Today's that date....18th September....

18^th September …yes, today’s that date……

And I thought we’d be into some serious stuff, you know, meaningful politics.

I thought the silly season was officially over. Wrong! 

We have the Lib Dem Conference gracing us here in Scotland http://www.politics.co.uk/    

Was that a deliberate tactic on their part to detract from ‘the -one -year -to -go -before -the -referendum –debate- and –try- and -grab –some- headlines?’

Or was it a deliberate tactic to be in Scotland and in the limelight generated today, 18^th September: the limelight that might just have otherwise over - looked them?

Who knows with the flip-flopping Lib Dems. 

But here I was, thinking a party conference would be previewing headliner policies. 

But no.  I heard about plastic bags and the cost of skool uniforms, before they got to …what else?

Mixed messages from Cable & Alexander?

Or that  it would have been worse if they hadn’t been holding the Tories back and in check!   

Surely that isn’t going to be their main manifesto message over the next two years.  Might not be the message, but it will be the mantra!

But, back to Glasgow.

Now we all know that Glasgow’s a great place: yes, I’m from Edinburgh and you can quote me on that. I’ll be there this week and next week. Apart from all the really good things in Glasgow, they’ve got great UK transport links. Why else do you think it was chosen by the Lib Dems? Excluding some additional pr due this being THAT DATE!

Was it to rally their troops? What troops? 

Have you seen the tv coverage with empty seats, rather like the ghost of Olympics just passed?

Was it to tell us we’re better together? Well, in their estimation we are, shackled to the Tory’s ideological policies that are being pushed through with Lib Dem support.

No one would deny that welfare reform is required since every system, every process requires to be monitored and changed positively when change is positively required, but delivered as a political party piece is another matter altogether.

But within this particular party conference and yes, their bed fellow’s future event, where will we hear direct reference to, and acknowledgement of the rise and rise in people across the UK accessing food banks?

Quote…. The Trussell Trust, which runs the UK’s biggest network of food banks, however, told TFN it has seen a sharp increase in people coming to food banks since April this year, including a large number referred by the Scottish Welfare Fundhttp://www.thirdforcenews.org.uk

The same article did include a message from the Scottish Government…quote…. 

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said “Local authorities may award food vouchers or food if that is the right option for the applicant. The cost of in kind support in the form of food or food vouchers should be deducted from the Scottish Welfare Fund budget in order not to place pressure on third sector food banks.”

No one would be foolish enough to claim that food banks are new, springing up just yesterday. http://www.trusselltrust.org/ . 

But their expansion, use and need for has to be a cause for concern. 

In turn, that depends on your party’s ethical and moral stance. 

Remember Gove? OK, it’s true, I’d prefer to forget him, but since I can’t, let me share the agony of remembering….

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/ 10^th September 2013

Quote: Criticism: Education Secretary Michael Gove said some families make the wrong decisions and get into financial trouble

Families become so poor they are forced to turn to food banks because of their own ‘decisions’, Michael Gove has claimed.

Now it has to be bad when the Daily Mail is on your case!

But is this UK and Scotland we want or deserve? 

Harsher penalties/jail sentences announced this week for welfare cheats along side tax breaks for some: the big some, the multi nationals, with bug sums to save, or hide, or remove from the UK altogether.

And what about those of us actually living here in Scotland, working here, paying our taxes here? Are we playing our part or letting it wash all over us? let's hope not!

Which means then today’s date is really significant…18^th September 2013…with one year to go for our referendum.

Will we have heard enough to make up our minds? Something tells me that we might even have overload before the year is up!

How big a role will social media play this time round? Let’s find out by being engaged.

What of the role of the younger voters this time for the first time? Talk to them, not at them, and listen to them!

And will the run up to the 2015 elections mean we hear from the 3 main parties about how they plan to devolve more powers to Scotland if we stay within the Union?  If they want us to vote for them, let’s hear from them!

And if the Yes Campaign truly believe in what they say they believe in, it’s up to them to convince us!

So whatever our views and thoughts, surely it’s our future here in Scotland to be decided by us as we vote in Scotland.

We really have to be involved between now and then…..a year from today…

THAT DATE!!

What have I missed?

7^th September 2013,

With autumn seeping slowly into Edinburgh, the holidays done and summer over. Must be, since I seem to have acquired an outer garment, commonly called a jacket!



But what have I missed? Senator McCain cosying up with President Obama? Strange bedfellows, surely. But then, needs must might be their thinking.



But must we, bomb & therefore kill more Syrians that is? There’s bound to be…what is that euphemism? Got it: collateral damage. So why should we?



In the belief that it will stop Syrians from killing (more) Syrians? Very easy for me to ask, and decry intervention as proposed, as I sit here comfortable, expecting to be safe and fairly secure…if I don’t worry about the rise in the cost of living, food price increases, winter looming and fuel prices escalating…yes, minor worries in comparison to Syria.



Does force need to be met by force? Do we need to cosy up with Al Q’aeda? It’s taken us how long to come to terms with the situation in Afghanistan that demonstrates we are now required to dialogue with the Taliban and their ‘supporters’.



Because whatever we know, don’t know, don’t want to know, Al Qeda is there, in Syria, operating in what is in effect, a civil war. So the question has to be: should we be there? And if not there with boots on the ground, though admittedly, that was never part of the proposition, then there, Syria actively supporting airstrikes?

Is that the only action? The best action? Why active, military intervention? Is it to demonstrate our moral outrage and commitment to the outlawing of chemical warfare? So who’s selling it?



Is there no other way of supporting victims, or engaging with protagonists in an effort to reduce death & destruction with a view to some form of cease fire and peace building after that?



Why was it so important after the Commons defeat for there to be warnings from our prophets of doom, informing us that our special relationship was over, and that our influence on the world stage was greatly diminished?

This wasn’t about us, remember, but about the victims on all sides; it’s about death & destruction; it’s about a civil war in another country.

Are we so immature that we’re put out when the door closes on the war boys talking their war toys and we’re not in there, too?

Are we so fragile that we worry when we see the French…yes, the French…talking to the Americans at top table level and we’re not there? Sacre bleu!

And what good will that do Hollande? Does Hollande want to morph into a Blair-et? Does he believe that such a stance of co operation and involvement will convince a sceptical electorate come the next election that French socialists are strong, determined, and most definitely not wishy washy lefty anti war mongers, anti American?

After all, isn’t that what happened here? Wasn’t that part of the fiasco that we saw unfold, leading to our involvement in the war in Iraq, w m d, (or rather the lack of)? In time for the next general election in the UK, post the invasion of Iraq, didn’t Blair want to be seen as everything other than anti American, anti-war? Didn’t he want to be up there on the world stage?

Et tu, Hollande?


So where are the internal refuges in Syria in all of this?

The displaced persons within their own country? And then the hundreds and thousands who have swept over into neighbouring countries as refugees? And will our posturing help them?

If it is our chosen lot not to be part of military strikes, thanks to the democratic process of the UK government, then let further processes of humanitarian support and aid to the desperate people of Syria be the first priority, carried out along with every possible diplomatic move to bring about a cease fire that moves into a peaceful future for Syria and its people.
Now that's something I could believe in and hope that my MP would vote for too.

http://www.mccain.senate.gov http://www.mccain.senate.gov

Syria crisis: al-Qaeda seizes village that still speaks the ancient language of Christ reported in the Daily telegraph

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/10289944/Syria-crisis-al-Qaeda-seizes-village-that-still-speaks-the-ancient-language-of-Christ.html

US and allies further isolated on Syria after French President Francois Hollande waits on UN report
Read more: http://www.news.com.au/world-news/middle-east/two-russian-warships-head-to-syrias-coast-as-us-plan-airstrikes/story-fnh81ifq-1226713572023#ixzz2eEDNsw5y 

http://www.news.com.au/world-news/middle-east/two-russian-warships-head-to-syrias-coast-as-us-plan-airstrikes/story-fnh81ifq-1226713572023#ixzz2eE6kBD4G