Dis-United Kingdom General Election campaign officially kicks off

Where would the world be without the Scots?  How many important inventions have they brought to the world?  

TV being one.................

https://youtu.be/lq6NmmiSi1E

The Tories really are making a Grade A mess of this election.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/mediamonkeyblog/2015/apr/27/telegraph-tory-letter-link-business

Telegraph's Tory letter link no longer does the business
PDF that reveals letter was authored by ‘CCHQ-Admin’ mysteriously disappears from the paper’s website

This divide and conquer carp is just that.  Carp.

It is not about encouraging people to be the best that they can be, it's about not taking responsibility and useless badmouthing of others.

Have we really gone that far backwards?

As I keep saying, Lily, after some new smear or ball's-up - I have never seen an election like this before, it's just dreadful. I've seen a good few people that normally back the Tories unthinkingly wondering what on earth they are playing at, with this woeful campaign.

I mean, whose bright idea was it to have posters of Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon all over ENGLAND as part of the Tory campaign? And those woeful, lame cardboard masks? This, from the Tories, the party that thinks it is entitled to govern?

I don't know if Milliband is actually 'winning', as much as Cameron is throwing the election away.....

I suspect the English UKIP vote may be a bit higher than expected, from disgruntled Tories that can't quite bring themselves to vote Labour. It says it all that I can actually understand the UKIP manifesto - NOT agree with it, I hasten to add! - and remember some of it.

I couldn't tell you anything about what Cameron intends to do for the next five years. LibDem policy seems to be, We'll work with any party that lets us keep our official cars.

They do not deserve to be in the position of public service as far as I can make out, Bonny?

He and his chums should have thought of that last September, when at about 7am on the day after the referendum, he ripped up everything that had been promised only a few days before.

I have absolutely NO idea what world he lives in, where people go to A & E for fun.

We know she can do it.  

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3057874/Fury-new-1bn-super-hospital-Glasgow-robots-private-cinema-NHS-England-faces-difficult-year-history.html

The Mail is furious because the Scottish NHS has just opened a brand new ultra-modern hospital - paid for by Scottish taxpayers.

It doesn't seem to occur to them that if Westminster didn't keep flushing so much money down the drain, they too could have modern hospitals - built on time and under budget. Instead of continually whining at Scotland, they might like to consider the fact that most of the residents of Westminster are actually totally incompetent.

No they could never admit to that.  I mean, aren't most of them in it?   

The concept of using your limited funds wisely, and keeping an eye on budgets, never seems to occur to Westminster. And it seems to be annoying the Mail even more that this is a real, genuine Scottish NHS hospital, not one of these nightmarish, bloated, public-private creations so beloved of Westminster, which do NOTHING except create highly-paid administrators and all sorts of rip-offs for multi-nationals.

This new hospital is to replace old Victorian ones in the area, so guess what else the Scottish government did? Yes, they sold off the land and premises to developers AND PUT THE PROCEEDS INTO THE NEW HOSPITAL.

Not into some deranged vanity project, or the balance sheets of multi-nationals, or Deutsche Bank, but the NEW HOSPITAL.

Now, none of this has anything to do with any political creed - it's just sheer commonsense, and prioritising. Things Westminster seems incapable of doing.

http://wingsoverscotland.com/fury-as-new-hospital-is-too-amazing/

We can’t help but be reminded of George Foulkes’ infamous 2008 complaint that the SNP were improving public services “deliberately”, the evil fiends. The Mail seems to be genuinely upset that the Scottish Government has chosen to spend some of its fixed, deficit-free budget on a spanky new state-of-the-art hospital for the people of Glasgow rather than, we don’t know, a giant anti-immigrant laser or something.

Yes, he did say that back in 2008:

https://northbritain.wordpress.com/2008/06/20/doing-it-deliberately/

The SNP are on a very dangerous tack. What they are doing is trying to build up a situation in Scotland where the services are manifestly better than south of the border in a number of areas.”

Interviewer Colin Mackay:”Is that a bad thing?”

Lord George Foulkes: “No, but they are doing it deliberately.”!!

There you are.......being financially competent = bad.  Incompetent = good because after all, there is so much money to be made in interest payments for mega loans.  

A few people are made hugely rich.  What do the little people know about wealth?  Be fair, Bonny.

People down south should be asking how it is that, on a restricted budget, the Scottish government manages to build NHS hospitals, improve infrastructure, build new bridges, help those at the bottom and encourage businesses and enterprises.

It's nothing magical, it's nothing to do with any 'ism', it's about using a bit of common sense. Ironically, the two things always held up as 'Scottish vanity projects' - the Scottish parliament building and the Edinburgh trams - are the fault of the first LABOUR Scottish government.

SLab wouldn't use the old, classically-designed Edinburgh High School because the SNP wanted to use it. And they dreamed up the Edinburgh trams just because they could. By the time the SNP took over, Holyrood was up and running and it would have cost more to cancel the trams, than to finish the project.

And then Westminster wonders why the SNP is regarded as fairly competent by Scots voters! Of course they don't get everything right, no government ever can, but they get far more right than wrong.

Which is more than can be said for Westminster.

You have hit on the reason there, Bonny.  

It is because the people at the top down south are AFRAID of what you guys are doing.  If their plebs find out they just might demand the same from them?

IMO, that has a lot to do with it, Lily. Westminster is terrified of the SNP - and to a lesser extent, UKIP - seeing the REAL books, etc, and seeing how much money hasn't gone for the betterment of UK citizens, the encouragement of enterprise, anything.

No, it's been thrown down the drain on vanity projects, dodgy deals involving Deutsche Bank, payments to Ukraine oligarchs, etc. Not to mention all those files that have been 'lost'.

http://news.sky.com/story/1473580/miliband-in-late-night-visit-to-brands-house

Share by email
Ed Miliband was caught on camera leaving the home of Russell Brand after giving a late-night television interview.

A picture was posted on Twitter which apparently showed the Labour leader leaving the star's London home where he records his YouTube show The Trews – true news.

It initially sparked speculation Brand was going to endorse Labour after months of telling people not to vote at all.

However, a Labour party spokesman said: "Ed was doing a media interview like he often does. We look forward to it being broadcast."

The interview will appear on The Trews, which is currently running a politics week. The episode on Monday concentrated on the Liberal Democrats and a take-down of the party's record in Government.

David Cameron responded by saying he didn't "have time to hang out with Russell Brand".

Speaking during a campaign stop in Enfield, he said: "He (Brand) says don't vote, that's his whole view, don't vote, it would only encourage them or something.

"That's funny, it's funny.

"But politics and life and elections and jobs and the economy is not a joke.

"Russell Brand's a joke. Ed Miliband, hang out with Russell Brand, he's a joke."

Brand has long preached about the futility of voting saying the political system must change because it has created a "disenfranchised, disillusioned under class".

He said he had never voted and never would......etc.

What on earth is Milliband thinking out? If this 'interview' isn't a real stunner, he's just made a complete tw@t of himself, getting involved with that unwashed egotist.

What was Miliband thinking?

If it's a really spectacular interview, in which Milliband explains his politics, philosophy, plans for the future, indeed, the meaning of life itself, it might be worth the risk.

Unfortunately, I fear it is going to be Millipede trying to be Cool, sucking up to the unwashed one, in an excruciating effort to appeal to the Yoof vote.

Mind you, he and Brand have at least one thing in common.

They're both millionaires.

Oh Lord, what a dreadful photo!

Incidentally, it is becoming clear that the wheels have come off Cameron's Austerity wagon. He's taken it so far, the economy is contracting everywhere except the City of London, and if whoever is PM next, doesn't get a grip, the economy is liable to go into a downward spiral.

His failure to keep a balance between the grip of austerity, and the dangers of rampant Keynesian may be about to cause a disaster.

I shudder to think what the London establishment is going to throw at her in the last week of the campaign.

You know what though, Bonny, whatever they do she will weather it with her head raised.

http://news.stv.tv/scotland-decides/318815-stvipsos-mori-poll-snp-set-to-win-all-scots-seats-at-general-election/

STV poll: SNP on course to win EVERY Scottish seat at general election
By Alastair Brian
29 April 2015 09:24 BST



The SNP is on course to take every seat in Scotland at the general election, according to the latest STV News poll.

A survey on voter intention showed 54% are set to back Nicola Sturgeon's party on May 7, up two points since January.

Based on the findings of the latest poll conducted by Ipsos-MORI , the Electoral Calculus website suggests that the SNP could win all 59 Scottish seats up for grabs. Other electoral calculators project Labour and the Liberal Democrats saving one seat each.

The SNP has increased their lead over Labour to 34 points in the survey. Jim Murphy's party could face electoral wipeout north of the border, with their vote down four points to only 20%.

More at link.

I won't believe this until the results are in a week on Friday. I keep thinking it's all some bizarre scheme, so if the SNP 'only' win 40 seats, the London media will spin it as a 'crushing defeat'.