[patriots] FW: ‘Dark Omens' And ‘Horror Shows': Scottish Independence, Power And Propaganda
- From: annette rose smith <annette-rose-smith@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "patriots@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <patriots@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 15 Sep 2014 15:26:42 +0100
To: annette-rose-smith@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: ‘Dark Omens' And ‘Horror Shows': Scottish Independence, Power And
Propaganda
Date: Mon, 15 Sep 2014 16:22:00 +0200
From: webmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
‘Dark Omens’ And ‘Horror Shows’: Scottish Independence, Power And Propaganda
......
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15 September 2014
‘Dark Omens’ And ‘Horror Shows’: Scottish Independence, Power And
PropagandaEstablished power hates uncertainty, especially any threat to its
grip on the political, economic and financial levers that
control society. And so it is with elite fears that the United Kingdom, formed
by the 1707 Acts of Union, could be on the verge of unravelling.
No informed commentator doubts that elite interests will do all they can to
maintain hegemony in an independent Scotland, should
that historic shift occur following the referendum of September 18. But if it
does happen, there will likely be significant consequences for the
Trident nuclear missile system, the future of the NHS and the welfare state,
education, climate policy, energy generation and other industry sectors,
the media and many additional issues; not just in Scotland, but beyond,
including Nato and the European Union. There is clearly a lot at stake and
established power is concerned.
Just over a week ago, to the consternation of Westminster elites and their
cheerleaders in media circles, a YouGov opinion poll showed that the 'Yes' vote
(51%) had edged ahead of 'No' (49%) for the first time in the campaign, having
at one point trailed
by 22%. The Observer noted 'signs of panic and recrimination among unionist
ranks', adding that 'the no campaign is
desperately searching for ways to seize back the initiative'. The panic was
marked by 'intensive cross-party talks' and underpinned George Osborne's
announcement on the BBC Andrew Marr show on September 7 that 'a plan of action
to give more powers to Scotland' in the
event of a No vote would be detailed in the coming days.
Confusion reigned in the Unionist camp, and in media reporting of their
befuddlement. According to the rules governing the
referendum, the UK and Scottish governments are forbidden from publishing
anything which might affect the outcome during the so-called 'purdah period'
of 28 days leading up to September 18. So, how to reconcile the opportunistic
'promise' during purdah to grant Scotland new powers following a 'No'
vote? BBC News dutifully reported the government sleight-of-hand that:
'the offer would come from the pro-Union parties, not the government itself.'
Voters, then, were supposed to swallow the fiction that the announcement came,
not from the UK government represented by
Chancellor George Osborne, but from the pro-Union parties represented by senior
Tory minister George Osborne!
However, Alastair Darling, leader of the pro-Union 'Better Together' campaign,
told Sky News that all new powers for Scotland had already been placed on the
table before the purdah period. What had been announced was
'merely... a timetable for when the Scottish Parliament could expect to be
given the limited powers already forthcoming.'
Thus, an announcement setting out a timetable for enhanced powers was
completely above board and not at all designed to influence
the very close vote on independence. This was establishment sophistry and a
deeply cynical manipulation of the voters.
Media manipulation was exposed in stark form when Nick Robinson, the BBC's
political editor, was rumbled by viewers able to compare his highly selective
editing of an Alex Salmond press conference last Thursday with what had
actually transpired. Robinson had
asked Salmond a two-part question about supposedly solid claims made by company
bosses and bankers - 'men who are responsible for billions of
pounds of profits' - that independence would damage the Scottish economy. Not
only did the full version of the encounter demonstrate that Salmond responded
comprehensively, but he turned the tables on Robinson by calling into
question the BBC's role as an 'impartial' public broadcaster. The self-serving
report that was broadcast that night by Robinson on BBC News at Ten did not
reflect the encounter which the political editor
summed up misleadingly as:
'He didn't answer, but he did attack the reporting.'
The distorted BBC News reporting was picked up on social media and no doubt
encapsulated what many viewers and listeners, particularly in Scotland, have
been observing for months, if not years. One reader wrote an excellent email to
us in which he said:
'Honestly, this is just ONE example of pathetic bias which more and more Scots
are seeing through. I've long been a follower of
your site, and I make a point of reading each and every alert. This is the
first time I've taken to contacting you, and as I said, I imagine lots of
others will be doing just that on the same subject.
'I've seen so much media bias with BBC Scotland since the turn of the year, but
it's now getting to laughable proportions. And now
that we have the entire London press-mafia crawling all over it too, it's daily
headline news - all doom and gloom about how Scotland will fail,
Scotland will be bankrupt, there's no more oil left, jobs will go, etc etc.
It's been diabolical.'
The BBC's dismissive response to the public complaints about Robinson's skewed
report concluded with the usual worn-out boilerplate text:
'the overall report [was] balanced and impartial, in line with our editorial
guidelines.'
It is not only the bias in BBC News reporting that has alienated so many
people, but the way the public broadcaster fails to adequately address public
complaints - on any number of issues.
Scaremongering-A-Go-Go
On the day following the YouGov poll result (September 8), frantic headlines
were splashed all over the corporate media:
'Ten days to save the Union' (Daily Telegraph)
'Parties unite in last-ditch effort to save the Union' (The
Times)
'Ten days to save the United Kingdom' (Independent)
'Scotland heads for the exit' (i, a tabloid version of the
Independent)
'Last stand to keep the union' (Guardian)
'Queen's fear of the break up of Britain (Daily Mail)
'Don't let me be last Queen of Scotland' (Daily Mirror)
And, of course, the laughably over-the-top Sun:
'Scots vote chaos. Jocky horror show'
Corporate journalists pressed on with their scaremongering over Scottish
independence. In the Telegraph, business news
editor Andrew Critchlow intoned ominously:
'Scottish homeowners face mortgage meltdown if Yes campaign wins.'
The same newspaper published a piece by Boris Johnson arguing:
'Decapitate Britain, and we kill off the greatest political union ever. The
Scots are on the verge of an act of self-mutilation
that will trash our global identity.'
A Times editorial twitched nervously:
'The British political class is in a fight for which it seemed unprepared. It
needs to find its voice'. ('Signifying Much',
September 8, 2014; access by paid subscription only)
Larry Elliott, the Guardian's economics editor warned that an independent
Scotland 'would not be a land flowing with milk and honey'. Jonathan Freedland,
the Guardian's executive editor who oversees the paper's opinion section and
editorials, bemoaned that:
'If Britain loses Scotland it will feel like an amputation...the prospect fills
me with sadness for the country that would be left
behind.'
Freedland quoted with obvious approval an unnamed 'big hitter' in the 'No'
campaign who claimed:
'none of this would be happening if there were a Labour government in
Westminster.'
This is the classic liberal-left fairytale that things would be different if
only Labour were in power: a delusion that all too
many voters in Scotland, as elsewhere, have seen through ever since it was
obvious that Blairism was a continuation of Thatcherism.
Freedland sighed:
'When I contemplate the prospect of waking up on 19 September to discover the
union has been defeated, I can't help but feel a
deep sadness.'
Given Freedland's role as a Guardian mover and shaker, with a big input to its
editorial stance, it was no surprise when
a Guardian leader followed soon after, firmly positioning the flagship of
liberal journalism in the 'No' camp. The
paper pleaded: 'Britain deserves another chance'. But the pathetic appeal for
the Union was propped up by a sly conflation of independence with 'ugly
nationalism', notwithstanding a token airy nod towards 'socialists, greens and
other groups'. The paper's nastiness continued with the unsubstantiated
assertion that 'a coded anti-English prejudice can lurk near the surface of
Alex Salmond's pitch'.
Ironically, one of the Guardian's own columnists, Suzanne Moore, had a piece
published two days earlier that inadvertently preempted the nonsense now being
spouted by her paper's own editors:
'The language of the no camp – Westminster, bankers, Farage, Prescott, the
Orangemen and Henry Kissinger – is innately
patronising.'
To which we can now add the Guardian.
She continued:
'Do not give in to petty nationalism, they say. Just stick with the bigger
unionist nationalism; it's better for you.'
In the Observer, sister paper of the Guardian, Will Hutton was virtually
inconsolable:
'Without imaginative and creative statecraft, the polls now suggest Scotland
could secede from a 300-year union, sundering genuine
bonds of love, splitting families and wrenching all the interconnectedness
forged from our shared history.'
He ramped up the rhetoric still further:
'Absurdly, there will be two countries on the same small island that have so
much in common. If Britain can't find a way of
sticking together, it is the death of the liberal enlightenment before the
atavistic forces of nationalism and ethnicity – a dark omen for the
21st century. Britain will cease as an idea. We will all be diminished.'
Writing for the pro-independence Bella Caledonia website, Mike Small responded
to Hutton's apocalyptic warnings:
'Unfortunately he has misunderstood the basic tenor of the British State, that
is to cling to power, to centralise it, and to
shroud it in obscurity.'
Small added that Hutton's caricature of the 'Yes' camp as 'the atavistic forces
of nationalism and ethnicity' is 'such an absurd
metropolitan misreading of what's going on as to be laughable.'
Small's crucial point is one we should remember when listening to senior
politicans; that their first priority is always to cling
to power. Craig Murray was scathing about the leaders of the main Westminster
political parties, and their last-ditch desperate
trip to Scotland last Wednesday to 'save the Union':
'Cameron, Miliband and Clegg. Just typing the names is depressing. As part of
their long matured and carefully prepared campaign
plan (founded 9 September 2014) they are coming together to Scotland tomorrow
to campaign. In a brilliant twist, they will all come on the same day
but not appear together. This will prevent the public from noticing that they
all represent precisely the same interests.'
Murray nailed what is at stake when he said that the 'three amigos' 'offer no
actual policy choice to voters', and he gave a list
showing how tightly they march together:
'They all support austerity budgets
They all support benefit cuts
They all support tuition fees
They all support
Trident missiles
They all support continued NHS privatisation
They all support bank bail-outs
They all support detention without trial
for "terrorist suspects"
They all support more bombings in Iraq
They all oppose rail nationalisation'
In short:
'The areas on which the three amigos differ are infinitesimal and contrived.
They actually represent the same paymasters and
vested interests.'
These 'paymasters and vested interests' are surely trembling with fear at the
power now residing in the hands of voters in
Scotland. As George Monbiot observes:
'A yes vote in Scotland would unleash the most dangerous thing of all - hope.'
He expands:
'If Scotland becomes independent, it will be despite the efforts of almost the
entire UK establishment. It will be because social
media has defeated the corporate media. It will be a victory for citizens over
the Westminster machine, for shoes over helicopters. It will show that
a sufficiently inspiring idea can cut through bribes and blackmail, through
threats and fear-mongering. That hope, marginalised at first, can spread
across a nation, defying all attempts to suppress it.'
Whatever happens on Thursday, skewed media performance on Scottish independence
- in particular, from the BBC - has helped huge
numbers of people see ever more clearly the deep bias in corporate news media.
SUGGESTED ACTION
The goal of Media Lens is to promote rationality, compassion and respect for
others. If you do write to journalists, we strongly
urge you to maintain a polite, non-aggressive and non-abusive tone.
Useful resources include:
BBC Scotlandshire
Bella Caledonia
Derek Bateman blog
Lesley Riddoch's website
Newsnet Scotland
Wings over Scotland
DC
This Alert is Archived here:
‘Dark Omens’ And ‘Horror Shows’: Scottish Independence, Power And
Propaganda
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