mistercrayon wrote:

Are you agreeing with griff? Increasingly probable feels so caveated that it’s hard to say it’s wrong in the context that two weeks ago I’m sure we would have said her exit was much less likely.

This, Rouj has an unconscious bias toward things certain people write. Probability has increased IMO.

Your one dimensional narrative is tiresome and lacking in nuance. I get where you are coming from but your continual adversarial stance makes it undesirable to engage with you in any meaningful way.

I have a very conscious bias against Salmond for being an odious shit of a man. As venal, corrupt and self-promoting as the worst of the Westminster politicians. Whatever gets dragged out by the press, Conservatives, and others with their knives out for Sturgeon please let’s all remember that the background of this is a man wriggling out of sexual misconduct accusations on technicalities. His own defence lawyer has admitted that he’s very much guilty of inappropriate behaviour towards women in and out of the workplace, but claimed that the evidence wasn’t there for a criminal case.

Salmond is a slimy man guilty of sexual misconduct in the workplace, yet our UK gov are saying a woman should resign because of it. Absolute state of this island, eh?

Thank you. I have been going a few times a week, actually.

Sorry that my one dimensional narrative of trying to put conservatism in the bin so we can have a more progressive society that treats the public with some respect is so tiresome for you, Griff.

You can brush it off and pretend like you would engage if only I wasn't so adversarial, but I don't understand how you expect people to not be somewhat adversarial to a political ideology that thinks an artificially exploitative societal structure is beneficial, or that has been directly responsible for people taking their own lives when the help they need is actively not provided to them, or they are made to feel completely othered just for being who they are.

I put it to you, that you do not want to engage and enlighten us all with some reasons why conservative political values are beneficial, or even reasons why people should not be so adversarial towards conservatives is because you benefit from these values in some way, and are okay with that coming at the expense of other people.

Also, you are still doing a bad job of explaining how you saying the likelihood of sturgeon leaving increasing is somehow different from saying her position is becoming increasingly untenable. Because she will only leave her post as a result of being found to break the ministerial code, making her position untenable. It's also hilarious that you are continuing to pivot back to a minor semantic issue instead of addressing the question that was asked, which was what do you think has made it increasingly likely she is going to go? You still haven't answered that by the way, you just said you read the guardian list of what is known and left it at that, you didn't say which item on that list now made it more likely she was going to have to go, compared to what was known yesterday, and so far only the scottish conservatives have called for her to go. Labour are saying she has serious questions to answer and the greens are saying they are going to let the panel do their job.

Saying something her “leaving is increasingly probable” is literally different to saying it’s “increasingly tenable”.

If I were to talk about my job for example I’d say the first statement could apply to the anything up to a couple of years in the future and the latter only if it was within a couple of weeks.

mistercrayon wrote:

Saying something her “leaving is increasingly probable” is literally different to saying it’s “increasingly tenable”. If I were to talk about my job for example I’d say the first statement could apply to the anything up to a couple of years in the future and the latter only if it was within a couple of weeks.

Right I'm going to make this easy for everyone. 

Griff said:

"Looks like sturgeon's exit is increasingly probable."

Sturgeon will only exit if she is found to have broken the ministerial code OR if a successful no confidence motion is brought. Both of those outcomes are that she leaves because her position as first minister is no longer tenable.

So in this case, saying her exit is increasingly probable is the same as saying her position is increasingly untenable.

I_R wrote:

monkey wrote:

I don’t know if I understand this. They were sexual misconduct allegations against Salmond. Sturgeon found out about them ahead of when she said she did. There was a probe that was botched because of erm reasons. Sturgeon pushed ahead with pursuing a criminal trial she was unlikely to win. (I’m presuming, with this last bit, that Sturgeon’s MO was to avoid any hint of her ‘covering up’ her predecessors behaviour, which would have certainly followed if the govt had decided to drop the case). Salmond gets off. Salmond thinks it’s all about him and goes on the warpath, damaging the leadership of the movement he’s been involved in for decades. Is that right?

Sturgeon didn't have anything to do with the criminal trial. The Scottish Government came up with a new complaints procedure to deal with the Salmond situation retrospectively and then failed to follow that procedure.

Ah ok. Cheers.

Roujin wrote:

Sorry that my one dimensional narrative of trying to put conservatism in the bin so we can have a more progressive society that treats the public with some respect is so tiresome for you, Griff.

You can brush it off and pretend like you would engage if only I wasn't so adversarial, but I don't understand how you expect people to not be somewhat adversarial to a political ideology that thinks an artificially exploitative societal structure is beneficial, or that has been directly responsible for people taking their own lives when the help they need is actively not provided to them, or they are made to feel completely othered just for being who they are.

I put it to you, that you do not want to engage and enlighten us all with some reasons why conservative political values are beneficial, or even reasons why people should not be so adversarial towards conservatives is because you benefit from these values in some way, and are okay with that coming at the expense of other people.

Also, you are still doing a bad job of explaining how you saying the likelihood of sturgeon leaving increasing is somehow different from saying her position is becoming increasingly untenable. Because she will only leave her post as a result of being found to break the ministerial code, making her position untenable. It's also hilarious that you are continuing to pivot back to a minor semantic issue instead of addressing the question that was asked, which was what do you think has made it increasingly likely she is going to go? You still haven't answered that by the way, you just said you read the guardian list of what is known and left it at that, you didn't say which item on that list now made it more likely she was going to have to go, compared to what was known yesterday, and so far only the scottish conservatives have called for her to go. Labour are saying she has serious questions to answer and the greens are saying they are going to let the panel do their job.

No need to apologise Rouj. In answer to your question, I had not paid much attention the situation. Upon reading the Guardian articles (and, yes, the responses from Labour and the Greens) I concluded that there was some substance to the accusations of misconduct. For me this moved the situation of her going (by whatever manner) from zero, to not zero.

You can harp on about conservatism, and cunts ad nauseum, it doesn't really matter to me. I think part of the problem in this day and age is the partisan cancer of political debate (arising from the political system no doubt but also identity politics and group think). I don't believe everything is so clear cut and simple. I mean it works for lots of people in a different arena, and by that I mean religion. There a perfectly reasonable elements to conservatism, as there are liberalism. Universal basic income? Absolutely. Free education, yes please. Free health care, of course. Benefits for those who find themselves unemployed or too ill to work, yes. Minimum living wage, yup. Scaled taxation, yes. Commoditising of housing and utilities for profit, fuck no. Free market, yes. Owning what you produce or contribute to, yes. Billionaires dictating charitable donations... hmm not really. Bloated middle management in local authorities and government, no thanks. Internet companies funnelling profits through low tax jurisdictions, no. Functioning banking system, yes. Equality of opportunity, yes. Freedom of speech, yes.

I am waffling now.

Hang on. Something is either untenable (cannot be held) or tenable (can be held). Something cannot be increasingly binary can it?

Also amusing as this is it's hardly the most important feature of this kerfuffle is it?

Sturgeon, her husband, and her mates / supporters and some of the civil service, appear to have fucked up. If that fuck up amounts to breaking the ministerial code (or indeed, the law) then Sturgeon absolutely should resign, taking care to pass the baton on to someone who can unify the SNP and continue to drive independence.

Whataboutism is a bad look. We need to have greater faith in our politicians, not less, and copying the worst of them is not going to achieve that.

So far, her defence is weak ("not hiding anything", "nothing relevant withheld" [emphasis mine]). Hopefully she can fight Salmond's strong evidence with similar, but right now it's looking bleak in my view.

Dunno but that feels like a different question. FWIW, and I'm sure he doesn't need or want me defending him, I hardly think Patel has Griff's high opinion

Yeah I'm not meaning to say she can/should stay. But I'm angry at the bullshit political world we live in where others can do far worse shit and merrily get away with it. You can frame that as whataboutism of you wish - and to done extent it surely is - but it's still a fundamental undermining of democracy.

TBF Sturgeon, I don't think, would ever rely on such a "defence". She needs to explain the earlier meeting, she needs to explain or deny the leaks convincingly, and that's about it.

She's already acknowledged the new policy was crap and needed changing.

She doesn't, in my view, need to seriously challenge the "conspiracy" crap - it's a nice story Alex, but you're a cunt, and having legal troubles and abandoned political friends due to your cuntery doesn't amount to a conspiracy, it just means everyone hates you.

And she doesn't need to massively defend going against the legal advice and continuing the case. That shit happens all the time, it's law, maybe this counsel said "give it up" but that may have felt like a betrayal of the victims.

So: explain the meeting and the leak convincingly and I think she's OK. Otherwise, she's on very thin ice I reckon.

Roujin wrote:

mistercrayon wrote:

. I think that makes it “increasingly probable” note - not actually “probable” though.

I'm confused. 

As you point out "increasingly probable" does not mean "probable", I agree with you. 

And when I said "increasingly untenable", I did not mean "untenable".

So how is using the term "increasingly untenable", not the same as "increasingly probable" in regard to Sturgeon's chances of not being in her post after this inquiry?

Ok, Rouj, you did change it from untenable, to increasingly untenable. Which for me means not able to be maintained or defended against attack or objection. Which I think is a little strong.

Lord_Griff wrote:

No need to apologise Rouj. In answer to your question, I had not paid much attention the situation. Upon reading the Guardian articles (and, yes, the responses from Labour and the Greens) I concluded that there was some substance to the accusations of misconduct. For me this moved the situation of her going (by whatever manner) from zero, to not zero. You can harp on about conservatism, and cunts ad nauseum, it doesn't really matter to me. I think part of the problem in the day and age is the partisan cancer of political debate (arising from the political system no doubt but also identity politics and group think). I don't believe everything is so clear cut and simple. I mean it works for lots of people in a different arena, and by that I mean religion. There a perfectly reasonable elements to conservatism, as there are liberalism. Universal basic income? Absolutely. Free education, yes please. Free health care, of course. Benefits for those who find themselves unemployed or too ill to work, yes. Minimum living wage, yup. Scaled taxation, yes. Commoditising of housing and utilities for profit, fuck no. Free market, yes. Owning what you produce or contribute to, yes. Billionaires dictating charitable donations... hmm not really. Bloated middle management in local authorities and government, no thanks. Internet companies funnelling profits through low tax jurisdictions, no. Functioning banking system, yes. Equality of opportunity, yes. Freedom of speech, yes. I am waffling now.

Thanks for the input. Re the Sturgeon stuff, that's cool, I'm just wary that calls for Sturgeon to go have only come from one particular party so far, a party that would benefit greatly if the SNP and the independence issue went away before the elections in a couple of months. So I would take with a huge pinch of salt the timing of the release of information and the coverage the day before Sturgeon is due to give evidence in the inquiry, or at least I wouldn't just rip one line judgements off the cuff in a case like this before considering who are the people who want Sturgeon to go. 

Do you ever wonder what it is that has caused the rise in increasingly partisan positions being taken by people politically? Has the amount of vocal opposition to conservatism and capitalism been increasing as the gap in equality between the people at the top of society and the people at the bottom has widened continuously for decades got anything to do with it? 

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you wrote, but in the list of things you are for or against, there is almost nothing conservative in there other than being against bloated local authorities and government (which I would say is opposed by pretty much everybody, nobody wants a wasteful government, even if they want the government to have a larger presence and involvement in running public services than they do now) and being for the free market. It's curious, because UBI, NHS, benefits, minimum wage, proportional taxation, decommodification of essential markets, owning your own labour, ending offshore tax havens, egalitarianism and freedom of speech are not conservative ideologies. It's curious, because you said there are perfectly reasonable elements to consveratism, but have listed almost none. 

If what you wrote are the first things that came to you in terms of policy directions you like, it's weird that you would defend conservatism at all, because you pretty much just listed left wing political ideas. Unless you're just trying to do a bit of devils advocacy and you're taking a stand against people having strong opposition to things they don't agree with and are demonstrably harmful to the majority, on the basis that all discourse should aim to be kept civil or else it becomes unproductive?