Voice in the wilderness
I know I’ve said all of this before, and more than once. But I was responding to a Facebook post in which someone was extolling the efficacy of the SNP1ALBA2 electioneering scam and thought I might as well share my response.
Unfortunately, in political campaigning, repetition is required, especially when you are one person working on the fringes as a ‘niche’ blogger. A lone voice in the wilderness of social media. You have to repeat things over and over in the hope that each time your message will reach at least one person who hasn’t heard it, and maybe even make them stop and think. Or am I fooling myself?
Alba Party is polling at around a quarter of the figure it would need to have a chance of gaining a seat. Based on the best information available, there is no reason to assume they will take even one seat. The whole SNP1ALBA2 thing was always just a scam to get votes. It has nothing whatever to do with aiding Scotland's cause.
We know this - if we take the trouble to think about it - because even if the ploy succeeds in its own terms, it inevitably fails in terms of progressing Scotland's cause. The ploy is being promoted on the basis of a simplistic arithmetic 'proof'. It takes no account of the way parliament works or politics in general.
Suppose the scam was a huge success from Alba Party's perspective, and they took three list seats. Or even six. What could they do to "push the snp on independence"? They would be sidelined by the SNP. They would be given no opportunity to speak on the matter of the constitutional issue. They would have neither power nor influence.
Even if the parliamentary arithmetic meant that the SNP required their votes, what are they going to do? Vote against what most people believe to be a pro-independence government? Threaten to bring down that nominally pro-independence government? That would be the electoral death of Alba.
The trouble is that all the nominally pro-independence parties are playing the same game. They are all using Scotland's cause as an electioneering device. There is nothing to suggest that they are even thinking in terms of a strategy for restoring independence. They are focused solely on luring voters in the hope of elected office and the rewards this brings, for both individuals and parties.
The trouble is that all the nominally pro-independence parties are playing the same game. They are all using Scotland's cause as an electioneering device.
The notion that Scotland's cause can be helped by shuffling your votes around among parties which are all equally useless is naive. As I have been telling people for what feels like decades, changing parties you vote for doesn't help unless you first force those parties to change their approach to the constitutional issue. Few listened. So, as things stand, all we can hope for out of the 2026 election is another five years wasted on top of the eleven that have already been lost.
But it gets worse! What John Swinney is proposing will severely undermine the campaign to restore Scotland's independence. He will get away with this because the vast majority of voters don't think very deeply about these matters. And because among those who do take an interest, the activists, there is so much petty tribalism and so many people putting party before cause.
It may be the politicians who are torpedoing Scotland's cause, but the independence movement is allowing them to do it.
You have to keep going Peter. If one Scot listens and understands what is happening /happened to Scotland and they share that knowledge ..it is worthwhile.
Yesterday I watched what happened to Scotland. A foreign nation ..england... gave another foreign nation ..America.... permission to land troops on OUR land...I'll say it again..OUR land. These mysterious troops then attacked another foreign nation while we were impotent to do anything about it. ...we couldn't anyway because the foreign english government didn't even bother to TELL the Scottish government what was happening in OUR land..how's that for disrespect? Our pathetic FM complained and then said that he agreed with the action taken by America.We have a real piece of excrement at the wheel. No apology from the english foreigners who run our country of course cos it's only Scotland and you can do what you like there ... the natives haven't a clue what is happening around them.
The Scottish government..or what passes for one must refuse Devolution. This is a con...it means we are impotent in certain aspects of running OUR country. Decisions like allowing foreigners to use our land for battle is DEVOLVED to the foreign english. The Bruce must be turning in his grave.
As for our political parties..they all appear to suffer from self aggrandisement...the action of promoting oneself as being powerful or important. What is a symptom?..the act of NOT LISTENING.
We have warriors in Scotland...Andy Wightman fighting for OUR land which is being used by foreigners as an investment portfolio..while we are just the peasants who get in the way. Read his blog. The rest of us must make it a HOSTILE ENVIRONMENT for the foreign english and people like Polveson who grab huge chunks of OUR land and would destroy our culture..our political will.....our very freedom.... as William said in Braveheart..('and let the english see you do it'.)
Keep going Peter..information the lifeblood of a country.
For OUR Scotland and her mushroom weans.
The practical problem for the ostensibly pro-Independence parties at the moment are two-fold:
They have no workable plan to achieve their supposed main aim and reason for being
and
According to opinion polling of voting intentions British Unionist-Nationalist (BUN) parties currently enjoy a majority in both ballots
If they sorted out the former they might find that the latter took care of itself.