Project Fear becomes Project Hate

Alex Salmond, First Minister of Scotland
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I sense a new theme oozing out of Project Fear. Or, rather, a redoubled effort on an old theme. The campaign to deny Scotland's rightful constitutional status has always aimed to sideline the massive grass-roots, community-based Yes Scotland campaign that they know they cannot defeat and deceive the people of Scotland into thinking that the independence movement is all about the SNP and, more particularly, all about Alex Salmond.

British nationalists think so little of the people of Scotland that they imagine we will be readily duped into swallowing their decidedly amateurish propaganda about the 300-year old struggle to restore the sovereignty of Scotland's people being nothing more than one man's personal project.

Unionists have such contempt for the people of Scotland that they suppose it will be easy to deceive us into seeing David Cameron as the heroic saviour of Scotland while the man we actually voted for as the political leader of our nation is somehow our enemy.

Note too the matching rhetoric from the Tory UK government and British Labour's puppets in Scotland, Johann Lamont, Anas Sarwar and the rest. They speak with one voice. And it is a voice shrill with fear and hatred. Hatred of the man who has done nothing worse for Scotland than deliver the independence referendum that the vast majority of us wanted. A man who has championed Scotland around the world and steadfastly defended the rights, institutions and public services that the people of Scotland cherish against the predations of successive UK governments.

No hate here!

If anybody still doubts that the anti-independence campaign is anti-Scottish then they need only read the article by Simon Heffer in today's Daily (Hate)Mail to have their illusions instantly dispelled. Riddled with lies, the entire piece clearly has no ambition to inform but seeks only to incite the kind of antipathy towards Scotland that is reflected in the comments. It is nothing more or less than blatant hate-mongering.

Those who aspire to be the respectable face of British nationalism - or, at least, the face less contorted by rabid fanaticism - will seek to distance themselves from this kind of hate-fuelled ranting. But what we see in Simon Heffer's bilious diatribe is but the shittiest end of a very shitty stick. Nobody who peruses the British press can be in any doubt that there is an ongoing and increasingly shrill campaign of shamelessly distorted and dishonest denigration that cannot reasonably be characterised as anything other than anti-Scottish propaganda.

Of flags and feelings

A political statement

As someone with a bit of a passion for live music, one of the highlights of my year is Perth's annual Southern Fried Festival - a superb celebration of American roots music over the course of what, for me, is now a lost weekend every July. I love it! But there was one incident this year which caused me some consternation.

The occasion was a show at Perth Concert Hall where Darrell Scott was opening for Patty Griffin. I arrived a bit late and, preoccupied with finding a seat and greeting friends, I paid no heed to the stage and so it wasn't until the lights came up that I noticed the large flag draped over the grand piano. More precisely, two flags, as it was a banner combining America's "Stars 'n' Stripes" and the British union flag.

To say that I was irked would be an understatement. In fact, I was quite taken aback by the strength of my reaction. I muttered something unprintable, but which is commonly abbreviated to "WTF".

I am not someone who is given to powerful emotional responses. I tend to be, if anything, overly analytical. So I was rather perplexed by what was, for me, an uncommonly visceral reaction. Throughout the first half of the show I was constantly distracted by this flag and a nagging annoyance that was all the more irritating for being as unfamiliar as it was inexplicable.