The Kintyre Forum

What is the key issue affecting the safety and security of the West Coast of Scotland?
Economic stability? It rises and falls all the time.
Nuclear weapons only fall once.

Here we go again.Baz with the yes campaign's equivalent of Dr Goebbels propaganda machine! I suppose you will be safe if the nuclear subs are moved to the Mersey?

There are those of us, Lochend, who believe that we will never be truly safe while nuclear weapons exist at all, on the Clyde, on the Mersey, or anywhere else. In fact, the most likely destination of our Trident fleet when it leaves Faslane will be a naval base on the eastern seaboard of the USA, and that's entirely appropriate, since we couldn't even use the things without the permission of the USA anyway.

For many of us, the issue is not safety but cost: why are we planning to spend billions on weapons of mass destruction when we could use that money to address the country's very real and very pressing socio-economic crisis? It is an obscenity to spend good money on bombs we'll never use when people are relying on food banks.

Let me finish, Lochend, by noting that yet again a 'nay-sayer' is choosing to smear Yes campaigners by comparing them to Nazis. As someone who has been very active in the Yes campaign - and who by no stretch of the imagination could ever be described as a Nazi - I find this deeply offensive. Unfortunately it is a tactic widely used by the No side of the debate, from Alastair Darling down. Regrettable, to say the least.

WC1,! I apologise if you thought I was comparing Baz (or yourself) to Dr Geobbels and feel it is rather rather disingenuos of you to suggest such.The way Baz carpet bombs this forum with his views,some of them very distorted and forceful, is indeed similar to a very concentrated propaganda machine! I note your comment on the use of smear tactics by the No campaign with interest! From the safety of distance I sense that that observation, coming from someone with decided Yes views compromises your position slightly.As for "The Bomb," I have many grandchildren and thought that with the fall if the iron curtain,the concept of mutually assured destruction might become unecesary and the bomb obsolete.Recent events and the proliferation of groups who seek to destroy our freedoms and way of life ,I am not so sure.As for moving the nuclear defence to the states,I am afraid that is pure conjecture.I have no wish to offend you because your posts are balanced and reasonable,I cannot say the same for the poster you defend!

lochend wrote:The way Baz carpet bombs this forum with his views,some of them very distorted and forceful

How so?
Forceful, I will take as a compliment, thank you.
Distorted? Please go to the relevent thread, and offer whatever example you can.

This topic is about the storage of 120 nuclear weapons on the Clyde.
Generations of Scots have protested this reality.
Now something can actualy be done about it.

Baz,I have no intention of pouring over your many diatribes on the subjects but two spring to mind.You suggest that the British parliament are going to re-introduce conscription, and by implication a yes vote for an independent Scotland would mean that could not happen north of the border. Is this not a scare story? This is an example of distortion.To be fair I cannot imagine a situation dire enough to require the drastic measure of conscription but If things became that desperate, would you expect the people of Scotland to put on their tin hats ,close their eyes and stick their fingers in their ears? Another piece that had me smiling was the video of a very rational and sage elder statesman castigating the governmen suggesting that they were not fighting the SNP but the whole nation.Alongside you showed a clip of an elderly slightly eccentric ex soldier who had lost brothers fighting for Britain,who expressed his love for the union.Was that not a rather distorted unbalanced post.I respect your views but they can occasionally verge on being patronising and possibly brainwashing!

Lochend, allow me to reciprocate. I have always considered YOUR contributions to this Forum reasoned and reasonable. Now that I've got the mutual admiration out of the way, I hope you'll allow me a reasoned and reasonable look at your recent contributions to this thread.

Whatever you intended by your first comment, it reads as if you are describing John Ainslie as the Yes campaign's equivalent of Dr Goebbels' propaganda machine, since it was a video of a speech by him that Baz posted. John Ainslie is a former army officer who describes himself as a Christian and a pacifist. He speaks for CND, not the Yes campaign per se, though his participation in the debate on behalf of that organisation serves to demonstrate that the Yes campaign is a broad church that includes but never exclusively comprised the SNP and its supporters. The clear implication of what you said is that anyone who says anything in favour of independence is a propagandist of Dr Goebbels' ilk. Coming on top of Alastair Darling's description of the SNP as "blood and soil nationalists" - a description the Nazis gave themselves - and you can not only see why people like me (and I have no doubt John Ainslie too) might take offense but also discern an emerging theme. That the No campaign has been using this smear as a campaign tactic (though they've backed off from it more recently) is an established and verifiable fact. Please don't insult me by suggesting that as a Yes campaigner I'm not capable of a rational and objective view of this.

In your most recent post you castigate Baz for promulgating a scare story. Well that won't do! We've had more than enough of those from the No campaign. We won't be able to use the pound if we vote Yes. We will. We won't get into the EU. We will, in fact, we'll never be out! We won't have secure pensions. The UK pensions minister confirmed to a parliamentary committee that we will. We won't get organs for transplant or be able to access specialist hospital treatment. The body that oversees organ donation confirms that, yes, we will. Not for nothing are they known as Project Fear! But I've gone off topic. Perhaps, in addressing these topics, we could all avoid ad hominem debating. In other words, to use a footballing analogy, play the ball, not the man.

Firstly let me explain a possible misunderstanding.I did not intend to suggest that Mr Ainslie was running a Geobbels type propaganda campaign,my criticisms were confined to Baz ! Mr Ainslie is obviously a man of much erudition and conscience.My disquiert is the selective use of videos and indeed scare tactics promulgated by this poster.eg,the call up scare which he,you and I know is extremely unlikely and would lead to the Tories becoming less electable that the Lib dems! Concerning the Pound,I am intrigued to know how you can be so certain that this issue will be so simple.We would all wish to live in a world where nuclear weapons didn't exist,but they do.If apart from purely ideological reasons, the fear is that the west of Scotland would be the area to receive attention in the event of a nuclear "event" I am not convinced the west of Scotland would fair too well if the warheads were positioned elsewhere in the Uk! I have to admit that living away from the 'arena' I am not subjected to the cut and thrust of the argument and thus must miss much of what you see and hear,I just feel that Baz has a tendency to brainwash however well meaning.

Lochend, I'll leave Baz to speak for himself. On the pound, the reason I can state with absolute certainty that Scotland can and will go on using the pound for as long as it chooses after independence is that the pound is a fully tradable currency and therefore no-one can stop us. Fact! Saying that we can't is a lie (designed to scare us of course).

lochend wrote:WC1,! I apologise if you thought I was comparing Baz (or yourself) to Dr Geobbels and feel it is rather rather disingenuos of you to suggest such.

lochend wrote:I did not intend to suggest that Mr Ainslie was running a Geobbels type propaganda campaign,my criticisms were confined to Baz !

Hmm You seem somewhat conflicted.

lochend wrote:You suggest that the British parliament are going to re-introduce conscription, and by implication a yes vote for an independent Scotland would mean that could not happen north of the border. Is this not a scare story? This is an example of distortion.

It was not a suggestion.
The Bill to introduce National Service is a fact, and was applicable to England & Wales only.
That the Bills progress has stalled, not rejected, raises a variety of issues.
Most of them are scary, but I am not the author of that story.

lochend wrote:I cannot imagine a situation dire enough to require the drastic measure of conscription but If things became that desperate, would you expect the people of Scotland to put on their tin hats ,close their eyes and stick their fingers in their ears?

Conscription and enlistment are distinctly different.
National Service is not dependent upon a dire circumstance, just the will of Westminster.


You consider logic & reason, with a touch of humour, to be "brainwashing"?
Perhaps you have been stuck in their "spin" cycle for too long.

Godwin's Law being demonstrated in the first response could be a new world record

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law

WC1 wrote:Lochend, I'll leave Baz to speak for himself. On the pound, the reason I can state with absolute certainty that Scotland can and will go on using the pound for as long as it chooses after independence is that the pound is a fully tradable currency and therefore no-one can stop us. Fact! Saying that we can't is a lie (designed to scare us of course).

You will need to pardon my ignorance in this, but does that mean Scotland could use the pound in the same way it could use the dollar or the euro, are they not fully tradeable?
If this is the case we would have no control on interest rates etc.
I do not know if this is the case, this is a genuine question from someone who is now very confused.

Sheik Yir Erse wrote:Godwin's Law being demonstrated in the first response could be a new world record

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law

Sheik, I fully understand why you put that, but to put it in context, there is another thread on here in a more appropriate place that has 11 pages and imho Lochend's ongoing frustration has spilled over to this one because of the continuous non sequitur fallacies of epic proportions there. There were many good posts on the other one - particularly those from Shona and Hume which enlightened me - and Lochend, like myself, did not get the answers we were seeking. I find the ad hominem accusations laughable because they have come from all sides and on this forum, like many others, there has always been this kind of debating.

Baz,I am anything but conflicted.I likened your Propaganda machine to that of Dr Goebbels,I did not suggest you personally were like Dr Goebbels,I have met neither you or him! As for the scare stories,wasn't raising the conscription issue a classic case of the same? If you think the English electorate would stand for that you are naive in the extreme.I repeat again,I am not subjected to all the cut,thrust and nuance of the campaign up there but for the yes campaign to try to suggest that lies,scare tactics and indeed ugly bullying are used exclusively by the Better Together campaign, I do not buy it! I think to suggest your posts contain only logic,reason and humour has me baffled, oh I've got,that's the humour.

Lochend, I understood your argument totally and so did Baz and others. Gizmo, if we have waited this long for answers on the currency question we are never going to get them!"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!