Scottish independence: Ed Miliband turns up the heat on ‘Tartan Tory’ Alex Salmond accusing him of the Thatcher tactics of greedy, self serving, selfish and divisive politics, ‘Salmondism’ is the illiterate bastard of ‘Thatcherism’

Dear All

You can’t have failed to notice that for some time I have been highlighting that the Scottish National Party is run a self serving clique.

These people aren’t interested in anything other than power and personal gain.

Surprise surprise, up pops Ed Miliband turn up the heat in the debate over independence with a highly personal attack on SNP leader Alex Salmond.

So, what is Ed saying?

He accused Salmond of being “self-serving and selfish”.

Funnily enough, I am told that my blog is read by the Labour Party and that comments that I have made have been the same line taken by Labour at FMQ’s on occasion.

Ed Miliband is right, Alex Salmond is “self-serving and selfish”; his politics are the politics of grudge, grievance and malcontent coupled with opportunism.

Because Scots hate Tories, Salmond banks on the ghost of past Tory misdeeds to sell his independence dream.

He doesn’t have any substance to his case, because he couldn’t be bothered to make his case.

Hating Tories isn’t a reason for independence.

Miliband is also right to draw comparisons between the SNP and the Tories.

Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon are Tartan Tories, while Ruth Davidson is a Scottish Tory, however, she can at least claim to be left of Salmond’s right wing government.

Salmond promotes a “divisive politics”, an uneducated brand called Salmondism which has echos of the same way that Margaret Thatcher did in the 1980s.

It’s me, me, me, Salmond is a true product of the Thatcher way, he is a fake, but a fake who has ran out of time.

Scottish independence is dead, people are turning their back on the SNP, and the Yes Scotland campaign which is seen as an SNP front is ineffectual.

Yesterday, Edinburgh Napier University students voted 70.5% No to independence.

Support has collapsed among the highly educated and those at the bottom of society.

Salmond has no friends to draw support from, that could explain why the SNP members keep making up phoney little organizations with others to try and appear there is a groundswell. 

There is no groundswell.

If you do the research, it is the same people doing this, without the ‘smarts’ to cover their trail.

In firing a broadside, Miliband saved his strongest criticism for the First Minister, saying:

“What about Alex Salmond? While we sketch a plan for our economic future, he spends his time drawing a line through the country. It’s the same divisive politics that we’ve seen from the Conservatives, just for a different end. He divides between the people of Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom. A narrow nationalism that somehow believes we’re stronger apart than together. That is so obsessed with driving us apart, that it has no focus on the issues that really shape people’s lives”.

He added:

“What did he say about Lady Thatcher’s legacy? That she helped to deliver a Scottish Parliament. Well I’ve got a message for him. Margaret Thatcher didn’t make the case for a Scottish Parliament. The Labour Party and the people of Scotland did. And Margaret Thatcher didn’t deliver a Scottish Parliament – a Labour government working with the people of Scotland did. His is a narrow nationalism that thinks the way Scotland prospers is in a race to the bottom across the UK, cutting corporation tax rates for powerful companies while doing nothing for working people. And a narrow nationalism that says if it is in the interest of the SNP then it is OK to do cosy deals with Rupert Murdoch”.

There is a race to the bottom and it is who will take over the leadership once Salmond is defeated.

Scotland’s unpopular Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon doesn’t have gravitas, personality and as we have seen leaves ordinary working class people in the lurch.

She is poison.

But to return to Ed, he continues by saying of the Salmond brand:

“A narrow nationalism that prays for Tory success so that he can convince people that the only way to get rid of the Tories is to get out of the UK. Praying for Tory success: have you ever heard such a self-serving, selfish, narrow-minded, blinkered, in-it-for-yourself, divide-and-rule piece of nonsense?”

Today is 516 days to the political death of Alex Salmond at the ballot box, the humiliating end of a life spent fighting to charge up his cash flow.

Augars well for the political death, then he can piss off back to his hovel up north!

Yours sincerely

George Laird

The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University