When Crown Counsel at the Murrell case said the £400,000 was "principally" donations and members' fees it wasn't because it may have included public money, but because party accounts at the time included £107,000 Murrell himself had loaned to the SNP.
The BritNat media is deliberately misrepresenting the Crown Counsel's words to imply Murrell may have embezzled *public* money. The reason the BritNats are doing this is because Westminster has no legal locus to hold an inquiry into Murrell *unless* his crime involves public money.
We are witnessing a massive journalistic and political fraud being perpetrated in plain sight. Any inquiry held by Westminster will cost sums of money considerably greater than the sum Murrell stole from the SNP ... and this time it *will* be public money. How ironic is that?
The Radio BritNat phone-in for the third day in a row is projecting a situation in England onto Scotland. This time it's a pro-Israel propaganda announcement by the UK Labour Govt. This is how your TV licence cash is being spent. Can we have an investigation into BBC Scotland?
The pro-Union media in Scotland won't change. Newspapers, deserted by Yessers, are scrabbling for the BritNat coin. The BBC *can't* change because its job is to protect the Union.
Scottish political journalism has, to all intents and purposes, ceased to exist and isn't coming back. What we have is the equivalent of toilet graffiti. Slurs, threats, smears and abuse scrawled, not on cubicle doors, but on autocues and newspaper pages.
People don't seem to realise that BBC Scotland isn't just biased, it also knowingly circulates untruths. The station is currently pushing a falsehood that Murrell may have embezzled public cash. So-called short money. SNP short money has been accounted for. Westminster rules are very rigid on this. There is, as things stand, no suggestion Murrell embezzled anything other than money raised by or donated to the SNP.
You can sense the smear campaign against Nicola Sturgeon already running out of steam because it lacks substance. Demands for an inquiry will replace it, but that too will eventually run out of steam due to it being an expensive and worthless stunt. Who's been damaged? The media.
What we've witnessed these last few days is an exhibition of what loathing does to people. The witch hunt against Nicola Sturgeon goes beyond mere political difference.
Those who've taken part in it and indulged it couldn't handle the fact she was cleared. We recall their abject disappointment when it was formally announced. Joanna Cherry's angry insistence that the former FM wasn't cleared, she was only not prosecuted, was embarrassing. It was indicative of a seething bitterness that encompasses almost the entire media.
Swinney's remarkable victory in the Holyrood election added to their frustration. Murrell's admission of guilt denied them their last hope which was a lengthy trial with dirty laundry aired. They craved Sturgeon in the witness box. That's why they exploded in an orgy of smear, innuendo and yes, misogyny.
They could never beat her. She won every election she led the party into. She left on her own terms. They hate that about her and they know they can't do anything about it.
We wonder how many people have been turned off of the Scottish media due to hysteria this month? Hysteria over a penalty at Fir Park dominated the news for days. Then more hysteria over a pitch invasion. Both of those now dwarfed by a hysterical smear campaign against Nicola Sturgeon.
Folk tune in for news and get tabloid junk merchants ranting at them like stall holders at a cheap bazaar. Are there no sober heads anymore? Is this the future of the Scottish media? Hounding people until bored then hounding other people? Baying mob after baying mob?
Sadly it looks like it.
The only route to an Indyref that the UK Govt will formally concede will be a single party majority in a Holyrood election. They will likely try to add spoiler conditions such as minimum voter turnout, similar to the notorious '40% rule' that delayed Holyrood for 20 years. Swinney will accept the former and reject the latter.
The size of the win for Plaid shocked the BritNat establishment. Three strong Celtic led administrations are a considerable political force. London can't resist such an alliance. The end of the Union is now a certainty.
Glenn Campbell's analysis of the Swinney/Starmer meeting on BritNat Breakfast this morning was predictably poor. He said Swinney maybe hasn't got as much as he thinks. Swinney has got *exactly* what he wanted. The constitution will be raised by the FM. It'll dominate coverage of the talks.
One of the things that we've noticed with respect to Scottish political journalism is the very poor analysis from senior reporters. They never saw Scottish Labour's capitulation until the final days despite social media predicting it immediately after Starmer's 2024 landslide. We said last September Sarwar was cooked and Starmer would be gone within a year.
Campbell's analysis has been dreadful in recent years. He foolishly claimed Rachel Reeves' first budget in Oct 2024 was going to define the 2026 Holyrood election and help Sarwar, despite nobody knowing how it was going to pan out and there being another budget scheduled for 2025.
Paul Hutcheon was still punting the idea of a FM Sarwar in the middle of the Holyrood campaign despite the motormouth being well behind. Gina Davidson of LBC laughably concluded pre-vote that a 62 seat victory would be a poor result for Swinney.
A pro-Union culture runs through the Scottish political media and renders it unable to see the truth. A desire to please their paymasters leads to group-think and bizarre conclusions/analysis that makes them look foolish.
Two manifesto commitments Swinney made prior to the election will discomfit the UK Labour Govt due to their overlap into the constitution. The 'essential items' price cap in supermarkets and the call for energy to be devolved. The Scottish public will back both if it means lower bills.
Starmer, or whoever replaces him, will find it difficult to refuse the first despite the UK Internal Market. Food prices are going to skyrocket this year. Labour will absolutely refuse the second.
It's going to be interesting watching this play out and the impact it will have on support for independence. It's also going to be interesting watching how Sarwar and Labour's Westminster House Jocks react.
Yessers need to encourage family & friends who might be politically indifferent to vote. These are the people who'd likely opt for the SNP or Greens if unsure. The attempt by the BBC to suppress Scottish voter turnout is aimed at these people. More voters helps Indy.
#BothVotesSNP
BBC Scotland is actively trying to suppress turnout as we enter the final days of the Holyrood campaign. Presenters and reporters are insisting the public has switched off, is scunnered, bored or fed up. This morning it was even suggested not voting was a positive thing to do.
At the same time it's started pushing Reform friendly narratives in a move designed to agitate the party's voting bloc. Asylum seekers jumping the housing queue and too many young Scots going to university are just two such issues being pushed by the station. Offord's profile is being raised at the same time.
They know the SNP is going to win this election. The BBC will do all it can to make the margin of victory as small as it can.
The reason given by Trump for the removal of whisky tariffs - namely the trade in bourbon casks - is exactly the argument used by John Swinney when he visited Trump last September. Angus Robertson made this clear in an interview with a churlish Laura Maxwell at the time. Maxwell was so annoyed she actually tried to attack minimum unit pricing. Maxwell's show, like Trump's tariffs, was eventually canned.
Swinney's visit was a hugely significant factor in Trump's decision. Make no mistake about that. The BritNat media will either ignore its significance or play it down.
We firmly believe BBC influence in Scotland is on the wane and nowhere near what it was at the last Holyrood election. There's a definite sense of frustration and desperation from some presenters and reporters that we haven't seen before.
James Cook, Glenn Campbell, Fiona Stalker, Gary Robertson, Lynsey Bews and Kirsten Campbell are the worst. Laura Maxwell has eased off a bit since Good Morning Scotland was canned.
The news agenda is very clearly biased with censorship and suppression rife, suggesting widespread corruption at the very top. The station's News & Current Affairs department is designed to sway, not inform, the ignorant, poorly informed and unsophisticated.
Social media is killing it. The more folk find out the truth the worse it gets for the station. Facts are its enemy.
Within five years it will have zero influence in Scottish elections.
When Anas Sarwar's FM hopes go up in smoke next month, as they surely will, folk will wonder how someone with the whole media behind him for four years could fail so utterly.
Here's why ...
The SNP was dead and buried after Nicola Sturgeon resigned. Branchform and naïve political decisions had made sure of it. This is where Sarwar started to go wrong.
Instead of crafting an image of himself as statesmanlike, accepting humility and willing to compromise, he became over-confident and began to gloat. He mistook the fawning behaviour of the anti-SNP media for public approval ... which he had yet to earn.
Hubris took hold and with it a preponderance for smearing and arrogance. Bad decisions and scandals were glossed over by a friendly media. Gaffs and blunders suppressed. The impunity meant he never learned.
Believing he could do no wrong and was destined to become FM, he grew rude and boorish when pressed on awkward issues. He aligned himself to Starmer for no good reason and became a hostage to fortune.
The SNP was always going to recover. Sarwar however wasn't prepared. He has squandered years as he played FM in waiting to a friendly BritNat media who craved such a scenario.
Look at Sarwar now. No principles. No policies. No dignity. An approval rating of minus twenty nine and falling. A legacy of gloating, smearing and lying.
He was never FM material. Unfortunately for him, the public know it now.
The UK Labour Govt has moved from simply favouring England to actively sabotaging Scotland. The blocking of the £1.5bn China turbine investment is just the latest example. It's OK for China to have a stake in the Hinckley nuclear power plant and a mega-embassy in London but not OK to invest in Scottish renewables.
The problem is exacerbated by having political parties and a broadcaster that are just English branches tagged 'Scottish' which means the decision isn't getting the condemnation or coverage it deserves. London kicks Scotland and these branches polish its boots.
Sarwar's QEU hospital smears are a perfect illustration of the corrupt way BBC Scotland reports 'news'. All it required for the smears to be circulated was for Sarwar to repeat them. No evidence was required.
You see this pattern repeat again and again on BBC Scotland. The Hate Crime Bill was going to cause the police to go into meltdown. It never happened. The recent claim of a mass exodus of junior doctors to Australia will also never happen.
The station isn't a news provider, it's a narrative creator. It circulates political messages.
Around three years ago this account believed that BBC Scotland was winning the war against the SNP. Nicola Sturgeon had just resigned as FM. The BritNat media was feasting on a dripping roast that was Branchform garnished with gender war sauce.
The Deposit Return Scheme and the new Hate Crime Law were being successfully demonised. Things looked bleak.
Fast forward to today and its the BBC that looks tired and lost. Kaye Adams has been dumped and Good Morning Scotland canned. Over half of the Scottish public don't trust the station. Its favoured Unionist Sarwar is a busted flush. Years of investment in the motor mouth down the drain.
Our gut feeling now is that the BBC is slowly dying in Scotland. It's weaker than it has ever been and showing no sign of recovery. An SNP majority in May has gone from 100/1 against to 6/4 against. The weaker the BBC gets the more likely an SNP majority and of course ... independence.