This is what a liar looks like
We’re grumpy this morning, readers, because it’s Sunday and we were planning a long lie and then someone told us about this. It’s the First Minister appearing on the Sophy Ridge show on Sky News at around 8.45am and you need to see it.
It was quite the performance.
Nothing we could say to you will be more revealing than just watching the entire clip for yourself. It’s such a piece of nervy, jittery evasion and deflection that sometimes it’s hard not to switch it off – indeed, the person who alerted us couldn’t make it to the end.
So we’ll restrict ourselves to noting a couple of key points, because otherwise almost every sentence of it could be dissected and we’d be here all day.
Sturgeon starts off by completely swerving Ridge’s question about when she knew of the investigation about Salmond, which we suspect is because she wants to avoid the embarrassment of having to repeat her pathetic excuse about having “forgotten” about her meeting with Geoff Aberdein on 29 March 2018.
She repeatedly – even when Ridge mentions Aberdein specifically – pretends to misunderstand that Ridge is talking about a separate matter in 2017, in which Aberdein had no involvement, when an allegation was made about events at Edinburgh Airport.
(Nothing ever came of that allegation, because it was so ludicrous and feeble that it didn’t even manage to get onto a charge sheet where Salmond was accused of crimes as heinous as “pinging” someone’s hair in a lift. It was also completely false.)
Quite interestingly, in an interview with Andrew Marr in October 2018, Sturgeon had categorically denied having ever heard ANYTHING about ANY allegations of a sexual nature against Salmond until the ones she heard about in “April” 2018.
Yet in her written evidence to the committee she says “I spoke to Mr Salmond about this [November 2017] allegation at the time”, which inescapably means that she was definitely lying to Marr when she denied any knowledge of it 11 months later.
Throughout the whole 10-minute section Sturgeon never does answer Ridge’s opening question, continually ducking it with the 2017 misdirection. Ridge is persistent but not quite on top of her brief, so she lets Sturgeon off the hook a couple of times, such as when Sturgeon remarkably denies ever having said she “forgot” about the meeting with Aberdein, even though she says so in her own written evidence to the committee.
RIDGE: You said that you forgot that you first found out from his chief-of-staff.
STURGEON: No, I didn’t say that.
Sturgeon also trots out her trusty squirrel of claiming that people are accusing her of both conspiring against and colluding with Salmond, although we can’t remember the last time anyone actually accused her of the latter. (The nervous giggle as she says it is almost as telling as the number of times she blinks throughout the interview.)
She repeatedly basically says Salmond’s guilty anyway, insisting that the whole thing is his fault for behaving badly even if what he did wasn’t technically criminal, and refers to the single such incident that Salmond admitted – an occasion when two mildly tipsy and fully clothed consenting adults slightly crossed a professional boundary, the more senior one apologised for allowing it to happen, the apology was accepted and they continued to work together.
Outrageously, she then attempts to claim that Salmond’s evident anger at Sturgeon ISN’T because she conspired to try to have him imprisoned for the rest of his life for crimes he didn’t commit, but because she refused to “collude” with him to stop any investigation ever happening – something that, once again, HER OWN submission to the committee shows as a plain and simple lie.
What Salmond actually did was attempt to solve the matter through arbitration and warn the Scottish Government that its inquiry was flawed, biased and illegal and would be expensively defeated in court – something which proved to be precisely the case when the Scottish Government backed down in a panic at the last moment rather than let its crooked machinations be publicly exposed in the courtroom.
(Indeed, on 8 January 2019 Sturgeon had told Parliament very firmly that after her meetings with Salmond on the subject she did not intervene, and did not feel under any pressure to do so, ie from him.)
Had Sturgeon listened then, she wouldn’t be digging herself into a bigger and bigger hole now. We watched Casino on telly a couple of nights ago and Joe Pesci’s grisly death scene was barely any grimmer than Sturgeon’s performance this morning.
It was the interview equivalent of being clubbed to a bloody mess with steel baseball bats and thrown bleeding but still alive into a shallow ditch. We fear Nicola Sturgeon’s eventual political end will not, unlike Nicky Santoro’s, benefit from the cameras turning away at the final moment to spare us the horror.
Slightly OT, but I’ve not finished with the Lord Advocate yet.
If your approach to the law is capable of supporting public health, you are able to support inclusive open democracy, as well as cultural and economic sustainability. Unfortunately, Scots are constitutionally denied access to due process in law, as a result of Westminster’s support of populist, majoritarian, (white) English nationalism, so Scots will never enjoy equality in law in Brexitania.
Subsequently, we will never enjoy the benefits of democracy in Brexitania. We won’t change this if we can’t force our law officers to stop supporting a legal order that is hostile towards international human rights law. If we can’t achieve this during the covid-19 crises, then there is no hope for Scotland as a nation.
This tweeter is putting together a comprehensive, public
list.
According to him another 18 new names have been added, and some people going for 3 seats.
Ludicrous process.
https://twitter.com/BlackIslePMD/status/1315679544788090880
Laukat @4.21pm.
I honestly hope that the seasoned SNP MSP’s that are planning to stand down next year, are waiting for Alex Salmond to throw his hat back into the Scottish political ring, either with a new party or on the back of one of the new indy parties.
I’m thinking that Salmond will wait until the last minute to announce it, to lessen the Britnat character assassination of him, and that whatever constituency he ends up representing we’ll get behind him, and pile the pressure on Sturgeon and Murrell, to either hold a indyref or go, its a win win situation for independence supporters, but only if Alex steps back into the fray.
https://www.thenational.scot/news/18786684.george-kerevan-will-alex-salmond-make-grand-return-holyrood-election/
@ Alabalh
Re Michael Sturrock, Crowdfunding for his election campaign when he had not actually passed vetting….
I think in criminal terms this is classed as Fraud.
Will he be ‘self referring’ himself to Police Scotland re this per chance?
Will he be offering refunds to whoever contributed?
Will it be getting entered onto his CV so the next time the incompetent dumpling attempts to get selected everyone will know what a divvy he is?
Will the SNP big yins, be clamping down on this type of behaviour and highlighting that it brings the party into disrepute…????
Hmmm, oh look a pig flying past the window.
In reply to Daisy Walker.
From what I can ascertain he plans to continue with his No to Yes website https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/michael-sturrock-for-edinburgh-southern/updates/135055#start
As you pointed out before it would be up to anyone who donated to challenge him, then it has to be assessed by, in this case Crowdfunder.
His blurb on the funder.
Please consider donating to my campaign to reach as many voters as possible in Edinburgh Southern. Funding will go towards the creation of my website & voter engagement platform, and sharing my story of becoming a Yes voter and to raise awareness of the many reasons why others should take the step from No to Yes.
I’m sincerely hoping that Wings hasn’t changed his mind about standing for Holyrood?
@RepublicofScotland
If AS stands I hope it is my constituency a bunch of YES men here just now but not in the way you would hope.
Puting my tin foil hat on for just one minute:
Nicola made strange comment about Alex Salmond and his show on Russia Today.
Is this the glue that has began to bind people at the heart of the SNP with some in the English establishment?
Did they agree to help Nicola set Alex up so that she would not have to worry about him returning as a hero and undermining her power, and for the establishments part, they could make sure that he did not continue the RT show, which they don’t like because they can’t control the content as they can with the MSM.
Whatever the reasoning, we are certainly beginning to see ever widening cracks appearing in the damn, and it won’t be long before it bursts.
The Alphabet women must know deep down inside that Nicola won’t hesitate to throw them under a bus if it means saving her own skin, so they must be feeling very uncomfortable right now.
Oh well, never mind!
NS’s latter deflection to the effect that “we all know what men are like” – pushing it onto alleged behaviour that was thrown out by two court cases in which Salmond was exonerated, and simultaneously the Scottish Government was found wanting, and those who alleged criminality were not believed by a jury, is pretty sad and pathetic.
The MeToo moment has backfired spectucularly.
But yes, I do know what men are like – and do understand and have observed alpha male behaviour – sometimes very close up.
But I also know what women are like.
I have seen the outrageously offensive PA/secretary who speaks down to and disparages men many pay grades above her own – later to find out that the source of her impunity is the fact of her sleeping with the boss – also the source of knowledge of private matters relating to the men she disparages.
I have seen the massively over-promoted women incapable of the elevated position they have appeared in (often unadvertised), only to find out that her elevation relied on sleeping with the man who made the appointment.
I have watched the women hover like flies around the honeypot of the alpha-males they seek to impress in the hope of preferment – men they would not otherwise spend a minute of their time with.
I have watched the same women drop these men when he was either deposed, or superseded by another who becomes the new object of their undivided attention.
I have spent a working lifetime watching women penetrate the glass ceiling from a supine position.
I have seen bad and venal behaviour by both men and women – it just tends to be different in form between the sexes (which incidentally are biologically immutable).
Sex has always been a currency of power – you can read it in the bible or Shakespeare or any number of trashy books and watch it in a multitude of films.
Women are no better than the men they allow to seduce them.
The idea that these puir wee lassies were victims of a big bad ogre is pretty pathetic really -and a crass failure to understand the unchanging nature of human relations.
In reply to Patrick Roden at 554pm.
I would say it’s sadly rather more banal. As someone who was closeish to things from 2014 this goes way back before even the referendum vote.
The talk of the steamie at Yes Scotland mid 2014,of course everyone wanted a Yes vote BUT the Sturrell camp were not as fussed as the Salmond camp.
Since she took over, well they fully took over, it’s all been about consolidating power.
You only have to compare the paucity of talent of the people she surrounds herself with, from Comms to Cabinet.
Alex Salmond surrounded himself with very smart people, he wasn’t afraid of challenge, he wasn’t a managerial level leader.
@Garavelli Princip
Whoa! Steady on. To win Independence we need the votes of both men and women. However it was a telling statement made by NS decades ago that all men had to do was wearing the right tie in the morning. A complete lack of empathy for men. Here is me thinking I gave my all for my wife, children and grandchildren over the course of my life. I have had the richer life and wouldn’t change it.I have had the more successful life because that is my measure of success. It’s not easy but rewarding nonetheless. I think I will wear my tartan tie tomorrow.
@ Albahal re Michael Sturrocks crowdfunder blurb
‘Funding will go towards the creation of my website & voter engagement platform’
Not such a dumpling in the way he worded it then. The intent to use it to crowdfund his campaign, but the wording is suitably wooly.
Do candidates have to fund their own campaigns / election fees now?
Because I would suggest this would be the biggest way of discriminating against groups already discriminated against (and suffering the financial hardships that go with it, as well as the dent to their confidence and career options).
I also thought it was the reason ‘short money’ from WM came into being, to stop it being an exclusive club for the already wealth, and a primary reason for raising money at local party level.
Now what is it, you can be a candidate for the party, but you have to pay for the seat yourself. Why bother being in a party in the first place then?
In reply to Daisy Walker at 6.15pm
On his fundraiser I still do think if anyone had the notion it would be worth a challenge, not convinced it is woolly enough.
But you know appears he is well in the with (the odious) Robertsons, Angus and Jen, they no doubt will be looking out for him. What a shower.
Re election fees, the deposit will still be paid by the party and there will be centralised leaflets etc paid by the party but once selected candidates will have to spend on any extra they want to, hence the rise in fundraisers.
But you know not sure how widely spread candidate fundraisers are across political parties, will have a look.
MI5 / spin doctor body language experts have clearly instructed her to look to her left when asked when she first became aware of the allegations. Conventional wisdom suggests looking to the left signals honesty.
re. speculative crow-funding and a general respect for the rule-of-law. If Scots law wasn’t in the custody of such a bunch of ignorant and bigoted Tories, Scots might be able to enjoy the benefits of democracy. Though we’d also need political leadership with the will and competence to protect Scotland’s democracy from expansionist English nationalism. 🙁
#ragging
http://ilj.law.indiana.edu/articles/61/61_3_Kevelson.pdf
I agree with Anonymous (@ 7:10 pm) as regards looking to the left. It seemed much too deliberate to me and Anonymous’ explanation makes sense.
At 4.12 -4.18 ‘This is not about my conduct, this is about Alex Salmond’s conduct’.
That’s what Nicola Sturgeon has to get her head round , isn’t it?
The inquiry IS about her and *her* government’s (she seems quite possessive about the government:-)) conduct. It doesn’t seem to have dawned on her yet that she’s got it very wrong.
Her denials are false and so are her eye-lashes which is why she’s blinking a lot.
She’s maybe not as sound as people think she is.
@Garavelli Princip 5:55PM
One of the best comments i’ve read. Grounded in the real world.
If Bunions were Onions
Would they make your eyes weep
If bunions were onions would they make you lose sleep
If bunions were onions? what do you think?
Shift and blink, blink, blink
Shift and blink.
What a disgraceful piece of character assassination by Sturgeon! She repeatedly refers to Salmond’s “behaviour” as if it was established fact despite independent witnesses testifying that most of the “incidents” never happened. (The other alleged incidents supposedly occurred in private) In the case of the alleged rape it was proven that the supposed victim wasn’t even present at Bute House when she claims it happened! In bringing in Not Guilty verdicts the jury demonstrated that they didn’t believe those complainants at all. In the case of the sole Not Proven verdict the jury probably felt that the complainant had been influenced by the others to magnify the “kiss and cuddle” into something more serious. After all, if she thought it was attempted rape why not say so at the time of her original complaint years earlier and why continue working with Alex? (BTW why is it the man is at fault for a consensual encounter while the woman is blameless?)
Sturgeon also trots out the “all men are bastards” line – men behave badly to women and it’s the woman who’s on trial supposedly. She’s a lawyer, doesn’t she know that not all complaints are valid and a Not Guilty verdict means you’re innocent of the charges? Also the “admissions of poor behaviour” were by Alex’s counsel not Alex himself, she should know that is a frequently used defence tactic – “my client is not a saint but not criminal either”. The defence counsel would have been negligent if he hadn’t made that argument. As a lawyer Sturgeon knows that. Besides the defence proved that all but one of the alleged behaviours did not happen. Sturgeon knows that as well.
If Salmond truly was the sexual predator Sturgeon insinuates he is then it is unbelievable that the first she knew of this was when contacted by Sky News. The behaviour of real offenders like Rolf Harris and Harvey Weinstein were well known among show business insiders. How could Alex have kept his alleged behaviour a secret from SNP insiders? Answer: he couldn’t. Two dozen police officers spent over a year on a fishing expedition trying to drum up more allegations against Alex and couldn’t come up with any other than the original flimsy allegations from the Alphabet Sisters. A comment from a reader on Craig’s blog said that she had worked in the VIP lounge at the airport and the politicians and businessmen with wandering hands were well known among the female staff who would warn each other who to beware of. Alex was a regular visitor and behaved as a perfect gentleman, she never heard any allegations against him unlike other VIPs.
One final thing: I see a lot of commenters here and on Craig’s blog alleging that the allegations and prosecution of Alex are a plot by MI5, the CIA, “the yoons”, Westminster, the Conservatives, take your pick. While the anti-independence people were quite happy to pile on once the allegations were public let’s be quite clear – the conspiracy was hatched at the top levels of the SNP in order to stop Alex from returning to the Party. Who would be threatened by Alex’s return? Obviously Sturgeon herself who would see him as a threat to her position, but also those women who don’t want to compete with him for preselection to a safe seat in the Scottish Parliament. We already know one of the complainants was miffed because as leader he declined to endorse her for a seat where there was a better-qualified local candidate ie someone who had done the hard work in the electorate rather than being parachuted in from Head Office.
@Stuart says 16 October, 2020 at 2:14 am
“A comment from a reader on Craig’s blog said that she had worked in the VIP lounge at the airport and the politicians and businessmen with wandering hands were well known among the female staff who would warn each other who to beware of. Alex was a regular visitor and behaved as a perfect gentleman, she never heard any allegations against him unlike other VIPs”
Oh Dear, you talk about “truth” then refer to the Blog of a conspiracy theorist who himself faces doing Bird because of his own deliberate attempts to thwart a Legal Case where well known protections had been put in place to protect the complainers which exists isn every trial of this sort. You seem to think none of these events ever happened , well there is never ever smoke without Fire and you can rant away your imagined injustices all you like. Is Sturgeon milking it it , yes of course she is but if you don’t understand how flawed she is as a thinker by now you never will. After all the fake “White Paper” of 2014 was 100% Her own design on which to Con Scotland with. https://www.sundaypost.com/news/scottish-news/sturgeon-almost-resigned-over-defence-of-convicted-fraudster/
@CameronB Brodie 12 October, 2020 at 7:15 pm
TLDR Are you still under the delusion people actually read your posts?
@holymacmoses 12 October, 2020 at 5:48 pm
“I’m sincerely hoping that Wings hasn’t changed his mind about standing for Holyrood?”
Pretty sure the Rev has made it very clear in a previous post only a few months back he has no intention of doing so as it would be incredibly boring and a waste of a large part of his life he would prefer to live in better more enjoyable other ways.
The amount of fiction on those shelves is very revealing.
Escapsim in full view, behind someone frantically trying to avoid the truth.