If you are too shallow to appreciate that the catch-all term 'social media' encompasses the most democratic means of expression and communication ever to exist, only then will you use it as a catch-all term for obnoxious expression and hateful communication.
It may be best to think of the SNP's draft manifesto not in terms of how far it is from what is required by how far it has moved towards that ideal.
Sturgeon's technique is like a magic trick. It fascinates only so long as you can't figure out how it's done. Once the mechanics of it become apparent, all you see is the machinery. You may still admire the slickly oiled machinery with all its smoothly meshing gears and silently spinning flywheels and perfectly tensioned springs. But the magic is gone. There is a sense of loss at its vanishing. But there is also a feeling of release.
If it is merely by discussing the Sturgeon inquiries that "we" are "enabling" the Tories to use those inquiries to attack devolution then presumably the theory is that the attacks would be disabled were "we" to stop discussing them. But that's not quite right, is it? Not unless the idea is that it that it is only "our" discussions that are doing the enabling rather than discussion in general of the Nicola Sturgeon affair. That hardly seems credible.
These two giants of Scottish politics divide the independence movement because each is a repository of hope. Hope is the common factor here. Desperate hope. Quite possibly delusional hope. Hope that is no more than a dully glowing ember. Hope that still burns with a bright flame. Hope for the dream that will never die - but which can all to easily be thwarted by disunity, disharmony and despair.
There being two such solidly entrenched camps it is likely that the Salmond versus Sturgeon formulation will become an established part of our political discourse for some time to come. The legends of both 'combatants' will grow as required to keep respective camp-followers on board. History may well tell a tale of current events that will be barely recognisable to those of us living through them.
I have seen numerous comments which imply - at the very least - that one or both of the current inquiries is an instrument of Alex Salmond's retribution.
The case of Alex Salmond is an exemplary instance of a smear which simply disregarded all the rules.
The same series of events. Two different and contradictory accounts. How can both be true? For the most part the events themselves are not in dispute. Some details such as dates and times may be disputed. But mostly the events are a matter of public record and accepted by both sides. The argument is over whether the events involved the kind of orchestration that would amount to a conspiracy. Alex Salmond sees that level of orchestration. Nicola Sturgeon does not.
What we don't do. What people have never even attempted whilst retaining some vestige of what we choose to regard as sanity, is to expect and demand specific constitutional and legal protection for every aspect of our psyche and our physical being.
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A blog by Iain Lawson
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