Drumlanrig

Published on 19/08/2012 00:00

THE lighter side of politics throughout the last week...

Who’s pushing a puerile political agenda again?

A GOLD medal for self-unawareness goes to the esteemed newspaper the Scots Independent. An editorial this week, reflecting on the Olympics, begins by slamming those dastardly Unionists for claiming the games had helped the Britisher cause. It demeaned the athletes, thundered the ScIndy, that people sought to “push a puerile political agenda” in this way.

The column then proceeded to consider claims by the London games organisers who had suggested it was “the best ever”. Why was this? The ScIndy pronounced: “Well, you may have noticed the UK’s diminishing influence in the world lately. The worry for our London leaders is that they have noticed that you, me and many others have indeed noticed. What better way to bolster a flagging global reputation than staging ‘the best ever’ Olympics?” This isn’t a puerile political point, in case you may be wondering.

‘Yes’ camp’s case from a parallel universe

THE debate also last week saw a novel contribution from Blair Jenkins, chief executive of the YesScotland campaign, who has decided to enter a parallel universe to make his case for independence. If Scotland hadn’t joined the Union 300 years ago, and had remained independent, why would it do so now? Jenkins is convinced that we wouldn’t – especially with all that lovely oil we’d have all to ourselves. It’s an interesting new twist for the well-funded, well-organised Yes camp to take. With the referendum in 2014, Jenkins now has two years to solve the mysteries of time travel, and everything looks sorted.

Reality soundbites for the Scottish Tories
WHO says the Scottish Tories lack glamour? Those avid voyeurs who follow Channel Five’s Big Brother reality show may have heard the runner-up Sara Mclean tell housemates that she is a Tory girl at heart. The Tories should waste no time in signing up Miss Mclean, a former Miss Scotland contestant, as a candidate.

Robison all a Twitter over young people

THE perils of tweeting politicians attempting to capture the yoof vote was illustrated perfectly by the sports minister Shona Robison recently.

Robison was at the Olympics closing ceremony twittering away furiously to give her followers her take on the spectacular event. One tweet hailing the English rock band Muse as “one of Scotland’s big music successes” caused fluttering in the twittersphere.

Almost immediately, Robison was forced to retract her comment, saying: “My apologies to Devon for trying to claim Muse, never listen to younger people sitting next to you.”