendum campaign or the death of Margo MacDonald.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The idea that he speaks for the Yes movement or even his own political party is perhaps stretching credibility however.
I agree with you to an extent, but there was the photo of him and Alex Salmond arm-in-arm, so he was being used as some part of the Yes campaign. I don't think his "day of reckoning" speech was too far removed from the views he's expressed over his political career.
And he is now using some "emotive" language to describe No voters which isn't too helpful.
Posted 9 years ago # -
And he is now using some "emotive" language to describe No voters which isn't too helpful.
Well if you believe that only yes voters have feelings or emotions or can be riled into saying stupid stuff by the opposition then it doesn't matter, right?
Posted 9 years ago # -
@Min
I was making a distinction between what was said before and after the 18th, and between those who have had a mass media campaign of vilification turned on them and those who haven't, which may or may not be fair right enough.
So I'd even cut my MP some slack if he wants to let off steam in celebration this week, but I don't plan to forgive him for what he said during the campaign.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"Well if you believe that only yes voters have feelings or emotions or can be riled into saying stupid stuff by the opposition then it doesn't matter, right?"
Not at all, there has been a lot of stupid stuff said on both sides. I was just hoping that the more senior voices would be a bit more reasonable now that the vote is over.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Not at all, there has been a lot of stupid stuff said on both sides.
I was being sarcastic, as I have only seen calls for leniency towards yes voters/campaigners/politicians as if the other side couldn't possibly have found anything about the referendum stressful or have found all of the accusations hurtful/annoying or otherwise have any reason to say anything stupid apart from sheer deep-rooted evil.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Anyway, I am going to bow out of this thread now as it is only making me arsey(er).
As you were..
Posted 9 years ago # -
Oops, Police investigation launched after Ruth Davidson admits on air that Better Together were sampling postal votes....
Posted 9 years ago # -
I was being sarcastic
Whoosh!!! Sorry, that went straight over my head! Reading it again, yep I see it!
I keep telling myself to step away from the keyboard but I'm failing.
just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in
Posted 9 years ago # -
@Baldcyclist:
Wings Over Scotland (not on my regular reading list) has a very good and impartial account of why all the conspiracy theories are just that, and also what Ruth Davidson was talking about. Essentially, it seems to be a standard part of elections and both sides will have done the same.
Davidson spoke about it after the polls have closed, so won't have committed a crime on TV.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I don't really subscribe to any of the conspiracy theories either, I don't think the vote was rigged. I don't even particularly think sampling the postal votes would have had that much of an effect on the actual vote either.
Probably the Yes side were sampling postal votes too, but no-one has been silly enough to state publicly that they were.
From the Scotsman article (probably as fair to No as you could get as they publicly supported No):
"
POLICE have launched an investigation into allegations that Better Together agents breached election law by viewing postal votes to discover how well the No campaign was doing in the weeks before the referendum poll closed
"It seems to be the 'viewing' of postal votes which is illegal, and not whether or not you spoke about that information before or after the poll had taken place. She seems to have admitted publicly that the crime of 'viewing' votes took place.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"It seems to be the 'viewing' of postal votes which is illegal"
I don't understand why postal votes were counted in advance - apart from 'convenience'.
Surely the 'delivery envelope' should have been opened and the signature on the inner envelope checked against the postal vote request form and that envelope piled up and opened at 10pm while waiting for the ballot boxes??
I don't suppose that postals were in the same proportion as the 'on the day' ones, but it seems as though they have been used to 'hearten' one side and (perhaps) demoralise the other(??)
Posted 9 years ago # -
As I understand it, the postal votes weren't counted in advance. The signatures and forms were checked in advance, and as part of this process some of the votes were seen - not deliberately, but of course the agents on both sides would try to gauge the relative numbers of those that they did see.
The Wings Over Scotland article I mentioned above, and also the comments on it, give a pretty detailed explanation of the entire count process. From my otherwise uninformed position it all seems pretty standard and above board.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"as part of this process some of the votes were seen"
So some not properly in the inner envelope?
Couldn't be enough to judge anything(?)
Posted 9 years ago # -
From that WOS piece:
In the days running up to the 18th, there were daily postal vote opening sessions, where ballot boxes containing postal votes were opened and the contents verified. This began by counting the number of envelopes (envelope ‘B’), which were then opened to reveal the postal voting statement and a second envelope (envelope ‘A’) containing the actual ballot paper. The postal voting statements were then checked against the list of postal voters, the information checked for completeness and correctness, and then packaging them up into sealed packets.
After this, the ballot papers were removed from their ‘A’ envelopes, kept face down so no one could see the vote, the number on the ballot paper checked against the number on the envelope to make sure they matched, and then placed into the ballot box. Some final verification checks were made, then the ballot box was sealed, ready to go to the final count.
Posted 9 years ago # -
If it is true that the Electoral Commission have called in plod that's both sad and serious.
It's just more fuel to the fire of those who refuse to believe that Yes lost the vote. We can't move on until we accept that - we'll just end up as bitter old codgers wailing into our beer.
Get angry at the BBC, the Labour Party and Standard Life by all means, but accept that Yes did too much shouting into Facebook echo chambers and not enough attendance at church coffee mornings and small business forums.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"If it is true that the Electoral Commission have called in plod that's both sad and serious.
"It's probably more in response to the large number of email complaints they received than any sign of foul play. Passing it to the police shows that they are trying to investigate thoroughly.
As I said above, I've no insight into this process other than the articles I've read since the poll. It seems as if it is only "standard" electoral practice from all sides, although taking place under a highly charged atmosphere.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Good to see that the Labour Party are cutting their local leaders some slack;
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-29363922
Posted 9 years ago # -
"
@davies_trevor: Forget #indyref This more hopeful, radical, possible. And in our hands to do it now. http://t.co/3Fo3tSQErS Democracy and fairness
"
Posted 9 years ago # -
If you were going to fix an election you'd do it better than that.
It's not illegal for election agents to view postal votes or to tally what they observe when postal votes are opened for verification. It may be illegal to publish the results of those tallies in the same way that pollsters avoid publishing the votes of people who say they have already voted by post. We knew, for instance, what proportion of respondents said they had already voted by post and how they had voted but no company separately reported those results.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Regardless of whether or not there were underhand practices in the count (I don't think there were) Yes lost.
Yes lost because whilst the idea was utterly radical, the campaign was stolid (and the entire state apparatus was opposed to us). It took about two hours to turn a 'don't know' to a solid Yes, and we simply didn't have enough people willing to invest the required 400,000 man hours to gain a win by one vote. A win by one vote would have been almost as awful as losing, possibly more so.
Next time round (let's not kid ourselves) social media will need to be used to recruit and train canvassers and speakers, not as a forum for argument. Too many people thought they were campaigning when they might as well have been shouting into their own broom cupboards.
GK Chesterton suggested that the truly adventurous man jumps over his own garden fence. We'll need an army of fence jumpers.
Posted 9 years ago # -
IWRATS - the same thing could be said about cycle campaigning I think. A lot of shouting into broom cupboards. We need some more fence jumpers. Any suggestions as to the best way to recruit and deploy them welcomed
Posted 9 years ago # -
You might find this useful for understanding why people don't simply accept what seems obvious.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/03/denial-science-chris-mooney
Posted 9 years ago # -
With the SNP on what, 70,000 members, the Tories over 10,000 and the Greens on 6,000, it looks like Scottish Labour might be the fourth largest party now in terms of members.
Posted 9 years ago #
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