Deciding the route of the number 17 bus

Wee Wullie Rennie is desperate to be noticed. When you’re the leader of a moribund party which came in fifth behind the Greens, and you only managed to get your seat at the expense of 40 odd lost deposits you must feel the need to justify your existence. There’s only so much mileage in bus timetables in Kelty after all. Now he’s upset because his role in the Remain campaign is being eclipsed by Alex Salmond, although to be honest the moon like face of Wullie could be eclipsed by a party balloon. But that’s not a nice thing to say about Tavish Scott.

Last night the Eck was speaking at a BBC debate, a debate that most people ignored because a) it’s about the whole EU referendum thang and no one in Scotland is really that interested in a Tory beauty contest when they’re all just different shades of ugly, and b) because it was a debate held by the BBC which is guaranteed to be more shouty than Ruth Davidson at Furst Meenister’s Questions. When Scotland wasn’t being patronised by the corporation, Alex Salmond stated that if the UK voted to leave the EU but Scotland voted to remain, there would be a clear justification for another independence referendum and that referendum would be held within two years. This is what got Wullie more upset than discovering that his favourite bus is to be replaced by a Lib Dem tandem, and they’d still struggle to fill the seats.

Speaking through the medium of a press release to a Scottish media that’s so desperate for some SNPbaddery that it even pays attention to Wee Wullie, the driver of Lib Dem fortunes and the number 17 bus from Cowdenbeath has demanded that Alex Salmond ought to withdraw from the Remain campaign. Not that Wullie is in a position to demand anything mind, except possibly demanding that passengers move down the bus to make room for people wanting to get on at the stop in the High Street, but that rarely stops him. Wee Wullie’s afraid that because his Eckness is warning that Scotland will hold another independence referendum if the UK votes to leave, he makes it more likely that the UK will in fact leave. Let’s explore the logic of that, because clearly in his haste to indulge himself in some SNPbadding Wee Wullie hisnae.

Scotland is the most pro-EU part of the UK according to opinion polls, by quite a considerable margin. Anyone who disputes that Scotland and England don’t have different political cultures only needs to look at the respective public attitudes in the two countries to our European neighbours. Scots are constantly decried by yoonatics for being parochial, insular, and xenophobic, but we’re far more likely to embrace the whole continental croissant café culture shtick, even though our weather is mingin.

Wullie claims to be afraid that independence supporters who otherwise want to remain in the EU would vote to leave as part of a cunning ruse to get Scotland to vote to leave too. It’s hard to see what he’s getting at there, but then this is Wee Wullie we’re talking about and any illogical and contradictory proposition will do as long as it enables a Unionist politician to score an SNPbad point. It doesn’t take a mental giant to work out that if Scots vote to leave the EU along with the rest of the UK then there wouldn’t be any justification for another independence referendum. So he’s clearly not thought that one through, which wouldn’t be the first time that Wullie hasn’t thought something through. No one has ever accused Wullie of mental gigantism, and it’s press releases like this one which are the reason why.

Alternatively, Wee Wullie is feart that Alex Salmond’s presence in the Remain campaign and his reminding voters that Scotland has a right to act in its own self-interest every bit as much as England does, will lead people in the rest of the UK to vote to leave in order to provoke another independence referendum and get rid of Scotland. Which means that Wullie wants Scotland to remain a part of a UK in which he thinks that there’s a very good chance that most people hate us. Wullie wants Scotland to play gooseberry and sit between Middle England and Nigel Farage when they want to go out on a date together to watch a movie about how horrible foreigners and Scottish people are. That might be good for Wee Wullie, as it means that the Unionist media will still pick up on his asinine press releases, but it’s pretty crappy for the rest of us because there’s no way that Nige is going to pass us the popcorn. Mind you, Wee Wullie has built an entire career on not thinking things through.

The remnants of Better Together want Scotland to forget all the promises and commitments that they made during the independence referendum. They want us to forget that they swore blind that they only way that Scotland could remain in the EU was to vote against independence, they only want us to remember the personal opinion of Alex Salmond and make it binding on an entire nation. They have no intention of making their own promises binding upon themselves. Alex Salmond reminded them of their promises on Thursday evening, and that’s what’s got Wullie’s goat.

The Unionists demand to control the narrative. They want the story to be that there’s no appetite for Scottish independence, and no obligation on the Unionists to fulfil their own commitments. They want to pretend that they won the Holyrood elections even though there is still a majority for independence in the parliament. They want to frame the EU debate as a one in which Scotland will do what Westminster tells it. They don’t want us to realise that Scotland’s hands do not have to be tied by decisions made elsewhere.

Alex Salmond has reminded them that there are other stories to tell, other paths to tread, and that what the independence referendum of 2014 really established wasn’t that Scotland has a burning desire to remain a part of the UK. What it really established is that Scotland is now the master of its own destiny. We put the Union on notice that September, no longer will Scotland passively sit in silence while Westminster makes decisions that are contrary to our interests. That’s what’s really upsetting Wee Wullie Rennie. The 17 bus to Kelty could turn out to be a bus to independence, and there’s bugger all he can do about it. He doesn’t get to determine the route.


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24 comments on “Deciding the route of the number 17 bus

  1. Lollysmum says:

    Oh very good Mr Kavanagh-never was a truer word spoken in jest. Wullie is just one huge joke!

  2. […] Wee Ginger Dug Deciding the route of the number 17 bus […]

  3. daibhidhdeux says:

    Ah, The Wullie.

    An ejaculation in his sleeping torpor (theoretically speaking).

  4. Saor Alba says:

    Wee Wullie Wimp is a total nonentity whose opinion is always worth ignoring.

  5. Ian Gould says:

    been at the bbc big debate today David Coburn was on the panel he makes wee rent a gob Rennie sound sensible

  6. John Porteous says:

    One of Wullie Rennie’s favourite rent-a-quotes is that the SNP, in seeking another independence referendum, does not respect democracy. Apart from putting his own (Westminster?) interpretation on government of the people by the people, Rennie takes hypocrisy to a whole new level when a prominent member of his own party is one Alistair Carmichael.

  7. Dan Huil says:

    Rennie is a hypocritical wee nyaff. The britnat media loves him of course. The bbc is just britnat … [whatever your favourite synonym of excrement is].

  8. mary docherty says:

    Ferr enjoyed that!!!! Noo ahm gonnie enjoy ma tea !!!

  9. Iain More says:

    Okay so it is more SNP BAAHD from the Fib Dooms and company. So now the so called Remain campaign is telling folk who can and cat campaign to stay in EU. How does that nonsense work? I personally hope that Alex Salmond is going round England telling the electorate there that if England votes for a Brexit that will trigger another Scots Indy Referendum. Maybe that is what the twa faced Yoons are really worried about, that England will see a chance to get rid of us once and for all. I can but hope!

  10. Joe Kinnear says:

    Personally I thought Alex Salmond was superficial, intellectually incoherent and politically maladroit in the ‘debate’. It really isn’t clever politics to use the tropes of “change is too risky” “the official predictions of doom from the political/media establishment are all truth with a T” and the whole “too wee. too poor, too backwards” mood music. I believe in the sovereign power of the Scottish people – not the EU commission. The EU is a dysfunctional, undemocratic and unreformable body. God only knows quite why the SNP are so uncritical of it. Equally I believe in the same for the UK (even if I want to leave the UK the sad fact is the majority of Scots do not want to).

    • hettyforindy says:

      See unbiased and factual, Wings Over Scotland article, 27th May, regards the EU.

      To be shackled to westmonster, that body that is epitome of democracy, (!) and not be in the EU hardly bares thinking about.

      If it were the case that in a fantasy land, whereby maybe even say, 45% of the UKok media were unbiased regards Scotland and the SNP, might that ‘majority’ you speak of, just switch. I guess we will never know, because UKok state run media, pumps out their own version of events, as well as outright lying to the people.

      It’s called propaganda. If we are taken out of the EU, we are basically fckd because UKok will do everything to ensure that they keep Scotland begging for crumbs. No thanks.

  11. Juteman says:

    I often see wee Wullie at Scottish Athletic events. I keep on telling my son to trip up the wee bastard, but my son refuses to look back at nobodies.

  12. Dan Huil says:

    First things first: independence from the so-called united kingdom, then we’ll decide on the EU, Nato and so on.

    • benmadigan says:

      totally agree Dan- Scotland needs to get independence, bed down its own parliament and then take stock of the pros and cons of what it means for an independent country to belong to all those various international organizations.

      Once people have the proper info to understand the advantages/disadvantages they can weigh them up and decide in a referendum

      • Jan Cowan says:

        I agree with Dan and Ben. Independence must come first.

        Superb article in “iScot” magazine, Paul. “The Union’s last hurrah”………I’m all for that.

  13. Iain says:

    Willie Rennie’s voice reminds me of the dreary old bore who used to run the Sunday school I was forced to attend as a child. It’s not only that sweetie-wifie delivery (“How are your legs today, Mrs Campbell We’ll call in later for a nice cup of tea and a scone.”), it’s the illogical brainless tripe he vomits out with such consummate ease. But then, he is a Liberal.

  14. Tinto Chiel says:

    It’s very difficult to find a Scottish politician who is as utterly irrelevant, talentless and tedious as Rennie, and that is from a very large group of Yoon possibles.

    He’s like a tiresome jack-in-the-box who pops up everywhere to shout, “SNP bad”, usually at the moon, a desperate little hypocrite without the sense to see his wee world is crumbling beneath him and who probably thinks he’ll get a seat in the HoL for being a good wee sodger for his Establishment buddies.

    The sad thing for Holy Willie is they probably can’t even remember his name.

    He’s actually beneath contempt and your consideration, Paul. And he only got elected because of tactical voting from Unionist Tories and Red Tories.

    The Libdems are now the zombie party of Scotland.

  15. Bill McDermott says:

    There is another angle on the English Nationalists voting to leave the EU because of Alex Salmond’s intervention and that is voters in Scotland so aghast at the prospect of Indyref 2 that they vote to leave the EU because not having Indyref 2 and their hatred of Salmond and all things SNP drives them in that direction.

    So how does that fit with Wullie’s avowed support for Remain? Another stoater from the Kelty boy as the UK votes out.

  16. Andimac says:

    Oor Wullie, Your Wullie, Naebody’s Wullie.

  17. Black Rab says:

    As everyone on here knows, Independence is a process and not an event. The process is positively in favour of eventual Independence. People vote where they think power is. Scotland, and it’s new parliament with the sound judgement of the SNP are displaying to the people of Scotland competence and that they are concerned only with Scottish interests. People sense this and eventually will vote on the side of the new power.

  18. Peter Hurrell says:

    IT doesn’t really make sense to say we want independence to take control of our affairs and then to say we want to be in the EU. Same applies to NATO.
    A lot of people are confusing European culture with European politics, they are not the same. Who wouldn’t embrace French food, wine, haute couture, film and cafe culture? The EU however is a completely different thing.
    The EU is a corrupt organisation that has been hijacked by a small unaccountable cabal serving the interests of global banking and business interests. It no longer serves the interests of the European people. The EU nearly started a war with Russia through its interference in Ukraine, aiding and supporting a ring wing coup, reduced Greece to enslaved penury, intends to privatise everything through TTIP. Why are we so keen to part of that?

  19. Joe Kinnear says:

    In what substantive way did Salmond boost the chances of a second IndyRef?

    And as for the big beasts of the SNP embracing the tropes of Project Fear mark 2 that is a dreadfully short-sighted piece of political opportunism. If the UK is ‘too small etc.,’ to leave the EU (an arrangement of some 40-50 years) and the change is ‘too risky’ and moreover all of the doomsday forecasts from the usual political and media establishment are the truth with a capital T then it will be mighty hard to argue in the context of an IndyRef 2 that Scotland leaving a 300 year old Union is ‘no biggy’, ‘risk free’ and so on (last time out the SNP could not even offer a moderately intellectually/politically robust answer on what money would be in people’s pockets – a fatally weak aspect of IndyRef 1).

    Secondly why do the SNP think everyone in Scotland (including independence supporters like myself) is automatically in love with the profoundly dysfunctional and undemocratic EU? (Read Peter Mair’s ‘Ruling the Void’ for more details on just how bad the EU actually is.)

    After all isn’t there polling evidence that the SNP support contains up to 30% of people for leave/Euro-sceptics? Why isn’t the membership of an independent Scotland in the EU a matter for the Scottish people in a democratic referendum or did I miss something?

    If Indyref 2 did happen is a Yes vote one for SNP land? That’s simply no very smart politics. After all everyone that is going to vote SNP now has – the independence cause has to now also appeal to people that don’t particularly like the SNP. The best argument for independence is the democratic one. Better for the SNP to say ‘yes we believe in the EU but the political direction of an independent Scotland is always in the hands of the Scottish people” – that’s the fucking key point of Scottish independence!

  20. John Edgar says:

    Wee Willie is of the opinion that,even if Scotland is taken out of the Eu against its wishes, he would be against a second referendum as it would be more “divisive” if Scotland left the UK. So Wollie Willie is against the democratic right of Scots to vote for their future. His sotto voce sub text is UK ok no matter what.
    Such is the squeek of the wee voice. Taking the argument to the logical stage. If Brexit means doom for Scotland, when you hear the remain group dahn sath and their yoonies beyond the Tweed, then we must remain in the EU even if we scotexit the UK. Woolie, wollie Willie blames AS for not being positive about the EU. It was WWW’s better together Tories and former coalition partners infighting dahn sath that has put Scotland in this position. We did not vote for CamCo. The Tories are am irrelevance along with Slab and SlibDem up here.
    The yoons excepting the Ruthite Tories will be glad to move to independence when the Tories dahn sath fight themselves to death after June 23.

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